Yohuac repeated what he’d told Reisil the night before. When he was through, Kebonsat glanced at Reisil, smiling ironically. “Everyone seems to think you’re the key, and no one, not even you, knows how. Not a position to envy, that.” He turned from Reisil back to Yohuac. “How did you come to be
ahalad-kaaslane
if you are not even of this world?” Kebonsat asked.
“I am not.”
Before Kebonsat could ask anything more, Baku tensed.
~Someone comes.
“Someone comes,” Yohuac echoed, climbing to his feet with Reisil and Kebonsat.
~A servant. From the Vertina Emelovi. She seeks Kebonsat.
Yohuac repeated the report to Kebonsat, who looked astounded.
“How can you know that?”
“Because Baku can speak to whomever he chooses. And pick information out of their thoughts,” Reisil said before Yohuac could answer.
“Useful,” Kebonsat said, looking disturbed.
Reisil understood. Were no one’s thoughts safe? Would Baku know everyone’s secrets? And thus Yohuac? The potential for his ability was staggering. He could spy out the plans of their enemies, of the sorcerers, of anyone at all. Was that why the Lady had sent Baku to Yohuac? Sent them to Reisil? But no. It lacked . . . honor. Perhaps she shouldn’t be concerned with honor when the safety of Kodu Riik hung in the balance. But remembering Upsakes and what he was willing to do in the name of the Lady and the good of Kodu Riik, Reisil felt queasy.
“I think we have to be careful. I don’t think we can rule out asking Baku for help, but—” She gestured helplessly.
“But neither friends nor enemies will trust us if we violate their minds indiscriminately,” Kebonsat said.
“I don’t have very many friends. I would very much like to keep them,” Reisil said wryly.
“None of us do. Not here.”
“Baku,” Reisil said, turning to the coal-drake where he crouched on the ground, the tip of his tail snapping back and forth, his white teeth gleaming like daggers along his jaw. For a moment Reisil didn’t know what to say. He was already angry, already resentful. He had a great gift to offer, and now she was going to tell him his skills were unwanted. Just as Yohuac did not want him. But then Reisil realized it wasn’t that way at all. She laid a hand on his head, meeting his hostile gaze earnestly.
“Baku, we must trust you. You are the master of our secrets. You are a great advantage to us—through you we can communicate with one another. We can ask you to pass messages more quickly and reliably than we might otherwise be able. But the trust between all of us comes from knowing that each one of us will reveal what is important when it is important. And to trust that our friends will do the same. So we must ask you
not
to share all that you hear in someone’s mind. We must ask you to consider carefully before you divulge what you think we must know.”
She was extending him a great trust, one that could put their lives in danger.
~I will guard well.
Reisil nodded and straightened. “It will be well,” she said to the two men. “But here comes the Vertina’s messenger,” she said, hearing a crackle of twigs and ice beneath stolid feet.
Kebonsat frowned. “She hasn’t spoken more than five words together to me. What could she want? And at this time of the morning?”
“You’re about to find out.” Reisil’s heart twinged, watching him step to meet the liveried messenger. Baku nudged at her arm, and she turned to give him a smile and then collected up the basket and crockery.
~We are friends
. He sounded uncertain.
~We are friends
. She and Baku and Kebonsat and maybe even Yohuac. And don’t forget Juhrnus and Metyein. You have more friends than you had a few days ago, she told herself, her heart feeling suddenly lighter.
“My presence is requested for breakfast,” Kebonsat said, folding up the note and tucking it in his belt. “I must be off. Same time tomorrow. Don’t forget. Take your sword with you and wear it.”
He waved and disappeared through the trees, carrying with him the practice weapons.
“I want a bath,” Reisil said. “And I’d like to hear more of your land, if you will.”
Yohuac gave that bow he’d given her the night before. “I would like that.”
“And the nahuallis. I definitely want to hear about them.”
Yohuac picked up her sword and followed after her, not answering.
