The Ancient Enemy (23 page)

Filek wondered how it could have happened that he had lost his position in Shasht and wound up on this horrible ship, under the thumb of the detestable Zuik, heading into the unknown east. Depending on the will of Orbazt Subuus, the Great God, Filek might never again walk through the door into his lovely house on West Court.

Filek still could hardly believe it had happened, as if someday he would wake up in his old life and all of this, Zuik, Captain Shuzt, and even the
Growler
itself would have vanished like a bad dream.

Filek was tormented by the knowledge that his wife and daughter were condemned to the hell below his feet. He loved his family with all his heart and had done his utmost to protect Chiknulba from the world.

Of course, Filek knew nothing of his wife's social blunder and would have had difficulty understanding it. He knew little of the world of rather wicked, wealthy women in Shasht city, and Chiknulba had never dreamed of telling him. The mystery, therefore, continued to haunt him. He had never made any request for military service, he had never asked to go to sea, he had no interest in such things. But he knew that an Imperial Command from the Emperor Aeswiren III's heir could not be ignored, and so he languished on this line for roasted meat, enduring the gibes and insults of Zuik and his assistants.

At last they were passing through the galley. Meat was searing on the grills and throwing up clouds of fat and steam. Great cauldrons were boiling with bones and offal, rendering them down for slave soup.

On great grills over a mass of hot coals the cooks were turning a multitude of joints and sides of various animals. Everything that had been available on the Land had been taken; beavers, donkeys, elk, deer, birds of several kinds, and lots of the monkeys. All were split and cleaned and set to sputter on the grill. The ground birds that had been nicknamed "chickens" were cleaned and spitted and roasted whole.

As the food cooked to a turn, the joints were handed up on platters to the High Table, where Captain Shuzt oversaw the distribution of the meat. Shuzt was that rare thing in the fleet, a fat man, stooped at the shoulders and clearly unfit for battle. Still, he held on to warrior status because of his connections to the upper nobility. Two assistants cut the joints, their knives a blur as they sliced and chopped. The officers approached from the left, the "inferior" side, and bowed over their empty plates toward Shuzt. Shuzt responded with the formal raising of his knife and fork, exchanged a few pleasantries with those men who were in his favor, then directed their plates to be loaded up with hot slices of meat, sauced liberally with thick gravy.

The meat he piled on the men's plates was not just for themselves, of course, but also meant for their women and dependents. On the women's deck they were waiting eagerly for it, and beneath them even the higher-status servants were expecting something, a few scraps at least.

The noble officers were done. Now the lesser officers came forward, cringing and holding out their plates. "I beg thee, my superior, for the good meat you have to give."

Shuzt would nod, and wave a hand to his assistants, who could judge with a nicety just how generous they should be. Some men left the table with plates groaning beneath the hot meat. Others were much more meagerly rewarded. Filek received a sufficiency, and no more.

In time all the officers had been dished out. The meat began to go onto the big trenchers that were taken out to the men. Every man aboard would get meat that day, excepting the castrated slaves, of course, who would simply get broth with their biscuit.

Filek took his plate of meat and headed down to the women's deck at once. Most men ate heartily before they went down to share with the women, and, some men even held to the ancient tradition and fed meat to their women by hand, as if they were animals. The women would beg, would kneel, and then be rewarded with a scrap of roasted meat.

Filek was not one of those men. He loved Chiknulba, and tried to behave as decently as possible when he was with his wife. In Filek Biswas's household the rules of purdah had been very much relaxed. In the city, Chiknulba had an all-female household staff and thus escaped many of the restraints of purdah.

His life had been set. He was second surgeon at the Mission Hospital. Old Klegg was number one, but had effectively retired. That had left Filek pretty much in charge. Mission was an old hospital set in a poor part of the city; there were many patients, but few were powerful.

