by Evan Winter
She switched topics. “The things I’m learning, the things they have me doing… I worry I can no longer tell right from wrong.” She switched again. “I thought I meant something to you. I thought we’d help each other find a path through this. I held on to that thought, but it turns out I don’t matter and that makes everything so much worse.”
Tau believed it was meant to be his turn to speak. He was unsure what to say. He was sorry he’d hurt her. That had been furthest from his mind. He could say that, but he didn’t think it’d come out right, telling her she’d been far from his mind.
Zuri raised her head, speaking as Tau was opening his mouth. He’d missed his chance. “I can’t believe I keep thinking about you,” she told him. “I want you to know that I’m permitted to journey home twice in my three cycles of Gifted training and that I used one of those trips so I could pass this Goddess-forsaken isikolo. So I could come here, see you, and tell you that I hate you.”
That hurt, and Tau dropped to his knees in front of her. “Zuri—”
“I hate you for making me feel this way,” she said, eyes brimming with tears.
Tau had no clue how to deal with this. He wanted to reach out for her but didn’t want to upset her further. He moved closer, keeping his hands to himself. “Zuri…,” he said again, deeming her name safe enough.
“Damn you, Tau. I’m crying. You could at least hold me, you coldhearted bastard.”
Even more confused, Tau leaned in and held her, wrapping his arms around her.
She nuzzled into him. “By the Goddess, I hate you,” she said, putting her arms around his neck and pulling him closer.
“You have it wrong—”
“What?” Her voice, though muffled, was sharp.
“Eh… you do matter. Very much. More than…” He’d been about to say “almost anything,” changed his mind, and finished with, “You matter more than anything.”
She nuzzled deeper into his tunic. “That’s all you’re going to say?”
“Yes? Eh… no,” Tau stammered. “I didn’t want things to be this way.” He wasn’t prepared for this. “I wanted a different life… for us.”
Zuri looked at him then. “Us?”
“I could have worked in the Onai’s keep. Our lives could have been different.” Pain flooded him. “You deserve so much more than I am.”
“No. You don’t get to decide that for me. You can’t tell me who is worth my… I feel the way I feel, and that’s that.”
“It’s too late, isn’t it?” he said. “We’re both wed to war.”
“You’re a poet now? Why would anyone wed a war?”
“Because that’s all life is.… Because the most any of us can do is fight to make things a little better, a little more just or safe.”
Zuri returned her head to his shoulder. “Just? Safe? I’m not sure that’s why we fight, and if it were, I’m not sure we deserve it.”
“Why not?” Tau asked, talking more about the two of them.
“Because of the things we do.”
It felt like she knew and was talking about what he’d been doing in Isihogo. “We are what we must be,” he said, “if we want to make this world even a little better.”
“Can a better world be found at the end of a dark path?”
Tau thought his time in Isihogo threatened his sanity, but he’d been with Zuri less than a quarter span and had already lost his moorings.
“I continue to the south in the morning,” she said, the sudden switch in topics making his head spin. “My escort is already billeted in the building next to this one.”
“Oh,” said Tau, sorry to hear her visit would only last the night, but grateful the discussion had settled on firmer ground.
“Why did you grow the scruff?”
“What?”
“The beard. The patches of one anyway.”
“Eh… I’ve been training. There’s not been time.”
“I see. Too busy to shave… or bathe.”
That was unfair. Tau had washed the day before… perhaps two days before.
She laughed. It sounded like music. “Let’s go.”
“Where?”
“These rooms have a bath. You need one and you need a shave. I’ll help.”
And, like that, the firm ground was gone, swallowed by a sinkhole. “A bath? Shave? I don’t need—”
“Tau, far be it from me to tell others what they do or do not need, but in this case I’ll make an exception. Come.”
“To the bath?” Tau’s voice cracked. He cleared his throat and lowered his voice. “To the bath?”
She took his hand and led him to the next room.
