Cordimancy

by Hardman, Daniel

  Toril finally took a step forward. Hika was whining. He stroked her head as he waved the flies away.

  “More of the brigands’ handiwork,” he managed, before doubling over to heave into the weeds.

  By the time he straightened up, Malena was dismounting, her face white with anxiety.

  “It’s not Tupa,” he said shakily. “It’s a girl, but not her.” He’d just spent two days burning the dead; he’d thought he was past this kind of reaction, but now he found there was still plenty of room for horror in his heart.

  Malena brushed past his outstretched hand, then stopped abruptly, turned back, and hid her face.

  They built a pyre at a level, wide place in the trail. The girl was light, but Toril still stumbled as he carried her. Despite fierce blinking, he could scarcely see. Dried rivulets in the dust on the girl’s cheeks provoked a speechless bitterness that surpassed even the emotion he’d felt as he buried his father.

  As flames rose, Shivi stepped forward. “Her name was Vahunira,” she murmured. “I helped birth her, and her twin brother.”

  After a time, Paka lifted his sitar from a saddlebag and began to pluck the strings. The tone was minor, the arpeggios slow. The quaver in his tenor was eloquent:

  Seed is sown ‘gainst winter’s grief,

  Sun and moisture soak the soil.

  Grain soon shows its bravest leaf,

  Then greens its way through wind and toil.

  Some strong of stem by fowl removed,

  Some withered in the field,

  Some, flood- or pestilence-consumed,

  Diminish autumn’s yield.

  Five above, with wisdom’s eye,

  See our tears and hear our prayer,

  Glean the fallen in your harvest;

  Sheaves together bind us there.

  Toril tried to join in, but he found himself capable of only broken croaking—or maybe, a full-throated scream. His hands were clenched; he could feel a pulse racing in his throat. He kicked at a rock on the trail, felt the sting in his toe. The pain brought his anger to a head. He kicked another rock, then bent to grab a branch and began beating it against the ground. The blows reverberated through his shoulders, straining muscle and tendon; the wood, as thick as his upper arm, had little give, and the bones in his hands and wrists shivered with each rebound.

  The resistance made him hit harder. He could hear himself sobbing, realized with a dull weariness that he looked crazy to his companions—but he couldn’t stop. He needed—needed!—to make the branch bend, break it to his will.

  The wood didn’t yield. He felt his muscles growing weary, felt blisters forming on his hands. Barely knowing what he was doing, he flung the branch down the mountainside with a shout of fury that sounded wild, even to his own ears, and bent forward, hands on his knees, his chest heaving.

  The blood left his face. His ears stopped pounding. He sensed a movement at his side, felt a touch on his arm.

  “Amen,” Shivi murmured, tears streaming down her own cheeks. “I couldn’t have prayed that better myself.”

  Toril was just swinging back into the saddle when he noticed an adult figure hurrying up the trail with a couple smaller shapes in tow. They were on foot, still far enough away to be anonymous—but they had apparently seen him, and waved to catch the riders’ attention.

  He glanced at his companions. Now that they’d done their duty to the dead child, everyone seemed eager to head for Sotalio. The sooner they left Noemi’s bones and smoke behind and surrounded themselves with normal human experience, the better.

  Paka grimaced. The priest shrugged his shoulders. Shivi nodded. Malena still wouldn’t meet his eye.

  He kicked his heels against the horse’s side and turned downhill with a sigh. Better to get this over with fast.

  In a short time he was facing a lean, salt-and-pepper bearded man sporting the knee-high boots and staff preferred by the goatherds that frequented the hills above town. Two gaunt, wide-eyed waifs peeked around his waist, mostly hidden by his patchwork cloak.

  “Toril ur Hasha?” the man said.

  “Yes.”

  “I live over by the copper mine.” He gestured to the children. “Niece and nephew survived the attack, and an old couple brought ‘em to me.” He looked up the trail over Toril’s shoulder, noticed Paka and Shivi, and nodded at them.

  “What can I do for you?”

  “I’m sorry Hasha walked the lone road,” the man said. “He was more than a good parijan head or clan chief; he was kind and fair. I met ‘im a time or two.”

