the Year the Horses came

by Mary Mackey

  To her surprise, Arang was the only person in the tent. Motioning for her to sit down on a pile of embroidered pillows, he sat beside her and tossed the horse scepter on the ground. He made a small, compact package with his legs drawn up under him, but he had grown a lot over the past few months. The boyishness was beginning to leave his face, and the tattoo scars gave him the battered look of a much older person. The constant practice with bows and spears had made him muscular and lean and the Great Chief's crown lent him dignity, but in the end he was still her little brother.

  "What are we going to do!" he asked as soon as they were settled, as if, as always, she had all the answers.

  "We're going to escape," she told him, and as she said the words she knew they were true. She started to tell him everything, beginning with the moment she woke to find Stavan bending over her and ending with Zulike's death, but something in his face stopped her. Again she looked around the tent, taking in the piles of rich blankets, the overflowing food baskets, the long tunics and shawls tossed carelessly on the floor, the horse masks and clay jars and bags of treasure, and again it struck her as strange that all of Zuhan's possessions were here except the most important ones: there were no weapons and no women.

  "Where's Dalish? I thought she'd be here with you even if the others were somewhere else, but no doubt there are other tents where — "

  "She's gone," Arang said quietly. There was no longer anything childish in his voice. "Vlahan's warriors came to take her and Akoah and the others away as soon as Zulike started screaming that Zuhan was dead. I think they're holding them prisoner in a tent somewhere near the place where they plan to dig his grave." He paused. "When Vlahan told me they'd all be strangled and I'd be given new women, I went after the bastard with my dagger. It was a crazy thing to do; he nearly broke my wrist tearing it out of my hand, but I don't care. It was well worth it, and at least I know he doesn't dare kill me. But he wanted to; I could see it in his eyes."

  Stunned, Marrah stared at the discarded tunics and overturned baskets and wondered if their bad luck was ever going to stop. But Arang wasn't finished. He went right on talking as if everything he was saying was all part of the same thought. "Have you ever made kersek, Marrah?"

  She was so surprised by the banality of the question that it took her a moment to answer. "Why, of course." She looked distractedly at the deserted tent. "Keeping the warriors supplied with kersek is one of the main reasons women exist. But what's that got to do with Dalish and Akoah?"

  "I'll explain later. Just tell me how it's done."

  She could tell he was trying to get at something, but she didn't know what. Still, if he had any kind of plan at all, it was better than nothing, so she described how the women chewed the wild grains and spit them into leather bags filled with a little warm water and honey; how fresh mare's milk was poured in and the mixture allowed to sit by the fire or in the sun until it fermented. She was about to explain how the whole mess curdled into a kind of wet cheese if you left it too long, when Arang stopped her.

  "Don't you put some kind of spice in it?"

  Oh, yes. She'd forgotten that part. The women sometimes added things to the milk — fresh hemp buds or finely chopped mushrooms or even a strange green lily-like plant that made the kersek smell like soup, but that was never done until the last minute because the herbs turned black and slimy if they stayed in the milk too long. When there was a big festival, all the bags of kersek were put into the river to cool and then, just before they were needed, the women opened them and put in the herbs.

  "That's all I needed to know." He settled back with a satisfied smile on his face. "My plan will work."

  "What plan?" She looked at him, hoping against hope that he'd thought of something she'd overlooked.

  "It's simple: we put the powder of invisibility in the kersek. The warriors drink it, and when they can't see us anymore, we all escape."

  "Oh, Arang!" She was so disappointed that she could hardly speak. "Have you forgotten? Changar took the dried thunder and the powder of invisibility when he took my medicine bag. All I have left is the yellow stone the priestesses gave me, and what can that do against — " She stopped in mid-sentence. Arang had pulled two small leather pouches out from under one of the pillows and was dangling them in front of her nose.

  "The charms!" She grabbed for them. "How in the name of the Goddess did you get them back from Changar!"

