by Janet Morris
“It is indeed overwhelming,” I said, as a prelude to a plea for food, but at the last of the threxfitters’ stalls I saw what I wanted, and put my arm about Chayin’s waist and stood on my toes to speak in his ear.
“Buy me that,” I said, pointing to a bitless head-stall with a nosepiece of metal wound with parr-hide, as is used in the north. This one had silver buckles, and the leathers were gilded, but it was the only one I had seen.
“Anything,” he said, and paid twice what it was worth to the merchant, without comment.
“Thank you,” I said as he handed it to me. “Since Guanden has no mouth, we will see if he has nerves in his nose.” And he knew what I meant: the threx had so much scar tissue in his mouth, he hardly felt the bits.
“Food?” he suggested, guiding me toward a number of fires that glowed up into the night.
“Your forereading is astounding,” I answered.
“And then some rest, perhaps?” His hand slipped from my waist to my hips.
“Indeed, for we must be up again by midday to take them around the track,” I reminded him.
“We have today and another before first first of Amarsa,” he objected. “They have both run this track.” We were among the food vendors, each of whom had spread deep-piled rugs upon the ground before their fires, that their customers might sit and eat.
Chayin sat me in a vacant corner and went to the fireside. Some jiasks, farther down the mat, regarded me curiously, talking in low tones to each other. I was maskless, I reminded myself, and of what that meant to them. Chayin met someone he knew, and they stood talking, bowls in hand. The jiask was Chayin’s height, but broader and darker, dressed similarly to the cahndor, but in black. They turned and headed toward me. The black-garbed one had a bladder over his shoulder.
I was getting to my feet when the spinning took me, and I sank back to my knees, and then I could no longer feel my body, or hear through its ears, or see through its eyes. I was in a different place, of pink phosphorescent seas and fuchsia cliffs where hump-eyed herbivores rose from the waves, their mouths dripping with brown vegetation. And then, not there, but another place, with a blaring angry call in my mind, that I had no business in that place. Hael’s mind, and others behind it I felt, pushing with the wrong tools upon the helsar, desperate, for now entwined in it, they had not the skill to free themselves. I thought the helsar would surely shatter from their force, the wrong way, at the wrong time. Sorters all, they had not thought to hest the filaments into order, but tried to push through them. And I had no choice but to aid the helsar, for its fate and my own were even then too closely linked.
From the inside, beyond the first gate, I set the filaments spinning in reverse; contrapuntal, it spewed them out. But I had by that step committed myself. A.portion of me lay trapped behind the golden gate, and would remain there until I could run the helsar in sequence and reacquire it. I slid out. The helsar was not unhappy at what had occurred, and what it had traded to me in return went with me, to see a world which for it is only a dream.
Then I knew that Chayin shook me, holding me by the shoulders, and I could feel the rug pile under my knees. Then sight, and his face, eyes narrowed in concern, membranes full across his eyes in his concentration. My mind met his before I found the skill of speech, and his sniffed mine all around, like a worried mother threx her newborn.
“Hael,” I said when I could, “knocked upon the gate, and he contrived to get his foot stuck there, he and his friends.”
“What did you leave there?” he demanded.
“Only a little time,” I reassured him.
“For him? I would have let him languish!”
“For myself; it is within my keep he would wreak his disorder and shriek his pain. How could I do otherwise?” I sat back on my heels and shook his hands off. The black-garbed jiask stood a little behind the cahndor, who knelt beside me. He stared. I tossed back my hair and wiped the beads of sweat from my upper lip. I could feel it running in rivulets from under my breasts down my ribs.
“It is done, and with little harm, Chayin.” I touched his face. “Let us eat our meal.”
He growled like a dorkat, but managed for me a wry grin, and handed me a bowl in which were a number of fried harth parts.
“Will you never introduce me, Chayin?” demanded the jiask, pulling on his beard with his hand.
“Jaheil, cahndor of Dordaisa, Estri of Nemar,” Chayin complied.
“Cahndor,” I acknowledged.
