The Rose Sea

by S. M. Stirling

  Karah knew she could not possibly live, and yet she did not die. The fiery currents carried her, and tossed her, and ate into her, and she knew what they did. All the world was pain and blinding blood-red light.

  She clawed her way up, swimming through fluid thicker than tar. Pain devoured her, and twice she stopped and let the fluxes drag her around and wished herself dead. But both times she changed her mind. Both times, as the burning sea clutched her and dragged her down, she regained her courage and pulled toward the air.

  Her head broke free of the lava, and she found she could see. A wave carried her upward, and she noted the direction of the black and featureless shore. Then it crashed on top of her, and buried her in liquid pain again. She swam in a daze, fighting for the shore while the sea in turn battled to keep her from it.

  And then she felt solid ground under her feet, and dragged herself from the burning sea onto the burning shore. The beach was smooth as glass or ice; so hot at the very edge it still glowed red and stuck to her flesh as she crawled, though farther away from the lava waves, it cooled fractionally and felt harder. She stood. She was incredibly weary, but there was no place to lie down, no place to rest. She trudged up the beach, her back turned to the searing heat of the sea. Ahead of her was only darkness. Her eyes strained for any feature, any detail—and finally she spotted movement off to her right.

  She plodded toward whatever it was that moved. She was battered by noise and heat and pain, and not really curious. But going toward something seemed better than going toward nothing.

  She came over the top of a glass dune, and realized what she had seen before had only been the hands and tops of the heads of those who moved She stopped as realization dawned on her, and threw her hands over her face and knelt on the ground. She faced the Three; the Father, the Mother, and the Child.

  Nothing happened to her, and she dared to look up. The Three watched her. They made no move toward her, gave her no sign—but they watched her. The Father was as she'd always thought he would be—falcon-headed, with the torso of a man and the body of a huge lion. His body was seamed and bloodied, and she realized all four of his great paws were chained to rock. The Mother was taller than Karah would ever have imagined Her hips and shoulders were as broad as they should have been, but all ten of her breasts were withered and dry, her pale skin was bruised, and her face was etched with pain. The Child, a massive wolf cub, threw back his head and howled—and his anguish was blotted out by the eternal roar of the sea. Karah could see that he'd gnawed his paws bloody where they were held to the glass beach by huge jawed traps.

  How can I free them? Karah wondered and crept forward to look at their manacles and their chains.

  Before she was within range, the Father struck at her with his beak, and the Mother swiped at her with one clawed hand. Karah looked into the Mothers face and backed away. Her eyes glowed like reflected fire from the sea, and she bared long white fangs.

  The Child snapped and lunged.

  Karah knelt again, carefully out of their reach, touched cheeks and forehead, and prayed.

  The wild-eyed ghost from her tent suddenly appeared, and took her hand, and leapt into the air. Karah was again enveloped in darkness and total silence. The sudden absence of heat and noise and pain left her giddy.

  And then they were in her tent again, she and the madman.

  Dawn was at hand—the sky outside her tent was pink. The air felt cold to her, though she knew it was not, and smelled fresh. Her head sagged forward, and she told the ghost, "Leave me."

  The old man whispered in her ear, "You must save them, Fateborn. You were born to free the gods—but you are not yet worthy. You are flawed—you are flawed and must be tempered before you are of suitable metal to cut away their chains. I will be your forge."

  Karah fell forward onto her bedroll and groaned, "You will be my death."

  "Only if you prove unworthy in spite of me."

  Karah opened one eye and squinted up at the madman. He still sat cross-legged, and stared blindly off into nothingness, or the eternal beyond. She noticed that he became more translucent with every passing second.

  She closed her eyes, and murmured. "Please, just kill me now."

  First Captain Morkaarin's voice said, "If you aren't out of that tent in five seconds, I just might. You've slept through call."

  Karah's whole body jerked, and she opened bleary eyes, and noted two legs in high boots outside her tent opening. "Oh, godsall, no. I can't get up," she groaned. "I'm dying."

  The First Captain's face peered into her tent. Karah noted that what had been an expression of annoyance on his face became one of—shock? Fear? Incredulity?

