Chosen of the Changeling

by Greg Keyes

  “Well?” Ngangata inquired, rising from his haunches and shouldering his laminated bone bow.

  “War,” Perkar mumbled. “My people are at war with the Mang.”

  “Your people are always at war with the Mang,” Ngangata replied, though rather tentatively.

  “No. The Mang have always raided us, and we have always repelled them. But now my people have invaded the Ekasagata Valley and established damakutat to defend what they have taken.”

  “Why haven’t Brother Horse and his people heard of this?”

  “Perhaps they have,” Perkar said darkly.

  “No, I don’t believe that,” Ngangata disagreed.

  “Well, maybe they have heard rumors but assume it is the same sort of raiding that has always gone on. The border with my people is many hundreds of leagues away.”

  “True. And the Mang are not all one people. What troubles the Mang of the western plains need not have any effect on the Mang of the South.”

  “Except,” Perkar noted, “in times of war. Their confederacy exists for mutual protection and mutual raiding.”

  Ngangata shook his head unhappily. “This means trouble for us. Brother Horse may find it difficult to treat us with hospitality when the news arrives.”

  “Ngangata!” Perkar cried. “Hospitality! My people are dying, and it is my fault. You know that, you were there. The Forest Lord had agreed to give our king more land. Because of me, that offer was withdrawn and will never be made again. Now it seems, unable to expand west, my people have chosen to move into the Mang borderlands. My fault, all of it.”

  Ngangata regarded him for a moment. “Apad and Eruka—” he began.

  “Are dead,” Perkar finished. “I am the only one left to shoulder the blame. In any event, Apad and Eruka would have lacked the courage to do anything without me.”

  Ngangata’s face was grim. “I know that,” he replied. “I agree; much of the blame for this lies with you. But if I understand Piraku, you should be thinking of something to do about it, rather than blaming yourself over and over again—rather than telling me about your guilt yet again.”

  Perkar clenched his fist and shook it in Ngangata’s face. “And just what is it I can do?” he shouted. “How is it that I can set this right, resurrect those already dead, my father perhaps among them?”

  Ngangata watched the fist impassively. “If you don’t intend to hit me,” he growled, “unclench that.”

  For one awful, helpless moment, Perkar did want to hit the half man. But at last he let the fist drop, uncurling it. He was opening his mouth to apologize when his head yanked around of its own volition—or rather, Harka’s.

  “In the trees,” he suddenly whispered, just as an arrow struck him in the shoulder. He gasped at the impact, surprised that there was no more pain. He had a confused glimpse of Ngangata in motion, heard the dull flat whine of his bow.

  “Watch out!” Harka warned, as Perkar fumbled him out. The blade trailed out into the light, a sliver of aquamarine ice.

  As he stumbled back to his feet, his gaze was again drawn to the trees; another shaft whirred from them, though not in his direction. Ngangata—the likely target—was nowhere to be seen. Of more immediate concern were the two horsemen churning through the snow toward him, both mounted on striped Mang horses. The men were Mang, too, multiple braids indicating that they were warriors of some rank, the red-dyed horsehair plumes on their leather helmets a sign that they were at war. Perkar had never seen Mang at war until now. They looked like wolves.

  They bore down on him, one with a lance, the second with a short, curved sword. Perkar whooped at them, his father’s battle cry, and waited, Harka held steady with both hands. The arrow, he now guessed, had not penetrated more deeply than his outer flesh, halted by the thick coat of elk hide and the light lacquered armor beneath.

  He waited until they were nearly on him, and then suddenly darted to his right; both horsemen swerved, still hoping to catch him between them, but Perkar sank to one knee and cut through both front legs of the nearest horse. The animal shrieked piteously and pitched past him, into the snow, the rider sprawling over his mount’s neck.

  An absolute master of his steed, the second Mang pulled in tight, but had to strike awkwardly to reach Perkar. Perkar avoided the blow entirely, stepped up, and slashed deeply into the warrior’s leg. The man uttered no sound, but his face registered a vast surprise as the blade sliced through the heavy lacquered layers of wood, bone, and leather that protected his thigh.

