The Carnelian Throne

by Janet Morris

  “What is your name?” the spirit Sereth asked. “Iyl-Deilcrit,” he said, not vainglorious, but in admission.

  “And what do you do, iyl-Deilcrit?”

  “I tend the ptaiss, and spit the guerm,” he replied through unwieldy lips. Now it would come, whatever judgment the spirit had thus far held in abeyance. He straightened his shoulders. When it did not come, when those eyes compelled his to speak, he repeated what he had said, adding: “Let me do so,” and ripped his glance from the other by an effort which left him breathing hard.

  “Get up, then. I would keep no man from his calling,” said the grinning spirit Sereth, rising.

  Dazed, he followed suit, moving slowly so that his legs’ tremors would not throw him to the ground.

  “That is Chayin,” said Sereth, pointing out the dark one who squatted near the ptaissling’s head. “And Estri.” The woman-spirit smiled over her shoulder and turned back to the newborn ptaiss. Her naked back gleamed in the firelight, as if it bore a fire of its own. “They accompanied me from Fai Teraer-Moyhe, and before that, across the western sea.” Deilcrit could not suppress his shudder.

  The dark man had something in his hands. Deilcrit could just make it out as it flew through the air: the spear, suddenly launched at him, sideways.

  Automatic, was the reaching. Then Deilcrit leaned upon the spear he had caught, like an old man on his staff. He was relieved that they were not of Fai Teraer-Moyhe. But all knew that there was nothing of man across the western sea. Ever more man-seeming, they were. But man could not have entered Benegua through the Spirit Gate. At least, he did not think so. What, then? The night hovered heavy, misting. No stars could be seen, just the dully glowing clouds. He shivered. If Parpis leaned upon this spear, he thought, what? The shade of Parpis, this time, remained silent.

  His eyes fell upon the ptaissling. He would have to find milk for it. Where? He shook his head, and leaned it against the cool bronze of the spear’s head. His cheek itched with the nagging pulse of the jicekak poison, and he angled the metal out of contact with his scratches.

  The one called Sereth spoke: “How long were you watching us, and why?”

  His voice snapped Deilcrit’s head around. His body followed. Disoriented, he almost fell. Grasping the spear in both hands, he regarded his inquisitor. If it had not been somehow useless against them, he was sure that they would not have given it back. The act magnified his helplessness. As a man rousted out of bed in the middle of the night, hustled off by taciturn soldiers, might desperately construct excuses for some misdeed unknown to him, so did Deilcrit seek some answer that might please these who had entered through the Spirit Gate. But he found none.

  “I tend the ptaiss,” he mumbled at last. “And spit the guerm.”

  But the spirit Sereth was not sated.

  Writhing as if in physical pain, he fought the impulse to bolt: he could not leave the ptaissling.

  Sereth fastened him still with eyes that pulled the words from his mouth: “The ptaiss ... what you did ... I saw it all,” he blurted out. “I did not know what to do. Aama was great with child. This was her first bearing.” The words, slow starting, poured out of him, uncheckable. “I was long at her side, soothing her ill temper. I was late to the Gate ....”

  “Listen, you can hear them. They mourn. All of Wehrdom mourns, by now.”

  At his words the woman spun around, regarding him across the slain ptaiss. From the forest’s depths, even from the far shore, came the wails of grieving ptaiss. He stared at her openly. And slowly, feeling with his spear behind him, he backed away.

  Sereth stood unmoving, silent, hands at his hips as Deilcrit retreated.

  The shifting wind brought their scents clear to him; their flesh smelled of strange food and sweat.

  “Kreeshkree, kreesh; breet iylbreet,” came the cry from above their heads, intrusive. The woman looked anxiously above, then down, then sought Sereth and touched his arm. It was hard to think of her as a spirit; her life flowed too full. Her presence made Sereth loom larger, if possible more forbidding. “Let him be until morning,” she said.

  “He might not be here in the morning.”

  “Let me try,” she spoke again, softly. She was naked to the waist. Sereth grunted, and shrugged. Then retreated, ever so slightly.

  “Deilcrit, will you stay the night with us?”

