Naamah's Curse (18 page)

And then the Vralians yanked off my thick, felt-lined boots and placed shackles and a chain on my bare ankles, and the process was complete.

My spirit was bound.

My
diadh-anam
was a frantic blaze inside me, beating at the walls of my chest like a caged hawk. I could no longer feel Bao’s presence in the camp. I could no longer sense the faint call of destiny in the west. I couldn’t even sense all the familiar things I took for granted, like the whisper of grass growing.

Seeing the horror written on my face, the Great Khan smiled slowly. “The witch is contained, I think. Now you will listen.” He raised one finger. “I will tell my man to release you. If you hold your tongue, I will honor my agreement with the Vralians. You will go with them, alive. If you cry out for help…” He plucked a dagger from his belt. “I will simply kill you here and now. Will you be silent?”

I nodded as best I could.

The Khan gestured to the man holding me. He let go of my head. I fell to my knees in a rattling tangle of chains, breathing hard, my neck aching.

“You cheated yesterday.” The Great Khan stooped to grab a handful of my hair, yanking my head upright. “My shamans agree. You used witchcraft to still the wind.”

I gave my head a faint shake of denial.

“Do not lie!” Clutching a hank of my hair, he gave my head a fierce shake. My scalp burned, bringing tears to my eyes. He narrowed his gaze at me. “I will not allow you to make a mockery of me, to bring shame and dishonor upon my family.”

“Please…” I whispered.

The Khan struck me across the face—hard enough to sting, no harder. It was only a warning. “You will be silent.” He released his grip on my hair, setting his hands on his belt and contemplating me. “Clearly, you possess magic. I think Arslan is right, and you are not so powerful as you pretend. Still, your tongue is a dangerous weapon. As much as he resents you, you charmed him to the point where he would not counsel violence against you.” He raised his brows. “Batu’s tribe is bewitched. Even my own daughter softened toward you. Should a daughter of mine accept her own humiliation?” He shook his head. “Never. I regret that she did not cut out your cursed tongue, but listened to it instead.”

I swallowed hard.

He leaned over me. “What did you say to her? That it was not her fault, that she had done nothing wrong?” With a cruel smile, he quoted my words. “
It is only that the gods have decreed otherwise
. Perhaps you may take comfort in those words as you find your fate is not as you had imagined.” Straightening, he nodded toward the Vralians. “It seems
their
gods have decreed otherwise.”

My heart was hammering in my chest, competing with my frantic
diadh-anam
. And yet I had to speak, even if the Great Khan struck me again. “Bao,” I whispered, flinching in anticipation. “He will know.”

“Yes.” Magnanimous in victory, the Khan withheld the blow I deserved. “I daresay he will when he wakes. Like you, he was plied with strong drink last night. If the magic of Vralia’s gods is as strong as they claim, my son-in-law will be free of the ties that bind you to him. Perhaps he will choose to stay after all.” He shrugged. “If not, for the sake of my soft-hearted daughter and my good general Arslan, I will show him mercy.”

It gave me a glimmer of hope.

The Khan Naram saw it, and crushed it with pleasure. “In time, I will relent and tell him what befell you. I have a fine tale prepared.” Another cruel smile curved his lips. “One that will send him far, far away from where you are going.”

I closed my eyes in despair.

The Great Khan gave an order.

Someone struck me hard from behind. Pain burst across my skull, and stars of spangled light burst behind my eyelids, flickering and fading.

I fell into darkness.

I
awoke in a covered cart, jolting over the plains.

At first I thought it was a bad dream, a nightmare brought on by strained nerves and too much
airag
, a jumbled mess of old fables and dire magic spun by my sleeping mind. But when I stirred, chains rattled.

Bound.

I was bound, well and truly bound. I remembered the shackles being clamped on to me and locked into place, the Vralians’ grave, dispassionate faces. My head ached ferociously. My
diadh-anam
was a faint, defeated spark inside me. I couldn’t sense Bao’s presence anywhere. I couldn’t feel a thing beyond the confines of my skin.

My stomach lurched, and I swallowed bile. Gods, I needed air! Frantic as a trapped animal, I scrambled blindly toward the rear of the cart, dragging my chains, bumping into obstacles I couldn’t make out in the dim light.

It was a tarpaulin of oiled canvas that covered the cart, secured in place by ropes. It gapped at the far end, glimpses of the brightening blue sky visible between the rope lashings.

Rope could be cut. Ignoring my chains, I groped at the sash around my waist for the dagger that Snow Tiger had given me, with its ivory hilt carved in the shape of a dragon’s coils.

It was gone.

Wheels creaking, the cart ground to a halt. Deprived of any sense beyond the ordinary mortal ones, I lay still and took quick, shallow breaths, listening to the faint sound of approaching boot steps. Unseen fingers fumbled with unseen knots. I willed myself to be calm, and sought to summon the twilight.

It was gone, too—or at least, it was beyond my reach. With my magic constrained by these bedamned chains, I could no more take a half-step into the spirit world than I could fly to the moon.

The canvas was folded back to reveal a bearded Vralian face peering at me. Filled with an unreasoning mix of panic and fury, I tried to hurl myself at him. Weighted down by shackles and chains, I merely fell over the tailgate of the wagon, the impact driving the air from my lungs.

“No good!” Retreating out of reach, the Vralian wagged a stern finger at me, speaking a limited version of the Tatar language. “We save you.”

