I have no philosophical objection to being the catcher and letting somebody else show off. “And the third solution?”
“Ah.” It was Narantir’s turn to smile. “The third possibility: our bodies are neither here nor not-here, because all is illusion.”
“And what would happen?”
“The universe would then end, of course.” Narantir drained his mug, and refilled it, slopping half more at than in the bowl in the largest owl’s cage. He was weaving, barely able to stand.
Tebol had cleared a space on his largest workbench, spread a black felt cloth on it, and assembled a collection of devices. Some were familiar, like the knife, bell, watron, pen, and brush. Others were completely strange, like a tangle of wires wrapped around and running through something that looked like a shriveled cucumber. There were pots of various foul-smelling paints and pastes, and a wet bone ball.
“Feathers,” he said. “We each need a feather.” Weaving, he approached the cages. When he snaked out a hand to pull a feather from the tail of the first bird, the fast-moving beak barely missed; the second and third birds didn’t even come close. Maybe he wasn’t as drunk as he seemed, or maybe he wasn’t as drunk as the birds.
‘This ought to do it,“ said Narantir as he slipped a fifth bar over the door, then tied his belt even more tightly about his waist before slipping out of the top of his robes.
Half-naked, he was even uglier than clothed. His huge, hairless chest and belly were covered with scars and lesions, one whole series of parallel scars running up his left forearm.
Tebol had stripped to nothing but a lotai, wrapped tightly about waist, buttocks, and loins. His chest and upper body, too, were covered with scores of scars and cuts, again with a whole series of parallel scars on the left forearm. All were minor injuries, certainly, but it looked like somebody had regularly spent time whittling away at the wizards.
He caught my expression and smiled broadly. “Amazing how often a bit of fresh wizard’s blood is needed in a spell, eh?” he said, picking up a sharp knife. Suddenly, without warning, he sliced at his forearm with a practiced stroke that left a red cut in parallel with the old scars.
A thin stream of blood ran down Tebol’s bent arm; by the time it began to drip from his elbow, he had a crystal chalice underneath to catch the flow. The cup filled quickly, almost brimming until Tebol muttered a quiet syllable as he touched a wand first to a pot of some horrid white mess, then to the wound, instantly staunching the flow.
“I take it you have done this before,” I said.
Narantir smiled. “The dan’shir not only sees, but he observes,” he said, while Tebol took up a brush and began to paint complex runes on his chest and belly, dipping the brush first into one horrid-smelling pot, then another. His movements were swift and sure.
At Narantir’s gesture, I removed my tunic. Tebol’s paints were cold and awful against my skin. He went to the window and unlocked the cages, although not opening them, ignoring the drunken hooting of the owls.
Tebol sat down in a corner of the room, while Narantir stretched his bulk out on the floor.
Tebol muttered a few syllables and the paints flashed into cold flame in front of my eyes, momentarily blinding me.
First was the pain. All was red agony, as my arms jammed themselves back hard behind my back and my body leaned forward at the waist in a way that should have sent me off-balance, but somehow didn’t. My fingers had grown immense, but indistinct; if they hadn’t hurt, I would have said they felt almost numb, as though I was wearing deep feathery gloves.
The universe had grown around me; the bars of my cage now arced far above my head. I turned my head almost all the way around, looking first at the cage on my breeze-ward side, and then at the one on my lee side. I guess I could have looked back by the door, where the three bodies either lay or didn’t, but I either didn’t think of it or couldn’t.
It hurt, but the hurt began to fade, then was washed away in a hunger. The only thing I could think about was how hungry I was, and how bright and clear the night was outside.
It is, isn’t it?
I know I didn’t hear it as words, not exactly, but that’s the only way I can remember it.
Yes.
I had always thought of darkness as a single black color, but here that wasn’t true; it was broken into scores of shades from black to white, from the dark satiny blackness of the sky between the stars, to the rich, deep gray of the fields to windward, or the glossy, oily gray of the fishponds in the gardens. The night was broken by hot white flares, so bright they should have hurt my eyes, but didn’t.
