The SoulNecklace Stories

by R. L. Stedman

  “City over next ridge.” TeSin pointed. “Rest here.”

  “Why?” Will said. “We’re so close.”

  “Many people enter city gates at evening. Guards very busy then – they not see us. So now, we sleep. Rest until afternoon. Then, we go.”

  Will nodded. “Very well.” He swung a leg over the saddlebow and stiffly dismounted. Wrapping himself in his cape, he settled back to rest.

  N’tombe woke him at noon. Will rubbed his eyes. His head felt somewhat clearer. Peering out between the needles of the gorse bushes, he saw clouds racing across the storm-colored sky. Overnight, it seemed, the weather had shifted. The air smelt of snow.

  “A fountain of silver,” he whispered.

  N’tombe, checking through her saddle pack, looked sharply at him.

  Should he tell the enchantress about the dagger? But Dana had mentioned it to him alone; it was their secret. Perhaps there was a reason she hadn’t told N’tombe. Perhaps she didn’t want her tutor to know. If he were honest, he liked the idea of holding a secret.

  “It’s nothing,” he said, and crawled backwards from under the bushes, careful not to scratch his hands on the thorns.

  N’tombe handed him a bowl of water-softened oats and a handful of dried fruits. “Here.”

  “Thanks.” Will scattered the fruit on the oats and took a spoon from his belt. Oats and fruit were filling and no doubt nourishing enough in their way, but sometimes it would be grand to have something a little more substantial. At the castle he’d had fried bacon and eggs most mornings. Back then he’d taken such food for granted. Well, he wouldn’t do so again.

  “I cannot sense pursuit,” N’tombe said.

  “That’s good, right?”

  “Probably.” She seemed troubled. “Will? Back there, on the road – what happened?”

  He munched and swallowed. Shook his head. “I don’t …” How could he explain the feeling of the road, of the power beneath his feet? “I don’t rightly know.”

  “I thought we were dead,” she said seriously. She looked at his spoon, poised halfway to his mouth, and smiled. “I suppose that exactly what you did matters less than the fact that it worked. What is important is that we are all alive. Eat your breakfast, Will Baker. Today we reach the city.”

  * * *

  In less than an hour the city came into view. Will hadn’t seen the place from this angle before; spread out on the plain below, the city was an awesome sight.

  “Behold, the Black Stronghold!” said TeSin proudly.

  The Black Stronghold, the City of the Eternal, was a spreading sea of buildings encircled by high black walls. Inside the city, more walls spiraled in dark rings toward the golden-roofed Imperial Palace at the city’s center. The place was covered in a cloud of dust, and small buildings clustered against the outermost walls; the city was still growing. One day, Will thought, it will fill this entire plain.

  Below their vantage point lay the fertile fields and rich grasslands that fed the city. They were watered by the shining silver canals that carried water from the high snowfields to cisterns, deep under the palace hill.

  On a flat piece of unwatered grasslands, untouched by canals, a group of men and slaves seemed to be building a low platform. They worked with their hoods pulled up over their heads, for the wind was chill. On the far edge of the platform, a low marshland reflected the sunlight like a silver platter.

  TeSin looked troubled. “Those men?” He pointed to the platform builders. “What are they doing? Grass is sacred. No one may set foot there.”

  “What’s that?” Will asked, pointing at the dust cloud.

  “Many buildings broken by earthquake,” TeSin observed.

  “But the walls are intact.”

  “Walls well made. Houses?” TeSin shrugged. “Less so.”

  From the hilltop they could see the road was crowded with ox carts and families on foot, refugees from nearby villages.

  “We’ll need to ride fast,” Will said, “if we’re to reach the gates by nightfall.”

  As they clattered down the hillside toward the road, the sun slipped below the cloud layer. Sunbeams, gold and red, lanced through haze and glanced on the golden tiles of the palace roof. For a moment the hill at the heart of the city appeared to be on fire.