FORBIDDEN
He followed Zuri. It was like he was floating, and he couldn’t help but wonder if she was using some strange gift to make him feel this way.
The next room was opulent. It had plush furniture, a raised bed larger than anything Tau had seen before, and the floor was carpeted. A show of this much wealth would have been gross in Umbusi Onai’s bedroom, and Tau was reminded of Zuri’s new standing.
Zuri seemed to be enjoying his reaction to the space. “An advantage to being Gifted,” she said, gracing him with her smile, the one that could turn night to day.
She led him to the next room. It held a personal bath and Tau found the very thought alien. Who on Uhmlaba needed such a thing?
“A personal bath…,” Tau mumbled, staring at the bronze tub that had been built into the ground.
“We have them in the Gifted Citadel and so do most Royal Nobles in Palm.”
“There’s more than one of these?”
“See here,” Zuri said, turning a knob near the head, or foot, of the tub; he wasn’t sure which was which. The knob turned and water flowed from the attached spout. “It’s drawn from the isikolo’s well.”
Tau walked over in wonder. He put his hand beneath the water and felt it pass over his fingers. It was cool.
“Get in.”
“I’m dressed.”
Zuri pursed her lips. “Yes, that is a problem.”
Tau’s eyebrows shot up. “Lady Gifted!”
“Exactly, Lady Gifted! That’s an order, Initiate. We will not permit the unwashed in our presence. And you do happen to be both particularly unwashed and particularly in our presence.” Zuri waved her arms at his clothes and Tau looked down to make sure she hadn’t gifted them away somehow.
“Off,” she said, stepping closer to help with the process.
Seeing she wouldn’t be deterred, Tau stripped as fast as possible and stepped into tub’s cool waters, sitting down to hide as much as he could. He caught Zuri looking him over.
“That’s good,” she said. “I’ll get soap.”
“Soap?”
Zuri took a rust-colored brick from a shelf near the bath. She knelt beside the tub and dipped it in the water near Tau’s thigh, lingering there, her fingers brushing the flesh of his leg. Tau’s face burned as he felt his body reacting. Zuri must have seen it as well but didn’t comment and began rubbing the damp brick over his body. It wasn’t a brick, though, and, as she stroked it over his skin, it created a lather that smelled of sun-dried grass.
The soap wasn’t as large as Zuri’s hands, so where she cleaned, she touched, her fingers caressing his body. Tau shifted his hands, placing them over his lower stomach and upper thighs, trying to hide his body’s betrayal.
Zuri moved the soap in slow circles over his chest. “So many bruises. So many cuts.” She placed the soap in a bowl beside the bath and walked to another shelf. She came back with a tiny bronze dagger. “Face first,” she told him, going for his neck.
Tau caught her by the wrist, holding her fast.
“Tau…”
He tried to make his fingers relax, but they wouldn’t. He was lost in memories of the demon, the one with hand’s-length claws that had slit his throat. It morphed into the one with the barbed tail that had ripped his chest open with its teeth. Then that one shifted, becoming the four-armed
nightmare that had strangled him, snorting foul breath in his face as he died.
“Tau?”
Hands shaking and mind still in the fog of memory, he managed, somehow, to let go. Zuri moved with deliberateness, letting him see every movement as she brought the dagger to his face. He jerked at the blade’s first touch.
“Care! I don’t want to cut you.”
He closed his eyes, breathing too fast and flinching when the blade kissed his flesh again. Zuri was gentle and fast. She used water to wet his skin and scraped away the scruff he’d grown. To keep her balance as she leaned out and over the tub’s edge, she placed a hand on his shoulder.
His eyes were still closed—they had to be for him to ignore a knife so close to his face—but her touch had him reacting again. She finished his face and neck, worked on shaving the stubble from his head, and her hand moved to his chest. As she shaved him, her fingers drew lazy circles and his body’s need shifted from arousal to desire to insistence. He groaned in discomfort, shifting in the tub, hoping to find a position that would offer relief, and didn’t even realize when Zuri was done.
