Maia

by Richard Adams

  Yet at supper last night she had realized that this had changed. Anything that ordinary people would regard as warmth or cordiality was not really, of course, within Anda-Nokomis's capacity; yet she, who knew him so well, could perceive clearly the alteration of his feelings. She could only suppose that he must have been reconsidering one thing with another-the escape from Bekla, the raft, the waterfall and her night excursion to the Ortelgan camp- and had at last decided to forgive her. She was not to know that in fact it was none of these things which had tipped the scale in that proud, obsessed mind. Maia's disclosure that she was his cousin had brought about in him a turmoil of perplexity. For some days he had been quite unable to decide whether it could or should alter his view of her- whether it ought to make any difference to his condemnation of her unspeakable treachery. Yet nevertheless, within the hour and while he was still very much confused, it had been the real though undivulged cause of his persuading Zen-Kurel against killing her. Only much later did he realize the full significance of the fact that when she had betrayed him to Sendekar she had not herself known either that she was Suban or that they were cousins. If she had known that she was Suban, would she have done it? He had concluded not.

  And then, following upon her saving of his life at the waterfall-and beyond all question that had been a brave, loyal deed, for no one could have blamed her if she had judged it impossible to attempt-had come Elleroth's very cogent suggestion that from the moment she had discovered that they were kindreds-that she was a Suban and he her liege lord-she could hardly have risked more or shown greater courage on his behalf.

  Yet even all this had not been enough for a man like

  Bayub-Otal. What had taken him completely by surprise and finally overcome his last reservations, had been Maia's instant and unhesitating reply to Elleroth that she was a Suban and wanted to go back to Suba. And when Elleroth had hinted at what she must already have realized-she had politely snubbed him and put paid to any further discussion of the matter. Until that moment it had never occurred to Bayub-Otal that when it came to the point Maia, Suban or no, would decline reward and honor from Santil-ke-Erketlis in favor of a hazardous journey to return to Suba and live there. Neither at that time nor throughout the evening had he said one word to express his astonishment; yet he had hardly been able to sleep for its effect. And it was this effect, evidenced by all manner of minute changes in that diffident, haughty man, which Maia was well able to sense and appreciate. Anda-Nokomis, she felt, was now more truly her friend than he had ever been. Might she dare hope to recover yet another friend?

  Alas! she was soon made sure that there was little enough prospect of that. Zen-Kurel remained all courtesy and detachment. She was still his responsibility: just that. And that, she felt sure, was the only reason why he had gone out to look for her yesterday, when he had learned that she had set out for the Ortelgan camp. He had regarded it as no more than his duty.

  It is perfectly possible-indeed it is common-to be delighted and gratified at one level of the spirit while remaining deeply unhappy at another; and so it was now with Maia. Naturally, the acclaim of the soldiers and the change in Anda-Nokomis had pleased her-she would scarcely have been human if they had not-yet she would gladly have given all in exchange for the longing of her heart.

  In truth, she thought dismally, it boiled down to something very simple. It was nothing to do with what she had merited in the past or whatever she might merit now. It was nothing to do with the fortress at Dari-Paltesh or the escape from Pokada's prison; with the rafts or the waterfall or the Ortelgan camp. The plain truth was simply that Zen-Kurel was no longer in love with her. Once he had been and now he wasn't. She loved him but he did not love her.

  In such a situation both merit and reason are alike immaterial.

  Where love cannot fulfill itself through reciprocity, it can do so only through sacrifice. And this, of course, was the real reason why she had instantly told Elleroth that she was going to Suba and then evaded any discussion either of her motives or of the danger. If it was the last thing she did, she was going to play her part in Zen-Kurel's return to Katria. It might very well be the vital part, too, for a boat would cost money. Besides, did either of them know how to handle a boat? She doubted it. She alone had the money to buy a boat and the skill to sail it down the Zhairgen to Katria. What was going to become of her after that was immaterial. This was high itruth. The low truth would keep till later.

  This was her melancholy solace as Zen-Kurel politely greeted her that morning. Yet solace it was, sure enough, to see his obvious hopefulness and the eager spirit with which he discussed the final arrangements with Tolis as they prepared to set out.

