by Greg Keyes
“What then?” Perkar groaned. “What am I to do?”
“She can slay him,” the Blackgod answered, eyes narrowed to milky slits. “She must be brought to his source, to the spot he was born. There she can slay him.”
“Hezhi?”
“Good. You understand. Take her to his source.”
“And then?”
“Then she will slay him.”
“How?”
“That is not your concern. Suffice to say she will do so.”
Perkar opened his mouth to speak again and then thought better of it. He was afraid, and he realized that it was a sensation that bearing Harka had muted for some time. He searched for his earlier disdain, his passionate anger, and found it buried beneath terror.
“Take her to his source,” he said, repeating the Blackgod’s words. “How shall we find it?”
“You know where it lies—in the mountain at the heart of Balat. And I will leave you roadmarks in any event. But have a care—do not travel upon him to reach it. You must go overland.”
“Even I know that,” Perkar muttered.
Karak squatted before him, so that his beak nearly touched Perkar’s nose. The Blackgod smiled fondly, reached over and tousled Perkar’s hair, the way one’s grandfather might.
“Of course you do, pretty thing, little oak tree. I just remind you.”
Before Perkar could reply—or even flinch from the god’s touch—Karak suddenly curled in upon himself, knotted into a tight white ball, and bloomed into flame, like a dried rose consumed by fire. He uncurled his body as the heat licked up from him, black again, completely a bird. A Raven larger than any man. The Raven hopped back from Perkar, regarded him with its head cocked.
“Just reminding you,” the Raven said, and strutted over to where Ngangata and Good Thief lay. Both had begun to stir, to watch the exchange between Perkar and Karak with dull eyes.
The Raven stooped over Ngangata, and ice formed in Perkar’s chest. He desperately willed his hand to reach for Harka, commanded his legs to bring him erect. He could not govern his limbs; they refused him.
Karak regarded Ngangata for what seemed an eternity, and Ngangata stared back at the god, his expression set and unreadable. Then the god hopped on, to where Good Thief lay.
“Hello, pretty thing,” the Blackgod cooed.
Good Thief looked not at Karak but at Perkar. His eyes held a desperate mixture of fear and anger.
“My horse,” he shouted. “His name is Sharp Tiger. Look after my horse, Cattle-Man.”
It was not a command, it was a plea. It was the last thing Good Thief said; Karak’s talons dug into his belly, black wings opened and boomed, and the god was rising up, the Mang dangling helplessly, his eyes still fixed on Perkar.
He watched the god and his prey until they dwindled to a speck, were gone.
Perkar barely had enough energy to help Ngangata into the tent—the fire was scattered, the night chill sinking into their bones. The tent was warmer but still uncomfortably cool, and the two huddled together, not speaking. Perkar thought of talking to Harka, but that seemed useless, somehow, and instead he lay there, remembering Good Thief’s face growing smaller. He certainly did not believe he would sleep, but suddenly it was morning, light glowing in through the tent skin.
Ngangata was still asleep, and Perkar did not disturb him. Instead he got up and pushed as quietly as he could through the tent flap. The sun was already well up, feathering the rolling clouds above with shades of gold, pink, and gray. Blue sky peered through cheerfully.
Perkar—not cheerful at all—gathered wood and started a fire. He found the corpse of the dead archer, his back open in long stripes, his eyes wide and uncomprehending. He dragged the stiff body to where its companion lay, and there he sang a song for the dead, offering what little wine he had to them. He did not know their names, of course, except for Good Thief, but there was an appropriate song for dead enemies, and he sang all of it. After that, he began to search for stones to cover the bodies.
After a long search, he found only a few fist-size stones. He looked down at the horse and the man, wondering how best to deal with them. Not far away, Sharp Tiger whickered, further reminding Perkar of his obligations.
“Let the sky have them,” a voice croaked from behind him. Perkar turned to see Ngangata, bleary-eyed, standing near the tent.
“They were valiant enemies,” Perkar told him. “They deserve some consideration.”
