by Steven Brust
“Here it goes,” he told the jhereg. The jhereg watched him mutely.
Savn held the patch next to the wound, and at as close to the same time as he could, withdrew the makeshift tube and slapped the cloth over it.
Vlad moaned once, but fortunately didn’t begin thrashing. Savn watched his chest motions, but they never wavered. He held the patch in place and took some of the longer strips to wind them about Vlad’s body.
One problem that he hadn’t anticipated was how hard it would be to get the cloth under the Easterner’s back while making sure the patch didn’t slip from the wound, which would open up the Cavern of the Heart and he’d have to do everything all over again. In the end, he had to let go of the patch for an instant, but fortunately the wax seemed to hold it against Vlad’s skin long enough for Savn to slip the cloth strip under him. He positioned it carefully, then tied it tight around the Easterner’s stomach, making sure it held the patch in place. Then, just to be sure, he wrapped two more strips around Vlad, again making them as tight as he could.
He let out his breath as if he’d been holding it the entire time, and said, “I don’t believe I did it.” He stood up and staggered over to a nearby tree to rest his back. He noticed that his hands were shaking. That was stupid. Why should they shake now, when everything was all right? Well, it was a good thing they hadn’t been shaking before.
The smaller jhereg hissed at him angrily. It seemed to be staring intently at Vlad’s left leg, where blood had soaked through his leggings.
“Oh,” said Savn wearily. “Yes. Well, he can’t be bleeding much, or he’d be dead already.” The jhereg resumed hissing at Savn. He sighed and went back to Vlad, made a slit down his legging and pulled it back to expose the wound, which was still bleeding, though not profusely. He splashed water over it so he could see it better, and because water was always good for keeping the Fever Imps from a wound.
The small jhereg was staring at Savn, as if waiting to hear the report of his examination. “The seam itself is but shallow,” he said, imitating Master Wag’s tones, “yet the scar will go from his knee to his ankle, and it will take a great deal of cloth to cover it. I hope I have enough,” he added to himself. Then he noticed how bloody the water was, and resolved to find a stream and get clean water as soon as he could.
Vlad was still talking to himself. Savn made certain his breathing was all right and that his throat looked straight, then set about cutting the rest of the sheet into strips, wondering why his throat had been fixed at that funny angle, and what had caused it to return to normal. He would have to ask the Master about that.
Master Wag would, no doubt, consider that today had been well-spent in learning his future trade, but Savn had no intention of telling him about it.
He gave Vlad a last inspection. As far as he could tell, the Easterner would be fine; he’d even stopped mumbling. For a moment Savn just stared at the Easterner, amazed that someone who had been so close to dying a few short minutes before now appeared to be sleeping peacefully, as if nothing at all was wrong with him. He felt unreasonably annoyed, as if Vlad’s apparent health were mocking all the work he’d done. Then he shook his head. “I’ll never understand how people are put together,” he muttered.
She perched in one of the thick lower branches of a friendly maple and watched her mate, waiting for the signal to kill, but it didn’t come.
She was not unhappy with the battle she’d been in earlier, but when the Provider had been hurt, her mate had screamed as if he’d been the one who was injured. She wished she’d understood what the fight had been about, since no one had seemed interested in eating anyone, but she was used to this. She also wished her mate would decide once and for all whether this soft one below her was a friend or an enemy.
Her mate continued watching it, and she felt his moods—now suspicion, now amusement, now something not unlike affection—but never a firm decision. She whipped her tail with impatience, but he didn’t notice, and just then she suddenly realized that the Provider was going to live. This surprised her, although she hadn’t been aware of how she knew he was dying, either.
And at about this same time, her mate suddenly turned, took to the air, and landed beside her.
Very well, then, they’d let the soft one live. She hoped either it or the Provider would supply some food soon; she was hungry, and she hated hunting.
Chapter Ten
I will not marry a wealthy trader,
I will not marry a wealthy trader,
He’d keep me now and sell me later.
Hi-dee hi-dee ho-la!
Step on out ...
Savn became aware that the shadows had lengthened, and wondered if he’d fallen asleep, sitting with his back to the tree. Perhaps he had. Everything was very still. He checked Vlad’s breathing, which was all right, then checked the bandage on his leg, which had soaked through. He removed it and inspected the wound. It was no longer bleeding, at any rate—or, rather, it hadn’t been bleeding until he removed the bandage. He knew there was a way to take bandages off without starting the wound to bleeding again, but he couldn’t remember what it was. It annoyed him that he could have managed something as tricky as getting Veld’s lungs working again but couldn’t remember how to treat a wound.
But he cleaned it once more, using the water sparingly, then wrapped it in what remained of Tem’s fine cloth bedsheet. He noticed again how bloody the water looked, and wondered if it really mattered; it was, after all, Vlad’s own blood; perhaps it was good for him.
He leaned against the tree again. He wondered if he ought to go to Master Wag’s where he was expected, but he didn’t want to leave Vlad alone; he preferred not to take any chances on someone or something, by accident or design, undoing all of his work.
