Black Jade (6 page)

'Was it Morjin, himself, then,' I asked Bajorak, 'who paid this gold to Garthax? Does he lead the Red Knights?'

'I have not heard that,' he told me. 'Were it so, we would attack them no matter if Morjin had paid Garthax a mountain of gold.'

'It will come to that, in the end!' Kashak barked out. Blue crosses gleamed on his sunburned cheeks to match the smoldering hue of his eyes. 'Let us ride against them now, with these kradaks!'

'And break our chieftain's covenant?'

'A chieftain who makes covenant with the Crucifier is no chief-ten! Let us do as we please.'

Bajorak, too, shared Kashak's zeal for battle. But he had a cool head as well as a fiery heart, and so to Kashak and his other men he called out: 'Would you commit the Tarun clan to going against our chieftain? If we break the covenant, it will mean war with Garthax.'

'War, yes, with
him
,' Pirrax said, shaking his bow. 'We're warriors, aren't we?'

Now Atara stepped forward, and her white blindfold gleamed in the strong sunlight. Her face was cold and stern as she addressed these fierce men of the Tarun clan: 'It's wrong for warriors to make war against their chieftain. Can not Garthax be persuaded to return this gold?'

Bajorak shook his head. 'You do not know him.'

'I know what my grandfather, Sajagax, said of Garthax's father: that Artukan was a great chieftain who would never scrape before Morjin. Does a lion sire a snake?'

'Garthax,' Bajorak said, 'is not his father's son.'

'Have you tried helping him to be?'

It was one of Atara's graces, I thought that she tried ever to remake men's natures for the good.

'Help
him?
' Bajorak said. 'You do not understand. Ganhax quarreled with Artukan over the question of . nether we should treat with Morjin. And two days later Artukan died while drinking his beer . . .of poison!'

'Poison
!' Atara cried out. 'That cannot be!'

'No, no one wanted to believe it - certainly not I,' Bajorak told her. 'But it is said that upon taking the first sip of his beer, Artukan cried out that his throat was on fire. One of his wives offered him water, but Artukan said that this burned his lips. Everything . . . burned him. No one could touch him. It is said that he put out his own eyes so that he would not have to bear the torment of light. His skin turned blue and then black, like dried meat. He screamed, like a kradak burnt at the stake. It took him a whole day to die.'

Master Juwain's faced paled, and then he said to Bajorak, 'If what you tell is true, then surely the poison was kirax.'

Surely it was, I thought as my heart pushed my flaming blood through my veins. And surely thus I would have died, too, if only the assassin sent by Morjin had managed to bury his arrow even a tenth of an inch into my flesh.

'I do not know this poison, kirax,' Bajorak said to Master Juwain.

And Master Juwain told him, 'It is used only by the Red Priests of the Kallimun. And by Morjin.'

Bajorak s gaze flashed from Master Juwain to Kashak and Pirraj, and he made a warding sign with his finger as he cried out. 'Treachery! Abomination! If Garthax really was in league with the Red Priests, if he is then. . .'

'Then his eyelids should be cut off, and he should be staked out in the sun for the ants and the yellowjackets to eat!'

These terrible words came from Atara. and I felt my heart nearly break against my chest bones to hear her pronounce the age-old punishment that the Sarin meted out to poisoners. 'He should be unmanned,' she added, 'and his parts given to the vultures!'

It was one of Atara's griefs, I knew, that when her hopes for men failed, she could fall icy cold and full of judgment, like a killer angel.

'
If
true,' Bajorak said, nodding his head, 'what you say should be done. But we know not that it
is
true. Only that, from what we've learned of Garthax, it
could
be.'

'Then until it is proved,' Atara said, 'he is still your chieftain. And so you must persuade him with words to break this covenant with Morjin, rather than with arrows and flaying knives.'

'
Words
,' Bajorak spat out. He looked from Atara to Kane and then at me. 'Valashu Elahad, all of you, rode with Sajagax to Tria to unite the free peoples against Morjin, with words. And what befell? Alonia is in flames, and in the Morning Mountains, the Elahad's own Valari make war with each other. And on the Wendrush! The Zayak ride openly into our country! It is said that the Marituk have allied with the Dragon, the Janjii, too! And so the Tukulak and the Usark, and other tribes, soon will. They think to choose the winning side before it is too late. They have no sense of themselves! Whatever side the Sarni choose will be victorious. And that is why we Tarun, and the other Danladi clans, must choose another chieftain, before it is too late. And we shall make our votes with
these
!'

