Bloodstone (28 page)

“Womb of Earth’s lamentations so moved The Changing One of the clouds that her tears flooded the Abyss before Zhe could reach its bottom. Zhe swam across the sea to our winding river—it flows through the gorge just there, beyond the temple—and finally reached the slopes of Kelazhat. Cold and sluggish, he wriggled up to the summit where, with his dying breath, he disgorged Heart of Sky whose heat restored him to life. And so it has been every sunset and every dawn. Zhe loves the cool embrace of his mother, but cannot resist his father’s warmth. Each day, he rises from the summit of Kelazhat. Each night, he returns.” The Pajhit scratched Niqia behind the ears. “So. What do you think of our gods?”

Keirith hesitated. “They seem to suffer so much.”

“That is why we must feed them with sacrifices.”

“Human sacrifices.”

“As your people once did.”

“Long ago.”

“Until fifteen years ago, we offered human sacrifices only once a year. But then came the Long Winter.”

“You call it that, too?”

“Yes.” The Pajhit eased Niqia off his lap. She stretched, mouth gaping in a pink yawn, and padded inside in search of a more hospitable nest.

“The rains fell for a moon. The earth slid into the sea. We thought—as your people must have—that the world was ending. That Heart of Sky was dying or that Zhe had grown too weak to carry his father through the sky. And so we began offering daily sacrifices to Heart of Sky and to Zhe. Not slaves or captives, but strong young men who offered their lives freely so our world might live again. But still the days did not grow longer. We realized that the God with Two Faces must also be appeased if we wished to change our fortune.”

“The god has two heads?”

“It refers to his nature rather than his anatomy,” the Pajhit replied with a hint of a smile.

“And Womb of Earth?”

“She is the goddess of life. It would be unfitting to offer death on her altar. To her, our younger priestesses offered the blood they shed each moon. On the day we offered sacrifices to all four gods, the sun came out. The year began to turn again. And the world was saved.”

“But that’s not . . .” Keirith’s voice trailed off. He didn’t want to offend the Pajhit by denigrating his beliefs, but he felt impelled to tell him what had really happened.

“That’s not the legend your people tell. You believe the Oak’s spirit was lost during the Midwinter battle and a man went in search of him. Yes?”

Keirith nodded, surprised that he knew the story. The quest had occurred long after the Pajhit had left his northern village.

“This man—what do you call him?”

“Darak Spirit-Hunter,” Keirith replied, careful not to give the words too much weight.

“Yes. This Spirit-Hunter went to Chaos—we call it the Abyss—and brought the Oak’s spirit back.”

“Not just the Oak,” Keirith interrupted. “The Spirit-Hunter’s brother—we call him Tinnean Tree-Friend—his spirit had been lost in the Midwinter battle, too. The Spirit-Hunter brought them both back. Tinnean Tree-Friend gave up his body. He became a tree. The One Tree that shelters the spirits of the Oak and the Holly. Only then could the Midwinter battle be completed.”

“And once it was, the year began to turn.” The Pajhit nodded thoughtfully; he seemed remarkably undisturbed at learning the truth. “It’s interesting, isn’t it? The similarities between the tales. Not the details, of course, but the necessity of sacrifice in order to restore the world.”

“It’s not just a tale. It happened.” When the Pajhit nodded politely, he said, “It did. Darak Spirit-Hunter and Griane the Healer—they were there. In the grove of the First Forest. They saw Tinnean transform. They witnessed the battle.”

“I understand.”

“Then . . . ?”

“Why do we believe something different?” The Pajhit rose and crossed toward him. To Keirith’s relief, he made no attempt to sit beside him. “Every culture has its legends about the Long Winter. Your people believe that Tinnean Tree-Friend’s sacrifice made the seasons turn. My people believe that human blood gave our gods the strength to live. The Eripteans built giant bonfires on their mountain-tops; they believe the flames rekindled the light of the sun.”

“But Darak Spirit-Hunter—”

“I’m not denying what your Spirit-Hunter did or what he claimed to have witnessed. I’m merely suggesting that it might have required the prayers and sacrifices of many people—and the will of many gods—to restore the world.”

The Pajhit bent over him and Keirith tensed. Immediately, the Pajhit straightened, but his expression remained intent. “You find it hard to accept our beliefs. The necessity of offering human life to feed our gods. But we believe such sacrifices are essential to preserve our world, to honor the suffering of our gods, and to give them the strength to endure that suffering. Ours is a harsh land.”

But if the legends were true, it had once been a lush paradise, where the barley grew higher than a man’s head and the forests stretched to the horizon. Perhaps the ancestors had come from another part of the world. This land held little more than rocks and scrub and a relentless sun that robbed even the great river of its water.

“Our legends say our people fled from invaders,” Keirith said carefully, “who cut down our tree-brothers and stole our children for sacrifice.”

“And ours say that the people who lived here refused to let us build our temples and worship our gods. When they attacked us, we fought back—and in the end, they left us in peace. Which story is true?” The Pajhit shrugged. “Both, no doubt.”

He was always pointing out the similarities between their peoples, their languages, their legends. No matter what Keirith said—or how hotly he spoke—the Pajhit always had a calm, reasonable reply. And every morning at dawn, this calm, reasonable man cut the heart out of another captive and offered it to his hungry sun god.

The next evening, he bluntly asked, “What’s going to happen to me?”

“That depends upon you.”

“You want to touch my spirit. To have me touch yours. But I’ve already—”

“You’ve made it clear you won’t allow that.”

“Then why—?”

“Am I wasting my time with you?”

“It’s not just because you enjoy finishing all my sentences.”