  Perkar turned back to his first opponent, who was rising to his feet, murder on his face. Unfortunately for him, his lance was too long to bring around effectively, and though he managed to graze Perkar’s shoulder, he soon held only a wooden pole, the steel blade severed from it by a quick blow from Harka. The Mang shot one glance at his mutilated steed, snarled, and hurled himself weaponless at Perkar, though a knife flapped against his hip. Harka took him in the heart, yet the man remained on his feet for a few instants, the purest look of hatred Perkar had ever seen only reluctantly replaced by death’s cold gaze.

  The second man was lying on his horse’s neck, teeth clenched; as Perkar watched, the blade dropped from his hand into the blood-spattered snow. The horse itself pranced nervously, as if unused to having no direction.

  Another shaft sped past Perkar, but almost at the same moment, he heard a sharp cry from the direction of the trees. He crouched behind the quivering body of the downed horse, waiting for more attacks, but none came, and Harka remained still and quiet.

  After a moment, Ngangata emerged, cautiously, from a clump of trees. “Are there more?” he asked, eyes nervously picking through the valley.

  “I don’t think so. Harka?”

  “No more. But there is someone else.”

  “What?” Perkar turned to Ngangata. “Harka says no more Mang, but there is someone else.”

  Ngangata nodded. “Someone killed the archer.”

  “Ah. I thought you did that.”

  “No,” Ngangata denied.

  Perkar drew a deep breath. “Come out, if you are a friend. If not, ride on.”

  There was a pause, and then a stirring in the trees. The figure of a man emerged and began walking leisurely toward them.

  “That,” Harka informed him, “is not Human.”

  IV

  The Godsight

  She stood beneath a leaden sky, the vastness of the River stretched before her. Those waters seemed a perfect reflection of the obscure heavens—his substance seemed dense, as if it were really polished slate or beveled steel—and it radiated a cold strength that numbed and quickened her simultaneously.

  She bent closer, touched her finger to the dark water, then gasped when she saw impressions upon the surface, as if invisible objects lay pressed upon the skin of the River God. Nearest was a hollow shaped like a water scorpion, so clear that she could even make out the delicate patterning of its plated underbelly. There, a trumpet-cuttlefish, long tapering horn of its shell smooth, the tentacles and a single large eye pressed in relief. And there—she gasped and looked away from the detailed mold of her cousin D’en’s face, as she had last seen it, with his eyes on stalks, like those of a crab.

  Trembling, she turned from the River, but looking away, she felt less comfort than ever. Four masked priests strode toward her, grim-faced, swinging their water cans and spirit-brooms. In front of them came Yen, the young engineer who had playfully courted her, only to reveal himself as a coldhearted assassin named Ghe. Behind those five figures were a hundred others, obscured by a veil of mist, but all threatening her, all intent on locking her away. As panic whetted keen in her breast, however, she felt something cross her toes; she looked down to see what it might be.

  It was a tiny snake, no bigger than a worm. It shimmered in iridescent colors, and something about it made her happy, promised to protect her from her enemies. She stooped and picked up the small reptile, and, on impulse, she swallowed it.

  I have just swallowed
a snake. She wondered, Now, why did I do that?

  At that moment, the snake stirred in her belly. Then lightning seemed to course out into her arms. The gray waters rushed into her toes, and as she watched, the River began to drop in level, even as the worm in her grew and grew, as the greedy serpent heads that her toes had become drank and drank. The River was drying up, but it was entering her, and with a cold horror she felt the weight of his vast sentience crushing her own, squeezing her like a giant’s fist. But part of her was delighted to at last have the power to destroy any who threatened her, who wished her harm …

  The revulsion was stronger than the joy. Shrieking, she spit the snake out, and with it went her power, as the water flowed back into the River and returned it to its former level. But then she saw something else, a thing by a small stony cairn, and the horror began again …

  Until she awoke, fingers balled into fists, wondering where she was. She sat thus for long, terrible moments as it all came back to her. A dream, a dream, a dream, she repeated to herself, but she knew it for more than that. It was really a distorted memory of what had actually happened scant months ago, when the River tried to manifest in her frail body and had very nearly succeeded. But she had escaped that, hadn’t she? Escaped her curse?

