The Revenants (34 page)

‘So short a life,’ he said. ‘To care so much about things, little things. To fill life so full of caring – I cannot. I live too long. You will see … you will see….’ and he was off again.

Jasmine interrupted firmly. ‘When he was gone, there had to be some man about the place. It was only fair that Cissus have the farm as her dowry – there was little enough there – and find a man to help work it. We made it up between us I would go into Lak Island and find some work. Girls my age did it all the time. I had the farm to come to on holidays or when things became too hard. It took only a short while of asking and I had a job as wash girl in a tavern near the canals. Wash girl isn’t a bad job at all. It pays little, but it’s clean work and not heavy. I did well, too, knowing how to read and do numbers. It wasn’t but a short time until Cissus found a husband, too, another of the stout, red-faced men Lakland is full of, one named Hahd who loved her dearly. Cissus is a kind, good person who deserves to be loved dearly.

‘I worked in the tavern for nigh on three years. What happened then couldn’t be prevented, I began to fill out. I filled out in the places most girls fill out in, though rather more and less in my case than in some. Also, I had learned to wash my hair and rub my hands with fat into which herbs were steeped. Living on a herb farm teaches you that, cleanly smells and good ones. It was rather my shape than my smell that got me into trouble, though, for the tavern-keeper (a kindly enough fellow, I’d always thought) began to make certain suggestions. I was interested not at all, but his wife didn’t care about that. She suggested that I find other work, and she wasn’t overly nice about it. Still, when I had cried a little, she patted me and said it wasn’t my fault. I think she was truly sorry. She took me to theatre street herself and introduced me to a dozen people, telling them I could do most anything that needed doing.

‘And that was the start of that. I learned to sew and set stage and do makeup. I learned to dance, at first a little, then more and more. I learned to act in little roles – nothing with singing in it, I cannot sing better than a crow, perhaps not quite so well. I did nothing indecent, for that would have disgraced my father’s memory. As it was, Cissus and Hahd came to the theatre once in a while and were not disgraced but were well amused.’

She stood and moved about as much as her short leash would let her, swinging her arms to restore the circulation. They had been in the rocky cleft for hours, hours, with the stars wheeling slowly overhead. She thought it must be near morning and that she should sleep. The dog king dozed again. Her story had taken her, however, and she would tell it out, even if none heard it but the wind and the distant stars.

‘The theatre people were good people. There was much temper and loud talk and declaiming about nothing much, but the people were kind and hard-working. And it was hard work, harder than I could have guessed. It is not easy, learning plays and doing them over and over. I began to think about saving a dowry for myself, about going to another town and opening a store to sell books. Father would have liked that. I didn’t do it, though, and the reason was Hu’ao.

‘If I were saying it as the books do, I would say I lost my virginity when I was sixteen. However, I didn’t lose it at all. As I remember, I was eager enough to give it away, and the young actor who took it was eager enough to have it. Oh, I was full of tears when he went with his group on tour. It was only to be throughout Lakland, the smaller places, but in Estlak they decided to go a little further east to a city toward the Concealment. Well, no one in Lakland saw any of them again. I, well, I was lonelier than I’d ever been before. He was truly a heart’s love, though we had been together only a few weeks. I think that is why, that winter, I took up with the young soldier who came with a troop of Tachob for some kind of visit or other to the High Administrators. They were in Lak Island all winter, and I was with him most of that winter. When he left in the spring, saying he would return in the fall, I was pregnant with Hu’ao. An end to the dancing for a while that was, and a surprise. Somehow I had never thought of it.

‘Well, there was nothing to do but bear it, and I did. I went home to do it, for the comfort of a place well known and for being with Cissus. And she, having had three of her own by then, knew what to do and helped me. I stayed there until Hu’ao was weaned and then went back to town. I could not lie back upon Cissus and Hahd forever, kind though they were, and I was quite able to work again.’ Her voice went on, low, almost a monotone. High above, the sky lightened toward dawn.

‘So, Hu’ao went to the Temple to stay with the nuns there, except for times during the week, and holidays, and an evening now and then. They charged plenty for it, too, but it wasn’t begrudged by me for they kept her clean and well fed and happy. She grew to be such a love. It was strange, you know, that a year or two later I found myself always thinking of the young actor as her father and hardly remembering the soldier at all. And, even stranger, I could not remember the name of either of them but only the pet name I had had for my love and he for me. I still often wonder what happened to him on the road away from Estlak, whether he lives still, somewhere, or whether he was taken by the filthy Gahlians and turned into something I would rather not think of….

