Griots

by Charles R. Saunders

  “The demon-sorcerer’s power was fueled by people’s belief in its potency,” Toulou explained. “With belief came the fear. He used that fear to exert his control over you. I never for an instant believed he had the power to kill me, which is why his fire had no effect on me. That’s also why his army was not as invincible as on previous encounters. My men did not just train your soldiers in the use of new arms and new tactics. We had to train their minds to believe that the demon-sorcerer’s minions could die on the field of battle as easily as a man.”

  Zara looked away as a surge of guilt and frustration bubbled inside her. “The men I sent to their deaths, the men he forced me to kill, my dead subjects...all of this evil he wrought upon my kingdom could have been avoided had I simply stopped believing in his power.”

  Toulou put a gentle hand on the queen’s shoulder. “Do not blame yourself, your majesty. You had no way of knowing the secret to his power. No one in your kingdom did.”

  Zara put her hand over his, taking a measure of solace in the foreigner’s words. “So, what lies ahead for you? More war and profit?”

  Toulou’s gaze shifted to a point beyond the horizon. “It’s what I live for.”

  While disappointment clouded Zara’s expectations, she did detect a note of hesitation in Toulou’s reply.

  That night the queen took the foreigner as her lover. She did so of her own free will, unfettered by a demon-sorcerer’s threats.

  When she awoke the next morning Toulou was gone.

  Zara suppressed the ache in her heart. A small smile lit up her solemn expression. “War and profit,” she whispered. “One day you will tire of those things.” She arose prepared to welcome to a new day. “In the meantime, I have a kingdom to govern.”

  Icewitch

  By

  Rebecca McFarland Kyle

  Ashlan spurred his tired stag the last few measures toward the warlord Lyrell’s camp. Doing so was not a safe maneuver on ice slickened ground, but the dread that sent him homeward ahead of the hunting party bade him hasten. Was it his mother, Lyrell’s headwife, or one of his younger half-sibs whose heart called him so?

  He prayed he was wrong with every step his beast made. Coming home virtually empty-handed during a near-famine would subject him to more of Lyrell’s lash—or worse, ostracision.

  Drumbeats on the frozen air, a broken-hearted death toll, slowed his pace only a little. ‘Attack,’ then ‘death,’ Ashlan read in the pattern, then nothing further.

  Other hunters would follow to defend the now vulnerable camp, but most would remain afield hoping the whale, ice bear, or seal to feed the clan’s empty bellies.

  The chill wind beat at his eyes, the only part of his seal brown face uncovered by furs and leather. His massive horned mount's hooves crunched as he moved implacably forward. Before them, their combined breaths fogged the air.

  In the fullness of winter, darkness ruled even the day. A flickering blue spark of Ashlan's magic lit the path so his beast could see the ground before them. Endless night was not a fit time for anyone to venture forth alone, but the summer’s fishing had been lean and the camp's supplies were dwindling fast. The warriors already had begun to slaughter the slower riding beasts for food, which would leave them traveling afoot with narrower foraging. Should any of the other clans choose to attack, they’d be fighting afoot. Although attacks by competing warlords were infrequent in winter’s omnipresent darkness, war was not unheard of particularly when supplies were as scarce.

  Ashlan paused at the rock wall where sentries were usually posted, awaiting a hail. When he heard nothing, he extinguished the flickering mage light that would target him like a campfire in the darkness and spurred his beast forward, his heart hammering with the hoofbeats on the flinty cold ground.

  Lyrell cannily selected this site because it was protected by a ridge with small pocket-like caves protecting them from the Northerly winds. Ashlan’s mother, Alle, had gained status as the headwife when she used her gifts, freezing and shaping water, to create a wall of ice surrounding the ridge’s other three sides, spiky as a shark’s tooth and built up in a maze-like web. Ashlan was one of the few hunters privy to all means of entrance and that knowledge was only gained because he’d aided his mother using his small water-gifts to freeze the ice spikes she’d created into place.

