Knaves

by Abbott, Alana Joli; Meadors, Melanie R. ;

  For the last week the weather had been fine and mild with the clear days and misty mornings of autumn. The moon was halfway toward full. The Full Moon of the Ninth month was when we celebrated with the largest festival of the year. I wondered where Rei and I would be then.

  I’d told Rei to stay awake, which was no hardship for her. I’d hoped to creep out of the house when everyone else was asleep. But Nami, who slept in the same room, stirred as we went past her.

  “What’s wrong?” she said in a low voice. “Can’t you sleep? I will sit with Lady Rei if you like.”

  At that moment the last thing I wanted was her kindness. I spoke in a cold voice. “Rei feels a trance coming on. It’s better if you don’t interfere.”

  As I said, the trances frightened people. They sensed her closeness to that other world, the world of spirits.

  “I’m taking her outside for a while,” I said.

  “Do you need any help?” Nami began to get up. “I’ll come with you.”

  “No!” I hissed. “It will be shorter if we are alone. Go back to sleep.”

  I took the bundle from where I’d hidden it under the veranda, and Rei and I quickly slipped into our sandals. As we left the garden by the west gate she grabbed my hand and said, “I love you, Ren.”

  No one else ever talked like that. Even my husband had never said those words to me.

  “Do you want to know why?” Rei said in such a clear voice I was sure the whole household would hear her.

  “We mustn’t talk now,” I whispered. “Let’s be as quiet as we can, like little mice. Tell me later.”

  I could see the stars and the hazy moon, but the mist was forming, and by the time we started to climb the track to the pass, it was already thick enough to hide all but a few paces ahead. I did not like walking blind over the mountain, although I knew the path well, but I wasn’t about to stop or turn back.

  Rei said quietly at my side, “I love you because you always know when it’s going to happen.”

  “It’s not going to happen. I just said that to keep Nami quiet.”

  “But it is. It’s starting now.”

  We were walking close, arm in arm, and I felt her body go rigid. That was how it began. Every muscle locked so you would have thought it impossible for her to move. And yet she moved, spun by what looked like some external force. And she spoke, words pouring out of her in a language no one understood or had ever heard before. There was no point trying to question her, and I could not keep her on the path. Nor could I let go. Her hand was locked in mine, her grip inescapable. She spun and I followed, blind in the mist, grazing my legs against outcrops of rocks, stumbling as my sandals were wrenched from my feet. Sharp stones cut my soles. We were close to the edge of the cliff. Any moment we would fall spinning off the mountain.

  I called her name, my voice a shriek in the dark. “Rei! Rei!” but she was beyond hearing.

  A fatalism settled over me. It was all decided for me now. I would never get to kill Lord Saga, but my sister and I would die together. I whispered to my husband, “I will be with you soon. Are you waiting for me?”

  I did not think I had spoken loudly enough for anyone to hear but a reply came out of the darkness.

  “It is not yet time.” It was my husband’s voice, deepened by sorrow. It made my throat catch so I could hardly breathe, and tears burst from my eyes. Then the voice spoke again, and the timbre was like my long dead father’s, but I could not make out the words. It was some language that came from beyond the grave.

  It seemed to calm Rei. Abruptly the spinning came to a halt. Her grip on my hand slackened. I could hear her breath coming in deep sobs, and behind it the roar of the waves at the foot of the cliff. Her hand slipped from my grasp. I could not see her or feel her. I tried to speak calmly. “Rei, walk away from the cliff. Walk away from the waves.”

  Whoever it was hidden in the mist repeated my words in the tone of my mother.

  “Rei, walk away from the cliff.”

  Seven years had passed since my mother died. I was ten, Rei five. Your mother’s voice is the first you recognize and the last you forget. Now I was sure we were already dead and in that other world. I felt no fear, for if these were ghosts, they were all dear and familiar to me.

