Renegades Magic

by Robin Hobb

  When we had left the ironmongers behind, Soldier’s Boy could breathe again, although he felt a bit shaky. Olikea had me sit down on a low wall. She hurried away and soon came back with a large mug full of a cool, sweet fruit juice. As he drank it, I looked around at the market with new eyes. There was ample evidence that this pattern of trade with Gernians was not new. I saw scraps of Gernian cloth woven into the headdress of a tall, pale man. A woman’s apron, much mended, had become a cloak for a small Speck child who darted through the teeming throng of traders. From what I knew of history, we had traded for years with the Specks long before King Troven had established a military outpost at Gettys. Had they previously refused our iron? I didn’t know.

  When she was certain I had recovered, Olikea took me from stall to stall, acquiring necessities as she traded away Lisana’s treasures. I ceased to pay attention. It was too painful for me to watch Lisana’s possessions treated as mere commodities. Let Soldier’s Boy deal with those feelings. Instead, I let my mind become caught up in the pageantry of the place. It put the Dark Evening carnival in Old Thares to shame. There were musicians and jugglers at one intersection, and hot food booths were sprinkled throughout the marketplace. I counted three races of men that I had never encountered before. One booth was run by tall, well-muscled folk, both the women and men, with freckled skin and hair that ranged from orange to straw yellow. Olikea had no success at their booth. She greatly desired the glittering crystal beads and figurines they offered, but they had no interest in her goods. Only tobacco would they have. All of them smoked pipes and their booth breathed the fumes of the aromatic herb out into the fresh sea air.

  Olikea stalked away from there, affronted, and Soldier’s Boy followed like a docile ox. We did not stop at the next two stalls. “They are the Shell Folk. They have nothing we need. Only those from across the salt water want their strings of purple shells. We have no use for them. ”

  At the ivory stall, we stopped, but not for ivory. Olikea traded for two small kegs of lamp oil, and arranged that we would claim them later.

  Three stalls away, six tiny men traded exclusively in items woven of grass. They had mats and hassocks, shoes, cloaks, and hammocks, all woven from the same peculiar blue-green reeds. Olikea had no interest in their goods and strolled past where, I confess, I would have lingered to stare. Every one of the little men was heavily bearded and yet was no taller than Likari. I wondered where they had come from but knew I would never get to ask that question, for Soldier’s Boy did not share my curiosity.

  Olikea stopped at the next stall. A smith there displayed his works of tin and copper, brass and bronze. He had spearheads and hammers, arrowheads and blades of all sorts and lengths. While Olikea studied the knives, Soldier’s Boy picked up a strange arrow. Behind its sharp tip it widened to a sort of basket-cage before fastening to the shaft. The smith left his assistant helping Olikea and came to Soldier’s Boy. He spoke Speck badly. “For fire. You wrap the gara so, in a rag. ” The smith picked up a smelly, resinous block. It dripped, barely a solid. “Then you put it in the basket. Set fire to it before you shoot it. Whatever it hits will burst into flames!” He threw his callused hands wide, simulating the explosion of flammable stuff. The smith seemed quite enamored of his invention, and shook his head in disappointment when Soldier’s Boy turned aside without making an offer.

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  Olikea traded away an ivory bracelet for a large brass knife in a sheath ornamented with mother-of-pearl and amber. The handle of the knife was made of a dark hardwood. I questioned the value of such a knife as tool or weapon, for I doubted that it would hold an edge. That did not seem to be Olikea’s concern. It came with a very long belt of white leather. This she fastened carefully about Soldier’s Boy’s middle so that the strap rode atop his belly and emphasized the swell of it. The knife, nearly as long as my forearm, hung grandly at his hip. Olikea grinned her satisfaction and then hurried us away from the smith’s tent.

  Women laughed and chattered, men with bangles in their ears and braids down their backs stalked past us, and small children in all manner of garb raced from stall to stall. The atmosphere reminded me of a carnival.

