by J. S. Bangs
She shook her head. This already sounded like something she didn’t want. “Brother, what am I supposed to do if I go ahead of you? A young woman, a slave. I don’t carry She Who Devours, and I can’t devour anyone. Who would be afraid of me?”
Kirshta laughed. “Half of power is simply convincing others that you have it.”
“But I don’t.”
Kirshta watched the east. His scratched at the rattan of the chair. “Today I devoured one man whole and took another’s name. The rumor of what happened will spread quickly. Half the countryside will be in terror of me within three days. You go on under my name, and you’ll find that it doesn’t matter if you have the power to devour men. Your brother is the Mouth of the Devourer. That’s power enough.”
“Do you think so?”
Kirshta smiled. He limped to the edge of the portico, looking into the darkness. The evening breeze rustled the silk screen.
“I wonder,” he said quietly.
He didn’t finish. Vapathi waited, then rose and crossed the portico to join him. “What, my brother?”
“The monsoon is coming,” Kirshta whispered.
“Not this soon. Not this far west.”
“It comes up from the Bounded Sea. She wants it. And if I…”
He leaned against one of the wooden beams of the porch. His eyes closed, and both of his hands closed over the post. He breathed in deeply.
“Kirshta—”
He raised his hand in warning. “That name was devoured,” he hissed. “Never say it. Now help me.”
Holding himself upright with his left hand, he stretched his right toward the east. He closed his eyes and breathed heavily.
“Hold up my arm,” he whispered to Vapathi.
She came alongside him and supported his elbow in her palms. Kirshta breathed heavily. The breeze stiffened, stirring up the sound of rustling palm leaves and waves on the shore. A throaty gasp sounded from Kirshta’s throat.
All at once the breeze became a gale. The silk screens over the porch snapped and tore. The wind howled, tearing at the corners of the house and the leaves of the trees. The crashing of waves on the shore was thunder. In the gloom, a column of black mist the thickness of a man’s arm swirled into Kirshta’s mouth. His eyes were closed, his lips drawn back, his hair thrashing in the violent wind. Leaves ripped from the palms on the shore, tumbled past, and smacked into the screens. The sound of screaming winds and rattling thatch.
And it stopped as quickly as it had begun. Kirshta fell to his knees, coughing. He gasped, and a whimper of pain dribbled from his mouth. “Vapathi,” he moaned.
She grabbed his hands, pulled him upright, and guided him to his chair. He collapsed into the seat with a moan and rested his head in his hands. She knelt next to him and stroked his arm.
“Vapathi,” he said again. A smile crept over his lips. “That was not as hard to swallow as I feared it would be.”
“What was it?”
“The monsoon.” He laughed. “She Who Devours has eaten the monsoon. Let’s see how the khadir fare when there is no rice.”
Navran
Navran stood in the antechamber of his bedroom and waited for his wife to meet him.
He hadn’t spoken to her all day, and if past trends held she wouldn’t speak a word at dinner either, despite the fact that her father was joining them. As near as Navran could tell she was naturally taciturn, barely speaking even to her maid, so she couldn’t be expected to say much at the best of times.
The curtain which separated the antechamber from the queen’s room rustled, and Utalni stepped out. She had a small, square face and a wide mouth. Her hair was bound in a bun at the base of her neck in the Uluriya style. Her maid had dressed her in a suitably queenly fashion, with heavy sari of shimmering green and deep blue slippers. She glanced at Navran, then looked down in embarrassment and bowed slightly.
“Navran-dar, my lord and king,” she murmured. She stood with her head bowed and did not look at him.
“Utalni-dar, my queen,” Navran said. “You’re well?”
She glanced up at him, flashing deep black eyes, and nodded.
He sucked in a breath. It seemed there should be more to say. His time with Josi had never suffered from such awkward silences—Josi would fill them all, letting Navran speak or be silent as much as he wished—oh, but he shouldn’t have let his mind go that way. A throb of pain lanced through him, a rush of longing and regret. He missed her.