  "I stole them," he said, and then he laughed the way he'd always laughed when he was up to no good. It was a proud little-boy honeycake-stealing sort of laugh. "You should see the expression on your face, Marrah. You look like a sheep who just ran into a tree. It wasn't so hard. The old fake dragged me into his tent to dress me and paint me up for that little scene with Vlahan, and I saw both bags lying in a corner on a pile of junk — which is probably what he thought they were. I took them when he wasn't looking. He'll never miss them." And he would have said more only Marrah grabbed him and gave him such a hug he pleaded for mercy instead. "Let go," he grumbled, "you're going to break my ribs." But he was laughing and she was laughing, and for a moment it seemed like the priestesses of Nar themselves were standing in Zuhan's tent.

  "Help me find a ball of white wool," she cried, "so I can tell Stavan to get the horses ready. We won't just take Akoah and Dalish, we'll take the women of Shambah and all the slaves. We'll ride through Vlahan's warriors like the wind rides through the grass. We'll be invisible!"

  "But for how long?" Arang asked.

  That was a sobering thought. They stopped laughing and hunted around for a ball of white wool. Soon they found a whole basketful, which wasn't surprising since everything Zuhan wore had been white. Picking up a good-sized one, Marrah hurried out of the tent, but not before she and Arang both knelt and touched Earth for luck.

  Her luck held. No one bothered her or asked her why she had strayed so far from Vlahan's tent. She passed through the camp as if she were already invisible, past the men who were sharpening their wooden hoes to dig Zuhan's grave and the women who were washing Zulike's body; past children who were playing at funeral by rubbing ashes on one another and babies who slept in the sun as calmly as if no Great Chief had ever been born or ever died. She even walked by Slehan, who was so absorbed in talking to another warrior he didn't look up. The dogs didn't bark, and the horses didn't whinny. There was too much going on for a woman to be noticed.

  She thought she might have to go all the way to the herdboys' fires to find Stavan, but she should have known he would be trying to come to her. She found him sitting in the mud not more than five hundred paces from Zuhan's tent. He was playing with a bit of horsehair, and he didn't even look up when she dropped the ball of white wool at his feet as if by accident. Instead he giggled, picked up a handful of dust, and threw it into the air, and when it came down on him he sneezed. She had to admit he made a pretty impressive fool. Picking up the ball of wool, he smelled it, plucked off a bit, and began to wrap it around his finger. His tunic was in rags, and his face was black with ashes and tears.

  Marrah looked at the tall grass, and he gave an almost invisible nod. There was no need to say anything.

  Retrieving the wool, she continued to walk through the camp, staying where Stavan could see her. There had never been a better day for moving around unnoticed. Timak was laying out Zulike's body, Vlahan was consolidating his power, and no one else cared. When she was absolutely sure nobody was watching her, she simply walked into the tall grass without a backward glance.

  A few minutes later she and Stavan were sitting on the ground behind a screen of high golden blades like two people marooned together in a basket. He had his arm around her, their foreheads were touching, and they were whispering furiously in Shambah, pausing every once in a while to listen. But there was nothing to alarm them: only the sound of chanting coming from the direction of Zulike's body and the steady thump of the funeral drums.

  "Kersek," Marrah was saying, "powder of invisibility...Arang...stolen from Changar...
funeral games... the warriors...all together in one place."

  Stavan was nodding. Yes, he thought it just might work. Yes, he'd have the horses ready. But he didn't like the part about her putting the powder in the kersek. They argued a little more in quick, low voices, and finally he gave in. He'd let her put the powder in the kersek, and when the invisibility came, she'd give a great cry, and he'd ride the horses into the middle of the ceremony and they'd all escape.

  The time had come to part. "I'll go first," he whispered, "and if anyone spots me, I'll lead them away from you. Wait awhile, my love; then keep low so no one can see you."

  She crouched down and made herself small while he stood up until his head broke through to the sky. The sun flashed in his hair. Suddenly he started back and gave a loud cry.

  "Be quiet!" she called to him in a low voice. "Are you crazy?" But there was a spear at his throat and three more at his chest, and before she could spring to her own feet, a second face was looking down at her.