  She kissed Zirek good-bye with tears.

  "I only hope you're doing the right thing, lass," said he. "I suppose you know best; but it's not too late t'o change your mind even now, you know."

  She shook her head, her eyes brimming.

  "No, I can't do that. But I'll miss you, Zirek, very much I will. Don't forget me, will you?"

  "That's not likely," answered he. "When I'm a rich man, with my own estate, I'll send for you to come and be my guest; you and your husband, eh?"

  "Oh, Zirek-"

  "Look, they're starting," he said quickly. "Don't get left behind, my pretty girl: that wouldn't do, would it? Might never get to Kat-I mean to Suba."

  He grinned, putting a hand on her shoulder. "It's true what I said in the forest that night, you know. He is still in love with you. You wait and see if I'm not right. Only we never really seemed to get any time to talk, did we, you and me?"

  He kissed her once more; then turned aside as Elleroth came up to wish her well. A minute or two later they were on their way.

  Two of the soldiers were familiar with the country between the camp and Nybril; a half-wild, little-frequented district, the indeterminate borderland between Sarkid and Lapan. With these as guides they made their way unhur-

  riedly downstream. All that morning they met no one, save for three young fellows out hawking and, later, an old man gathering sticks. This seemed encouraging. Local people, at least, were apparently ready to venture out on their normal business. Tolis asked the old man whether he was not afraid of robbers. The old man shrugged.

  "One's always afraid. These are rough times. But you have to live, and I haven't much that any robber would want. I scratch a living and trust in the gods. What else can you do?" Maia gave him ten meld and they left him staring after them, shading his eyes with his hand.

  After some six hours the guides were sure that they were now at least half-way to Nybril, and Tolis and Zen-Kurel began looking for a place to camp for the night.

  Maia, having persuaded one of the soldiers to come with her to carry back her clothes, strolled half a mile upstream and swam down to cool off. Like the Urtans at the Olmen, the lad was disconcerted at her stripping naked, and she could not prevail upon him to walk back along the bank beside her. It was the same when she waded ashore: everyone was busy elsewhere. Yet in her absence they had done enough and more to show her what they felt for her. Camp had been pitched upon the edge of a little grove, and in the center of this they had erected for her an arbor with which Lespa herself might not have been displeased. Leafy boughs had been bent, interlaced and tied down to form a kind of hedge round a central patch of turf, and here they had made her a bed of pliant branches and a mattress of grass covered with cloaks. At its head, strands of scarlet trepsis had been entwined on the hedge-wall to read "Ser-relinda."

  Later that evening she danced for them: "Astiguata" and "The Long Reeds," two dances of Tonilda which she'd known from a child; artless stuff-hardly the thing to set the upper city alight. But then she had no Fordil-only their rhythmic clapping and a man who sang "Diddle diddle di-do." Yet she enjoyed it, while to the men it was like water in a desert. After supper enough wood was collected to keep a fire going all night, sentries were posted and most of the men were soon asleep.

  Maia lay wakeful. A few stars twi
nkled through the branches and she could just make out the gentle, continuous lapping of the river fifty yards away. Nearer by sounded the minute rustlings of the thicket in the sultry dark. They had given her

  a personal sentry-more as a mark of esteem than from any real need she might have to be guarded-and from time to time she could hear the man quietly moving or clearing his throat a little way off among the trees.

  It seemed to her now, in that state of half-dreamlike imagination often induced by silence, night and fatigue, that she herself had been gliding away-yes, a year and longer now-upon a river fully as grim as that which Zirek had evoked in his tarpli for Meris. She thought of all those she had encountered, good and evil, who had gone under in that river-Sencho, Sphelthon, Tharrin, Durakkon, Milvushina, Jarvil, Randronoth, Meris. She thought, too, of those whom likely enough she would never meet again- the three girls she still thought of as her sisters; Sednil, Ogma, Nennaunir, Otavis and above all, Occula. "O Lespa!" she prayed. "Sweet Lespa, that's preserved me through so much, preserve Occula too. Don't suffer that cruel woman to kill her; and let the two of us meet again one day. Le it be part of your dream."