“You are too much of a woman to be the deadly tiask that Chayin paints you,” he said, leaning forward to take the hand I offered in Astrian greeting. This man had been in the north. He negotiated the three-turn grip with easy familiarity.
I smiled at his compliment but said nothing.
“I have been trying to convince Jaheil to take a yra of jiasks and accompany us to Mount Opir and beyond.” Chayin’s tone deepened suggestively. “Of all the cahndors, Jaheil is the only one to whom I would trust my back. I am going to have to turn it sometime in the near future.”
“It would suit me, such a romp. I have been too long a cahndor. I have not blooded my sword for a score of passes.”
“Even a cahndor, in Nemar, gets more exercise than that. Have you heard of Aknet’s attempted foul play?”
“I have heard.” The black-eyed jiask nodded. “Estri, tell Jaheil what you saw that day in the sky.”
“A M’ksakkan craft, big enough to have held that many Menetphers. It came from Nemar and then veered northeast,” I said.
“Think you what I suspect?” Jaheil demanded of Chayin, tugging so at his beard that his jaw wobbled.
“That the M’ksakkans aid the Menetphers? Doubtless. And they will aid us all against each other until there are none left to say what they may do in the desert!”
“What would you do about it?” Jaheil queried Chayin.
“Refuse them any ground. Unite all the cahndors against the M’ksakkans. If you will see to Itophe and Coseve, I will convince Aknet that it is not to Menetph’s benefit to treat with the star men.”
“And how will you do that? You and Aknet under the same web-cloth is reason enough to have one’s sword well whetted. Since I have known the two of you, the only agreement between you has been when to enter into battle. Have things so changed between Menetph and Nemar?”
“Know you only that I will do what I say! I can be very convincing.” And Chayin showed that smile he wears only upon the kill.
“Are you also a living god?” I broke in, for I saw many around whose ears were fairly pricked in our direction.
Ostentatiously Jaheil rolled back his wide sleeves to exhibit his marks of godhead. “Certainly We are all gods, eh, Chayin?” And he uncorked his bladder.
“Can the gods tell who will win the Golden Sword?” I asked him, taking a drink of some tart kifra and handing it back.
“Surely you know that already?” he evaded.
“Ah, within, within,” I quipped, “it is all within, but so much rests upon us learning to fetch it out where we can see it. Omniscience must be exhausting.” The banter served its purpose. The jiasks down the mat took up their own talk, and the small group behind me wandered into the night.
“To get what is within without”—Jaheirs eyes twinkled and sparked in his dark face—“one must set the lure and wait. A high mind receives that which by nature belongs upon that level,” he pronounced.
“Enough! I hear such drivel too often! The higher the mind, the farther the horizons for which it pines!” Chayin snapped.
“Will you, Jaheil,” I said smoothly, “accompany us to Mount Opir?”
“My lady, I doubt if I have a full yra of jiasks to whom I could trust my own back! If I find that I do, I may later join you. Hard is the lot of a cahndor!”
“Hard is the lot of a man who has upon his couch Aniacaer? Come now, Jaheil!”
“All love grows dim with time, Chayin. The fuel burns, the fire low between us. And you, the same with Liuma?”
“The same,” said Chayin in a clipped tone. “Whom did you bring with you, then? Doubtless the cahndor of Dordassa will not sleep alone at Frullo jer?”
“What I brought, I would not be seen with in public. I am not so lucky as you, to have such as Estri among my tiasks. I brought two crells, of whom, if you wish, you may partake, and I had thought to take a maskless tiask who does not outweigh me. As a matter of fact, what drew me to you was this maskless lady, for I did not recognize you in the dim light.”
“I have heard it is a common saying in Dordassa that all we of Nemar look alike,” Chayin teased him.
“If that were true, how could I sit before one as ugly as the cahndor and as beautiful as the tiask of Nemar at the same moment? It is a blessing of stronger gods than we, that produces such beauty.” Jaheil, sucking prodigiously at the kifra bladder, leaned toward me.
I shifted against Chayin, and he rose, sensing my unease, and held his hand out to me. I took it, and the uritheria of Nemar jiggled between my breasts.
