The Grass King’s Concubine

by Kari Sperring

  “Marcellan,” Julana echoed. They tasted the name, rolled it over pink tongues, inhaled it through sharp noses, shaped it in the fan of their whiskers, learned how it wrapped him, covered him, gave him self. “Marcellan.”

  15

  A Boat of Moss and Stone

  JEHAN WOKE SLOWLY and registered that his neck was stiff. He rubbed the back of it with a hand and wriggled. His eyes were gritty, and his throat was dry from reading. He blinked a few times and stretched. The Book of Marcellan lay open before him; beside it stood the water bowl, now empty. In her corner, Clairet stood peacefully, head down, dozing.

  Two dark-furred bodies curled up together atop the pile of hay, noses burrowed into one another’s sides, flanks rising in slow rhythm, fast asleep. He could escape them now, perhaps, take Clairet and head out into the steppe. Without water or maps or any clear sense of where he was going. The women—ferrets—whatever they were—were smaller than he. He could have escaped from them at any time. He had chosen to read. They had water and shelter and his only dim hope of finding Aude.

  He was hungry and thirsty. He had a handful of dried fruit and an end of hardtack in his saddlebags. The twins twitched as he rose and took the bowl to fill it but did not waken. Beyond the door through which Yelena had fetched his drink, he found a dank scullery with a low trough filled to a depth of about three inches with clear water. He took the bowl back through into the kitchen and set it down, looking around him. Perhaps somewhere in one of the dusty dressers he might find tea or rice to eke out his supplies. At the very least he might be able to wash the dirt from his face and forearms. Shaving was beyond him—his razor was back in the wreck of the Woven House. Wherever Aude was—if Aude still was—he could only hope that she was better housed and provided for.

  He was wasting time here. He should take Clairet and go before the twins realized. He had to find Aude.

  Setting the bowl back down on the table, he began to search for food that he could take with him. Everything was thick with grime, and the cracked storage jars held nothing but dust and cobwebs. Whatever the twins ate, they did not trouble themselves to store it. He rummaged in his saddlebags for the hardtack and broke off a piece to gnaw on while he reorganized his few possessions. He must refill the canteen, too…Bending to pick it up, his elbow knocked against the saber, and it fell to the floor with a clatter. Jehan froze.

  In the hay pile, the twins stirred. First one head then another lifted, black eyes blinking. Clairet extended her soft nose downward to sniff them, her breath riffling their fur. One of them rolled, exposing a long pale underside. The other yawned, then pounced on her sister, nipping at flank and limb. They wrestled, tumbling over and over until they tipped out of the hay onto the floor. The topmost clawed free and bounced away, claws skittering. The second leaped after her, over the flagstones, under a dresser, onto chair seats and windowsills in a chaos of tails and teeth and energy. At last they came to rest in a panting heap in the center of the floor a yard or so away. Jehan watched them, waiting.

  A twin raised her head and looked at him. Her ears flickered. At her side, the other stretched out, reared up and…He looked away from the confusion of flesh. When he looked back, a naked woman knelt on the floor, with the ferret-formed sister on her lap. He kept his eyes on her face. She said, “Awake now. Read more.”

  He said, “No. I have to find my wife.”

  She bared her teeth. “We told you. Reading finds her.” Her sister arched her back.

  He said, “I’ve wasted enough time.”

  “No.” The woman pointed. “Look outside. You’ll see.”

  He was wasting even more time. Keeping a wary eye on her, he circled toward the window. The ferret twin followed him. The glass was thick with grime; he rubbed at it with his cuff and succeeded in clearing a small patch. Outside was nothing.

  Nothing. Just a wash of gray: no sky, no ground. He enlarged the clear patch to no avail. Another dust storm, said the rational part of him. But he could not believe it. That grayness was no cloud of dust. It was just…Nothing. He said, “But…”

  “Book moved us. A little. We’re in a between place. Read us out.”

  He looked at Clairet. The pony stood calm, eyes half closed. He was mad, looking to a pony for guidance.

  She was all he had. Sighing, he returned to the table and the book, trying to find where he had left off. He could barely follow most of it—the language was archaic. Yet the twins listened in silence, faces alert. The fingers of his right hand grew black from dust and smudged old ink. The fingers of his left crept under the neck of his shirt to clutch at Aude’s locket. He read slowly, tongue twisting over the polysyllables. The world focused down around him, to the page and the black type and the stumbling words. The twins crept closer, listening, while outside the light dimmed.

