The Age of Light (The Ava'Lonan Herstories Book 1) (8 page)

Turning cycles
into dust

Take what may
and come what must

“Bright the
shadows, dark the turn

Things once
known must be unlearned

Defeats of yore
must be undone

Victories hailed
will be unwon.”

He sighed, disquieted by the gloomy mood upon him.

The girl. The girl kept him from his communion with
the earth, kept him from peaceful repose. He had spent an unknown amount of
time watching her after interrogating her, wondering what to make of her.

So she wants to talk, eh?
He was not sure
he believed her. What could be so important, what could be so pressing that she
would stalk him for a ten’turn and then do her best to trap him? What would
send such an important unknown one out into the heart of the unclaimed
lons
looking for answers that he might not have? He had wondered and worried at this
vein of thought until it began to come apart like a rotting leaf. After that he
had simply gazed at her, absorbing the warm beauty of her, feeling his relief
turning, like the march of time, slowly, inexorably, into something else.

Something that had taken root from the moment he saw
her, from the moment he had beheld her. She was beautiful - the heart-shaped
face, the almond eyes of piercing mahogany, the roundish spread of nose, the
full, succulent mouth; the dark richness of the skin, like deep, iridescent
silk; the wealth of hair, tight spirals of strands strictly disciplined into
sinuous
guinne
of pure satin. But there was more than that. There was this thing that had been
steadily growing since he had first touched her, the mists of her velvet
presence washing over him and the flush of some white hot emotion or sensation
that almost reminded him of the inveiglement of woman-sweet fruit, her body
soft/hard and yielding and just ripening.

This thing that he could not name had been riding
him since he had taken her into his home, her welfare held in his hands, her
life given to him to care for like a promise of blind trust. She was stirring
up feelings and emotions in him that he had not expected and was not equipped
to deal with, old emotions long packed away, never again to see the light of
Av. She dragged them out of him, dusted them off with her presence, and made
him feel them.

No,
he amended, his brow furrowing.
No,
she does not make me feel them, she instills them in me, inspires them, and I
must choose whether to acknowledge their existence. The thing of the matter is
-
I have no choice.

He dropped his head and ran his hands over his arms,
remembering her silken skin whispering over his as he had held her during her
sickness, remembering how she had clung needfully to him and curled trustingly
to him as she slept. How she had clove almost lovingly to him whenever he was
close, and reached after him whenever he rose to leave the room.

He stood and paced, wanting to kick something. To
cave in the head of another one of those foul beasts.

They hurt, those things long forgotten,
rediscovered. It hurt to feel again, to slip on the silken harness of -
attraction. The warm skin of - companionship. The hot, moist collar of -
desire. Each feeling presented itself before sliding on painfully, claiming him
with a strength and finality that frightened him. He had not known how he had
hungered for the presence of another; he had not been aware of how much he had
yearned to hear a voice other than his own. He had not realized his need to
touch and be touched. He thought he had dealt with these demands, subdued them,
extricated them. Them and others, so many others that were making themselves
known, other needs without name, other feelings without number... a thousand
little things that he had not missed until he had them again.

He looked up in despair at the embracing eve.

What has she done to me? What has she made of me, of
my life? What will I do when she has to return to - wherever she came from?
For go back she
would, when she was strong enough. That went without saying.
It will leave
me with hot memories and a broken life that it’s taken me all these cycles to
fix. It will leave me lonely - again.

Again
... he had almost managed to forget in
all those cycles, that there had been a time before. He had forgotten, had
slipped into the timeless Now of survival, where the only things the memory had
room for were those things that kept him alive and sane. Perhaps he should have
left her where others could find her, left her a passing thing in his life, a
curiosity, fleeting in memory. Then he would not be on the verge of
remembering.

And
I don’t remember. Sweet Goddesses, don’t let me remember...

A smile. A sly, teasing glance. A merry laugh. A
long, relaxed, conversation. A soft/hard body and soft, warm lips...
That was all
that remained of she whom he would not remember.

He went outside to get the hardwood branch he had
chosen for his new spear shaft. He took it to the fire pit and began carving
away at it, peeling great furrows with furious sweeps of his knife.