  "What happened to you?" he asked.

  "I couldn't sleep last night," she said And then she considered what she had been through, and decided a lie would be safest. "Nightmares," she added.

  He cleared his throat. "Nightmares…"

  She nodded.

  He gnawed thoughtfully on one side of his bottom lip, then sighed. "We're packing and moving out today, but you can sleep for the moment. And go to the infirmary when you wake."

  He walked away.

  When he was gone, Karah rolled on her side, ready to let herself drift into sleep. She noticed, however, an odd glow in her tent She looked down at her legs, and then at her hands and arms.

  Then she rolled onto her belly and pressed her face into the coarse blanket of her bedroll. She started to cry.

  Her body glowed with a soft, pale light.

  CHAPTER VII

  A warm wind boomed across the rolling hills of Farbluffs County. Reddish-green, the knee-high grass rippled and swayed, hiding the rocky soil. The dirt roadway kicked up under the hooves of Konzin's mount, each plodding step sending arrows of pain through his chest Off in the middle distance, a horse herd grazed under the watchful eye of mounted ranch hands, moving slowly down towards the cottonwoods that edged a waterhole. The stallion tossed his head and whinnied a challenge.

  Konzin's horse answered. Two of the ranch hands turned and cantered toward him; the roadway was on Five Points land. As they came closer, they cried him hail. The shouts of greeting turned to alarm as they pulled up and saw his injuries.

  "'Tis Konzin!" one cried, gaping.

  He suppressed an impulse to snap who did you expect? at her. Both of them pulled out their bows and crowded closer, looking around.

  "Bandits?" one said, standing in the stirrups. "Raise the alarm!"

  Konzin shook his head "Master an' Madine must hear me," he said. "Now!"

  The hands spun and galloped toward the main ranch, shouting the alarm.

  * * *

  Just before he rounded the last turn to the Grenlaarin ranch, Konzin paused to be sure all the little details in his appearance and his story were right. The horse was near death—its flanks quivered and its head hung low. Konzin hated to waste good stock, especially when it was going to be his good stock very soon.

  But the Grenlaarins can't doubt that I was desperate to reach them. If I rode a horse to death getting to them, they won't doubt.

  He looked terrible, too. He'd look even worse when he rode up. He decided to deliver his news, then faint. Ought to be good drama. And no sense riding home anything less than a hero.

  He savored what would happen next Iano Grenlaarin and the hands would ride off in search of vengeance, and Konzin's bandits would kill the hunting party on the road. Misa Grenlaarin would die grieving her husband and only child—with a bit of help from the nightshade tea Konzin would give her.

  He sat there for just an instant, relishing the picture. When the elder Grenlaarins were out of the way, he would pay Lord Colonel Gonstad the rest of the bribe, and get Karah back out of the army where he'd safely tucked her away.

  The army is a wonderful paid nanny, Konzin thought.

  She would marry him, legitimizing his claim to the Grenlaarin ranch—and then…

  He was uncertain whether she would be his loving and devoted wife, or whe
ther she would suffer an unfortunate accident in the barns. Might be easier to keep all the stories straight if she were trampled by a rogue stallion. Maybe after she dropped an heir. It would be satisfying to see the uppity bitch lie down and spread for him and ride her ragged, but she'd be dangerous if kept around too long.

  Poor sweet Karah. He smiled, thinking of her demise. Time later to see about that.

  When he rode onto the Grenlaarin homestead, he hung across the horn of his saddle like one near death. His horse, foam-flecked and blowing hard, staggered as it walked—man and horse were crusted with dirt and dried blood, both equally gaunt and wounded.

  Iano ran out of the barn as he rode up. Misa limped out of the house at a half-trot, her bad leg dragging. The rest of the ranch hands clustered around him gapemouthed. The cobbled courtyard was full of noise and questions, and people looked out of the windows of the whitewashed adobe buildings that surrounded it. Half a dozen dogs ran around the outside of the crowd, barking.

  "Dead," he wheezed. "All… dead." Then he toppled out of his saddle.

  Strong arms caught him and lowered him gently to the ground "What did he say?" Misa's voice was right next to his ear.