  She herself was still adrift on that river which had killed so many. Towards what falls was she drifting now and where would she come ashore? Danger, she thought, always danger, danger. I live in danger like a fish in water. Never a safe bed and a strong, loving arm round me, same as any girl back in Meerzat.

  Suddenly she sat up quickly, startled by sounds of movement just outside the entrance to her bower. The sentry was making some slight but deliberate noise to attract her attention. After a moment, his voice said, "Saiyett?"

  "What is it?" she said sharply.

  "There's one of the gentlemen wants to speak to you, but he says only if you're not too tired."

  "Who is it?"

  "It's the Suban lord, saiyett: Anda-Nokomis."

  Anda-Nokomis, that chilly exemplar of propriety, the last man in the empire to make his way to a girl's bed at night! Her curiosity was aroused. Whatever he might want, it could not be her body: and whatever it was he wished to say, he was giving her the option of refusal. But then he would, wouldn't he?

  What could conceivably be at the back of this? She really could not refrain from finding out.

  "Very well," she answered. Drawing her cloak around her, she propped herself on her elbows and waited.

  After a few moments Bayub-Otal, cloaked like herself, came quietly through the opening and sat down on the ground beside her. She could tell at once that he was agitated.

  "Maia," he said, speaking just above a whisper, "thank you for letting me come. I haven't sent the sentry away, so you needn't worry about appearing compromised. I need to talk to you alone, and there seemed no other opportunity."

  "Not tomorrow, in Nybril?" She shrugged, putting on a little act of not being particularly interested but nevertheless bearing with his whim, however incorrect.

  "I felt-I felt I ought to speak to you before we reach Nybril."

  "Ought? Why, what have I-"

  "No, no! I only meant-"

  He stopped. She had never seen him so hesitant and unsure of himself. This was not the haughty, frigid lord of Suba whom she had come to know so well.

  "I-" Then, suddenly, "Maia, what I want to say to you is that I've done you wrong. I've done a very grave wrong to your honor and integrity as a Suban, and I'm extremely sorry for it. May I ask your forgiveness?"

  "Why, how's that, then, my lord?" This was disconcerting-embarrassing, too.

  "Please don't call me that. Use my name,"

  "Well, then, Anda-Nokomis, there's nothing to forgive."

  "Oh, yes, there is. If you had treated my honor as a Suban as I've treated yours, I believe it would have driven me to-"

  She put her hand on his. "Ah, well, but that's different, in't it? I'm not the Ban of Suba, am I?"

  "I've slighted and insulted you on account of what you did before ever you knew yourself to be Suban. I've altogether failed to realize the depth of your loyalty to me or your feeling for Suba."

  I can't disabuse him, she thought. What good would it do? It'll be better for both of us if he goes on thinking I've been acting on account of being Suban. Zirek could see the truth, but not Anda-Nokomis, thank the gods.

  "Well, dun't matter, Anda-Nokomis, honest. You needn't get so worked up; you're making me feel that awkward. Let's just say n'more about it. Reckon I'd 'a felt the same

  as you if I'd bin shut up all that time in that old fortress."

  "If only you'd learned earlier that you were Suban-"

  "Ah, well, but I didn't, did I? What's gone's gone; and now's now."

  "Yes," he said agitatedly, "now's certainly now; very much so. That's the rest of what I felt I had to say."

  She waited-truth to tell, with some little apprehension, for she knew her man, and this loss of self-possession was so much unlike him as to be disturbing. He seemed to need time to choose his words; hanging his head, plucking at the grass and once or twice looking up as though making a false start. Finally he said, "To decide'to go back to Suba: that shows exceptional courage, too."

  Another silence. "You see, there'll be those who don't know what you and I know. They'll only know about the- about the Valderra."

  "Doesn't matter," she answered listlessly, her thoughts already straying.

  "It would matter to me if they killed you; it would matter very much, Maia."

