Heroes Adrift (9 page)

“That will work,” said Atara, rubbing her hands together. “That will do.”

“But I can do better.” And I'd just been getting into it.

“I am looking for pretty, not athletic. Though a little of that is good, too.” She was looking me up and down again. “No silver. Just copper. Maybe we can find some gold. Yes, everything orange, yellow, gold. The Flame Dancer.”

The Flame Dancer? Was she serious? I didn't dare look at Karish, who was no doubt snickering and would start me off.

“Dunleavy is no good.”

I'd be sure to tell my parents they'd chosen an inadequate name.

“Leavy. Leavy the Flame Dancer.”

Oh my good gods. How could I possibly face anyone carrying a name like that? “I fear such a title would be more appropriate for someone more flamboyant.”

“You can learn to be flamboyant.”

Oh aye. As simple as that, was it? “I'm a Shield, ma'am. It's the nature of a Shield to be sedate.”

“By inclination or training?”

“A little of both.”

“Inclination can be overcome. And if you can be trained to be sedate, you can be trained to be flamboyant. Everyone!” She clapped her hands twice, and I realized there were even more people watching than I remembered. “This is Leavy and Shintaro. They will be joining us for a while. They are good omens, and a guide for our next path.” The fact that no one found this announcement startling disturbed me. “They have nothing. I think they will bring us much. We will provide them with what they need. We're leaving tomorrow.”

Not much of a speech maker.

Everyone started moving. Some leaving, some disassembling the practice gear and carting it away.

An older woman picked her way to me, easily avoiding the flow. She was dressed in the same manner as the younger women, and I had to admire her bravery and self-confidence. “I am Corla,” she said. “I read the future.” Zaire save me. “I can share my tent with you and your husband.”

“Oh, we're not married,” I said.

“No matter. Many don't bother. That does not impair the invitation.”

Before I could explain that wasn't exactly what I meant, Fin—a broad middle-aged man who still managed to carry off the scanty garb—approached. “We have enough spare fabric to fashion a sort of tent for you,” he rumbled in the deepest voice I had ever, ever heard. “It might scar the eyes, but it will keep the sun off.”

“Thank you. That is so kind.”

Karish was then spirited away by Fin. I spent the rest of the day introducing myself to people, those who weren't out performing. They were, as a whole, a talkative bunch, and uncomfortably inquisitive. They wanted to know all about why we were there. I stuck with the same story I'd used in front of Karish—searching for long-lost family—with no embellishment, certain that they were questioning him as well. When they pressed me for details, I praised the beauty of their tattoos or asked them what they did for the show.

I learned that there were thirty people in all, adults and children, performers and handworkers. The troupe had belonged to Atara since her mother, who had owned it before her, had died, and they spent all their time traveling from settlement to settlement, performing for coins. As the island was rather small, it seemed to me that the show would end up visiting the same settlement twice in a year, perhaps more. The solution to that was variety. All performers were pushed to constantly change their acts. And the performers themselves were not constant. A couple of rope walkers had left the troupe a few stops back. This was one of the reasons Atara, whom everyone called Ma, was so quick to take us on. We were new, and as Northerners we would draw an audience by our mere presence.

Day slid into evening, and Karish found me sitting under the ovcas—what they called the extra flap suspended beyond the entrance of the tent—with a young girl named Glynis. His hair was ringed with sweat and there were streaks of dirt across his face and his bare torso, not to mention caked under his nails. And yet he still managed to look good. Regular freak of nature, he was.

Of course, it might also have had something to do with the gleam in his eye and the odd glow about him. I was immediately suspicious.

“What have you been doing all day?” he asked.

“Uh, nothing,” I admitted, immediately afflicted with that most useless of emotions, guilt, because it was obvious he had been working like a dog.

He grinned. “Nothing?”

I nodded, wondering why he thought that was something to smile about.

He chuckled. “Come along, then.”

I took my leave from Glynis, who apparently found my manner amusing and giggled in response. I followed Karish through the camp, where most of the performers had returned and were showing signs of packing up. He led me to the edge of the camp, to a tent that was even more eye sticking than the others, each side a different color and pattern, the roof a faded, distasteful green. It was smaller than the other tents, and it had no ovcas.

