Authors: Jude Fisher
‘Someone’s been putting words in your mouth. For all we know, the Far West may be as poor as the rest of the world by now.’
‘Who said anything about the Far West?’
‘Oh, there’s another legendary land of treasure, is there? Another wild-goose chase for you to take us all off on? Haran, your eyes have gone as sly as a stoat’s—’
‘I have a map.’
‘Some of these Istrian lads are fair to look upon.’
‘They are beardless wonders.’
‘I liked the dark one with the choker of sardonyx.’
‘They’re all dark, idiot. Which one do you mean?’
‘The one who took the archery prize. He looked like Great Horin the Hunter when he pulled that bow. His skin was like polished cherrywood. You could have seen the definition of every muscle in his torso when he flexed his arm—’
‘’Tis time you took a husband, Fara, and no mistake.’
‘I had an odd one a couple of days back, Felestina.’
‘An odd man: now there’s a wonder.’
‘Truly, though: he was so hard that I was quite concerned for my well-being. Hard as a rock, and just about as responsive. And what was really strange was that within a moment of our finishing, he was ready for more . . .’
‘Some of these Istrian lords are as horny as goats. It’s their religion, you know. Stifles their natural urges till they’re mad for it.’
‘What are you wearing for the Gathering, Jenna?’
‘The green, I thought.’
‘They say green is unlucky.’
‘But it brings out the best in my eyes.’
‘You think you’ll get close enough that King Ravn will notice your
eyes
?
‘I thought I’d start by unlacing the top three eyelets of my bodice.’
‘It certainly won’t be your eyes he’s looking at if you do that . . .’
‘Gold, he said. Gold everywhere.’
‘And all we have to do when we reach the island is to kill the old man?’
‘That’s what he said.’
‘We’ll need to get a crew together.’
‘Aye, but quietly, or you’ll have a fleet to contend with.’
‘That’s most odd.’
‘What is, Fezack?’
‘You see the little girl over there, the northerner who came to see me a few days ago?’
‘I see her.’
‘Look more closely, fool. Her chest—’
‘It’s certainly a goodly size.’
‘When she came to me, she was as smooth as flatbread. The potion I gave her was to encourage her own body to start its womanly processes; but this sudden excess of bosom is unnatural—’
‘She has, perhaps, stuffed smallclothes into her bodice . . .’
‘Perhaps. I might think the same were it not for other things I have noticed of late.’
‘Such as?’
‘Have you not noted the blessed silence from Lornack’s wagon?’
‘That’s true, he’s not coughing any more. Perhaps it’s the dry air here—’
‘Dry air, indeed! You think the dry air can explain why Feria gave birth to a child with two heads?’
‘But it did not live—’
‘Or the babe with scales down its arms and claws like an eagle in Talsea Town?’
‘Shush, Mother, not so loud—’
‘There’s magic at work: true, strong magic. I can feel it in my bones.’
‘Do not say such things, Mother. The Istrians may tolerate a few harmless charms and potions, but the burning times for those like us were not so long ago that they do not remember their fears. None of us would wish to see those fires rekindled . . .’
‘We shall have to be careful. Water down your prescriptions my dear: offer only the most anodyne fortune-telling, even if you see the whole fate. There is a power at work, and it’s getting stronger.’
‘Would you do me a favour, Doc?’
‘Depends what it is.’
‘Have a look at this for me, will you?’
‘Ugh. Put it away, Dogo. Why in the name of all the Furies do you think I should want to see your ugly todger?’
‘You know about these things, Doc: I seen you treat wounds and the like. Look: it’s growing. It’s been growing ever since yesterday when I bought some stuff from one of them nomad charm-sellers . . .’
‘Looks like you need to go see my Felestina, you do. She’ll soon make it dwindle.’
‘A healer is she, Doc?’
‘Healer, my arse. She’s my favourite whore, Dog-boy.’
The Games had been drawing huge crowds – on the first day for the marksmanship events – the archery and spear-throwing – then for the heats for the swimming and sword-play; but especially for the wrestling event, where hundreds of young men – the flower of Istria and Eyra – had stripped down to their breeches and rubbed their bodies with oil to repel the grip of their opponents. The Eyran and nomad women had gathered at the rope boundaries, whistling and cheering as their chosen combatants won their bouts; cat-calling and hissing at those they deemed culpable of foul play, or those they thought less attractive. A particularly thickset Istrian boy with a thatch of dark hair had been pelted with fruit when he had beaten the Eyran favourite – a tall lad from the Black Isles whose piercing blue eyes caused many a young woman to swoon – in the final round.
