Authors: David Eddings
‘
Yes!
’ Kring half-shouted. The Domi had been weeping openly, and his voice was hoarse and savage.
‘I tried to run,’ Mirtai went on, ‘but another Arjuni kicked my feet out from under me and tried to grab my dagger. I cut the fingers off his right hand and stabbed him low in the belly. It took him two days to die, and he screamed the whole time. His screams comforted me.’
‘
Yes!
’ It was Kalten this time, and his eyes were also tear-filled.
The Atan girl gave him a brief, sad smile. ‘The Arjuni saw that I was dangerous, so they knocked me senseless. When I woke up, I was in chains.’
‘This all happened when you were only eight?’ Ehlana asked the giantess in a half-whisper.
‘Seven, Ehlana,’ Mirtai corrected gently. ‘I wasn’t yet eight.’
‘You actually killed a man at that age?’ Emban asked her incredulously.
‘Two, Emban. The one who screamed for two days
also died.’ The Atana looked at Engessa, her glistening eyes a bit doubtful. ‘May I claim that one as well, Father-Atan?’ she asked. ‘He might have died anyway of something else.’
‘You may claim him, my daughter,’ he judged. ‘It was your knife-thrust that killed him.’
She sighed. ‘I’ve always wondered about that one,’ she confessed. ‘It clouded my count, and I didn’t like that.’
‘It was a legitimate kill, Atana. Your count is unclouded.’
‘Thank you, Father-Atan,’ she said. ‘It’s a bad thing to be uncertain about so important a matter.’ She paused, collecting her memories. ‘I didn’t kill again for almost half a year. The Arjuni took me south to Tiana. I did not cry at all during the journey. It is not proper to let your enemies see you grieve. At Tiana, my captors took me to the slave-market and sold me to a Dacite merchant named Pelaser. He was fat and greasy, he smelled bad, and he was fond of children.’
‘He was a kindly master then?’ Baroness Melidere asked her.
‘I didn’t say that, Melidere. Pelaser liked little boys and girls in a rather peculiar way. The Arjuni had warned him about me, so he wouldn’t let me near any knives. I had to eat, however, so he gave me a spoon. He took me to his home at Verel in Daconia, and I spent the entire journey sharpening the handle of my spoon on my chains. It was a good metal spoon, and it took a very fine edge. When we got to Verel he chained me to the wall in a little room at the back of his house. The room had a stone floor, and I spent all my time working on my spoon. I grew very fond of it.’ She bent slightly and slid her hand down into her boot. ‘Isn’t it pretty?’ The implement she held up was a very ordinary-looking spoon with a wooden handle. She took it in both hands,
twisted the handle slightly and then pulled it off the shank of the spoon. The shank was thin and narrow, and it came to a needle-like point. It had been polished until it gleamed like silver. She looked at it critically. ‘It’s not quite long enough to reach a man’s heart,’ she apologised for her spoon. ‘You can’t kill cleanly with it, but it’s good for emergencies. It looks so much like an ordinary spoon that nobody ever thinks to take it away from me.’
‘Brilliant,’ Stragen murmured, his eyes glowing with admiration. ‘Steal us a couple of spoons, Talen, and we’ll get to work on them immediately.’
‘Pelaser came to my room one night and put his hands on me,’ Mirtai continued. ‘I sat very still, and so he thought I wouldn’t resist. He started to smile. I noticed that he drooled when he smiled like that. He was still smiling – and drooling – when I stabbed both of his eyes out. Did you know that a man’s eyes pop when you poke them with something sharp?’
Melidere made a slight gagging sound and stared at the calm-faced Atana in open horror.
‘He tried to scream,’ Mirtai went on in a chillingly clinical way, ‘but I looped my chain around his neck to keep him quiet. I really wanted to cut him into little pieces, but I had to hold the chain in both hands to keep him from screaming. He began to struggle, but I just pulled the chain tighter about his neck.’
‘
Yes!
’ Rather astonishingly, it was Ehlana’s doe-eyed maid Alean who cried her hoarse approval, and the quick embrace she gave the startled Atana was uncharacteristically fierce.
Mirtai touched the gentle girl’s face fondly and then continued. ‘Pelaser struggled quite a bit at first, but after a while, he stopped. He had knocked over the candle, and the room was dark, so I couldn’t be sure he was dead. I kept the chain pulled tight around his neck until
morning. His face was very black when the sun came up.’