“This is our tent,” he announced with palpable pride.

I smiled at him. “You put it up.”

“I did.” Hence the glow. “I mean, Fin showed me how and helped me, but I did most of it.”

The jokes that sprang into my brain, all about the likelihood of this effort collapsing or being blown away, were strangled into silence for being inappropriate under the circumstances. “I'm impressed.”

“Really?”

“I couldn't do it.”

Karish grabbed my elbow. “Look inside.” He pulled me forward and opened the tent flap, latching it up against the nearest wall.

I was arrested by all the stuff littered on the floor of the tent. Bundles of clothes. Sandals of all colors. Pots and pans. Mats and sheets and small hard pillows destined to give me migraines. And things I didn't recognize. All filling the small front space of the tent.

“Atara showed me a list of everything that was here.” Karish unwrapped one bundle of clothing, revealing a flashy golden length of cloth that filled me with dread. “And what the expenses of traveling are. And an estimation of how long it would take us to pay everything back.”

I didn't bother asking for the numbers. They wouldn't mean anything to me. “Did it seem fair to you?”

He shrugged. “I really don't know, Lee. Different places put different values on things, having different wage rates and different standards for prices. It didn't seem outrageous to me, but”—he shrugged again—“I'm no expert.”

“So how long will we be in debt to these people?”

“It depends on how much you bring in as a dancer. But she gave me an estimate for that as well.” He pulled in a deep breath. Oh, no. “Something over two years.”

My mouth dropped open, so I covered it with my hand. Two years?
Two years?
Were they insane? “Taro—”

“I know.”

“We're not even going to be here two years!”

“I know. But, Lee, what else can we do? We have nothing here. No suitable clothing or gear.” He looked at the cloth in his hand and shoved it back into the bundle. “No useful skills.”

I sank to my knees on the mat that served as the floor. “Hey, you can erect a tent.” I unwrapped a small leafy bundle and discovered a cool hard ball of cooked rice. “It's just…two years.”

“The way I see it, we travel with them, find…the line…then sneak away—”

“Taro!”

“Let me finish. We sneak off when we can, and when we get back to Erstwhile, we have the Empress send them back whatever money we still owe.”

“They'll think we're thieves when we leave. And it's a poor way to repay them for taking a chance with us.”

“We'll leave them a note. And aye, they probably won't believe it. But they will when they get the money.”

I didn't like it. I didn't like any of it, being beholden to these people, belonging to them for two years, making a fool of myself for money and sneaking off once we didn't need them anymore. Reeked of dishonor. But Karish was right. I didn't see an option. And I was furious with the Empress for putting us in this position.

“So what will you be doing?” I asked to sort of change the subject.

The glow, which had dimmed when he revealed our financial situation, disappeared completely. “Fetching and carrying, because I don't know how to do anything. Useless aristocrat, indeed, eh?”

He was not useless. In any sense of the word. He had a rare, valuable, dangerous ability that the people on this damned island lacked the brains to appreciate. “You can raise a tent,” I reminded him. “You can learn. So can I.”

He hissed. “You don't have to, do you? You have something they want.”

I looked at him, tucked a lock of his hair behind his ear. “Are you jealous?”

“Yes.” His tone was bitter. “I'm here on sufferance. Because you can do something that appeals to them and they figure they can't have you unless they take me, too.”

“Actually, we were both taken on because Atara thinks we're good omens. She obviously isn't guided by reason. And you're the one who knows how to handle money.”

“No, I don't, Lee. Not really. Stop it.”

Damn it. He was sliding into one of his moods. Damn all these people, anyway. “Ah, I know what the real problem is. You're just all bent because Atara doesn't think you're gorgeous.”

Outraged was better than downcast. “That has nothing to do with anything!” he snapped angrily.

“Oh aye. After a lifetime of getting everything you wanted just by batting those eyes and flashing that simpering smile.”

“I neither bat nor simper!”

