Osif shook his head. “Well?” He looked up. “How well behaved is this thing?”
“What do you—” Yerith looked at Nate, who hadn’t said anything up until now. He gave Yerith a look that said, Let him think I’m a deformed ghadi.
Yerith sucked in a breath and said, “We should move on while there’s daylight.”
CHAPTER TWENTY
GHADI IN LOINCLOTHS carried most of the cargo. Nate, at Osif’s insistence, carried one of the bags himself. He was the only human who carried anything that wasn’t a weapon. Nate didn’t mind all that much. The time he had spent working out in the catacombs had left him more fit than he had been when he came to this place, he was just a little wobbly from the sea voyage.
Nate kept within earshot of Yerith and Osif, listening to the Sandanista-lite bitching about being pulled from his important studies to escort Nate to the mountain. For this guy, Arthiz had been too long away from the Monarch’s people in the jungle, and he didn’t understand what things were like here. He was out of touch.
What they needed here were new recruits, fresh mages to learn the skills needed to fight the College. They didn’t need pale novelties. Now they had to spend their own resources on studying this stranger when it would have been better to let the College keep the misbegotten thing, and let Arthiz’s intelligence within the College gather what information on it they found.
After all, what possible use could this creature be to anyone?
Nate listened to about two hours of this guy before he suspected that they were reaching their destination.
The signs were old stonework—first, in the path they followed, where ancient pavestones peeked from the earth, then in mounds that formed unnatural geometric patterns in the jungle floor, marking the sites of long crumbled buildings.
They walked toward the sound of water, and about ten minutes after first hearing it, they stepped out from under the jungle canopy, to face a cliff towering about three or four hundred feet straight up before the face fell back into an eroded bluff.
At its base surged violent rapids that filled the air with a gray mist and the sound of rushing water.
The cliff face itself was carved over its entire surface area, except for a few places where the river had claimed a portion of it. Paths switchbacked across the face of the cliff, stairs were carved into the stone, man-sized holes peppered the surface accessing some interior structure.
Stone vines and leaves competed with the real thing. Columns reached up fifty, a hundred feet, some even taller. Balconies and terraces jutted from the face of the cliff. And, everywhere, statues.
Ghadi statues.
A stone skyscraper. A whole city carved into the valley wall. An old city. But it was only a ruin at first glance. After more than a casual observation, Nate could tell that the clearing that he followed Osif into was not a natural occurrence. Looking back and forth, the ground had been cleared and exposed from the river to about a hundred yards back. No one could approach here from the south without being completely exposed to the inhabitants of the cliff face.
There was a single bridge crossing the river, a rope and wood construction that was placed about fifty feet downstream from the remains of a stone bridge—the rubble was obviously the result of recent demolition. The rope bridge was over one of the more violent parts of the rapids, and was so narrow that people would have to cross single file.
A single torch there could stop the advance of an army.
Admittedly, most of what Nate knew about strategy came from computer gaming, but to him at least, it looked as if the people here were serious about defending themselves.
Osif led them across the rope bridge, which was more stable than it looked, and up one of the ramps that hugged the cliff face. It reminded Nate a lot of the road that spiraled up the plateau of Manhome. The construction was the same, as was the artwork.
He glanced back at the ghadi porters, wordlessly carrying their burdens for their human masters. Nate wondered how they could go from point A to point B. The artwork alone made it clear that the same creatures built this place.
Could they really have completely lost their language?
Osif led them into one of the holes in the cliff wall. Nate’s feelings of being watched were confirmed when, once inside the cliff, a quartet of men stopped Osif and double-checked everyone. They gave Nate the once-over half a dozen times, muttering to themselves.
“—This is what they’ve been talking about—”
“—what is that it’s wearing?”
“—ever seen skin that white? Is it alive?”
“Ugly, isn’t it?”
Osif turned to Yerith and said, “Have him put that down. I have to present you to Bhodan.”
Nate dropped the crate he was carrying before Osif had finished his sentence. Osif was a little too self-involved to notice, but the four guards did a double take, and Nate made it a point to smile at them as Osif led him and Yerith deeper into the cliff face.
Bhodan was deep inside a warren of caverns. They reminded Nate of the catacombs under Manhome, except these were larger and better lit. The occasional tapestry hung on the wall, half disintegrated. The carving was finer and more precise, giving Nate the feel that this was carved for living space.
At the end of a long maze of corridors, they walked through an unornamented door into a darkened chamber. Nate felt a wave of claustrophobia, as if he was going to be locked up in a dungeon again. He felt his heart race, and was prepared to rush the door if it started to close.
Instead, a raspy voice called out, “Osif, my son?”
“I’ve come back with Arthiz’s gift to us.”
“Let me provide you some light.” Something sparked a few times, on the far side of the room, and eventually an oil lamp was burning.
Yerith gasped.
