The Paper Sword (4 page)

“Come on, we have to run!” Saheli shouted to the others.

Torgee and Tharfen seemed suddenly to wake up in the dousing and like startled deer from a forest fire they took off across the plateau.

“No! You should take shelter,” Vallaine yelled, but Saheli had already darted off, the impact of the rain resounding on her chest with extra force as she drove herself forward at a terrific pace. For a moment, Xemion hesitated, staring at Vallaine, caught up in the grip of his contrary desires as the thunder rumbled over them.

“You have to make your choice,” Vallaine shouted over the rain. “Are you going to go running after her or will you come with me and take up your destiny?”

The only thing Xemion knew for sure about his destiny was that it was with the person who was currently dashing away. “I'm sorry,” he said, and then he turned and ran after her. When he was about a hundred yards away he stopped and took one look back, half-expecting Vallaine to be pursuing him. But there he stood in the downpour at the cliff's edge, shaking his head as though with disdain. Seeing Xemion's backward glance, a little smile lit up his lips, and with his red hand to his brow he gave, before he turned and started down the cliff, an Elphaerean salute.

Arrivals and Departures

E
ver
since he had heard old Anya recite the first of the Phaer tales from the locket library when he was just a little boy, Xemion had been waiting for just such a glorious invitation as Vallaine had extended to him; yet here he was running away from it. He wasn't even thinking about it. Nor was he thinking about the rise of the new Elphaerean Republic with the proposed throwing off of Pathan chains. All he could think of was that she had told Vallaine that he and she were betrothed.

Every time his mind landed on this thought he felt giddy and weak. In all the four months since he'd rescued her from the river he'd never known her to lie for any reason. In fact, she seemed incapable of lying. But this was either a lie — a lie told strategically and expertly to avoid shaking the man's hand — or it was the truth, and thereby a truth that confirmed what he himself felt in every cell of his body: he was betrothed to her and she to him in some ancient way that was preordained and inevitable. The warm rain pelting down through the canopy and pouring over him and down onto the forest floor did nothing to cool the fire he felt at this thought, this hope as he ran along beside her. He wanted to stop and ask her right now. Why did you say that? But she had never been one to answer direct questions directly. Not since the first day he'd known her.

He would never forget that day. Anya had slapped him full in the face and he had called her a hag and almost struck her back. He left the tower tree in a rage, fully intending to never return. But when he got down the mountain as far as the river crossing he discovered a second river had come careening down the side of Mount Ulde, crashing into River Ilde from the side, doubling and tripling its width. He'd had to walk much farther along the bank to find another spot to cross. That was when he first saw her about a hundred yards upstream. All he saw was a flash of long black hair stretched out on the torrent before she rolled under the rapidly moving surface and disappeared.

Many long seconds passed by pierced by the shrieking of seabirds and the hissing of spray before she came up again just ahead of where he stood searching. He didn't know if she was dead or alive but he dived into the thick, cold waters to save her. Farther than he'd ever swum in the thinner version of the river he swam now deep into the middle of the torrent. He couldn't see in the muddy water, but somehow he managed to grab hold of her hair and pull her closer so that he could hold on to her with one arm and swim with the other. Her face was turned away, toward the falls, but he could tell by the limpness of her body that she was unconscious. Also, he saw that her left wrist was tightly bound to her side by a thick rope that trailed behind her. Thrashing with his one free arm, he strove to drag her across the current to the opposite shore, but the two of them were caught up in the rapids and quickly swept into the oxbow where the second river collided with the first. He barely managed to hold on to her as the conflicting currents buffeted and spun them. Then they were swept into the torrent that sped toward the falls. Normally the river ran along the bottom of a deep gorge here. But the volume of the water had increased so much it now filled the gorge almost to the top. And the precipice wasn't far off.

