Bascha, I said inwardly, please don’t die on me yet. I need you to rescue me.
If she could, she would.
If she couldn’t, I wasn’t sure I cared if Rafiq—or anyone else—cut me to pieces.
As the horses moved out, as mine was chivvied along, I shut my eyes. Everything in me rebelled.
But then I glanced over my shoulder. Nayyib had turned. Was ducking into the shelter. She wouldn’t be alone.
I will try, he had said, to make certain she doesn’t die.
“Do better than try,” I muttered.
When Rafiq asked me what I had said, I held my silence. After a moment he shook his head and kicked his horse into a trot. Mine, and theirs, went with him.
About the time I began to doze off in the saddle for the fifth or sixth time, Rafiq woke me with a comment and a question. “Your horse looks ridiculous. What made you do that to him?”
I sighed, shifted in the saddle, swore inwardly; it is not comfortable riding with your wrists tied in front of you and leashes around your neck. Especially when your body wants to slump forward over the horse’s neck, and your neck has nooses around it. “Bald, blue-headed priest-mages.”
He had dropped back to ride near me. Now he eyed me askance. “Sticking to that story, are we?”
Well, except for the gelding’s adornments, it was the truth. But I countered with a question of my own. “What exactly is this contest Umir’s holding?”
“He wants to see who’s the best sword-dancer.”
“We already did that in Iskandar a couple of years ago.” I recalled it very clearly. Del had killed the Northern borjuni Ajani there, satisfying her vow to avenge the death of her family.
“It didn’t end quite the way anyone expected,” Rafiq said.
That was an understatement. All hoolies had broken loose, and Del and I had left town as quickly as possible. “So Umir’s decided to start putting on exhibitions? Isn’t that a little odd for him?”
“He wants to find out so he can hire the best.”
“The best for what?”
“Protecting his business interests. Full-time employment with one of the richest men in the South until retirement. Not bad work, if you can get it.”
It was not unusual for a sword-dancer to hire on with one employer for a term of service, but it had always been situational. I’d never heard of a permanent employment. “And you want it.”
“I want it, and I intend to get it.”
“And these two friends of yours are just along for the ride?”
Rafiq laughed. “Oh, no. Ozmin and Mahmood will take their chances, too. But they know I’m better than they are.”
“Sometimes,” Ozmin said, from my left.
“Usually I just take pity on you and let you think you’re better,” said Mahmood from my right.
I ignored them and addressed my comments to Rafiq. “What does it have to do with me? I’m not a sword-dancer. I can’t play with the big boys anymore.”
“Oh, he’s making an exception for you. Or maybe that should be we are. Not in the way you expect, maybe, but it ought to be worth it regardless.”
“And what is that?”
“Dessert.”
“Dessert?”
“Well, reward, really. You.” He grinned. “You’re not a stupid man, Tiger, and you know the South very well—as was proven by your disappearance. Everyone wants you. But it might take years for any of us to track you down in order to kill you. This way, you’re right there at hand. An extra prize for the last sword-dancer standing: the chance to kill the Sandtiger in a dance to the death. Umir put out the word months ago, but you’d disappeared.”
“You found me easily enough.” Not that it made me happy.
Rafiq shrugged. “That was luck. I was at Fouad’s waiting to meet up with Ozmin and Mahmood when your young friend came in asking about a healer. I had no idea where you were, or even that you were back from wherever it was you disappeared to.” He grinned. “Probably you should have stayed there.”
So, maybe Nayyib hadn’t sold us out. Maybe he’d had no real choice about leading them back to us.
Or maybe he had.
Maybe, maybe, maybe.
Frowning, I guided the gelding over a rocky patch, hoping he wouldn’t stumble and strangle me by accident. But he was a rather comfortable ride, despite the circumstances. Del hadn’t exaggerated. If I were on the stud, I’d have been choked ten times over by now.
Which reminded me that he was still missing. And now likely to stay that way; Nayyib wouldn’t know to go looking for him, and Del was too sick to suggest it.
To take my mind off that, I looked at Rafiq. “And Umir, I suppose, will reward you for bringing me in.”