Nate sucked in a breath, too. The man by the lamp looked as if he shouldn’t be alive. His face was a twisted mass of scar tissue, ragged cuts following the lines of the typical College writing. The man’s eyes were gone, in their place more sunken scar tissue filling the orbits of his skull. He didn’t have hands, his arms ended in two leather cups where a complex set of blunted hooks emerged.
The man smiled, the expression rendering his face even more skull-like. Nate could understand why this man wouldn’t come to meet them himself.
“Welcome guests. I am Bhodan, and this is my College.”
Osif started to say, “Master, this is the stranger that—”
Nate stepped forward and said, “My name is Nate Black. Thank you for meeting with us.”
Osif’s expression was worth the price of admission. He turned to face Nate and said, “You can speak,” as if it was an accusation.
Nate smiled at him. “Yes, I can.”
“Slowly,” Bhodan said. “Your words are spoken strange.”
Osif turned on Yerith. “Why did you hide this from me?”
Because you’re an asshole. Nate answered Osif. “She answered every question you addressed to her.” Nate turned to face Bhodan. “Why was I sent here?”
Bhodan got to his feet with a slight limp. “Arthiz said he had a special student for us. He believes that you might cause the College of Man much distress.”
Osif grunted, causing Bhodan to laugh. “Osif doesn’t share Arthiz’s opinion.”
“Even if he can be trained at all, what use is he? Even in an acolyte’s robe and mask, he could not walk among men without being known. He couldn’t leave here, so what use is that?”
Bhodan kept chuckling. He pointed a hook at Osif and said, “I cannot leave this refuge, so you say I am useless?”
“No—I—Master, you are a great teacher, a great leader. We cannot say the same about this interloper.”
“You judge too quickly.” Bhodan faced Nate and asked, “Why did you not speak to my student, Osif?”
Nate looked across at Osif, who looked pissed. A long time ago, Nate hadn’t cared about making social enemies. There were other thing
s to worry about in life rather than whether people liked you or not. Either he, or the situation, was different enough now for Nate to realize that he had made a diplomatic misstep.
One consolation—the guy was an asshole who probably wouldn’t have been on Nate’s side anyway.
“I learned more about him by remaining silent,” Nate said.
Bhodan seemed to find that amusing.
“Do you actually believe that he is who Arthiz thinks—” Osif began to say.
Bhodan whipped around and snapped at him, “This is not the time. Raise such questions to me, alone.”
“Master—”
“Go now, make sure there are rooms for our guests. We will speak of this later.”
Osif opened his mouth, but Bhodan made a violent gesture with his hook, and Osif grimaced, glared at Nate, and left.
“I apologize. At most times Osif is not like this.”
“Why am I here?” Nate asked. “Who does Arthiz think I am?”
“You are here because Arthiz thinks you might aid our cause.”
Why do I think you’re not completely forthcoming?
“How?” Nate said. “From what I have seen, the only reason I am here is because I would probably be killed if I was anywhere else.”
Bhodan nodded. “You are here now.”
“How do you think I can help you?”
“Perhaps you cannot, perhaps Osif is correct. Perhaps you are a harmless animal, the way the ghadi believed the first men were.” Bhodan frowned. “But when the gods play their games, the result is always severe. If you have a purpose here, it is the Monarch’s preference that it serve us and not the College of Man.”
Uh-huh.
“What is it you want from me?”
“To be an acolyte. A soldier in the coming war.”
Nate unconsciously touched his face and thought of the scarring that these people went through. Like hell, old man. You’re not cutting anything in my skin.
“What if I don’t want to be part of your little army?”
Yerith touched his arm. “Please—”
Nate shook off her attention. “Do I not get a choice in all of this?”
Bhodan gave him his skull-like smile. “Yes, you do. If you insist, we will keep you in a safe place as long as the Monarch believes you may be of use.”
“Like my cell back in Manhome?” Nate looked over at Yerith.
“I suppose,” Bhodan said. “Is this what you want?”
“What I want is to be sent back home.”
“Only the gods can walk between worlds.”
“What’s the alternative?”
“We will teach you as an acolyte, until we find something you cannot learn.”
“Can you do that without cutting my skin?”
Bhodan actually seemed surprised at the request. “Do you understand what I am offering?”
“Maybe not. But I do not want to be scarred. Is that necessary for me to learn what you want to teach?”
“No.” The vibe from Bhodan was odd. To Nate it seemed as if it was perfectly reasonable not to want his skin cut up. However, even Yerith looked at him with some surprise. They’re almost acting as if the scarring was a fringe benefit. . . .
Maybe that’s how they saw it. They did act as if he walked into a job interview and said, “I’ll take the position, but please don’t pay me anything.”
Bhodan shook his head. “If you do not wish to pass through the . . .” He used a word Nate had never heard before. “It will be your decision. So you will train here?”
“Teach me whatever you want.”
“Good. I will show you to your room.” Bhodan walked toward the door.
Nate looked at Yerith, who looked even more lost than she had on the pier. “What about Yerith?”
“We have ghadi here that need to be cared for.” He addressed Yerith. “When Osif returns, he will take you to them.”