  If Lyrell could defend the area, they hoped to scavenge driftwood and whalebone enough to build permanent houses during the short summer months which gave them hours of daylight to work. Having a home base would make them more attractive to neighboring warlords with aims toward increasing their territory, but Lyrell trained many capable young men to defend their position. Their chief would soon celebrate his fortieth summer. He was aged for a warlord, ready to settle down and enjoy the fruits of his labors.

  Ashlan slowed his mount as he worked his way through his mother’s puzzle-like wall. He stepped through quartet of spikes resembling the teeth of a great beast, a ‘Fire wing dragon’ she’d called it only to him, then sidled past a crevasse designed to break the legs of unwary man and beasts. He did all of this by feel, remembering the rhythm of a children’s song his mother taught to aid with the task.

  Once past the wall, Ashlan’s breathing calmed when he sighted the main firepit still lit. Though the encampment was still as death, he saw no signs of battle in the day-old snowfall.

  Scarcely any of the camp's inhabitants turned when Ashlan rode in to the inner circle of the camp past the outer ring of hide tents of the single warriors and hunters tasked to guard the women. The clan was clustered around the central cook fires talking worriedly. Many wore mourning gray and ash-smudged faces from the firepit.

  "What happened?" Ashlan called when he neared the gathered people beside the periphery of the fire. Fear, shock and grief was what he saw, though his clansmen spoke not a word. He could plainly read the pallid features of Lyrell’s clan. None but his mother could discern the blood rising in his own shadowy mien.

  "The Icewitch has come!" One grizzled Grandmother, twisting her hands in consternation, shouted in a trembling voice. "She has taken Ayrn as her offering."

  Ashlan’s blood heated with rage. Of all his half-siblings, he was closest to the golden haired blue-eyed Aryn, fleet as an ice-bear with their Mother’s lyrical voice and gift for shaping water.

  Ashlan’s fists tightened on his reins, causing his horned mount to dance nervously. The old woman made a frightened noise, shifting the children away from them. His mount reared, trumpeting a brief protest. He quickly regained the beast’s head, settling him down before his sharp hooves injured an innocent. He forced himself to breathe, to swallow the knot of panic in his chest so he could speak calmly.

  "Where did she go?" Ashlan demanded. His mind whirled with memories of childhood terrors by campfire light. As the only dark-skinned child living within the camp of moon pale people, he’d been threatened more than most with being given to the Icewitch if he misbehaved. The creature had many faces in his youthful nightmares. Each of those dreams ended with him awakening stifling screams. A youth of seventeen years, he'd long since abandoned such childish fears. True, young boys were periodically taken from their clan, but the occurrences were seldom compared to those frozen to death or savaged by an ice bear.

  Desperate tears rolling down the milk-white faces of the women made him comprehend the Icewitch had indeed invaded their camp. But he would be cursed further than he was if he would allow the creature to take his youngest brother.

  "Ashlan, where she goes, you cannot follow." Alle, his mother, strode forward, her thick covering of furs making the slender woman appear almost as wide as she was tall. Her piercing silver eyes, the only feature Ashlan inherited from the fair-haired woman, filled with crystalline tears. At her command, one of the older boys stepped forward to take the reins of Ashlan’s beast. Ashlan dismounted so he could speak to the tiny woman eye to eye.

  "I will not permit her to take members of my family!" Rarely was Ashlan's voice raised It did not
befit a shengi, a son of rape, to speak in more than whispers, but he was angry beyond caring.

  "It is my fault, Ashlan," Alle protested, her musical voice rising with the strain. "I should have sent out the sacrifice myself. I had not thought she would venture forth in this weather."

  "Sacrifice?" Ashlan narrowed the space between himself and his mother. The harsh land made them all callous, but the idea of willingly giving up younglings was beyond reckoning.

  "Come with me." Alle ordered to the large central cavern Lyrell reserved for his family. "I suppose you are old enough to learn."

  Alle quickly led him into the space she shared with Lyrell, a cuplike cave warmed with a ball of blue-white fire Ashlan conjured atop the high rocks. His new baby sister, Jemoia, blissfully slept cuddled with one of the bitch dogs who aided them in the hunt, wrapped in heavy furs and heedless of all the commotion around her.