And this one
-
will I be able to forget her, too?
He knew that he could not, no more than he could have left her in the
unprotected wilderness after touching her. He would not forget her - he knew
her too intimately, knew her body inside and out, learning it in his struggle
to save her life. He knew her mind as much as her training permitted. And he
knew a deep, warm, loving place inside her that he had touched purely by
accident when he had dragged her, body and mind, away from the clutching hands
of death.

Why did I touch that part of her? Why didn’t I just
let her go?
Her fever had been so high that her brain was malfunctioning, her heart
arresting, the poison destroying tissues and organs almost faster than he could
heal them. He had felt her mind unraveling, her soul straining away from her
body toward loving hands that beckoned. Beloved hands that promised peace. In
desperation he had opened himself completely to her, reached out with all his
strength and touched that glowing entity that was her with his own innermost
self. It had only lasted an instant, one searing, blazing, light/dark instant
of delectable contact, but it had been enough. Enough to seal her forever in
the dark recesses of his mind, in the warm places in his soul. It fed the thing
that rode him. He had brought her back from the brink; but after that, touching
her always seemed to yearn toward that instantaneous caress of selves, that momentous
sharing of souls. It reminded him of a time with that other...

His thoughts were mercifully interrupted by a dry
cough and a weak request for water. He set down the mangled branch and rose
swiftly in answer, filling a
calabash
bowl and
using a touch of ‘
rita
to cool it. He
entered the room were she was, his sleeping chamber, and lit the large standing
candle.

She tossed and turned, her lips visibly dry as she
whispered for water again. She was not awake, however, not really. He sidled
onto the bed and leaned forward to lift her up a bit, held the bowl to her
lips. She drank deeply, nearly emptying it. Then, with a murmur of thanks she
bundled trustingly against his lower chest. A smile curved his lips. Her warmth
swept through him with devastating effect, redoubling the rage of molten
emotions and soul-depth yearning coursing through him. Without a second thought
he picked her up and lay on his side, letting her stretch out along his
fore-body, his arms protectively about her. She tucked her head under his chin
and sighed, sounding content.

He echoed her sigh as the rush of newly discovered
emotions and newly touched selves bathed him in brilliance.

What
will I do when you are gone...?

the
darkness turned...

Av’dawn
stripped away the darkness as it turned, unwinding it in sensual
twisting steps, flinging it pale green across the sky. He rose with Av,
extricating himself from the
desi
and the loving
folds of her limbs. Her arms clung, silently pleading for him to stay. He
smiled, gently stayed her hands, covered her when she curled into a ball like a
kitling.

He went about
his morn routine, basking in the warm glow of the memory of her nearness. He
managed to rouse her enough to feed her a light broth, then again a little
later to give her medicine and bathe her as he always did, at midmorn. But she
would not fully come awake.

At
zenith
he looked in
on her and frowned. She needed to wake up, to come to full consciousness. Had
he overdone his help when he had blocked her pain the turn before? He touched
her, probed her mind, felt his influence still holding her. He carefully drew
some of the influence away, draining it slowly back into himself. The spark of
her grew brighter, an encouraging sign.

Ky’pen’dati,
he called, come to light. You must wake up.

beguiled, the light turned, led by
darkness...

The
light turned through the air and the silence, drenching the lain with the sweet
presence of itself, the
afterzen
crushed
with its perfume as the Season’s blossoms wept their scent.

The scent of
afterzen
surrounded
Soku as she sat back in her sunken marble bath, washing her hair. She sighed
with contentment, smiling. It had been a long time since she had washed it
without aid.

Forgetting all troubles and losing all cares in the
honey-scented water, she
took great pleasure in
washing the thigh-length, silken mass. Her hair was her pride and the symbol of
her standing, that which marked her as Queen. For it was her hair, when
guinned
and arranged, that made her crown, the
Dakua
crown of the
Doan. When
guinned
it hung straight to her
thighs, before the intricate winding and fastenings bound it up into the
standard of her Tribe, Family, and Reign, the hundred and tenth Queen of the
Tribe Doan.

Of course, it was not thigh length at this moment.
The hair of the people of
Ava’Lona
, when
freed from the
guinne
and wet so that the natural
spirals of the strands asserted themselves, drew up tight to a thick round
quantity. The strands, if pulled straight, actually reached her feet. Braided,
they stopped at mid-thigh. Wet, the strands twisted and curled about each
other, until the whole wealth of it hung to only half its full length, about
the middle of her back. She loved the feel of it loose, free, and full of thick
lather of the
olia
plant. She worked the lather into
her scalp, combed through the living wealth of it with her fingers, then moved
languidly to stand under the arch from which a crystal curtain of water fell,
to rinse it before lathering it again.