  A bronze-skinned woman in a long red tunic accosted us. She carried a tray of small glasses filled with exotic liquors in bright colors. I smelled anise, mint, and juniper, but more penetrating by far was the scent of strong alcohol. Olikea waved her grandly aside. I wondered if the woman’s skin coloring was natural or a cosmetic. I looked at the backs of my now-dappled hands and wondered why that should matter. I myself was now buried deeply within dapples and fat and overshadowed by my other self. How could I ever again expect to tell anything about another person by looking at her body?

  I was pondering this when I abruptly realized I had retreated into a literally “senseless” state. I was no longer hearing, seeing, or smelling the market. I had become an entity of pure thought, a being wrapped in a body but deprived of its apparatus. I was suddenly drowning, smothered by flesh. My awareness leapt and struggled like a stranded fish, and then abruptly meshed with Soldier’s Boy again. I felt air on my skin and I longed to take deep gasping breaths of the cool stuff. A thousand scents—smoke, spices, sweat, cooking fish—rode the air. I devoured the sensory information. I could see and I joyously beheld the moving crowd of brightly clad folk, the noon light glittering on the bright and glistening sea, and even the shell-strewn path we followed. I was like a prisoner granted a glimpse of the outside world again.

  I suddenly perceived that was exactly what I was. I was trapped in a body that was no longer mine, and only by sharing Soldier’s Boy’s awareness could I sense anything.

  I feared I was losing myself in him. I should tear myself away, I thought, but could not bear the sensation of solitary confinement in his body. With a sinking heart, I knew I was becoming resigned to my subordinate existence. I was losing the will to fight him.

  I looked through his eyes in a daze of despair, looked out at his world as a passenger looks out of the window of a carriage. I could not control where I was carried nor what I saw. I became passive with hopelessness.

  We passed the deserted husks of two stalls. At the third, Olikea stopped.

  Waist-high stone walls defined the space. It was a generous area, the size of a cottage. Long poles of bleached white driftwood supported a brightly colored awning. The tasseled edges hung down, flapping in the ocean breeze. Soldier’s Boy had to stoop to enter. “Let me be the speaker here,” Olikea warned him in an undertone.

  “I shall speak whenever I decide to,” he rejoined gruffly. He looked about at the displayed merchandise, his fascination tinged with horror that gave way to dim recognition. Here were the tools and pharmacopoeias of the shaman’s trade. Bundles of feathers, strings of teeth, and dried herbs on the stalk swung in the open breeze, suspended from the poles. Cleft crystals sparkled and chimes tinkled. Nameless bits of dried animal organs occupied a row of fat ocher pots. Tightly stoppered glass vials of oil jostled against polished stones in an array of colors and sizes.

  A plank shelf held a succession of copper bowls brimming with trade items. The first held necklaces made from snake vertebrae. Olikea lifted one and the strand moved sinuously. She gave a small shudder and dropped it back in the bowl.

  The next bowl held an assortment of shriveled mushroom caps. “For dream-walking,” she noted aloud, proud of her knowledge.

  Tightly crinkled green-black dried leaves filled the next copper bowl. They looked like leather to me, like dried lizard skin. Olikea started to stir them with a finger, then paused uncertainly, her hand hovering over the bowl.

  “Dried seaweed. To strengthen the blood of a Great One after the exertions of his magic. ” The woman’s voice was as desiccated as her wares. She came tottering out of a curtained nook at the back of her stall.

  She was a Speck, but so old that her dappling had faded to a faint watermark on her skin. Her hair was very white
and so thin that I could see her pink scalp through the tendrils of it. Age had spotted her scalp and her dark eyes were filmy. Both her ears were pierced with many holes, and in them she wore small earrings of jade and pearl. With both hands she grasped the broad head of a white walking stick. It looked like it had been fashioned from one bone, but I could not think what animal would have bones of that size.

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  The old woman peered at Olikea, paying no attention to me. “You do not need to be here,” she announced. “Your sister has already purchased all that is necessary for the Great One of your kin-clan. Unless, perhaps, he has fallen ill?”

  “I have not recently seen my sister or Jodoli,” Olikea replied stiffly. “I am not here on her behalf. You might notice, Moma, that I have a Great One of my own to tend now. Or has age so darkened your eyes that you cannot perceive even one of such glorious girth?”