“A productive search to you, Jaheil. You have reminded me of my duty, and I must hasten to it.” Chayin bade him farewell, and we threaded our way through the crowd to a cluster of large appreis that bore the device of Nemar, and between them into a central one that awaited us.
Chayin unlaced the flap and held it open for me. Mats were unrolled, and two oil lamps lit, and both our saddlepacks had been brought there.
I unlatched my cloak and let it fall with a sigh of relief, and my boots and belts and breech and band I stripped off also, before I saw the figure that lounged in the shadows. Chayin had his back to me, bent over his saddlepack, searching something from its depths. I knelt casually and picked up my boot, sliding my hand around the grip of a razor-moon. Then I let the boot fall back.
“Chayin,” I said softly, “we have a visitor.” And the cahndor was at my side, blade glinting in the lamplight.
A laugh came from out of the figure in the shadows, and at that sound the razor-moon dropped from my nerveless fingers to stick upright in the thick pile rug. Chayin bared his teeth and sheathed his blade.
“I sent word to you,” Hael said, stepping out of the shadows.
“I received it,” Chayin acknowledged, “and if I had heeded it, I would sit still in Nemar, awaiting you.’’
Hael spread his hands. There was a stiffness to his movements, and his face seemed somehow rearranged. I bent and retrieved the razor-moon, forcing my limbs to do my will. It was Hael’s debility, and his sending of it, that had numbed me. I sent it back to him, and saw his face blanch as I returned to him his gift.
“By what means,” Chayin demanded, pretenses abandoned, “have you contrived to be in two places at once? What Day-Keeper’s tricks can you find to excuse your presence here?” He glowered at Hael, who stood slightly weaving upon his feet. I wondered if what he had gained in the helsar was worth this price to him, and whether it would cost me so much, when my turn came.
“I have communed with Tar-Kesa,” said the dharener at last. “I have conferred with my brothers in aniet. I but do the will of the time. The M’ksakkans arrive momentarily. I had thought to save you from what promises to be an unpleasant confrontation.” His voice was not so sure as his words.
“And the Golden Sword? Do you prize it so little?” Chayin snapped, accusing. “I have seen the results upon Estri of what you did in aniet. I have seen she who must stand for us all upon her knees, helpless by your machinations. Would you lose us our only chance to win?”
Hael’s face regained some animation. “Even that!” the dharener exclaimed. “Even that is a puny price to pay, for what might be gained.” And he looked at me defiantly, his uncertain hand quivering as he pointed at me. “Nemar lies upon the line, because of her. She is accursed by Tar-Kesa! You dally with your doom, Chayin! And all of us must be drawn in your wake. Blood is upon her path, and it is Nemarsi blood!” His words rode upon some chill and ghostly wind. “Any who aid her shall be by His will destroyed. I have seen it.” Hael glared at me, then at Chayin.
“I too have spoken with Tar-Kesa,” said Chayin, folding his arms across his chest. “What he has shown every dharener, he had shown his chosen son also. Have no fear, brother, for those messages so clear to you have not been withheld from me. About the M’ksakkans, He has instructed me. And about this woman also. His will be done!” And he held out his hand, palm upward, to Hael.
“The mind-tool”—and his voice was silk-sheathed steel—“give it to me.” And, as Hael hesitated: “Surely you do not doubt His will as it is manifest through His son?” And Hael handed the taswrapped helsar to Chayin, who hefted it in his palm.
“Now, go, and see you to the Nemarchan and your dharener’s duties. But I warn you, stay your hand from my affairs, and your mouth also.” And Chayin turned his back to his brother and knelt once more at his saddlepack, helsar in hand.
Hael stared, unbelieving, for a moment at Chayin. Then he wheeled and strode through the flaps and out into the night. But the promise his eyes had made mine in those last moments was unmistakable.
I went and laced the flaps, that they not rattle and snap in the rising wind. When I turned from this, I saw Chayin stripping off his gear. When that was done, he went and extinguished one of the oil lamps and sat himself upon the cushions in the semidark.