  Rei walked into me, and I seized her, holding her close. Her head found my breast and she leaned into me. The ground was firm beneath my feet. An owl hooted from the forest. The cuts on my legs and feet were smarting. I was alive.

  Rei would be bewildered and docile for a while, and then she would sleep for a long time, but we could not wait while she slept.

  “Rei, we must keep moving. Can you walk?”

  “I’m tired,” she murmured.

  She felt so frail in my arms. I could easily carry her.

  The voice spoke again, a mixture of male and female, all those I had loved and lost.

  “I will carry her.”

  “Who are you?” I said. “Come closer so I can see you.”

  I don’t know what I hoped to see in the darkness and the mist. Yet there was a glow as it approached me. By its light I saw a figure dressed in men’s clothes, a sword at his waist and a flute in his sash. He was tall, yet slight with delicate features more like a woman’s, and radiant eyes which lit up his face and gave it a reddish tinge. It is a mountain man, I thought. People said they stole young women to be their wives and then devoured any children that were born. But I was not afraid—I could not be afraid of anyone speaking in that voice.

  It was the way spirits entrapped humans, but I did not think of it at that time.

  Nor did Rei. “All right,” she said gratefully, turning to him and sinking into his arms. He caught her and lifted her easily, holding her against his shoulder like a child.

  “Rei!” he said in delight. “Rei and Ren!”

  “Who are you?” I said again.

  “You don’t need to know my name. You did not know it when you called me before. Don’t you remember? You asked for my help at the shrine, and I have come. I had to.”

  He paused for a moment and when I said nothing went on. “Let’s go.”

  “Where to?” I began thinking of dark caves or sorcerer’s huts thatched with bones.

  “To Miyako, of course, to the great capital. Isn’t that where you wanted to go?”

  He began to walk without any more discussion, and I followed him. The light that fell from his eyes showed me the path. I had summoned a being that was not human, and I had no doubt he would give me the help I needed, but I had promised to give him whatever he wanted in return.

  WE HAD WALKED uphill for a little way when the mist began to clear. When we stepped out into moonlight, I saw we had come to the top of the pass. Below lay a sea of clouds, out of which emerged mountain peaks, some pine covered, some bare black rocks, the farthest ones snowcapped.

  “You can sit and rest, but not for long,” said the being.

  I sank down on the pine needle covered ground. The needles were soaked with dew, but I found their resiny smell comforting. I ached all over. He let Rei slide down until she lay with her head in my lap. She murmured something but did not wake.

  The being sat down cross-legged next to us, took the flute from his sash, and set it to his lips. In the stream of music, I recognized some of the tunes from our festivals, but his playing was far more skillful and complex. It touched something deep inside me and I wanted it never to end.

  I closed my eyes, and dream images began to show themselves to me. Then I heard clearly the sound of horses.

  “They are following us!” My eyes snapped open.

  “Don’t worry.” His eyes shone like embers. “Don’t be afraid.”

  The red horses from the shrine came up out of the mist, first their maned heads and necks, then their backs and tails, finally their black legs, almost invisible against the basalt rocks around us.

  They wore the old-fashioned harness, fringed with red silk thread interwoven with gold, in which they were dressed for th
e festivals. The being greeted them and thanked them for coming. They lowered their heads and breathed out plumes of mist at him.

  “This is Ka and this is Hai,” he said. He told them our names and asked them to treat us with kindness. I felt I should apologize for all the times they had been made to work in the village. Or thank them for bringing my husband home to me.

  He helped me mount the one called Ka, and then he lifted my still sleeping sister and leaped onto Hai’s back. The horses began the descent as the moon set and the sky slowly became fringed with the red light of dawn.

  So they were magical horses all along, I thought, and half expected them to canter lightly over the sea of clouds. Instead, they followed the track down into the mist until we were all swallowed up by it. The air became dank and chill. Rei slept on. At first the being led the way, but when the track widened, we rode side by side. I was able to see him more clearly now. Like the horses’ harness, his clothes had an old-fashioned air, and the faded fabric had once been rich, silk from Shin by the look of it, threaded with gold.