  “Thank you,” Toril said. “I agree.”

  “Well. I came to tell you somethin’. Saw your smoke and realized I had to hurry or I’d miss my chance. I expect you’ll know what to do about it. Maybe you can pass it along to the clan chief when they pick a new one.”

  Toril raised his eyebrows, not wanting to detour into the current state of politics.

  “The kids don’t say much. Too scared. They hid under a bed while the bandits killed their parents. Heard the whole thing, and saw enough to give ‘em nightmares.”

  Toril said nothing.

  “Anyways, last night the girl mumbled somethin’ in her sleep that got me thinkin’. She said, ‘Don’t take him!’, over and over again, and then she woke up screamin’ and wouldn’t calm down till she saw her brother sleepin’ safe beside her.

  “I asked her ‘bout it this mornin’. She said she was dreamin’ that they took her brother like they took the others.”

  Toril waited for more explanation. When none was forthcoming, he frowned.

  “What others?”

  “That’s what I said. Took me a while to pry it out of her, but I guess she saw the robbers roundin’ up a few of the children.”

  “You mean they corralled some kids to make the killing easier?” Toril asked, his voice trembling.

  The goatherd shook his head. “No. She says men tied their hands together and threw them on horses like baggage.”

  “The children were alive?” Toril asked. “The bandits carried them off?” He looked at the girl, who had grabbed a corner of the goatherd’s coat and pulled it across her face, leaving only eyes and a tangle of ebony curls exposed.

  “Tupa!” Malena whispered hoarsely.

  Toril nodded to acknowledge the idea.

  The goatherd cleared his throat. “’Course, could just be the girl’s imagination,” he observed. “No doubt it’s easier to remember kids alive behind a saddle than dead in the streets. But I thought someone oughta know.”

  “Why would the bandits do such a thing?” Toril wondered aloud. “If they killed all the parents, they couldn’t hope for ransom. The kids would just slow them down on the trail...” He looked back at the smoke rising from the pyre, then at Malena. Dismounting again, he took a few steps and knelt in front of the girl. “Are you sure?” he asked, his voice soft.

  The girl nodded, then shrank behind her uncle.

  “This is important,” Toril continued, still addressing the girl. “I need to know what you saw. As much as you can tell me.”

  He waited for a moment.

  “Could it have been a grown-up that you saw tied up? Somebody short? Or could it have been one of the golden ones?”

  “They took Sahanir,” the girl whispered, shaking her head.

  “Sahanir?”

  “My friend. And Riva. And Tixepal. Children.” The girl had dropped the corner of the coat; her lips trembled.

  “I’m sorry,” Toril said gently. “I’m so glad you’re brave enough to tell me this.”

  “Can you get them back?” the girl asked, wiping a hand at the trickle on her cheek.

  “I can try,” Toril offered, unwilling to destroy her hope. “Maybe I can get some other men to help me. I wish I understood why the bandits would carry off a handful of kids.”

  “Lots,” the girl corrected. “Not a handful.”

  “Lots?”

  “Every man took one on his horse.”

  “We’re
not going to Sotalio now,” Malena insisted. “There’s no time.”

  “Nothing has changed!” Toril spluttered. “Before we heard the goatherd’s news, we knew we needed help to mount a rescue—and that’s still the case. In fact, it’s even more the case. You think we’re just going to sneak up on scores of the same men who burnt Noemi to the ground, snatch a bunch of children away, and ride off without a fight?”

  “We could do it at night. Be gone by morning.”

  “We’re going to wake kids up without a single one of them making a peep? Just slip away like phantoms? Think what it would be like to travel with children, Malena—dozens of them, maybe. We couldn’t go fast. They’d be terrified, hungry. What would we feed them? Out of the ashes in the valley, we scrounged enough food and gear for ourselves, not for lots of little ones. We only have the three horses, but even if we had horses for everyone, would they be able to ride well enough to follow? If they travelled on foot, they’d be painfully slow. We couldn’t cover their tracks. The bandits could sleep till noon and still catch us at their leisure.”

  Malena, who had dismounted while Toril was interviewing the goatherd, approached her husband and put the palms of her hands on his chest.

