by Joan Aiken
It was making for the monkey, whose antics were beginning to slow down.
Do snakes eat monkeys? Dido wondered. Do monkeys eat snakes? I’m getting hysterical, there’s too much action hereabouts, guards bashing each other with stools outside, and a special Benefit Performance in here, loser gets a shot of poison, winner gets the freedom of my ankle.
The snake was circling the monkey warily. There was a short tactical pause, then an involvement so quick and so complete that Dido could not decide which had been the aggressor: the snake’s metallic coils flicked to and fro, the monkey’s tail whipped, curled up, whipped again. If I weren’t a coward, Dido thought, this’d be the moment to jump on both of ’em, hard . . . and get a jab in each ankle. If I had a stick, anything but my bare hands . . .
Her hands were behind her. She had kept them there, gripping the doorpost, distrusting their steadiness. The wooden jamb moved slightly as her fingers drove against it. She gave it a push sideways, her heart suddenly leaping; a section of it came away. With a swift, resolute tug she had a three-foot joist in her hands, rotten at one end. Ignoring the cloud of ant-infested dust that fell on her ankles, she held her weapon coolly, watching until the deadly skirmish on the floor came within reach; then she beat down with all her strength, striking for the snake’s head, which gripped the monkey’s hind leg. The snake twisted away, writhing – she thought she had missed it, but it twisted back, coiled and re-coiled in agonised jerks—The monkey lay limp in death.
Now – don’t wait – the door had given, moved behind her when she pulled out the length of doorpost. She gave it a cautious shove, another, more violent – and burst out, coming face to face with Tylo.
“What – wherever—?”
“Come away, quick! Quick, Shaki-miss! Not good here! Those men – imrit shash jailosh—” He fell into the Dilendi language, evidently expressing something too bad to be said in English.
“One of them hit the other on head, so I hit him with handle of gun—”
He nodded to where the guards lay collapsed among the wreckage of their jug and cups. The hot sun was drawing winy steam from the shards of earthenware.
“You look very sick, Shaki-miss – what in there with you?”
“Oh, just some wild-life,” said Dido, gulping. “I’m sorry I didn’t stop where you told me, Tylo. I was so thirsty – I went to drink from the brook. There’s a blind man somewhere – let’s get away from here!”
She snatched up her velvet game-cloth which lay among a scatter of cowrie-shells.
Tylo tugged her, at a run, back to where the horses were tethered. No blind man was to be seen. Perhaps he had gone back to his station by the waterfall.
“You still thirsty – here—”
From the ground, Tylo picked up a hard brown fruit the size of a turkey’s egg, which he expertly cracked on a stone, splitting it in two. Each half contained a mouthful of juice protected by a layer of white pith.
“Drink, quick—”
“That’s prime,” Dido said, gulping. “If I’d only known!”
The juice was sour, fresh, wonderfully thirst-quenching.
“Next stream we fill our water-bottles. That enough? Now we ride, gallop-quick!”
Chapter Four
THEY RODE UNTIL DUSK THROUGH HOT, SLEEPY forest. The island, Dido learned from her companion, was like a great wedge, tipped upwards towards the south. Mount Fura was the highest, southernmost point; and not far below the highest peak of that was John King’s royal residence, Limbo Lodge.
“Why’s it called that? That’s a funny name,” said Dido.
“Well I dunno, Shaki-missie. Old Sovran King would have it so. After he wifie die, that’s where he mostly stay. Would come to Regina town no more. Too sad, see? And throw his girl-child off Cliff of Death in clay pot.”
Dido’s blood ran chill.
“Why did he do that?” she demanded, when she got her breath back.
“Too much she make him remember wifie.”
“Seems bad luck on the girl-child.”
“Ah well, see, Shaki-miss, Outros people not want girl children. Not at all! No value.”
“Is that why gals have to wrap up their heads?”
He nodded. “In town, hate gal. Among us, Forest People, most different. For us, girl-child bring good luck. When she grow, she be Kanikke.”
“What’s that?”
From Tylo’s explanation, Dido learned that, among the Forest People, who did not live in settled villages, but kept moving around, the men were Hamahi, guides, or record-keepers, while the women became Kanikke, witches, and dealt with the practical affairs of life.
