by Greg Keyes
He returned his thoughts to Ghan. He had learned at least three useful things from the old man. First, that he could still speak to other Human Beings in a normal fashion, something he had begun to doubt; not only normally, but as a Jik, concealing his true self—whatever that was now. Second, that Ghan did not, in fact, know his true identity. As far as Ghan was concerned, he was Yen, a young man infatuated with Hezhi. Finally, though denying it verbally, it was clear from various subtle signs—which he could still read—that the librarian knew that Hezhi was alive and probably knew where she could be found. That meant that he was on a productive trail, likely the only trail, since, as it turned out, he had lain in the depths of the palace for nearly five months. Hezhi must be far from Nhol, far from the River and his vision.
Ghe passed the entrance to the Hall of Moments, where light coruscated so brightly through colored glass that he had once believed the Waterborn had snared a rainbow to live there with them. He went by it quickly, head lowered as if in thought or deference, and hurried into the empty portions of the palace. It was there, some fifty paces down the Hall of Jade Efreets, that he noticed the man following him. Though startled, he gave no sign, instead continuing on as if nothing were odd. He took a few strange turns, leaving the traveled thoroughfares far behind, and eventually stopped to rest and wait in another of the palace’s innumerable courtyards. This one—he did not know its name—was in a sad state of disrepair, yet, consequently, had a melancholy beauty. Small, open to the sky, it was sunken through three tiers of palace, overlooked by eight empty, cobwebbed balconies. The pallid winter sun draped a scraggly, ancient olive tree in saffron light, and a few grassy weeds clawed at the pitted limestone pavement. Ghe sat on a bench of antique design, a stone slab supported by leaping granite fish—though the latter were mostly obscured by moss and lichen. A thick, black thornbush of some sort twisted tortuously up the wall he faced to cling to a wrought-iron second-floor balcony. Ghe idly wondered if it were some sort of rose vine and if its blossoms would also be black.
A moment later, the man entered the court, and Ghe had his first good look at the person’s face. He nodded in gentle surprise; the face seemed familiar, and he should know the name that went with it. But he did not; it was fled into the darkness where so much of him had gone. For a moment, as he watched the recognition dawn on the other face, Ghe felt a profound bitterness, resentment even. Why should this man be whole, when he himself was not?
“Ghe?” the fellow asked.
Ghe managed a smile, though his anger continued to grow.
“I am Yen presently,” he said. “Watching, you know.”
“Where have you been?” He had boyish features, mouth a bit crooked. Ghe seemed to remember liking the man, or at least liking something about him.
“Just now? The library.”
“I mean for the past several months. You disappeared, after that mess at the Ember Gate. We thought you were dead.”
Ghe feigned puzzlement. “Dead? No, I was just reassigned. They sent me down to Yengat, in the Swamp Kingdoms, to alleviate a little problem. I’ve just returned, and they’ve assigned me to another… child.”
“Oh,” the man said. “I guess I just didn’t hear. Things were in such chaos, afterward. All of those priests and soldiers, dead—I just assumed she got you, too.”
“What happened to her?” Ghe asked. “I never heard.”
“They caught her, finally, in the desert.”
“Ah.”
There was an awkward pause, and the man flashed Ghe an uncomfortable little smile. “Well,” he said at last. “I thought I recognized you. I just wanted to make sure. Come around the compound, when you get a chance.”
“They have me staying over here right now,” Ghe replied. “But I will.”
“Good.” He turned to go. Ghe watched him walk ten paces, quickening slightly with each step. He sighed. “Wait,” he called. The man took another step or two, then slowly turned around. “Come back. What did I say wrong?”
The soft face hardened, eyes narrowing; he snorted at Ghe. “Everything. Who are you, really?”
“Oh, I am Ghe. That part is true.”
“Is it? One of the priests who survived saw your head cut off. And I’ve been promoted; I would know if you had been sent to the Swamp Kingdoms. So I ask again, who are you?”
“No one, if I am not Ghe,” he answered, standing up and striding toward the young man, who nodded as Ghe approached—as if he had asked himself a question and then answered it.
