4: Witches' Blood (8 page)

“Yes, of course,” John replied. He was only half listening to Alidas.

He hadn’t realized how tired he was until he sat down and relaxed. He’d been up since dawn and the walk down from Rathal’pesha was always tiring. He noticed that a number of people had stretched out on the ground with their cushions propped under their elbows or beneath their heads. He lay back.

The green tent above him glowed like the underside of an immense leaf. John closed his eyes.

“Would you like me to read some aloud for you?” Alidas offered.

“Sure,” John replied. Laurie laughed.

“I think Alidas was asking the ladies, Jahn,” Laurie whispered. John shrugged in reply.

Alidas’ voice was soft as he read and the cadence of the poem reminded John of a lullaby:

Fine men may court you with silver and stone.

Spring blossoms will promise an autumn delight.

But bless us, our sisters of holy white bone,

Lest day breaks too swiftly and turns into night.

Alidas continued reading, but John’s thoughts lingered on the words of the first poem:
sisters of holy white bone.

The existence of the Issusha’im Oracles seemed too strange to be believed. Living bones. They frightened him and fascinated him at the same time. Eyeless skulls somehow watching, searching, looking into the unknowable future. Yet Ravishan’s sister was one of them.

John didn’t know exactly when he drifted into sleep. But his thoughts began wandering from the oracles to the great stone gateways that they commanded. With the Nayeshi’hala, they could tear apart the fabric of existence. John’s dreaming mind created images of black holes ripping through the skies, tearing away color and light from the land the way a rupture in the hull of an airplane could whip away all life within. He shuddered in revulsion—as if those two lambs were once again dying in his hands and he could not stop it from happening.

John bolted upright.

The tent was darker, lit now by hanging oil lamps. More people had gathered inside. Many of them were in the open space at the center of the tent, dancing. John straightened his cassock. He could only catch glimpses of the people around him as they moved between the luminous oil lamps and the deep shadows of the night. Their bodies melted into one another, forming one swirling silhouette.

Music rose up from the far left side of the tent where a dozen musicians were gathered on a raised dais. John was a little surprised to see Bill among them, strumming an instrument that looked like an overgrown mandolin. Alidas leaned at the edge of the musicians’ dais, watching Bill play. He held a small bone flute in his hands. John guessed that he, too, would be playing along with the musicians.

For a few minutes, John simply watched Bill play. In Nayeshi he had never shown any aptitude for music. Or perhaps, he just hadn’t shown any interest in it. He hadn’t shown any interest in anything, really. He was the friend who everyone thought was smart enough to be outstanding in any field he chose, but who never made a choice. He had seemed content to do nothing but rent odd videos, memorize obscure, useless trivia and wander through dance parties dispensing misinformation.

Now it was strange to see him so deeply focused and eager. John noted the way Bill’s fingers slid and jumped along the strings. He could pick out the distinct tones of Bill’s music as it floated through the surrounding pipes and drums. The purity and skill of it was obvious.

John searched the wide space of the tent for Laurie. He caught sight of her at the entry, nearly opposite him. She stood beside Ohbi, watching Bill. A moment later, she glanced to the pile of cushions where John had been sleeping. Seeing him awake, she waved and held up a small bundle of what looked like bread and began working her way around the edge of the crowded tent towards him.

 
John caught glimpses of her between the raised arms and turning bodies of the dancers. For a second, she dropped into a deep shadow and then emerged again, her pale hair gleaming in the lamplight. She wasn’t far from him when, suddenly, a dark form seemed to melt out of the silhouettes of the dancers and jerk her back into the darkness. At first, John mistook it for a play of the flickering light.

But Laurie didn’t reappear.

A sudden fear seized John. He rushed forward, brushing dancers and onlookers aside, hardly taking note of them as he raced along the edge of the tent.

He could feel some strange power, radiating from within the curtain-like folds of the tent wall. It shimmered through the darkness like heat waves dancing across a desert horizon. It drew him.