“Help me!” he shouted as the power of the water, compressed between the walls of the narrow gorge, welled about them deeper and quieter and quicker. He tightened his arm around her and gave her a quick, hard squeeze. There was a cough and a cry and then he felt a shudder of energy through her body. She lifted her head and her one free arm shot out of the waters and began to drive powerfully against the current. Gasping, thrashing at the rapids, the two of them, each with one arm, struggled like two halves of a bird against a gale. Beside the falls, the willow atop the ridge that was normally forty feet above the water was now literally in the river. The thin soil that held it there was almost completely washed away so that it's long roots flipped and waved like suddenly released tentacles in the roaring waters. With everything he had left in him Xemion lunged, trying to catch the end of one of those roots. He felt the scrape of one of them in his desperate palm, but before he could close his fist the might of the water dragged both the root and the girl out of his grip and he was swept along the last few feet toward the falls and certain death below. Even as he came to the great curve of the waterfall and saw thousands of feet beneath him the jagged rocks he would die upon, he was thinking
I've lost her.

But just then something gripped him tight about the chest and yanked him back. The girl. The rope. Somehow it had wrapped itself about him in the oxbow and the other end was still attached to her wrist and her waist. She must have grabbed one of the willow roots with the other hand. The water tugged and battered at him. He tried to shout and tell her to release him but she didn't or couldn't let go. With a strength that belied the slenderness of her arms she pulled first herself and then him in closer and closer until he was able to grab at one of the roots. Now that he was secure she dragged herself up the willow roots to the shore. Xemion hauled himself in behind her and they both sprawled panting at the base of the willow. “Thank you for saving me,” he said, when he finally rose. It occurred to him that she might well say in return “thank you for saving me.” But she said nothing. She just lay there on her stomach, one side of her face pressed to the tangle of roots and clay, the other hidden in her long black hair. His first feeling when he knelt down and gently peeled the wet hair away from her face was of horror and then of compassion. The whole side of her face was terribly swollen and purple. Over her left eyebrow there was a deep diagonal split in the skin that was so straight it might have been cut with a knife. The light-brown shift she wore, still wet from the river, clung to the outline of her body, thin and long-boned and shivering. She was unconscious again.

He didn't know where she'd come from. Many rivers fed into this valley. Who knew in which of them she had first entered the water. If indeed she hadn't fallen out of the sky.

When she finally regained consciousness she had no memory. He'd had to swallow his pride and go back to Anya in the tower tree for curative Ilde water. For a week Saheli had lived out there in the forest and he took food from the tower tree and brought it to her, and every day the swelling of her features decreased. Then one day when he was tending the herb garden with Anya she found her way through the rose thicket to the tower tree and from the moment Anya saw her she seemed to love her. She threw her arms around her and hugged her and invited her into the tower tree — something she'd never done for anyone other than Xemion. That was only four months ago, but so much had changed since then. Anya had died; he had begun telling the stories not only to Saheli but to Torgee and Tharfen as well; and now, today, the strange stick and the visit from the man with the red hand.

At a fork in the path, one side of which led south to the sea where the village of Sho stood, they parted company with Torgee and Tharfen. Torgee blushed as he always did when he talked directly to Saheli. “Farewell, Saheli, and I bid good health to your mother,” he said with an awkward bow.

“Thank you, Torgee. I know she would want me to wish you good health in return,” Saheli replied.

“She is well then?” Torgee asked.

If Saheli had answered she would have had to answer truthfully and say that Anya had in fact died two weeks previously. But in accordance with what she and Xemion had agreed on, it was Xemion who answered. “She is still abed with the gout. But the fall is coming. She loves the fall.”

The sodden and sullen Tharfen gave Saheli a quick hug, but she didn't even look at Xemion as she turned and headed off down the path.

“Say goodbye to her,” Saheli whispered to Xemion.

“Goodbye, Tharfen.”

Tharfen turned and looked back at him impassively. Her rage, her hatred, welled up in her anew and she was sorely tempted to take out the sling and her biggest rock and launch it straight at his smiling face, but deep in her heart she knew it wasn't really rage or hatred at all. It was something else that, according to all the stories she had ever heard, mostly from him, was just as powerful. She lifted her head haughtily, sneered, flared her nostrils, twirled her empty slingshot threateningly over her head, and with no words turned and continued on her way.