  Deilcrit laid down the spear and looked at it. Then he crouched beside it in the grass, swallowed hard, and said: “Command me, Most High,” while thinking how unfair it was of them to use Woman’s Word to imprison him. Something many-legged crawled up his hand. He shook it off without notice, his eyes fastened on her as she approached. In some unfathomable way, she brought the flames’ light with her. He pondered this, for she stood with the fire at her back, and he could imagine no other source whence light might be reflected by her skin. Thus he neglected suitable obeisance. And his body, as she came closer, waxed audacious, presenting him with one extreme reaction after another. He tore his attention from her, setting it instead upon the dark one, Chayin, by the slain ptaiss’ head, and on the ptaissling, shadow turned sentient clambering at her belly.

  “What is this Wehrdom? And what did you see that so affrighted you? And speak to me of the—ptaiss, and why they are sacred,” she commanded him.

  Deilcrit nodded dumbly. Miserable in realization of his insufficiency, he studied the grass, and her booted feet. “It is not me you want, Most High. I am low in Mnemaat’s service. Only the first ten parables are known to me. And I am no wehrnone but the initiated could speak to you of the Way. Ptaiss, I know ...” He trailed off, spreading his hands wide.

  She took no notice that he looked upon her breasts, but smiled encouragingly. “Tell me,” she insisted, “what you saw.”

  Deilcrit shivered. She would have from his own mouth his death sentence. He sensed it. And then there would be none to care for the ptaissling. But she knelt down on the grass opposite him, and his resistance was dissolved by her proximity. Unable to stop either his staring or his words, he did as she bid him: “I saw the Spirit Gate, upon which the guerm climbed, struck by lightning. I saw you enter through it. I saw you build a fire. I saw you eat of the flesh of quenel, long denied to man. I saw you strike dead a ptaiss, a thing that no man could do, which no man has ever done. What more?” Then he lowered his head, waiting. When death did not come, he raised it. “Most High, what are you?”

  She blew a breath, soft and hissing, through her teeth.

  The ptaissling, at that moment, began to whimper. Its cries tore at his heart. In this world into which it had come, those needs for which it moaned could never be filled. “The ptaissling, may I see to it?” The audacity escaped his lips before thought could intervene. “I ask you, in Mnemaat’s name, to allow me.”

  In the ensuing silence, his restraint dissolved with the newborn’s ever-more-urgent cries. Finally, while he crouched ready to spring for his charge and the forest’s safety, she spoke:

  “Do as you will, iyl-Deilcrit.”

  He sprang like a loosed arrow to the ptaissling’s side.

  “Be assured that your god is not defiled by what we have done.” Her words trailed after him, wrapped in a humor that appalled him.

  His hands around the ptaissling’s head, he pulled its mouth from Aama’s depleted udder. Then, only, he looked over his shoulder at her. Out from her flesh gleamed starlight, a patch of it. He had not imagined it. It winked there, uncanny, embellishing her left breast. The ptaissling whimpered more insistently. He squeezed the last drops of milk onto his fingers and let the searching mouth suck them clean. Its teeth, tiny yet sharp, nipped impatiently.

  “Estri,” snapped Sereth, and a great deal more in their alien tongue as he led her forcibly into the shadows. Deilcrit’s hand sought the ptaissling’s pounding heart as it butted its unseeing face against his leg. The Most High’s voice, low and musical, made short, conciliatory answers to the other’s anger. He had never even imagined such a state of affairs: she did n
ot curse, nor abrade, nor turn Sereth’s form to stone, but accepted meekly whatever chastisement was in progress. Even with her body stiffened by the manform’s rough treatment, the grace of her was astounding. He dragged his gaze away, discomfited at all that he saw. Her image danced before his eyes, though he looked upon the black-furred newborn, huddling against him for warmth. He lay down and curled his body around it, pulling it to him, away from the cold corpse of its mother. The ptaissling snuffled its way up to his chest, pushing its wet nose into his armpit. Its body was quivering. He drew up his knees so that they touched its hindquarters, and threw his arm over it. Even early-born, it was large. On its feet it would stand as high as his thigh. A flicker of pride in Aarna’s child came and went, and in its wake a sharper awareness of his irrevocable loss. He crooned to the orphan, forgetting all else in that moment of shared grief.

