Toads and Diamonds

by Heather Tomlinson

  Diribani inclined her head to Ruqayya. As they had arranged, the princess tossed a wooden practice knife to the girl who had sneered at Diribani earlier.

  "Attack her, Ladli," the princess said.

  Ladli had caught the dagger, but at the command, her fingers fumbled it. "What, my lady?"

  "You wanted to see her defend herself," Ruqayya said. "Go on. We're waiting."

  "Yes, my lady." The young woman jumped to her feet and stabbed the wooden weapon at Diribani.

  But Diribani had entered the discipline of the dance. The heart drum steadied her; the spirit drum lightened her step. Centering herself, she extended her awareness within the boundaries of the tent. With ridiculous ease, she evaded the dagger.

  Her opponent overbalanced and almost fell. A couple of onlookers jeered, but Ruqayya shushed them, as Diribani had asked.

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  No matter where one performed it, ritual dance was a sacred undertaking, not like the white-coats' armed contests, where the object was to draw blood. A petitioner worshiping the twelve in any form--prayer or music or dance--sought to invoke their harmony.

  Ladli feinted, then stabbed again, harder. The thrust would have bruised Diribani's ribs if she had been there to absorb the blow.

  She wasn't.

  The other girl hissed with surprise. She tried again. Missed. Each failed attempt made her angrier and more determined. But not successful. Like water, Diribani flowed around her.

  When Ladli was wiping away tears of rage with her fist, her body stiff with frustration and shame, Diribani moved to the next stage. As she had been taught, she began to teach. Lightly, she tapped Ladli's elbow, back, thigh, shoulder, showing her where she was out of balance.

  The moment Ladli stopped trying to strike Diribani and started imitating her steps, Diribani slowed deliberately, to show her. She started with a simple foot-pattern and danced away to let the other girl complete a rotation once by herself. Legs, heart, spirit, all leaping like a running deer.

  Ladli had stopped crying. Her expression resigned, she finished her circle and raised the dagger in salute. To her surprise, Diribani's empty palm was already there to meet it.

  Diribani smiled encouragement, her feet still moving in slow, rhythmic steps.

  Ladli's face tensed with concentration. Like Diribani, she kept dancing. With a sudden motion, the dagger sliced sideways. Again, Diribani's hand touched it. Ladli's expression became even more focused. Inward, Diribani was glad to see--where her attention

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  belonged. While the girl's feet carried her in a tight circle, the dagger flashed out unpredictably. Always, Diribani anticipated it.

  Sweat beaded on their faces as they circled. Diribani knew her muscles would be complaining later, but this was so much fun! The musicians were as talented as temple players, which helped. The spirit drum sped up. Ladli's dagger followed; Diribani extended her senses and matched it. Up, down, sideways. Over her head, behind her knees. The sides of the tent seemed to pulse with the beat of the drums, the rhythm of women breathing in unison.

  And one man.

  At some point, Prince Zahid had stepped inside the tent. His privilege, as Ruqayya's brother, but one he had seldom exercised. He stood, unnoticed as a shadow in the corner. Until Diribani caught his eye.

  Their glances locked for the tiniest instant. The admiration she read in his face jolted her out of step.

  Slap! The dagger missed Diribani's hand and tapped her on the elbow. Startled, she lost her place in the rhythm. She tripped, then tumbled--slowly, gracefully, inevitably--over Ladli's hip and landed in a tangle of pink fabric at Ruqayya's feet. Smiling through her panting breath, Diribani sat up and folded her hands to her opponent.

  No, her partner. Ladli bowed and handed Diribani the dagger hilt-first, to signal surrender. The drummers ended in a flourish. Diribani turned to include them, too, in her appreciation, as the other women clapped their hands. Laughing and exclaiming, they crowded around the dancers.

  Ladli bent over at the waist, breathing in gulps as if she had just run a race. She shook her head. "I couldn't touch her, until she let me."

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  Diribani peeked at the corner of the tent, but Zahid had gone. "As I said, I'm not very good. Tana can keep up for hours."