So saying, he reached into his quiver and drew out a long, feathered shaft. With one smooth, quick motion, he nocked it to his bowstring, drew it back to his ear and loosed it toward the Red Knights and the Zayak warriors. His great horn bow unbent with a crack like thunder. The arrow whined through the air and buried itself in the grass a few hundred yards away. Not even Sajagax, I thought, could shoot an arrow a mile.

Bajorak's eyes gleamed, but he sighed. 'Atara Manslayer is right,' he said. 'Until Garthax's treachery is proven, he is still our chieftain. And so his cursed covenant will be honored.'

Much of what he had told me we had learned while in winter camp with Karimah and the Manslayers, for the Wendrush is Ea's crossroads, and news flows as freely as the great sagosk herds over its windswept plains. I had not, however, known about the Marituk's alliance with Morjin. They were a great tribe, and so this was evil tidings - but no surprise. In Tria, I had nearly claimed the Lightstone for myself; I had spoken a lie and slain a man, and as with a stone cast into a black water, these evil deeds had rippled outward to touch many peoples and many lands.

'And so,' Bajorak continued, looking from the Red Knights back at me, 'we shall not attack our enemy. They know this. It is why they ride so impudently.'

'But what if they attack
us?'
Maram wanted to know. It was a question that he could not stop asking Bajorak - and himself.

'They won't,' Bajorak told him. 'They haven't the numbers ... yet.'

'
Yet
?' Maram called out. 'Ah, I don't like the sound of that, not at all. What do you mean,
yet
?'

'I believe,' Bajorak said, 'that these are not the only companies of Red Knights or Zayak that Garthax has allowed into our country.'

At this Maram craned his neck about, scanning the horizon. And all the while he muttered, 'Oh, too bad, too bad!'

Bajorak ignored him and looked straight at me. He said, 'Until Karimah came to me asking us to escort you, I could not imagine what these companies were seeking in our lands.'

I said nothing as I watched the Red Knights, who seemed to be waiting for us to remount so that they might renew the chase.

'But I do not understand,' he went on,
'why
they are seeking you.'

'Surely that is simple,' I told him. 'We are Morjin's enemies. Surely he would pay much gold to anyone who brings him our heads.'

I rested my hand on the hilt of my sword; I looked into Bajorak's eyes to see if he desired this gold badly enough to betray us. But I saw there only a blazing hatred of Morjin and a fierce pride.

Then Bajorak looked away from me toward our enemy. 'Perhaps they
do
want to kill you. But perhaps they are seeking the same thing as you.'

His perceptiveness vexed me, and I told him, 'We have not said that we are seeking anything.'

He smiled as best he could and said, 'No, you say little, with your lips, Valashu Elahad. But your eyes sing like the minstrels. I have never seen a man who
desires
as you do.'

'Perhaps,' I told him, 'we desire nothing more than to cross your lands.'

He pointed at the snowy peaks in the west, 'To go into the wild mountains where no one dwells?'

'Perhaps we wish to dwell there.'

He held out his hand toward Estrella and Daj. 'It is strange that you take children with you on such a journey.'

'Is it strange to want to find a place where they might come of age in peace?'

Bajorak's face softened as he said, 'No, that is not strange - if any such place exists. But if it
did
exist, surely you would not seek it in the Sarni's lands so close to Sakai.'

'We go where we must,' I told him. 'Will you help us?'

'We would help you better if you helped us.'

'We ride together,' I said. 'If our enemy attacks
you,
we will fight
them.'

'That is good. But I would be even better if you trusted us.'

'We've trusted you with our lives.'

'Yes, but not with that which impels you to risk your lives.'

'As Kane has told you, that would be an unnecessary burden.'

'You
say. But the greater burden is not knowing where we are going or why. It puts my men at risk. And I do not spend
their
lives as readily as I do gold.'

As the sun's light broke upon the fillet binding his forehead, I pressed my finger hard into the little zags of the scar that cut mine like a lightning bolt. And I said, 'You have pledged to ride with us, even so. Will you keep your pledge?'