“Please. You expect to be able to work your way around anyone.”

“I do not manipulate people.”

This was getting ugly. That hadn't been the plan. “That's not what I'm suggesting.”

“Isn't it?”

I sighed. “Taro, we are in a strange place, with different rules. We both have to learn. And if you think I'm happy to take a sport I love and tart it up for the entertainment of ignorant—” I halted. The only words ready to leap off my tongue were derogatory, and they didn't deserve that. “Well, I'm not happy about it.”

“Nice try, Lee. So you have to wear some flash and dance at something less than your standard. Doesn't change the fact that you can contribute something that these people want, and I can't.”

I didn't comment. He wasn't believing anything I was saying, anyway.

We had a solemn, quiet dinner, and I didn't know what to do about Karish's mood. After years of being near worshipped for being a Source, it had to be a blow to have one's principal skill dismissed as useless. And no matter what he said, it had to be hard to be told he was plain. He wasn't used to being seen that way. I would have been annoyed if someone had said that right to my face, and they would have been telling the truth.

The remainder of the tent had been separated into two tiny bedrooms, little larger than the mats we were sleeping on. Lying on the mat, I realized the tents provided no protection from noise. I heard others moving around, talking, shouting. I heard things I really didn't need to hear. Very embarrassing.

And, unable to sleep for thinking of the bizarre mess we'd found for ourselves, I heard evidence of the return of Karish's emotional equilibrium. He started chuckling. “Leavy the Flame Dancer,” he snickered.

So I glared at the cloth hanging between us, temporarily resenting its presence. Then I reached under it and slapped him on the shoulder. Four times.

The camp was rolled up early the next day, and we started walking toward the next location. The path we traveled was a narrow one, barely wide enough to accommodate the troupe's one wagon, pulled by two mules and itself narrower than what I was used to seeing at home. The air was thick and seemed to settle on my skin like an extra layer of weighty discomfort. It was hard to breathe, and the dense foliage that surrounded us blocked the sky and trapped the heat. It felt like the inside of a damp, dark, hellishly hot box. During the worst of the day's heat, we stopped to eat and rest, but I was exhausted, my shins stinging with the unaccustomed activity.

“Just watching you is making me sweat,” a low voice purred beside me, dragging my eyes up from the wheels of the covered wagon I was following. “One of us must have given you something deccy.”

I wasn't sure what deccy meant. I looked at the shell gamester bouncing along beside me. Her clothing was far more subdued than it had been the first day I'd seen her, her skirt of thicker material and falling nearly to her knees, a shirt covering most of her torso, though leaving her arms bare. She had sturdier sandals, and most—though by no means all—of her jewelry was absent.

“People were most generous,” I said. Though could it be called generosity when we were expected to pay for it? “But I don't know what ‘deccy' means.”

“Ah. Good. To wear.”

“I'm not used to the sort of clothing your people wear.”

“You will faint from the heat,” she warned me.

“It's not likely. Shields don't feel temperatures as much as other people.”

“Shields?”

I was starting to get over the shock of hearing people who didn't know what Shields were. A little. I explained what Shields were, and why that meant I felt physical sensations a little less acutely than most people.

“Oh,” she said. “Fin told me they were tricksters.”

“Tricksters.” That was always a fun one.

“Claiming magic that isn't there. Halting storms that never were.”

That again. “I can promise you,” I said through gritted teeth, “that is not the case.” Obnoxious brat. “And it's not magic.”

She shrugged. “We have no such people here.”

I noticed. But there was no point in beating the point into the ground. “Our skin isn't used to the sun. We can't wear your clothes yet.” Karish being a case in point. His skin had gone a deep painful red from the waist up over the night, and he was stretched out and suffering in the wagon in front of me. He couldn't bear to be touched and he was, of course, highly irritable. He had ordered me off the wagon, telling me to leave him alone. I did, without comment.

“So you are not linking?”

I dragged my eyes up from the wheels once more. “I don't understand.”

“You and the plain one aren't lovers?”

I stared at her. What the…? Who was she to ask such a question? And what in the world did that have to do with what kind of clothing we wore?

