A Bait of Dreams

by Clayton, Jo;

  Zidras was gazing at Shounach’s back, his surface thinned until hints of pain and hunger crept out. He heard her horse’s hooves and turned to her, his fingers flicking through a calming ritual, his surface intact again. He waved his delicate hand as she rode past, called a fluting farewell to Deel. Before the trees quite closed on her, she looked back. He was still gazing after them.

  forest idyll

  Morning was reddening the sky when they reached the top of the cliff. A horde of ragged hungry boys ran out from hovels clustered about the base of the massive walls of the Svingeh’s Keep and swarmed around the riders, tugging at legs, reins, anything they could get hold of, demanding to be hired as guides through the forest, shouting their skills, begging coins, roaring threats and all the while busy fingers were getting off with anything they could pry loose. It was like being attacked by roaches, none individually dangerous but the horde capable of nibbling them to death.

  Shounach thrust an arm into his bag. “Cover your ears,” he shouted. He started playing a thin bone-white pipe, producing sounds that ate through their hands and into their heads. The horses bolted, but ran in step like a trained team, leaving the beggars rolling in agony on the stony ground. Gleia lay with her face in the horse’s mane, holding on with her teeth, sparing a second’s attention to wonder at Shounach’s control of the beasts. They blundered blindly into the tangled forest until they stumbled onto a winding track and slowed to a walk, then stopped, heads down, breathing hard.

  She twitched as a hand touched her leg, opened one eye a crack, relaxed with a sigh as Shounach eased her from the saddle and carried her to the side of the track, settling her with her back against the trunk of a stunted bydarrakh. She looked up into his anxious face and smiled at him, shocked out of her retreat and reservations; she reached up and touched his face, her fingers trembling. He pulled her to him, held her gentled against him until she stopped shaking.

  When he heard her breathing change, felt the stiffness come back into her body, he let her go; without a word he left her and went to tend to Deel.

  Gleia was both angry and jealous, furious at her own stupidity, furious with Deel for being there, raging at Shounach for being what he was—and at herself for being what she was.

  Later, as she rode through the reddish half-light of the forest, she began to understand that this was how it would always be with them, even after Deel was longtime gone, even when nothing blocked them. Moments of closeness so intense it seemed they wore each other’s skins. Longer times of quiet amity. And times of coldness when anything either did was wrong.

  The Forest was dark and thick with growth in spite of the heavy crowns of the trees; she soon saw that much of the tangle was parasitic on the trees, suckers growing out of trunks and roots, epiphytes nesting in crotch and crack. The air was thick with their perfumes, heavy with humidity, making her head ache. Deel tried singing her wailing songs, but the air under the trees quenched them into stillness just as it hushed everything else.

  They rode through the whole of the day even though high heat turned the air under the trees to a steambath. The canopy kept Hesh’s teeth off them, and neither Deel nor Gleia complained at the long day. The Forest made both of them uncomfortable and they wanted out of it.

  DEEL

  She had very little experience with riding, no occasion for it since she’d kept to seacoast cities until she threw herself into this tangled quest. She was accustomed to training her body to new tasks so she learned the basics of riding easily enough, but the muscles she was using weren’t those she customarily used; she was suffering by the end of the day, not thinking, just enduring, images out of memory drifting through her head.…

  Throb of drums, echoing and re-echoing through the glittering winding Caves of Summerhome on Burung, dancers wheeling past, running nid to nid, singing to the echoes until the Caves rang with the magic, the laughter.…

  Waves like blue mountains rising under her, about her, the fishboat riding the hills as they rose, dropping as they dropped, seized by water whose power she could not fight only read and yield to, giving herself to Ooaala of the waters, using the best skills she had to keep herself alive, driven not by hate or vengeance but by the more primitive need to survive, to go on and on, an eternity of struggle.… Streets, where? no matter, hunger a rat in her belly, confusion of faces and hands, dancing, coins tossed at her, hands pawing her, all the streets fading together, all the same in the end, all the taverns fading together, all the same in the end, all the men fading together, all the same in the end.…