“Let the sky have them,” Ngangata repeated. “They are Mang; that is their custom.”
Perkar puffed out a long, steaming breath. “You mean leave them here for the wolves?”
“Yes.”
“There should be something more we can do than that.”
“For dead bodies? No. Offer to their ghosts later, if you still feel guilty. Now we should leave this place before their kinsmen arrive.”
“How did they know to come here, in the first place?”
“Their gaan saw us, no doubt.”
“Then he will see us wherever we go.”
Ngangata shrugged. “If we are moving, there will be no place to see.”
Perkar nodded reluctantly. “I have to take Good Thief’s horse.”
Ngangata gave Perkar a somewhat painful flash of a grin.
“That is a Mang war horse. No one but his rider may approach him.”
“Good Thief asked me to. It was his last request.”
Ngangata raised his hands in a gesture of helplessness. “I will pack the tent,” he said.
Perkar stared at his fallen enemy for a few more heartbeats, then turned his attention to Sharp Tiger.
The stallion eyed him dubiously as he approached. Sharp Tiger seemed a fitting name; though most Mang horses bore stripes upon their flanks and hindquarters, his were pronounced and black, laid upon a tawny field. His mane was jet. Of course, his name would have nothing to do with his appearance. Mang horses were named after dead Mang warriors, just as Mang warriors were named after dead horses. Perkar wondered, as he approached the beast, whether a man or a mount had first borne the name in the long ago.
Sharp Tiger watched him draw closer, eyes flaring; he dipped his head up and down restlessly.
“Shununechen,” Perkar said gently, as he had heard Mang say to mounts not belonging to them. “Smell me, cousin.”
Sharp Tiger allowed him closer, until he could place his cupped hand near the animal’s nostrils. The beast sniffed him uncertainly.
He was still saddled, the bit still in his mouth. Perkar sadly realized that he hadn’t even unsaddled T’esh for the night; he could see him grazing some distance away, nearer the stream. This was no way to treat such beautiful mounts.
But then, neither was cutting the legs out from under one, he reflected, gritting his teeth.
“Are you going to let me on, cousin?” he asked Sharp Tiger:
His plan had been merely to lead the horse behind T’esh, but now he had an inexplicable urge to ride him. Ngangata, of course, was right. This horse would never let anyone but Good Thief upon his back. Still…
He put his foot in the stirrup, and Sharp Tiger stood there, passively. It wasn’t until he tried to swing his other leg over that the beast reacted.
Perkar was suddenly in the air, propelled upward by Sharp Tiger’s explosion of movement. He thudded to the ground and rolled. Sharp Tiger came after, lashing down with his fore-hooves. Only Harka’s preternatural sense of danger saved Perkar from the stallion’s hard, sharp weapons; he was only lightly grazed on one arm before he fought clear and returned to his feet. Sharp Tiger ceased his attack as abruptly as he began it and watched Perkar with clear, dark eyes.
Perkar smiled wryly at his own stupidity.
“Very well,” he said. “Then will you let me lead you?”
Sharp Tiger stood, quiet now. When Perkar cautiously took his reins, he followed without complaint.
Not much later, with the tent packed and Ngangata mounted, they set out toward Brother Ho
rse’s village. Perkar rode with his thoughts, and one eye on the cloudswept sky, the fear and memory of black wings clear in his mind.
IX
The Reader of Bones
Ghe took himself down to the docks to think.
Almost, he feared the sunlight. Tatters of stories remained in his mind, fantasies spun in the dark alleys of his youth by the poor and the fearful in Southtown. Creatures like himself stalked those tales, ghouls who fed on the lifeblood of the living, who shunned the bright eye of the sky lest it wither them away, reduce them to droplets of polluted and stained River water. In the daylight, such things remained in their deep crypts below the city, in the bottomless depths of the River…
But the sunlight did him no harm. In fact, it cheered him, as did the brightly clothed merchants bustling about the quays, the pungent stink of fish, the sweet incense of fortune-tellers, the savory scent of meat grilling on the charcoal braziers of food vendors. He stopped at one of the last, paid a dark young girl with a pox-scarred face a copper soldier for two skewers of garlic lamb and a thick, spongy roll of tsag’ bread. He sat on a dock with his legs dangling out over the River, eating his meal and watching the gulls worry about the barges, the thick-armed men unloading cargo from the Swamp Kingdoms, from up-River and from far-off Lhe.