  Konzin kept still and tried to look near death.

  No one answered her for a moment. Then one of the hands muttered, "I think he said 'all dead.'"

  Hands shook him. "Konzin! Konzin! Wake up!"

  "Fetch the mediciner!" Iano snapped. "Koethe, take the horse into the barn and rub him down. No water or food 'til he's cool. See if there's anyway to save him. Zele, Jorsha, help me get Konzin inside."

  Men lifted him up, hands carried him. He cried out once when they pressed against his ribs—then faked delirium. Well Bull, the Derkinoi bandit he'd told to beat him, had been too vigorous, and Konzin suspected several of his ribs were, at the very least, cracked.

  The Grenlaarins and their workers settled him onto a soft bed, and someone began removing his filthy stinking clothes and mopping away the blood and grime. He enjoyed the feel of the warm, soapy water—and enjoyed hearing the horrified whispers as those who bathed him noted his many bruises and cuts.

  One of the house-girls finally whispered, "What d'you suppose happened?" She sounded young, and he didn't recognize her voice. A new girl, then. When his Derldnoi employees joined him next week, she might make a nice prize for one of them. A nicer prize if she were also pretty. He didn't dare look. Not yet He was still "unconscious."

  Quick, uneven footsteps sounded in the hall, and the whispering stopped. That would be Misa Grenlaarin. The house servants never whispered around her—she didn't approve of gossip. She knew they'd been at it, though, for she snapped, "Quiet, all of you! None of you know what happened, and you've no way of finding out until he comes to."

  Someone pinched the back of his hand—hard. He fought not to cry out. He did groan slightly. "Don't kill them," he mumbled, thinking it might be good to start making himself sound like a hero. "Let them go—take me." He groaned again for effect, and lapsed into silence.

  "Humph!" Misa's snort was right next to his ear. She must have been the one who pinched him. "He isn't dehydrated," Misa said. "Skin snaps back pretty as anything. Eyeballs aren't sunk in, either. So either he's been managing to get water for himself—though the horse looked like it hadn't had a drop—or this happened recently."

  There was a thoughtfulness and a lack of credulity in her voice that Konzin didn't care for at all.

  The servant girls sounded like birds who'd just seen a cat. "Just… happened?" The girl who asked sounded terrified by the thought. "You mean whoever hurt him might be near?"

  Konzin liked her. She believed.

  "Now that I think about it, no. This happened days ago." Misa's voice was crisp and certain. "Those bruises are not new. You see how the edges are yellow and green?"

  "Yes."

  "That's a sign they're healing. Takes a couple days for a bruise to start to heal and fade. So why, in a ride of at least that length of time, did he obtain water for himself but none for his horse?" There was a long silence, while the hands kept on washing him.

  Suddenly Misa added, "Also, his injuries don't look very bad. So if he's managed to get enough water, and if he isn't very badly hurt, why isn't he awake now?"

  The question chilled Konzin. Misa wasn't reacting at all as he'd expected. He'd planned on listening to her wail and tear her hair, hearing her mourn the loss of her only child. He'd expected both himself and his story to be accepted at face value.

  She was being far too rational. And she was noticing things he hadn't intended anyone to notice—she was, in fact, noticing things he hadn't realized anyone could.

  Konzin heard running footsteps, and a door opened, then slammed.

  "Halloo! Where are you?"

  Konzin recognized the mediciner's voice.

  "Came fast as I heard. You have an injury? Trampling? Something like—" The mediciner's voice stopped. "Good gods have mercy, looks like the whole herd ran over him."

  He felt another set of hands, these colder and less gentle, begin to poke and prod at him.

  "Healer Fenaulda, he rode into the paddock just some bit ago," Misa said, "collapsed off his horse, and hasn't said a word of sense since then. He's muttered a bit, and cried out once or twice, but nothing to mean anything. And I can't find any injuries so big or so bad he shouldn't be awake."

  The mediciner's hands began pressing and worrying at his skull. "The bruises are all old," she said "I can find no lumps on the skull, and no holes or depressions. Cuts are all shallow and healing—" She lifted one eyelid, and for an instant he and she were looking right at each other. Then he rolled his eyes back.