  Gleia’s face shuttered, then open, then shuttered again, on fire with passionate affirmation, freezing with the fury of her determination.…

  Shounach’s face, old, young, enigmatic, exotic, looming over her, tender, angry, fascinating her.…

  SHOUNACH

  They rode past small farms hacked into the Forest, with log forts that housed the livestock as well as the several families living together. Women and children were working in the fields, the harvest just beginning as the days grew colder and shorter. He heard the sound of axes, the crashing of trees, knew the men were deeper in the forest cutting wood to add to the pile rising already over the outlook towers, the greatest need, fuel for the wintering.

  He knew when Deel began to suffer from her aching muscles and read Gleia too well for his comfort. She’d gone remote again. He cursed Deel for being there, fought with the growing rancor that was as unjust as his resentment at her presence. If he hadn’t sought to use her again, stupidly, viciously, unnecessarily, hating her because he’d wronged her and planned to wrong her again, making love to her not because he wanted her but because he wanted to punish Gleia, if he hadn’t been so blinded by malice, she wouldn’t be here, she’d be with the Sayoneh, contented, Gleia contented to see her happy. He couldn’t understand even now why he’d done it, why he’d expected to fool Gleia who knew him better than anyone had since Stavver gambled his life away two centuries-standard ago. Arrogance, he thought. Because she didn’t know what made the earrings work, she wouldn’t know what they were meant to do. And all the time he knew how shrewd she was, street-wise, pain-wise. Shounach-wise.

  And it was so unnecessary. After the fuss with Deel he’d slipped past the guards and planted stick-tights in the Sayoneh gear, a dozen pinhead beepers, far more effective than those damn earrings that might have cost him more than he was willing to pay. If Gleia left him now, it would be the hardest thing he’d faced since Stavver’s death. Love. A foolish sickening word. Used mostly for the pull of the flesh. He couldn’t say it to her, though he’d tossed it off easily enough a dozen times before. Gleia was … kin and kind. In flesh and spirit, kin and kind. A wise man would have let her go when she left him the first time to keep her promise to her seaborn sister-friend. But he couldn’t help himself, he sent the message by Tetaki. And if she hadn’t come, he’d have gone to her. Made a nuisance of himself, or killed her in a rage like he killed his brother. He grew cold at the thought and tried to wipe it away, then tried to wipe away the memory of the times he’d deliberately hurt her. She thought herself plain, marred, awkward. He’d seen her quiet envy of Deel’s grace and laughing charm. He knew how many years she’d heard herself called trash, slave, bonder, thief. There were more scars inside than ever on her face. He knew how to hurt her and he’d used that knowledge, frightened by how necessary she’d made herself without trying or even noticing, infuriated by that resilient independence that was both threat and challenge.

  Summersend. Urgency and weariness. End of search. He was tired. He wanted it finished.

  Ashla’s hells, wouldn’t this forest ever end?

  Gleia

  Her head throbbed. She smelled fear and rage and pain.

  There was something behind them. A quick glance at Deel and Shounach showed her that they’d noticed nothing. She rubbed at her temples, pressed the heels of her hands against her eyes, but the prickling wouldn’t go away.

  Eyes on her. Hate. Blood-hun
ger. Catman. Arena slave meant to claw the life out of others of his kind or have it torn out of him. Escaped. Pursued. Coming through the trees.

  A golden shadow flitting through green-red shadows. An instant he looked at her, eyes new-green like spring buds. Startled. Raging. Then he was past her, silent in spite of the grudging thorn tangles under the trees.

  Hounds belling. Coming closer. Their resonant voices dulled by the heavy air, swallowed by the sullen, greedy trees.