  Despite the busy road they made good progress, so by the time the shadows were long, they had reached the city gates where the city walls towered, black against the gray sky. Soldiers, staring out across the plains, paraded along the ramparts. They carried bows and full quivers across their backs. All, Will knew, were expert shots.

  Will pulled his hood over his face. The Noyan had been right; there were throngs of travelers, all pleading with the guards to let them in, and to let them in speedily.

  “So many people,” Will said.

  “And all annoyed,” N’tombe added.

  “Is tradition.” TeSin smiled. “Each time my mother return to city, she argue with guards.”

  At the front of the queue was an ox cart driven by an emaciated old man. Two guards demanded to inspect his cargo; the driver declined. He spat on the ground, narrowly missing Will’s feet, and shouted angrily at the guards. The Noyan chuckled.

  “Did he just call them ‘sons of dogs’?” Will asked.

  “Ah.” TeSin seemed surprised at Will’s understanding. “Yes.”

  Two other guards, lounging either side of the gate, watched the pantomime with interest.

  Will chewed at his lip, worrying. The Stronghold changed all the time; new buildings were always being erected, others being torn down. It had been … what? Two years since he’d been here. And the earthquake – any landmarks he might have remembered could well have been destroyed. Could he find the silver fountain? The one time he’d seen it had been by accident; he’d been a-wandering through the city, exploring the place at random.

  The crowd was piling up behind them. Peasants, carrying crates of squawking chickens, argued loudly, calling to be let in before the gates closed. Dropping his reins, the old man shook his fist at the guards. The oxen, feeling the reins relax, stretched out their necks and the wagon rolled forward.

  “Ha!” A stern-faced guard held up a hand.

  The guards beside the gates unsheathed their swords. From the ramparts above came an answering shout. Tipping his head, Will saw archers set arrows against bowstrings. The old man, doubtless realizing this was not a battle he could win, grumbled and heaved on the reins until the oxen stood. Behind him, other peasants yelled in protest.

  Finally, having inspected the wagon, the guards waved the oxen forward and through the gate.

  “Next!” shouted the captain, and beckoned to TeSin.

  TeSin’s horse took one step forward before another disturbance came from behind them. Will, twisting awkwardly in the saddle, saw children grabbed by mothers. A baby screamed. People pressed themselves hastily against the wall, getting out of the way. At the gates, the guards snapped to attention.

  “A magician!” Pulling her hood over her face, N’tombe seemed to almost disappear. If he hadn’t known she was there right in front of him, he wouldn’t have noticed her. She wasn’t invisible; just unremarkable.

  “Move!” TeSin hissed, “Will!”

  Barely in time, Will kicked his horse to movement.

  From the rear came a column of dead-eyed slaves, ankles chained together. Some coughed and hawked phlegm as they shuffled awkwardly forward. Behind them was a company of soldiers, watching the slaves closely, as though they might take flight at any moment. At the rear came a cart, piled high with lumber and tools. Clearly, the men had been building something. Looking more closely at the shambling slaves, Will realized: these were the men who had been constructing that platform. But, if what TeSin had said was correct, that the grasslands were sacred, why? And what was the point? Surely, with all that had broken in the city, such men could be put to better use than constructing a platform beside an empty marshland.

  Behind the cart, half-hidden by
the piles of wooden offcuts, rode a silent figure on a black horse. He was cloaked in black, and his hood obscured his face. As the figure passed, the air seemed to ripple. There came a stench of rot, of decay.

  “Kamaye!” Will thought, and reached for his sword.

  Will felt, rather than heard N’Tombe’s denial: No, not a Kamaye, she whispered, her voice as intangible as her body. A magician. But he is very powerful. Stay silent, Will. Do not draw his attention.

  Will shrank into the shadows beside her. The soldiers and the slaves stopped at the gateway, when the guards crossed their spears. The magician rode forward, and stopped directly in front of the captain.

  “You will let us pass.” His deep voice held no inflection.

  The younger guards looked uncertainly at their captain, but the captain saluted and waved the guardsmen back. “Lord.”