He shuffled in place, looked at the top of Utalni’s downcast head, and sighed. There was nothing to do except go to dinner.
“Dastha,” he said with a brief gesture to his guard standing at the door of the antechamber. Dastha nodded and started out, and he and Utalni followed.
They were the last to enter the dining chamber, as custom demanded. The guests rose as he and the queen entered: Veshta and Srithi together to the right of the dais, while Yavada sat on the left next to his daughter. Beyond him waited Gaudam, the Uluriya man who held the rings of Manjur while Navran paid back his loan, along with his wife. Bhudman, the elderly saghada who advised Navran on matters of religion and ritual, was the last one around the table.
They bowed to Navran in unison, then a silver bell chimed and Navran, Utalni, and the rest of the room sat down on the cushions provided for them. Servants entered with trays of spiced lamb stew and yellow rice from Paidacha’s legendary kitchen, and the eating and the talking began.
“Navran-dar, any word from Davrakhanda regarding Mandhi?” Veshta asked in a pause between bites of stew-soaked roti.
“None,” Navran said with some dismay. “Only the promise that Sadja-daridarya, whose name we say with fear and trembling, would respond.”
Srithi looked troubled. “I, for one, really want to know why Mandhi didn’t write you back herself. And why we have to wait for the Emperor to respond. Something is amiss.”
“Doubtlessly his response is on its way,” Yavada broke in from Navran’s left. “Majasravi is very far away.”
Veshta answered. “But why not write back from Davrakhanda? Mandhi herself could write, or the regent that the Emperor appointed there. I forget his name—”
“Ashturma-kha,” Navran said.
“Well, one of them.”
“Something happened,” Utalni said, so quietly only Navran could hear.
She stared down at her plate, her hand tearing uselessly at the corner of her roti, only a few bites of stew touched. She made no effort to look up at the others in the conversation. Navran nearly told her to speak up, then he remembered his own reluctance to speak publicly when he had first been thrust into the company of these men. He spoke up for her.
“The queen says something happened. Some mistake.”
In the corner of his eye, he noticed a grateful glance from Utalni to him.
Srithi drew her breath in sharply. “I know. I mean, I was afraid of that, but—what could have happened?” She kneaded Veshta’s hand fiercely.
“We’ll find out soon enough,” Yavada said. “I never met the woman, but if she’s half as fearsome as her reputation in this place—”
“Ow,” Veshta said, loudly enough to disturb Yavada’s speech. Navran glanced over and saw Srithi’s nails digging into his palm, with Veshta pulling at her wrist to get her to release him. Then he saw Srithi’s face, her body rigid, her eyes wide, her mouth half-open in a frozen scream.
There was silence around the dining room. Srithi spasmed.
Her foot kicked aside the tray of food in front of her. She folded in half, smashing her forehead against the wood of the table, then she released Veshta’s hand and clasped her hands together into a knot before her chest. She spoke in a low, rough voice, like a scream half-strangled in her throat.
“Woe, woe, woe to the silver and the night. A sign grows within my body, conceived beneath the blood star: a child of warning, child of promise. He will be the first of ten thousand, born as a sign to mend what is broken and break what is whole. He will be the last
of ten thousand, never to eat the rice of his father’s land, but to witness its cleansing. Burn the fields and scatter the seed.”
A terrible retching sound came out of her throat. Her back arched and she threw herself away from the table, hitting the back of her head against the stone floor.
Veshta bellowed and scrambled to her side. Her eyes had disappeared beneath her shivering eyelids, and her hands pawed mindlessly at the air. He lifted her off the ground and cradled her in his arms, holding her head in his palms lest she twitch and strike herself on the stone again.
“Bring the palace doctor,” Navran snapped to Dastha standing behind him. He leaped down from the dais and knelt at Veshta’s side. Yavada and Bhudman closed around Srithi’s quivering form.
“She’ll be fine. Be fine,” Veshta repeated, not releasing his grasp on her head.
“We should take her to a private room,” Bhudman said quietly. “Let her rest.”