  But not to me. O Lespa, I believe my heart's breaking! Why do I have to undergo all this talk of Suba and what's going to happen when Zenka's gone? Can't I find some way to get this man to go away?

  Just as she was about to thank him for his kindness and ask him to leave her to sleep, he spoke again.

  "Your loyalty to Suba-your loyalty to me, too-they do you more credit than I can express, Maia. I've come to realize that you're like me-you're not a person who asks for favors, are you? You prefer to let deeds speak for themselves. But I can't believe that it hadn't already crossed your mind that in choosing to go back to Suba you'd be in danger."

  Why can't he go? she thought.

  "I felt sure it must have been worrying you, even though you're too courageous to talk about it or let anyone see it. That's why I came to speak to you tonight; to spare you any further worry as quickly as I could."

  As she shook her head uncomprehendingly, he took her hand in his.

  "Maia, I love you. I've come to admire you and love you more than any woman I've known since my mother died. I've come to ask you to marry me-to be my wife

  in Suba. You'll be safe then; and happy, too, I sincerely hope and intend."

  She was taken so utterly by surprise that she could only stare at him. The idea of Anda-Nokomis as a lover-as any woman's lover-now seemed so incongruous, so anomalous as to seem totally out of character. It was as though he had said that he had decided to sell himself into slavery or become a priest of Cran. She realized now that she had never-no, not even at the time when Kembri had first put her in his way-thought of Anda-Nokomis as a sexual being; as someone naturally capable of feeling desire. Yet she felt no impulse to laugh, as Nennaunir might have. Whatever else he might or might not be, Anda-Nokomis was a man of the most dutiful responsibility, a man of his word, who never spoke more than he felt, or intended to perform. If he said he loved her, what he meant was that he had formed the purpose of committing himself to being her loyal husband for the rest of his life: and also, as he had made clear, that he had considered the position she was bound to find herself in if she returned to Suba, and was ready to identify himself with it and make it his own personal concern.

  The next thought that occurred to her was that, unlike Eud-Ecachlon, he did not stand to gain anything at all from marrying her, apart from herself. From the point of view of his public position she would, initially at all events, be the gravest possible liability. It was an enormous-an overwhelming-compliment; by far the greatest ever paid to her in her life. What he intended was nothing less tha
n to invoke on her behalf the full weight of his authority as Ban of Suba, to reinstate and vindicate her in the eyes of those who would otherwise kill her. Yes, and to put that authority at risk, too, for it would take a fair old bit of carrying off, would that. They might not be so keen on him when he turned up with her and made it clear that he meant it. She could imagine the reaction of Lenkrit, for example, upon learning the news. But if she knew Anda-Nokomis, he had already thought about this. He said he loved her and he meant just that. She had in all actuality won his heart. Well (she couldn't help adding), what there was of it. For his, as she well knew, was a heart incapable either of glowing with warmth or sparkling with humor.

  What a lot of strange and different things men meant when they said "love," she thought: Tharrin, Elvair-ka-

  Virrion, Randronoth, Anda-Nokomis. Pity they can't boil them all down together-sport, pleasure, generosity, desire, respect. If I had any sense I'd accept this offer from a high-born, honest man who means what he says and won't ever change. But I haven't any sense-either that or else too much. I don't love him-I can't feel anything for him-so what can it matter to me? Once, in Melvda-Rain, Maia, you had a gold crown, studded with diamonds: but it's gone, gone; so what would you prefer now-bronze, lead or copper? What do I care?

  She began to cry from sheer mortification, seeing in her mind's eye Zen-Kurel, the way he walked,'the curl of his hair, his trick of opening and closing his hand when he was considering a problem. Oh, don't go through it again! Don't start going through it all again, what the two of us said to each other that night in Melvda-Rain! Don't!

  Anda-Nokomis was speaking. "Oh, Maia, I'm sorry to have upset you. I only meant to relieve you of anxiety by speaking as soon as possible."

  She was trying to imagine herself as his wife. She could not-even though she respected him, even though it might make all the difference between safety and a death not so very different from Meris's. Such was her distress and confusion that she could only cling to him, sobbing.