  “Every moon, the Icewitch took a young male from the clans,” his mother spoke softly. “I caught her coming to claim one of ours and I made an arrangement with her. I’d give her one of the boys from our campfire each winter if she would leave us alone.” She paused tiredly when she glanced toward his youngest sib, only a handful of moons old. “Jemoia’s birth was harder on me than I’d expected...I should have given the duty to another of the women...”

  Ashlan’s fists clenched. He strode a pace away from the familiar domestic scene swallowing back horror at what his mother had done. Heat from the close quarters made him want to remove his fur coverings, but he knew if he did, he’d remain by that fire weeping like a woman.

  “When I was late with my tithe, the Icewitch came to the camp as in days of old—-” His mother’s voice had the desolate crack of a frozen lake breaking beneath your feet.

  "I am going to save him," Ashlan interrupted, silencing her with a slash of his arm.

  She recoiled, tear bright eyes wide and for the first time, frightened.

  "You must accept this. I can’t lose you.”

  Ashlan shook off his mother’s tiny hands, grasping at his muscular forearm. Heartbroken sobs wracked her small form and awakened the baby girl, who wailed along with their mother.

  "This is my brother! Your son.” Ashlan’s head shook in denial with every word. His mother placed her small body between the door and him, her lips firming.

  "Your half-brother," she corrected. "I tried to keep her from choosing one of this family. I always took the children to that mad creature myself because doing so would give me the right as headwife to choose which boys were taken. I selected the lame, the frail, and halt who’d be claimed by this hard land before their manhood, anyway. But, when she came here, she chose of her own. I am just grateful it was never you."

  Ashlan turned his back to hide the tears. Growing up with the taunts, Ashlan believed he was hardened to any abuse, but his mother’s love and favor still stabbed him in his heart. Why she loved him when he was forced upon her, he could never understand.

  “I’m getting Aryn back.”

  “My son, she has powers you cannot even comprehend.”

  “I will either bring Aryn back or I will not return.” Ashlan laid one kiss upon her forehead in parting, then turned from her embrace. Squaring his shoulders, he stepped out into the main camp to reclaim his mount. He let the cold air harden himself to his mother’s sobs. They followed his steps like a ghost, blowing away in the cold arctic wind.

  He noted he was yet the only hunter to return.

  “Which way did the Icewitch come from?” Ashlan asked of the young man, who pointed a shaking arm toward the ridge that Lyrell had so counted on protecting them.

  Ashlan blinked, realizing a portion of the ice-maze next to the ridge was gone.

  “Melted,” the youth’s voice was as high as a young girl’s. “Like she’d touched it with fire.”

  Then the youth fled. When Ashlan heard the sound of Lyrell’s drummer announcing the warlord’s return, he quickly mounted his own beast and hastened away.

  His mother’s words echoed in Ashlan's mind as he followed the trail the Icewitch left. How could they have sacrificed their children all these years? Were they not warriors? Were they such fearful babies they would waste their strength on conquering weaker warlord’s camps and bullying helpless villagers and refuse the challenge of a threat to the countryside such as the Icewitch?

  Reproachful thoughts heated Ashlan's blood on the cold trail. And a strange trail it was indeed. He would have sworn the witch was a fool for taking a sled and team on paths his own beast could barely navigate. Surely the rails would freeze. Yet, his puny magic showed him clean two parallel lines over the worst of the terrain.

  The trail was straight and clean and easy to follow like that of a poisonous snake or an ice bear. The kind of path only a fool would follow.

  Abruptly, the lines drawn by the sled rails disappeared. The tracks of the team still indicated that they were pulling a burden. Somehow, she'd managed to levitate the sled while her beasts lumbered along giving it forward motion and direction. Such a feat was an accomplishment compared to Ashlan's own magic. So far, only he and his mother had any gifts among the people of this land. His mother, who was fair as any native and a rare beauty as well, was revered. Ashlan, with his night-dark skin and tangled black hair, was reviled despite the fact that he was the only person he’d ever met who could light a fire without a flint.

  What other spells will I have to face?