In the hospital there were endless opportunities to advance the scientific basis of surgery. Filek had worked there for two decades, revolutionizing the use of anaesthetic and painkillers. This had not been done without incurring some cost, however, for he came up against the priests of Orbazt Subuus, who were against such improvements in surgery. The zealots denounced him as an enemy of the Great God. They demanded that he be given to the priests for trial. Such trials ended only one way, with the convict bound over the stone altar while the priests raised the knife high.

But Filek had a strong reputation among the Nuns of Pilki, and they had the ear of the Emperor. The zealots were whipped back into line by the Emperor's men, and Filek's work continued.

Fortunately for Filek and Chiknulba, they were not alone in their thinking about the world. An alternative society existed in the capital, alongside but hidden from the main one. At quiet gatherings and dinner parties these people drew together to read poetry, listen to music, and discuss the world openly with no reference to the Great God. With these friends the demands of purdah were largely forgotten. Women and men joined together in open social gatherings. As long as they avoided the scrutiny of the religious zealots, they could live a life that was enjoyable enough, behind the high walls of their gardens.

But that life had ended with the delivery of that order from Nebbeggebben, sending them to the expedition feet. And now, down belowdecks, Filek brought the meat to his women, and they sat together on a bench, knee to knee, and ate with relish.

On the upper deck, Rukkh of the Blitz Regiment took his place at table and set down his plate of meat. As a warrior of high status Rukkh sat among the demi-elite, his plate heavy-laden. He had not seen meat in many months and so he tucked in directly.

His companions, Forjal and Hukkit, took their seats and also got down to business. It was unusually quiet. Up and down the table the warriors of the
Growler
were far too intent on their meat to spare time for conversation.

Rukkh cared little for that. Of late there hadn't been much to talk about. It'd been ten months since they left Shasht. He was tired of Forjal's vapid dreams of the New Land, and if he had to hear another of Hukkit's stupid jokes, he'd scream.

So he ate and thought instead of the enticing girl with the strawberry mark.

Months earlier he had seen her for the first time. He had gone down to service old Maruga Okkada, who had requested a hard young body for the job. Captain Okkada had given Rukkh the chance to serve and he had grabbed at it. Maruga was older than his own mother, and less attractive, but to shine in Okkada's eyes was far more important than that.

On subsequent visits, usually to tup old Maruga, he had seen the girl a few times.

She was truly lovely. He wanted nothing more than to court her and then take her physically and ride her like the fierce mustang that he was sure she was.

He had investigated the girl carefully, as was the way of the wise warrior. Life had many pitfalls and hidden traps, and it was best to know where one was treading. The girl was a Gsekk, a powerful clan, on the mother's side, but clearly in some kind of disgrace to be quartered down there.

The father, Filek Biswas, was a good surgeon, a rarity in itself in modern Shasht. Maybe that was what had led to his being appointed to the ship. Poor fellow had probably never wanted to come. Biswas himself was of a minor house, the Ghuiter.

All of this made Rukkh think that he might yet apply to take the girl. He was of lowly stock, but hard in body and quick in mind. He would rise in the world. The girl was doomed to spinsterhood or worse because of that mark. No man in her social class would risk the taint of witchery in his own household.

The father and mother were under some kind of disfavor, so his proposal to them would not be as insulting as if they were back in Shasht. It might even be the best they could hope for. In the building of the New Land, social distinctions would be more flexible for a while. Rukkh was determined to seize the opportunity.

"Hello!" said Hukkit, banging the table beside his elbow. "Rukkh is having pussy dreams again," Hukkit said to Forjal.

"Hey, Rukkh, only pussy you get is grandmother pussy, and that's the way it's gonna be."

"You're just jealous. If you had the chance, you'd fuck the oldest grannies down there."

"You think you're going to climb in society by serving as stud? You're crazy, Rukkh."

"I know, I know. But I think it's more fun that way."

"Fun? What is that?" said Hukkit. "I don't recall when there was last any fun around here."

They all sighed. For months life had been grim indeed.

"Won't be long now; this meat is the first taste of the new world."

They returned to chewing and munching. Soon, everything would be different.