  Olikea stepped to one side as if she had been concealing me behind her. It was a laughable charade, like hiding a horse behind a cat. But Moma obediently lifted her hands as if suddenly astonished. Olikea caught the old woman’s cane before it toppled. Moma seized it back from her and stabbed the cane in the ground at my feet. “He is magnificent! But I do not know him! What kin-clan have you robbed? Who now weeps and gnashes their teeth that he has been lured away? Or have you taken a new loyalty to his kin-clan, Olikea?”

  “I? Never. I know to whom I was born. Indeed, Moma, I have stolen him. I took him from the foolish Jhernians, who did not even know his worth. ”

  “No! Is such a thing possible?” The old woman teetered forward a few steps. With one veiny hand, she patted the swell of my belly as if I were a large and friendly dog. I thought she was astonished that a Gernian could become a Great One. But then she said, “They did not know his power, even when he carries it in such glory? How can this be?”

  Olikea pursed her lips sagely. “I think they are blinded by all the iron they use. Even on a Great One, iron, iron, iron. Iron in knots on his chest, and on a great buckle he wore at his waist!”

  “No!” Moma was scandalized. “I am shocked that he was not stunted by such treatment. ”

  Again Olikea pursed her lips in the Speck gesture of denial. “I fear he was, mother of many. Great as he is, still I must wonder what he could have been if he had not been mistreated and near starved of his proper foods. ”

  “Tormented with iron and starved,” Moma lamented for me. “Then you have been his savior, Olikea?”

  Olikea spread her hands and bowed her head modestly. “What else was I to do, Moma? If I had not gone to him, I fear he would have perished. ”

  “Such a waste that would have been! And at a time when the People have more need of our Great Ones than ever. ”

  So far Soldier’s Boy had remained silent. I sensed his approval of Olikea’s words.

  Moma set one of her wrinkled hands atop the other and rubbed the back of it. “So, then, you who have never before had the care of a Great One have come to trade with me. There is much you will need for him, so much. I fear you may not have enough to barter. Yet I shall do the best I can to see you have at least some basic supplies for him. It is the least I can do after all he has suffered. ”

  “You are kindhearted, Moma, very kind indeed,” Olikea replied in a rather brittle voice. “But I think I have brought enough trade goods to provide well for my Great One. If your prices are fair, that is. ”

  The old woman’s eyes retreated into pits of wrinkles when she narrowed them. “The best goods, fairly priced, are still expensive, girl. Winter comes. It is easy to find the berries, the nuts and herbs, the gall of a squirrel when the world is green and growing. But in winter, those things are gone and feeders must turn to the wise provider who has harvested and stored such things. Who is that provider? Why, only Moma! Only she has what the Great Ones need to dream-walk, to hear music in the wind, to quick-walk tirelessly, to see with the hawk’s eye, to walk the hidden paths. ”

  “Varka has a stall of herbs also. ” Even to my ears, Olikea’s interruption sounded impertinent and challenging. It seemed unwise. What was she thinking?

  Moma took offense, as I had expected her to. “Oh, yes, he has a market stall. And he will sell to you, cheaper than I will, if what you want are moldy herbs and berries dried away to sour pits! Do you think to drive a hard bargain with me, little Olikea? Beware. All know that there are never enough quality supplies to see all of the People’s Great Ones through the winter. Those with foolish feeders must do without.

  “I do not need to sell my goods right now. And if you will not meet my price, I shall not. I will keep them and I will wait. Before winter is gone, Kinrove’s feeders will seek me out, to buy all I have and at a good price, too. And they speak to me always with respect. ”

  “Oh, respectful tongues are fine,” Olikea conceded in a tone that said otherwise. “But only if those tongues speak of the very finest trade goods. I shall not disappoint you in what I offer, Moma, but do not think me a foolish little girl. I know what things are worth. ”

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  With the back of her hand, Olikea pushed aside the bowl of seaweed. In its place she set out the dark blue leather pouch and made a ceremony of opening it while Moma pretended disinterest. Her failing eyesight betrayed her, for she craned her neck to see as she leaned closer to the plank shelf. She was tellingly silent as Olikea lifted the treasures from the bag and arranged them carefully on the plank. She did not hurry. Earrings went with their matching necklaces and bracelets. Figurines were carefully spaced. These were Lisana’s finest treasures. I had never seen them in strong, clear daylight. Despite their years, they shone, glittered, and gleamed. Earrings of carved ivory vied with those of hammered silver, figures of jade and amber flanked soapstone statues, bracelets of linked gold spiraled temptingly on the plank.