She moved to the side of the tub and reached for him, the fingers of her right hand touching, then holding his manhood. Her caress made him jump, sloshing water out of the tub as his eyes flew open.
“Tau…,” Zuri said, her face determined, the same look she’d worn the first time they’d kissed. Her eyes were large but hooded, lips apart and full. Tau thought to say something, but her hand was gliding up and down, reducing his world to her fingers.
Zuri kicked off her slippers and eased into the waters, her black Gifted robes still on. She came near, sitting over his legs, her clothes floating around them. He could feel the bare skin of her thighs on his, and her left hand was around his neck, her right still stroking. She leaned toward him, closing her eyes, and she kissed him.
Her lips, her body, they brushed against him. And, where once the fingers of her hand, rising and falling, had been enough, they became too little. Tau’s own hands drifted to Zuri’s hips, and she rose onto her knees, using the hold she had to guide him to her.
“We can’t,” Tau said, knowing she would have to be the one to stop, because he couldn’t. “It’s forbidden.”
She kissed his forehead, his cheek, his lips, and, fumbling at first, she drew him inside her.
“Goddess… by the Goddess…,” Tau said, feeling her sheathe him.
“Is this so wrong?” Her voice was breathy. “Why would this… Ah!” She closed her eyes, let her head fall back. “Why would this be…”
They found a rhythm and all the demons in Isihogo could have assaulted the bathing room and Tau would not have stopped. They moved together, kissing, caressed by the cool waters, suspended in ecstasy. Then Tau found there was more.
It was as if he was caught in an avalanche, picking up speed and force. Zuri kept pace. No, she was the one making the pace.
“Yes,” she whispered, her lips near his ear. “Yes, Tau. Yes!”
Her voice, the need in it, did something to him. The avalanche became a flood and, eyes squeezed shut, he felt pressure, pleasure, and pain. His ardor coalesced, crowned. It drew him into her, overcoming him until, like a drowning man piercing the surface to take a breath, the tension burst, granting release.
“Goddess wept,” Tau groaned as he looked into Zuri’s fire-bright eyes. He was drained of… everything, but felt whole. “Zuri…” Her name, it meant something new, something he wanted to understand. He lifted a hand from the waters and touched her face, wishing everything and everyone gone, wishing life could be the two of them and nothing more.
“Tau,” Zuri said. “Tau, you can’t stop.” Zuri was still moving.
“Neh?”
“Tau, I need—” She grabbed him by the chin, making him look at her. “Don’t stop!”
His need was vanishing with astonishing speed.
“Tau? Tau!” Zuri said.
He moved his hand back into the waters, took hold of her hips, and moved, syncing up with her again.
“Yes!” she said. “Like that! Like that! Like… Oh! Oh, Tau!”
Her nails dug into his neck; she arched her back and pressed her knees into his sides. He felt her body around him, almost forcing him from her, and she threw her head back, crying out so loudly he had to stop himself from putting a silencing finger to her lips. Then, with one last spasm, she collapsed on him, shaking. Tau was about to check that she was well, when she kissed his chest.
“Can you go again?” she asked, lips tickling his collarbone.
“I… Give me a few breaths?”
“Yes, a few breaths. This time in the bed.”
“The bed?”
“Yes, I want to try there.”
Tau nodded and Zuri shifted, unsheathing him. She stood in the tub and wriggled out of her robes, letting them fall into the bath. Her dark skin was smooth, her breasts round, firm, and as perfect as the rest of her. Ananthi couldn’t be more beautiful.
“I’m ready… for the bed,” Tau said.
Zuri got out of the tub and walked to the bedroom. “Come, then,” she said, and he did.
SURVIVAL
Some spans later, hot, sweaty, and more at peace than he’d been in recent memory, Tau held Zuri close in the oversized bed. “Why can’t these moments make up the whole of life?”
She laughed. “Wait another span or two. You’ll be hungry and all you’ll want will be your next meal.”