“How do the men keep records?”
“You see, you soon see, when you see my Sisingana.”
“So the town people, the Angrians, hate gals and the Forest People love them.”
“Is so, is so.”
“And the Civil Guards are town people.”
“Is so, golly-likely.”
Croopus, thought Dido, I just hope Doc Talisman keeps fooling those guards that she’s a boy.
But she didn’t fool Tylo. That’s rum . . .
“What happened at the jail, Tylo? Did you see Doctor Talisman? Did you give her my message?”
He laughed. “No, I not see. But she, Doc Talisman, top-high Kanikke! She soon be out of that place. They – those Guards – fright-scared of that Shaki-lady. She got mighty strong nooma.”
“What’s nooma, Tylo?”
A kind of magical power, nooma seemed to be, Dido gathered from his explanations. She was somewhat startled, then remembered Talisman’s amazing feat of lifting the heavy marble basin full of water. Could something like that have happened at the jail?
Dido and Tylo had long since left the orderly plantations and were now making their way through true forest, the vegetation packed and juicy around them, creepers and ferns solidly filling up the spaces between the big trees, which towered high above, their crowns, and the sky itself, out of sight above dense foliage. Even the birds and monkeys sounded far away, hundreds of feet overhead, and the path snaked its way through silent green twilight.
Dido supposed there was a path; Tylo seemed quite certain of where he was going and kept on at a steady pace. Then Dido began to notice a small white bird with a pink tail and crest which, from time to time, perched on a bough above them, chattered out a short, shrill song, then flew on ahead. Sometimes it lit on the brow-band of Tylo’s horse.
“Is that the same bird each time?”
“Is so, Shaki-miss. Memory-bird. You tie knot in rope, throw rope in water, memory-bird stay with you when you want.”
The memory-birds, Dido learned, each had their own zone. All Aratu was divided into memory-bird zones.
I wish I could get hold of a memory-bird, Dido thought; they sound right useful. Not that there was any shortage of other birds at this point. But they were mostly out of sight. The trees in the spice-plantations had been bustling with gaudily coloured parrots and parakeets, and no doubt they were here too, but high up, invisible. Once or twice Dido, with a thumping heart, noticed a huge snake, twining in among the branches, but there did not seem to be any pearl-snakes in the forest.
“Pearl snake, he stay near sea, near nutmeg-grove,” Tylo confirmed. “Only tree-snake in forest.”
“I don’t know as I like these any better,” said Dido, regarding a twelve-foot specimen winding its muscular way up a vertical tree-trunk.
“You leave him alone, he leave you.”
“I’ll do that.”
Presently Tylo’s memory-bird changed its call. Instead of the short song, it let out sharp warning shrieks.
“Rain come soon. Best we find shelter-place for sleep-night,” said Tylo.
“I’d have thought these trees would shelter us.”
“Oh, no, Shaki-miss. Best we find a wocho.”
A wocho, Dido learned, was a house where Forest People had lived but moved away. Soon Tylo found a clearing with two huts which consiste
d of thatched roofs on legs.
“No walls?”
“What need?”
“To keep out snakes?”
Tylo explained that if you said the proper charm before going to sleep, no snake would trouble you.
The wocho roofs sloped down to deep, overhanging eaves. One house had an earth floor, the other a kind of deck, knee-high above the ground, made from palm fibre laid across joists.
“Ponies in there,” said Tylo, and tied them up in the first wocho with an armful of fodder apiece. “Now we go sit here on deck—” and he gave it a poke to dislodge any ants or scorpions that might be lodging among the fibre.
They had not been any too soon in taking shelter; the memory-bird was entirely correct in its forecast. The air turned grey. The forest gave a loud moan. Then the trees at the edge of the clearing vanished from view; a thunderous noise, a mixture of rattle and roar, swallowed up the whole world; the ground outside the hut looked like a battlefield, with water pouring down and water leaping up, bouncing off the dry earth.
