The Waters Rising (11 page)

Bear demanded, “And so, what do you do?”

Finally, Bear had come to the question he’d been headed for all along. Abasio had been expecting it. “I do two things. One way I earn money or trade for goods is by being a dyer. I make fancy cloth for women’s clothes, sometimes men’s, too, depending on how people dress wherever I am. I do cloths for dining tables or napkins, sometimes curtains or fabric for fancy furniture. Second thing I do is—you ever hear of a newspaper?”

Great Bear shook his head.

“Back in the Before Time, before the Hot Times and the Big Kill and the Time When No One Moved Around, every day somebody would write down everything interesting that happened and they’d print copies of the writing and go around the town selling copies to everyone so they’d know what was happening. That was a newspaper. They had other ways of doing it, too, but they were ease-machine ways, so we can’t have those ways anymore. Me, and others like me, we’re it. We like to travel and we like to find out what’s happening and we like to tell people about it. Like if you were going east past the second range of mountains, you’d probably give me a bit of money or some food or supplies as a thank-you when I made it a point to tell you there were griffons there, plus a few giants and more trolls than I’d be comfortable with unless I had a small army with me.”

“Magic,” sneered Bear.

“From what I know, more likely genetics,” said Abasio. “Mixing it up under conditions leading to mutation. And very few of them are able to reproduce themselves. I’ve never seen a female giant, for example, but the male ones must have mothers somewhere. They live a good long time. I’d guess giants are a grizzly bear–human sex-linked cross overdosed on human growth hormone, if you’d feel happier about those words. Trolls probably had some genetics from way back, elephant, maybe, or something from the prehistoric past when beasts were huge. Could be accidental, or . . .”

“Or?” asked Bear.

“Or somebody could be doing it. They knew how, in the Before Time.”

There was a lengthy silence.

“If you can explain trolls, how about curses?” asked Xulai when the silence became boring.

“What about them?” asked Abasio.

“I was in the inglenook and I heard Cook say the princess was cursed,” Xulai announced, trying to sound calm and uninvolved in the matter.

Precious Wind raised her head to cast an appraising look at Xulai. “Yes, it was a curse. And it’s all right to weep for her, Xulai.”

As though Precious Wind’s words had turned a faucet, Xulai’s tears spilled. Ignoring the wetness that slipped over her cheeks and dripped from her jaw onto her lap, she said, “Dame Cullen asked who had done it. I think I know who it was. I know the princess was fighting against it. I helped her when I could.”

“Of course you did, Xakixa. So did the duke. So did I.”

Only rarely did Precious Wind call her Xakixa, and never when other people were about. The role of a Xakixa was very much a Tingawan thing, not something one bandied about among the locals.

“She taught me things,” Xulai said, gulping.

“Such as?” asked Bear.

“She taught me that chalk has tenacity, endurance, intractability, that yew has strength to resist unnatural invasions of the body—”

“Which we should not discuss where anyone can overhear,” interrupted Bear, who had been sitting in the open window, drinking tea. He got up and pulled it shut.

Precious Wind went to close the door. “What we do, we do silently. It’s best not to set these Norlanders thinking we are much different from themselves. Misunderstanding between us and them can happen too easily. Our sages have said that what may be considered sacred in one land is considered foolishness in a second, barbarous in a third, and heretical in a fourth. And in those first and fourth kinds of places, their officials don’t mind executing anybody so foolish or barbarous as to question divinity or heresy.” She stared hard at Abasio, as though ready for an argument.

He said mildly, “I’ve known that to happen, yes.”

“They wouldn’t think such things foolish if we could show them it really works,” Xulai interjected.

Precious Wind shook her head. “We couldn’t show them, because the kind of thing you’re talking about doesn’t work unless a powerful intention unites all the elements. You could put the physical elements in place as Xu-i-lok told you to, but without a source of power, it would not work.”

“Why did
that person
wish her dead?” Xulai asked.