  “Use your magic,” she said. “They say you’re the strongest lip Kelun has seen in the last three centuries. You defeated your father in a duel. You brought me back! You’ll think of a way to use that power for the children.”

  Toril paled. He shook his head slowly. “I... I don’t think I can.”

  “I know I’m asking a lot,” Malena said. “But you have to try. We all have to. And we have to act now, before more children die, or the trail grows cold.” She squeezed his arms, and when he opened his mouth again, put her fingers on his lips. “You think I’m being unrealistic. But if that’s your concern, then I think you ought to admit some problems with the Sotalio plan as well.” She gestured at the staff, strapped to Toril’s saddle. “Have you really thought through what will happen when you ride into Rovin’s lair with that?”

  Toril’s cheeks puffed out in a sigh of exasperation.

  “My sister’s married to his cousin, Toril. I hear enough gossip to know how he’s insinuated himself into every center of influence, how he’s managed potential adversaries. Not just recently, Toril—for years! He wants that staff. I think you may have underestimated the lengths he’ll go to get it. We know he’s been whipping folk into a frenzy about a border war. If you go there, I guarantee you won’t walk out again with a friendly escort, on an errand of your choosing, with Rovin’s agenda unaddressed. Or if you do, it will be after days or weeks of wrangling. Not hours.”

  “I know it’s going to be ugly. But there has to be a way!” Toril rubbed a hand over his forehead, seized a handful of hair, and sighed.

  “Maybe you should just give him what he wants,” Paka offered. “The staff in exchange for men to back a rescue.”

  Toril looked at each of his companions in turn, gauging their reaction. “I don’t want the staff for power or prestige,” he murmured. “I took it under protest, at my father’s urging.” He took one of Malena’s hands. “His demand, really. But when I took it, I swore I’d put my people first. If I simply hand it over, men will die in this stupid war that Rovin is manufacturing. How can I let that happen?”

  “You’re speculating,” said Shivi. “Maybe saner heads will prevail in the war councils. Maybe not. But the men of our clan are not helpless, Toril. These children are. They’re part of the clan you swore to protect, too.”

  “Never forget the ‘helpless’ in the name you chose,” Gitám said. “Who is helpless?”

  “Malena.”

  Silence told Toril that his answer was inadequate.

  “Who? Am I forgetting someone?” he asked. “What do you want me to say?”

  “Keep asking that question, Toril—and ask who is not helpless, as well.”

  Toril’s brow furrowed.

  “A name is about choosing, Toril. You must know who you help, because you will have to make hard choices. Part of carrying your name is knowing which battles you should not fight. This is one of the trials in your ordeal.”

  “Fine,” Toril said bitterly. “I’ll trade the staff. Now let’s go, already.”

  Paka and the priest looked satisfied. Shivi was hard to read. But Malena shook her head. “I begin to see why Hasha trusted your motives,” she said, lips thinning. “Guile is not in your nature. But it is in Rovin’s. He won’t want to bargain with you. He’ll just confiscate the staff and throw you in a cell.”

  “He’ll need to show the public that he cares for the children of the clan,” Toril protested.

  “He has told everyone to prepare for war,” Malena said. “He can’t just suspend that order, on tenuous evidence, at the urging of a man that he claims is crazy. Besides, if he makes any concessions in exchange for the staff, he gives you legitimacy.”

  Shivi grimaced. Toril drew breath to protest, but Malena touched him on the arm again. “We don’t need good will and unity from Rovin. We just need men. And there is a better way to get them than bargaining.”

  “Such as?”

  “Go after the children yourself, but spread word of the kidnapping.” She gestured at the priest. “Send a spokesman. Have him argue that any other focus is heartless. Have him call Rovin a coward for not sending men to help you. Announce that you’ll relinquish the staff as soon as he shows that he deserves it. Then see what happens.”

  “I think I could do that,” the priest offered. “I’m not much for political intrigue, but my oratory’s pretty good. And I can get an audience.”

  Toril shook his head. “What if Rovin doesn’t react the way we’re hoping? Then we have to pull off a rescue by ourselves. I can’t do it. We have a better chance if I’m my own spokesman in Sotalio.”