I went to him and laid my head in his lap. He stroked my hair, and we spent a time in silence.
“It is true, you know,” I confessed, “what he said about me. The race that fathered Tar-Kesa spawned me also, and this world’s future lies in contest between us.” And admitting it, my voice sounded hopeless even to my own ears.
“I do not believe in curses. I have lived every torture conceivable; every curse ever spoken has been laid upon me. I was by chaos sired, and out of fear’s belly did I come. The accursed knows his siblings, and you are not one. Long before I met you; Terror consumed me and made the leavings Her agent.” He tossed the helsar into my lap, like some worthless bauble. “How could I fear you?” His voice softened. “When I am with you, my own curse comes less often upon me; should I fear that which alleviates my pain?”
“That is no conscious skill of mine, but a hereditary gift that eases you. You are soothed by the calm within the crux that surrounds me. But it is my primal self that hests the time and has all my life done so. You have even said this to me. I try now to control it; make the hesting a conscious skill, before the power turns back upon me. I must do so. I hold in my mind that which I wish, hesting. But I have not the dexterity to sort and correct and hest all at once. So I am in effect blind until my will comes to be. I may not win, Chayin, nor can I see past my choosing, or determine what will come if I fail.”
“And can this mind-tool help you?”
“Perhaps. And if not, the ending will be quicker. It is premature, but Hael has left me no choice. I will need your help.”
“Anything.”
“I need safety for my body while I am away from it. Three days, at least. While I am gone, will you watch over what remains?”
“Can it wait until we are upon Mount Opir?”
“If you can keep the thing from Hael, and safe, it could wait that long. But it is a tool from the school of another race, the helsar, and you should not handle it, nor should I until I can give it my full attention.” I could feel it calling.
“I will secrete it where it will be safe until we ride for Mount Opir, and then return it to you.”
“Do so,” I said, and gave it to him, and he rose in the dim light and went to the middle stanchion and fussed awhile about its base. When he returned and lay beside me, he was empty-handed. And we began what by rights should have taken more than an enth, but was ended before being barely begun by a braying of Chayin’s name outside the laced flaps.
He groaned and cursed and wrapped his breech around him before ripping out the laces to admit Jaheil, cahndor of Dordassa.
I made no move from among the cushions, thinking that Jaheil would speak
his piece and depart, and we could return to what concerned us, but at Jaheil’s first words I knew such would not be the case.
“The M’ksakkan ship has arrived,” he announced, walking past Chayin and across the apprei, to throw himself down beside me upon the cushions.
“I importune!” He leered at me. “Forgive me, tiask.”
“I do not find your choice of moments at all amusing,” I said to him, “but I will excuse you this once, if you will promise not to repeat your error.” And I rose to my knees and began searching about for my clothing.
“Have you done your part with Itophe and Coseve?” Chayin inquired as he pulled his sword belt and the breech I was missing from under a mat. He threw me the breech, which Jaheil intercepted and handed to me with a flourish.
“It is just done, but I would wager you have not had time for Menetph.”
Chayin smiled and latched his cloak at his throat.
“You are truly godlike in your omniscience, Jaheil. I have not seen Aknet. I go now to do so. Delay them for me, with some clever stratagem, until I join you.”
Chayin stood awaiting me. I grabbed up the Shaper’s cloak.
“They would not start without the two of you,” Jaheil remarked.
“They will start without one of us for certain,” said Chayin, holding the flap that I might pass out before him.
He hurried me through the waning dark along the aisles of appreis, until we stood before an imposing circle of them, each bearing the device of Menetph. Through these to the one encircled we passed, and before the flaps Chayin called Aknet out to meet him.
After an interval the flaps were unlaced, and a large man stood backlit, before us, cloaked and fully armed. Aknet aniet Beshost was black as a northern harth, in middle years, powerful, and girthy; with a layer of fat laid deceptively over his strength.
“What has the son of Inekte to say to me?” he demanded in a growl.
“I would discuss with you some things in private,” said Chayin. “Such things as are not spoken of between appreis.”