‘A fair kill, my daughter,’ Engessa said to her proudly.
She smiled and bowed her head to him. ‘I thought they would kill me when they discovered what I had done, but the Dacites of the southern towns are peculiar people. Pelaser wasn’t well-liked in Verel, and I think many of them were secretly amused by the fact that one of the children he usually molested had finally killed him. His heir was a nephew named Gelan. He was very grateful that I’d made him rich by killing his uncle, and he spoke to the authorities on my behalf.’ She paused and looked at the princess, who was still nestled in her lap holding the gleaming little dagger. ‘Could you get me some water, Danae?’ she asked. ‘I’m not used to talking so much.’
Danae obediently slipped down and went over toward one of the cooking-fires.
‘She might be a little young to hear about certain things,’ Mirtai murmured. ‘Gelan was a rather nice young man, but he had peculiar tastes. He gave his love to other young men instead of women.’
Sir Bevier gasped.
‘Oh, dear,’ Mirtai said. ‘Are you truly
that
unworldly, Bevier? It’s not uncommon, you know. Anyway, I got on quite well with Gelan. At least he didn’t try to take advantage of me. He loved to talk, so he taught me to speak Elenic and even to read a bit. People in his circumstances lead rather tentative lives, and he needed a permanent friend. I had been taught that it was polite to listen when my elders spoke, and after a time he would pour out his heart to me. When I grew a little older, he bought me pretty gowns to wear, and sometimes he’d even wear them himself, although I think he was only joking. Some of his friends wore women’s clothes, but nobody was really very serious about it. It’s
something they laughed about. It was about then that I started to go through that difficult time in a girl’s life when she starts to become a woman. He was very gentle and understanding, and he explained what was happening so that I wasn’t afraid. He used to have me wear my prettiest gowns, and he’d take me with him when he was doing business with people who didn’t know his preferences. Daconia is an Elene Kingdom, and Elenes have some peculiar ideas about that sort of thing. They try to mix religion into it for some reason. Anyway, the fact that Gelan always had a young slave-girl with him quieted suspicions.’
Bevier’s eyes had a stunned look in them.
‘Maybe you should go help the princess look for that water, Bevier,’ Mirtai suggested to him almost gently. ‘This was a part of my childhood, so I have to talk about it at this time. You don’t have to listen if it bothers you, though. I’ll understand.’
His face grew troubled. ‘I’m your friend, Mirtai,’ he declared. ‘I’ll stay.’
She smiled. ‘He’s such a nice boy.’ She said it in almost the same tone of voice Sephrenia had always used when saying exactly the same thing. Sparhawk was a bit startled at how shrewdly perceptive the Atan girl really was.
Mirtai sighed. ‘Gelan and I loved each other, but not in the way that people usually think of when they’re talking about a man and a woman. There are as many different kinds of love as there are people, I think. He had enemies, though – many enemies. He was a very sharp trader, and he almost always got the best of every bargain. There are small people in the world who take that sort of thing personally. Once an Edomish merchant became so enraged that he tried to kill Gelan, and I had to use my spoon to protect him. As I said before, the blade’s not quite long enough to kill cleanly, so the
incident was very messy. I ruined a very nice silk gown that evening. I told Gelan that he really ought to buy me some proper knives so that I could kill people without spoiling my clothes. The idea of having a twelve-year-old girl for a body-guard startled him at first, but then he saw the advantages of it. He bought me these.’ She touched one of the silver-hilted daggers at her waist. ‘I’ve always treasured them. I devised a way to conceal them under my clothes when we went out into the city. After I’d used them on a few people, the word got around, and his enemies quit trying to kill him.
‘There were other young men like Gelan in Verel, and they used to visit each other in their homes where they didn’t have to hide their feelings. They were all very kind to me. They used to give me advice and buy me pretty gifts. I was quite fond of them. They were all polite and intelligent, and they always smelled clean. I can’t abide smelly men.’ She gave Kring a meaningful look.
‘I bathe,’ he protested.
‘Now and then,’ she added a bit critically. ‘You ride horses a great deal, Kring, and horses have a peculiar odour. We’ll talk about regular bathing after I’ve put my brand on you.’ She laughed. ‘I wouldn’t want to frighten you until I’m sure of you.’ Her smile was genuinely affectionate. Sparhawk realised that what she was telling them was a part of the Rite of Passage, and that she would very likely never be this open again. Her typically Atan defences had all been lowered for this one night. He felt profoundly honoured to have been invited to be present.