Ten steps away, and the man’s right hand struck out, an easy, casual, fantastically quick motion. Ghe was prepared, and when the mean, thin blade reached where he had been, he was a full step to the left, pivoting against the wall. The steel pinged against something behind him as Ghe pounced, landed lightly just beyond arm’s reach. His opponent lashed out with a second blade, this one not made for throwing but for penetrating bone, for cutting heart and lung. The knife was wielded skillfully enough, but to Ghe it seemed pitifully slow, its arcing thrust utterly predictable. He stepped in, caught the wrist and elbow, just as the other Jik’s left hand slammed into the cluster of nerves on the side of his head. A jangling pain rang though his skull, but Ghe’s grip remained firm on the knife-arm until the other twisted strangely, dropping his knife in the process, and quickly stepped away, free of his grasp.
“Very good,” Ghe softly commanded. “A trick I didn’t know.”
“You are Ghe,” the man said. “Quicker, maybe, stronger. But his moves, his techniques. What happened to you?”
In answer, Ghe skipped forward, feinted with a lunging punch far short of its target, followed it with a rear foot sweep. Almost, but not quite, his enemy avoided the low, vicious kick to his ankle; but Ghe clipped a heel, and the other man grunted as he stumbled back, off balance. Ghe leapt forward, committing to a dangerous lunging kick, hoping that the man actually was off balance and not feigning. He was rewarded with a harsh gasp as the ball of his foot splintered the man’s sternum. He fell heavily against the courtyard wall, glaring at Ghe and spitting flecks of blood.
Ghe paused, not quite knowing why. Had this man been his friend? Probably not; he felt that he had few friends. But he was certainly a Jik, and perhaps a fond acquaintance.
Though clearly injured, the other lashed out with the back of his hand, but Ghe knew it for a feint and so sidestepped the stronger punch from the opposing fist, cracked his own knuckles along the man’s spine. The Jik dropped and did not move until Ghe retrieved the fallen knife; then he made one feeble attempt to sweep Ghe’s feet. Ghe was never convinced his opponent was really unconscious, however, and easily avoided the attack. He finished him with a quick thrust under the jaw, up into the brain case, watched the eyes roll and then set themselves, senseless, to watching the sky.
“I wonder what your name was,” Ghe whispered to the dead man, and panting, sat against the wall, hand still on the knife hilt.
He watched, fascinated, as the colored strands inside of the man began to unravel. He was not hungry, not at the moment, and so he just watched, curious to see how men died.
The strands fell away. The ones extending into limbs and organs withered, vanished, were sucked up by the dimming knot in the heart. The knot, untied into slender filaments, now braided into a thick strand, and as Ghe watched, it retied itself in a new pattern, dimming further still, until almost he could not see it. It lay there for a time and then stirred, like a feather touched by the merest breeze. Curious, Ghe reached to touch it, not with his hand but with the something he used when he fed. The little bundle shivered, fluttered, moved to him. Ghe took hold of it gently, felt its rhythmic pulse, like a bird’s heartbeat
What is this? it said. Just like a voice, but a voice that spoke in the hollows of his bones, in the beat of his own heart. What has happened?
It was the dead man. Qan Yazhwu, son of Wenli, the netmaker—images flickered in Ghe’s mind: childhood, a woman, the first terrified moment when learning to swim…
Shuddering, he thrust it away, and the voice was gone. The ghost-seed tumbled away from him and then once again chose a direction, floating purposefully down the hall. When it met with a wall it passed on through it effortlessly. Ghe understood where it was going. Downstream, to the River.
“Farewell, Qan Yazhwunata,” he whispered, and then turned back to the body, considering its disposal.
VII
Surrounded by Monsters
Hezhi leaned against the wind-smoothed stone, steadied herself, and caught her breath. Already the terror of what she had seen was fading, but the strangeness of it remained, the shock. Brother Horse had seemed to her, in the short time she had known him, the most Human of creatures: earthy, affectionate, and easygoing. He had comforted her from the first, from the moment they met, lifting her onto his horse, wrapping her tight in his arms as they thundered away from Nhol, from her birthplace and her doom.