“Fin told me the plain one refused double mats for singles.”

“Fin should keep his mouth shut,” I snapped. “And stop calling Karish plain. You're all blind.”

She laughed. “Everyone knows everyone's goings here. Might as well get to it first stride.”

Ugh. I'd forgotten about that sort of thing. One of the reasons I'd been happy to leave the Academy. Everyone into everyone's business. It exasperated me. Really, who cared about the fights, who had been caught cheating on a test, who had stolen the grammar teacher's hairpiece, who was sleeping with who? In people trained to be discreet, objective and mature, gossip was a disappointing vice.

Not that I'd never done it. And not that I hadn't enjoyed the odd tidbit of information about people beyond our walls, including one Lord (former) Shintaro Karish. It had been a part of the package of news we received about the outside world. But I never cared to engage in that sort of thing about people I saw every day. There was something more sinister and underhanded about it then.

I wasn't looking forward to diving back into that kind of environment.

“And your man is plain,” she insisted. “He is too pale.”

“Then I must be hideous, because I am far more pale than he.”

Her eyes widened in shock. “No!” she objected, gesturing wildly with her hands. “Yes, your skin is light, but there is fire behind it. And your hair—” She reached out to touch, but perhaps something showed in my face, for she halted long before contact was made. “Is it your color?”

“My color?”

“Do you dye it?”

“Oh. No.” Why would anyone dye their hair red?

“Oh.” And she was disappointed. Her body practically drooped. “So I cannot find that color.”

I stared at her. Her hair was a glorious, deep black. “Your hair is beautiful!”

She shrugged. “It is common,” she said dismissively. “Almost everyone has this color. Like your man.”

I had thought, the previous day, that Atara had either been rude in her assessment of Karish or was showing the insensitivity of a trader trying to shove the price down by claiming there was no value in the product. Perhaps, though, it was a cultural characteristic. “Who are you?” If they could be blunt, so could I.

She laughed again. “I am Kahlia. Daughter of Atara.”

Ah. A family trait, maybe. “Pleased to meet you.” But wait. Atara was so dark, and Panol nearly so. And both had the slimmer frames of most of the other islanders I had seen.

But then, family members didn't really have to look alike. I supposed.

“So, you are not linking?”

What damn business was it of hers? Unless. “Why? Do you want him?”

She shook her head quickly. I was both relieved and annoyed. “There is no light behind his smiles.”

Please. Not a whole tribe of people who spoke like Sources. “I don't understand.”

“He smiles because he has to, not because he feels to.”

Was he still doing that? I thought he was getting over that, a little. And why would he feel the need to do it here? These were complete strangers, with no foreknowledge of the Triple S or the Stallion or the Karish family. “He's certainly not smiling now.”

“I will help you choose your clothing,” Kahlia announced.

“Is that what this whole conversation has been about?”

“The clothes you wear now, I have never seen anything so ugly. You must have no eyes.”

“These are travel clothes.”

“So?”

“So, they are meant to be sturdy and comfortable, not beautiful.”

“They can be both.”

“Perhaps, but to make things beautiful takes time and effort.”

“So?”

“So, it's time wasted on something that's made to be functional.”

She rolled her eyes. “Beauty is never a waste of time. You have such strange ideas.”

I longed to tell her the same thing.

“Your costume for dancing, you concede it must be beautiful?”

If I had to. “Yes.”

“You will let me choose it?”

If I had to.

She would know best what would appeal to her own people. And I should be grateful that she was willing to invest so much effort in me. “Yes, thank you. That's very kind.”

She pressed a small cloth bundle into my hand. “Give your man that. It will make him feel better.”

I unwrapped the bundle and found small polished pebbles, light brown in color. “What do you do with them?”

“You eat them.”

“They're medicine?”

“No. They're sweet.” She winked at me and then skipped away to join someone farther up the line.

I climbed up into the wagon as quietly as possible, in case Karish was asleep. He raised his forearm off his eyes only long enough to see who I was. I couldn't blame him for his lethargy. It was even hotter in the wagon. “How are you feeling?” I got a grunt in response. “Kahlia gave me something for you to eat.”