“You’re all I need to survive,” he told her.
She rolled her eyes and punched him in the arm. “Silly man.”
He pulled her close, kissed her, then kissed her again, enjoying her nearness. “I feel happy.”
“Why do you make it sound like a question?”
Tau rubbed his shaven head. “Can it last?”
“Nothing lasts. We have these breaths, though.” Her eyes roamed his face. “You take yourself to Isihogo?”
He nodded, confirming her guess.
“Tau, do you have any idea how dangerous that is? If the demons find you they’ll attack and won’t stop until your soul thinks itself dead.”
“I fight them.”
“You can’t, they’re immortal. They—”
“No, I didn’t say I could. I do. I go to Isihogo to fight them.”
Zuri shot up into a sitting position. “What?”
He sat up as well. “Time is different there—”
“Yes, thank you, I taught you—”
“I needed more time to—”
“To what, Tau? To what?”
“To train, to fight, to become more than the time in my life can make me.”
“You fight the demons? Can… can they be killed?”
“No. I don’t know if they’re immortal or immune to attack or… I can hold them back, but…” He trailed off.
“They get you in the end,” she said. “Each time you go?”
He nodded.
“And you keep going?”
He nodded.
“How many times?”
He shook his head.
“You don’t know? You’ve lost count? By the Goddess.” She reached out, touching him on the shoulder. “Tau, if you have sense left, you have to stop. It’s dangerous.”
“I can handle it.”
“No, you can’t.”
“I’m fine,” he lied.
“The shaving knife in the tub…”
“I’m fine,” he said again.
“For how much longer?”
“For as long as it takes!” he said, his tone making her draw back.
She stared at him, eyes flitting about his face. “The Omehi don’t deserve the sacrifices you’re making.”
“You think too much of me.”
“It’s for vengeance, then? You’d see your soul burn for it? If so, you’re adding to the same evil you think your vengeance will lessen.”
“It’s for justice, and for that I’ll face any suffering.”
“Tau
—”
“You think the world we live in is good enough? This same world where we can never be together? They will take you to a Royal Noble. He’ll force himself on…” Tau wrestled for control. “He’ll try for a pure bloodline, for future Gifted.”
“Please—”
“What am I to do when that happens? Should I bring tributes for the children you’ll bear?”
She watched him.
“We’re worth more than that,” he said.
Zuri put her hands on either side of his face. “I’m here with you now, aren’t I?” she said.
“Are you allowed to be?”
“I’m here.”
“For how long?”
“For these breaths.”
Tau shook his head. “They aren’t enough! I want more. I want to marry the woman I love, to have children with her, to watch them grow… with my father beside me.”
“Tau…”
“If I can be better than them, then any of us can be. The Nobles? They are great because we are on our knees. No more. I choose to stand.”
She lowered her head, eyes closed. “And what if all we’re owed, Lesser and Noble, are these breaths? What if the Cull happened for a reason and Xidda isn’t a test we’re meant to pass?”
“How can you say that?”
Zuri opened her eyes. “Because I’ve been at the citadel.”
Tau waited, letting silence prompt her.
“Gifted…,” she said. “Gifted are born with differences in their ability to shroud themselves in Isihogo. The weakest among us can enervate, grabbing power and releasing it quickly. The stronger of us can enrage, taking energy from Ananthi’s prison and using it to greatly empower a man, so long as the blood of a Greater or Royal Noble runs through his veins. Others can edify, delivering messages across distances in the mists of Isihogo that would take days in Uhmlaba.
“But the most powerful of us can entreat, calling out to any living creature that can reason. It’s why the hedeni bring no beasts to war with us, and it is why, in the early days, they burned our valley to ash. They sought to kill as many of us and as many animals as possible.”
“The hedeni burned the peninsula?”
“Down to the dirt. It’s why we have little else but insects, reptiles, and the few horses and other mammals that the Royal Nobles saved and now breed.”