Mercy, thought Dido, how can anything stay alive under that deluge? It’s a mighty good thing we’re here and not out there! She turned to say this to Tylo, but realised that he could not possibly hear her, it was like trying to make herself heard through the yelling, shouting, and screaming of a huge multitude. Every now and then there came a flash of lightning across the gloom. Too bad we didn’t take out the grub from the saddle-bags, Dido thought, we could have had us a picnic; but I wouldn’t venture out in that downpour, even to the other hut, it’d flatten you out like a pastry. The rain cascaded down the stout leaf-roof above them and poured off the eaves in a solid sheet. It’s like windows made of water, Dido thought.
The storm raged all night, then stopped as suddenly as it had begun. The forest was sodden and dripping and, because the drenched foliage hung straight down, a good deal lighter; patches of sky were visible. The birds in the treetops were shrieking joyfully as if astonished at being still alive.
“We late, now we eat as we ride,” Tylo said, and gave Dido a hunk of corn-bread with figs stuffed into the middle.
They rode fast, munching, through the forest which now became thinner and more open giving way to dispersed groves, then to shrubby savannah-land. Descending into a valley they saw a larger grove of taller trees ahead of them. The memory-bird, satisfied, let out a broadside of chirrups, then flew fast and disappeared among the trees.
“My Sisingana’s now-place,” said Tylo.
The sun in the east was dazzling; sparks and flashes of light tossed and flickered from every wet surface; but Dido, peering ahead, could see two large dwelling-huts in the middle of the shady grove, and, she thought, figures seated in front of them.
“What is your great-grandfather’s name?” she asked.
“Name he known by is Asoun, but real name known only to him.”
“I see,” said Dido, though she did not, quite. Still, she thought, if he wants to keep his moniker to himself, I reckon that’s his business.
“Is the other cove that’s sitting with him – is that Lord Herodsfoot?”
Tylo gave the chuckle that always seemed to follow any thought of his lordship. “Mylord Oklosh! Yes, that him.”
Well, thank goodness for that, thought Dido. At least there’s one thing that’s worked out to order.
It had not quite worked out yet, though.
For as they entered the grove, Dido heard a piteous wail from overhead, somewhere to their right. Visibility was less dazzling now they were in the shade of the grove; she scanned the dusky foliage high above them and caught sight of a small somebody at the end of a leafy branch, who called out frantically: “Aie, aie! Help me, help me! Help, please!”
Was it a monkey? No, it was about the size of one, but human, and absolutely petrified with terror.
“Oh, Tylo! What shall we do, what can we do?”
Gliding up the tree, twining round and round the trunk with formidable strength and speed, was one of the large snakes they had glimpsed as they rode through the forest.
“Can we pull it down by the tail?” cried Dido, sliding off her mount.
“No, no, Shaki-miss! He strangle you at once dead, shock-shock quick!”
Dido did not waste time asking any more questions, she acted. Far away, long ago, in the streets of Battersea, London, she had more then held her own against mobs of enemies wielding bottles and brickbats. Now she snatched up a hefty stone from the ground and hurled it with certain aim and ferocious force. The stone struck the snake’s head, and a shudder passed through all its shining spiralled length. Grabbing another stone, Dido flung it with equal fury. The snake loosed its hold of the tree-trunk and fell to the ground in a twist of writhing coils. When Dido let fly with a third stone, the snake waited no longer but made off, discouraged and affronted, seeking for easier pickings.
“My word, Shaki-missie!” said Tylo, hugely impressed. “You number one thrower!”
Without answering, Dido went up the tree. A mere tree was to her a simple matter, due to all the time she had spent in the rigging, first of a Nantucket whaler, then of H.M.S. Thrush.
“Don’t you be scairt, I’m a-coming!” she called. A faint whimper was the only reply. The tiny girl she had come to rescue was huddled in a cluster of shorter branches at the end of a long upward-pointing bough. Now the cause for her venturing up so high was also visible: bunches of bright-red fruit about the size of grapes or cherries. Her face and hands were splashed with their juice and she had a large grass-fibre bag half full of berries.