Bhodan walked out the door and waited in the hallway for him. Nate took a last look at Yerith, then he followed the blind man.
BOOK THREE
A ruler of men once became jealous of the College of Man. He saw the wise men of the College say what was true, and what was not. What was right, and what was not. When the wisest scholar of the College came to him and told him what power he held, and what he did not, he responded by saying, “You will see what power I have.”
The ruler closed the places of learning, and banished the scholars of the College of Man to the countryside outside his domain.
“Tell the trees what is true,” he told them. “Tell the river what is right. Tell the sky what power it has.”
Even as the ruler told the scholars this, Ghad walked the streets of the city and told the people what was not true, what was not right, and told them of power. . . .
—The Book of Ghad and Man,
Volume III, Chapter 23
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
BHODAN TOOK him to a room even less inviting than the one that he had left to come here. It was little more than an unadorned stone box, lacking even a door for privacy. There were only two pieces of furniture; a rough cot, and at its foot, a large chest about twice the size of a footlocker.
When Nate opened the chest, half of it was filled with the books that Yerith had given him. For some reason, that made him feel better about being here. His journal sat on top of everything.
Next to the books was clothing similar to that Osif had worn to meet them. Sandals, canvas pants, a robe with a vaguely Oriental cut, and a long sashlike belt. All of which was probably a good thing, given the state of filth his current clothes were in.
“You are a student here,” Bhodan said, “You will live as a student here.”
It took a little while for what that meant to sink in. Nate had his own idea of what a student’s life was like. His mental image of higher learning was so ingrained it even influenced his mental translation of the word “College.” However, to Nate, this College bore more resemblance to a military training base or a Soviet reeducation camp.
Let’s hope these are the good guys.
Shortly after Bhodan left him, a man with a long, carved staff walked down the corridor and stopped in his doorway. He stared at Nate and said, “You are a student here.”
“That’s what I have been told.”
The man slammed the bottom of the staff on the ground. The sound was like a whip cracking in the enclosed space. “You were not asked a question.”
Nate backed off a step.
“You will wear the clothes of a student.” He pointed at Nate with the staff. “Remove those rags.”
Nate’s immediate impulse was to mouth off to this guy. But trying to communicate in a different language gave his brain enough pause so he didn’t pop off the first thing that came into his head. Which, in this case was, How’d you like to wear that stick, big boy?
Nate erred on the side of discretion and stripped, peeling the fabric off his body. Rings of gray marked him where the elastic of his T-shirt or jockeys had touched his skin.
Big-stick stared at Nate while he stripped, and if he had known the words, Nate would have mentioned something about the homoerotic overtones of what was happening.
Big-stick instructed him to fold his old clothes and place them in the chest, and take out his new uniform. Nate started to put the new clothes on, but was interrupted by another whiplike crack of the man’s staff. The metal-shod tip came uncomfortably close to Nate’s foot.
“I did not tell you to dress.”
Nate stood there, waiting.
“It is time for the baths.”
Big-stick wasn’t kidding when he said it was time for the baths. Not only were the baths communal, every student bathed at the same time. Nate placed his clothes on a stone bench at the edge of a steaming pool of water as more and more people filed by him. No one spoke as they filed into the room, though every single one of them, men and women, stared at him as they passed. Each of them took their clothes and placed them on the benc
h set into the perimeter of the cylindrical room.
The only folks who didn’t strip were a trio of men bearing staffs who clustered by the entrance. The only difference between them and the students was age—the students were all younger than Nate, the guards perhaps slightly older—and the color of the belt at their waist. The students, Nate included, all had plain black belts while the guards wore embroidered blue belts with silver and gold highlights.
Nate watched the others for what he was supposed to do. He had already screwed up enough first impressions to last him the rest of his life. The last thing he needed was a dozen new people to be pissed at him because he ruined their bathing ceremony.
Fortunately, as far as Nate could tell, there was no particular protocol involved. Other than the general silence, and a slight segregation of gender—men on one side of the pool, women on the other—everyone seemed to be free to proceed as they thought appropriate. All slipping in the pool in a semi-haphazard fashion.
Nate decided that he must have had the modesty beaten out of him, because he was slipping into the warm pool of the bath before he realized that he was more uncomfortable about how filthy he was in front of all these strangers than he was about being naked.
Even that discomfort faded when he slipped into the pool. It reminded him of how he missed showers, and indoor plumbing. His body slipped into the warm water and suddenly every muscle in his body tried to relax, dropping him so that he was only head and shoulders above the surface. He rested there for a few moments, floating. It was the most luxury he’d been afforded since coming to this world.
It was a few minutes before some order was imposed on the proceedings. Once all the students were in the water, one of the guards walked along the perimeter, using a hooked tool to drag lids off of cylindrical pits that ringed the edge of the pool. Once he had completed this task, everyone edged to the pit nearest them and withdrew a white cloth. Nate followed everyone’s lead, noticing that the holes ringing the pool were filled with water about twenty degrees warmer than the water in the pool itself.
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