by Glenda Larke
Gelder rolled the gems in his fingers and held them up to the light. “Good gems. But dangerous work. Armsmen know we be helping outsider, we in trouble.” He turned to Umber. “We keep in the family, eh?”
To Jasper’s surprise, Umber grinned. “Gladly.”
Gelder looked across at Marrake. “And I don’t want to be hearing any rumours, understand?” He added something in Khromatian that was probably a threat.
Marrake nodded and smiled, but no amusement reached his eyes. He slipped down from the sofa. “My job is done. I’ll leave ye here,” he said to Jasper. “Good luck. Ye’ll need it.” He clasped Jasper by the hand and while Gelder and Umber were conversing in their own tongue, he whispered, “Trust the son, not the father.”
After Marrake had gone, Gelder took the sapphires and left Umber and Jasper together to plan their departure.
“Ye overpaid him, ye know,” Umber said. “So come with me while I choose the best damn hacks we have in the stable to be making up for it.”
Jasper smiled slightly as they left the house in the direction of the stables. “I hope you’re telling the truth because I wouldn’t know the difference. I’ve never ridden an alpiner before.”
“Really? Well then, ye’re going to be the sorriest young man this side of the Variega Mountains by the time we reach the pass. Ye’ll be sore enough to be killing your mount and walking.”
“I’ll survive.”
“I’ll get ye a steady beast with no tricks.”
“Why did you just tell me your father is a cheat?”
“Perhaps because I loathe the bleeding rotten bastard. I stayed on the farm up till now because of my mother. If I’d left, he’d have beaten her to death one day, and I couldn’t persuade her to be leaving. But she died earlier this year, and now I’m looking for a way to get out of here without losing everything that’s owed me.” He grinned at Jasper again, but the expression held more grimace than joy. “There’s never been much love in his pile, I can tell ye. Why do ye think young Erith skedaddled? My grandfather was even worse than Gelder. People in these parts say Erith was the best of the bunch, but wild.” He waved a hand at the building they were heading for. “Generally the Greys treat alpiners and eels better than themselves. We’ll ride out of here without showing Gelder which hacks we take, I think. When do ye want to leave?”
“Now.” Jasper pointed to the pack he had with him. “I have everything I need.”
“I haven’t even had my breakfast yet!” Umber protested, and then he threw back his head and laughed. “Lord Shale, I believe ye’re a man after my own heart.” Suddenly sober, he added, “Ye do know we could die? The Verdigris family are strong in magic. Ruthless, vicious bastards. The moment your girl doesn’t have the protection of magic, she’s dead. If we’re caught, we’re dead, too.”
“Then why did you agree to guide me?”
“Because I want out of this place. Because the idea of a man so in love that he’ll risk everything for his woman appeals to something in me. Maybe the same thing that had Erith die for Sienna. Because for once, I want to be doing something other than feeding eels and breeding alpiners.” He shrugged. “I’ve always wanted an adventure, and now I’ve got it. I’m good with a sword, by the way. And I’m a waterlord, so I suppose we can give them a fight if it comes to a confrontation.”
Jasper, who’d made no mention of Terelle being “his woman,” blushed and hastily changed the subject. “You’re a Watergiver?”
“Yes, didn’t ye know? If a person’s personal name is a colour of some sort, ye know they were granted that name as a youngster, when they were identified as a Watergiver.”
“I know umber is a colour, but Bice?”
He laughed. “Yes. And Jet and Rubric and Hue.” He glanced at Jasper as they walked up to the stable entrance. “We usually choose our own names. Umber is a clay pigment. Heat it up and it becomes more intense. That still describes me. Jet has a black heart, as his name implies. And Hue? Not one colour, but all. Delusions of grandeur even in his name. And ye, Shale? Rainlord, huh?”
Jasper nodded, but his heart sank. Salted hells, what have I got myself into now? He had to trust a Watergiver, and it felt like a rotten idea. “Stormlord, actually. One step up.”
“We don’t make that distinction. I guess I’ll find out your skills as we go along. And ye don’t speak our tongue?”
He shook his head.
“Never mind. I’ll do the talking along the trail. Dressed like that, ye can pass for one of us—just don’t open your mouth.”
As Umber turned to give orders to the stable hands about the alpiners, Jasper raised his gaze to the distant mountain peaks. Somewhere on the other side of them was Terelle. Soon he’d feel her presence again, like a tantalising whisper on the wind, a whisper that spoke to him of her water. He must, because if there was no touch of her, it might mean she was dead…
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Khromatis
Low Plateau Pale, Verdigris Manor
Rubric always knocked and waited for Terelle to give him permission to enter. He came every day, usually staying the run of a sandglass. Vittia came at the same time to clean, to bring Terelle clean clothes and more water, but her tasks were quickly done. Sometimes Rubric also came when her lunch was delivered, choosing to sit and eat with her.