Bear, rising, frowned at Precious Wind as he nodded in Abasio’s direction. Xulai knew he felt they shouldn’t talk about things with him in the room. She started to object.

Precious Wind did it for her, smiling at Abasio. “He’s all right, Bear. He doesn’t know if he’s here for some reason, but he’s not inimical. When he showed up, I made inquiries. He’s said to have saved the world from being wiped out by resurrected ease machines.”

“Not just me . . . ,” objected Abasio. “I only helped . . .”

Precious Wind shook her head kindly at him. “People tell stories about you.”

Great Bear frowned in irritation. He didn’t like being contradicted at the best of times, but he satisfied himself with a relatively quiet snort.

“If we want to discuss what’s going on, we must go back a number of years,” murmured Precious Wind, settling herself comfortably, as for a long story.

“Falyrion, the Duke of Kamfels; his wife Naila; and their two children, Falredi and Genieve, were close friends with Justinian’s parents and Justinian himself. There was a good deal of visiting back and forth. I understand that at one time, it was even thought possible that someday Justinian and Genieve might be married.

“Then Falyrion’s wife Naila died suddenly, leaving Duke Falyrion a widower. Not long after, somehow, the widower Falyrion met a woman named Mirami. She was the heiress to Altamont, very young, about Genieve’s age, very beautiful, fascinating by all accounts, and they ended up getting married.”

“How did Genieve and Falredi feel about that?” Abasio asked.

“Falredi had his own interests, his own friends. Genieve, I recall hearing, spent most of her time after her father’s second marriage making long visits to friends of her mother’s. Eventually she married someone from Elsmere, I believe.

“Meantime, however, Mirami bore Falyrion a daughter, Alicia, and two years later, a son, Hulix. Then, while Hulix was still just a toddler, Falyrion, Duke of Kamfels, died suddenly. His son Falredi became Duke of Kamfels. A few years after that, Falredi also died. Hulix succeeded him in assuming the title.

“When that happened, Mirami left Hulix in Kamfels while she and Alicia went to live in Ghastain, with friends of hers. Hulix was only five at the time, so Mirami left her chamberlain, Chamfray, to serve as steward of Kamfels until Hulix was old enough to rule by himself.

“Mirami was only in her twenties, a very beautiful woman. She must be around fifty now, but we are told she is still a very beautiful woman. At any rate, her friends introduced her at court. King Gahls saw her, married her, and she bore him his only son: Rancitor.

“Then, one day when Justinian, Duke of Wold, was visiting the court of King Gahls, as he did occasionally, to be diplomatic and show respect, Crown Prince Rancitor, who was then a boy of twelve, told the duke he should consider marrying Alicia, the Duchess of Altamont, Rancitor’s half sister. She was, I suppose, in her mid or late twenties then.”

“ ‘Consider marrying,’ ” snorted Bear. “It was a command.”

Precious Wind made a face at him and continued. “It’s true that when royalty suggests something, the timorous take it as a command. The duke has never been timorous, and he could not follow the suggestion anyway, for, as he explained to the child-prince, he had recently been betrothed to Princess Xu-i-lok, youngest daughter of Prince Lok-i-xan, Tingawan ambassador to the court of King Gahls. The wedding date had been set.”

Bear stretched and decided to take part in the discussion. “Child or not, Rancitor knew very well that they were betrothed. He also knew that for us Tingawans pledging troth is more important than the rite of marriage itself. The betrothal involves our family and tribe, and our money, and our property, and our succession to family title, as I very well know! When one becomes betrothed, everything important is already done. The wedding is just a time for feasting and moving furniture!”

Precious Wind nodded. “True, the betrothal was talked of widely. Everyone thought it astonishing that a mere duke of a barbarian country had become the accepted betrothed of Tingawan royalty!”

“Barbarian?” said Abasio, head tilted in question.

Precious Wind said, “Any cultured Tingawan would consider Norland a barbarian land. Many people here do not read; they have no orchestras, no choruses; there is no such thing as a museum; dance and drama do not exist; and except in the Tingawan embassy, there was not a bathhouse in all of Wold until Justinian built one for his wife!”