  “I will not give the location of the Stone House, for such things are best not widely known. But I will say this. Those people—and they are few—who dwell within a day’s walk of it shun it and name it unhealthful, believing it to be the haunt of evil spirits. I thought to find it barred and guarded, as is the case with the Glass Tower, whose entrances are sealed and unseeable, its hinterland harsh and forbidding. Yet its door is not locked against human entry, and the approach to it is easy. My horse did not balk, nor did it panic. And when I entered the house, at first I found only dust and shadows. Though I climbed to its highest point and looked into all its rooms, I found no sign that any had ever dwelled there.

  “I thought of leaving, having found nothing, no carving, no shape, nothing at all that bespoke the purpose of the place. Yet, as I descended the stair for the final time, it seemed to me that the shadows deepened. My foot slipped. I put out a hand to save myself, and the wall beside me was undressed stone, harsh and sere. The steps trembled, and I lost my balance. Flung forward, I reached again for the wall, and my hands passed through it. Before me, the wall parted, revealing the shape of a doorway, hitherto invisible to my human eyes. Its outline…”

  The Stone House shook. Jehan tripped over a word, stammered, looked up. But that’s in the book… Under his hands, book and table shivered. In the bowl, water slopped and washed. There was a moment of stillness, another shake. And…

  The flagstones buckled. Thrown forward into the table edge, Jehan gasped. Stone groaned, clattered, began to shear. The dresser creaked, tipped, fell with a crash. Fragments of pottery spilled out across the floor, rolling into the cracks and corners. The twins huddled close together. Another heave tipped Jehan to the ground. Clairet whickered, shifted. If she panicked inside the room…Jehan crawled toward her, stone shards cutting into his hands, abrading his knees. Her coat was damp with sweat. He leaned into her, murmuring reassurances. The woman-shaped twin said, sharp over the noise, “The gate. The house is opening.”

  It was an earthquake. This house was old and long neglected. Its timbers were dry, brittle. It could not be the gate of which Marcellan had written. Such things did not happen. Jehan said, “We need to get out.” And remembered that outside was no longer there. He swallowed.

  “Wait.” The woman had uncurled from her huddle. She squatted in the center of the room, heels balanced, moving with each creak, each tremor, each sway. “Look at the pony.”

  He looked back at Clairet. She turned her nose toward him, nuzzled at his hair, her breath sweet with hay. All fear, all alarm had drained from her. He patted her, looked back at the twins. “I don’t understand.”

  “The gate is opening. Pony knows. WorldBelow is welcoming to her kind.”

  He said, “If the roof collapses…”

  “Stone House is built for this. Wait. Watch.”

  Between him and the door, the floor stretched away, cracked and jagged, shifting with each breath of the earth. Gates between the world of men and the five domains. He had been educated to comprehend those words as metaphorical. The words in Marcellan’s book had been matter-of-fact. It was a long time ago. He was probably caught in a minor earthquake and hit his h
ead. And yet…Aude had believed in this Stone House and its gate. Beneath him, the ground heaved yet again. He toppled into Clairet, felt the pony support him. Her flank was warm under his cheek, her heartbeat slow and steady. If she isn’t afraid… If it truly were an earthquake, surely she would sense that. She had sheltered him from the wind and the dirt storm on the open steppe. She had led him away from the wreck of the Woven House to this place, which, however strange, at least offered shelter and water and some fragment of hope that Aude might yet live. The Stone House and the Glass Tower… Clairet huffled at him, blowing his hair. He did not trust the fitch-women. He had trusted this stocky pony with his life. He could choose to trust her again. This chaos was his only chance to find Aude.

  In the fabric of the wall that supported the stairs, stones shifted, fading from deep gray to milky light blue. Inch by inch, a doorway formed, framed in an amber glow. A breeze blew from it, fragrant and mellow as spring twilight, carrying with it hints of yeast and barley beer and the siren call of fresh water. Before me, the wall parted, revealing the shape of a doorway. At Jehan’s back, Clairet whickered and pushed her nose into his neck. He patted her, his gaze fixed on the opening.