  "If you're not forbidden to teach us flesh-eaters" --Ruqayya used the rude word deliberately--"I would be honored to learn from you."

  "And I," Ladli said.

  "I would be happy to teach anyone who likes," Diribani said. Carnations fell into her lap. She handed one to Ladli. "You did very well for your first practice." Her legs unfolded. "Oof. I'll pay for this tomorrow. It's better to stretch first."

  "It looks like fun," a girl said.

  "Hard work," another demurred.

  "Both," Diribani answered them truthfully.

  "Tomorrow." Ruqayya directed a servant to begin extinguishing the lamps. At the signal, the other women put on their coats and head scarves. Like giant moths, they drifted off to their sleeping tents.

  Diribani paused to refold her dress wrap into the usual skirt-and-shawl drape. Nissa brought her slippers.

  When they were alone except for the maids, Ruqayya spoke. "You were distracted at the end."

  "Yes," Diribani admitted. The warrior princess missed nothing.

  "Be careful," Ruqayya said.

  Of her brother, did she mean? Or of Diribani's own wandering attention? She stepped into her slippers, thinking about how a spark of intention could leap the greatest distance. About distraction, and danger. Fierce Ruqayya wouldn't warn her of shadows.

  "Good night." Diribani folded her hands to the princess and followed Nissa's lamp into the darkness.

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  ***

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN Tana

  THE metal blade slid over Tana's scalp. She knelt on the bamboo mat, her hands clasped in her lap. Long black locks slithered over her shoulders to land, limp and lifeless, on the ground. Coolness followed, the wind's playful touch tracing naked skin. Though she had agonized over the decision, the sensation itself was pleasant. Tana peeked at her reflection in the basin of water. Her neck seemed longer, her ears more delicate, without hair to hide them. She looked smaller. Older, or younger? She couldn't tell what others would make of her appearance. Her mother, she meant. Her sister. Kalyan.

  Unvarnished honesty, that was her new plan. She had forged it in weeks of temple service and nights of dancing. With the gift of snakes and toads, Naghali-ji had separated Tana from her family, her home, and any possibility of a normal life. In return, the goddess offered her devotees three choices. Tana had escaped death; good fortune eluded her. So she had decided to go in search of wisdom.

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  Diribani's gift had taken her far from Gurath, though never far from Tana's thoughts. Perhaps Tana's fate, too, lay elsewhere.

  The first step was admitting how little she possessed. The shaved head, the orange renunciate's robe, the small bag and wooden begging bowl were just the outward signs of a truth she had accepted in her heart. It had pleased the goddess to strip Tana of everything she valued. So she would search until she discovered what Naghali-ji wanted her to have, or learn, or do.

  "Wash, please," the priestess said.

  Tana bent over the basin, bracing her elbows to face her reflection full-on. Two determined dark eyes stared back. At their fierce expression, she almost jerked away. Deliberately, she closed her eyes and splashed the water over her bald head. Her hair would grow back. Until it did, she would have to get used to this hot-eyed, egg-headed girl.

  The priestess handed her a drying cloth and small clay pot. "The skin will be tender. You don't want to burn, the first few days." She rubbed her own bronze scalp. "Try and keep to the shade."

  "Yes, Ma-ji." Tana spread the salve on her skin. It smelled like coconut. She stowed the jar in her bag. "I'm ready."

  The priestess accompanied her to the temple gate. Tana took a last look at the bustling complex. She had enjoyed
caring for the injured animals and learning more about snakes from the priests. She had served meals to the pilgrims, and, in the evening, danced under the stars to the heart drum and spirit drum. Every word she spoke, each toad and snake, reminded her that she had unfinished business with Naghali-ji.

  Tana's mother had visited the temple and begged her to reconsider. But Tana knew that every day she delayed meant another

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  chance the governor's spies might find her. The sooner she left, the sooner the priestess could tell Alwar that Tana had become someone else's problem. The thought made her smile, a bit grimly.

  "Peace, Tana," the priestess said. "May the twelve guide your steps."