“Handsomely. And this way if I don’t win the contest, I still benefit from it.” He laughed as he saw my dubious expression. “I’m not stupid, Tiger; there’s always a chance something might prevent me from winning. I could trip at the wrong time. Get a blister on my thumb. Lose a finger.” He glanced pointedly at my hands. “All the other losers will just be losers. I’ll walk away with Umir’s coin in my purse, and the honor of bringing in the Sandtiger to face punishment.”
“We will walk away,” Ozmin clarified.
Mahmood nodded. “We’re splitting it, remember? Otherwise you could have taken him on by yourself. And we all know who’d have won that contest.”
Maybe not, in my current condition. I contemplated leather knots glumly. I’d known returning to the South was a risk. Being challenged by Khashi in Julah was merely the first of many I expected to face. But that was one by one. Umir’s scheme likely would get me killed. At Alimat we’d held many such contests to test our skills against one another, because competition brought out the best. It focused the mind, honed the talent. By the time the two finalists met, regardless of cuts, bruises, and slashes, they were prepared for anything.
Whoever came out of Umir’s contest the winner would be very, very good, and very, very hungry for his—dessert.
“Doesn’t sound like there’s much in it for me.” I said lightly.
Rafiq affected surprise. “But of course there is! You’ll have the honor of dying in front of men you trained with, sparred with, danced with, even drank with. Men you respect, and who respect—respected—you. Who will never forget you and will speak your name to others. How better for a sword-dancer to die? It’s our kind’s immortality.” Then his expression hardened. “Oh, but I was forgetting. You have no honor. You aren’t a sword-dancer. You’re just a man whom no one will remember, whose name is never spoken. A man who never lived, and thus can have no immortality.” Rafiq added with elaborate scorn, “A man such as you might just as well have been born a slave.”
The verbal blade went home, as he had intended. My origins weren’t a secret. They’d been part of the legend: a Salset slave had, against all odds, risen to become a seventh-level, Alimat-trained sword-dancer, favored by the shodo. When you’re a legend, origins don’t matter except as seasoning for the story.
Now, of course, I wasn’t a legend. And Rafiq wanted a reaction. Maybe he wanted me to choke myself trying to reach him. But I merely grinned at him. “So much for honor. I don’t think there is much in killing a former chula.”
His face darkened. After a moment he kicked his horse into a trot and went ahead again.
While I, meanwhile, blessed the bald, blue-headed priest-mages for forcing me to rededicate myself to one of the teachings of my shodo.
Discipline.
It was its own kind of magic.
ELEVEN
BY THE TIME we reached the place Rafiq identified as Umir’s somewhere near sundown, I was tired, thirsty, hungry, sunburned, and more than a little sore from a long ride with my hands tied, not to mention the residual debilitating effects of sandtiger poison. Most of it had worked its way out of my system—and this was my third encounter, so my reaction was somewhat lessened—but I wasn’t exactly feeling myself. Rafiq and his friends had given me water along the way,
but they didn’t claim a spare burnous among them, so all I had to wear was my dhoti. Not to mention I hadn’t eaten for a couple of days thanks to the sandtiger attack, and now that the worst of the sickness had passed my belly was complaining.
Last time I’d looked, Umir had concentrated his holdings farther north. It was very unlike him to take himself so far south. But he was a tanzeer who enjoyed buying all manner of items he deemed worthy of his collections, and I guess domains qualified. For all I knew he’d added five or six since I’d sailed for Skandi.
The house was, I decided as we approached, fairly modest for a man of Umir’s wealth and tastes, being little more than a series of interconnected, low-roofed rooms built of adobe, the pervasive mudbrick of the South, with timber roofs. Except Umir had had his adobe smoothed into silken slickness and painted pristine white with lime, so it glowed in the sun. Tall palm trees formed clustered lines of sentinels around the house, and masses of vegetation peeped over courtyard walls, indicating there was good access to water. Which I saw proved as we rode into the front courtyard: a three-tiered fountain spilled water into a large tile basin. This was wealth incarnate. Trust Umir to find water at the edges of the Punja.