“Now don't forget,” Saheli called after them, “not a word about any of this, or we're all in big trouble.”

“Don't worry,” Torgee called back.

“Now don't forget,” Tharfen mimicked her tone. “Not a word about any of this …”

Warrior Beloveds

A
s
soon as the others were out of sight, Saheli and Xemion headed off at a fast pace. They still had a long way to go before they reached the tower tree.

“I feel guilty not telling them about Anya,” Saheli said. She kept rubbing her palm down the side of her hip as she ran.

“I don't,” Xemion replied. “There are good reasons not to tell them — the safety of Chiricoru for one, and our vow for another.”

“I know. We promised Anya we wouldn't, but it still feels a little … disloyal.”

“I understand,” Xemion said, “but there's loyalty to Anya and her memory, and then there's loyalty to people like Torgee whose parents are kwislings. If people were to know that we are out here alone and word got out to the examiner, it wouldn't be good for you or I … and it definitely wouldn't be good for Chiricoru.”

At the word
Chiricoru
, Saheli quickened her pace.

“I'm sure she's fine, Saheli,” Xemion said, but they both began running even faster.

At length the rain stopped falling and they came to a thicket of tall sunflowers, hollyhocks, and roses. Ducking their heads, they disappeared into one of the tunnels through the mesh of stem and leaf and strode on toward the green, welcoming light at the other end. In the clearing beneath the broad branches overhead, Saheli paused and looked almost guiltily at the stone they had placed over Anya Kuzelnika's grave. Normally she would have remained by it for some time with her head bowed, but today she was worried. With a hasty nod to signal her departure, she ran toward the tower tree.

From the outside, Xemion and Saheli's home looked like an enormous maple tree. Hidden within the massive trunk, though, was a stone tower, very ancient and large enough to accommodate spacious living quarters. Closing the door quietly behind them, the two friends entered the lavender fragrance of the front room. Light slanted down from high window slits, which had once allowed the arcing of telescopes to scan the night skies for astrological omens. Saheli didn't pause. She darted up the narrow staircase that led through one of the tower tree's massive branches to a large room at the top. The observatory, as the room was known, was well lit by a glowing crystal dome that sparkled overhead in the late afternoon sun. Saheli's face softened with obvious relief as a large golden swan waddled over to her. Chiricoru was clearly very old but her ancient eyes brimmed with life and feeling. She let out a soft honk of greeting.

“Oh, there you are my dear Chiricoru,” Saheli answered gently as the bird's beak nuzzled her hand. She put her arm tenderly around her long neck.

Chiricoru looked just like a normal swan except for her gold colouring and the red cock's wattle that decorated the upper portion of her neck just beneath the beak. This would not have seemed unusual to a Phaerlander of a hundred years ago, when the creation of spell-crossed creatures was fairly common, but to a Pathan in this new modern era it was a hideous and dangerous affront to decency and public safety that needed to be exterminated. It was for this reason that the late Anya Kuzelnika had hidden the bird away for the past half-century. In all that time she had allowed only Xemion, and in the last few months Saheli, to see her. Xemion, knowing Saheli's fear of the spellcraft, had told her that the cock's wattle was a purely natural aberration. Saheli did not doubt this to be truth, but in the days before Saheli's arrival Anya had told Xemion a different story.

Just before Anya's birth, two of her uncles had both independently commissioned spell kones to be written to create a guardian animal for her. Unfortunately, as was too often the habit in those days, when both kones were spun at once, they acted as one — a classic cross-spell. The result was a Phaer mix of both spells; a creature mostly swan, but a little bit rooster. Or as the Pathans called such beings, a chimerant. Fortunately, baby Anya loved the colourful bird as soon as she set eyes on it, and from that day until the end of her life Chiricoru, had been her beloved companion. It was no wonder, then, that the sad quality of the bird's tone had notably increased in the two weeks since Anya's passing.

“I told you she was safe.” Xemion grinned as he entered the room.