I took wing, working my shoulder muscles hard, climbing in a tight circle into the night sky, high above the walls of the castle.
Wait, didn’t quite sound behind me. This is new to you; you might make a mistake.
I didn’t wait. The night was calling. I stretched out into a shallow glide, wheeling across the sky while the two others climbed up toward me.
There were stupid humans below on the grass, chasing the prey away, involving themselves in their overly complicated lives instead of properly searching for prey or resting to digest. Eaters of carrion, taking bits of dead, burned flesh from servitors, a mocking parody of the way a mother would feed her chicks.
Hmmm. Still, off in the darkness, thinking himself hidden in the shadows at the edge of the lighted portion of the garden, a fat mouse waited, eyeing some crumbs dropped on the moss a quick dash away. If I came up behind him, it wouldn’t matter whether he did or didn’t make a dash for the food; I’d be on the same path as he was and, skimming over the ground, could snatch him up before he would get a squeak out.
The approach was the tricky part; I swooped over the walls to the west and set myself into a steep glide, picking up speed as I stooped. There wasn’t a straight path to the mouse, not exactly; I would have to duck under low branches, rise high enough to clear the hedge, then put myself into a final approach, snatch him either out of his hiding place or on the run, then climb quickly enough to clear the serving table beyond.
I dove, wind rushing past me in a loud but constant whisper that my feathers muffled. The mouse was but a tiny spot below me, something far too small for human eyes to notice or human mind to care about, but I could see his beady little eyes and watch the nervous twitch of his whiskered snout.
I pulled myself down, under the branches, then cupped my wings to gain barely enough altitude to clear the hedge. No need to flap more; I was going fastfastfast, talons outstretched to grab and hold, only needing feather touches to—
The taroo of another owl was almost in my ear; I pulled up, hard, climbing into the night, while a stick of some sort whooshed under me, just barely missing my feet as I wheeled high into the sky.
Below my feet, the warrior looked up in irritation at having missed what should have been an easy kill, while another was busy fastening string to bow. It only occurred to me later that the thing that saved me was the fact that there were so many out-domain lords around, making it both polite and politic to get permission before nocking an arrow.
Both of the other owls were at my side, one of them plumper than the other.
Go a-hunting where it’s safe, the thin one said, if you have to go hunting at all.
Birds don’t smile, or the fat owl would have smiled. I’ll show you where to find a nice, fat mouse, out in the fields, where it’s safe to hunt.
He did.
Look: I am not at all certain that the wizards were telling me the truth about the indeterminacy; wizards have been known to lie. Wizards have been known to create illusions, as well, and illusions are hard to see through when you’re drunk. On the other hand, they’re not Helpful Owen of tale and legend who knows all, answers freely, but always lies; that would be too easy.
On yet another hand, something happened during the night. I don’t know what, not for sure. The only thing I do know is that I woke up with a horrible headache, and a horribly queasy stomach, and half a dead mouse on the
floor near my mouth.
I didn’t throw up. I didn’t want to see what I would throw up.
Narantir’s thick face was too near mine. “Wake up, Kami Dan’Shir,” he said. “Lord Arefai invites you to join him for the morning hunt with his bride’s father.”
He splashed some water in my face.
Great. Now I was scared, hung over, more than vaguely nauseated, and wet.
Chapter 8
Vikay, a hunt, an attempted deception, and other reasons to kill.
Everybody has a function in life. Even our beloved ruling class.
Peasants raise wheat, rice, cotton, pigs, and milking cows; members of our beloved ruling class eat bread and steamed rice, wear clothes of cotton and leather, and drink milk. Ranchers raise beef cows and horses; members of our beloved ruling class eat beef and ride horses. Cobblers make shoes; members of our beloved ruling class wear shoes. Acrobats and musicians create beauty with sight and sound; members of our beloved ruling class sit on their tender buttocks and watch. All of the lower classes raise sons and daughters; members of our beloved ruling class have them clean their stables or tend to their rooms and persons.