Thirst reestablished itself. I wanted nothing more than to fall into the fountain, but good old Ozmin and Mahmood still had me closely leashed. Rafiq tracked down a servant, explained his business, and within a matter of moments we were politely invited to dismount in the cobbled, shaded courtyard. The horses were taken away by grooms. Damp cloths were presented to Rafiq and his two friends to wipe off the worst of the trail dust; I was ignored. Ozmin and Mahmood still shadowed me on either side, leashes coiled in their hands. In dhoti, dust, sunburn, and sweat, I was definitely at a disadvantage when it came to presentability.
We were permitted into the house and left to wait in a reception room of airy spaciousness, with tile floors and colorful tribal rugs. Priceless items were set in nooks and adorned walls. Low tiled tables displayed other items, including thin, colored glass bowls and bottles, which I found more than a little risky with numerous careless sword-dancers trooping through the house. But maybe that was part of the appeal for Umir.
After a suitably lengthy wait intended to intimidate lesser personages, Umir’s steward appeared. Said steward then led us through the reception room out into what I thought was a courtyard off the back of the house. Except I discovered it was nothing like. The back of the house was constructed of plain walls bowing out from the main house like a bubble. Thick, curved walls approximately six feet high. No exposed bricks. No adornment. No windows. No vegetation. No fountains. No nothing, except elegantly curving walls that met precisely opposite where we were standing, and imported silk-smooth Punja sand raked into perfection.
A circle.
A very large circle, more expansive than a proper sword-dance required; I suspected the sword-dancers not fighting a given match would stand against the walls to watch. There was no danger in doing so; a man who stepped out of the circle drawn in the sand forfeited the match, and we all of us had learned to dance in close quarters. That was part of the beauty, the art, and the challenge.
Umir, I realized with a start of surprise, had had the house built with his sword-dancer contest in mind. If it were true he intended to hire the winner for life—or at least for the balance of his professional career—it was no surprise sword-dancers would come from all over the South. Likely at retirement Umir would settle some land and a dwelling on him; not a bad job at all. I’d even be interested myself, if I weren’t scheduled to be the post-dance entertainment.
Waiting in the sun surrounded by white-painted walls wasn’t my idea of fun, especially since I was tired enough my eyes kept trying to cross. I scrubbed with bound hands at the sweat and dust filming my face and considered plopping myself down in the sand, then eyed Ozmin and Mahmood and decided against it. But as Rafiq and his friends grew impatient enough to start complaining, the master of the house appeared.
Umir the Ruthless was a tall, slender, aristocratic man with high cheekbones, arched nose, and dark skin, all classic features of a Southroner save for his eyes, which were a pale gray. I’d always assumed Umir had some Borderer in him. As was habitual, he wore robes of the finest fabrics. The toes of soft, dyed-leather slippers peeked out from under the bullioned hems.
He spoke to Rafiq, but didn’t look at him. His gaze was fastened on me. “Well done.”
Rafiq had never claimed any subtlety. “When do we get paid? Now, or after he’s dead?”
Umir was unruffled. “Oh, now, of course. I’ll have my steward tend to it.” He assessed me with a faint smile. “Well, Sandtiger… the last time we met, I wished to acquire your woman. Does it please you to know I now wish to acquire you?”
“Depends on what you want me for,” I answered. “Now, if it was me you wanted to hire for lifetime employment, we could probably work something out. But if I’m meant to be dessert, probably not.”
One brow lifted delicately. “Dessert?”
“I told him what you plan,” Rafiq offered. “How he’s to be the reward for the winner.”
“Oh, but you should have left that to me,” Umir murmured. “You have deprived me of amusement.” Apparently he’d made some kind of signal, because two large men appeared from the house. Umir indicated them with a negligent gesture. “Rafiq, you and your friends are free to avail yourselves of my hospitality with the other sword-dancers, in the visitor’s wing. This particular guest is now the responsibility of my house.”
I just love the way a cultured man finds euphemisms for everything. Guest. Hah.