Chapter 29
The long winter had at long last begun to release its icy grasp on the land. The days were warming, and spring rains had begun to fall. It was a cause for celebration, as hungry people prepared garden plots for carefully hoarded seeds. The days passed swiftly and uneventfully, if one did not count the expanding numbers of plague victims in the Fringes. It had become more difficult to enter the city. No one was admitted without proper documentation and inspection. Those who departed could not be certain they would be allowed to return.
The sorcerers had done little as far as Reisil could tell, either to aid Kodu Riik or to attack. On the single occasion Reisil had cornered Sodur in the three weeks since the Scallacians’ arrival, he informed her that it had been decided it was too early to trust the sorcerers with the truth about the Iisand. The Scallacians would have to prove their good intentions and abilities by first curing the plague. Then a
nokula
would be captured for them to cure. And finally, if all was well, they would be asked to aid the Iisand.
Sodur was peculiarly distracted and evasive. “They have been quite cordial, I am told. Our Lord Marshal does not trust them. Of course. But that is his job, after all.” He dodged her gaze.
“You haven’t asked about Yohuac and Baku,” Reisil began.
Sodur waved a hand. “No time. They want you. Don’t tell them anything. Don’t trust anyone. Anyone!” He stared piercingly at her for a fleeting moment and then hurried away, Lume trotting at his heels. The lynx turned back once to look at Reisil.
Sodur’s behavior was nothing less than Reisil had come to expect, and yet his obvious eagerness to be away from her opened her wounds afresh. All over again, Reisil felt betrayed, and angry that she should feel so. Worse was his lack of interest in Yohuac and Baku. Nor had any of the
ahalad-kaaslane
welcomed them. It was almost as if their contact with her had tainted them, made them untouchable. If only she could have news from the
ahalad-kaaslane
who were still her friends. Fehra, Reikon, Felias, Bethorn. She wouldn’t feel so alone.
She continued her morning sword lessons. As agonizing as that first week had been. Reisil was proud of how far she’d progressed. Being able to swing a sword to some purpose was liberating. Not that she could hope to defeat anyone with any skill. But she was no longer an easy target, and with time and practice, she’d do better than just hold her own.
Few had noticed the addition of the weapon to her wardrobe, with the exceptions of Juhrnus and Metyein, both of whom snickered at her obvious discomfort, though they applauded her for learning. Not that she saw much of either of them. Metyein could not speak to her publicly, making his remarks under his breath as if talking to a bowl of crystal ornaments or a shelf of books, while Juhrnus was occupied by the sorceress. When he wasn’t with Kedisan-Mutira, he was with Metyein, scouring Koduteel for information. And there wasn’t much good news.
As she expected, Yohuac and Baku’s arrival had stirred up a storm of animosity and suspicion against all three of them. Yohuac and Baku were her constant companions wherever she went. Yohuac, despite his quiet, brooding demeanor , enjoyed a good joke and would divert her with songs and tales of his land. Reisil returned the favor, her presence easing the tension between Yohuac and Baku.
They accompanied her to the Fringes, where she did her best to help the plague victims with her store of medicines, offering comfort when she could do nothing else. In the last week, the numbers of plague victims seemed to double every few days. Reisil couldn’t begin to guess how many were infected or how many had already died. With the citizens of the city growing more and more frightened, blaming the Fringe population for the spread of the plague, the Fringe folk kept the sick hidden.
On those days she worked in the Fringes, Reisil could do little more in the evenings than retreat to the privacy of her room, too exhausted and hopeless to face the malicious tongues of the court. Or the oily sorcerers. Far from being condescending or spiteful, they were ingratiating and glib. They liked to brush against her, to stand too close, to watch her as a cat watches a mouse—hungry and eager. She tolerated it, knowing it was necessary. From what Kedisan-Mutira had told Juhrnus, they would eagerly cultivate a relationship with Reisil, if only to gather information.
But she could not tolerate their insinuations and invitations, not on the nights after the Fringes. Then it felt like she no longer had skin, like every nerve was exposed, every muscle raw and throbbing. She was grateful for Saljane and Baku, who nestled around her. They said nothing, but their affection and concern were palpable. To distract her, Yohuac told her stories of his village. Eventually she would drift into a heavy, dreamless sleep. Reisil didn’t doubt that Saljane and Baku had something to do with her lack of nightmares, but she made no complaints.
