Samiha's Song

by Mary Victoria

  ‘The problem,’ responded the Chief Inquisitor, gloomily, ‘is precisely the aforementioned softness, that is to say, the general lack of anything which in my trade might be termed adequate working material …’

  ‘Don’t be silly. She’s there. You work on her.’

  The man peered up at a corner of the glittering windowpane, giving a slight shrug. ‘As to the actual presence of the subject, with due respect Holiness, opinions may differ …’

  ‘For heaven’s sake.’ Fallow rolled his eyes. ‘She’s in your dungeon, isn’t she? She’s been there for three days.’

  ‘There’s “there” and there’s “there”, sir. A subject may be “there” but not really “there”, if you catch my meaning …’

  ‘I do not,’ grated Fallow.

  ‘Well, sir. It’s like this. I take pride in my art. I know the human body and how it works. There’s no doubt that the subject, begging your Sanctity’s pardon, possesses a human body. But that’s not enough. My trade, much as it may seem surprising to your Holiness, deals less with the body than with the mind. In this case, sir …’

  The torture-master trailed off again, staring at the fringe on the ornate carpet.

  ‘Yes?’ snapped Fallow, impatiently. ‘In this case?’

  ‘In this case,’ mumbled the man, ‘the mind is dealing with me.’

  ‘Are you saying,’ huffed the Saint, ‘this preposterous woman frightens you?’

  ‘Frightens may or may not be the appropriate term …’

  ‘Oh, for the love of the Tree,’ spluttered Fallow, rising from his chair in exasperation. ‘You’re unable to work with her. Fine. We’ll just find someone who isn’t so damned sensitive. Dismissed.’

  The Chief Inquisitor stood up with quiet dignity.

  ‘She looks at me,’ he said. ‘That’s all she does. Looks at me and files it all away for future reference. I’m not used to that sort of treatment, Holiness.’

  He bowed and trudged out of Fallow’s office.

  The light was on for a long time. Several servants of the seminary came and went in Samiha’s chamber, strange lunatic creatures who had for some reason put out their own eyes, a terrible thing to witness. She talked to them in an effort to find out why they had done this damage to themselves. They answered that they were intrinsically bad people, damned for what they had done. They would not believe her when she told them that they were free and good, and might leave this purgatory of their own making whenever they chose. They did not stay long, for her company appeared to provoke them. After only a few moments in the chamber, they began to rake their own cheeks with their fingernails and dash their heads against the wall, though she begged them to stop. Then they ceased coming altogether. The darkness was beautiful and complete.

  ‘Why do you hurt?’ asked Ashekiel, softly.

  ‘Because of who I am,’ whispered the Kion.

  ‘Why do you fear?’

  ‘Because I know the price I’ll pay.’

  ‘How will you escape that feeling?’

  ‘I don’t want to escape it. It’s part of who I am.’

  ‘Are you ready to live, Samiha?’

  ‘Yes.’

  26

  Why are there so many festivals in Argos city? thought Tymon, traipsing through the familiar streets of his childhood. Not a week passed when some obscure saint was not commemorated in his former home. Besides that, the Argosian calendar was punctuated by four major holidays, alternating bouts of fervent ritual and entertainment of a more profane nature. The Tree Festival actually managed to offer both at the same time. During the three high holy days of Atonement, Judgment and Absolution, rules of Purity and Impurity were relaxed and the lower echelons of Argosian society mixed in heady freedom with their betters. All might confess their sins equally. It was a time of collective unburdening and lavish offerings, a rowdy, chaotic, popular holiday the young man had always hated. He felt uncomfortable with public displays of emotion; the Tree Festival was replete with such scenes.

  The mid-winter holiday was vital to the survival of the Jays, however. It was then that the performers were allowed into Argos city for a circumscribed period. When Tymon’s hosts had docked in the air-harbour that afternoon in the month of Frost, the day before the start of the festival, they had found no less than seventeen companies offering a full range of productions from epic tragedy to the burlesque. The income earned by the players now would support them for half the year. Due to the Doctor’s fears, Jocaste’s troupe had been forced to tour only the outlying areas of the Central Canopy, resulting in great impoverishment. One of the Jay girl’s first actions as manager had been to lift her father’s ban on travel to Argos city.