‘So, I went back to work, dancing again, and acting again, and going here and there meeting this one and that one. Hu’ao and I had three good years together, and then I fell sick. It was a disease all of Lak Island had that winter with chills and aching and bowels like water. When I went to pay what I owed for Hu’ao, months later, the old nun told me I might not have her again. Well. Why make a long tale of it? The cowardly magistrate who had pretended to be my friend let the Eldest Sister get away with her story – and it was a story, be sure of that. No more than a pat on the head and a pitying glance he gave me. What was there to do but go? Could I stay without hope of seeing my sweet girl child again? So I went. And now I think it was perhaps a good thing.

‘I got all the way to Hynath Port in one long, lonely year, and it was there Jaer bought me.’

The dog king shifted uneasily, whined under his breath, cocked his ears toward the opening among the stones. Hastily, before he could speak, she went on.

‘When I saw her first, Jaer, she was only a girl, a nice wide-faced girl with brown eyes, much like Cissus. Then Jaer became a boy, and the feel of him next to me in the night was a little like my love again. Only when morning came there was a funny expression in his eyes, like Hu’ao when she got her hand caught in the honey-pot, not knowing what to do about it except that she wanted some. Medlo was eyeing the boy. He had the grace to blush. At that moment, Jaer only reminded me of Hu’ao.

‘Hu’ao, my own child, fleeing into the north with the nuns from Lakland. Where is she now? Does she remember me? Oh, I would give much to hold her again….

‘And I am so tired, so tired while you sit there watching me with your red eyes, your ugly tongue hanging out of your mouth. Dog king, you will regret this stealing of me. Much will you regret….’

The dog king flicked his ears in her direction, waited for her to go on, but she could not. She was slumped on the stones, too weary to say another word. He began his litany of lechery once more, his whining tale of what he would do, and do. It ended abruptly, the dog king thrust against a stone, breath driven from his body, his eyes rolling madly toward the huge shadow which loomed over him and thundered in Thewson’s voice.

‘What is it you will
do
, dog? What is it you will
desire
, dog? What is it you will say before you
die
, dog?’

Then Jasmine was swept up in Thewson’s arms, the thongs stripped from her legs, to weep luxuriously on his shoulder. Daingol was there, tying the dog king with the same fetters which had bound her. Barstable Gumsuch was there, standing aloof in the shifting firelight to which he had led the bigger people with eyes sharpened by decades of tracking peddler’s animals. His eyes had been close enough to the ground to see tracks long after Thewson and Daingol had given up in the darkness. Dhariat was there with Jasmine’s boots in her hand and Jasmine’s cloak draped over one shoulder. Doh-ti and Mum-lil were there.

And of all of them, it was Mum-lil, in the high, treble voice of a child, who called Thewson out of his anger.

‘Do not kill him, warrior,’ she cried. ‘We may find a use for him. By the Powers, I cry stay to your hand, warrior.’

And Thewson, scarcely knowing what he did, let his spear rest on the dog king’s narrow chest but did not drive it home.

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

THE ABYSS OF SOULS

Days 1-15

Month of Wings Returning

It took them half a day to recover the distance they had lost in two days of tracking. By noon, they had come to the mound to pick up the baggage and the others of the company. By night they had forded the River Nils and turned northwest toward the distant city of Seathe at the edge of the northlands beside the mysterious depths of the Abyss of Souls. The dog king ran behind Thewson’s horse, tethered to it by the same thongs which had bound Jasmine. He ran silently, drawing as little attention to himself as possible, for Thewson had taught him not to whine or bark or speak by judicious application of a whip. Jasmine wondered if he were bored. She thought not, somehow. ‘It will be a new thing for him,’ she told herself. ‘What he wanted. Something new.’ When they stopped for the night, the dog king was lashed between stakes driven deep into the sod by Dhariat and Daingol. They did not bother to go out of his hearing before talking of his fate.

Until that moment Thewson had spoken hardly at all. Now he took Jasmine by the shoulders. ‘Did he … force you?’