But he was most certainly not Human, or at least not completely so. Human Beings did not have creatures living inside of them.
At least, she did not think they did.
“I can’t trust anyone,” she said aloud. “Only Tsem.”
And perhaps Perkar. It was odd, that thought. She had known Perkar for no more than a day longer than she had known Brother Horse, and she hid seen the ugliness he was capable of, the slaughtered bodies of her father’s elite guard, the decapitation of Yen. But Perkar and she were twisted together in some way, braided by their own desires—not for each other, perhaps, but bonded in some inextricable fashion. It was not love—she loved Tsem, she loved Ghan, loved Qey. What bound her and Perkar was not that, nor was it the awkward, restless desire that Yen had inspired. It was something less compelling but more powerful.
But that was her belly talking. Her brain was learning to trust itself, and it told her that even Perkar was not to be counted on.
The cliffs behind her soared as high as three-story buildings and were often as sheer as city walls. She had regarded them from afar, from the village, and they had seemed mysterious, intriguing. Like a city, yet not a city. Spires, walls, caverns like halls—she had imagined them all. Crinkling her brow, rebellious, she strode back into them, following a crooked canyon floor, trying not to think about the things in Brother Horse, the god of the cairn, about gods and demons everywhere.
She was suddenly struck by an odd memory. The stone rising about her seemed to form a vast hall, and save for the lack of buttresses and a real ceiling, she was suddenly, powerfully reminded of the Leng Court, where her father often held ceremonies and audiences. When last she had been in the court she had seen a drama, a representation of the legend of her family. It told of the People, surrounded on all sides by monsters, unable to save themselves, and of how Chakunge, the son of Gau—a chieftain’s daughter—and the River destroyed them all.
Surrounded by monsters: that was what the Mang were, surrounded by monsters, in every stone—maybe more than surrounded, maybe even penetrated, if all were like Brother Horse. In Nhol, the River had changed that, at least, killed these things that infested the land the way termites infested wood or maggots old meat. Maybe that was what these cliffs were, a place where these “gods” had burrowed, like insects, through the land, tried in some crude fashion to form a city comparable to Nhol.
It dawned on her that her people might not have been all that different from the Mang at one time. The girl in the story, Gau: she had been the daughter of a “chieftain”—a very old word, one not used anymore except to refer to the leaders of barbarian tribes. But Hezhi’s own people had once had chieftains, very long ago. Before becoming a part of the River, before escaping from these visions…
The wind hummed and shuddered through the stone corridors, and Hezhi felt fright creeping back upon her. What if her “godsight” came now, and she saw whatever thing made that noise? What if the cliffs suddenly came alive around her?
They could most easily enter her through her eyes, Brother Horse claimed. Despairing, she sank down to her knees, then sat, shut her eyes, and imagined a cool breeze across rooftops, Qey in the kitchen, fussing over an evening meal of braised chicken with garlic, black rice, and fish dumplings.
In Nhol she had learned to fear darkness; now she found solace in it.
I wish Perkar were here, she thought, clenching and unclenching fistfuls of the grainy sand. There was no snow here, though she had noticed drifts piled against the south canyon wall. Still, it was cold. It would get colder at night Where would she go? Back to the camp, where Brother Horse and those creatures in him waited? Where everyone was a relative of the old man and no one trusted her at all?
Yes, she needed Perkar.
As she thought this a second time she suddenly realized what she was doing and snarled in sudden self-fury. Perkar was right not to trust her! Once she had called him from across the world, from his home and family, and for what? So that he could slaughter men in the streets of Nhol that she might escape her destiny. And now, here she was, in the midst of that new destiny he had sacrificed so much to help her create, and she was wishing for him to come save her again, to bring his bloody blade and make carrion of her problems.
No, not again. This time she would make her own way.
But what did that mean? Could she survive here, in the Mang Wastes, without the Mang or Perkar?
No, she could not.