  What the old Explorer had done with his long life before he joined the Jays was a mystery. Even his full name was unknown — his friends had called him by the nickname ‘Birdy', before simply referring to him as the Doctor. All Jocaste had been able to tell Tymon, during their two-week journey to the city, was that he had taken up with her mother twenty years ago. After his wife’s death from fly-fever, he had stepped in as guide and manager to the troupe. His madness had developed gradually: he had only recently begun asking for ‘volunteers’ for his experiments, after trying out his methods on animals. Following his death, Jocaste had thrown the abominable chair and orah-instruments overboard. It was with difficulty that Tymon had convinced her to keep at least the Doctor’s journals. Although he had not had the time to read them himself, he suspected they were not without value.

  The Doctor’s daughter had proven to be a staunch ally. She had personally nursed Pallas back to health and seen to it that her charges were delivered safely to their destination, with all they could ask for in the way of assistance. Tymon had not told her what had happened during the trance in the pavilion but she seemed to sense that he had helped her. The fleeting looks of adulation he saw on her face had reminded him disturbingly of Dawn. Once, a few days after the Doctor’s death, she had approached him and told him that as far as she and Anise were concerned, he was the ‘good luck angel’ for their troupe. Did he have any words of advice for her? As in the case of Dawn’s hero worship, he had found himself tongue-tied. He did not wish to become a replacement guide or mentor. He had mumbled an ineffectual response about her knowing best what she should do. She had said no more, but treated him, to his great discomfort, as if he were indeed a heavenly visitation.

  The reunion with the Jays in the city had been a joyous one. Some of the other convoys contained family members Jocaste’s troupe had not seen for years, and then only by chance, during far-flung tours of the Canopy. The tired travellers had been treated to an impromptu party on board one of the largest vessels. Everyone was agog to hear of recent events in the breakaway tribe. The tale of the Doctor’s demise was greeted with general astonishment and commiseration. But the Jays in Argos city had news of their own to share.

  This year, by all accounts, the seminary had managed to trump even the actors. By far the greatest drama on offer at the festival would be the trial of the Nurian queen, set to begin the following morning. Samiha’s hearing would take place in the Temple Hall over next two days; a verdict, almost certainly execution, would be carried out on the third, the Day of Absolution, before the traditional general amnesty. It was the first time a heresy trial had been conducted in public since the infamous Explorers Sect met its demise. As Pallas pointed out when he and Tymon left the barges that evening, the coincidence was curious, to say the least.

  To Tymon, walking up the causeway with his newly recovered friend, Argos city appeared to have shrunk. Everything in the town was smaller than he remembered, the perspectives flattened and cramped. The exotic produce being folded away in the market struck him as both tawdry and overpriced. He had seen better quality Treespice sold at a fraction of the cost in Marak and spied richer weave-mats in the homes of Nurians. He trudged along the familiar route, brooding on what he had heard from the Jays about the likely course of Samiha’s trial. Jocaste’s f
riends had shaken their heads over the foreigner’s fate, expressing their sympathies when they heard the tale. But no one had questioned the final outcome. No one doubted that Samiha would die. Jocaste alone had had the courage to disagree. She was the only one to offer to help smuggle the Kion out of the city.

  Although he was touched by the Jay girl’s suggestion, and conscious of the risk she was willing to take for them, Tymon had other plans for Samiha’s rescue. Ara’s vision of the Lyla meant that the scheme with the air-chariot was back in play. There were still many unknowns to contend with, of course, and the added complication of breaking into the yellow warehouse. They had no idea whether the Lyla was guarded or if it contained any fuel, and were unable to rely on a Reading to answer these questions. The warehouse would have to be observed carefully. They would also try to contact Samiha, for Tymon had decided to negotiate his truce with prophecy as closely as possible. All these delicate operations would require assistance. The Jays had done what they could for them; they needed new allies in the city. Tymon thought he knew where he might find them.