  Shounach looked over his shoulder, scowling. He reached into his bag and took out the bone pipe. The music he produced this time hurt her ears but not her head; it changed the belling to yelps that faded quickly as the hounds retreated and presumably their handlers ran with them. Shounach played a while longer to be sure he routed them, then put the pipe away; he twisted around, grinned at Gleia, inviting her approval of his minor triumph. She raised her hands, clapped them in polite applause, lifted a brow. With a laugh, he swung back, chucked his mount to a faster walk.

  The Forest went quieter and more ominous as night thickened about them; the trees pressed in on them, low-hanging limbs brushing at them, thorny twigs snagging clothing, scraping across skin leaving lines of blood behind. The narrow track felt like a precariously held free-zone, a gap the Forest struggled to close. Shounach pressed on and on into the stifling darkness but Gleia didn’t protest or suggest stopping though each time she shifted in the saddle she was more and more aware that her body was one general ache. She hated these trees, they seemed alive and bitterly hostile to anything human, she wanted out of this place so desperately she was willing to ride all night if that’s what it took.

  But a glance at Deel showed her this wasn’t possible. The Dancer was a fuzzy shadow in the blackness, but Gleia could see her swaying like the mast of a small boat in a big storm, her hands wound tight in the horse’s mane.

  Before she could decide what to do, the Forest drew back from them, a half-moon campsite chopped out of the trees. A small turgid stream wandered across the track and through the burned-out space, managing a subdued glitter or two as it emerged into leaf-mottled moonlight. Gleia sighed with pleasure as she followed Shounach out of the darkness; her shoulders relaxed and she breathed more easily.

  She slid down and did a few wriggling hops to loosen up her muscles; it hurt but it was a pleasant sort of pain. Shounach chuckled and got busy throwing down bedrolls and groundsheets, unknotting the small pack of food and cooking things. Deel sat in the saddle without moving, still clutching at the mane, her hands knobby with strain. Gleia rolled over to her, walking on the outside edges of her feet, her knees feeling entirely unreliable, her body light and wobbly. “We stopped.”

  “Yeah. Tell my legs.”

  “Tell you what. Just lean and keep leaning, I’ll catch you.”

  Deel snorted. “Hunh! you couldn’t catch yourself.”

  Shounach stepped past Gleia, caught Deel about the waist and pulled her off the horse, stood her beside Gleia then went back to setting up the camp.

  Deel clutched at Gleia. Together they staggered over to the pile of blanket rolls and collapsed there, giggling and groaning, sprawled on their backs, luxuriating in the pale gray light seeping down on them through the gaps in the canopy.

  DEEL

  Deel watched Shounach assembling a small, neat fire, Gleia peeling tubers for the stew. She kept working her legs, bending and straightening them, prodding carefully at the muscles through the heavy twill of her trousers, the tremble and weakness slowly leaving her hands; it’d been a long time since she was so exhausted. Gleia gathered up the peels, pushed onto her feet with a grunt of effort and carried them toward the tangle at the edge of the clearing. Deel raised one leg as high as she could, held it out in front until the muscles began twitching, then let it fall. She started to lift the other.

  The brittle bushes in front of Gleia exploded as a limber form burst from them and caught her before she could move, swung her around, pinning her arms to her sides with one of his, his other hand holding a knife to her throat. Gleia stood very still. The catman’s bright round eyes peered over her shoulder, radiating rage, pain, and threat. “Chuun!” The word was a spitting snarl. “Auke kaalte chim. Maach?” He shoved Gleia farther into the clearing and Deel got a better look at him.

  His tawny fur was barred with slightly darker strips, his ears were drawn back tight against his head, his snarl lifting his lip to bare curved tearing fangs. He jerked Gleia tight against his body, drawing an involuntary gasp from her as his claws dug into her arm.

  Deel bit her lip and got slowly and with some difficulty to her feet, taking care not to startle the fugitive. “What does he want?” She couldn’t take her eyes from Gleia. The slight brown woman was relaxed, unafraid. How does she do it? I’d be petrified. Gleia’s light brown eyes were fixed on the Juggler, there was a slight, rather amused curl to her mouth, a hint of expectancy in the tilt of her head.