The Pajhit smiled. “When I was younger—before I became the priest of Heart of Sky—I was the Master of Zhiisti. I instructed the first-year apprentices.”

“Did you enjoy it? Teaching?”

“Very much.”

“So does my—” Keirith broke off. This time, the Pajhit waited. “. . . my father.”

“Ah, yes. The Memory-Keeper. What was his name again?”

“You remember his name.” The man remembered everything.

“Has Ennit always been a Memory-Keeper?”

“As long as I can remember.”

The Pajhit chuckled. “Very good. I probe. You evade. I don’t suppose you’d tell me if you have brothers or sisters.”

Keirith considered. “One of each.”

“And you are the eldest.”

“How did . . . ?”

“I’ve lost track of the score,” the Pajhit said. “Who’s winning tonight?”

“Is that all this is to you? A game?”

The Pajhit’s smile vanished. “No. But I’m willing to play by the rules you establish. For now.”

It was easier with Hircha. She never asked any questions. But she was just as good at evasion as the Pajhit.

She was later than usual this morning, leaving him to sit in the garden and play with Niqia. Absently dangling the end of his khirta just out of reach of her questing paw, Keirith admitted that he looked forward to their lessons.

At first, Hircha had seemed as wary of him as he was of her. She’d told him that she was required to report everything he said and did, but as they grew more comfortable, he sometimes forgot her warning and found himself confiding in her. Just the frustration of being held here against his will, his anxiety about his fate. He never used the word fear; a man didn’t let on such things to a girl. Still, he felt better when she confessed that she’d been scared during her first moons in Pilozhat. But when he’d asked about her capture, she’d abruptly changed the subject, leaving him to curse himself silently for his clumsiness.

He often felt clumsy around her. He’d never spent much time with girls—except Faelia. And she didn’t count.

His khirta jerked in his hands as Niqia pounced. He tried to tug it free, but that only caused her to seize the fabric between her teeth. When he rose, she darted away.

“Niqia. Stop that.”

She raced under another bench, leaving him to trail after her. He laughed, realizing how ridiculous he must look, down on his knees, one hand clinging to the taut length of flaxcloth, the other grabbing a fistful of material to keep the khirta from sliding off his hips. When he heard echoing laughter, he looked up to discover Hircha standing in the doorway. His face grew warm and he tugged hard enough at the flaxcloth to drag Niqia out of hiding. After a brief tussle—careful lest Niqia decide his fingers made a more tempting target than a strip of cloth—he managed to free himself.

“Stupid cat,” he mumbled as he rewound his khirta and double knotted it at his waist.

“Silly boy.” But her smile was kind. His face grew even warmer. “She’ll never let you alone now. We’d best find another place for our lessons.”

His heart raced at the unexpected opportunity to escape the confines of the Pajhit’s chamber. “Is it allowed?”

“It’s not like they won’t be with us,” she said, nodding toward the guards, just visible through the thin draperies.

To his dismay, she led him only a short way down the corridor and into an open-air courtyard. It held a few stone benches and a small “garden” composed entirely of different colored rocks, artfully arranged in a spiral.

“This is the priests’ private garden,” Hircha told him as she settled herself on one of the benches, “but the Pajhit has given us permission to use it as long as no one’s here.”

To call it private seemed an overstatement; anyone leaning on the railings above would have a perfect view of them.

“That floor has a dining hall and a classroom for the male Zhiisti as well as their living quarters.”

“Do the priestesses live there, too?”

“Their wing is on the other side of the hall where you were questioned.”

“Where does the queen live?”

“In the north wing. Near the throne room. The king lives there, too. Not that you’d care.” Her pointed look reminded him of his enthusiastic description of the queen. He pretended to examine the rock garden while he waited for his blush to subside.

As the lesson progressed, Hircha seemed distracted, idly tracing the pattern of the tiles with her toe, jumping up to brush her fingers against a pillar. Finally, he asked, “Is something wrong?”

“I’m just restless today.”

“I don’t think the queen is all that beautiful.”

“What?”

“I mean, she is, but it’s probably because she’s so . . . different. From the women at home. And the girls.” To his utter shame, his voice broke on the last word.

Hircha looked completely bewildered. Obviously, she hadn’t been upset about the queen at all. Desperate, he said, “Can we go someplace? Anywhere. Just walk? We could practice at the same time.”

Too late, he remembered her limp.

“We’ll have to stay in the palace,” she finally said.

Relief washed over him. “Of course. All right. That’s fine.”

Her mouth was pursed, as if she had tasted something bad—or was trying not to laugh at him.

He was acting like a fool. This was his opportunity to observe details about the palace instead of shambling along, casting covert glances at a girl he barely knew—a girl he’d never have a chance to know. He could trust no one. Not the captives in the slave compound. Not the Pajhit with his lessons on cats and culture. Not this girl who reported everything he said and did—and whose thin lips would curl in disgust if she ever found out what had happened on the ship.

He shivered as they walked through the empty interrogation chamber; it was one place he never wished to see again. The pillared entrance led to a broad stairway. Beyond it was a huge courtyard, three or four times as wide as the marketplace he had glimpsed that first day. The walls of the palace rose around it, but to his left, he noticed another smaller courtyard. He shrank back when he saw the bearers and their curtained boxes coming through it.

“Are those the Jhevi?”

“Hard to say. They’re rich, though. Only important visitors arrive in litters. The merchants use the west gate.” Hircha pointed across the courtyard, but he saw nothing resembling a gate. “That’s the administrative wing,” she said, as she limped slowly down the steps. “The kitchen and storage rooms are on the ground floor. The one above is for the scribes, the potters, the metalworkers—”