Jasmine shook her head. ‘He began. He wanted an heir, Thewson. I told him I am already pregnant. Carrying your child, Thewson.’

At that, Thewson fell silent, mouth slack, an expression of awed discomfiture on his face. Dhariat gave him an amused glance.

‘He was talking great lewdness. We thought …’

‘No, Dhariat. He talked it, yes, but I do not think he felt any such. He was like some weary old men of Lakland I have known. They talk such lechery, as though they lust greatly, but it is only talk, to stir themselves up. In their eyes is only boredom and weariness and a waiting for death. It is only to tell themselves they are still alive. It is meaningless. If he had truly lusted for me, he would not have let me talk and talk. I could sorrow for him if he did not sicken me so.’

Mum-lil spoke. ‘It is as I thought. In Pau-bee were some such. One hears it in the voices, the boredom and pain that all their lecherous talk is only a curtain over. Still, that one does not
look
old, not in body.’

‘Not in body, no.’ Daingol pushed a charred branch into the flames. ‘In mind, yes. Too old, too long confined among the stones of Tinok Ochor.’

Mum-lil went on. ‘Not old in body, then, and clever, and quick on his feet, and a sly sneak or he could not have taken Jasmine from the midst of us. I wonder if he could be made to be useful to us.’

‘To do what?’ snarled Thewson. ‘To make dirty talk? There is no one weary of life here who needs dirty talk!’

‘To find Jasmine’s girl child,’ said Mum-lil.

Jasmine’s heart surged, making an ocean sound in her ears, then thudded miserably as she thought of Hu’ao in the dog king’s hands. ‘No, not with him …’ she murmured.

‘Tsh. Did you not say the little one was with nuns of your homeplace? If he found one, he would find the others, to bring them all to a place we may meet.’ Mum-lil stroked her belly. ‘It is not good to lose a child and wonder always where and how and if. Not good.’

‘What oath would bind that one?’ asked Po-Bee. ‘It would sicken Peroval.’

‘No,’ said Sowsie. ‘There is an oath which would bind even that one. A singer’s oath, one known well to members of the Choir of Gerenhodh. The oath of Obon.’

‘But you can’t sing,’ objected Dhariat. ‘No more than I.’

‘Not true,’ laughed Daingol. ‘Sowsie might have been foremost among the Council and the singers. She chose not.’

‘I chose not.’ Sowsie stared into the flames, making a puckered mouth at what she saw there. ‘Now I may choose again. I will need help for this oath. Lain-achor, you and I can bind this one to Jasmine’s need.’

‘Fitting,’ said Mum-lil. ‘He would have had a child from her. So she shall have one returned through him.’

‘If Hu’ao lives,’ breathed Jasmine.

‘Wait,’ Thewson grumbled. ‘I have sworn this to Jasmine. To find the child. It is the bride price.’

‘Bride price?’ Mum-lil was much offended. ‘She carries your child and you talk of bride price?’

‘We are needed to go north,’ said Sowsie. ‘You most of all, Thewson. This one is needed for nothing. Let us use him.’

Thewson merely stared at Jasmine, she returning the stare. At last, she said, ‘I will think of another price, Thewson. If they can bind that one in a way that will make him find my child but not harm her, then let him go.’

Sowsie smiled, and Lain-achor seemed equally amused. They did not say why, but when they took the dog king away into the grasses for privacy, they laughed.

Daingol shook his head. ‘I cannot tell you of that oath,’ he said to Mum-lil. ‘But it is one of which Peroval would approve.’

It was a long time before Sowsie and Lain-achor returned, striding into the firelight with laughter in their eyes still. Behind them the dog king came, in some way indefinably changed.

‘This is no longer dog king,’ said Sowsie. ‘This is Fox, quick and sly, bright of eye, sharp of teeth, barker in the wilderness, evader of the dogs of men. The oath demands this of him.’

Him they had called the dog king was changed before them, pricking his ears, straitening his back, his eyes glittering. He laughed at them, a fox laugh.

‘We have taken memory,’ said Sowsie, ‘and time. We have given a new life with this oath. Go then, west to the Chornagam Mountains, to the trail of this child, months old though it be, even into Lakland if you must. Bring those you find to Labat Ochor, to Tiles, and await us there.’