“Do it,” Navran commanded. He closed a hand over Srithi’s wrist and nodded to Veshta. Veshta’s eyes quivering with tears, he lifted Srithi and carried her out with the king.
* * *
Srithi slept on a mat laid out on the floor, the golden light of an oil lamp washing over her form, her face returned to an expression of sleeping peacefulness. One of Navran’s maids crouched holding her hand, while Bhudman sat on a stool in the corner of the chamber, watching Srithi with avuncular concern. Veshta paced madly from one end of the room to the other, periodically chewing his thumb, sending stormy, fretful glances between Srithi and Bhudman. He glanced once at Navran, then looked away.
“Do you think it’s true?” he said after a moment.
Bhudman shifted atop the stool and touched his knuckle to his forehead. “What’s true, Veshta?”
“What she said. About being pregnant.”
Bhudman let out a gravelly murmur. “You would know better than I whether that could be the case.”
Veshta grunted. He paused in his pacing and looked over at Navran, who stood near the doorway, then shook his head. “This can’t go on. We can’t….”
“What?” Bhudman asked.
“She can’t have another child. Not if she’s like this.” He pointed accusingly at her lamp-lit silhouette.
“Happen often?” Navran asked.
Veshta clenched his jaw and shrugged. “What is ‘often?’ There have been a handful of attacks like this since the night of the red star. The stars upon her, no one has seen them except for me and others of the household.” He glanced at Navran, then put a hand over his eyes in shame.
“Have you written them down?” Bhudman asked.
“Written what down?”
“Her prophecies.”
Veshta’s eyes grew wide and he gaped at Bhudman with an expression of horror. “You can’t be serious.”
Bhudman laughed. “Why can’t I be serious? Ulaur has sent an amashi to give her the gift of prophecy. We would be remiss to refuse it.”
“I am trying to save my wife,” Veshta snapped. “To put an end to her fits. Not to write down her babbling.”
“I suspect that her fits will end when Ulaur sees fit to take this burden from her, and not before,” Bhudman said. “Do you scorn the gifts of the fire of ages?”
A grimace twisted Veshta’s face, as if he wanted to curse but couldn’t quite bring himself to do it in front of Bhudman. “And what would you have me do?”
“Write down what Srithi says. And bring the writings to me.”
“I want to see them, too,” Navran said.
“Why?” Veshta hissed. “So you can mock me?”
“Veshta,” Bhudman said quietly, “are any of us mocking you? The Heir of Manjur wishes to take advantage of the gift of Ulaur to your household.”
“My household.” Veshta’s grimace melted. He put his thumb to his temples, and he seemed to suppress a sob. “Couldn’t it have come to a different household?”
“Do not reject the holy gift,” Bhudman said quietly. “We need it, or else Ulaur would not have given it to us.”
Veshta answered with a voice suddenly turned hoarse. “I don’t even remember what she said today. Aside from the part about having a child.”
“I do,” Navran said.
Bhudman dipped his head. “Speak, my lord and king, and I will correlate your words with what I recall.”
Navran nodded. “She said she was with child. The baby will be a sign to break something and mend something. It won’t eat his father’s rice. The field will be burned.”
“That last part is separate. Burn the field and scatter the seed.” Veshta looked up and briefly met Navran’s gaze with his burning eyes. “She’s said that before. Says it every time she has a fit.”
“So I recall as well,” Bhudman said. “I remember the prophecy has two parts. First, the child would be first of a multitude, with the mending of what is broken and the breaking of what is whole. Second, the child will be the last of a multitude, and will never eat the rice of his father. The statement to burn the field and scatter the seed comes as a coda.”
“I don’t even have any rice fields,” Veshta muttered.
“I suspect that father is meant allegorically,” Bhudman said. “In any case, I’ll write it down. Next time, whoever is with her must make great effort to write down her words exactly, since the precise choice of words may be important.”
Veshta’s shoulders slumped. “A child,” he whispered. “So soon.”
“How old is Gapthi?” Navran asked.
“A year and some.”
“She’ll be nearly two by the time Srithi gives birth again, unless her pregnancy is further along than I suspect. That is not too soon to have a second child.”
