Watson, Ian - Black Current 03 (9 page)

 
          
"Yet it's all right for me to be
abandoned?"

 
          
"You wouldn't be. You'd be
together."

 
          
"Since I moved in here, Yaleen,
I've become a person of some import. That's a new sensation for me. Your father
and I spent years cosseted together. Narya's birth reaffirmed our ties—but it
was a false reaffirmation, wasn't it?"

 
          
"Have you spoken to Dad about
this?"

 
          
She shook her head. "Not yet. I thought
I'd tell you first. It's my decision, mine alone."

 
          
"Mum, this trip mightn't be
plain sailing."

 
          
"Why ever not?
Are we boarding a leaky boat?"

 
          
"Life's uncertain. Anything
might happen."

 
          
"Equally, anything might
not
happen. We'll just be away half a
year, you and I."

 
          
"Really made your mind up,
haven't you?"

 
          
"High time,
too!
Others have been arranging my life for long enough.
You, Chanoose, the guild.
Yes, it's time to assert myself—
just as you have always done. The mother learns from the daughter." Mum
smiled benevolently; it was such a smile as 1 had seen on Chanoose's face.

 
          
"Assert? I don't know that I've
been in much of a position to do that lately."

 
          
"Opinions might vary on that
score. People seem to be forever running errands for you.
All
the way from Aladalia and Ajelobo.
Building dikes, goodness knows what
else. Now let's do something for
my
benefit, shall we? In turn I can help you assert yourself more
effectively."

 
          
This
business has all gone to your head, I thought to myself. You ve become a
dowager, from out of a story book. . . .

 
          
Again, that smile. "Do you know,
daughter, I haven't travelled anywhere significant since my wanderweeks all
those years ago.
Now
I shall."

 
          
"But.
. . ." But I don't want you on that boat. I'm not really a child. Your
presence will make me into one!
You 'll
diminish me.
You 'll
elbow out Peli who s my true ally.

 
          
I couldn't bring myself to say any of
this. She was my mother, after all.
My mum twice over.

 
          
It was early on a Newday morning. In
just twenty-four hours we were due to sail—me, Mum, Peli, Donnah, and assorted
guards— aboard a schooner, the
Crackerjill,
which had been placed entirely at our disposal. First port of call: Gangee.

 
          
Almost the whole of Stamno's copy of
The Book of the Stars
had already been
smuggled out of the temple at the bottom of various pitchers. The previous
evening, I had finished the last few pages—for Stamno to copy, and Tam to
encase in clay. The job would have been completed overnight.

 
          
I was sitting on the top step of the
marble stairway which led down to Pemba Avenue. I was hugging my knees as I
watched the world go by to work. Quite a few people waved to me; I smiled and
ducked my head at them. Guardswoman Bartha
loitered
a
few paces behind, keeping an eye.

 
          
I heard voices from the entry hall:
Tam's—and Mela's. Mela was another guard.

 
          
"Let's have a look, then,"
she was saying.

 
          
"Oh, you've seen the like of
these before." Tam sounded perfectly casual.

 
          
I looked round. He had one pitcher in
his hand and another tucked under his arm.

 
          
"Just so," said Mela.
"I've been thinking how that style's rather ugly for a hot-shot potter—
specially
now that you have the super clay to make true
porcelain."

 
          
"I've had to keep my hand
in."

 
          
"You couldn't even get a hand in
one of those. How do you clean it? I wouldn't buy a jug I couldn't clean."

 
          
"It isn't a jug. It's a pitcher.
You just swill it out."

 
          
"Yet most days lately I've seen
you take a couple of those down to yon stall; where they certainly don't gather
dust. They're grabbed almost before you can say £«-store."

 
          
"That's gratifying to
hear."

 
          
"Oh, didn't you
know?"

 
          
I didn't dare continue watching, in
case I seemed anxious. Perhaps it was time to arrange a little diversion? Such
as Yaleen tumbling downstairs?

 
          
"Let's take a closer look at
these much-desired items, shall we?"

 
          
I heard fumbling, stamping—then a
splintering crash. "Oh
shit!"
cried
Tam.

 
          
I jerked round. The pitcher from
under his arm lay shattered.

 
          
"Look what you've gone and
done!" he bellowed. But he didn't sound panicked.

 
          
"That's exactly what I'm doing:
looking." Mela toed the fragments with her boot, sorting them about.

 
          
Ah. The broken pitcher had been a
decoy. Tam had dropped it deliberately.

 
          
I jumped up.
"Hey,
you!
Mela!"

 
          
Bartha clamped a hand on my shoulder,
suppressing me.

           
"Now
let's break the
other
one,"
suggested Mela silkily.

 
          
"Oh come on," growled Tam.
"What do you think you're playing at?" But his cheeks had flushed.

 
          
"Guild security," said
Mela. She snatched at the pitcher in his hand. Tam jerked it away. She grabbed
again. He swung it high out of reach.

 
          
Then the incredible happened. To
extend her reach, Mela unsheathed her machete and slashed at the pitcher. The
target clove in half, leaving Tam clutching the neck. The base flew away in my
direction, smashing on the floor. Potsherds lay scattered—and amidst them a
slab of uncooked clay, with an edge of waxed paper sticking out. Bartha's hand
became a vice on my shoulder.