The bird honked a greeting at Xemion and for a moment stood there eyeing them expectantly. Then she waddled her way over to the purple divan where a large silver locket hung by a copper chain from a knob on Anya Kuzelnika's chest of drawers. She gave the locket a quick peck, causing it to swing back and forth.

“Are you ready for the last story in the cycle then?” Xemion asked the bird gently.

The bird honked in reply and pecked the locket again.

Xemion eyed the crystal dome in the ceiling above them. “It looks like the sun is in just about the right position,” he said. “I'll get the equipment.” He took down a wooden box from a shelf and removed two lenses, one as big as a plate, the other about a quarter the size. These he positioned in slots at either end of a copper housing that sat on the table. Next, he extracted a small square mirror from a case and slid it in at an angle to another slot in the top of the housing.

Saheli, meanwhile, had opened the locket and was looking inside. Anyone with normal vision would have seen that one side displayed a picture of a gorehorse. But Saheli had extremely fine vision. Even without a glass she could see that the image was actually a mosaic made from the close-packed spines of rows and rows of tiny, differently coloured books.

Except for the tiny spine of one red book the slots on the other side of the locket were entirely empty. When they had been full the spines of the books in them had formed the picture of a red lion. Slowly though, as the books had been withdrawn and read, the spines changed colour so that as they were slid into the matching slots on the opposite side of the locket the image of the lion slowly diminished and an image of a rampant gorehorse gradually grew. It was the final book, the last remaining red tip of that lion's mane, a volume whose spine was hardly wider than the scale of a fish, which Saheli now removed delicately with her tweezers. She placed it carefully on a glass slide at the bottom of the copper housing and then drew a black curtain around the windows so that the room darkened considerably.

“Why do you keep rubbing your hand like that?” Xemion asked her.

She shuddered and looked at her hand as if she had just become aware of it. “Because I'm imagining your hand in that man's hand and it feels so horrible I want to rub it off.”

“But my own hand doesn't even feel like that. He seemed honourable and honest to me.”

“I don't know how you can say that.” The pace of the rubbing increased. “You heard him say that he could do wicked things.”

“He was jesting!”

“Well, even to jest about wickedness in this world —”

“But even in
The
Phaer Tales
they jest about wickedness.”

“You didn't think he was just trying to get us onto that ship for some evil purpose?”

“Saheli, if he was a slaver or a pirate he would've just pulled that sword and forced us.”

Saheli thought a moment and her mood changed. “I hope I haven't been unfair to him. I hope —”

“Well, as he himself said, you shouldn't just blindly trust people, so …”

“But you seem to feel an almost blind trust in him.”

Xemion looked up to see what the position of the sun was according to the various calibration points etched into the circular frame the crystal sat in. He quickly turned three of the seven crank handles, each of which adjusted the position of one of the tiny sun-steering mirror facets. Now it was Xemion who had to pause and think. “It's true. I would have gone off with him right then if I'd been free to.”

“So you think …. you believe there really will be a rebellion in Ulde on the equinox?” she asked.

“I don't doubt it at all.”

“And you would go if you could?”

“Of course I would. We both would.”

With that, he turned a final crank handle and the sunlight came through the crystal in the ceiling, compressing it into a tight white beam and steering it through the lens, thereby projecting the tiny text of the last tale onto the wall. Anya had always insisted that Xemion restrain his voice whenever he was anywhere outside the tower tree, but there was no need of that now. He began to recite loudly and eloquently, revelling in the new deeper qualities that had entered his voice in the last few months.

It was the story of two warrior beloveds — Xemion's hero Amphion and his beloved, Queen Roe. As in so many of these tales the two fated lovers have long been separated and are constantly frustrated by forces that wish to keep them apart. Queen Roe has tried six times to cross the Eastern Sea and reach the Phaer Isle, where she knows Amphion is imprisoned, but a sea serpent always prevents her. Finally she bargains with the serpent. She tells him that she knows of a special food that will end his hunger forever. If she brings him this food, and if he is indeed forever satisfied, he must agree to let her pass. And if he is not forever satisfied she will lay down her very life and allow him to eat her. When the serpent agrees the Queen goes to the Isle of Zize and retrieves a whole grapevine from the Valley of the Blessed. She sails back in her coracle to the middle of the ocean, but just before she gets to the leviathan she stops, anchors her boat, and dives deep into the sea to retrieve something. She brings it back along with the vine to the serpent, who awaits her, planning to first devour the food she has brought and then the Queen herself.