Katla had looked on, unmoved. Halli, useless lump that he was, had gone out in only the second round. Of all the Rockfall clan, the wrestling was her event, the one at which she excelled in the island Games. She might even have given the Istrian a run for his money: not for strength – for he was fearsomely muscled – but certainly for agility and technique, though she doubted she’d have been able to pin him, even if she’d got him down. Here, though, they wouldn’t let women participate, and without the opportunity for disguise: even with her flat chest, she reckoned they’d notice the difference, stripped to the waist. As it was, even to come and watch the sport, she’d had to wind a length of coloured fabric about her head, on her father’s orders, after the officials had visited their booth. ‘It’s either that or dye black what’s left,’ he’d said grimly. Fent, meanwhile, drew glances wherever he went – though the charge for affray had long been dropped by the wounded Istrian boy, who was recovering well. No, it was the red hair – in conjunction with his finely cut features and slim build – that drew their eye. The sacrilege of a woman setting foot atop the Rock had struck some atavistic chord in the more fundamental southerners: now that word had spread and still the offender had not been caught, they were all talking about it. Fent noticed how many Istrians watched him sharply as he passed, as if determined not to be taken in by his mannish clothing or masculine stride. Twice, he’d been stopped, but one close look at the rough red stubble on his chin and he’d been waved on his way. Tor, accompanying him on one of these expeditions, had suggested that Fent don one of Katla’s tunics and affect a provocatively sway-hipped gait in order to really give them something to talk about, and had earned a sore jaw for his trouble.
More seriously, the previous morning two flame-haired sisters from the Fair Isles had also been stopped and taken into custody. At only twelve and fourteen years of age, and having no skill in the Old Tongue, they had been kept in the holding cells for the best part of a day, crying out piteously in Eyran while stern-faced southern officials fingered their hair and asked them unfathomable questions in the musical Istrian language they had been admiring only that morning, as they listened to a pair of southern swordsmen exchanging pleasantries between heats.
At last, the family had noticed they were missing, and after scouring the fairground, had gathered themselves quite a large group of searchers, who had eventually converged upon the Allfair officers’ booth, more to report the girls’ disappearance than out of any suspicion they might be held there. The furore that had ensued had resulted in somewhat greater circumspection from the officials since then; even so, the incident had sparked brawls that night, and even now the mood was tense.
‘Did you see me, Saro?’
Tanto Vingo leapt the rope and clapped his brother on the back so hard that Saro yelped.
‘I was magnificent, even if I say so myself. Did you see how I wrong-footed him at the last? Feint, feint, block, turn—’ he mimed out his win for Saro’s benefit ‘—let him catch me a glancing blow on the dagger, then bam! Straight in under his arm. If it wasn’t for that stupid competition button they make you put on the point, I’d have skewered him nicely.’
Saro stood there, swaying, his eyes unfocused, feeling the triumph and bloodlust sweep through him from Tanto’s touch; and then it ebbed away as abruptly as it had come, leaving him feeling empty, stranded.
‘Wrecked the dagger though.’ Tanto pulled the blade from its sheath and waved it under his brother’s nose.
The blade, albeit slightly notched, was otherwise undamaged, though little spatters of blood had dried along its length and Saro found himself wondering whether it had come from his brother’s opponents in the swordplay, or from the old mood-stone-seller Tanto had so needlessly killed. It was typical of his brother that he would not bother to clean the weapon properly: that was a job for a slave to do, if he had thought to make the instruction.
‘Have to buy another before tomorrow’s final: can’t afford to get some bastard’s weapon caught in the nick.’
‘But Tanto, you can’t afford a new dagger, not if—’
‘I shall win the swordplay, and you, my dear Saro, will win the horserace, and then I shall have the bride-price and plenty to spare, so don’t give me a hard time over one small dagger.’
And with that he grasped Saro by the arm and marched him towards the Istrian quarter.
‘I have seen the Vingos, my dove, and we shall complete our alliance tomorrow evening. I had hoped it would be today, but for some reason, they appear to be delaying. No doubt they’re juggling their money, as are we all!’
Selen Issian observed with some distaste that her father appeared to be in an unusually jubilant mood. She supposed he was already counting the money, was already deciding exactly how to split the payments to the Council in order to keep as much of the dowry for his own uses as he possibly could.
Tomorrow evening
. This would be her last day and night as a free woman: then she would be bundled off to some cushion-strewn tent and – how did they so delicately put it? – initiated into womanhood. She felt the rage rise up in her again and had to stare hard at the floor, for if her father saw the resistance in her eyes, she knew he would beat her again. It was no surprise that he’d taken the strap to her after she had painted her lips so crudely, but clearly her act of defiance had rebounded upon her.
