FIERCE: Sixteen Authors of Fantasy

by Mercedes Lackey

  Mandir brightened. “You like it?”

  “It’s lovely.” She held it up to herself to check the fit. Close—she might need a tailor to make a few alterations, but Mandir had chosen well.

  As he eyed her, some of the tension eased from his body. “I figure you won’t be wearing the green and silver on every occasion. And I saw that you liked the colored swatch at Bodhan’s.”

  “Thank you, that was thoughtful.” Except for her Coalition silk, this was the nicest garment she’d ever owned, plus she’d never seen anything like it before. Delighted, she took a step toward Mandir, meaning to hug him, then remembered all those times he’d cornered her in the hallway, all those times he’d called her stupid and ugly. And later, that time he’d smashed her homework tablets in a fit of temper. She stopped herself midstride. Her eyes were on him, and she saw that her error had not gone unnoticed. He’d seen the hug coming, had unfolded his arms to accept it, and had watched her change her mind. In response, he sent her a tight half-smile.

  Gritting her teeth, Taya laid the sundress on her bed and headed for the table. “We should discuss the case.”

  Mandir trailed after her. “Am I forgiven?”

  “For the banana wine? Mostly.”

  “How about for Mohenjo?”

  “You almost killed me at Mohenjo.” Taya sat down at the table.

  Mandir, still standing, rested his elbows on the back of his chair. “For Mohenjo, how many dresses will it take?”

  She glared at him. “Mandir, I’m not for sale.”

  “That was a joke.” He pulled his chair out and sat down. “Look, supposedly our jackal’s killed three people, but after yesterday I’m not so sure. The first two crimes have some similarities. In each case, we’ve got a pair of young lovers in which one of the lovers is murdered. In one situation it’s the man, and in the other it’s the woman. But this third case doesn’t fit the pattern. No young lovers.”

  “None that we know about,” said Taya. “Who’s to say for sure that Amalia didn’t have a lover?”

  “Zash said she didn’t. She was guarded day and night—”

  “Maybe it was the guard,” said Taya.

  “That’s disgusting,” said Mandir.

  “Not necessarily,” said Taya. “Depends on the circumstances.”

  “It’s not clear to me yet why the jackal would feel motivated to murder young lovers.”

  “That’s not clear to me either,” said Taya. “But you were saying it doesn’t fit the pattern. I’m saying it might.”

  “My point is there’s only one person we’ve been introduced to so far who had a motive to kill Amalia, and that’s Zash.”

  “He might have had a motive, if you take a cynical view of his relationship with his sister, but he didn’t have the means,” said Taya. “You saw what was left of that hut. What could have fueled such a fire, if not the rage of Isatis? I saw the jackal in my first scry-vision. I know it was a woman. I suppose there could be more than one jackal, but what are the odds?”

  Mandir shrugged. “We need to talk to Zash’s servants and field hands.”

  “I agree,” said Taya.

  “But we can’t tell him in advance,” said Mandir. “We can’t let him hand-pick who we talk to. We need to go out there someday when he’s not expecting us, and—”

  A pounding came at the front door.

  Knowing it was probably breakfast, Taya rose, and Mandir followed. The servant at the door handed them not only their breakfast dishes but a small clay tablet for each of them.

  When the servant had gone, Taya set her dishes on the table and looked at her tablet. The message inscribed on it was an intimidating block of text, so she checked the insignia at the bottom to see who it was from. The magistrate. All right. Swallowing, she began reading silently from the top. To...our...illustrious...

  “Hm,” grunted Mandir, looking at his own tablet. “We’ve been invited to a party.”

  Taya glared at him. Had he read the entire message in that tiny span of time? “What sort of party?” She scanned the tablet, trying to pick out the important details, but words did not have a habit of jumping out at her.

  “It’s three nights from now. Lots of people will be there—ruling caste, wealthy merchants.”

  “You think Zash will be there?”

  Mandir turned toward her, his eyes narrowing. “Why do you care?”

  “Because I like him. Also, I was wondering if wealthy farmers get invited to ruling-caste parties.”