  The magician held up a hand. Stop. His hood hid his eyes, but the long bronze-tipped nails on his right hand turned, as though seeking a target. On the ramparts above, the archers watched, silent and attentive. The magician’s horse sidled restlessly.

  Will held his breath, tried to quiet the beating of his heart.

  Don’t look at me, he prayed. Please.

  The magician sniffed. “I smell …”

  “Lord?”

  “A strangeness … Something comes.” Again the right hand turned, its razor-sharp index finger pointing left, then right. Hunting, seeking.

  Will could sense N’Tombe’s fear. TeSin loosened his blade in its scabbard. The magician stiffened.

  Will thought of gray fog and gray hills. He pulled thoughts of mist and darkness into his heart and wreathed it about himself. Stone, he thought, I am made of stone. He felt himself fading; felt the world become insubstantial.

  He thought he heard a woman, wailing: Why do you wander, so far and alone? A man with no eyes pressed a green stone into his palms. Will made to hold it, but it faded through his hands like a dream.

  In the crowd, a baby cried. “Hush, hush,” someone whispered.

  A slave shuffled his feet and his chains clanged like a hollow bell. Then the magician lowered his hand and pressed his horse forward, into the city. Will breathed again.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Girls Do Not Fight

  Mai-Long didn’t want me to sit too close to the entrance in case we might be observed, so we huddled at the rear of the cave. I wrapped my arms about myself and tried not to shake with cold. We sat in silence for a time, as the sun crept below the western hills. I felt restless, as though I should be up and doing, not hiding here.

  “Tell me about yourself,” I said.

  She seemed surprised by the question. “What do you want to know?”

  “Everything,” I said expansively. “Start at the beginning.”

  She took a deep breath. And then … it was like a dam bursting. Mai-Long, silent all the time of my imprisonment, now would not stop talking! She began not with her birth, but before, with her mother, a woman of higher status than Mai-Long’s father. Status seemed to figure large in Mai-Long’s life.

  She spoke about her childhood. It seemed that the children of the jailers treated the dungeons as their own private playground, darting in and out of vacant cells, and exploring the tunnels. I felt strangely jealous – how I would have loved to have had playmates. Although, perhaps not to have had a prison as a playground.

  But at the age of six or seven, Mai-Long was separated from her playmates and sent to the school for officials.

  “I was special,” she said proudly. “Children of the jailors went to the school for servants. But my father, being the Imperial Jailor, had a higher rank, which made the other children jealous.”

  At the school she had met Ji, an officer’s son. He introduced her to fighting.

  “I fell in love,” she said simply.

  “How old was he?”

  She smiled. “Not with him. With fighting.”

  Quite abruptly, she stopped. The low light of the evening sun crept to where we were hiding, so for a time I began to feel a little warmer.

  “Sunset,” Mai-Long said softly. “Now, in the palace above, the Emperor prepares for his evening meal.” She caught me looking, and smiled. “I learned all this at school.”

  “This school. Is that where you learned to speak my language?”

  She nodded. “I was good at languages. I learned two from civilized lands, and one from a barbarian country. So when time comes to enlighten these people we may easily explain our ways.”

  “By enlighten, do you mean invade?”

  One day, perhaps not today, but soon, the Emperor and his army and his magicians and the Kamaye would spread like a black wound across the world, and if they could they would invade my own land. Looking at Mai-Long, her face turned toward the sunset, I could see that she believed whole-heartedly that her city was the greatest city in the world, and its ruler the wisest.

  “You learned to fight when you were, what? Seven? Eight?” I asked.

  She took a deep breath, as though this was the question she’d been half-wanting, half-dreading, and told me how Ji had instructed her in secret.

  “We knew it was forbidden, but we didn’t care. Ji was learning with the other boys, you understand? Many times I spied on their instruction, until the master found out, and sent me away. But Ji, he was a kind boy, and he came to me afterwards. I was sobbing in a corner, and at first I wouldn’t even look at him.” She glanced at me. “Have you ever …” she pounded her fist on her leg, “wanted to do something so well that your whole body aches? As though you were born to do this one thing, and this thing only? Even though to do it might lead to your death?”