  "Peace, Ma-ji," Tana replied. A lucky frog leaped onto the priestess's bare foot. It rested for a moment, then hopped across the courtyard, delighting several children who were waiting for their father to finish praying at Brother Vilokan's shrine. Tana hitched her bag over her shoulder and stepped into the street. Instead of walking through the city, she circled the walls. A network of footpaths bordered the cultivated fields and jungle thickets around Gurath. Eventually, she found her way to the royal road.

  While she was dancing one night, the question of where to go had answered itself. As Tana had saluted each of the twelve directions, she had almost laughed out loud when her feet turned east-of-north, the point of the compass dedicated to Naghali-ji. What could be more obvious? She even had a guide. Tana could follow the river San to its source.

  Her pilgrimage had begun with auspicious weather. Washed by the rains, the sky was as yet unclouded by the dust that hotter months would bring. Sunlight poured down on groves of mango and pinkfruit, palm and nut trees. The hemp blossoms glowed golden. Wheat and barley ripened in shades of delirious green. Until the emperor's road turned due north to Lomkha, it ran by the San. Tana walked along the shady bank, enjoying the breeze on her scalp.

  Birds who had spent the rainy season elsewhere were returning to Tenth Province. Near the river, Tana heard the whistling of

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  duck wings, the cries of curlews and pipers, and, once, the squawk of a disgruntled night heron. Great flocks passed overhead, flycatchers, finches, swallows, and starlings. Where the smaller birds flew, others followed: eagles and falcons, buzzards and kites. In the shadow of the hunters' wide wings, doves ceased their cooing, quail their chuckling, green parrots their screaming, and mynahs their chattering. Only the frogs in the ditches and the insects in the fields continued shrilling and buzzing, unconcerned.

  People, too, were taking advantage of the fine weather and improved roads. Farmers harvested the rice, millet, and sugarcane sown before the rains. Trade caravans set out from Gurath for the empire's most distant corners. Before Tana left the temple, couriers had begun to come from Prince Zahid, laden with jewels for the governor, and, more precious to Tana, letters from her sister. Ma Hiral had brought them to share with her.

  Together they had read of Diribani's travels, and how she was teaching the white-coat girls to dance. But a whiff of sadness hung between the cheerful lines. Surrounded by the Believers' different customs, attitudes, clothes, and even food, Diribani clearly missed her family and home.

  Tana thought that loneliness made another bond between them. Naghali-ji's gifts, though so different, had parted them with equal swiftness from the lives they knew. Tana wondered whether her journey would take her as far as her sister's. The manner of it was certainly more modest. On foot rather than elephant-back, she shared the road with long lines of camels and oxcarts. Later in the year, the tramping of so many hooves would raise clouds of choking dust. For now, they packed the dirt into a hard, flat surface.

  Outside artisan and farming villages, gangs of children waved

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  and called to the caravan drivers. Once the wagons had passed, they'd dart into the road and fill their baskets with ox dung left behind, to be dried in pats on the village walls and burned for fuel. The only cart they left alone was a corpse wagon, carrying the dead to the cremation grounds outside the city. That driver commanded folded hands and respectful silence.

  The shade trees along the road belonged to the emperor. It was forbidden to raise an ax against them, but dropped branches were free for the taking. As she walked, Tana met girls and boys collecting wood to burn and thin branches to repair shutter lattices. Many people asked for her blessing. She folded her hands and smiled. It was still early in the season for pilgrims, but she had seen a few other orange robes on the road. As long as Tana didn't speak, she blended in, one more traveler going about her business. With every step from Gurath, she felt freer.

  The soft light of late afternoon gilded the treetops and cast the road in thick shadow when she reached a village she recognized. Tana had visited Piplia before with Ba Javerikh and Diribani. The headman was a master gem-cutter who had left Gurath to teach the trade to his extended family. They had built a nice well here, too, if she remembered correctly. A bath would soothe her aching legs. She'd stopped several times to rest, but her feet weren't yet used to walking all day.

  Food first, her stomach informed her. Tana made her way to the grove in the center of the village and sat down in the grass. She leaned against a tree trunk, scratching her back against the rough bark. A sweet smell made her look around, then up. She'd chosen a cork tree: Dangling clusters of long-throated white flowers had released their twilight fragrance. She sniffed with appreciation.