It had been a very long time since her hair had been
solely her responsibility.

She repeated the luxurious lathering four times, the
ritual sweeter since she did it for herself, feeling her hair become softer,
silkier and more tightly spiraled with each repetition. Finally she stood under
the arch to thoroughly rinse it of all traces of the shampoo, before emerging,
like some newly-born Goddess rising from the sea, from the bath, her hair a
glowing, liquid black mass of near-locks. Donning a soft robe, she knelt in the
last of the
afterzen
light and inundated her hair
with thick mela’oil. Then she wrapped her head in a swath of special oil-cloth,
to let the waning light of
Av
draw out the
excess moisture and help her hair and scalp absorb the oil. She formed a picture
universal the Realm over. It was a ritual as old as time, as deeply rooted in
the forgotten past as the sacrament to the ancestor tree, or the game of Trade.

She used this time to think. With the edict of
silence and contemplation, all Trade
lorns
she had
planned between the end of the
Bolorn
and the
beginning of the
Salaka
had to be put off. This would
not affect her too adversely, and it gave her a chance to review her lists of
prospective and established suppliers and buyers. Based on the information she
had gathered in the turns before the
Bolorn
, she made
tentative changes to be discussed with her Voice and
Trade’Marm
when talk and
‘
tun
were once more
permitted. She worked through the political and economical ramifications of her
revisions before committing them to memory. The game of Trade was a broad and
intricately complex one, touching all aspects of
Ava’Lonan
life. Subtle, convoluted, it was a dance of politics, economics and personal
interaction, a war’don’mi of wits and words, rather than with skill and swords.
One’s rank among Queens often had little
bearing on one’s standing in the game. Skill in negotiation of Trade agreements
and winning concessions were huge determining factors. Honoring agreements made
and having a record of long standing, profitable coalitions oftimes affected
one’s position more than the total value of goods one had to Trade. Soku was
one of the least of the Lesser Western Queens, but she was an established
player of the game. At times she even stood higher than many Greater Queens
with lons ten times the size of hers.

The stakes for which one played was also a great
determining factor. This was based on one’s wealth and gift for Trade, one’s
ability to foresee the outcome of a business venture or a new enterprise, and
one’s ability to invest wisely in such ventures. As a mid-stakes player, Soku
rose slowly, but steadily, holding firmly to what ground she covered. High
stakes players were usually Greater Queens with much wealth but little
standing, seeking to acquire status quickly. These generally had resources to
spare, but were poor players or in bad repute as far as honoring their
agreements and concessions.

Political affiliation also had a considerable impact
upon rank in the game. This was a wildcard of sorts, for the aspect of politics
was an ever-changing entity, political parties rising and falling in popularity
with seemingly little reason or rhyme. The views that one supported often
played a part in deciding the terms of a concession or the conditions of an
agreement.

Last of all, time and region strongly affected the
position of a player. One always tried to deal generously with others of the
same region; however, in other regions a value crop might be scarcer, and
therefore more favorable terms might be had. Choosing where and with whom one
Traded helped set precedents or trends. And time, the great unifier, often made
and razed many a Trade agreement, for some goods did not have good shelf life,
and the art of refrigeration had never been fully recovered after the
Yo’teng
.

Soku thought over the harvests of this Season. Her
yoni’do
herds were doing well, the calves already weaned and the younglings growing
strong. They would bring good prices in the Nor’Este Territories, in exchange
for thousands of hands of
blugo
, plantain and
green banana. Her sugar apple and
sou’a’sap
crops
were plentiful, large and sweet, fine to Trade in the Central Territories, in
exchange for wines, rums and leathers. And the rich olivine,
jadine
,
malachite and emerald mines gave forth pure, unpolished stones for which silk,
salt, jasmine tea, bush tea,
desi
-reams, linens,
cotton prints and precious metals could be Traded with in the Estern Border
Territories. These were
the three mainstays of the Doan: cattle, produce and precious gems. The Doan
touched lesser markets with goods and crops like nutmeg and other spices,
embroidered and printed silks, finished leather products and wood products. But
these were mostly Traded on the local level, among the Western Territories,
though on occasion they were exported further for premium prices.