  That night, they had borrowed the least flamboyant clothing on offer from their actor friends in preparation for their outing: a set of brown worsted tunics and breeches. Pallas, though still pale and weakened from his ordeal with the Doctor, resembled a Jay well enough if he did not open his mouth. Tymon had chosen a cap with a wide brim to complete his disguise, concerned lest he be recognised in the streets. He did not forget he had been declared a traitor by Admiral Greenly. Despite his fears, however, they passed the city gates unhindered, a pair of ragged youths barely noticeable among the many festival arrivals. They entered a modest artisan’s quarter in the second tier of the town, seeking an address Tymon remembered well from his days at the seminary. He had never been invited into Masha’s residence as a child, but had often had the little room in the eaves pointed out to him. As far as he knew, the old cook lived there still.

  It was a long moment before the proprietor of the house cracked open the door in response to their knocking. An oily individual with fat fingers, he peered sceptically at the young tearaways on his front step. He did not open the door any further than absolutely necessary, curling his digits protectively around the wood.

  ‘What is it?’ he sniffed. ‘We don’t need any tickets to any shows, lads.’

  Gazing up at the stolid Argosian citizen blocking his way, Tymon suddenly saw himself as the burgher did: a dusty vagabond with an insufficient growth of beard, lean and brown from months of travel. The cap was superfluous. The clipped and scrubbed novice of the seminary was gone, never to return. He removed his headgear with a show of respect.

  ‘Please, sir,’ he wheedled, in a good imitation of the Jay brogue. ‘We’ve come to visit the sister of my sainted mother, dead all these years. Doesn’t Amu Masha live here? Please kindly let her know — her nephews, Ty and Mon, have arrived.’

  ‘Sainted, eh?’ retorted the man, rolling his eyes. ‘Masha never spoke of a sister.’

  But he opened the door wider and motioned them into the cramped hall.

  ‘Mind you don’t touch a thing,’ he said, as he squeezed his bulk up a staircase at the back of the building. ‘I don’t want to be rubbing dirty finger marks off the furniture. This is a respectable house.’

  He led them to a room on the third floor landing and rapped on the door. ‘Amu,’ he shouted through the keyhole, as if his tenant were deaf. ‘There’s your nephews or some such to see you. Ty and Mon. Shall I let them in?’

  The answer from the other side of the door was immediate, though faint.

  ‘Tymon? Of course! Let him in!’

  The oily man opened the door and motioned them into a small but immaculately tidy room. The only items of furniture were a table and chairs and a plain poster bed in one corner. Upon this, half sitting up in her impatience to receive her guests, was a far frailer Masha than the one Tymon remembered. In half a year the old cook’s bulk had reduced and she seemed to be confined to her bed. But her eyes were as bright as ever, and her smile full of eager recognition as she held her arms out to Tymon.

  ‘My boy,’ she gasped, embracing him fiercely. ‘You’re well. You’re back. Thank the Tree.’

  Then she held him at arm’s length, staring in horror at his clothes. ‘You look like a scarecrow. What have you done to your hair? And is that meant to be a beard? I taught you better grooming.’

  He lifted a finger to his lips, aware of the fat man hovering in the doorway. Masha instantly understood the need for discretion.

  ‘Thank you, Gord,’ she said, smiling at their host. ‘You’re ever so kind to let them up. My nephews have travelled from all the way across the canopy. We haven’t seen each other in years.’

  The man named Gord emitted an incurious grunt in answer and withdrew, pulling the door firmly shut behind him.

  ‘Talk quietly,’ whispered Masha. ‘That fellow’s a terrible snoop. I want to know everything that happened in Marak. There were rumours you went native and joined the Nurry rebellion, or worse.’ Her gaze strayed curiously to Pallas as she spoke. ‘Where have you been? And how did you get home without the Fathers knowing, you rascal?’

  And so he told her. She held his hands while he sat on her bed, recounting all that had occurred in Marak and afterwards, or as much of it as he could squeeze into a condensed report. Instinctively, he held back on the parts of the story that had to do with the Grafting, glossing over his apprenticeship with the Oracle. He was not sure the old cook would appreciate his deep involvement with the Eastern Doctrine. Her face, brown and wrinkled as an old apple, grew serious as she listened to him, but she did not interrupt. By the time even his shortened tale had drawn to a close, darkness had fallen outside the latticed windows of the apartment. Pallas waited by the curtains and watched the lamplit road below with quiet patience.