I heaved myself and my chains backward, huddling in the rear of the wagon, wrapping my arms around me until I caught my breath. “Why?”

The second Vralian, who looked to be a few years younger than the first, came to confer with him, speaking in an unfamiliar tongue. The first raised his medallion to his lips and kissed it. “God wills it,” he said in a reverent tone.

“Then I am grateful to your god,” I said slowly and carefully, unfolding one arm and extending it. “If you will take off these chains, I will go with thanks.”

Free of the chains, I could summon the twilight and pass through the campsite like a phantom, taking Bao with me.

The Vralian smiled gently and shook his head at me, as though I were a child who’d said somewhat foolish. “We save you from
you
.”

I stared at him, and then raised my voice. “Well, then, I bedamned well don’t want to be saved!”

He shrugged. “God wills it.”

“I don’t care!”

He made a hushing sound, pointing backward toward the Tatar campsite. “Not far yet. No trouble, or the young man…” He made a slashing gesture across his throat. “Khan say he kill.”

Bao.

I weighed my choices. My head ached too much to think straight. If Bao was awake, he would know something had happened to me, for as surely as the chains kept me from sensing his
diadh-anam
, they would prevent him from sensing mine. Whatever their purpose, the Vralians didn’t seem intent on harming me. They said we had not gone far yet, so I couldn’t have been unconscious for long. If I screamed and shouted at the top of my lungs, it might be that Bao would hear me.

And what then?

I didn’t doubt that the Great Khan would sooner kill Bao than allow him to rescue me. Skilled as he was, Bao couldn’t take on all the Khan’s men; and he surely couldn’t outride them. It would be best to be patient. There was a key to these chains. All I needed was a chance to steal it, and a minute or two to undo my shackles.

I raised my hands in surrender, chains dangling from my wrists. “No trouble.”

The Vralian nodded. “Good.” He pointed at the floor of the cart. “Today, hide.”

Forcing myself to be compliant, I lay down. They pulled the tarpaulin back in place, lashing it securely.

Hours passed, long, stifling hours filled with fear, nausea, and tedium. Every hour took me farther away from Bao, farther away from freedom, farther away from the hope that my destiny was calling me home.

What in the name of all the gods did the Vralians want with me?

Never in my life had I felt more alone, miserable, and helpless. At least in the face of the storm that had nearly killed me, I’d been too busy trying to survive to even know what I was feeling.

Although I tried not to, I wept.

My only comfort was the spark of my
diadh-anam
, alive and flickering inside me, a promise that the Maghuin Dhonn Herself had not forgotten me. I was Her child. These cursed chains could bind Her gifts, but they could not kill Her divine spark within me. In the suffocating darkness beneath the tarpaulin, I prayed to Her; and I prayed to Naamah and Anael, who were my D’Angeline patron gods. Although I could not sense their presence, I prayed they had not forgotten me, either.

At last, the interminable cart-ride came to an end. The Vralians unhitched their horses, hobbled them, and turned them loose to graze, then untied the tarpaulin once more. With a strange, reluctant solicitousness, they helped me clamber out of the cart.

It wasn’t easy.

In the early-evening light, I got a better look at the shackles that bound me. They were etched with sigils and inscriptions in a strange alphabet. The cuffs around my wrists were linked to the circlet around my neck by chains long enough that they didn’t restrict the movement of my arms overmuch. That wasn’t their purpose. The chain that linked the shackles around my ankles was another matter. It was short enough that I was forced to adopt a halting, mincing gait.

Clearly, running away was not an option.

In case the matter was in doubt, one of the Vralians—the one who spoke a bit of the Tatar language—produced yet another chain, looping it around the front axle of the cart, and lacing it through the chain on my left arm. Averting his gaze, he put down a pallet of furs for me, indicating that I could take shelter beneath the wagon.

“You’re too kind,” I muttered.

Deeming me safely secured, he studied me with deep-set eyes. “God wills this.”

Already, I was perishing sick of his bedamned god; but I had the sense to hold my tongue. The other fellow set about erecting a tent well beyond the reach of my tether, which I was sorry to see. They had not been overtly cruel to me thus far, but what kindness they had shown me, chaining me like a dog, I misliked.

I was scared and alone, and if they had given me the opportunity to bash in their heads with a rock while they slept, I would have taken it.

They didn’t.

Instead, they kindled a careful fire of dried dung-chips, heating a pot of water filled with strips of dried meat and root vegetables. They knelt in prayer before they ladled out servings, murmuring in sonorous tones.

The second fellow brought me a steaming bowl of stew and a spoon. Far from it though I felt, I resolved to try being pleasant.

“Thank you.” I accepted the bowl, my chains rattling as I reached for it. I took a deep sniff, miming pleasure, then smiled at him. “It smells good.”

He beat a hasty retreat, avoiding my gaze. Stone and sea, what was
wrong
with these men?

Whatever it was, I didn’t learn the answer that night. When dusk fell over the steppe, they extinguished their fire with care, retiring to the safety of their tent. Huddled in my cocoon of furs, I watched the moon rise and spill its silvery light over the plains, thinking and thinking, my mind restless.

I wondered if I could shift the cart.

I tried. Scuttling underneath it, I found the wooden chocks that braced the front wheels and pried them loose. When I banged them softly together in my fists, it made a very satisfying sound.

Scrambling out from beneath the cart, I got to my feet and went to the end of my short tether. Throwing my weight into the effort, I tried to drag the cart toward the tent.