John tore back one of the deep folds of the tent to discover Rasho Tashtu holding Laurie from behind in a tight grip. One of his thick arms crushed across her throat, while his other hand groped at her breast.

“If you don’t let me go,” Laurie hissed, “I swear I’ll kill you.”

John knew she could and would. He could feel the fury and power emanating from her in waves.

“You need a little training.” Tashtu’s words were slurred. “A real man—”

John didn’t let him get any further. He caught hold of Tashtu’s hands and ripped them off of Laurie. She immediately bolted free.

“Who the hell do you think you are?” Tashtu roared. The alcoholic flush in his face looked almost black in the shadows of the tent.

“Release me, peasant!” Tashtu snarled. “I’ll have your head for this.”

 
He attempted to jerk free but John held him, grinding his thumbs into the soft flesh of Tashtu’s wrists. He wanted to snap the man’s hands off. He wanted to feel the bones crack and the tendons tear. But Tashtu was too high-ranking in the Bousim house. Harming him would only end up endangering Laurie and Bill. John knew that, and yet it was incredibly hard not to keep twisting the man’s arms, grinding into his bones.

John released him and Tashtu stumbled sideways.

John glanced back to Laurie. Her jaw was clenched, her lips pressed tightly closed as if she were fighting to remain silent. Her pale eyes looked unnaturally bright. Her entire body trembled, but John didn’t know if it was with fear or rage.

“Are you all right?” John asked.

Laurie managed a tight nod.

John caught a movement from the corner of his eye and turned in time to see Tashtu straighten. His hands were clenched into fists.

“Fucking priest!” Tashtu swung for John.

John blocked Tashtu’s punch and then caught the man’s throat in one hand. John’s fingers felt hot as they closed around the supple muscles and delicate column of cartilage that encased Tashtu’s trachea. John flexed his hand and Tashtu choked.

 
“I could kill you.” John’s words came out evenly, as if he was not seething with anger, as if it was a simple statement of ability and not a driving desire. He was so enraged that he could hardly think of anything else. His attention locked on the kick of Tashtu’s desperate pulse against his palm.

Only slowly did he become aware of how quiet the tent had become. Distantly, he registered the circle of startled and fascinated men and women surrounding him.

Tashtu swayed in John’s grip, his mouth wide open, his face dark purple. John instantly released him. Tashtu collapsed to the ground. This time, he didn’t struggle back up. He lay, sprawled out and gasping.

John turned back to find Laurie, but she had disappeared into the crowd. John thought he saw her far back with the other members of the Bousim household, her face buried against Bill’s chest.

“Interesting choice of entertainment, Ushvun.”

John turned to meet Dayyid’s unamused face. John opened his mouth to offer his explanation but then realized that Dayyid appeared to be in no mood to hear anything he had to say.

John hung back between Ravishan and Hann’yu as they trailed Dayyid back across the fairgrounds. In the depths of the night, John expected the stalls to have been locked up and the vendors to have bedded down. Instead, torches had been ignited, and oil lamps lit and hung. Fairgoers still packed the narrow avenues between the stalls, tents, and wagons. There were fewer children but far more men.

The smell of burning oils and strong wine wafted through every other scent on the air. The music that John picked out through the roar of fast bargaining and loud drunken voices was oddly slow. Smoky, sensual melodies curled out from the closed flaps of the tents they passed.

Dayyid glanced back over his shoulder at Hann’yu.

“I would have thought that you’d have remained sober enough to keep Ushvun Jahn from embarrassing himself in a common brawl.”

Hann’yu grinned. A red, alcoholic flush spilled across his nose and cheeks. The strong smell of wine and mead clung to his breath. There was no denying that he had been drinking. But compared to Tashtu, Hann’yu only seemed slightly tipsy.

“It was hardly a common brawl.” Hann’yu gave John a slightly lopsided grin. “That was a rasho that our Jahn took down. And the man had been mistreating ladies all evening. Jahn may very well have been acting as Parfir’s wrath for the offenses. It was magnificent.”