Beneath him, he could feel the River, like a father, proud of his presence.
“You are mighty,” he said, addressing the limitless waters wonderingly.
Only reluctantly did he bend his mind to his worries.
His time in Nhol was limited; that much was clear. He could not kill every man and woman who recognized him. Already the priesthood must be investigating the disappearances, especially of the slain Jik. And it was surely urgent, in any case, that he leave soon to find Hezhi.
But the world was vast, and he knew not where to look. Only Ghan could tell him that, and Ghan had made it plain that he would say nothing. Given time, Ghe felt certain that he could win the old man’s confidence—he cared deeply for Hezhi, and that was a lever which could be worked until the man’s stone heart was prized up, lifted so that Ghe could make out what was underneath. But he needed time for that.
Time, also, to learn a few things. Even with the powers of his rebirth, he would face enemies he only vaguely understood—the white-skinned barbarian who would not die, for instance. Was he like Ghe, some sort of ghoul? Was he more powerful? And in Ghe’s mind were vague shadows of other powers, out beyond where the River could reach. He must know something of them, as well.
He let his gaze settle over the city, wondering where he might find the answers he sought. In the library, perhaps, where Hezhi had found her secrets. But Nhol had many dark places, where old knowledge slept.
The foremost of these towered behind the dockside taverns and markets, as pristine and monumental as they were squalid and ordinary; the Great Water Temple. It was a stepped pyramid formed of white stone, water geysering from its sun-crowned summit, a fist of the River shaking aloft toward the heavens. He had been inside the building, seen the perfect column of water drawn up through the very core of the structure, and wondered, awestruck at the rush and power of it. From where he sat now, he could see two of the broken slopes where the water cascaded down, four streams for four directions rushing to rejoin their source in the canals that surrounded the priesthood’s most holy building. To him, also, it had once been holy, a symbol of the great power he served and of the order that had raised him from sleeping with dogs to a position of respect and honor.
Now, with the River’s perspective, he saw it much differently. Within its white shell, he now sensed a heart of mystery, a labyrinth of falsehood and deceit. From its caverns the priesthood spun their spidery webs, shaped the bonds that held the River God in place. It held libraries, too, vast dusty rooms of forbidden knowledge, chants and formulae of terrific power. He had but glimpsed such things when he was initiated as a Jik, but now he had some sense of what was hidden there, beneath the falling water, the great hill of rock.
He turned his gaze back to his feet, to the god flowing below them. “You want me to go there,” he whispered.
That would be dangerous, even for him. The priesthood had the power to shackle a god—and what animated Ghe was less than a finger of the River’s power. But the priests had taught him, made him from a common thief and cutthroat into a finely wrought weapon. A weapon could be turned upon its smith as easily as upon anyone else.
The food was not as good as he had anticipated. The smell had been wonderful, tantalizing—but in his mouth it had no flavor. As if, along with so many things, he had forgotten how to taste.
Discouraged, he tossed what remained of his meal into the water. “Eat well, my lord,” he said, before rising and resuming his walk.
He went next to Southtown, though he was in no way certain why. He knew that he had been born there, but the nets in that part of his mind were the most torn and tangled; they held the fewest clear images. Walking down Red Gar Street, the place he remembered best, was like hearing only snatches of a song. Here a shop sign was as well remembered as his name; but blocks would go by that seemed as alien as the depths of the palace. Still, it brought something of a return of his earlier good cheer; his nose and his skin seemed to recognize the street as his eyes did not. A sort of melancholy happiness walked with him, the ghost of recollection.
And then, when he stopped on a corner to watch a boy pick a minor noble’s pocket, someone spoke his name.