Soku longed for
papi’ras
and stylus, but was loathe to break her pose, for tradition held that to break
it was to invite the
la’ja’djin
, the
joumbi
that brought bad luck, to take the vacated spot. She held her patience and
stifled a sigh, checked the wrap. It was almost dry on the outside, but not
quite. She cast a baleful eye at the orange-blasted veils of approaching
Av’set
.
She should have started much sooner; would have, had the
Bolorn
ended sooner, or should have put off the in-depth washing till the turn after.
It was generally considered bad luck to wash one’s hair, or to be caught drying
it, after
Av’set
.

She let her thoughts wander to the High Queen’s
response to Tokia’s challenge. Her withdrawal had indicated insult to Family
honor. It said that the Heir was absent because of personal matters that tied
directly to the honor and welfare of the High Family, perhaps even at the
orders of the High Queen. Or the
Av’rujo
. And the
fact that Tokia had issued challenge was an affront to the High Queen and her
family and a direct challenge to the orders given the Heir.

Soku frowned slightly. Slights to Family honor were
tricky and complex in their ramifications and resolutions. The consequence of
the challenge was that upon the Heir’s return she would have to produce
sufficient evidence that her mission carried such import that it overrode her
required presence at the
Bolorn
. This had
the side effect that whatever that mission happened to be would be exposed, and
also possibly putting the High Queen in an uncomfortable position if the nature
of the assignment were sensitive enough. But if it were grave enough to warrant
her absence, then the challenge was remitted and the sensitivity did not become
an issue.

There was the possibility that the purpose of the
mission was not that significant, but that the Heir had been seriously injured
in carrying it out. This was also acceptable, but just so, for if the Heir were
hurt and could not be moved immediately, then her absence, of course, could be
pardoned. There was also a combination of the two, a crucial but dangerous
mission which had resulted in injury of the Heir. In any of these cases Tokia
would be at the receiving end of the full brunt of the odium she had brought
upon herself and would lose much. Unless she could prove that the Heir had been
negligent, and that if she had been injured as a result of that negligence,
then this was not sufficient reason for the Heir to be absolved. The lines were
very blurred, depending on who could make the stronger case.

What it came down to was this: that Tokia knew
something, or seemed to, though it remained to be seen whether she knew enough
to save herself, and that perhaps the High Queen was not on as sound footing as
was comfortable. They would know after the
Tures
,
the Realm-wide holiday, when and if the High Queen made an initial statement to
the reason for the Heir’s absence.

Soku put the subject to rest for the time being to
relax, and begin on her hair. A pot of royal jelly made of
olia
oil and hybiscus sat at her feet. She unwrapped the mass and parted it down the
middle, so that it fell to either side. One half became a fat bull plait while
she concentrated on the other. Dividing that mass into two again, she began the
tiny
guinne
at her scalp, moisturizing the hair at the roots and all down its length. She
had forgotten how much hair she really had, for by the time she finished the
quarter she had parted, her fingers, arms, shoulders and back ached with dull
fire. She made no plaint - it was well that she remembered how others labored
for her in service to the Tribe. But she was one, while the
maddi
that took care of her hair numbered four.

She must have sighed, as she started the next
quarter, for hands joined hers in taming the wild, lustrous mass. She glanced
up to see her head
maddi
Kylia
kneeling beside her, comb in hand, helping. Her expression must have shown a
touch of consternation, for Kylia smiled and patted her hands to say that she
did not mind helping and that Soku should rest. And before the Doan Queen could
offer any form of protest, other hands soon joined Kylia’s, familiar hands. All
of her servants and
maddi
seemed to be
going about their usual tasks of their own accord, though it was not required
of them this eve. The only thing missing was their singing and the soothing,
ever-present chorus of drum-beat.

Soku glanced around, expressing silent gratitude.
She made a mental note to obtain
t’jal’li
jewelry
and adornments in the Tribe colors for them all.
T’jal’li
were like badges of honor, given only to the most loyal and faithful of
subjects. It let all the world know that they were favored by their Queen,
faithful to their duty always. This would elevate their rank in the eyes of
those of their community and mark them as exemplary. And when they moved on,
they would have their pick of occupations.