“You never speak of the nahuallis,” Reisil accused Yohuac one night after listening to a lengthy story about a young woman and her eccentric husband. Her eyes were gritty, her head throbbing, but she didn’t yet want to sleep.
“I had hoped you had not noticed.”
“Did you think my ears fell off?” Reisil turned her head back and forth, showing him that they remained attached to her head.
He flushed, staring at her stockinged feet as she sat against a mound of pillows on her bed. The tall doors to the balcony were propped open a few inches, the spring breeze chilly but welcome in rooms that had been shut up all winter. Reisil stroked Saljane, who nestled in her lap, sated by a meal of fresh fish. The larders in the palace had grown sparse indeed, but there was still plenty of fish to be had in the coastal waters. Baku too had eaten heavily, pulling an enormous fish from the ocean, chewing flesh and bone alike and leaving nothing behind. Now he lounged before the door, red-streaked eyes heavy.
“The nahuallis . . . We don’t often speak of them.”
“But aren’t they the leaders of your tribe?”
“With the
tecuhtli
—the Iisand of our tribe, if you will.”
Reisil turned, leaning on her elbow to look at him. “But from what you have said, it sounds like the nahuallis are the real leaders and the
tecuhtli
must defer to them.”
“It is complicated.”
Reisil waited for him to say more, and when he didn’t, she gave up and rolled onto her back with a sigh.
“The
tecuhtli
is the head of the tribe unless the nahuallis intervene. He does not resent this. With their magic and the favor of the Fifty-two Gods—the Teotl—they are more wise than he.
“The nahuallis walk among tribe, eat with us, have children. The members of the tribe are careful to notice only that which is ordinary and expected of wives and mothers and sisters and daughters. When a nahualli wishes attention, she—” He paused, raised his hands and let them fall back into his lap. “It is difficult to explain. We do not normally speak of the nahuallis. They simply
are
, like the air. And like the air, they give us life. But who notices the air?”
He stopped again, gathering himself. “When a nahualli wishes the attention of the tribe, there is a change in the wind, in the earth, in the trees. A looming, as if a storm gathers in the night. Then what she speaks and what she says we will do or not do, think or not think. The Teotl speak through the nahuallis and no one,
no one
, ever disobeys. To do so is to refuse the counsel of the gods. That can only bring disaster for the entire tribe. So you can see, it is difficult for me to speak of them. I have spent my life trying to do the opposite. And what I know of them, I have been taught to forget. I will tell you what I can. Will that suffice?”
“It will. And I can learn to be patient, knowing that you are not merely avoiding my questions.”
Yohuac chuckled. “You are like enough to the nahuallis to make that a dangerous proposition.”
“Thank you, I think.”
“You are welcome.”
“Tell me something else about your people. You live in tribes scattered across your land and you move your villages from place to place within your territories following the prey. Yet you are well trained as a warrior. Kebonsat is terribly impressed at your skills. Are your tribes warriors? Do you have battles with other tribes? Do you have any cities? Who rules?”
Yohuac grinned at the barrage of questions and reached for a mug of ale. He drank it with obvious pleasure and to little ill effect. And as ale was one of the few things still plentiful in the palace, he was not forced to stint. “Answering all of those questions will take much of the night and will make me perilously dry. But I will do my best to comply, no matter how much I must suffer.”
Reisil snorted. “Put water in that cup instead of ale, and I might begin to believe you.”
“You would torture me, then? You are a cruel taskmaster indeed.”
“Your story had better be good, or you shall have no more,” Reisil said, pulling a blanket over her legs. “Go on. Don’t keep me waiting all night.”
“It begins with the Teotl. They are not all equal; each has strengths the others don’t have. Nor are they wise and benevolent. They are greedy, suspicious and capricious. Only
Ilhuicatl
alone has strength to bind the others to his hand. He rules the sky. The sun and the moon answer to him, the clouds and the stars, the rain and the wind and the lightning and thunder. And beneath him, the earth, the oceans, the mountains, everything. He is all that’s powerful, and the other gods cannot survive without his tolerance.