“Ghe!” An old woman’s voice, one he utterly failed to recognize.
He turned in surprise, fingers knitting into deadly shapes. It was an old woman—an ancient woman—dressed as a fortuneteller. Her clothes were faded, shabby, but she wore a steepled hat with golden moons and stars embossed upon it that looked both new and expensive. Before her was spread a velvet mat for her fortune-bones. Her face was split in a half-toothless grin, and her eyes sparkled with an odd mixture of lights—happiness, wariness, and concern.
He knew her face. Images of it lay about his mind like shards of a shattered pot. But no name was attached to it, no past conversations, nothing. Nothing save for a faint, pleasant sensation.
“Ghe? Haven’t you come to sit with an old woman?” The old eyes had sharpened with suspicion. He hesitated, searching his mind, thinking desperately. He smiled and knelt by her mat.
“Hello,” he said, managing to sound cheerful. “It has been a long while.”
“And whose fault is that? Ah, little Duh, what has the priesthood made of you? I scarcely recognize you in that collar. You look tired, too.”
She knew about the priesthood. Who was this woman?
“It is a busy life,” he muttered, wishing he at least had a name to call her by. Was she some relative of his? Not his mother, surely. She was far too old for that.
The puzzled, suspicious look was still clear on her face. He had to—do what? He should run, leave, that was what he should do.
“Read the bones for me,” he said instead, gesturing at the inscribed, polished slats that lay on the mat.
“You put store in that now? The priesthood teach you to respect old women properly?”
“Yes.”
She shrugged, picked the bones up, and rattled them around in her hands.
“Whatever happened to that girl?” she asked casually. “The one you liked, that they set you after?”
His dismay must have been as clear to her as the call of gulls above. Her own eyes widened. “What have you done, little one? What is this about?”
Ghe felt a little tremor walk up his spine. He had to do something. He reached out for the little, fluttering knot of strands that made up her life. She knew it all, this old woman. That he was a Jik, about Hezhi, everything. Best to kill her now, quickly.
But he could not. He knew not why. The moment passed, and he shrank back from the strands, though now he felt a bit of hunger—completely unabated by the bread and meat he consumed earlier.
“Listen,” he hissed.
“Listen to me.” He took a deep breath. “I don’t know who you are.”
Her eyes widened and then flattened. “What do you mean by that? Life in the palace made you too good to talk to old Li?”
Li. He had heard that name in his vision, when he was reborn. Then it meant nothing, just a sound. Now…
Now it still meant nothing, save that it was this old woman’s name.
“No. No, that isn’t what I mean at all. You clearly know me, know my name, know much about me. But I do not know you.”
Her face cleared then, blanked like a perfect, featureless mask: the inscrutable fortune-teller.
“What do you remember?”
“Bits of things. I know I grew up around here somewhere. I remember this street. I remember your face—but I didn’t know your name until just now.”
Her face remained expressionless. “Perhaps some sort of Forbidding,” she muttered slowly. “But why would they cripple you so? This makes no sense, Ghe.”
“Perhaps,” he began, “perhaps if you were to tell me, remind me. Perhaps the memories are only sleeping.”
Li nodded slowly. “That could be. But again, why? You are still a Jik?”
“Still,” he said. “Always.”
“Last I heard from you, you had been set to watch one of the River Blessed. A young girl. Did something happen?”
“I don’t remember,” he lied. “I don’t remember that, either.”
The old woman pursed her lips.
“I should read the bones, then,” she said. “Maybe the bones will show something. Sit with me here a bit.”
She rummaged in a small cloth bag and began taking things out.
“You gave me this, you know,” she said, as she laid a little cone of incense out on her velvet mat.
“I did?”
“Yes. When you were initiated. This cloth and this hat. Be a dear, little Duh, and go light this on the flame of old Shehwad over there.” She waved her hand at a man cooking skewered meats a few tens of paces away. He nodded, rose, and walked over to the stand.
“Li asked me to light this here,” he told the person—who, despite the fact that Li referred to him as “old,” was certainly younger than she.