Just as the sun began to sink, Xemion reached the part of the story where the Queen tells the serpent he must suck the vine in all at once in one quick gulp in order to be forever satisfied.

“The snake's long tongue forked out and tasted the end of the vine and found it very sweet indeed. He exhaled all his breath in preparation to ingest the long vine. But just as he pursed his lips to begin sucking the vine in, Queen Roe substituted the thing she'd dived down to the bottom of the sea to find — the other end of the snake. She watched, hardly even smiling, as the snake unknowingly ingested more and more of itself quicker and quicker until with a last rending yawning pop not only its hunger but the snake itself disappeared forever. And so the mighty Queen Roe, after seven years of trying, finally made her way across the ocean toward the Phaer Isle where soon, surely, she would be united with her warrior beloved.”

For a while, when the story was over, Xemion stood there staring at the place on the wall where the text had been. He was so agitated he didn't notice that he too had begun to rub his hand down his leg. Nor was he much aware of the burning sensation in his palm and the urge to clutch at the hilt of the painted sword still hidden beneath his cloak.

“What did you think?” he asked Saheli, not looking directly at her. He was a little embarrassed now that, for the first time, the idea of beloveds had come up in one of the stories. She showed no emotion. Her eyes were on Chiricoru.

“What exactly are warrior beloveds?” she asked.

Xemion gulped. “There is a tradition in the Phaer militia,” he told her, his voice breaking a little, “that two warriors can become joined in a certain way to form a special kind of fighting unit called a dyad, or warrior beloveds.” Her eyes veered close to his, slightly bemused, and he continued. “It was believed that when two warriors loved one another deeply it gave them together a much greater strength than any two warriors who were not beloveds.” He shrugged. “Usually they are a man and a woman, but it can also be two men or two women. It is an ancient and honoured tradition.”

She took a moment to think about it, then she said, “It seems like it will have a happy ending. I hope she finds him.” She smiled, and for once as her eyes skidded by she allowed them to connect directly with his for a second. Xemion almost gasped as the two glints of green ricocheted down into his soul.

Saheli took in a deep breath. “Anyway, I've been thinking I'd better explain something …” she said, and Xemion thought she must surely be about to address the issue of betrothal. “I've been thinking, and …” But just then Chiricoru, who had received the story's ending with an unusually puzzled expression on her face, started to crow and peck at the door. “All right, Chiricoru,” Saheli said, shaking her head. Then she whispered, “She wants to visit Anya's … place.” In her normal tone she said to the bird, “I'll let you out.”

As they disappeared down the stairs, Xemion got the tweezers and retrieved the tiny book from the bottom of the projector. Holding the locket in his palm he bowed his head in close and attempted, unsuccessfully, to slide the book into the one remaining slot at the topmost point of the gorehorse's horn. He hadn't realized how much his hand was shaking. He looked at his palm and wondered if it was slightly redder than normal. He bit his bottom lip, gripped the tweezers firmly, focused his mind, and in one smooth motion slid the tiny book into its awaiting slot. The image of the gorehorse was now complete. He gazed at it with sad satisfaction. This was the locket's fourth image and the fourth cycle of stories, but the first one for which he'd done all the recitation. He thought of Anya, who had read the first three cycles to him, and tears rose a little in his throat. On her deathbed Anya had not only repented of beating him but also of teaching him to read. It would get him into trouble she had said as she lay dying. But Xemion replied that he had no fear of Pathan overlords and was more than glad that he could read. In fact, he said, he would always be thankful to her no matter what it might one day cost him.