 
          
"What's
that?"
exulted Mela.

 
          
Tam lost his cool. Discarding the top
of the pitcher he dived to secure the waxed package. Mela also dived. The
machete, which was still in her hand, was a part of her hand. It was the reach
she lacked. As Tam's fingers closed around the clay-wadded paper, Mela's hand
descended fiercely. The machete blade chopped Tam's wrist and stuck in the
floor.

 
          
Pulsing squirts of blood spouted—over
a hand which lay severed. Tam's blood was pumping from a stump. Mela's machete
had sliced right through flesh, muscle and bone.

 
          
Tam didn't howl. Maybe he couldn't
feel any pain yet. Maybe the pain was blotted out by the sight before his eyes.
He lay sprawled, staring madly at his potter's right hand—and his wrist-stump
spurting life-blood.

 
          
Mela sprawled too. She still held her
weapon, with the edge buried like a cleaver in a butcher's block. Her teeth
were chattering crazily.

 
          
No, Tam didn't howl. But I did. And
what I was howling was, "Current! Current! Madden Mela! Kill her! Send her
to the Earth!"

 
          
No such thing happened. The Worm
didn't rear itself in Mela's mind. (And maybe this was just as well. Who wants
a priestess who can frenzy you and slay you when she fancies, with a chant of
hatred?)
Nor did my frantic wrenching release me from
Bartha's grasp.
But my cries alerted the temple. Feet came running.

 
          
Donnah took in the scene in a trice.
"Tourniquet!" she screamed. Tearing her own belt free, she ripped
Tam's sleeve away and began binding the belt above his elbow.
"Another one!
Wads!
Bandage!"
Within moments Donnah was tightening somebody else's belt just below Tam's
shoulder. I'd run out of breath to howl by now—and he, I think, had fainted.
"Salve!
And clay!
Wet clay to plaster
on!"

 
          
Presently Donnah rose. Mela hovered
nearby, brandishing the waxed package. Her blade stayed stuck in the floor. She
thrust her discovery at Donnah.

 
          
"Here! He was trying to sneak
this out. It was buried in clay at the bottom of the jug. When the jug got
smashed he tried to snatch it. He would have run off with it. So I had
to ....
It was an accident, Donnah: his hand. I swear
it."

 
          
Donnah accepted the package. She
ripped it open, unfolded the sheets written in Stamno's hand and scanned them.
"So," she said.

 
          
"It was an accident."
Mela's voice pleaded. "That thing's important, isn't it?"

 
          
"Yes. But you . . . exceeded all
bounds. And in front of
her!
Get out
of my sight, Mela!"

 
          
Mela fled.

 
          
A wide board from a trestle table was
brought. Tam was eased on to this. By now he was moaning and shivering. Tremors
racked his body. Two guards bore him away, within.

 
          
Donnah approached me slowly, and
knelt to be on a level with me. "I think we've saved him, Yaleen."

 
          
"Saved him?" I cried in her
face. "You've destroyed him! He's a potter without a hand! You might as
well kill him, and be done. Let him go to the Ka-store. That's the only place
where he can be a potter now—the potter of his memories!"

 
          
"With good care, he'll be
well." Her face twisted. "He'd better be. I have questions to
ask—him, and Savant Stamno. I shan't bother you with such questions, my
priestess. You have much to occupy your mind, with the
Crackerjill
due to sail." She was controlling herself only
with difficulty. She was trembling. She was scared.
Of
Chanoose's reaction to the news of this obscene mutilation?
Or of her rage at
why
it
had occurred?

 
          
"I'm not sailing anywhere, you
stupid sow! You pissing stinger!"

 
          
"Tam will be most courteously
looked after. I swear by
The Book!
I
do realize what he means to you, Yaleen. We may even be able to fit him with
some sort of spatula on the end of his wrist."

 
          
"A spatula?
Why not just nail a shovel-head on him!"

 
          
"Reports of his progress will be
flashed to you faithfully. Mela will be punished. She'll be kicked out of the
temple. Right out of the guild! I promise you she'll never sail again. But
you
must sail, Yaleen —for everybody's
sake."

 
          
To my astonishment I saw that she was
weeping. She put an arm around my shoulder and hugged me tenderly. Her salt
tears were on my cheeks. I was so surprised that I didn't spit or hiss or bite
her.

 
          
I felt my own eyes watering, and a
moment later I was sobbing— just like the kid I looked to be. Peli wasn't there
to comfort me. But I knew that I couldn't have surrendered to Peli in the way
that I now surrendered to Donnah—because Peli was my comrade. Nor with my mum
could I have broken down. Yet with Donnah suddenly it was possible. Why so? Was
it because I had betrayed Donnah; and now found
myself
comforting her just as much as she was comforting me?

 
          
"I'm still not going," I
sniffled into her red hair.

 
          
"If you don't want to, little
one," she murmured, "your boat can wait. We can wait. The whole world
can wait."

 
          
Which, of course,
meant that I would have to sail as planned.
No world can wait.
Neither ours, nor all the others.