  The twins had crept forward, ferret paws pattering ahead of human knees and hands. They stopped a little in front of him, quivering, twitching, every hair electric. Perhaps they spoke to one another in their language of scent and touch and motion. He waited. And then: “The gate is open,” said the woman. “Grass King’s gate. Our gate. Time to move. Time to go home.”

  Jehan sat back on his haunches and stared at the doorway. There was no point in trying to deny that it was there. Clairet mouthed his hair almost as if she would reassure him. He rather wished she could speak. She would likely make a lot more sense than the twins. The scent of yeast flooded the room, making him hazy and hungry all at once, as if he were downwind of one of the Brass City breweries.

  He said, “Where does it go?”

  “The Grass King’s domain.” The woman turned to face him; her sister crouched on her foot.

  “Stone and growth, earth and grass and grain, trees and blossom. It runs through walls and everywhere that is the ground. It is in the birth of green things and their rotting away. All this belongs to the Grass King and lies under his hand.” Her voice was strange, low, lilting, words spun from memory. When he looked at her, she had turned away to gaze into space, small eyes glazed. Her twin pressed against her. “The Stone House is of the Grass King. So are we.”

  It was lyrical, but it told him nothing he could grasp. He said, “But…” He must search for Aude in this vagueness. He needed to know how to find her. He needed to find her quickly. “How big is it?”

  “Big or little doesn’t matter. Going makes itself.”

  And that made no sense at all. “You said those people—Cadre—have my wife somewhere in the Grass King’s lands. I have to find her. Where do I start?”

  The ferret hopped onto the floor, chittering at him. The woman said, “We go to the Rice Palace. There are paths.”

  “How long will it take?” He still did not know if they were truthful. But if Aude was down there…He did not know how long she might have, in what circumstances she found herself, whether she was injured, whether she had food or water or shelter. He clutched at her locket again.

  The woman bared her teeth. “Wrong questions. Wrong shapes. Big is not. Long is not. The paths are.” Her voice was impatient. “The paths are not human shaped. The path is…Path is as it is, has what it has. Happenings. Markers. Questions.” She bent, held out a hand to her sister. “We should go.”

  “But how?”

  “Enough.” She stood. “We go.”

  Aude might be somewhere beyond that door. He hauled himself upright, leaning on the table, and gathered his few remaining possessions. He was about to close the saddlebags when something occurred to him. “Do you want me to bring your book?” It still lay open on the table where he had left it.

  The twins exchanged glances. “Take the book to WorldBelow,” the woman said. She was not talking to him. “Marcellan’s book. Take it back to Marcellan.” Her twin shifted, ears flicking forward. The woman hesitated, then said, “Yes. Bring the book.” The ferret nipped her, sharp and sudden. She added, “Please.”

  The book was fragile. He closed it in a puff of dust and wrapped it carefully in the sleeveless jerkin he had worn under his two coats. It took up all of one side of the saddlebags. He looked at his map, at the box of shot and powder for the carbine, and hesitated. The map, folded tight, would fit into a pocket. The shot…Would it be of any use to him where he was going? He had his hand-me-down sword and the wooden-hilted knife he used for cutting meat and hair and leather. He had no idea. He was losing more and more of the familiar. He pushed and shoved at the contents of the other bag and forced enough space for the box. It had served against the desiccated thing in the Woven House. Perhaps it might serve again. The twins watched him. Pushing the map into the pocket of his coat, he found the shard of stone he had taken from the windowsill upstairs. It felt warm in his palm. He clutched it for a moment, then transferred it to the pocket of his trousers instead. Perhaps it would help bring him—him and Aude—back to this place. He asked, “Is there anything else you want to bring?”

  “Why?”

  The woman was still naked. It seemed that the transformation—however it was achieved—did not include clothing. She said, “We have our pelts. Our feet, our teeth and claws and nostrils.”

  “Yes, but…” He did not know how to say it. “I mean, that’s true, but when you’re not…When you’re in your human shape, well, aren’t you cold?”

  The ferret butted her head into her sister’s jawline. After a moment, the latter said, “Oh. Human clothes. We don’t need them.”

  He did not know what to say to that. He would have to adapt, it seemed. It was, he told himself, no worse than the fact of the twins’ shapeshifting, than gates that appeared from nowhere. He busied himself with tying the bags and said nothing.