Knowing she had made the Vingo boy so avid was somehow worse than the beating.
‘I’ve bought you something special, my dear, for the ceremony.’
Tycho clapped his hands and two of the slaveboys came running in: Felo and Tarn, Selen noted with a little flutter of emotion. She would even miss them.
They had been captured three years ago in the raids on the hill tribes, she recalled suddenly, feeling for the first time a twinge of empathy. What were they now – seven or eight years of age? To be only four or five and see your family killed, your village burned, to be sold into slavery: worse, to be sold to foreigners whose tongue you could not even speak, and be whipped until you could: it was a terrible fate. She tried hard to feel better about her own in comparison, and failed.
They laid a bundle at their master’s feet, and with clever hands untied the multitude of knots that held it all together, then rose without a word and stepped obediently backwards and out of the door.
Tycho quirked an eyebrow at his daughter.
‘Don’t you want to see what it is?’ he invited smoothly.
Selen stared at him, then at the bundle. Her feet felt rooted to the ground.
Tycho made a moue of disappointment then himself bent to the package, grasped the contents, and, with a flourish, rose and shook out a robe of the most perfect orange silk Selen had ever seen. She caught her breath.
‘Beautiful, isn’t it?’
She nodded tightly, feeling the tears well up. Her marriage dress, the orange symbolising Falla’s holy fire, the generative force of the world, which would be invoked at the ceremony. There were embroidered slits at breast and hip level, the top one horizontal, and lower vertical, for now held closed with ribbons of fine satin. She knew what they were for. Her women had been most specific in their descriptions.
King Ravn rolled his shoulders, stretched and sighed. His eye passed wearily over the charts and maps they had been perusing for the last two hours, amid heated debate (between his nobles, at least) as to the finer benefits and disadvantages of possible alliances with the south. The words on the maps, and in the air, had long since stopped making any sense to him. He had found some while back that if he relaxed his focus, the parchments, sandy and faded, became muzzy and indistinct, stretching across the table in their rolls and folds to become a kind of desert, the inky details upon them shimmering as if in the midst of a heat haze or Fata Morgana. He yearned for the days before he became king, when he could take to the high seas at will.
‘Aran Aranson of the Rockfall clan is here to see you, sire.’
Ravn’s head came up. ‘Who is he?’
‘A Westman Islander, sire.’
‘An interruption, at last.’ Ravn grinned. ‘Send him in.’
Stormway and Southeye looked annoyed at this sudden intrusion into such crucial political discussions; but Egg Forstson was on his feet with alacrity at the sound of his old friend’s name.
‘Aran, my dear fellow!’
As the tall Westlander ducked under the canopy, he found himself engulfed in a bearhug, encompassed by smells both musty and animal, though whether they emanated from the man himself, or from the vast, yellowing fur he insisted on wearing even in the height of summer, it was impossible to tell.
Egg stood back, still gripping Aran by the arms, and regarded him with delight.
‘It’s been a long time, old friend.’
‘A year, almost to the day, at the last Allfair.’ Aran grinned back, his dark, stern face creasing suddenly into a rarely-used expression. Against the weatherbeaten skin and dark beard, his teeth gleamed as white as new ice. The Earl of Shepsey, on the other hand, looked tired, Aran thought, tired and grey, as if in the intervening year time had been running at different rates for the two of them, as if the older man was willing himself towards the grave, while he, Aran, was running as hard as he could in the opposite direction. They had fought together, side by side, back to back, in some of the bloodiest fighting of the last war, lads thrown into one another’s company when the ship Aran had been on had been set ablaze and sunk as they made their raid on the Istrian port of Hedera, and he and the survivors of the
Dragon’s Tooth
had been taken onto the
She-Bear
, Egg’s father’s fine old vessel. The Istrians had managed to blockade the harbour entrance behind the
She-Bear
so that they had been hemmed in, naming arrows raining down on all sides, setting alight the sail, the deck, items of clothing; grappling hooks coming over the side and howling men hurling missiles from the swarms of little boats crowding around them, waiting for the fire to catch and the crew to jump. From their diverse armour and weaponry it had been clear that the larger part of them were hired freeswords. He could even have sworn some of them had once been Eyran. It was curious how the Empire always had enough money to pay others to fight for them, Aran remembered thinking, as the first mercenaries began to board them; and then there had come a great roar from behind them and the old King’s ship – the
Seafarer
– had broken through the blockade and come crashing through the lightweight Istrian vessels, scattering them like chaff to the wind.