  Malena cupped her palms around his chin and cheekbones. It was a gesture of tenderness and intimacy that wives and husbands sometimes used; he’d seen it often from his parents, but never experienced it himself, and he felt a quiver along his jaw at the unexpected pressure of smooth skin.

  Was his wife aware of the power of such a gesture? Did she know what it meant to him? She’d been unwilling to even touch his hand since he’d found her in the stable—and now she was putting her hands on his chest, and caressing his face?

  He could feel Malena’s fingertips trembling, too, as she stared into his eyes. “Remember when I said I get feelings about people, sometimes?” she whispered.

  He nodded as much as her hands would let him.

  “Well, Toril, I’ve got a feeling right now. The north pass, not the Sotalio road, is the way my parents would have gone as they headed home. The bandits had my sister’s horse. I need to go after my family and those children—now—if I want to live with myself later. And so do you. Trust me!” she breathed. “We can figure out how to use your magic on the way. Right now we have to go!”

  Reluctantly, he worked his fingers beneath hers, pulled her hands away, and stepped back. “We’re going to Sotalio,” he said firmly. “I can’t save the children on my own. We need help. I’ll make Rovin see reason, one way or another.”

  Malena wheeled around and walked back up the trail, her back stiff. But she didn’t stop when she reached Shivi and the waiting horse. Instead she pushed past, stumbling and then lurching into a trot as she recovered. The fork that turned west for Sotalio, or northeast toward the still smoking pyre, was a few hundred paces uphill, but even before Toril swung into his saddle, she was cutting right, across a switchback.

  Toril turned left, the muscles of his jaw stiff.

  17

  enchantments ~ Kinora

  As White Hair strode toward her horse, Kinora froze. The hunger, which had twisted her stomach until even moldy crust tasted sweet, faded into a dull ache—not gone, but overwhelmed by terror. She stopped chewing.

  “Do your business in the weeds!” the man hissed, stopping at the horse in front of her and seizing the rope that boun
d two boys together at the waist. He jerked them both out of the saddle and held them dangling for a moment, his arm showing no strain at the weight. The whites of the boys’ eyes flashed in their dirty, tear-stained faces as urine dripped from one leg. He shook the rope once for emphasis, then tossed the pair into the underbrush.

  The golden warriors who’d been slinking along the edges of the trail scattered to avoid tumbling children. One huffed in irritation, which seemed to enrage White Hair. Or Gorumim—Kinora had heard the men call him that enough that the other name was sinking in.

  “You have a problem?” he snapped.

  As she watched the warrior mumble a response, Kinora shifted in the cold, caustic puddle that she and the girl behind her had leaked together onto their own leather seat. Would she be next to incur his wrath? She thought of the stones that she’d piled into a crude quattroglyph at their last stop, and shivered, still amazed at her own boldness in leaving the sign. Would anyone find it?

  She scanned the near edge of the forest, looking for wolves. A handful of the oversized beasts were sleeping in the cart a few paces ahead, but at least one had shadowed them from the forest earlier in the day. She’d glimpsed its strange, striped coat repeatedly; twice, its knowing, bloodshot eyes had returned her gaze.

  The animals did not attack—Gorumim’s most detailed commands were met with perfect obedience for some reason she did not understand—but their power and malice were unmistakable.

  The only thing that stabbed deeper than her fear of the wolves was the panic she felt about Gorumim himself. She’d seen his face now a handful of times, and on each occasion, the cruelty that he radiated had become more obvious. Despite the white hair, she might have said he looked young—he had smooth cheeks, unblemished skin, and powerful, easy movements. Yet his gaze conveyed a world-weary flatness that felt old, even ancient. The eyes made him scarier in a way Kinora could not verbalize.

  Crouched in a tent the other night, she’d heard a scuffle, and spied through a seam as Gorumim killed two of the bad men the golden warriors had brought. He’d done it without hurry, binding them and then nicking their throats in a sort of meticulous dance, and despite her nausea and horror, Kinora hadn’t been able to look away as the men begged and screamed and then fell silent. When he had licked the lifeblood from their throats and begun to whisper, he’d looked up—and Kinora couldn’t decide who appeared more dead: Gorumim or his victims.