Sword Singer-Sword Dancer 2 (15 page)

to the Sun. A hungry deity.

"Tiger?"

The flesh peeled back from Del's bones, exposing muscle and viscera. Gone was the Northern bascha, banished by Southron sun. And now, it was my turn.

"Tiger."

I flinched away from her touch. It hurt too much. Her flesh would debride my own.

"Tiger--stop."

I stopped. Blinked. Stared. And recalled we were North, not South... there was

no desert here.

It was a soft day and softer afternoon, full of misting rain and bits of fog, damp enough to drown me. The road was muddy because of it, and the turf exceedingly slippery. No matter which way I went, I found myself laboring.

And cursing the missing stud, absent three days now.

I'll admit it, I'm fond of the fellow. We'd been together seven years... and over those years had come to a companionable, armed truce. He was tough, strong,

resilient--as well as mean-tempered and sly. But we'd learned one another's habits and got along tolerably well, especially in tough situations.

And now I was without him.

Men say horses are stupid. I say they've just figured out a way of making men believe the lie so their kind can get the upper hand when a body climbs into the

saddle.

Or tries to climb into the saddle.

"Tiger," she said, "are you all right?"

"Rest," I mumbled and dropped my bundle down. I bent over, bracing hands on knees, and tried to clear my chest. My head felt full of cloth. My eyes were dry

and gritty, then teared as I blinked.

"Water?" she asked quietly, reaching for the bota slung diagonally across her chest.

I shook my head. Coughed. Wished my headache would go away. Coughed again; my chest was tight and painful.

Del frowned. "Are you lightheaded? Sometimes it takes people that way when they

first begin to climb."

"Not lightheaded. Rock-headed ..." I sneezed, and wished I hadn't. "Hoolies, I

feel terrible."

The frown deepened. "Why do you feel wrong-headed?"

"Not 'wrong'--rock" I reached up to tap my head with a sore knuckle. "My head feels like a rock."

She sighed, brow furrowed in concern. "I think you have caught cold."

Caught cold. A moment before, lost in memories of the South, I'd been scorched

by heat.

I stood upright, trying to clear my lungs. Something wailed deep in my chest every time I drew in a breath or moved. "What exactly is that?"

Del blinked. "A cold?" She paused. "Don't you know?"

"Some sort of disease?"

"Not--disease." Clearly, she was taken aback by my ignorance, which didn't please me much. "Sickness, yes... have you never heard of it?"

With infinite patience, I asked, "How can a man 'catch cold' when he lives in a

blazing desert?"

She shrugged. "People do. North, South--it doesn't matter. Have you never been

sick before?" Del paused. "Sick sick, not hung over from too much aqivi. That I've seen myself."

I scowled, shook my head. "Wound fever a few times. Nothing else." I sniffed and

felt it reverberate inside my skull. "Did catching cold--or whatever--have anything to do with that sword? With that storm?" I frowned. "It was cold as hoolies in the middle of that mess... did you make me get sick?" Balefully, I glared. "Is this your fault, bascha?"

She raised a defiant chin. "If you had put on the leathers like I told you, and

the furs--"

I shook my head. "Too much weight."

"Then when you freeze your gehetties off, don't complain to me." Crossly, she gestured toward my bundle on the ground. "Come on, then... we're wasting time."

I looked back the way we had come, toward the way we would go. "Where are we, bascha? I've lost track,"

"Still on the Traders' Road. We have a long way to go." She paused. "You've slowed us down."

"Sorry." But I wasn't. I coughed and peered through cloying mist. "Does it ever

get dry here?"

"Midwinter rains," she answered. "It will get worse, not better, at least until

we reach the uplands. Then we'll be in snow."

I shivered as a breath of wind caressed my flesh. Silk was plastered against my

body, "Hoolies, bascha--I wish you were a Southroner."

"I don't." Emphatically. "I'm not about to give up my freedom."

I sighed. "I only meant then we could be doing this where it's warm."

Del's mouth twisted wryly. "We'll go a little farther, Tiger. There is bound to

be a roadhouse soon. We can eat there, and change into dry clothing--warmer clothing--and wait until morning to go on."