Xulai, who much enjoyed cavorting with Precious Wind in the great steaming tub in the bathhouse, said, “I didn’t know that!”

Precious Wind patted her hand and went on. “The duke had met the princess at the court of King Gahls during a great reception given for the Tingawan ambassador.” She smiled, a bit sadly. “It was one of those fatal meetings that are later immortalized in both history and fable. Generations to come will read of it.”

Though Precious Wind had said this quietly, and though her face was still, Xulai felt the words like hammer blows. She knew Precious Wind. She was saying that something had happened that was more important than a mere romance, something of portent.

Precious Wind turned to look directly into Xulai’s eyes, nodded slightly, and went on: “Their fates were cast with their first glance at each other, and the duke went to the ambassador on his knees to ask for her. There were lengthy negotiations.”

“Negotiating what?” Xulai asked.

“Everything,” growled Bear, throwing up his hands. “On Wold’s side: dowry. On Tingawa’s side: wife-price. That’s another of our differences. In Norland, women are so little valued, a man must be paid to a take a wife; in Tingawa, women are so greatly treasured, a man must pay dearly to get one, as I have good reason to know!” Bear still owed a large part of the bride-price for his own betrothed, and getting it by wagering had proven unprofitable.

Precious Wind took up the story. “The ambassador, Lok-i-xan, had already allowed his six elder daughters to become first wives to nobles of leading Tingawa clans, and he had obtained sisters or cousins of these highborn men as wives for all six of his sons in Clan Do-Lok. In this manner, Prince Lok-i-xan had already made a dozen alliances with wealth and power, enough to satisfy his ambitions several times over.”

“What were his ambitions?” Xulai asked.

Bear answered. “Clan Do-Lok has been a century putting its alliances together. We are far too lowly to be told anything about them, though everyone knows Clan Do-Lok now heads the roll of great clans in Tingawa. Only the emperor ranks higher, and even he rules only as allowed by Do-Lok.”

Precious Wind nodded in agreement. “This marriage of his youngest daughter evidently fit into Do-Lok plans well enough, though Tingawa made it look like a sizeable concession. Perhaps they felt that a seventh daughter was worth building good relationships with barbarian Norland. At any rate, the ambassador said, so let it be.”

“Mirami was a widow with children,” said Abasio, returning to the earlier subject. “Why would a king marry someone with a family to complicate the succession?”

Bear laughed. “It was his fourth marriage. During the preceding five years, he had had three noble, virginal wives in a row, each of whom died without producing any children at all. Perhaps that was enough excuse for choosing a wife who had proven herself capable . . .”

“Not to mention expeditious,” murmured Precious Wind, “as regards fecundity.”

Abasio murmured, “Since the king had been unable to impregnate his three former wives, I am surprised there weren’t some questions as to who actually, ah . . .”

“Sired either the Kamfels or Gahls offspring?” Precious Wind finished his question. “There may have been whispers, but the queen has several faithful and very dangerous gentleman advisers who are known to react violently against anyone speculating on the queen’s virtue. If anyone thought of doing so, chances are the matter remained unspoken—or was spoken of only once by someone who subsequently went away on a long, long journey.”

Xulai had been trying to remember where this conversation had begun. “I asked about curses . . .”

“Which led us to Alicia, who is half sister to the crown prince,” Precious Wind agreed. “From the time he was born, she had been his constant playmate and companion. Rancitor grew to love Alicia more than anyone. In fact, when he was about six or seven, he asked his father to award her the duchy of Altamont, which was at the time ownerless.”

Abasio looked up sharply. “A six-year-old thought of that?”

“Not very likely, is it?” Bear grumped. “The king was so besotted with having a son he didn’t ask whose idea it was. It may well have been Alicia’s idea; more likely hers than her mother’s. It’s rumored the queen had a prior claim to Altamont through a former association with the Old Dark Man, and she wasn’t delighted at its having been given to Alicia . . .”