  "Good afternoon, wife of Vlahan," Changar said. He smiled a slow, wolflike smile. "Perhaps you'd like to explain to these warriors what you're doing in the tall grass with Zuhan's fool of a son?"

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Hail to the happy brides

  who breathe the air of paradise.

  TRADITIONAL HANSI SONG

  Zuhan the Brave, Great Chief of the Hansi, Son of Han and Ruler of the Steppes, was dead, and his warriors and women were digging his grave in the cold mud with wooden hoes and antler picks. The sky had turned a sodden gray, and a cold wind was blowing from the north, howling like a wolf as it swept across the plain. The tall grasses bowed before the coming storm just as Zuhan's subjects had once bowed before him, but after tomorrow no one would ever bow to Zuhan again. He would lie for thousands of years under the grass, surrounded by the bones of his horses and the skeletons of his wife and slaves; his fine woolen garments would rot, his copper necklaces would turn green, the flesh would fall from his face, and the worms would eat his proud heart.

  But the Hansi warriors had no sense of how short their Great Chief's eternity was going to be. They thought he was as immortal as the stars, so despite the snow flurries and biting wind, they worked furiously to prepare a worthy resting place for him. Some of the younger ones even got so hot digging they threw back their hoods or took off their woolen tunics altogether and worked bare-chested. They knelt or stood, scrabbling in the muddy earth, and as they worked, their women followed behind them, filling baskets with the soil and dumping it in a big pile that would later be mounded over the finished grave. It was hard work, because every basket that was emptied had to be brought back filled with stones to line the floor and walls. Otherwise the mud would cave in on Zuhan, Han would refuse to accept him into paradise, and the Hansi would be shamed for all eternity.

  Despite their labors, Zuhan's grave looked like a muddy hole as the day drew to a close, but when it was done it would be a symbol of royalty and power. Fifty horses would be killed, stuffed with straw, and staked out around the rim. One end of the huge rectangular chamber would be filled with Zuhan's treasures, since a Great Chief could not arrive in paradise empty-handed: weapons mostly — spears and daggers, singing bows, arrows, quivers, axes, and shields — but there would be baskets of bracelets and necklaces as well, some made of copper but most strung with animal teeth — wolf being the most highly prized — fine rugs too, and soft wool blankets, and even jars emblazoned with sun signs and filled with the jerked meat and dried fruit Zuhan and his household would need to sustain them on the long journey to the Heavenly Pastures.

  When the treasures were all safely stowed in their proper places, Zuhan himself would be brought to his eternal resting place on a fur-covered sledge pulled by three black horses. Zulike would follow on a smaller sledge, and the two bodies would be lowered into the grave on ropes woven from white horsehair and dipped in blood. The warriors who had guarded Zuhan during his lifetime would lay him out on a white calfskin pallet stuffed with sweet-smelling straw and put his dagger in his right hand and his horse scepter in his left. Then Zulike would be laid at his feet, face down, so she wouldn't see paradise before him.

  When the bodies were in place, the most devoted warriors would cut off their hair and throw it into the grave until Zuhan was covered in a blanket of devotion made of every color from gold to black. But before that, the grave would be filled with another offering. Changar and his assistants would stand on the rim, strangle Zuhan's concubines and slaves, and throw them into the tomb to share eternity with their master. That was quite usual, so usual that as the warriors dug into the cold ground they hardly thought about it. But there was to be an additional sacrifice at this funeral — actually, two additional sacrifices. One was Vlahan's younger wife, the pretty little savage from the forest lands who had been caught in the tall grass with Zuhan's idiot son. Since she was the aunt of the new Great Chief, not everyone approved of the fact that Vlahan had handed her over to Changar. Vlahan had been angry, of course. What man wouldn't be? But most thought he should have killed her on the spot like a wronged husband was bound to do instead of making her part of the ceremony. Others said Vlahan could do anything he wanted to with this wife, who'd borne him no sons and wasn't even his first; while still others whispered that this was Vlahan's way of showing that he ruled the Hansi and not the little dark-haired boy who sat in Zuhan's tent claiming to be the son of Achan.