  Mandir frowned. “My guess is no.”

  “Oh well,” said Taya. “We should go. So many people in one place? I might spot the witness. Or even the jackal, if we’re really lucky.”

  “Besides that,” said Mandir, “it might be fun. Especially if Zash isn’t there.”

  Taya made a face. “I don’t know about fun. I haven’t the slightest idea how to act around the ruling caste.”

  Mandir shrugged. “You’re Coalition, so you’re in a class by yourself. No expectations, right? But watch out for the men, because half of them will be trying to wrangle you into their beds.”

  “Really?” Suddenly the evening sounded like it might have potential, with or without Zash.

  Mandir glared at her.

  Chapter XVII

  Hrappa

  “HOW IS THE LIONESS?” TAYA asked when Rasik brought their horses around for the day’s investigation.

  “Back to normal, more or less,” said Rasik. “You could scry there now.”

  As they passed by the farmers’ district on their way to the city gates, Taya signaled Rasik to wait and slowed Pepper to a walk. Zash had mentioned banana plants in Hrappa. She hadn’t seen any, and she intended to find them. They couldn’t be on the floodplain, where they’d be drowned during the inundation, so they had to be here, within the walls. She craned her neck, peering over the flat brick houses. At this time of day, the farmers’ district was nearly deserted except for some grandmas and grandpas, too old for farm work and just loitering about.

  “I thought we were headed for the river,” said Mandir. “What are you looking for?”

  “Banana plants.”

  “Speaking of that,” said Mandir, “why did you tell Zash your parents weren’t banana farmers?”

  She gave him a withering look. “Because they’re not.”

  “You told me they were, the day I met you.”

  Ah, there was one. The waxy green leaves of a banana canopy could just be seen shading a distant courtyard. And there was another, not far away from it. Of course the farmers would keep the trees in the sheltered courtyards, not out in the open where anyone might walk off with the fruit as it ripened. Her curiosity was satisfied, for now.

  “I never said that.” Taya turned Pepper, clucking to urge her into a trot. “All I said was that I came from banana country. You weren’t paying attention.”

  Mandir’s blood bay cantered a few strides to catch up. “Are you telling me I’ve been wrong about your background for nine years?”

  “That’s what I’m telling you.” She nodded at Rasik and aimed Pepper toward the city gates.

  Conversation became impractical as they neared the roaring river. The Lioness was the lifeblood of the river country, and Taya had never been far from her shores. As an infant, she’d been bathed in the Lioness. As a girl, she’d learned to swim in her shallows. She’d poled rafts across her depths, fished for palla, hauled countless buckets of water from her banks. But the Lioness of the delta region, where she’d grown up, was like a toothless old matriarch compared to the Lioness of Hrappa.

  Here the river snaked through the rocky landscape, serene in her deep blue center but frothy and disordered in her shallows, where she twisted about boulders and gathered in dissatisfied eddies. She was a young river, exuberant and wild. Little in the way of greenery dared to grow along her banks. Here and there a particularly hardy tree gripped the stony ground, but mostly the bank was gravel worn smooth by the river’s passing or sheer stone c
ut away by the flow. The water level of the Lioness varied dramatically, and right now she was about two feet below her banks.

  “Just last night, she was over the banks?” asked Taya, slapping at a needlefly. They were always thick near the river.

  Rasik nodded. “She goes over them all the time.”

  “Look!” hissed Mandir, sounding more excited than alarmed.

  Taya and Rasik turned immediately in the direction of his gaze. Downriver, distant but clearly visible, a herd of onagers had waded into the shallows to drink. The jack tossed his head, long ears flopping, as he looked around for predators. Then he shoved his muzzle deep into the water.

  “Flood and fire,” Rasik murmured with pleasure. “They’re on our side of the river. What is that: one jack, three jennies?”

  “Four jennies. There’s one behind the others,” said Mandir.

  “The one with the bent ear looks pregnant,” said Rasik. “She’ll be slow. Soon as we’re done here, I’m getting my bow.”