Could she face Brother Horse again? She didn’t know if she could do that, either.
Abruptly she realized that she might no longer have a choice. New sounds intruded upon the slow, terrible melodies of wind through stone. The muffled rhythm of hoofbeats, tinkle of brass bells, and human voices moving nearer with each moment. Reluctantly she opened her eyes and glanced quickly around. What would she do if it was Brother Horse? He must know that she had seen him. Had he intended that?
Well, she would face him. If she died, she died. She would not die weeping or cowering. She was Hezhi, daughter of the emperor of Nhol, once possessed of enough power to make the world quake beneath her feet. It would take more than an old man possessed by demons to make her cringe.
Still, she trembled a bit as she stood to face the hoofbeats.
Two horsemen had entered the canyon. Neither was Brother Horse. They were Mang, clothed in bachgay—long black coats split for riding—and flaring elkskin breeks. Rigid bands of lacquered armor showed beneath their coats. Both bore bows. It was plain, even to her, that they were following her tracks—and that they now saw her.
As they drew closer, she realized that she did not recognize them; they were not of Brother Horse’s band. This was no surprise—since the Ben’cheen had begun, there were more strange faces than familiar ones. What was more disturbing was that these men also wore steel caps with plumes of red-dyed horsehair, and she remembered hearing that this signified being at war. She glanced around, wondering where she might hide, but there was nowhere; the cliffs were too sheer to scale—at least for her to scale—and there were no obvious caves or crevasses to crawl into. She could only watch them come, alert for any sign of their intentions on their faces.
When they drew nearer, they unstrung their bows, returned them to ornately embroidered sheaths. They paused in doing this, and though one might take his eyes from her, the other was always watching, as if she were a snake or some other dangerous thing.
Done disarming, they urged their mounts closer to where she stood, and she, not certain how to respond, merely watched them come.
“Du’unuzho, shigiindeye?” one asked softly. “Are you all right, cousin?” His accent was strange, not like that of Brother Horse, though she could still understand him. Up close, his face was not as fierce as it appeared from a distance; lean and narrow, it tapered pleasantly. His eyes were not black, as were her own or those of the other Mang she knew, but a light brown, flecked faintly with green. He was quite young, perhaps no more than fifteen. His companion looked the same age, though more thickly built, his face and eyes more typically Mang.
&n
bsp; “Gaashuzho,” she answered. “I will be.”
He nodded, but his face registered the strangeness of her accent. He cast his eyes down for a moment, as if considering how to say what he wanted to say.
“You are not Mang,” he settled upon at last.
“No,” she answered. “No, I am not. But I am in the care of the South People.” Brother Horse had told her to explain that to any strangers she met.
“It is she,” the second rider hissed, but the first held up his hand to silence him.
“My cousins call me Moss, for my eyes,” he explained. “My war name is Strums the Bow. You may call me Moss, if you please. My cousin’s name is Chuuzek.”
“Hey!” Chuuzek grumbled, and Hezhi wondered if he was upset because his name had been given to a stranger or if it was because the name Moss gave meant “He-Continually-Goes-About-Belching.”
“My name is Hezhi,” she replied, knowing it was polite to give a name when one was offered. “Have you come here for the Ben’cheen?”
“Partly,” Moss told her. “We are of the Four Spruces People.” He said that as if it should be significant, and Hezhi was sure that it probably was, to other Mang. It meant nothing to her, but she nodded as if it did. Moss regarded her impassively, then cleared his throat. “Well,” he said. “I would like to offer you a ride back to the village. It is a long walk from here.”
“No, thank you,” Hezhi replied. “I have a companion I shall rejoin shortly.”
“Ah,” Moss replied. Chuuzek looked around the canyon at that, expressing either disbelief or wariness. He grunted something under his breath.
Something isn’t right, Hezhi realized. These two were acting oddly, even by Mang standards. It could be because she was not Mang, but there was Chuuzek’s blurted “It is she.” That worried her immensely, and she wished now that they would go away. Moss seemed pleasant enough, concerned even, but then so had Yen, and he had been prepared to kill her.