  From beside Aama’s head, the dark one, Chayin, chuckled and crawled toward him. He tensed, and the ptaissling mewled. He racked his brain to match that name with a god from Benegua’s pantheon, but his limited schooling provided no correlation. The unfamiliar deity squatted near, staring. He felt compelled to stare back.

  “She affected me that way, the first time,” Chayin said, the whites of his eyes bright.

  “Thus it always is, with those that cannot be had. How else?”

  “That one,” assured the dark tempter, “can be had.”

  Deilcrit sat up. The ptaissling sobbed softly. His hands balled into fists. He said nothing. But he felt those eyes, somehow inside of him, weighing his most incriminating thoughts, that licentious evil he ever strove to suppress but which bubbled unimpeded up from the depths of his sullied soul. If only Aama’s corpse did not lie here ... He wondered, wildly, why this had happened to him. There were others upon whom life lay easier, others who found no torture in the laws. Like the lightning assaulting the Spirit Gate, it struck him: it was for precisely that reason he had been chosen. What profit to them, if man not be weak? He put his head in his hands, pressing his palms against his eyelids. The ptaissling climbed onto his lap and buried its face between his crossed legs.

  He heard the rustle of Chayin’s movement, just before the hand came down on the crown of his head.

  “Do not fear so,” advised the dark one awkwardly. “Questions beginning with ‘why’ have no true answers. It is not likely to be as bad as you make it, unless you make it that way. I will help you dispose of the ptaiss. I would not have sought to make a trophy pelt of her, had I known. I regret your loss. Must you inform someone?”

  Deilcrit, his head still bowed, pressed his palms more firmly against his lids. He nodded.

  “I will go, also, and speak for you. You will be back, doing whatever you do, before you know it.”

  Deilcrit, without raising his head, shook it. Beyond doubt, he knew that it could not be true. He was not the same. Nothing was the same. Nothing would ever be the same again.

  “By the Wing of Uritheria,” exploded the dark one. “A man fully grown, in good health ... What has you huddled up like some infant, shivering? I have said that I will help you.” The hand upon his head, with a desultory shake, withdrew. “I have promised you protection, to the extent that I am able, in this land, to give it. Though I am as yet unknown here, I assure you that you have received no small gift! Whatever befalls, in your need call my name. I will hear you. When you are ready, we will see to the ptaiss.”

  Upon those amazing statements, the dark one rose up and joined his companions.

  Deilcrit, staring after, wondered with what he had just pacted. A part of his mind noted the ptaissling, sleeping on his lap; and the ptaiss sounds, coming ever closer, in the forest beyond. His ears heard, also, the discussion, incomprehensible but for its heat, occurring by the fire. He slid his legs out from under the newborn, drew up his knees. Over them he crossed his arms and, on his crossed arms he rested his chin. He hardly knew that he did these things. The ptaissling muttered but did not wake. He regarded it freed of emotion. Could he chance its life upon a night hunt? Could he flee with it, despite his vow? The last thing he wanted was to stay near Them. What was to be done with Aama’s corpse? He could not just leave it. What would he do if he could not find a surrogate mother? He tried to recapture some shadow of Parpis’ wisdom. He recollected only what the dark one said. As a man, lost beyond hope of returning home, stands at a fork in the road, undecided, waiting for an omen to make his choice for him, so stood Deilcrit before the task of assigning sense and value to what had occurred. He had come too far, he knew, to turn back. As fearful as he was of the wrath of Mahrlys-iis-Vahais, twice that fearful was he of those ranged around the fire, those who could lift the thoughts from his mind and the will from his limbs. Now the dark one had so much as designated him a servant. So conscripted, whether for good or evil, into the designs of Mnemaat the Unseen, could he do other than obey? A strangely replete surrender came over him. Buoyed by its strength, he got to his feet. Slowly he approached them, his eyes fixed on the ground, to do as the dark one had bid him, and attend the body of Aama. Then, for better or worse, he would lead them to Mahrlys: Mahrlys, whose body tortured his dreams incessantly; and whose eyes, though often upon him, had never seen him. She would see him, soon enough.

  Just before he reached them, he turned about once more to reassure himself that the ptaissling slept. Wings fluttered above his head.

  Automatically, he reached out his arm.

  “Kreesh,” said the whelt, flapping wildly, its claws fastening around his wrist.