  ‘Well.’ Masha released a long breath as the narrative reached its end. ‘You’re a free thinker, an outlaw, and on the run from the priests. I suppose that much hasn’t changed since you left.’ She smiled shyly at Pallas. ‘And you’ve found friends in unlikely places, which is all to the good. But I’m afraid you’ve no hope of rescuing your heretic queen, Tymon. I see why you came back: I see that you love her, though you don’t see fit to tell that to your old Amu. But it’s pointless, my sprout. The All-Father isn’t about to let his prize go.’

  ‘The All-Father?’ he asked. ‘Saint Loa? I don’t understand.’

  Masha glanced anxiously toward the doorway, lowering her voice. ‘There have been changes since you went away,’ she murmured. ‘The Dean’s declared himself a new incarnation of the Prophet, no less. The Council ratified the whole thing before he turned around and disbanded them. Now it’s all talk of religious purity, war on the heathen and Argos ruling the world. He’s had visions of the future, apparently. Everyone’s thrilled to bits, except for folks who have any sense left in their skulls.’

  ‘What? Fallow? The return of Saint Loa?’ Tymon could not help laughing. ‘People actually believe this?’

  His mirth faded as he remembered the so-called Saint would have access to an orah-clock to make his predictions. Was the Dean, then, the false prophet referred to by Noni? After the young Grafters’ intervention on the Doctor’s ship, Tymon had assumed that she had meant the Explorer. Now he recalled the Doctor had been entirely uninterested in prophecies. While he was considering this disturbing possibility, Pallas stirred from his post at the window.

  ‘Someone is entering house,’ he observed. ‘Young woman. Brown hair. Carry bag.’

  ‘That’ll be Nell bringing me supper,’ exclaimed Masha, flustered. ‘I don’t get out much these days I’m afraid, not since I broke my hip. Forgive me young fellow, what’s your name — Pallas — you’d better not talk, for now. We can trust Nell, but she’ll be fairly shocked to find a foreigner in my house, as well as our long-lost bound-boy. One surprise at a time.’

  Nell’s surprise at finding Masha in the company of two young men
took the form of a coquettish lift of the brow as she stepped into the room. She did not recognise Tymon and had to be told, twice, that the fellow with the peculiar cap and shabby tunic had been her admirer in the kitchens.

  ‘Well, of all the blessed things,’ the kitchen maid declared at last, setting a dimpled fist on her hip and pouting prettily at him. ‘Our Tymon, run off to join the Jays. What do you do, juggle pancakes for a living?’

  He forced himself to laugh, wondering how he could have been fascinated by this vulgar, tittering girl with her flounced skirts and heaving bosom.

  ‘Of all the blessed things,’ repeated Nell.

  She found nothing more interesting to say, though she did seem to think better of Tymon now that he had grown an inch or two taller and acquired an air of rakish experience. She primped and pouted and twirled her flounces until Masha asked her to please lay the food on the table, there was a good girl, as their guests were surely hungry. Nell produced a covered bowl of stew from her bag as well as several pieces of vinefruit, cheese and bread. She had just finished her preparations and drawn up a chair beside Tymon when Masha upset her plans once more.

  ‘Our Nell has been stepping out this month with an old friend of yours, Tymon,’ she remarked, a wicked gleam in her eye. ‘Bolas the journeyman architect. Now, Nell. I think it would be a lovely idea if you fetched your sweetheart so that he might visit his friend. You’ll have to be discreet, of course. See if you can’t manage that, my dear.’

  When Nell had left the room, wilting a little in embarrassment at being disposed of, Masha beckoned Tymon to her side.

  ‘What I am about to tell you, you must not repeat to a living soul,’ she whispered. ‘My heart would be easier if you dropped this notion of a rescue. But if anyone can help you, Bolas can. There are people in this city who don’t agree with Fallow, or hold with all his Saint nonsense. Bolas is one of them.’