Ozmin and Mahmood were happy enough to hand over the leashes to Umir’s large servants. The steward presented a coin pouch to Rafiq and led them back inside. Which left me outside with Umir, and my two keepers.
The tanzeer’s expansive gesture encompassed his circle. “Do you like it?”
He waited expectantly. I hitched one shoulder in a half-shrug. “Rather attractive in a spare, unassuming sort of way.”
“Oh, yes. Very minimalist. No distractions that way. Merely the pure, elegant art of the sword-dance.”
He had not brought me out here to discuss the attractions of his architecture but to impress upon me this was to be where I died. I thought again of sitting down, or asking if I could go back out front and fall face-first into the fountain. Did neither, under Umir’s examination.
The tanzeer’s nostrils flared with distaste. “Why is it whenever I see you, you are in a state of utter filth and dishabille?”
I smiled winningly. “I lead an active life.”
He made a dismissive gesture. “Well, for a short time, at least, you shall enjoy the best my poor house has to offer. Scented baths, oils, the finest of food and wine, comfortable lodgings; even women, if you like. I do not stint my guests.”
At this point, wobbly as I was, it all sounded wonderful—except for the women. Well, even they sounded wonderful in the abstract. (Once upon a time the women wouldn’t have been abstract at all, but Del had reformed me.)
“I’m not a guest,” I said. “I’m dessert.”
Umir smoothed the front of his figured silk overrobe with a slender hand weighted with rings. “I would be remiss if I offered my other guests dessert lacking in piquancy. By the time you step into the circle, you will be well fed, rested, and fit.”
“Hasn’t anyone told you?” I asked. “I can’t step into a circle anymore. That’s the whole point of elaii-ali-ma.”
He waved that away. “Call it what you wish. A square, if you like. But you will fight for me, Sandtiger. As only you can.”
I lifted brows. “What’s in it for me? What possible motivation would I have for meeting the winner of your little contest?”
Umir’s eyes and tone were level. “Until last year, you were a man of honor. An Alimat-trained, seventh-level sword-dancer of immense skill and repute. I saw what took place at Sabra’s palace, how you stopped the dance against Abbu Bensir and declared el
aii-ali-ma. It was for the woman, was it not? The Northern woman. Well, I understand her worth. Not for the same reason, perhaps, but that hardly matters. You made an outcast of yourself for her sake. It had nothing to do with disenchantment with the oaths you swore, the life you chose. You may deny it now, to me, but when you step into that circle—and it will be a circle—you will recall those oaths. They will once again rule your life. You will dance, Sandtiger—and yes, I do mean dance—because you will have no other choice. It is all you know. It is what you are. And you will die with whatever honor you may make of your last dance.”
Umir was right. With my life at stake, I would not refuse to dance. But… “You know, I’m getting really, really tired of everyone assuming I’ll lose.”
The tanzeer stared at me with the faintest of puzzled frowns.
I spelled it out for him. “I might win, Umir. What happens then?”
He shook his head. “I have been given to understand that it is an impossibility you might win.”
“Oh? Why? Did you ask Rafiq? Someone else? How can anyone be sure what will happen?” I took one step toward him, as much as I was willing to risk while on doubled leashes. “What if I win, Umir? What happens then?”
He was baffled. “But you have broken all your oaths. It was explained to me.”
I laughed. “Yes, but broken oaths and loss of honor does not necessarily translate to loss of skill.”
Clearly Umir had never considered I might win. Clearly none of the sword-dancers he’d consulted considered I might win. Which is just the way I liked it.
“So,” I said, “does the deal apply to me? I win, and you offer me employment?”
His face was very stiff. “I find it highly unlikely you would win.”
I lifted brows. “Why? Do you intend to drug me?”
Color stained his cheeks. “Of course not! I am not Sabra, who was interested only in punishing and killing you. I want a true dance. A true winner. There will be no trickery.”
“Your winner won’t dance with me,” I said. “He’ll fight me. He’ll attempt to kill me. And I will do my very best to kill him. And if I do, I expect some reward for it. Something more than dessert.”
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