  “Kreesh,” he whispered back to it, bringing his wrist slowly toward his chest. The whelt, cobalt crest raised, humped its wings up and sidled to, his shoulder, where it perched, silver beak clacking.

  “Kreesh, breet,” said the bird dejectedly, and rubbed its head against his. The fire crackled. The whelt started, half-spread its wings, and shifted from foot to foot.

  “Ssh, ssh,” he soothed, reaching up to smooth its crest. The whelt shivered, stretching out its neck until one green eye was level with his. The eye blinked.

  Among the strange ones, all converse had ceased. The woman half-hid behind the lighter man, staring.

  Self-consciously, he further quieted the whelt, whose talons still twitched and trembled. A big bird, this; not the whelt he had expected, nor any of his. His questing fingers found its banded right leg, traced there the sign of the Vahais, Benegua’s high council.

  “Go on,” he advised softly. “Why get involved?” The whelt, as he, knew better. But it only cocked its head.

  “Breet, iis,” he accused it. It ruffled its feathers, shifting its weight from leg to leg. “Go on,” he advised, pushing his wrist insistently against its chest.

  Again it stretched its neck and rubbed its head against his cheek. The jicekak scrapes, irritated, began itching, The woman hesitantly approached. He closed his eyes and took the whelt’s message. Here was his omen, come unasked. Mahrlys’ face hovered before him, and from her mouth came the words of death and waiting. Of death, the whelt was better informed than he: ptaiss, quenel, and whelt. Whelt?

  With a disparaging screech, the whelt took sudden flight from his shoulder, talons digging, wings battering his head. Reflexively, he ducked down and away. It climbed the air, screeching, wingtips nearly brushing the woman’s face. She screamed, and threw herself to the ground. The men rushed to her aid, but the whelt was gone, heavenward, safe from their blades.

  None of his would have behaved so, he thought, fingering his punctured shoulder. Under his tunic, the clawed flesh throbbed wetly.

  He brought his fingers to his lips, licked the blood. She rose up, slapping ashes from her hands, and stood there, at arm’s length, her whole body an eloquent demand for explanation.

  He raised his head high, under that scrutiny, then grinned uncertainly.

  “Whelt. One of Mahrlys-iis-Vahais’.” His whole body turned hot, as if the fire had caught his flesh. He could not look away, but he could think of nothing to say to her. He merel
y stared back, with every pore of his body. He was dimly aware that the dark one shed his outer garment and then his inner, and replaced the outer alone. The inner layer he offered up to her. She, hardly seeming to notice, took it and slipped it over her head.

  Deilcrit breathed a sigh of relief.

  Then she said: “You are hurt,” and he wondered whether anything mortal could have voice so soft, as she rolled up the dark sleeves and pulled her thick braid over her shoulder. “Take that off, and I will dress it.”

  She was pointing at him. He backed away, shaking his head, toward the ptaissling; surreptitiously chancing a glance at her companions. They leaned close together, talking quietly. Thus he stumbled over his own spear. Glad for the respite from her flame-colored eyes and his confusion, he reached down to retrieve it. He dared not do what she asked. And yet he dared not disobey her. Miserably he retreated into the cloaking dark beyond the fire’s circle.

  “Iyl-Deilcrit”—she laughed, following him—“stop and let me see to your wound.”

  He stopped, in the blessed shadows, and leaned his forehead against the flare of the spear’s head. His eyes strayed to the ptaissling. He could just make it out. There was no question, now of escape: by way of whelt, that had been forbidden him. Waiting, he could endure. But the deaths to be met by more of the same ...

  At her touch, he jumped as if scalded. It was all he had conjured it to be, that touch. Hopeless, at her repeated command, he fumbled at the strap tied about his waist, fingers plucking clumsily at the knotted, damp-swollen cord.

  “Here,” she murmured, “let me do it.” He stood, not daring to breathe. When the knot was freed, the belt, with its pouch and scabbard, fell to the ground.

  “Well?” she urged, smiling. He was glad he could not see the starlight on her breast through the fine cloth. He peered over her head, at the two lounging in the fire’s glow. Then he stopped thinking, in response to her stamped foot, and pulled the tunic upward quickly, before he could turn and run. And if he ran, he would have Mahrlys to face ....