To the little group in Bilauk, the rest of that day was forever stained with the tones of nightmare. Thru and the others could do little in the ruined village except to assist the handful of survivors they pulled from the burning houses: two mors and an elderly mot named Haloiko, who had lain under a pile of turnips in his cellar during the raid. The mors were reduced to quivering and moaning by the terror they had experienced, the endless screaming, the sound of axes hacking off heads. Only old Haloiko could tell them anything. The attackers were not mots, not pyluk certainly, they were nothing that the old mot had ever seen before. But he knew them. He had heard them described at religious festivals all his life.

"They were men," he said. "Men like the men of old; they have come back."

As astounding as the burning of Bilauk had been, this information came as even more of a shock.

"But, how can this be?" Nuza said, sounding stunned. "Man is dead, long ago."

Gem piped up with the first lines of the "Inheritance" prayer.
"For poison in the waters had become poison in their seed, And Man thinned with each generation until his light faded from the world."

Nuza replied from the same prayer.
"And there came a time when no sound broke the stillness of the world except the play of the wind. Man was no more."

Old Haloiko vehemently disagreed.

"I'm telling you what I saw. They have huge noses and no fur! Just coarse beards and long, greasy hair. They carried spears and wore helmets. They had no fur on their legs. They were like mots but taller, uglier. They were men."

But the troupe members could not let themselves believe it.

"How did it happen? When did the attack come?" Thru asked.

"I was asleep. I woke, heard them killing in the street. I went down to the cellar and hid under the turnips. They searched the house, but they did not care about turnips. I watched them later. They had rounded up a lot of folk and they marched them down the street. I heard the screaming start later."

"You saw them."

"Oh, yes, I saw them. I watched them from the cellar; there's a gap in the plate over the sill. I been meaning to fix it for years. They carry round shields, they wear helmets. They are warriors, that much is plain. They took everyone down to the harbor and from what you say, they killed them all there."

"But why would they kill everyone like that? And where are the bodies?" Nuza wondered.

Toshak looked at them with eyes filled with ice. "They took the bodies with them, of course. They took them as meat."

The rest stood there frozen by his words. The shadowy nightmare of childhood dreams, Man the Cruel was upon them; the hooded figure, the face with the piercing eyes, the long nose, and the hungry white teeth, Man with the trap and the block, the long sharp knife and the heavy axe. Man the Cruel was alive, and had returned to slaughter the folk of Bilauk.

They turned their steps back to the road and retreated to Shaffgums. They did not speak amongst themselves along the way. They stared at the ground and occasionally looked out to the sea. Gem sobbed to himself. Nuza had tears running down her face. So, she found, did Toshak, which surprised her.

In Shaffgums the folk heard the tale with dumbfounded eyes.

"The killers, will they come back?" A young mot asked.

"We do not know. But they are very dangerous."

"You might want to consider coming with us," said Nuza. "We're going north to Crozett."

"I saw them," said old Haloiko, "I saw them, they were men."

The villagers' faces resonated with shock at this revelation.

"It cannot be."

"That's impossible."

"You know me, I'm Haloiko. Would I tell you these things if they hadn't happened?"

They stared at him, fear rising in their eyes.

"We must go to Crozett and send word to the north." It was their unspoken fear: What if raiders had attacked other places?

"From Crozett they will send pigeons to Tamf with the news. The King must learn of this as soon as possible. There must be some kind of response."

"We must learn to fight them," said Toshak implacably.

They stared at him, but Thru was shaking his head.

"We have forgotten how to make war."

"We will fight. If we have to, we will fight."

As they came over the brow of the hill they saw to the north another pillar of smoke, angling in across the land.

Nuza gave a sad groan at the sight. Thru felt his insides wrenched.

"Where are their ships?" said Toshak, striding forward with his spyglass in his hand.

He scanned the horizon, but saw nothing.

Hurves was a small place, tucked along one bank of the River Darnder. Polder stretched upstream, and small wooden jetties moored the handful of fishing boats. The houses were still sending up smoke although they had largely burned out by the time the troupe reached the paved place along the riverbank.