Bajorak looked back and forth between Pirraj and Kashak as anger clouded his eyes. He shook his bow at me and snapped out: 'We Tarun are no pledge-breakers! Hai, but you are a hard man, Valashu Elahad. And a willful one! Let us ride then, if that is your wish!'

And with that, he jumped back on his horse, and with Pirraj and Kashak, galloped back to the bend in the river where most of his warriors were gathered.

Liljana stood with her arms thrown protectively around Daj and Estrella. And she scolded me: 'You were barely cordial to him. I've never seen you be so hard.'

I watched as Karimah returned to the Manslayers, who were getting ready to ride again, fend I said, 'We know little of this Bajorak and his true intentions. And you've been able to tell me little.'

She clapped her hand to her pocket where she had secreted her blue gelstei. 'Would you have me
try
to tell you?'

'As you tried with the Red Knights?'

Liljana's heavy eyebrows pulled into a frown. 'You're hard with me, too - cruel hard. What have I done to make you so?'

The hurt in her eyes stabbed straight into me. I took her hand in mine and said, 'My apologies, Liljana. You've done nothing. Now why don't we see if we can lose these damn knights before the sun reaches noon?'

After that we set out as before and continued our race acrossthe Wendrush. We drove our remounts too hard; I felt fire in the lungs of these great beasts and spreading out along their blood to torment their bunching muscles and straining joints. It grew hot, not quite so sweltering as in Marud or Soal, but too hot for early

Ashte. The sun rose higher and shot its golden flames at us. I sweated beneath layers of wool, mail and leather underpadding. The wind in my face carried some of this moisture away, but did little to cool my sodden body. I turned to see the others working hard as well. Maram, on top of his bounding brown gelding, puffed and grunted and sweated like a pig. Kane sweated, too, for he was attired no differently. As always, though, he made no complaint. His black eyes seemed to say to me that the Red Knights following us in their thicker armor suffered even worse than we.

The riding quickly became a misery. Biting black flies buzzed around our eyes and ears. I watched Bajorak leading his more lightly-clad warriors ahead of us. Would he honor his word, I wondered? Or did he hope to use us as bait, inviting an attack by other companies of Red Knights and Zayak who would join our pursuers? Perhaps, I thought, Bajorak would then call down a host of Tarun warriors that he might have secreted somewhere among the steppe's long grasses. He would annihilate his enemy and use this incident as a reason to mount a rebellion against Garthax. And he would not care if my friends and I - kradaks, all, except for Atara - happened to be annihilated, too.

My father had once told me that a king should strive to dwell inside others' skins and perceive the world as they did. It should have been easy for me to know the truth about Bajorak, easier than it was for Liljana. But it was harder. In the shallows of the Great Northern Ocean, I had once seen an oyster which closed itself inside its shell when disturbed. So it was with me and my gift. All my life I had avoided the harsh touch of others' passions. And why? Because, like grit in the eyes, it hurt. And even more, because I was afraid. Bajorak had said that Garthax was not his father's equal. Neither, I thought, was I mine.

And so I rode on and on, watching the glints of gold about Bajorak ahead of me and turning to gaze at the red smear of Morjin's knights and the Zayak warriors on their ponies pounding after us across the sunlit plain. We did not escape them all that long day. We were only three miles from the mountains when at last we stopped to make camp by a stream that flowed down from these heights. And as with the night before, our enemy set up their tents only a mile away.

We were all tired and sore from the cruel day's work, and so none of us had much enthusiasm for tending the horses, gathering wood and water, making the fire, and other such things. As usual when the sun went down, Liljana took charge. She insisted on preparing us a hot meal, and it was good to sit down with our bowls of bloody sagosk meat, whose juices we mopped up with fresh rushk cakes. These Liljana made herself, for she had excused both Daj and Estrella from their chores. The children were so weary and worn that they could hardly hold their bowls to eat their dinners. The sun had burnt their faces, and dust dirtied their hair. Although Daj would not allow himself to whine as other children did, much less to weep, I knew that the hard riding had chafed him, nearly flaying the flesh from his legs. Estrella was in even worse condition. She sat very still, fighting to keep her eyes open. Even the slightest motion caused her to wince in pain.