Part 70 (1/2)

Mother Weiwara came forward, looking prosperous and. healthy.” Let the Hallowed One go to her bed,” she said sternly to the folk crowded around. She escorted Adica to her cottage and crouched outside, just beyond the threshold, as Adica ducked under the door and dropped her pack on the floor, then sank onto her knees on the musty pallet.

”You have been gone a long time,” said Weiwara through the door.” More than two seasons, now. The dark of the sun is only half the moon's cycle away- ”I know.”

”Oh, Adica.” Once, Weiwara had been her dearest friend, two girls growing up together. With the darkness hiding them each from the other, she had the courage to touch that lost friends.h.i.+p again, despite the evil spirits that could smell the threads binding one person to another and use those links to sink their claws into the unsuspecting.” Where have you been?”

”On a long journey. I'm so tired. I lost Alain.” His name caught in her throat. She had to pinch the skin of her neck with a hand to strangle a sob.” But do not fear, Mother Weiwara.” Her voice was little more than a whisper.” The working will go forward. Soon you will be freed from fear.”

If the weather held. If the Holy One still lived. If Laoina reached her people in time to lead a strong band of warriors to the aid of Two Fingers, in the land of Horn. If they could drive the Cursed Ones away from that stone loom, and so link up with the others. If Hehoyanah did as her uncle asked, and joined the weaving. If no Cursed Ones attacked the tents of Brightness-Hears-Me. If Falling-down did not die. If she herself did not break of sorrow.

”Tell me what you saw,” breathed Weiwara in a low voice.

She began to object but caught the dismissal before it pa.s.sed her lips. Alain had taught her how to listen to others in a way that allowed her to see past the words to glimpse the heart. Was that curiosity, even wistfulness, in Weiwara's tone? Did her old friend conceal a hankering to see distant lands and strange sights?

Sometimes telling is the only way to make the pain end, or at least lessen.

She told Weiwara the story of their long journey, of the strange creatures they had seen, of the unknown cities they had glimpsed, of the ambushes they had avoided. She even told her of the vision she had seen of the banquet of plenty, burnished by gold and the woman with fire in her heart who had given her a ring to return to Alain. As she told the story, she pressed the ring into her cheek. T ”But I didn't see Alain again. When I woke from my trance, was in Shu-Sha's palace, where Laoina and the others had carried me. Alain had gone with three of the men of Shu-Sha's tribe, back to get the dogs. He never came. I waited there for five days, but he never came.”

Wind breathed through the chimes hanging around the outside eaves. A cow lowed from a nearby byre. If she stopped now, she would fall into pieces and never be able to go on.

”Tell me about Shu-Sha,” said Weiwara, as though she had seen into Adica's heart.” What is her palace like? Do the people of her land look the same as we do? What do they eat?”

”Queen Shuashaana is powerfully fat. You've never seen a woman with so much power in her body, thighs as big as my hips and arms as big as my thighs. Her belly is as large as a cauldron and her b.r.e.a.s.t.s are like melons.”

”She must be very powerful,” whispered Weiwara in awe.” I wasn't even nearly that fat when I was pregnant with the twins.”

So drowned had Adica been in her own fears and sorrows that she hadn't thought once to ask of doings in the village. So much might have happened since she was gone, and yet she had to be careful how she asked, never to mention any person by name who might thereby become vulnerable to the darts of the evil spirits listening around her.

”I hope the Fat One's favor still smiles on the village.” ”Spring and summer pa.s.sed swiftly, Hallowed One. There were two raids by the Cursed Ones north of here, at Seven Springs and Four Houses, and some people were killed but the Cursed Ones were driven off. Dorren came from Falling-down to tell us that we must fortify Queens' Grave. We had work parties from the other villages all summer to build the palisade on the lower embankment, to protect the stone loom. One time just at the autumn equinox a scouting party shot arrows at us, but both palisades were finished by then, so they left when they saw they could do no damage with such small numbers. Still, we've sent for war parties from the other White Deer villages, in case they come back. The Fat One has blessed us with three births and no deaths in the moons since you departed. Her favor has been strong over us.”

”May it continue so,” prayed Adica softly.” Forgive me, Weiwara, to speak of fate when the spirits swarm so near to me, but one thing troubles me. Since you are Mother to our people, it falls to me to ask you.”

”I remember our friends.h.i.+p. I will not turn my back on you now.”

Adica sighed, shuddering.” Promise me that you will lay me beside the ancient queens, if you can.”

Adica smelled Weiwara's tears.” You will be honored among us as if you were one of the queens of the ancient days. I promise you that. No one in this tribe will ever forget you, as long as we have children.” ”Thank you.”

”Is there anything else you would ask of me?” To think of lying down alone on her old pallet made her think of the queens, asleep under the hill, but she knew she had to sleep, to keep up her strength just as she had to eat. So Shu-Sha had told her. Nothing mattered more now than that the great weaving be completed successfully.

”I will sleep. You must look to the village now, and I will prepare for what is coming.”

Amazingly, once Weiwara had left and she lay down undressed on her pallet, covering herself in furs, she dozed off easily. Weariness ruled her. She slept, and she did not dream.

But the morning dawned cold and ruthless, nor had sleep softened her heart. She rose at dawn and did what she could to air out her bedding. She examined the dried herbs hanging from the rafters, weeding out lavender that had gotten eaten away by a fungus, burning a tuft of thistle too withered to be of use. Already, at dawn, villagers gathered before her house.” Hallowed One, the birthing house hasn't been purified properly.”