  The woman said, “My sister says clothes are easier for you. We’ll bring them.”

  He looked round. She held out the shabby tunic. She said, “Please pack this.”

  He could stuff it into a corner. It was greasy and sour in his fingers. He nodded, “Of course.” What was her name? She had told him, he was sure…Yelena. He said, “Is there anything else, Yelena?”

  “Julana.”

  He could not keep it straight. Two names, two shapes…He filled the canteens in the scullery and topped up Clairet’s bucket. She drank in slow gulps. He picked up her tack and hesitated. He could lead her using the halter she already wore. The bags could be attached by their own straps and the canteens and carbine hooked to them. The doorway was low and narrow, no place for riding. And the twins must walk, or run, or whatever it was that ferrets did. He left the bridle hanging from the handle of a door, the saddle heaped in a corner, and picked up the bags. He pulled on his overcoat, checked that he had hat and gloves. Clairet leaned into him as he fastened on the bags, and he patted her. He said, “We’re ready.”

  “Good.” Julana crouched on the floor, limbs pressing close, bones pulling downward, inward.

  She was about to change. He said, “Wait—how do I know where to go?”

  Her voice came thinly, misshapen by a mouth that was already shifting form. She said, “We know. Walls know. Follow the light, down and down, to the cave and the pebbles, to the river…” A shiver of fur began at her wrists and ankles, drawing her tight, tighter, knotting and binding her ever smaller. Her nose pushed forward, eclipsing the rest of her face; her ears spread up and out. Through it, the voice continued, distant now and distorted, “Wait for the boat of stone…” Claws scratched on the flags. She shook herself, and the last faint hint of woman form was gone. Her sister—Yelena?—sniffed her, nose to nose. They rubbed close, whiskers telling tales he could not hear. Then they separated and skittered across the floor toward him. A nose nudged his leg; tee
th nipped his ankle through his boot. He took a step, and one ferret bounded onto his foot. She stopped. She raised herself, pawing at him.

  He was expected to carry them. Somehow, that had not occurred to him. They were twice the size of the ferrets his brother had kept to hunt rabbits. Another nip. He knelt, and they swarmed up his legs, clambering and clinging to the heavy quilted trousers, hooking onto his outer coat, tasting buttons, snuffling and exploring, One settled herself on his shoulders, long warm body wound scarfwise about his throat. The other curled herself into the crook of his arm. He stood, and she leaped neatly onto the top of the saddlebags.

  Ahead of him, the door was hazy: a shadow of dark oak and iron rivets bound into a surround of golden stone. It rippled, drifting in the yeast-heavy air. A neat iron ring was set about halfway down it, cast in the form of a wreath of ripe wheat. It was warm to his touch, even through his gloves, moving easily and silently. The door swung open onto a rock passageway. The sides glimmered, mica crystals in long swaths reflecting the low amber light. Underfoot, the ground was uneven. Jehan inhaled and stepped forward. The twin around his neck, whichever one it was, pressed close. Was that meant as approval or reassurance? Or was she herself afraid? He could not tell. His footfalls fell dull on the rock, caught by it and swiftly silenced. Clairet’s hoofs were muffled. Warm air filled his nose and throat, making him cough in surprise. The shoulder-mounted twin—he decided arbitrarily that it was Julana—dug her claws in to steady herself. He muttered, “Sorry.” As Clairet’s tail cleared the entrance, the door swung itself shut behind them. Looking back, he found himself staring into darkness. No way back.

  The steppe would be no better. He set his jaw and stepped forward along the passage. It led downward, shallow and straight. Follow the light. At first it seemed that the walls were its source, that the light radiating from within them through the myriad crystals. But as his eyes adjusted, he realized that it was at its strongest in front of him. Like the door, it was shadowy, tidal, changing from instant to instant. As they walked, on and on, he lost all sense of time. The passage gave no hints as to its extent, its depth. The soft light clouded and shrouded and silenced. At his back, Clairet followed steadily, her breathing calm. He was too warm in his tundra layers. He wriggled his shoulders, and Julana burrowed closer to his neck; he shrugged off his outer coat, folded it over an arm. When he reached for his scarf, his hands met fur. Julana twitched under his hand, then long teeth tasted him. He pulled back. “If you want to be carried, don’t bite.” This time she allowed him to tug the scarf loose.