  The sacrifice of Vlahan's wife was unusual enough, but it was the second extra sacrifice that caused the most whispering as the wooden hoes and antler picks bit into the dirt. Changar had proclaimed that Stavan the Fool was to share his father's grave as if he were a small child instead of a grown man, not because he'd gone into the tall grass with Vlahan's wife — a fool couldn't be punished for anything since he didn't know what he was doing — but for a much less acceptable reason. Changar claimed he had heard Lord Han Himself calling Stavan to paradise along with his father. Now girl babies were often sacrificed at a funeral, and sometimes even small boys if the dead man had many male children, but the grown son of a chief? Never, not in all the history of the Twenty Tribes. Crazy or not, a chief's son had certain rights.

  When Slehan had seen Vlahan hand Stavan over to Changar, he had called his warriors and women together and ridden out of camp. Several Hansi warriors who had been particularly loyal to Zuhan left with him, and there was already talk of war. Worse yet, as the news spread, other subchiefs might join Slehan in rebellion. Slehan had reportedly said he would be ruled by the son of Achan but not by a bastard.

  The coming sacrifice of Zuhan's idiot son had already set loose bad spirits. The horses were restless, as if they could smell violence and betrayal in the air. The cows and mares were hard to milk, and the sheep had all huddled together in a frightened flock. As the wind blew and the sky darkened, the warriors talked of war, the women whispered anxiously among themselves, and Zuhan's muddy grave grew deeper.

  In the prison tent, Dalish, Akoah, and Marrah sat on a pile of rugs listening to the sound of the wind and the murmur of voices. Sometimes they could hear a pick scrape against a rock or the thud of stones being dumped into the pit, but except when the women came to bring them more food, they could see nothing of the outside world except the circle of gray sky that hung above the smoke hole.

  "Will they strangle us?" Akoah whispered. Her eyes had the crazy, frightened look of a small animal caught in a trap. Marrah put her arm around her and tried to comfort her, but Akoah was trembling so hard her fear was contagious. Marrah felt Akoah's fear enter her mouth and lodge in her throat. She saw a bowstring vibrating in a warrior's hand, Zulike's fingers clawing at empty air, her body turning face down as it fell to the ground. Closing her eyes, she took a deep breath and forced herself to think of miracles instead: a storm that would scatter all the warriors and give them a chance to escape, a bolt of lightning that would burn Changar to a cinder, a stampede or a whirlwind or an enemy attack. If she gave in to the fear of death, it would
overpower her and she'd go to the stake like a frightened sheep.

  No matter how frightened I get, I have to keep acting as if there's something I can do, she thought. She drew Akoah closer. "No one's going to strangle you," she promised.

  "But what if they do?" Akoah bit her lip, and tears formed in the corners of her eyes like two crystal pebbles. Outside, the wind was making a moaning sound, and sometimes a little chaff blew in under the bottom of the tent. Akoah shuddered and touched her neck with the tips of her fingers. "Will it hurt terribly?"

  "No," Dalish said. "It's very quick." Marrah knew Dalish was lying. Being strangled wasn't painless at all. You'd have plenty of time to feel everything. What did you see at that last moment? Did the Goddess grant you a vision of some kind or did you die as blindly as you'd lived? She wanted to ask Dalish if anyone had ever survived strangling and come back to tell what the moment of death was like, but she didn't want to frighten Akoah any more than she was already frightened.

  The red tassels were still swinging defiantly across Dalish's forehead, and her gaze was level. Dalish was brave — perhaps braver than she was. Again Marrah thought how easy it would be to give up and sit with her arms wrapped around her knees like Akoah, but there was Arang to think of, and Stavan. Arang was probably sitting in a warm tent eating a hot meal because Vlahan couldn't run the risk of hurting him in any way, but Stavan could have been severely beaten for all she knew. She thought of Changar's face looking down at her through the grass. She should have pulled Stavan's dagger out of its sheath and plunged it into his heart. She never should have let them take him alive. On the other hand, where there was life, there was the possibility of escape.