I bent and pulled my bundle from the ground. "I hate rain." I said it with profound clarity, just to make sure she knew.

Apparently, she did. She turned her back and began to climb.

We did not find a roadhouse. We found a worsening rainstorm, which beat me down

into a large lump of sodden silk and misery. I plodded through mud, slipped on

wet turf, wheezed, coughed, sniffed and labored my way up one hill and down another, knowing better than to complain and give Del fodder. I fixed my attention on taking one step after another, and managed to accomplish it.

Right into the tip of a sword.

I realized, dimly, that Del had been shouting at me to stop. I hadn't heard her.

Or else her noise had joined the racket in my chest, merging sniffs and coughs

and rumbles one into the other, until all I'd heard was my own wheezes, ignoring

everything else. Including whatever warning might have been given.

It didn't please me at all. But I was too tired to care.

I peered down at the sword tip. It rested against my wet, silk-swathed belly.

And it trembled, the sword, because the hands that held it were too small, too

scared, lacking skill.

He was, I thought, maybe ten.

"Stop," he said fiercely.

"Yes," I agreed, "I have."

"Don't move." A new voice. Female. Young. Equally fierce and adamant.

I frowned. Shifted my gaze from the boy to the girl, who stood three paces behind the boy and held a pale white staff at the ready position, though I doubted she had the training to wield it properly. It takes years to master a quarterstaff, even for a man, and she, most clearly, was female, if still girl

rather than woman.

Del had put down the saddle pouches. Her hands hung at her sides. She made no attempt to unsheathe her sword, or to knock away the girl's staff.

I blinked. Tried to clear my vision. For the moment, the rain had let up. But the day was gray, blue and gray, shadowed with slate and steel.

Beyond the girl and boy stood a wagon, halfway off the road and leaning away from the hillside. An elderly piebald mare drooped dispiritedly between the shafts, ears flopped, neck low, head hanging between her knees. The wagon, I thought, was as old, as well as incapacitated. One rear wheel, the right, lay flat in the mud. The tilt of the wagon would make it almost impossible for anyone other than a strong man to lift it; two children could not, nor could the

woman who stood by it, wrapped in an oiled blanket. Clearly she was apprehensive, staring fearfully at Del and me and the children, and I realized

they were her own.

Such brave souls, the children. And very fortunate. Del and I were friendly; anyone else could have killed them outright for their folly. Easily. Without a

second thought.

I sighed; it wailed deep in my chest. "No harm," I told them. "We're travelers,

like you."

"So they said!" the girl snapped. "We gave them welcome, and they robbed us."

"Anyone hurt?" I asked mildly.

"Only our pride," the woman answered stiffly. "We trusted too easily. But we learned. Now we do not trust."

I gestured toward the wagon. "You'll have to trust someone, eventually. I don't

think you can repair that, otherwise."

"We will do it ourselves!" A fierce, proud young lady. Fifteen or sixteen, I thought. Blonde, like Del. Blue-eyed And, like Del, determined to prove she was

as good as any man.

I almost smiled. But I didn't, because I thought she was worth better.

Del was staring at the boy. Her face was pale. She drew in a noisy breath, released it, spoke softly. "There's no need for the sword," she said, "or the staff. We'll help you with the wagon."

The girl jerked the staff northward. "Just go on," she said strongly. "Just go

on your way and leave us."

"And let someone else come along behind us... someone not so friendly as us?"

I

shook my head. "To prove our good faith let us shed our harnesses. Unarmed, what

threat could we offer?"

"Just go on," the girl repeated.

"Cipriana." The woman's voice was gently reproving.

"How do we know they wouldn't cut our throats?" the daughter demanded. "What makes them better than the others?"

"You are wise," Del said, "to be careful. I respect your determination. But Tiger is right: unarmed, we could help you."

The sword wavered against my belly. "Cipriana?" The boy was clearly the shier of

the two and well accustomed to deferring to his older sister.

She shrugged, jaw tight. And then, abruptly, she jerked the staff away. "I am not stupid," she said fiercely, eyes filled with angry tears. "I know if you want to harm us, you can. What good are Massou and I against you?"