As this thought formed, he realized that he felt rather fine; he had managed a very difficult procedure under far from ideal conditions, in spite of having only the vaguest idea of what the problem was, much less the solution. He looked at Vlad and smiled, then looked at the two jhereg, who were now seated next to each other on the ground, their wings folded.
“I feel like I can do anything,” he told them.
The smaller one looked at him for a moment, then curled around and rested its head on its neck, looking at Vlad. What was the relationship between Vlad and the jhereg? It had something to do with witchcraft, he knew, but what was it exactly? Would he ever know? Would he ever be enough of a witch to do such things himself?
Why not?
If he could save a man’s life with a jug of water and two pieces of leather, he ought to be able to perform spells, especially after everything he’d been shown. He remembered that odd state of mind, which felt like a dream, but where his thoughts were sharper than being awake—distant, but present. Why shouldn’t he be able to get there himself? He remembered how Vlad had done it; he should be able to do it on his own.
He leaned back against the tree, pretending he was sinking into it. Slowly, methodically, he took himself through the procedure that Vlad had shown him, relaxing his head, neck, shoulder, arms, and every other part of his body. By the time he reached the soles of his feet, he felt curiously lethargic—he knew he could move if he wanted to, but he didn’t want to; he was held motionless by his own will. It was an odd feeling, but not quite what he wanted.
Sink, he told himself. Back into the tree, down into the ground. Feel heavy. I am a beam of light, and empty, and I will travel in and down. I am heavy, so I will fall. There are steps that lead into the tree, past its roots. I will take each, one at a time, and with each step, I will go deeper. And, almost to his surprise, it worked—he felt light as air, heavy as stone; his vision was as intense as a dream, yet he could control it.
He was very aware of his own breathing, of the sounds of the small, scurrying animals around him, of the light through his eyelids. He wished to remove himself from all of these things that were part of his world, so: Again, deeper. Deeper. Draw in and down.
Savn imagin
ed his body sinking further through the dirt and the clay and the stone, and with each layer, he became more distant from himself, from Vlad, from the world he knew. He was aware of controlling his descent, and so he gave up the control, and drifted.
Falling through the ground to the spaces beneath, alone, spinning in place, seeing without eyes, walking without legs, coming to an emptiness where emotion is pale and translucent, and sensations are the fog through which thoughts are observed. He regarded himself, reflected in narrow seclusion, and realized that, in fact, he was not alone, had never been alone. His sister, his mother, his father. Master Wag—they slowly spun around him, looking away; his own gaze retreated and advanced, went past them all, past his friends, past the Easterner.
He created a vast forest to walk through—a forest the like of which he’d never seen, where the trees rubbed shoulders and their tall, thick branches created a roof. At his feet was a large silver goblet. He picked it up and carried it with him for a while, enjoying the coolness he imagined against his fingers. Or did he imagine it?
There was a break in the forest, a clearing, and tall grasses grew there. He was barefoot now, and he loved the way the grass felt between his toes. In the center of the clearing was a pond of clear water. He dipped his goblet into it, and drank. It was very cold, yet he knew that he could dive in and it would be as warm as a spring afternoon. He thought of doing so, but now was not the time. He walked on, and before him was a high stone wall. In the way of dreams, it had appeared before him with no warning, stretching out to the sides forever, and towering high above him. For a moment he quailed, as if it were a threat rather than an obstacle, but he thought, This is my dream, I can do as I will.
And so he took to the sky, like a jhereg, circling once, then up, past the wall and out over the chasm of the future, into which he could climb or jump, the choice arbitrary but full of significance.
Like a jhereg?
There was a jhereg there—no, two of them—flying about over and under him, saying, Isn’t it grand to fly to fly to fly? But now you must choose must choose must choose.
It annoyed him, to be told what he had to do by jhereg, so he refused to choose, but instead continued once he was over the wall, continued aloft, light as the air, warmed by the winds of chance, until the burden of his own power threatened to pull him down.
“I need wings,” he said to the emptiness below him.
“No,” said a voice which he did not recognize. “You are wings. You do not fly, you are flight.”
The surprise of hearing a voice where nothing could exist outside of his will was buffered by the words themselves—What did it mean to be flight? He was now wrapped in the dream fabric he had created, and in his confusion chasm and world disappeared, leaving him bodiless and nowhere, yet he scarcely noticed, for the sensation of flight never left, which, he realized suddenly, was the answer.
“I can go anywhere, then; do anything.”
“Yes.” The voice was quiet, and echoed oddly in what were not his ears, its age and sex impossible to determine, and irrelevant.
“But this is only my dream. When I am awake, I can’t fly and there is only one path.”
“This place will always be here.”
“But it isn’t real.”
“Real? No. It is not. The trick is to find this place along the one path you think you have. Then, perhaps, you will find others.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I know.”
“This is where Vlad lives, isn’t it?”
“Sometimes.”
“Are you G’mon, the Lord of Dreams?”
The answer was accompanied by a laugh that reminded him of Polyi’s. “No.”
“Then who are you?”
“It does not matter.”
Below him, around him, there were points of light. He knew without trying that he could focus on any of them, and learn of it, and it would be as important as he chose to make it. How, then, to choose among them?