  Mandir grinned. “Wish I had mine. I’d go shooting with you—except I want the jack.”

  “Meat is meat,” said Rasik. “I’ll take whatever I can hit.”

  Taya rolled her eyes. What was it with men, always wanting to shoot at things?

  All at once, in silence since they were so distant, the herd wheeled, leapt back onto the riverbank, and galloped across the dry plain.

  “What do you think spooked them?” said Mandir.

  Rasik shrugged. “Lion? Steppe dogs? Needleflies?”

  “I hope they shift,” said Mandir.

  Taya hoped so too; it was a sight worth seeing. She watched, hardly daring to breathe, as the herd galloped directly away from the river in coats of pale brown. Then, as if in response to some unheard signal, they abruptly changed direction and galloped south in coats that had shifted to storm-cloud gray. She smiled. Hunters prized onagers not only for their meat but for their wiliness, and because their synchronized shifts of direction and color caused so many pouncing lions to land on dead air. When in flight, onagers sought open areas and could not be driven into closed canyons. This made them the most challenging of the hoofed animals to hunt, and therefore, according to the nonsensical logic of men, the most sought after.

  “I’m getting my bow,” said Rasik.

  “The herds don’t get this close to Hrappa very often, do they?” said Mandir.

  “No,” said Rasik. “If word gets out, half the city will be hunting them.”

  “If we’re done watching the onagers,” said Taya, “I need to scry the crime scene. Where is it?”

  “There.” Rasik pointed to a rocky island about ten feet into the river. The water between the shore and the island was shallow, and a large boulder just beyond created an eddy, preventing the water from flowing too fast through the channel. Taya could easily wade across.

  “What was Narat doing on that island?” Taya asked.

  “Well,” said Rasik, “it’s a common spot for trysts—get behind those rocks and no one can see you. But her lover didn’t show up, so she must have been alone.”

  “We’ll never get the horses down there,” said Mandir. “Rasik, you stay here with the horses, and I’ll go out to the island with Taya.”

  “No. Mandir, you stay behind, too,” said Taya. “There’s barely enough room on the island for my scry-fire. I don’t want you to get burned.”

  He shook his head. “You’re not going out there alone.”

  “I mean it,” said Taya. “You can’t come. Scrying takes every bit of my concentration, and if I have to worry about things like keeping my fire away from you, it increases the chance that I could be hurt.”

  Mandir acquiesced, grumbling.

  Taya dismounted and handed the reins to Rasik. She hopped off the bank into the shallows. The river bottom was part sand and part smooth pebbles. Water swirled around her feet, questing, toying with her. Taya murmured a few respectful words in the mother tongue, assuring Agu that she was one of the ilittu and she meant no harm. It might or might not make a difference with Agu; she was the least predictable of the mothers. Ripples ran across the surface of the water, acknowledging Taya’s presence. Behind her, she heard Rasik’s sharp intake of breath at the water goddess’s response. She smiled to herself and waded to the island.

  She made the trip without incident and was relieved when she stepped out onto dry land. Mother Agu’s unpredictability always frightened her a bit.

  She called to Isatis, a crueler goddess but more honest and straightforward, and summoned the flames in a great circle around her. Come in power, Mother Isatis, she called in the mother tongue. Come in greatness. The fire roared to life, exultant as it leapt toward the sky.

  You are rage incarnate. You are the cleansing fire who sears the wickedness from the world, and the warmth that holds back the cold sting of death. Bless your humble daughter, who loves and fears you, with another vision.

  Isatis responded not with a single vision, but with hundreds. Taya reeled in confusion. In the fires, she saw countless images, each depicting the same event: a wall of water rushing down the Lioness’s path and swallowing up whatever stood in its way. But each flood was different. In some images, greenery covered the hillsides, indicating it was the season of Lalan, while in others the lowlands were flooded, which meant it was the season of Agu. In some images, a single man or woman was taken by the flash flood, in others more than one, in still others boats or herds of animals. Taya stared at the images in confusion. She hadn’t yet asked Isatis for a specific vision, and the Fire Mother seemed to have anticipated her. One of these scenes had to be the one showing Narat’s death. But which one?