  "Hmmm," she said She lifted one of his arms and wiggled it a bit. He kept it limp. She moved it over his face, still wiggling and twisting.

  "No resistance," she said She seemed to be talking mostly to herself. She abruptly dropped his hand, but he'd been expecting something like that He let it flop naturally to his side, thinking angrily that if he hadn't been fast as he was, she would have hit him in the face with it.

  "Hmmm," she said again. "Interesting…"

  There followed a long and excruciating silence, during which Konzin yearned to open his eyes so he could see what was going on. Then the mediciner's hands moved to his chest and pushed along the ribs with painful vigor. "Let me see. Ribs are tight," she jammed the edge of her hand into his belly, "belly's soft," she squeezed his balls so hard he nearly levitated off the bed, "testicles aren't swollen—though you would think somebody beat him up this bad, they would have taken a swing or two at those."

  They didn't need to, Konzin thought. You're going to do it for them.

  The mediciner sighed "Get me a stack of pillows and a horse-piller."

  A horse-piller? he thought, horrified. He'd used the piller plenty of times to medicate sick horses. It was a hollow tube as long as his arm and nearly as big around. By the gods, what's she going to do with that? he wondered. Jam it down my throat and shove medicine through it?

  Apparently he wasn't the only one who wondered. "What do you need the piller for?" Misa asked. "Surely you don't want to give medicine to an unconscious man. He'll choke, won't he?"

  I'll choke, Konzin thought. I'll definitely choke.

  "Not going to stick it down his throat," the mediciner said. "I think I know why he's unconscious. I think he has a terminal knot in his lower bowel. Sometimes people who have been badly beaten develop one. The last sign before death is persistent unconsciousness."

  There was a long pause. Then Misa said, "Oooooh. Terminal knot I think I've heard of that It's supposed to be a terrible way to die."

  "Horrible," the mediciner agreed "Gruesome."

  Konzin began to feel some concern. What if the beating Well Bull had given him had caused this "terminal knot," whatever that was? It would be beyond irony to have bribed the Lord Colonel to hold his press in Karah's inn, to have hired the thugs to kill the hands and beat him up so he could get t
he ranch—and then to die because the idiot beat him too hard.

  And what did the mediciner intend to do with a horse-piller to fix terminal bowel?

  Then he realized he wasn't unconscious—so he was probably fine. And whatever Healer Fenaulda intended to do with the piller, he didn't need it done.

  "I've got the piller," one of the girls called.

  "Good. Help me roll him over in the pillows, with his butt in the air."

  He didn't like the sound of that.

  Misa asked, "What are you going to do?"

  Konzin felt keen interest in hearing the answer to that question.

  "I'm going to shove the piller up his arse and see if I can straighten out the knot."

  Konzin decided it was probably time for him to wake up. He began to groan loudly.

  "Terrible, terrible. Roll him over quick," the mediciner said. "He sounds like he's dying even now."

  The house-girls grabbed Konzin and flipped him before he could think of a way to stop them.

  He rolled back onto his back. "Where am I?" he murmured.

  "Oh, he's waking up!" one of the house-girls cried. "He's getting better."

  Good girl. Quick of you to notice. I'm waking up, so I certainly won't need the horse-piller.

  "He's delirious!" the mediciner shouted. "That's end stage. If we don't straighten his bowel, he'll be dead in five minutes."

  If you do straighten my bowel, I'll kill you, Konzin thought. He opened his eyes and stared around the room with an expression he hoped would make the mediciner understand his confusion was rapidly fading. "I know where I am… I'm at the Grenlaarin ranch," he wheezed. "By the Three, how did I get here?"

  "I'd like to know the same thing," Misa said. Her dark eyes glittered.

  Beside her, the mediciner, a tall, thin woman with blunt-cut blonde hair and a menacing expression, smacked the palm of one hand with the horse-piller. The tube looked twice as big as Konzin had remembered. He blinked and swallowed nervously.

  The mediciner said, "I'm still concerned He's got memory lapses and the gods only know what all else. I'm afraid if we don't go ahead and straighten that bowel, he'll relapse and die first thing when we aren't looking."