“What does matter?” he said.
“You matter, and he matters.”
“He? Vlad?”
“Yes.”
“I need his help.”
“Yes, you do. But he needs you more than you need him, you know.”
“I saved his life.”
“Yes. And he will need you again.”
“For what?”
“Be kind,” said the voice, trailing away in an impossible direction. He tried to follow, and rose up, up, up. The world he had built was gone, so he thought to build another as he rose. He was climbing now, and weaving in and out of thick strands that were the roots of the tree of the world. There was a strange sound, and it was a coolness on his face. The darkness had become light, yet he was unaware of the transition. Sensations grew, and seemed real: a stiffness in a shoulder, the fluttering of a bird, the smell of the trees and the brush.
He opened his eyes.
“You were far away,” said Vlad.
Savn stared. The Easterner still lay on his back, but his eyes were open. In his hand was the wax plug from the bottle, and the two leather sheaths that were still thrust through it.
“You’re awake,” said Savn.
“Yes.”
“How do you feel?”
“Pleased to be alive, as well as surprised.”
“No,” said Vlad, “don’t tell me.” He looked at the odd device in his hand, inspecting the blood at the cut end of the sword sheath. “I think I’d rather not know how you did it.”
“All right.”
“But I owe you my life, and I won’t forget that. Where did you go?”
“I was, uh, I guess I was exploring.”
“How was your journey?”
“It was ... I don’t know. I’m not sure where I went.”
“Tell me about it.”
“Well, I was alone, only then everyone was there, and I made a forest and walked through it, and then there was a wall, and I flew over it, and there was a voice....” He scowled. “I don’t think I can describe it.”
“That was sufficient,” said Vlad. “You went to visit your dreams.”
“Yes. I knew it was a dream, and I knew I was making it up.”
“Did you like your dream?”
“Yes,” said Savn, sitting up suddenly. “I did.”
“That’s a good sign, then. You should always like your own dreams.”
Savn didn’t know what to say. On the one hand, he wanted to talk about it, but on the other, it seemed too private. He waited for Vlad to ask him a question, but the Easterner just closed his eyes.
“I have some food,” said Savn.
“Not now,” said Vlad.
“Do you think you can move?”
“No.”
“Oh. I’d like to get you somewhere safer.”
“Then you know I’m in danger?”
“I saw the fight.”
“Oh, yes. Sorry. It’s a little hazy. How did I do?”
“How did you—”
“Never mind. Perhaps it will come back to me.”
The two jhereg rose, took a couple of steps forward, and flew off. Savn tried to follow them with his eyes, but they soon became lost in the trees. A moment later, Vlad said, “There is no one around.”
“Still,” said Savn. “I’d like—”
“In a while. I’m feeling very weak, right now; I need to rest. You don’t have to stay, however. I’ll be fine.”
Savn grunted. Vlad started to say something else, but instead he closed his eyes again. Savn ate bread and cheese, then took a chance and carried the water jug to the nearest stream and filled it, which took over an hour. When he returned, Vlad was still sleeping, but presently his eyes snapped open and he said, “Is someone pounding nails into my side?”
“No, you—”
“Just wondering.”
“It hurts?”
Vlad didn’t see fit to answer this question; he just closed his eyes tightly, then opened them again, then closed
them once more and fell asleep. Savn felt his forehead, which he remembered to be the first place the Imps of Fever liked to attack, once a wound had allowed them into the body—he remembered how Master Wag had sat up with Lorr from Bigcliff for three days, bathing his head and chanting. But Vlad’s forehead seemed, if anything, slightly cool. Perhaps Easterners had cooler blood than humans.
It occurred to Savn that wet applications and chanting couldn’t hurt, in any case. He took some bloody scraps of the first bandage he’d made, dampened them, and put them on Vlad’s forehead, while pronouncing as much as he could remember of the ward against Fever Imps. He also tried to make Vlad drink water, and had some success, though much more water dribbled down his face than went into his mouth. Savn continued the chanting and the applications for about half an hour, until he noticed that Vlad was awake and watching him.
“How do you feel?” said Savn, who, for some reason, felt self-conscious.
“Weak,” said Vlad. “My side hurts like ... It hurts.”
“Can you eat?”
“No.”
“You should eat.”
“Soon.”
“All right. Want some water?”
“Yes.”
Savn gave him some water.
“I’ve been having some odd dreams,” said Vlad. “I can’t tell how many of them are real. Did I just have a fight with about six very large people with swords, wearing livery of the Athyra?”
“Seven, I think.”
“And one of them got me?”
“Two or three.”
“And I got a few of them?”
“Yes.”
“So that much was real. I was afraid it might be. Did someone harness me to a horse and use me as a plow?”
“No.”
“I suspected that was a dream. Were there three little tiny people standing around me arguing about who got what pieces of my body, and what to do with the rest?”
“No.”
“Good. I wasn’t sure about that one.” He winced suddenly, his jaw muscles tightening and his eyes squinting. Whatever it was passed and he let out his breath. “My side really hurts,” he said conversationally.
“I wish there was something I could do,” said Savn. “I don’t know much about stopping pain—”