  She gradually understood that she was in a ben’, one of the horsehide tents the Mang used for camping. She was cold, except on her left side, where the dog, Heen, lay curled against her, snoring raspily. Nearby, Brother Horse snuffled out a harmony to the canine’s tuneless song. Earlier, Hezhi had found these noises distracting; now they comforted her, for they were Human, mundane.

  But she was in danger again, as certainly as Heen was a dog. And Brother Horse knew it. He had forced camp before they had gone half a league beyond the cairn where she saw …

  Tomorrow he would explain. Tomorrow.

  She lay back, her breathing growing calmer, but sleep did not return to her that night.

  Hezhi drew her knees up beneath her chin as she watched the colorful riders enter the village, listened to their raucous shouts. The half Giant sitting next to her stirred restlessly, shifting a frame easily twice as massive as that of any Human as he braided and unbraided fingers like fat sausages into a double fist resting against his thick-featured face. The knotted hand hid a scowl, and she could imagine she heard his teeth grinding.

  “Princess …” the Giant began, but Hezhi shook her head.

  “Hush, Tsem,” she said. “Watch the riders. I want to write Ghan about this.”

  “I’ve seen plenty of these barbarians enter the camp in the past few days,” Tsem grumbled. “I’ve had little else to do.”

  “That isn’t what Tiin tells me,” Hezhi answered, glancing sidewise at the half Giant.

  Tsem blushed almost purple. “One has to do something to pass the time,” he mumbled. “I can’t hunt, horses groan beneath my weight—”

  “But at least you can entertain the unmarried women,” Hezhi finished. “Just as in Nhol.” She sharpened her glance. “Unmarried, Tsem. These people are not as forgiving in their policies toward adultery as those you are accustomed to.”

  Tsem scrunched his face in mock concern, bushy eyebrows steepling like mountain ridges. “What might the penalty be?” he asked.

  “You know Barks-Like-a-Dog?”

  “The old man with no nose?”

  “Exactly.”

  “Oh. Oh!” Tsem’s face fell into lines of real dismay.

  “So take care,” she cautioned.

  “I can do that,” Tsem replied. “I’m glad you told me.”

  “This isn’t Nhol, Tsem, Don’t ever think it is. Nothing we know will serve us out here.”

  Tsem snorted. “People are people, Princess. Much of what I know serves me wherever I go.”

  Hezhi started at the bitterness in that. It was rare for Tsem to display such acrimony.

  “What is troubling you, Tsem?”

  As they spoke, thirty warriors thundered around the village, shrieking like demons. Each bore a long, colorful streamer knotted to a lance, and the result was breathtaking, barbaric, a cyclone of color. Unmarried girls dodged in and out among the surging mounts, snatching at the streamers, while younger children jostled alongside, jangling strings of bells and clapping wooden noisemakers together. The din was impressive.

  Tsem was silent, pretending to watch the spectacle; Hezhi prodded him with her toe, then kicked him when he did not respond. He turned on her, flashing knuckle-size teeth in a dangerous-looking scowl, and she was again taken aback by the anger in his reply.

  “You cannot ask me that,” he snapped. “If you cannot tell me what troubles you, then I …” He trailed off into a growl and a glare.

  “Tsem,” Hezhi began, laying her small hand on the corded bulk of his arm. The muscles in his neck worked silently for a moment as he ground his teeth. Then he sighed and turned a milder gaze on her.

  “What good am I out here, Princess?” he asked after a moment. “What good have I been to anyone since leaving Nhol? Since before that, even?”

  “Tsem, you were injured.”

  “Yes, and stupidly so. And you have had to pay for my healing, pay by working like a common maid.”

  “That has nothing to do with you, Tsem. These people expect everyone to work. There are no princesses among the Mang.”

  “And what sort of work am I suited to? Now that I have healed, what will I do to show my worth?”