  “Food,” Shounach said softly, his voice hardly louder than a whisper. “Keep still.” He held out empty hands. “Maach, damai-shaffiin, chanoyi,” He turned back to Gleia. “I’ve told him to let there be peace between us, that I’ll get what he wants.” He started to bend, straightened at a hiss from the catman. “Ha-shiin, chanoyi, chun tas a hin.” He pointed to the packet sitting beside the shallow bowl of tubers. “I told him that’s meat, but he doesn’t want me to move. Deel, take a step toward me, let’s see what happens.”

  Deel closed her hands into fists, held her breath and took a short, hesitant step.

  “Baisch. Izhin-usan lim-feh hahshi.”

  “He approves, says let the woman throw the meat to him. Keep it slow and easy and we should get through this with our skins whole.”

  Deel sighed. “I said it wouldn’t be boring with you around; didn’t know what I was wishing on myself.” She moved with slow, unsteady steps to the packet of meat; Shounach’s hand was a warm strong support as she went to her knees beside the fire, a necessary support because her body didn’t seem to want to bend. She fumbled with the string, finally got it loose, unfolded the parchment and took out a strip of smoked meat. She held up the meat so the catman could see what it was, then lobbed it at him.

  The hand pinning Gleia’s arms flicked out like the tongue of a toad, snapped the meat and was curled back about her before she had a chance to move. He looked down at the strip of meat, his nostrils flaring, lifted his head. “Zhaish.”

  “Toss him the rest of it, strip by strip,” Shounach said.

  Deel nodded. The meat strips tumbled through lazy arcs, landing one by one at Gleia’s feet; when the parchment was bare, she settled onto her heels and looked up at Shounach, suppressing a gasp as she saw him holding two of the spheres he used in his act.

  He was staring down at them as they warmed in his hands, their cool blue shimmer reflected in eyes gone silver. The small breeze that crept along the stream was pushing his hair about; it carried to Deel the rank musky odor of the catman, a smell that made her wrinkle her nose and raised the hairs along her spine. Shounach looked from the strengthening glow of the spheres to the nervously twitching catman to Gleia who had a thick red trickle crawling down her throat where the catman’s knife had nicked her as he caught the first strip of meat.

  “Zhaish.” The catman looked down at the small pile of meat, made a rumbling purring sound, shifted from foot to foot in a kind of swaying dance, Gleia swaying with him as she tried to avoid the edge of the knife.

  Shounach began talking in the cadenced gutturals of the catman’s tongue, making a song of them; at the same time he began popping the spheres into the air, turning them into a shining round about his calm and slightly smiling face. Around and around, his voice weaving a kind of magic out of words, playing with them, soothing the catman, relaxing, edging into him so it was a part of him. Deel watched the catman’s face lose its snarl, watched his shoulders, arms, hands losing some of their tension, though he still kept the knife at Gleia’s throat.

  “Hredragh,�
�� Shounach sang, weaving the word over and over into the chant like the decade marker on a rosary, soft singing words the beads slipping into the silence until the hush was complete, made so by the single sound of the Juggler’s song. “Hredragh, friend, my friend, tush ghusseh, no danger, tush dusseh no threat, tush lameh, no sorrow.…” Over and over.

  The catman took the knife from Gleia’s throat, straightened his arm, the muscles highlighted by the sheen of the short soft fur lying flat against his skin. Slowly he opened his fingers until the knife dropped. It struck the ground at an angle, tumbled over, settled to rest against the heap of meat.

  There was tension in the Juggler’s face now, rivulets of sweat ran down his nose, dripping from his chin, but he kept the spheres circling in their tranquil round, the words slipped fluidly from his lips. “Tss-sha shau my fire is yours hathya honn hudh my life to your kin hredragh oh friend hredragh ya hredragh.”