  I wondered why she displayed it all. Surely we would not trade all of our best items for dried leaves and shriveled mushrooms. A rising tide of dismay tightened my throat; Soldier’s Boy shared my extreme reluctance to see Lisana’s treasure frittered away. Yet Moma stood with bated breath as Olikea opened the bag wider and peered within. Then Olikea dipped her whole hand into the bag. Gently, as if lifting a living creature, she raised the scarf-wrapped object. She held it in her palm and deftly opened the wrappings to reveal the ivory child cradled there.

  Moma gasped in awe and one of her hands lifted. The reaching fingers reminded me of a hawk’s greedy talons. They were stretched toward the sleeping baby, the fertility charm that had failed Lisana but remained her greatest treasure. Horror rose in me.

  “No!” I exclaimed, and in that same instant, the word emerged from Soldier’s Boy’s throat. For that moment, we were fused, a single united entity. I was shocked at how wonderful it felt. I was full of power and whole. This was what I could have been, had the Tree Woman never divided me. I felt a flash of anger at all the ways my life had gone wrong. This was what I should have been!

  But the emotion and the thought were not solely mine. They stank of Soldier’s Boy and I tore myself free of him. I would not become a minor part of some Speck shaman, some forest mage. I was still Nevare, Nevare Burvelle, and I did not intend to surrender that. As if from a distance, I heard Olikea respond to me. She gave a silvery laugh. “Oh, no, of course not! This is not for trade. I know what your hopes are, Great One! We could not part with this, not until it has done its work for us. ”

  And before Moma’s reaching fingers could touch the figurine, Olikea had flipped the scarf back over it. As quickly as she had displayed it, she lowered it back into the open sack. Then she patted my arm as if I required calming and reassurance.

  Moma held out an entreating hand. “Wait. Do not be hasty. For that one item, I will give you a winter’s worth of magical provisions. A generous winter’s worth. ”

  Olikea laughed again, but this time I heard not the tinkle of silver but the clang of steel. In
disbelief she asked, “Is a Great One’s babe not worth more than a winter’s worth of herbs?”

  “Two winters,” Moma offered and then recklessly changed it to “Five winters. ”

  “Not for ten winters. Not for barter at any price,” Olikea replied coldly. Then she stood a moment, tapping her lips as if considering something. “I am young. I have many bearing years ahead of me, and as I have already borne a child, I know I need not fear I am barren. So, perhaps…To a very trustworthy woman, a woman of good standing, I might lend this charm. For only a season, of course, just long enough for her womb to catch a babe. Then I must have it back. ”

  I sensed an invisible bargain was being struck. Difficult as it was, both Soldier’s Boy and I held ourselves still. Moma’s breathing was loud, an echo of the endless rush of the waves against the shore.

  “How came you to have it?” she suddenly demanded. “The Ivory Child passed out of all knowing more than two generations ago. ”

  “That does not matter,” Olikea informed her. “It has been kept well, in secret, and used wisely. Now it is my turn. ”

  “It is a very desirable thing,” Moma told her. “Some would kill to possess that. You should be careful, very careful, of showing it here in the Trading Place. ”

  “I think you give me wise counsel, Moma. I will be more cautious. I will not show it again. ” Her sudden show of respect and deference to Moma’s wisdom surprised me. Olikea paused significantly and then added, “And if one comes to me, quietly, wishing to talk of borrowing it, then I will know that she knows only because you have judged her a worthy and trustworthy woman. For only to you have I shown this. She would be in both our debts, such a woman. ”

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  Moma smiled. It came over her wrinkled face slowly but it was a wide smile. For such an old woman, her teeth were very good. “That she would,” she agreed, pleased and thoughtful. “That she would. ”