”Hallowed One, my daughter got sick after drinking cider, but Agda says it was the berries she had, not the cider. There are still five jars left. Maybe evil spirits got in them, or maybe they're still good.”

”Hallowed One, is it true that Alain didn't come back with you? My dog got a thorn in his paw and one of the geese has a torn foot-”

It was a relief to be busy. She dressed, broke her fast with porridge and goat's milk, and went first to the birthing house. After three new births, it desperately needed purifying; she smelled spirits lingering in the eaves, making it dangerous for the next woman who would enter to give birth here. As she examined the outside of the house, testing how the thatch had weathered the summer, looking for birds' nests, spiderwebs, and other woven places where spirits might roost, she glanced occasionally back at the village.

Manure from the byres was being carted out to the most distant fields in preparation for the winter. Beor and his cousins were slaughtering a dozen swine to feed the war parties, camped up beyond the embankment, and his sister had just brought up a big pot of hot boiled barley to catch blood for a black pudding. Young Deyilo tended a flock of geese out on the stubble of a harvested field.

Getsi appeared with a covered basket. She had grown a hand in height since Adica had last seen her, and the shape of her face had begun to change. In another year she would approach womanhood. But Adica would not be the woman guiding her across that threshold.

”What do you have there?” she asked the girl, more sharply than she intended.

”My mother has been collecting herbs and flowers for you. Where shall I set them?”

”Here, Daughter,” she replied, a little shamefaced, pointing to the ground just in front of the door.” Your mother will have my thanks. This thatch needs beating. You've had a frost that loosened it.”

”It's been cold early this year,” agreed Getsi.” I'll get my sister to come do it. My mother says I'm not strong enough to do it right yet.”

”You'll soon be.”

Getsi smiled, careful not to look her in the eyes, and loped off back to the village, lithe and eager.

Best to keep busy, and not to think on what she had lost. She completed her circuit of the birthing house before kneeling down before the basket, uncovering it. A rush of scent billowed up, dust dancing as wind caught and worried at dried summer milfoil, placed at the top. Beneath them she found small woven pouches containing flower petals or juniper berries, and beneath these but terwort, betony, and mint leaves, the bundled stalks of tansy and five-leafed silverweed, as well as lavender so fragile that it crumbled at a touch. She laid the contents of one of the pouches on her knees to sort it, sheltering the light petals from the breeze: eglantine and wild rose, made pale by age.

A horn call blared: the alarm from the village, a triple blast to call every person in to the safety of the walls. Shocked, she simply froze, lifting her head to stare as children shrieked and men and women dropped what they were doing and went running.

The horn sounded again, a single blast followed by silence, followed by another short blast. She heard shouts and cries turn from alarm to amazement as people streamed out of the gates, running to meet what a moment ago they had been running from. Still she did not move.

A dozen hors.e.m.e.n appeared around the southern flank of the great tumulus, the Queens' Grave. In the next instant she saw they were not hors.e.m.e.n but the Horse people. One of them carried a rider, a human like herself. Running among the centaurs came two huge black hounds.

Petals slid unheeded down her thighs, catching in the cords of her skirt. Never could she mistake him for anyone but himself, nor would she ever mistake another man for him. She leaped up, rose petals falling in clouds around her, trailing after her, as she ran to meet him.

He pushed through the crowd gathered to stare at the centaur women. They gave way, seeing his purpose. Breaking free, he hurried forward and caught her in his arms, holding her as tightly as if he never meant to let her go, his face pressed against her hair.

He said nothing. She wept helpless tears of joy and relief, and after a while he pulled back to kiss them away, although even he could not catch every one.

”Hush, Adica. I am come safely home. The Holy One is rescued. We couldn't return south to get you because of the war, but when we learned that Queen Shuashaana had already sent you home, my friends agreed to bring me here. All is well, my love. All is as it should be.”

”I love you,” she said through her tears as the hounds bounded up, great bodies wriggling like those of pups in their eagerness to get a greeting from her.” I was so afraid I had lost you.”

”Never,” he promised her as he embraced her again.” Never.” Held within that warm embrace, she knew she would not falter now, not even when it came time to walk forward to the death that awaited her. She would not go gladly, never that, but she could go with unhesitating steps because she had been granted strength and joy by the gift of love.

CHILD or FLAME PALACES floated on a river of fire, each linked to the last by means of bridges as bright as polished gold. At intervals brilliant sparks flew up from the river of fire in the same way sparks scatter and die when a blacksmith strikes molten iron with a hammer. These sparks lit on her body as she met the embrace of a host of creatures, daimones whose substance was made entirely of fire.

Where they touched her, crowding around, she burned. Her hands burned, her skin burned, and fire from within broke the bonds of the binding Da had wrapped around her so many years before. He had tried to seal her away from herself. He had crippled her for so many years, but in this place his magic held no power. Sparks pierced the locked door behind which Da had hidden her soul, melting the lock until the door swung wide and vanished in a cloud of steam, and she burned until her flesh was consumed and fire within met fire without.

She was like them. She had a soul of fire no different than their own.

Joy struck at her heart like lightning. The universe changed into purity around her, and in her heart and in her soul she knew she had entered a place existing beyond the mortal limits of humankind. Even her bow, Seeker of Hearts, had vanished. She had nothing of Earth left to her, nothing binding her to Earth any longer.

In the embrace of fire she burned for an eternity, or perhaps only for one instant.

Then she found her voice.” Who am I?”

Here in the realm of fire their voices thrummed as though they were themselves taut strings on which the music of the spheres played out its measure.” Step into the river of fire, child. Here nothing can be hidden that you call past, which binds you, and future, which blinds mortal eyes.”