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  Placing her begging bowl on the ground in front of her, she sat and waited.

  Within moments, the first child spotted her. Curious eyes peered from behind a mango tree. Feet pattered in the grass, and then came the familiar shout: "Ma, there's a pilgrim." How many times had Tana heard Indu say exactly the same thing?

  Soon a young girl brought her a cup of tea. A boy followed, bearing rice cakes spread with butter, and slices of dried mango. "There was soup earlier, but we ate it. Sorry, Mina-ji."

  Tana smiled and folded her hands. She sipped and ate, enjoying the peaceful scene. Men and women were returning from the fields or the well, tired and dirty or laughing and clean, depending. A horse whinnied; a cow lowed in answer. Dogs barked from the courtyards they defended. As daylight faded, doves cooed sleepy songs in the branches above her. Tana heard the rackety-rack noise of grinders and cutters slow, then stop. In the workshop, artisans would be cleaning their tools, sweeping up the dust, and returning the gemstones to their marked pouches. Each one must be accounted for at every stage, from mine to finished ornament. The familiar sounds made her feel at home.

  "Peace to you, pilgrim." The headman's wife appeared, resplendent in a melon-colored dress wrap. She carried a pot of spicy lentils. Ladling some into Tana's bowl, she leaned closer to study her face in the dim light. "Mina Tana?"

  Tana rubbed her bald head. "I'm surprised you recognized me, Ma-ji." A green frog fell from her lips and hid, its color indistinguishable from the grass.

  "Aaah!" The woman hugged her pot of lentils to her chest. "It's true, then, what we heard. You'll honor our house tonight, Mina

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  Tana? My husband and his guest will want to hear the story from your own lips."

  "Outside is better for talking," Tana said. "And I don't mean to burden you with more visitors."

  "It's no trouble," the woman assured her. She eyed the snake at Tana's other side. "That ratter, is he spoken for? With the white-coats' bounty, it's difficult to get a healthy house naga."

  Tana shook her head.

  "Please excuse me." The woman hurried away. "Vilina," she called. "Vilina, bring the snake basket."

  Tana ate her lentils. The snake stretched lazily, as if it found its new existence good. Tana watched it over her bowl. As long as a house naga appeared at least once in a conversation, it seemed that people would excuse Tana's other shortcomings.

  But when the horse whinnied again, Tana stiffened. Dropping the begging bowl, she crept to the edge of the grove and peered around a tree
at the headman's compound. Through the gate, a white shape was visible, ghostly in the twilight.

  No ratter could excuse Tana's stupidity. What else could she call it? Lulled by the day's lack of event, the stroll through a peaceful countryside, Tana had jeopardized her entire plan to slip unnoticed out of Gurath. Like a fool, she had stopped at a village where she was likely to be recognized. She had spoken. She had even disregarded Jasmine's familiar whinnying. How many people rode white horses to a gem-cutters' village? She couldn't bear another argument with him, or, worse, uncomfortable constraint.

  Tana slipped between the trees and made for the well. Unlike Gurath's large open tank, this one was a single shaft dug deep into the earth. A small pavilion marked the flight of steps leading down.

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  Lamps glowed in their niches, illuminating the snake curves painted over the doorway. As Tana remembered, a decorative stone border surmounted the pavilion. Flowering vines wound up the pillars and spilled across the roof. Through the years, the stems had grown thick and woody, strong enough to support her weight.

  Grateful for the concealing darkness, Tana climbed up to the roof and wormed her way under the vines. Generations of children had played here, leaving nests lined with mango pits, empty nutshells, cracked clay cups. Birds twittered at Tana's intrusion, but soon quieted.

  She'd been just quick enough. A lantern glowed by the headman's gate. It bobbed through the grove to the flowering cork tree. To judge by the voices, the ratter had been secured, and Tana's begging bowl discovered. She recognized the headman's voice, and his wife's. But the person calling her name most loudly was Kalyan.

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  ***