I just don’t know what the rest of us would do without our beloved ruling class to consume what we produce. I do know, though, that I wouldn’t mind finding out, or at least I wouldn’t mind not finding out later than just after sunrise.
With a hangover.
The dew hadn’t left the grasses, and the birds had already started their mindless chirping about how pretty the day was, as though anybody cares what a bird’s opinion is.
The sun was too bright, and standing as we were outside of the east gate, there was no shade; no trees are allowed to grow near the outside walls of D’Shaian castles. A stiff, damp breeze blew from sunwise, hard enough to whip dust into my eyes. Damp, sticky dust. The wind also brought the stink of the dozen or so horses that waited with their handlers a short way down the road. I guess that a few horses voiding themselves would have interfered with the ceremony.
I hate the hour of the cock. If I had my way, I’d go to bed just before the departure of the lion, and rise with the coming of the horse.
“Good day, Kami Dan’Shir,” Arefai said, as he knelt over his gear.
“Good day, Lord.”
He was stylish even at this offensive hour, dressed in the finest of deer-hunting gear. The pleats of his tunic were sharp enough to shave with, and the leather thigh pads of his trousers were polished to a sheen bright enough to shave in. The corners of his beard had been freshly trimmed, and his hair was still damp from a morning bath. As he checked over his quiver of arrows, eyeing the fletching here, checking the sharpness of a broadhead there, he looked so fresh and bright and clean that it made me want to retch.
I suppressed it; I’m not completely sure that Lord Arefai would have considered my voiding my stomach all over him to be an entirely friendly act. From the way Lord Minch was looking at me, I am sure he would have wanted to find out; I had the feeling he was almost as unfond of Arefai as he was of me.
“Good morning, Kami Dan’Shir,” Toshtai said.
“And to you, Lord Toshtai.” Toshtai’s huge tunic was cut unstylishly full, and he was wearing leather trousers instead of the more fashionable leather-inlaid ones. I guess he already had to kill so many cows for one pair of trousers that he didn’t want to empty Den Oroshtai’s barns for a new set of hunting chaps.
If he had had an expression, I would have guessed he was frowning at the thought of having to be up and around, a real sword and hunting knife belted about his waist, with nothing but an intricately carved spear to lean on—if you didn’t count old Dun Lidjun, and Toshtai only leaned on Dun Lidjun metaphorically.
But he didn’t have an expression on his face, so I didn’t guess.
Dun Lidjun looked fresh and vigorous in his hunting tunic and trousers of heavy blued cotton, inlaid with leather patches of chest, elbows, knees, thighs, and seat. A note of discord: his limp gray hair was tied back with a red ribbon, the sort of thing that could have been a lady’s token.
He stood near Toshtai, leaning on his longbow, although I had the definite sensation that if the bow were to disappear, Dun Lidjun wouldn’t stagger for a moment. His narrow, gray eyes rested on mine for a moment, then moved on, a death sentence passing me by.
Edelfaule, as usual, looked like an underinflated version of his father, from the rawn-yellow tunic to the old-fashioned hunting trousers, even to the way he leaned on his spear.
He snapped his fingers at the nearest of the servitors. “Weren’t you listening to my father a few moments ago? He said that Kami Dan’Shir was to hunt with us today.”
I soon had a totally useless bow in my hands and a quiver strapped around my waist, as well. Everybody else was checking out his gear, so I pulled out an arrow, trying to look like I knew what I was looking for.
Demick, perhaps even more stylish than Arefai—his clothes were hemmed with silver thread, which seemed to be all the fashion along the coast—was watching me closely.
Arefai raised his eyebrows, then nodded. “I see you’ve seen what we’ve done.”
Other than the usual? Other than putting me in a situation where I don’t belong, with members of our beloved ruling class looking at me as though they’re deciding when instead of what?
I spread my hands. “I am not fresh, wet and bloody, from the womb, Lord,” I said, bluffing.
Orazhi was watching me impassively, and Demick with a flat stare.
Demick caught my eye. “I wonder if you would tell us…” he started.