  “Tiin said—”

  Tsem dismissed that with a roll of his eyes. “Curiosity, Princess. Woman are always curious about me. Once. Novelty is a fleeting thing. The truth is, these people think I am worthless, and they are not far from the truth. I was raised to be the servant of a princess, and, as you say, there are no nobles here.”

  “No slaves, either,” Hezhi reminded him. “Stop feeling sorry for yourself. There are things you can learn to do.”

  Tsem began to reply, but then his eyes bulged.

  “You did it,” he swore.

  “What?”

  “Made me tell you. Made me complain. The only thing I know how to do is serve you, and you won’t even talk to me.”

  “We are talking,” Hezhi noticed.

  Tsem turned his eyes back to the riders. Some of the girls had managed to snatch pennants, and now the original bearers of those streamers were chasing them, trying to grab them up onto their horses.

  “Something happened to you,” he said. “Something bad. Are you going to tell me?” The bitterness had left his voice, but there was challenge there, as if she were withholding something she owed him.

  “I don’t know,” she said at last. “I don’t know what happened. Brother Horse tried to explain.”

  “But it has to do with your … nature.”

  She shrugged. “Brother Horse said that I saw a god. He saw it, too; just a little god, he said, the child of some spider goddess.”

  “Did you?”

  “I saw something. No, it was more than seeing …”

  She felt suddenly very close to tears. Her voice trembled as she said, “I thought I had escaped it, Tsem, but my blood is doing something. I thought I was safe.”

  Tsem gently drew her to him, and she relaxed, rested against his mammoth frame and took comfort in the familiar smell of him. She closed her eyes and imagined that they were in her mother’s rooftop garden, hot sun bleaching the city white around them—before everything, before the whole nightmare began, when she was still just a little girl.

  “I don’t know about these things,” Tsem soothed, “but Brother Horse says you will not change, will not become one of the Blessed. We are far and far from the River, Princess.”

  “Yes, so Brother Horse said. But Tsem—in Nhol there was only the River, the River and ghosts. Nothing else. Out here, there are gods everywhere. Every other rock, every creek. Everywhere. And if I am going to start seeing them, the way Brother Horse does, the way I did yesterday … if that happens, I will lose my mind.”

  Tsem patt
ed her shoulder thoughtfully. “Does Brother Horse believe that this will happen, that you will keep seeing these gods?”

  “Yes,” Hezhi confirmed. “Yes, he thinks that I will.”

  “Oh,” Tsem said. He turned his gaze thoughtfully back to the village perimeter, where the great chase was winding down; horsemen were beginning to dismount and clasp their relatives to them. The air was thick with the smell of roasted meat; soon the feasting would begin.

  “While odd,” Tsem began again, in an optimistic tone, “Brother Horse has not lost his mind, and you say he sees these gods. Perkar speaks of seeing gods, as well. It cannot be so terrible as you fear.”

  Hezhi nodded into the crook of his arm. “Brother Horse and Perkar are different. Perkar has seen gods, it is true, but they were clothed in flesh—they were manifest. I am told that anyone can see a god thus, and while their form might be disturbing, it is not the same as what Brother Horse and I see. We see the essence of the god, the unmanifested form. That is altogether different.”

  “How so?”

  “They get in here,” Hezhi said, tapping her head. “They worm through our eyes into our minds, the way the River did, when I almost lost myself.” She paused. “I never told you, Tsem. It was after you fell down, when Perkar was fighting the Riverghost. I … I was filled up. The River filled me up, and I could have done almost anything: torn Nhol apart, killed Perkar, killed you. I wanted to do all of those things, because I was not me. That’s what it will be like, every time I see. Thoughts and feelings and desires that have no place in me—yet they feel right, too, as if they have always been there.” Her voice felt dull in her throat.

  “Brother Horse must know how to live with it. He must,” Tsem insisted. “I don’t understand these things, but he must. He can help you.”

  “Yes,” Hezhi murmured as, across the plaza, an oaken keg of beer was tapped to a general chorus of approving howls. “Yes, that is what he says. But …” She gazed up into Tsem’s sympathetic eyes, at his thick harsh face and the kindness it yet contained. “I thought I had escaped,” she whispered. “Won’t I ever be free?”