Terelle had to admit it was the highlight of her day; ironic when she considered how much he exasperated her, always irritating but rarely explaining anything. He was like an itch you couldn’t scratch. She did bless his kindness, though, in bringing her board-books to read. Without those, she might have been bored out of her mind. They were written in Khromatian, but their alphabet was similar and deciphering it helped her to learn the language. Rubric continued with her spoken lessons, drilling her over and over until word patterns became automatic, until she was actually thinking in Khromatian, even dreaming in it. Occasionally they dropped back into the Quartern tongue, but it was no longer necessary.
At first, she concentrated on resting and healing; later she returned to her old dance routines to keep her muscles toned. And every day she begged to see Lord Jade again.
“She’ll come one day,” Rubric assured her every time she asked. Once he added, “When she comes to terms with seeing one of her sons hitting a woman in the face, with knowing her youngest and most beloved offspring has been a party to killing a number of innocent Alabasters, and with her husband having revealed himself to be the unscrupulous monster he is.”
And still the days went by without her seeing the waterpainter again.
“What about the danger I represent by being here?” she asked. “How can she not worry over that? Rubric, I’ve no desire to hurt you, or her, or Azure and the children. Yet everyone here is in danger from me.” It was a lie, but she put into her voice all the horror she remembered from the Scarcleft earthquake. “You have to let me go, or risk your house falling down around your ears in order to free me from this room. You have told your mother this?”
“Yes. She’d never heard of anyone causing an earthquake with paint before.”
“Oh, stop being so flippant. Perhaps your waterpainters are more ethical and cautious about what they paint and how they paint it. The person who did the painting that caused the earthquake wasn’t. And he’s the same person who did the last painting of me.”
“I’ll pass that on to my mother.”
“When are you returning to Marchford?”
“Soon. We’ve only lingered this long because Jet caught the grippe from the children and has been too sick and feverish to ride. Fevers can’t be cured by waterpainting. He’s getting better and we should be off in a day or two.”
Her heart lurched sickeningly at her anticipated loneliness. “I’m not sure why, but I’ll miss you,” she said.
“Really? Come to think of it, I’ll miss our conversations too.”
“There is so much I still don’t know.”
“Like what?”
“Like why Khro
matians hate Alabasters so much. Like why you are so secretive and protect your borders from intrusion so assiduously. So many questions.”
“You never stop trying to learn things, do you? Always probing and digging and looking for rational answers. I bet you’re more often disappointed than satisfied.”
“Only when Rubric Verdigris won’t tell me stuff I want to know.”
He laughed. “Oh, all right. Here’s a summary of our religious history to answer your first question. And bear in mind that this is boring stuff I had to listen to in school when I was more interested in beating the mockery out of other boys in the playground.
“Our faith started in the highest mountains, where all our rivers originate, among the Alabasters, did you know that?”
Terelle shook her head.
“They were the pious ones who taught us to stop worshipping devils and demons, and turn to the one true God, the Source of all water, the giver of life. Men made pilgrimages there to hear God speak in the Source, where it bubbled from the mountain as a small stream. All this is several thousand years ago, you understand.”
She nodded.
“In those days, God really spoke to people. His voice issued forth through the water. Thousands of believers went on pilgrimages there and heard the voice of God. The Alabasters grew rich on the gold brought by the pilgrims. They built cities. They mined the mountains. They made things from the metals they found. They changed from simple mountain folk to greedy merchants. They tossed their rubbish and their poisons and their sewage into the rivers so that it spread throughout Khromatis, into every corner of the land. People died of poisoning and in plagues spread by the filth. The Alabasters said we brown folk didn’t matter, only the white-skinned were pure.
“So God became angry. He told pilgrims he would not speak to them until the land he had granted them was pristine again. His voice vanished from the Source. In their anger at the Alabasters for what they had done, the lowlanders rose up against them. Wars were fought. The Alabasters lost because we had Watergivers and they didn’t. Their cities were razed flat to the ground and their mines were closed. They were banished from the mountains they had defiled. Religious leaders say that when God speaks again, it’ll mean the Alabasters are forgiven and can return. The stories say the Alabasters were remorseful and agreed to their own punishment and exile. They have lived in the hope of their return.”
“Let me guess what happened next—the Khromatians suddenly found they missed all the metals and metalworkers. That was when they brought back the Alabasters to do the work in the Southern Marches. Right?”
“Something like that.”
“I hate to tell you, but your manufactories are making a poisonous mess of the Southern Marches.”
“Ah, but those lowlands weren’t part of our original land at the time when God spoke to us, so our leaders—in their infinite wisdom—don’t care about the pollution down there.”
“Nice.” She sat pondering the story in view of what she knew about the Alabasters.
“Nothing else to say?” he taunted. He sat on the window ledge, precariously balanced yet wholly at ease.
“A harsh sort of god,” she said, “one who punishes generations that had nothing to do with the crime.”
“People do that all the time. Punish you for things you’ve no control over. Like being born poor or… different.” His sardonic bitterness was back.
“Do you believe the story you just told?”
He shook his head.
“What do you believe in, then?”
“I guess… in justice. That somewhere after this life there is justice. Compensation for suffering.” He laughed. “How mad is that?”
She didn’t think it was mad at all, but said nothing.