John glanced to his right to see Ravishan’s reaction. So far he had been silent, keeping his eyes focused on Dayyid’s back. Ravishan looked over to him at the same moment and gave him a brief, approving smile.

John imagined that an entire day spent with Dayyid had to be miserable and exhausting. He wished he could offer Ravishan some consolation.

“You would have been proud to see him move, Dayyid,” Hann’yu continued. “It was like lightning. Something to put the fear of god back into the masses.”

“Ushvun Jahn’s prowess does nothing to excuse you,” Dayyid responded coldly. “I shouldn’t have to come and fetch you for the Purification Ceremony every year. If you had minded the hour and kept your eyes on Jahn, none of this would have happened.”

“But as it was, Jahn saved a very pretty girl,” Hann’yu countered.

“For all we know she was one of the whores who follow the fair,” Dayyid said.

“She was Jahn’s sister.” The playful tone dropped from Hann’yu’s voice.

Dayyid glanced back, this time to John. John met his gaze. Dayyid’s scowl seemed to soften, and he said nothing to John. He turned his attention back to their path.

“Was she...is she all right?” Dayyid asked after several minutes of silence.

“I think so,” John said.

Dayyid nodded and said nothing more.

They continued threading their way south through the fairgrounds until they reached the last wall that enclosed the terraced steps of Amura’taye. City guards, armed with archaic-looking bows and spears, stood on duty at the heavy gates. They bowed as Dayyid approached and remained bent down until John, Ravishan, and Hann’yu had all passed through the open gates.

Outside, John expected to only see the flat expanse of the Holy Road, the small shrine to Parfir, and the surrounding forest. Instead, he found that they had stepped out into a second fairground. But a single whiff of the air told John why this one was kept so far from the city.

The air was choked with the smells of blood, meat, excrement, urine, and fires. Makeshift pens held fattened goats, young sheep, and old gaunt tahldi. Dogs crouched together in cages. Coops of weasels hung from the eaves of wagons. Smoked and salted carcasses dangled from walls and over entryways.

Tahldi bellowed and dogs whimpered as they were dragged from their pens. Teams of sweating, muscular men wrestled the animals down. Butchers slashed open the animals’ throats with fast, practiced strokes of their gleaming knives. Blood splashed and sprayed. Almost immediately, women and girls took over the work of skinning, gutting, and butchering the slaughtered creatures.

In the flickering red torchlight, the bodies of butchered animals seemed to melt into the blood-stained sweating forms of the men and women moving between them. Crowds of buyers shoved their way to the pens. They pointed and shouted out which animals they wanted, many demanding the same dog, goat, or sheep. Arguments seemed to break out constantly.

“You haven’t been here before, have you?” asked Hann’yu.

John shook his head. He had tried to hide his revulsion at the vast, open-air abattoir, but Hann’yu must have noticed it.

“I was astounded the first time I came as well. I couldn’t believe how many people were up and about this late. They don’t even have proper lights.” Hann’yu shook his head. “But the blood market is always busiest at night, when the air is cooler and there aren’t so many flies.”

John simply nodded. The fact that it was so busy at night hadn’t really made an impression on him. His deep familiarity with the twenty-four-hour conveniences of Nayeshi made the idea of nighttime shopping unremarkable.

It was the way the blood and butchery seemed so routine, the straightforward brutal slaughter that shocked him.

“The night brings out its own kind of vermin.” Dayyid threw a pointed look to the shadowy alcove between two wagons where a group of men seemed to be lounging. John wasn’t sure what Dayyid was referring to. The men looked bored, but hardly like vermin. In fact, some of them seemed very well dressed. Then John saw a woman farther back in the shadows. The thick body of the man thrusting between her sprawled legs hid most of her nudity. Her thin arms absently clung to his back as she stared up at the dark sky.