by Mike Brooks
“But what gives you that right?”
Blackcreek’s dark eyes flashed suddenly. “What gave your clan the right to raid our shores, kill our people and take our possessions?”
Saana gritted her teeth. “We have not done so since this man became chief.”
Blackcreek held her gaze for a long moment, then exhaled audibly through his nose and nodded very slightly. His manner was still brittle, though, and Saana could feel the tension in the air.
“This lord suspects you came here for something other than to quarrel about the ownership of land,” Blackcreek said shortly, tapping one finger on his ledger and looking down at it instead of meeting her eyes. “What was it?”
Saana grimaced. This was always going to have been a difficult conversation; she suspected it would be doubly so now. “There was a fight earlier, in the street. This man had to stop it. One of your men and one of the clan, who had been set to work together. The Brown Eagle was Timmun, yours was…” She paused for a moment, trying to recall. “Nahel.”
Blackcreek still wasn’t looking at her, but she saw the skin at the side of his eyes wrinkle as he frowned. He looked up at Osred, still standing by the door. Saana noticed the steward had a disapproving expression as he looked at her.
“Osred, do you know the name? It sounds familiar, but this lord cannot place him.” He looked back at the ledger. “He will be in here, somewhere…”
“A labourer, lord. This servant believes the reeve held him in the cells for two days, a year or so ago,” Osred replied.
“What caused the fight?” Blackcreek asked Saana. He still wasn’t looking at her.
Saana took a deep breath. “Timmun was too much drinking, and he is not always good man, but Nahel seems a…” She searched for an appropriate Naridan word. “He is wrong. He desires men.”
Blackcreek straightened up in his seat, apparently expecting her to continue. “And?”
Saana tried to keep a grip on her temper. Was the man being deliberately obtuse? “He kissed Timmun!”
“And Timmun did not want him to?” Blackcreek asked.
“Of course not!”
“Lord,” Osred interjected, “Nahel has been guilty of such behaviour, when in drink. He seems somewhat misguided as to who would want his advances.”
Blackcreek opened his mouth, but Saana spoke first. “Who would want? The man is made wrong! You must see?”
“His actions are wrong,” Blackcreek agreed guardedly, “but to say the man himself—”
A horrible suspicion began to creep over Saana. “Do you mean men lie with men in your land?”
“Lie with…?” Blackcreek’s face didn’t show revulsion, merely confusion. “What do—”
“Fuck!” Saana shouted at him. Nalon had taught her all manner of words, but she’d not thought to have to use it in this context. “Do men fuck men here?!”
Blackcreek’s face closed down into something every bit as hard and dangerous as the war mask he’d worn on the salt marsh. He’d finally grasped her meaning. “Of course.”
Of course? Saana was astounded. How could the man just stand there and admit such a thing? Father Krayk placed few demands on his people, but the primary one was for them to survive: how could they do that unless men paired with women?
“And your women?” she asked, barely daring to hear the answer. What peril had she left her daughter in? “They will lie with other women?”
“Lie with, marry, adopt children with,” Blackcreek snapped. “Why does it matter?’
“Is this why your town half-empty is?” Saana demanded, hearing her own voice rise to a shout as she threw a hand towards the window. Where had she led her clan? “Are your men too busy fucking men and your women—”
“There was plague twenty years ago!” Blackcreek thundered, slamming his fist into his desk and standing up. Saana rose with him and met his dark, burning gaze with her own as they ended up nearly nose-to-nose.
“The sickness took this lord’s parents, and his law-father’s wife!” the young Naridan yelled into her face. “Along with half the town! That is why we have so many empty houses!” His jabbing finger stopped just short of her chest, which was just as well, but the new Lord of Blackcreek wasn’t done yet.
“And what do you do to men of yours who love other men?” he demanded.
Saana rose up on her toes, outraged. “No one would do such thing!”
“Really?” Blackcreek demanded. “Then how do you know about it, and why are you so scared of it?”