  He looked like a human, but he was not, yet I was too shy to ask him directly what he was. I began to feel very anxious, partly because of his strangeness but also because I was farther from home than I had ever been. I was worried about guards and the barriers ahead, worried about being pursued, and all the time, I felt the bonds of home tugging on me, telling me not to leave. I had thought I was a brave person, but my courage was deserting me.

  “Don’t be afraid,” the being said again. “I am here to protect and serve you.”

  Now I dared look him straight in the face to meet his radiant gaze. “But I don’t know who you are!”

  “You will find out,” he said, half mocking, half serious.

  We rode most of that morning without seeing anyone. The trees and flowers were all familiar to me, and the birds sang songs I knew, yet the absence of people made me feel as if we were in another world. Rei woke around midday, pale and confused as she always was, all the more so for finding herself on the back of a red shrine horse, held by a stranger.

  We stopped then and the being helped her down. He had been courteous enough to me, but he treated her with a particular solicitude. He made her sit in the shade, spreading out a cloth, again faded but once luxurious, that he took from his pack. He also produced a small iron kettle and two ceramic cups.

  “Please gather some wood and build a fire,” he said to me, as he set the cups on the ground. “Rei and I will have to share,” he added, smiling to himself. “I will go and get water.”

  Rei gazed after him. “He’s someone we know, isn’t he? Some relative I met a long time ago? I’ve forgotten his name.”

  “You’ve never met him.” My voice sounded cross to my own ears, but Rei did not seem to notice.

  “He’s nice,” she said, wistful as she often was after a trance.

  I began to scour the small grove for dead sticks, pine cones, and dried grass for tinder. I cleared a circle in the earth and set up the makings of the fire. The being came back from the spring, clicked his tongue in disapproval, and rearranged my efforts. I did not see how he did it, but one moment the pile was dead, the next it had burst into flames. He balanced the kettle between two flat stones, and when the water began to bubble, he threw in some aromatic leaves. After a few moments he lifted the kettle by its handle.

  “Be careful!” I said, “You will burn yourself.”

  He smiled as if I had said something funny and poured the tea into two cups. He gave one to me and took a few sips from the other before passing it to Rei.

  “Don’t drink it,” I began to say, but it was too late. Rei had already placed her lips where his had been. I turned my cup in my hands, wondering if I should not pour it out, but the fragrance from the tea was so beguiling, and I was so thirsty, that I could not prevent myself from drinking too.

  We rested under the tree while the being saw to the horses. He removed their harness and let them roll on the ground, then led them off to the spring to drink. I fell asleep, and when I woke, it was late in the afternoon.

  The fire still burned, its flames almost invisible in the sunlight. Rei had picked flowers and made a garland. She looked like a spirit of the forest. I was afraid she had been enchanted and was going to slip away from me. I knew we needed to be among ordinary people again.

  “We must find lodging,” I said. “I don’t want to spend another night outside.”

  He nodded as if humoring a child. “Then let us ride on.”

  He prepared the horses, and when Rei and I were mounted, he waved his hand towards the fire and spoke a word I did not know. The flames leaped up as though in yearning and then subsided and were extinguished.

  The moon had risen, white in the afternoon sky. By the time it turned silver we were approaching a small town. I did not know which clan it belonged to, perhaps the Yamada, one of the neighbors who would not come to our help. It consisted of several dwellings and shops on either side of the road and one large inn. Torches burned at its entrance, filling the air with smoke. Behind the inn, horses tied on lines stamped and neighed as our two red horses approached. Grooms turned their heads towards us. They wore crests on their jackets, some the single peak of the Yamada and at least two the jagged mountain range of Lord Saga.

  My heart stopped, plunged, and then started up again so fast I thought I would faint.