“Not interested.”

“She said it would make you feel better.”

“She said it was sweet.” His mouth scrunched up in disgust.

“You heard her?”

“I'm not deaf,” he snapped.

I put the small bundle down, near enough for him to reach if he should change his mind. “You weren't such an impossible patient when you were stabbed.”

He bared his teeth to the canines. “So sorry I'm not entertaining you.”

“Do you want me to get you something to drink?”

“Stop fussing, Lee.”

I climbed down from the wagon, deciding not to talk to anyone else for a while. I seemed to be coming off for the worse in these conversations. But this was a resolution the others in the slowly moving troupe chose to ignore. Many in the troupe came back to ask questions they had no right to ask. They were entirely resistant to my hints to go away.

I gave up on trying to get anyone to call me Dunleavy. They merely gained amusement from the attempt. They wouldn't even settle for Lee. They liked the way Leavy sounded, and they refused to move from it.

Shortly before the softening of the air announced the imminent arrival of sunset, a halt was ordered. Everything was moved off the beaten track that served as a road. Many of the adults pulled out large-bladed knives and cut away undergrowth and small trees. The tents were erected, but along different lines than they had been at the outpost. Much smaller, with no ovcas, in order to squeeze into the smaller space.

Karish finally emerged from the wagon to put together our tent, because I hadn't the vaguest idea how to do it. Fin came by to show us how to prepare the ground and set up. He was a wonderfully patient man, and a good thing, too, because I was incompetent and Karish was barely hanging on to his temper. I came out of the trial with my fingers scraped and pinched and bruised, and I began to suspect that there was a reason why I never did anything with my hands.

As soon as the tent was set up, Karish unrolled a mat and put it directly on the ground. Then he stretched out on the mat and the forearm went back over the eyes.

“Have some water, Taro.”

“Don't nag, Lee.”

“You'll feel better if you drink something.”

“The water's not cold.”

What a child. “So?”

He didn't bother responding to that at all.

I unwrapped some cold rice. I didn't care for eating it that way. The only way to eat rice at all was in pudding. But I was starving and too tired to try preparing anything. Though the pace had been slow, I had been walking most of the day, and I wasn't used to it.

I watched the others preparing their food, fires and torches piercing the fading light. Some of the troupe members were practicing their acts, apparently unwearied by the travel of the day. I noticed Corla looking at us, and frowning. I kept my face free of impatience as I watched her make her way over to us.

I really didn't feel like talking to anyone.

“Young man!” she snapped at Karish. “Why is your mat on the earth?”

He sat up for her. “It's uncomfortable lying directly on the ground, ma'am.”

“And why are you lying outside?” she demanded. “You want to lie down, you go inside. Come. Up. Get up.”

It always amazed me that old people seemed to think they had the right to tell absolutely everyone else what to do. And if she was aware of Karish's clenching jaw, she gave no sign of it as she prodded him to his feet and ordered him to roll up the mat. Then she asked, “Where are your croppers?”

“Our what?”

Apparently two of the unrecognizable bundles we had received the night before were collapsible chairs of small wooden bars and cloth. We had been given only two, however, so Karish was stuck sitting on the ground while Corla and I sat in the croppers. I pitied Karish, who so obviously wanted to lie down in the tent, but he was afflicted with too stringent a set of social graces, and he wouldn't leave until Corla did.

Then she asked us for wine, chiding us for not offering it to her immediately. And we apparently had it. One of the water skins actually had wine. Very very pale and light, and a little sweet even for my tastes. “None for you,” Corla said to Karish. “You are too red. Did the tree beads help?”

“Your pardon?” Karish asked.

“The tree beads. I had Kahlia bring them to you.”

“Oh,” I said. “The pale brown things I gave you. The little bundle.”

“Ah.” Karish turned on her a tired version of his usual smile. “My apologies, ma'am, but my stomach was a little uncertain at that time.”

“So you didn't eat them? Where are they?”

Karish's face froze. He'd probably left them in the wagon.