Oh, no. I didn’t expect him to try me out. There would have to be a way of declining gracefully, but how was I to be expected to think of it with a dozen of them looking down at me?
“Impressive,” Toshtai said, interrupting. “I would not have thought you would see such small markings with such a quick glance.” He turned to Demick. “My apologies, Lord; you were saying?”
Small markings, he had said. There it was. A burn mark near the notch on the shaft: three tiny circles set in a small triangle. I forced my eyes away.
“I was saying, Lord,” Demick said, clearly keeping his voice impassive and emotionless with some effort, “that I, too, am impressed.” His look at me was not friendly.
“I am touched, Lord,” I said, with a quick bow. “The three balls symbolize my former profession, of course,” I said, taking three arrowheads from the pouch and putting them into an impromptu juggle before putting them away.
Toshtai actually smiled then; the corners of his mouth moved visibly up.
It had all gone on over Arefai’s head, but Edelfaule gave out what looked like a quick smile. Which only stood to reason. If Demick had exposed my bluff, it would have reflected badly on Toshtai, and Edelfaule was certainly going to be more protective of the interests of Toshtai and Den Oroshtai than of Demick and Patrice.
“Juggling,” Lord Minch said. “Isn’t juggling part of acrobatacy, and is that not a peasant thing?”
I smiled in agreement. “It surely is, Lord Minch. Acrobats are peasants, and they do juggle to entertain their betters. Dan’shirs also juggle, to help themselves concentrate.” As the Historical Master Dan’Shir and to date the only dan’shir, I figured I was safe from authoritative refutation.
“Hmm. One wouldn’t think that a practice would be shared between classes,” Minch said.
“No, Lord, one wouldn’t. Unless one noticed that, say, peasants walk, a practice they share with the middle class, the bourgeoisie, and the nobility.”
That hadn’t gone beyond Arefai; his smile was overly broad. “By Spennymore’s tepid testicles, Kami Dan’Shir is right. I have seen lords walk, many a time, and never thought to think them lowering themselves thereby.”
Minch didn’t quite glare.
We waited in front of the main gate of the keep, a hypocritical hunting party: Arefai, Toshtai, Edelfaule, Minch, Demick, Orazhi, Esterling, and ten or so other lords I didn’t know by name,
accompanied by ten times that many servants, if you include me, which you ought to.
Or, perhaps, you ought to include me in the hunting party: I had a bow, too.
Yes, we all were armed with bows and arrows, and soon we would ride out in search of prey, but first there was a drama to be enacted.
Off in the distance, within the castle grounds, far beyond where the huge doors of the main gate stood open, a party emerged from the south door of the donjon. The women were all in white robes decorated with black, green, red, and pale yellow, symbolizing birth, growth, blood and beginnings, although no two of the robes were quite the same; some were cut low, some high, some were decorated with embroideries of animals, others with abstract designs.
It all made me quite queasy as they made their way toward us.
But then the group parted, and there she was, in a simple robe of pale yellow belted at the waist, the color either symbolizing a beginning or making a tribute to Lord Toshtai, who often wore the same shade.
ViKay was tall and graceful, her body slim but not boyish. Her face was delicate without seeming fragile, her lips fall and rich and parted in an easy smile. A thin gold chain encircled her neck, securing a small bone placque just below the hollow of her throat. Her long black hair, shiny in the bright sunlight, was twisted into a complicated knot at the back of her neck, secured with three long bone needles.
On the night of their wedding, I would envy Arefai as he removed those needles, then worked at the knot at her waist.
“My lords,” she said, her voice lower and warmer than I had expected. “I come to wish you a good morning.” She turned and met the eyes, one by one, including mine. I can’t say for sure, but it felt like the corners of her mouth barely turned upward when her eyes rested on mine.
They were deep eyes, warm and brown. All bowed toward her. I didn’t mind bowing toward those eyes.
“Daughter,” Orazhi said affectionately, although formally, “I have invited these lords to accompany me on the hunt, to test their worth, to prove their merit. It is my hope that you will look with favor on the victor of the hunt.”
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