“Is not scared to hate unnatural!” Saana yelled at him. “Someone start fly like bird, you cheer? Or you kill them for being…” She tailed off momentarily, then remembered what Nalon had said about the Naridans’ superstitions. “For being witch?”
“You consort with witches!” Blackcreek bellowed at her.
“Is wrong word!” Saana shouted back. “Your language not have right word, and you think any woman who know things must evil be!”
“Get out of this house,” Blackcreek snapped, stepping back from her and pointing towards the door. “Get out, before this lord forgets his manners and does something to doom both our people!”
Furious though she was, Saana would not shame herself by staying in another chief’s home when she was no longer welcome. She turned and strode towards the fearful-looking Osred, but couldn’t hold her tongue. “You try to doom this man’s people by giving us houses of sickness!”
“That was twenty years ago!” Blackcreek yelled from behind her.
“Why you not burn them?” Saana demanded, turning around as she reached the doorway. On Tjakorsha they knew the difference between a sickness from within, such as the slow decline that might mark the end of life for an elder, and a sickness that could be passed to others. If a person had died from the latter in their longhouse then it would be burned, and them with it. This ‘plague’ must have been a sickness that could be passed, judging by the Naridan’s words, and yet the houses still stood.
“But… why would we burn houses in the middle of a town?” Blackcreek demanded incredulously, throwing his arms up. “The flames would catch, and we would lose everything!”
“And this maybe why half your town die!” Saana snapped. “Everything too close!” She didn’t wait for his reply, but stormed past Osred. She needed to find Zhanna. Part of her hoped a guard would try to get in her way so she could put her fist through his face, and the Dark Father take the consequences.
Coming here had been a mistake. Right now, she wasn’t sure whether she meant the castle itself, or Narida in general.
TILA
TILA HAD EXPECTED Fourth Channel to be a canal running through East Harbour, and in some respects it was, but not dug by the hands of people. Instead it was one of a network of fissures in the north-eastern side of Grand Mahewa through which the sea ran, and which essentially broke that part of the island into smaller islets. The Alabans called this area ‘the Narrows’, and the channels were spanned by bridges varying hugely in size and integrity.
The blue-doored warehouse had been fairly easy to find, once Tila had worked out the Alaban method of numbering the channels. The door guards looked slightly surprised when she’d spoken the code words, but had allowed her and Barach entry nonetheless.
Certainly, Tila was the only obviously Naridan woman inside, at least in terms of her clothes, which might have explained the guards’ reactions. The other spectators were mainly Alaban, although there was one small, rat-faced Naridan man, a couple Tila were fairly sure were Morlithians, and one or two others she couldn’t place at all. All were crowded around a fenced-off oval in the middle, within which the action took place on blood-stained dust.
The first few fights were empty-handed affairs, contested until one party went limp or yielded. Tila had brought most of her money with her, wagered generously based on her gut instinct from looking the fighters over when their names were called, and after three fights had won back more than she’d staked. However, when the next bout
was announced and she was once more handing over coins to the youth working her side of the oval, the question changed.
“First blood?” the youth asked in Alaban. Tila frowned, and looked back at the oval. Each fighter was being handed a pair of long knives. It looked as though not all the blood on the floor came from broken noses or ripped ears.
“That one,” she replied in the youth’s language, pointing at a dark-skinned fighter she’d have assumed was a woman, had she not been concentrating on keeping an Alaban mindset. They looked quicker than their opponent, and while Tila might not have backed them had the fight been to the death, that was not the question she’d been asked. This fighter, like most announced so far, had a showy assumed name: something to do with an ocean predator, Tila believed.
The youth nodded, and Tila dropped her numbered wooden token into the proffered leather bag. She kept the matching other half, to show when it was time for winnings to be paid out, and turned to watch the fight.