"Good enough," Del said gently. "And before we are done, I will teach you to be

better."

The woman came down from the wagon, clutching closed the folds of her blanket.

She was neither young nor in middle years, being somewhere in between; a tall,

handsome woman with red hair, firm jaw, green eyes. The dampness caused loosened

strands of hair to curl; the rest was fastened to her head in a thick, coiled rope deepened to bronze by the rain.

She stopped by the girl, touching her shoulder gently. "Cipriana, Massou, you have done well. I am proud. But now, let these people have their freedom again.

They have offered us help; the least we can do is accept it with good grace."

The boy relaxed his grip on the sword too abruptly; overbalanced, it fell out of

his hand and thudded against the turf. He stared up at me in anguished shame.

"Massou?" I asked. He nodded. "One day, I promise, you will be big enough to carry your father's sword. For now, you might do better with a knife."

"Like this one?" The woman showed me the blade she had hidden in the blanket.

At

my blink of surprise, she smiled. "Do you think I will stand by and let my children do my fighting for me?"

"Or a man; we make do on our own." The girl flicked a glance at Del. "Does he do

the fighting for you?"

Del smiled slowly. "Little ishtoya" she said, "your courage is laudable. But first you must learn better manners."

Color flared in the girl's face, then spilled away. Ashamed, she bowed her head.

She had a slender, childish neck. "I'm sorry," she said quietly. "But without my

father ..." Her voice trailed off. She looked at the boy, at her mother, then lifted her head and squared shoulders. "There is no one left to do a man's work

for us, and so--"

"--and so it falls to you." Del nodded. "I know. Better than you think." She looked across at the wagon. "We will repair it, if we can. If not, perhaps I might ride ahead to a roadhouse and see if a new wheel can be bought, if I can

have the loan of your mare."

Instantly suspicion flashed in the girl's eyes. And then died. "Will he stay with us?" She looked directly at me.

I sneezed, and regretted it at once.

"Have you caught cold?" the woman asked. "Poor man, and here we stand in this wet, nattering on about wheels and wagons." She cast a glance at Del. "We are grateful for whatever help you can give us. But what can we do for you?"

Noisily, I sniffed. "Make it warm again."

Eleven

The woman's name was Adara. Massou was ten. Cipriana fifteen. They were Borderers, Adara said, who had left the tiny settlement but a day's ride from Harquhal to go north. Adara's husband had been a Northerner, though she herself

was half Southron--a typical Borderer, with a language bora of both cultures--and he had wanted the children reared as he had been reared, knowing

something solid of heritage as opposed to a Borderer's piecemeal lifestyle.

Unfortunately, he would now never see it: the journey this far had been fraught

with difficulties and he had died but a week before. Of the strain, Adara said

quietly; his heart had given out.

We huddled around a tiny fire beneath the rainbreak Adara stretched out from the

end of the wagon and staked, sipping gritty effang tea and getting to know one

another before the repair work was begun. (Effang is not one of my favorite drinks, but they didn't have any aqivi and beggars can't be choosers. Our wine

was nearly gone. And at least effang is Southron.) Massou and Cipriana sat with

their mother between them, clearly protecting her as much as she protected them.

Del and I gave them room, not wanting to trespass any more than was necessary.

"A week?" I was surprised they had continued on so soon after the man's death.

Also that they had continued at all.

Adara drew in a deep breath. "We considered turning back, of course. But Kesar

had worked so hard to bring us this far that we couldn't dishonor him so."

I looked at the girl, at the boy, at the woman, "It isn't an easy journey," I said quietly, "not for anyone. Even Del and I recognize the risks."

"And we don't?" Adara was not a meek-tongued woman, though her tone was unrelentingly courteous. "We have been robbed twice, Sandtiger--once unknowing,

at night, the other in full daylight. Our food supplies dwindle daily, our mare

is old and tired, our wagon now lacks a wheel. Do you think we're blind to these

risks?"

"No," Del said quietly. "What he means is, there are those who are more able to