She sighed then, and her face grew sad. ‘Gelan had one very special friend whom he loved very much – a pretty young fellow named Majen. I didn’t like Majen. He used to take advantage of Gelan, and he’d deliberately say and do things to hurt him. He was frivolous
and selfish and very, very vain about his appearance. He was also unfaithful, and that’s contemptible. In time he grew tired of Gelan and fell in love with another meaningless pretty-boy. I probably should have killed them both as soon as I found out about it. I’ve always regretted the fact that I didn’t. Gelan had foolishly given Majen the use of a rather splendid house on the outskirts of Verel and had told him that he’d made provisions in his will so that Majen would own the house if anything ever happened to him. Majen and his new friend wanted that house, and they plotted against Gelan. They lured him to the house one night and insisted that he come to them alone. When he got there, they killed him and dropped his body in the river. I cried for days after it happened, because I was really very fond of Gelan. One of his other friends told me what had really happened, but I didn’t say anything or do anything right away. I wanted the two of them to feel safe and to think that they’d got away with the murder. Gelan’s sister inherited me – along with all his other property. She was a nice enough lady, but awfully religious. She didn’t really know how to deal with the fact that she owned me. She said she wanted to be my friend, but I advised her to sell me instead. I told her that I’d found out who had murdered Gelan and that I was going to kill them. I said that I thought it would probably be better if I belonged to somebody who was leaving Verel in order to avoid all the tedious business about unexplained bodies and the like. I thought she’d be tiresome about it, but she took it rather well. She was really quite fond of her brother, and she approved of what I was planning. She sold me to an Elenian merchant who was going to sail to Vardenais and told him that she’d deliver me to him on the morning of his departure. She’d made him a very good price, so he didn’t argue with her.
‘Anyway, on the night before my new owner was planning to sail, I dressed myself as a boy and went to the house where Majen and the other one were living. I waited until Majen left the house and went to the door and knocked. Majen’s new friend came to the door, and I told him that I loved him. I’d lived with Gelan for six years, so I knew exactly how to behave to make the pretty fool believe me. He grew excited when I told him that, and he kissed me several times.’ She sneered with the profoundest contempt. ‘Some people simply cannot be faithful. Anyway, after he began to get very, very excited with the kissing, he started exploring. He discovered some things that surprised him very much. He was even more surprised when I sliced him across the belly just above his hips.’
‘I
like
this part,’ Talen said, his eyes very bright.
‘You would,’ Mirtai told him. ‘You never like a story unless there’s a lot of blood in it. Anyway, after I sliced the pretty boy open, all sorts of things fell out. He stumbled back into a chair and tried to stuff them back in again. People’s insides are very slippery, though, and he was having a great deal of trouble.’
Ehlana made a choking sound.
‘Didn’t you know about insides?’ Mirtai asked her. ‘Get Sparhawk to tell you about it sometime. He’s probably seen lots of insides. I left the young man sitting there and hid behind a door. Majen came home a while later, and he was dreadfully upset about his friend’s condition.’
‘I can imagine,’ Talen laughed.
‘He was even more upset, though, when I reached around from behind him and opened him up in exactly the same way.’
‘Those are not fatal injuries, Atana,’ Engessa said critically.
‘I didn’t intend for them to be, Father-Atan,’ she
replied. ‘I wasn’t done with the two of them yet. I told them who I was and that what I’d just done to them was a farewell gift from Gelan. That was about the best part of the whole evening. I put Majen in a chair facing the chair of his friend so that they could watch each other die. Then I stuck my hands into them and jerked out several yards of those slippery things I told you about.’
‘And then you just left them there?’ Talen asked eagerly.
She nodded. ‘Yes, but I set fire to the house first. Neither Majen or his friend managed to get enough of themselves put back inside to be able to escape. They screamed a great deal, though.’
‘Good God!’ Emban choked.
‘A fitting revenge, Atana,’ Engessa said to her. ‘We will describe it to the children in the training-camps to provide them with an example of suitable behaviour.’
Mirtai bowed her head to him, then looked up. ‘Well, Bevier?’ she said.