It didn’t last long. Tila’s fighter was indeed quick, but also unlucky. After a couple of nimble, slashing advances, they happened to slip at the wrong moment. Their opponent lunged in just long enough to jab their shoulder with a blade, then danced away out of range, triumphantly displaying their bloodied knife. The winning fighter received a purse of coin, with the wincing loser relying on what the crowd wished to contribute, which didn’t appear to be much.
“Evening,” a voice said at her shoulder, and Tila turned to find herself looking at the rat-faced little Naridan she’d seen earlier. He was a finger’s breadth or so shorter than her, and had chosen to emphasise the already impressive length of his chin with a tuft of beard ranging from dark brown to gingery. He smiled, showing teeth of uncommon evenness, then flinched slightly as Barach took a looming step towards him. “Easy there, s’man means no harm!’
Tila reflected how she’d used a similar phrase to Skhetul, and wondered whether she’d sounded any more convincing. “What do you want?”
“Merely company,” he assured her hastily. “S’man likes these folk well enough, but it’d do his ears good to hear his own tongue. He gets nervous, you see, especially on a night such as this.”
“Why, what night is this?” Tila asked him. He seemed nervous, certainly; his words were coming too fast, and he was looking everywhere except at her. She definitely wasn’t going to take her eyes off him.
“Well, in a moment s’man’s husband will walk out and fight three people to the death,” the little man said, with an embarrassed laugh. “It makes his heart race, no matter how many times he’s seen it.”
“To the death?” No wonder the magistrates were so unhappy about these events. Tila had wondered why a bit of fist-fighting was such a crime. “A four-way fight, you mean?”
“More of a three-on-one.”
Tila looked back at him, shocked. “With weapons?”
“Oh yes,” he nodded. “He wouldn’t stand much of a chance, without.” He bowed slightly. “Apologies, s’man’s manners are absent. He is Marin of Idramar.”
Idramar. Nari curse it. “A pleasure,” Tila replied, with a perfunctory bow of her own. Livnya was well-known enough in the city that if Marin moved in the right circles, or indeed the wrong ones, he could have heard of her. There were many Livnyas in Narida, of course—Tila’s old nursemaid, for one—but she didn’t want to give him either of her names. Marin smiled expectantly at her, but took the hint after a few moments.
“Ah, here they come,” he said, changing the subject. Tila turned her head and, sure enough, three Alabans walked out. They looked unremarkable sorts, and took their weapons—an axe, a short sword, and a spear—with no great sense of familiarity. The cryer announced their names, which seemed to just be names so far as she could tell.
Then, however, the cryer shouted two words in Naridan.
“Sar Blacksword!”
He was of an age with Tila, or perhaps her brother. His weather-beaten face was hidden beneath a very un-Naridan dark beard, but his hair was certainly braided like a sar’s. He was considerably taller and broader than his husband, although not so large as Barach, and like the other fighters, he wore simple Alaban garments: a long-sleeved maijhi, and loose-fitting karung gathered at the ankles. A longblade and a shortblade rode on his left hip, and the scabbards of both were stained black.
A blacksword. A sar shamed so badly that any noble deeds he’d performed, no matter how great, had been expunged from memory, and the pictorial records of them on his scabbards destroyed. It would make sense for such a man to be earning a living fighting in a foreign land; he’d find work in Narida as a mercenary, judging by the Brotherhood tattoo she could see on his hand, but most shamed sars didn’t like being surrounded by reminders of their fallen status.
He carried himself like a fighter, at any rate. Tila eyed him, then the three opponents. “What are the odds against him?”
“The odds are in his favour,” Marin replied.
Tila blinked. “You’re shitting.”
“May Nari blind s’man,” Marin declared, holding up one hand. “The house has put the odds in his favour. They hope everyone will bet heavily against, thinking they’ll win big.”
There was certainly an eager rush to place bets, and most tokens were going into one bag. Tila scratched her chin, thinking. “The house must be confident.”
“They’ve good reason,” Marin shrugged. “Laz is the finest s’man has seen with a blade, and s’man doesn’t say that just because he loves him.”