“Hang on, liddle ’un – that’s the ticket,” Dido said encouragingly. The small girl gave her an amazed look, half alarmed, half trusting, but after a moment or two allowed herself to be helped down the branch and back to the main trunk of the tree. Here, she regained all her own tree-climbing confidence, and slid nimbly down to the foot of the trunk, where Tylo was dancing up and down.
“Yorka! Yorka! Wicked child! Ahash oho toohooli!”
Dido understood that he was giving her a terrific scold in the Dilendi language, but that she was defending herself vigorously. What was she to do, what was she to do, with the two old gentlemen so busy, and no breakfast meal ready for them when they would have finished their sacred business, and Uncle Desi away catching fish in the river? Of course she had to pick some djeela fruit!
“Oh, are those djeela fruit?” inquired Dido. “I thought no one was allowed to grow djeela trees except John King?”
Tylo gave her a quick glance, both embarrassed and reproving.
“Never mind that for now, Shaki-miss! I explain you later. Yorka tells my Sisingana singing Lord Oklosh world-beginning mystery song. Very long song, must sing sunrise to sunrise. Can not stop song till finish. Lord Oklosh putting song into word-paper-speak. Must, must wait till finish. Near done now.”
“Massy me,” said Dido. “A song that lasts twenty-four hours!”
Now indeed, coming closer, they could hear the Sisingana, who sat in front of his house, partly chanting, partly telling a long saga – Dido caught a word here and a word there, about the living world, the great cloud-beast-mother that carries us on her back, the moon and the sun, her sisters, the shadow-people who live underground. How they were all born, where they are all going. To tell this story truly would take a hundred hundred treetimes. And our own island, Aratu, is the centre of the whole mystery, the heart of the cloud-beast-mother. And the centre of our island is the twelve ghost-stones. Nine are already fallen. When the last three fall, then comes the dark after which there will be no sunrise.
The Sisingana’s strong, vibrating voice began to slow down, then came to a stop. An insect like an outsize cricket emerged from his great mass of silvery beard and chirped lustily.
“Is finished!” said Tylo. “Longlegs clockfly say so.”
The Sisingana had a broad brown benevolent face and the blackest, deepest eyes that Dido had ever seen. He wore a cloak of silvery pale djeela-flowers, which were hooked at the en
d of the petals so they clung together. He had been sitting cross-legged while giving his lengthy recitation, but now he stood up and stretched. His movement reminded Dido of Talisman. She noticed that his hair and beard were soaking from the storm. He must have been sitting out here telling his story through all that downpour . . .
Dido turned to look at the other old gentleman and received a shock. Somehow she had always assumed that Lord Herodsfoot was elderly, from what she had been told about him and the things he chose to do. Would you expect a young person to wander all over the world looking for roses and dice-games and grasshoppers? Hardly! But Lord Herodsfoot was indeed quite young, about the same age as Lieutenant Windward of the Thrush. Dido reckoned, and Lieutenant Windward was only thirty-five.
Herodsfoot had a thin, pale, acute face, and fair fuzzy hair – hair so pale that it was almost white, which was why the child Yorka had mistaken him for an old gentleman. Also he wore tortoiseshell glasses perched on the end of his nose, which made him look serious. And he had been frantically scribbling in a small thick notebook all the time and the Sisingana was chanting his tale of the world. Herodsfoot, like the Sisingana, was completely drenched, clothes, face, and boots, but he had managed to keep his notebook dry by pulling a huge green waterproof leaf over his head and shoulders, and protecting the notebook under its folds.
“Why the plague didn’t they go indoors?” Dido asked Tylo later.
“Oh, my Sisingana would never allow an Outros person into his house.”
“Why?”
“Infection. Not body-germ – soul infection. Only have Shaki-lord sit outside there, Sisingana will have to wave feathers four days to drive away soul sickness.”
(And, indeed, all the time that Dido was in the forest, she never set foot inside a Forest Person’s house – unless the owners had already left, as when they sheltered from the storm in the deserted wocho.)
Now Dido approached Lord Herodsfoot, who was carefully studying his notebook to make sure that the rain had not blotted any of the writing in it. Of his soaked clothes he seemed oblivious. Dido noticed that what he had put down in his notebook was not ordinary writing, but pothooks – some kind of shorthand.