  Alle knew of magic and had some training, though she never would tell where she learned. When they were alone, she’d conjure creatures out of ice to amuse him. When Lyrell’s children were born, she shifted to making shadow animals with her hands against the tent walls like other mothers.

  The trail ended at a high tower on a crooked finger shaped peninsula on a field of ice that could be a substantial lake when it warmed up. Smoke drifted from the top of the tower offering warmth and heat.

  This is a useful steading, Ashlan realized. The tower would house at least one large family and their servants. The lake would provide water perhaps even fish. The crooked finger of land was an easily defensible area with three sides of the tower backed by water. And, the keep was undefended. Ashlan only saw one set of small tracks that led to the tower. Lyrell should have claimed this for his steading long ago.

  A house of stone, Ashlan marveled. The tower rose to an amazing height. Scarcely, had he ever seen a large house of wood. The warlords were far too busy fighting amongst themselves to build any permanent dwellings. Cautiously, he touched the walls, running a curious gloved finger along the mortared veins. Chiding himself for wasting precious time, he continued forward, seeking the Witch who held his brother. Having no other clues about her location in the tower, he followed the warmth.

  Ashlan cautiously entered the door, shielding himself with his magic and his sword against attack.

  "Welcome, Dark One." Arctic winds blew down Ashlan’s spine at the sound of the voice. Momentarily, he considered turning and fleeing. Older and wiser men than he had not deigned to take the path he had chosen. Still, it was Ayrn she had.

  "What do you wish from me?" The voice and the warmth led him to a circular room in the center of the tower near the top. The warmth was almost as uncomfortable as the cold outside. Dominated by a huge bed, curtained with scarlet velvet, and a roaring fireplace, the room obviously was meant for sleeping and other pleasures. Balls of bluish flame from the same flickering light as Ashlan’s own poor magic, suspended in midair, provided brighter illumination than candles.

  Cautiously, Ashlan stepped across the threshold. Keeping his weapons within reach, he tried to match his posture to her own. She showed no defensiveness, but Ashlan suspected the witch did not need to.

  "I came to retrieve my brother, Ayrn," Ashlan answered simply, coming to face the silvery wraithlike creature that stood before him. He marveled at the harsh planes of her chiseled form, which was beautiful as a spear of ice carved by a Northern wind. The normal round softness of a woman
was not there. Even her nipples seemed as though they would be sharp and painful to touch. Her face was what fascinated him the most, though. Her wide nose and full lips were similar to his and her hair was twisted in locks like he wore in the summertime to keep himself cooler.

  "How novel," a short, amused laugh parted the Icewitch's lips. "You would hardly qualify as a replacement. You have been with a woman."

  How did she know that? Ashlan wondered. Unbidden the memory of his first woman returned to him. He'd not understood when his mother delivered him into the hands of the coarse woman who lived at the edge of the camp. Like many of the children, he'd snooped around the outside of her tent wondering at the animal grunts and laughter emitting from the men who visited there, including his Lyrell, his reluctant adoptive father.

  Ashlan had been unprepared for the way the woman’s hands and mouth moved across his body, summoning feelings it would take years for him to recognize and understand. Ashamed, he'd hung his head afterwards as the woman regaled the whole camp with tales of his scarred, dark flesh from Lyrell’s early beatings. One by one, he outfought the jokers.

  His mother's only explanations for her action was that she wished to protect him. Now, Ashlan understood she’d made him unfit for a sacrifice. It would have been far too easy for the camp to give up an oddling to the Icewitch. Indeed, according to his mother, it was their custom. Only his mother would’ve missed him if he was gone. That, he could not understand, since his dark face and foreign features had to be a daily reminder of the rapist who fathered him.

  "You may have him back, if you wish." Elegant silvery fingers pointed towards a pile of covers in the corner furthest from the scarlet bed at the foot of a tapestry woven in rich yellows, greens, and reds depicting animals Ashlan believed were the true form of the ice creatures his Mother created to amuse him. He paused, startled to see a bear with what looked like a snake for a nose, a big cat with a long mane of twisted fur, and a winged beast above them.