“Your second question—about why we protect our borders so… assiduously. That has a history, too. It comes from the time when the world changed. You had your Time of Random Rain. Over the Giving Sea, whole cities vanished under the oceans. To the east of us, people starved because they were sea fishermen and there were no fish to catch. Terrible things happened. The priests say we were protected from the worst of it by God because we’d exiled the Alabasters. I think it’s more that we were sheltered by the mountains. Anyway, the only thing that threatened us was all the people trying to come into our land to save themselves from thirst and starvation—or drowning by the oceans. Watergivers and the army served to keep all comers out. A simple story.”
“A cruel one.”
“It is, isn’t it? When starving people knock, you lock the door. We’ve been like that ever since.”
She changed the subject. “You’ve never told me the real reason your mother was so upset when I asked if she’d teach me how to use painting to heal.”
He altered his position to lean back against the window frame, one foot on the ledge and his hands clasped around his bent knee. He gazed out over the garden, but his eyes were devoid of any awareness of what was out there. Then he sighed and turned back to her. “She dreamed once of having a daughter, one who would be a waterpainter. Someone she could teach, not just to heal, but also to produce paintings of beauty and intensity. I failed her on both counts.”
“Those are her works on the walls downstairs?” She had a vague recollection of seeing paintings in the entrance hall.
He nodded. “She is the greatest artist of our Pale. She is also our greatest healer.”
“Oh? Then I’d have thought people would flock to your door. But I haven’t noticed that you have many visitors.” From her room, she had a near perfect view of who came and went.
“My father doesn’t like it, but she did convert a room at the back of the house where she does her painting, overlooking the kitchen gardens. It’s quiet and she can receive patients there without them coming through the main part of the house. Mostly they’re just friends and neighbours.”
She blinked, hiding the burst of joy inside her. I know where to find paints.
He didn’t notice. “It’s sad my father won’t let her pursue her talents—to run a hospice, perhaps, or to exhibit her art in the Peak. He thinks it beneath the dignity of a Verdigris to be an artist, let alone heal any farmer or ditch digger who needs it.”
“And she accepts the limitations he places on her?”
“What else can she do?”
She snorted. “I can think of plenty of things I’d rather do than stay married to Bice Verdigris.”
“It really is none of your business.”
“No, you’re right. But don’t expect an apology. She could teach me.”
“Instead of me? You think you’d make up for a son who was so—so disappointing to her? Besides, what use would it be to you to know how to heal? You’re going to die right here, in this house.”
Terelle glared at him. “Well, I don’t believe that, do I? I believe the magic of a waterpainting will get me out of here—possibly to the detriment of the Verdigris family.”
He slipped down from the sill to lean against the wall, arms folded, feet crossed at the ankle, one of his favourite postures: the couldn’t-care-less-pose.
She reverted to what they’d been talking about previously. “Your mother loves you deeply as you are. She changed your appearance, didn’t she? To match what you know yourself to be. Is that not an act of great love?”
He paled and stood bolt upright. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“No? Doesn’t your mother’s waterpainting skill have something to do with the way you look now?”
His silence lasted so long she wondered if he was going to reply at all. Finally, he whispered, “How did you know?”
“I’m a painter. I see things most don’t. And then, I was also brought up in a snuggery. One of the handmaidens there was more feminine than me. And yet her body wasn’t female.”
“Ironic, isn’t it? At my birth, my mother thought she had what she wanted: a daughter. Trouble was, the girl grew up to be a boy in all ways—except the ways that count for men like my
father. My mother? She loved me enough to waterpaint me the way I want to be, the way I felt myself to be, at least externally. Hundreds of paintings. Tiny little changes, year after year after year. Or sometimes not so much changes but keeping me the way I was.” He ran a hand over the flatness of his chest. “And I worked hard to become the swordsman I wanted to be. The muscles are real.”
“She did a wonderful job. You both did.” She tilted her head appreciatively. It was a snuggery handmaiden look.
“Stop it!”
She flushed. “Sorry. I must admit I’m amazed your father ever allowed you to become an armsman.”
“My mother said he had to, or she’d leave him and…” He paused. “Let’s just say there are things he wouldn’t want the world to know about his business dealings; things my mother knows.”
“She must love you deeply. And yet you aren’t happy.”
“Why should I be happy? I’ll never be completely the person I want to be.” He shrugged. “I could live with that, be happy even, if everyone else could accept what I am. But the world doesn’t work that way. My religion tells me I sin, although I’m blessed if I know how. My father loathes me. My brothers think I’m a joke. If I display compassion or mercy, they call me girlie. My fellow arms-men ridicule me to my face even though I can match them in half a dozen ways. No matter how good I am, it’s never good enough. And have you any idea how many times I’ve had to ward off unwanted attention from other males who profess to be better men than me? The only way I’ve saved myself from rape is with my waterlord power. What I am grieves my mother. Should I be happy?”
“I’m sorry. I guess it’s hard for me to imagine what your life’s been like. Back where I come from, it wouldn’t matter. Not even the waterpriests care about such things. Oh, there’ll always be some who are contemptuous of snuggery men and women, but mostly who you are, and what you do with who you are, is no one’s business but your own—unless you interfere with the worship of the Sunlord. Then it becomes the business of the waterpriests.”