  I thought of Rosa and the ruby pendant of the necklace and the way I ached to take the thing in my hands. “Yes.”

  “Then you understand why I did what I did.”

  “What did you do?”

  “Ji taught me what he was learning.” She sighed. “At the time you understand, this seemed innocent. We never thought …”

  “He taught you? How?”

  “Each day, after his class, he ran through the back tunnels–”

  “Back tunnels? Of the prison?”

  She nodded. “We used an empty cell to practice.” She smiled. “Ji was never the best teacher. He found it hard to explain things, and I grew angry with him for not paying enough attention in his class. I suppose I was an obstinate, thoughtless student. But we were children and his mother was of lower status than my mother.” She smoothed the sandy floor of the cave with her hand. “We grappled in the cell, shouting at each other until the walls rang with our cries. I pushed him; he pushed me. We were quite evenly matched. I suppose Ji teaching me was good for his abilities also. What do you think?”

  I imagined two children sparring in an empty prison cell; their cries ringing from the stone walls, their panting breaths. How could no one have heard them?

  “Lady?” she asked. “Do you think Ji benefited from teaching me?”

  “Probably.” I remembered Will teaching me, how he’d had to stay better than me, even though he was only a novice himself. “Yes,” I said more definitely. “He would have benefited.”

  “Good.” She nodded, pleased.

  “How long did you continue this for?”

  “We were discovered the week before Ji’s tenth birthday. So, probably a year.”

  “So long. Why did you stop?”

  She sighed. “We were practicing in the jail. I disarmed Ji; he fell, and I was ecstatic. No one usually went to these areas; they had been deserted for many years. But that day, my father was inspecting them, I do not know why. Anyway, he heard me shouting. When he ran into our practice cell, I trembled, waiting for his anger. I thought I was in trouble! But he smiled – he was proud of me, his daughter!” She wiped her eyes.

  “And Ji? What happened to him?”

  “Oh, that was the last time we fought. My father said it was too dangerous for both of us. And then, when Ji turned ten ye
ars his family moved away. I never saw him again.” She looked out the cave, to where the sky was fading into dusk. “Sometimes, I wondered if my father had arranged for Ji’s father to be transferred. I do not know.” She shrugged. “After Ji left, my father said that if I was going to learn this thing, I must learn to do it properly; not from a nine-year-old boy. He hired a teacher, a tiny man, once a fearsome warrior. I never knew his real name – my father said this was too dangerous – I called him ‘Master’. He was old, but had the temper of a snake. He taught me to fight barehanded, how to use an opponent’s strength against him. Like my father, Master believed that passion should never be denied. Thus he was prepared to teach me, despite the danger.” She was silent for a moment. “They said my father was a traitor to the Emperor. But I do not agree! My father was a good man, and he saw that my abilities might be useful to the Emperor. That is what I told them, when they came for me. Rather than listen to me, though, they killed him – my father, executed in full view of his men. He was truly disgraced.” She took a deep breath.

  “They made me watch,” she added.

  “I’m sorry.” I pictured it in my mind; crowds of officials in their regalia, the prisoners under guard, Mai-Long’s old playmates. A scaffold and a man waiting for his end. We sat in silence for a moment. The smell of dust and smoke came faintly on the wind.

  “The Emperor watched too. From behind a curtain. He does this sometimes.”

  My breath caught in my throat. If I could get the knife, then perhaps – if I knew when he was watching and where …

  “I should not have learned to fight,” she said sadly. “I disobeyed the Lord Emperor’s instructions. My path was decided for me by his wisdom, yet I chose to set my feet aside from it.” She looked at me as though I was a gift from heaven or something. It was eerie – I could almost see the gratitude oozing from her skin. “I owe my life to you, my lady.”