Tila studied the man announced as Sar Blacksword, and whom Marin had just named as Laz. He appeared almost bored. Either he was a superb actor, or he was truly unconcerned by what faced him. It could just be foolhardiness, of course, but he looked to have done this before.
She came to a decision, and dug a chunk of coins out of her purse. “Barach, place the bet.”
Barach took the wager and her token, and joined the press of bodies. Tila glanced around to make sure no one was close enough to overhear, and leant in a little closer to Marin.
“You know the people who organise these fights?” she asked.
“We’ve talked with them, of course,” Marin replied.
“Do you know someone named Kurumaya?” Tila had planned to ask about once she’d bet on a few fights, but this seemed a better opportunity.
Marin flashed his teeth again in a smile that was all twitch and no mirth. “Aha! Yes, um, well.” He nodded somewhat sheepishly towards the oval. “You would need to talk to the cryer. After this fight, perhaps?”
Tila shrugged. “Very well.” The cryer was a small-statured Alaban with hair worn loose down past their waist, and a shrill, but very loud voice. They’d now exited the oval and were watching with their back to Tila, past where Barach was placing the wager.
The bustle of betting subsided, and the two youths signalled that everyone had made their wagers. The cryer barked an instruction, and the three Alabans in the oval raised their weapons.
Sar Blacksword strode forward to the middle and stopped, slightly hunched forwards, with one hand on the grip of his longblade and the other on its scabbard.
The Alabans looked at each, then spread out. They were taken off-guard by his confidence, Tila could see that at once. The spear-wielder started to edge around behind him, while the one with the shortsword went to his left and the one with the axe to his right.
Sar Blacksword simply stood there, his eyes flickering from one to another.
It wasn’t as unfair as it looked, Tila knew, as the three Alabans edged inwards. The longblade had a greater reach than either the shortsword or the axe, for one thing. The three fighters still stood a chance of outmatching Sar Blackwood if they knew how to handle their weapons, or were skilled at working together in such a situation. If not…
The axe fighter moved first. They didn’t shout a battle cry; they just waited until the Naridan had glanced away from them, then lunged in with nothing more than a grunt of effort as they swung their axe up.
It never came down in the way they intended. Sar Blacksword sidestepped towards them into a classic drawcut, sweeping his longblade out and ripping it across his attacker’s midsection before the axe could fall. He completed the move with a spin that ended with him facing his two remaining opponents, while the axe fighter stumbled past him, then fell onto their knees. Blood began to leak out at about the same time as the Alaban began screaming.
Sar Blacksword flicked out his longblade, sending droplets of blood spattering across the oval’s floor, then raised it to guard position in front of his face. His expression hadn’t changed.
The other two Alabans stared in shock for a moment, then moved in past their fallen comrade.
The spear fighter began jabbing, clearly hoping to drive his opponent up against the crude fence surrounding the oval, and limit his movement. The sword fighter closed in as well, seeking to close the trap from their side.
Sar Blacksword took two steps backwards, then as the spear jabbed in towards his ribs again he twisted aside and caught it behind the head with his left hand, slashing at the wielder with his longblade. The Alaban panicked and let go, stumbling backwards as the Naridan’s deadly blade swept through where he’d been standing a moment before.
Sar Blacksword tossed the spear up, caught it again with his left hand halfway down the shaft, then threw it at the sword fighter.
It was a clumsy throw—he was clearly right-handed—but the distraction was good enough. The sword fighter sidestepped the spear well enough, but their stance was lost. Sar Blacksword had charged the moment the spear left his hand, and his longblade flashed out. The short sword managed to deflect it once, twice, but the second parry pulled the Alaban off-balance and Sar Blacksword’s blade bit into the side of their neck before they could block it the third time. The fighter grimly clamped one hand over the wound, despite the fact that blood immediately spurted out between their fingers, and lunged clumsily.