  From the shore, Mandir watched, fascinated and horrified, as the cyclone of flames enveloped Taya. He knew she was well trained in what she did, and she was not in any real danger. Still, it was all he could do not to run to her rescue.

  “I’ve seen a lot of Coalition pass through here, but until you two came I’d never seen that done,” said Rasik. “What makes Taya a fire seer? What skill does she have that other people in the Coalition don’t have?”

  Mandir glanced at him. “Well, for one, she’s a woman. Isatis has yet to accept a male disciple.”

  “Oh.”

  “Isatis chooses her disciples,” said Mandir. “There would have been some sort of display when Taya was chosen. I wasn’t there when it happened, but Isatis picks her disciples for their eloquence.”

  “Eloquence?”

  “Not in the river tongue,” said Mandir. “In the mother tongue. Most of us in the Coalition learn enough to speak it awkwardly, and we have some stock phrases we use when performing magic. But if you read the old documents written by our ancestors, the language is metaphorical and full of flowery, poetic phrases they used when addressing the Mothers. Most of us don’t have the knowledge or the fluency to speak it in that way. But a few do, and Isatis favors them.”

  “Hmm,” grunted Rasik.

  Taya seemed to be taking longer than before. Mandir hoped that meant she was getting a particularly detailed vision. Noting a faint hum in the air, he cocked his head. He couldn’t quite tell where it was coming from. Upriver, perhaps. “Do you hear that noise?”

  Rasik was silent for a moment, listening. He turned upriver and stiffened. “Flood and fire. Get her out of there. Get her out!”

  Mandir saw it. The wall of water roared down the riverbed, slamming against the banks and sending up enormous geysers. It was headed straight for Taya, who was hidden away in her vortex of flames.

  Mandir jumped into the shallows and ran toward the island through knee-high water that dragged at his calves. He had to get to her before the flood did—though what he would do when he got there, he didn’t know. “Taya!”

  Rasik called to him from the bank. “Don’t go out there. Stop the flood with your magic!”

  Not possible. For a jackal to rouse the wrath of Agu was easy, trivially so, and even the most sophisticated ilittum could not calm her back do
wn. But he couldn’t stand on the shore and watch Taya be dashed to pieces. “Taya! Taya!” he called as he splashed through the water, hoping his voice might penetrate the fire. But when he dashed up onto the island, the flaming vortex was impenetrable in its blistering heat. “Alaku, Isatis, besu!” he shouted, trying to extinguish the fire, but his words had no effect. Taya’s magic was stronger than his.

  The wall of water careened toward him, high as a horse’s head and white with froth, so loud in its onrush that it drowned out the roar of the fire. “Nehu Agu!” he cried. “Nasu kilalli nehu!” And the waves swallowed him.

  Chapter XVIII

  Hrappa

  TAYA COULDN’T FIGURE OUT WHERE she was. Something had knocked her over, tumbling her upside down and sideways. She opened her mouth to scream and choked on water. Her eyes stung, and she could see only grainy darkness. She was moving—someone or something was dragging her along.

  Was she in the river?

  She flailed her arms and legs, seeking purchase against something, anything at all, but she could feel only the vicious tug of the current. Where was the surface? She had to find it, had to breathe. Her eyes were burning, but she wouldn’t close them, not until she oriented herself. As she struggled in the water, she struck something sharp. Pain erupted in a searing line along her hip.

  Something brushed her right side, moving with the current. She whipped around. In the murky water she could just make out the sleek body of a passing water creature. Its forked tail appeared, waving gently, and she recognized it. River dolphin. And here she was, bleeding in the water.

  But the creature didn’t seem to be interested in attacking her, and dolphins had to break surface to breathe. She didn’t dare grab its tail, lest it whip around and slice her open with its wicked teeth, but she swam after it, clawing desperately at the water. The dolphin was a strong swimmer. It outpaced her and she lost sight of it, but ahead she saw a brighter area of water. The surface! She flailed in its direction. Her arms and legs felt frighteningly weak.