“But in her condition?”
Bhudman nodded. “Perhaps… as the pregnancy progresses you might confine her to a place where she can always be cared for. Prevent her from taking a fall. Or perhaps her ‘child’ is also a prophetic image, she actually isn’t pregnant at all, and we’ve leaped too quickly to a conclusion.”
“Find out soon,” Navran said. “Ask her maid. She might already know but not have told you yet.”
Bhudman rose to his feet with a groan, leaning on the cane in his left hand. “I will go fetch a tablet on which to write down Srithi’s prophecy. Veshta, will you be here?”
“Until she awakes.”
Bhudman nodded. “When you return to the House of the Ruin, I will to come with you. See what you and your household remember of Srithi’s past prophecies.”
For a moment Veshta’s face seemed to stiffen into anger. But he nodded. “If you must.”
Bhudman shuffled out of the room, leaving Navran and Veshta alone for a moment. A swirl of desire rose up in Navran’s gut. He shouldn’t ask, he was just begging to put himself into pain—but neither could he resist.
“How is Josi?”
Veshta gave him a sharp glance, then a wary smile showed through his worry. “Married shortly after you. I thought I told you.”
“You did. To Peshdana. But now… how is she?”
Veshta breathed heavily and gave Navran a piteous glance. “Well enough. She and Srithi visit each other often. Peshdana is kind to her. It was no great misfortune that befell her. Nor you. No, I’m sorry my lord and king, I should not have spoken so bluntly.”
Navran waved aside his concern. “At least her marriage is not misfortune.” He thought of Utalni in the queen’s chamber with a mixture of dread and pity.
Veshta looked at Srithi lying silently atop the straw-filled mat, then back at Navran. “Perhaps Josi cries when I don’t see her, but she seems to have made peace with her fortune. She was lucky to be married at all, at her age and in her condition—”
So he suffered alone. Navran turned away from Veshta and clenched his jaw against the pain like a knife between his ribs.
“—and she doesn’t weep for lost chances. And as for you, your wife is young, and her father your ally. What else do you want?”
“
That’s all,” Navran said. He walked out of the room before Veshta saw his tears.
The palace hall passed by in a blur. A sick, hot feeling sat in his gut like coals raked over his stomach. He charged through the door into his antechamber, scattering his valet and his guard with a furious glare. The door to the queen’s chamber was open when Navran passed by. Utalni sat on a cushion, and a maid brushed her hair.
He stopped. The maid paused, noticing Navran in the doorway, and Utalni turned her head. She gave him a little bow.
“My lord and king, is the woman well?” she asked.
Navran stood for a moment, his fists clenched, scalding misery bubbling inside him. He swallowed and found his tongue. “She’s well.”
“And you, my lord and king?”
He bowed his head, put his hands over his burning eyes, and pushed through the chamber into his room.
Mandhi
The town looked like every other they had visited since landing: a mish-mashed collection of sod houses, conical stone homes which tapered to blunt points, and one or two larger stone halls. There was nothing as organized as a street to be found anywhere. The paths between the huts were black mud and endless puddles, and the approach to the town was a narrow footpath on the soggy, moss-covered heath.
Jauda took the lead, with Mandhi and Nakhur following. The bronze sword at Jauda’s waist was the only thing that had prevented them from being stabbed and robbed already.
“What is the name of this village?” Mandhi asked.
“Hlaskeg,” Jauda replied. “Last one before Mabeg.”
Hlaskeg, Mabeg, Lurd, Danadl. All these names, as hard and bulky as stones, as ugly as the villages themselves. Mandhi scowled and pulled her heavy cloak over her shoulders against the damp. It was early summer in Kalignas, which apparently meant endless drizzle and cold, wet fog that rose every day off of the sea. Supposedly the sun appeared sometimes in this country, but Mandhi hadn’t yet seen proof of it.
She swore never to have anything to do with the Kaleksha again, as she had many times in the last several days. And then she remembered Taleg, and she repented, like every time before.