  “Saga’s men are here already,” I said, trying to lower my voice so I would not be heard. I kept my head down so no one saw my face.

  The being stared openly at the grooms, and they stared back, seeming to be more interested in the horses than the riders. One said something to the other, but I could not hear the words.

  I remembered Okuda had coveted the red horses, and I feared these were his men who had been sent to retrieve them. Surely they would deduce who we were and take us into their possession too.

  The being dismounted and lifted Rei down. He went into the inn and came back to say he had procured space for us in a room reserved for women travelers.

  “I will stay outside with the horses,” he said to me as he took Ka’s reins. “No one will take them, and no one will take Rei or you.”

  I looked into his radiant eyes and could only trust him. As he walked away the flames from the torches bent towards him and seemed to hiss and sigh.

  Rei ate a little at the evening meal. There were many things I wanted to ask her—did she understand the being’s archaic words, was it the same language she used, did he always speak truth—but her face was soft and dreamy, and after the meal she fell asleep quickly. I stayed awake all night listening for the sound of horses’ hooves. I longed for daylight and dreaded it.

  Before it was light I woke Rei and led her outside. It was another misty morning, the tang of winter chilling my face. No one else was up, but the being had the horses ready. Their red coats glowed in the grey landscape, as if they sucked color from everything around them. As we rode away I looked back, but no one followed us. I remained tense all morning, making Ka nervous and skittish.

  Rei was the opposite, more relaxed than I had ever seen her, in the circle of the being’s arms. She had never been considered beautiful, but now I could see she was. She did not speak, but every now and then the being pointed something out to her, kites swooping over a river, a cloud shaped like a mushroom, red splashes of leaves on a high mountain, clusters of autumn lilies, a distant silver thread that was a waterfall, and she laughed in delight.

  I had never heard such laughter from her before.

  The road followed the valleys between the hills, crossing shallow rivers, skirting deep bays and estuaries. Mostly it was well maintained, but in places it had been washed away by rain or damaged by earth tremors. The horses snorted as they picked their way through ruts and around boulders, but they were surefooted and did not stumble.

  We had been riding all day when the land seemed to flatten, the valleys became wider. Dykes and empty stubbled rice fields stretched away
on either side of the road, the rice stalks drying on long poles.

  I smelled smoke and ahead saw the low roofs of a small town. Just before them stood the wooden guard posts of the barrier that signaled the boundary of a domain. I glanced at the being. Were we going to ride through or attempt to go around somehow? And what story would he have ready to tell the guards?

  His demeanor had altered in some way. It was not that he was tense as I was, but he was more alert than he had been all day. The horses put their ears back, twitching them as if they could hear something. I was sure the being’s rather long ears were twitching too. Then I heard it, a dull pounding on the road behind us—a horse galloping, maybe two. Ka was trembling beneath me. I drew the reins tighter, preparing to ride on fast, all the while looking at the being for some clue as to what we would do next.

  The two riders came up behind us, separated and swept past us, making Ka buck a little. I brought him back under control with a momentary flash of relief as I thought they were going on and had no interest in us, but they came to an abrupt halt a little way ahead and wheeled around to face us and block our way.

  We were only a short distance from the barrier, and I could see armed men rushing out of the guardhouse.

  I expected the horsemen to draw their swords but instead one of them spoke quite politely to the being.

  “We did not mean to alarm you. We saw the horses at the inn and realized they must be the ones our lord desired to acquire a few weeks ago. We would like to buy them from you to present them to him.”

  The being frowned as though he did not understand the words. Finally he said, “They are not for sale.”

  The other man snorted incredulously while the first said, less courteously, “You don’t understand. When Lord Okuda desires something, he gets it. I’ve offered you money and I advise you to accept.”

  “If you don’t, we will just take them,” said the second man.

  “It is you who understands nothing,” Rei said boldly. “They are shrine horses, not to be bought or sold. They belong to the Fire God.”