by David Duncan
He moved his sword to a more comfortable position and stretched out his arm along the backrest. Quili jumped and then blushed furiously.
Damn! Wallie had forgotten that he was no longer the man he had been on Earth. Women looked at Shonsu in a way women had never looked at the nondescript Wallie Smith. Wallie Smith might have received odd glances had he paraded around bare-chested in a kilt and leather harness, but not those sort of looks.
Which raised the problem of Nnanji's attentions to Quili. Nnanji had never made any secret of his ambition to become a free sword―it had been about the first thing he had imparted to his liege lord Shonsu when he had begun to relax enough in his company to talk at all. Wallie had parried the hidden questions about their joint future until he had gained time to learn from Honakura just what a free sword was. He had been disgusted to learn how much those wandering warriors expected in the way of hospitality. It was not a sutra, it was a universal custom, which meant a law―free swords could have anything they wanted, including access to their hostesses' beds.
That prospect was at least as attractive to Nnanji as the opportunities for bloodshed. Since the onset of adolescence, he had lived within the narrowly male world of the barracks, naively absorbing all the macho bragging, believing the tall tales of breathlessly grateful maidens. Now he saw his chance. He had no desire to be a routine policeman in some quiet little town or city. He dreamed of the open road―or, to be precise, open River―and honoring beautiful damsels would be a large part of the romance of it all. Here he was, a free sword at last, and this pretty young priestess had the misfortune to be the first woman he had encountered.
Wallie could admit a certain barbaric logic in the custom. Free swords were the good guys and brigands were the bad guys, but at times the distinction between them must become blurred. So hospitality was given without limits―unstinted generosity could avert pillage, and there was one sure way to avoid rape. Another benefit might be an increase in genetic diversity among the People, for likely few of them ever moved very far from their birthplaces in this primitive culture, and inbreeding would be a problem.
But that was the general case. In the specific instance, young Quili was being molested. Wallie could hardly change the laws of the World, but he could certainly divert Nnanji this time. He glanced back at his companions in the cart, noting his new oath brother's glum expression. Satisfied that the squeaking axles and the roar of the stream would drown out his words, he turned to Quili and remarked, "Adept Nnanji seems very attracted to you, apprentice."
Quili blushed even redder. "I am greatly honored, my lord."
"Are you sure?"
She gasped and somehow managed to go redder still.
"No, no! That wasn't what I meant!" Wallie floundered. "I am very much in love, Quili. I am totally infatuated by Jja. Like a starry-eyed boy! I seek no other woman."
Understandably, she made no reply to such insulting gibberish. She kept her eyes on the plodding horse, although it seemed to be managing without any guidance from her.
"What I meant... I mean, if I seem ... Oh, damn! If Nnanji thinks that I want you, then he will leave you alone. Do I make myself clear?"
"Either... Yes, my lord."
"Then I shall pretend. But I'm only pretending!"
"Yes, my lord."
He moved close and put his arm around her. Nnanji would certainly notice. She looked tiny in her yellow cloak, like a half-drowned canary, but there was a surprisingly firm young woman in there. He felt Shonsu's disorderly glands begin to stir and repressed them with thoughts of Jja.
After a moment he said, "I swear I am only playacting, Quili."
"Yes, my lord."
"So there is no reason for you to tremble quite so violently."
†† ††
At first the meal went quite well. The visitors had been squashed in around a group of tables in one of the cottages, while six or seven women flustered around, serving the food by squeezing tactfully past between the guests' backs and the walls. Half a dozen children had managed to slip in, also, and the tiny room was packed and stuffy and dark. The fare was plain, as Quili had promised, but the fresh bread and lean ham were delicious. With farm butter and bright vegetables, warm beer in earthenware pitchers, and a mysterious stew, no one was going to complain about the food.
Nor could anyone object to the quality of service. All the women were brown-clad farmers of the Third, from two white-haired matrons in long-sleeved gowns, down to the youngest, whose name was Nia. Nia wore nothing but a short, simple wrap .and looked very good in it.
And there was another young lady named Nona, whose wrap was so breathtakingly and impractically brief that it must surely have been shortened for the occasion. At first everyone had fawned humbly over the swordsmen, but soon Nona found courage, and then even Nnanji's Trojan appetite could not distract him from her obvious availability. The two of them began smirking, cracking lewd jokes, and almost striking sparks. Wallie concluded with relief that Quili was out of danger. He intercepted a few eyelash flutters from Nia, which he discouraged by feigning interest in Quili. Only one swordsman fathermark would be authorized by this visitation.
That point might have to be stressed to Novice Katanji, who had made fast progress with a couple of the preadolescent girls, naked and flat-chested and definitely off-limits in Wallie's view. There were no girls of his own age around, so perhaps Katanji was merely being friendly―or perhaps not. As the eating progressed, though, his socializing slowed down, and he began directing sharp glances around the whole company and then at Wallie, who had just made the same discovery himself: there was too much tension. Something was wrong.
Until that realization struck, Wallie had been fairly content. He and his companions were clean at last. Their garments had been rushed away to be laundered and temporary replacements provided. At first an abbreviated brown loincloth had made him feel as shameless as Nona, but once he was seated at the table he forgot about it and tucked into the spread with genuine appetite.
Then two minor problems appeared almost simultaneously. As he ate, he began to feel a strange lethargy. Honakura yawned. Jja followed suit―and so did Nnanji, in the middle of his animated flirting. He blinked in surprise and carried on. Wallie smothered a yawn himself. It had been a short night, but... jet lag! They had been moved the equivalent of several time zones by the Hand of the Goddess. Now it was not yawning but laughter that struggled for possession of Wallie's throat. The thought of jet lag in this primitive culture was ludicrous, and the idea of trying to explain it to anyone else even more so. Nevertheless, it was worth remembering, for the resulting mental confusion could seriously warp a man's judgment for a day or two.
His second problem concerned Jja.
The tenancy was a clutter of cottages, all small and mostly shabby, interspersed with barns and sheds, and standing among vegetable patches. Pigs and chickens roamed underfoot, while background noises told of dogs and at least one discordant donkey. The setting was pleasant, centered on a pond that served for washing, stock watering, and irrigation, but in all directions the surrounding countryside was concealed by little bare hillocks and copses of scanty trees.
It was a humble settlement, and the people who inhabited it were humble, also. But they outranked the estate owner's slaves, who lived elsewhere, and they were uncomfortable at having to entertain Jja and Cowie and Vixini. Cowie was quite unaware of the conflict, looking content for the first time since Wallie had met her, stuffing food into herself, apparently impervious to jet lag. Jja had become very quiet. She sat close by Wallie and attended to Vixini and spoke only in reply to questions. He fumed, but there was nothing he could do. The women were trying the best they could. Doubtless Quili had warned them, and the hostility was being suppressed, but it was there. Wallie had not met this prejudice in the temple―Nnanji made no value distinction between free woman and slave―but for these people slaves were a threat to livelihood. The difference was not racial, it was purely an accident of b
irth, yet the free could not hide their contempt of the unfree. The World of the Goddess was an imperfect place.
So he tried to reassure Jja without at the same time offending the attending women, and he made the best of it. He also made conversation with Quili, on his right. She had discarded her bulky cloak, revealing a threadbare lemon gown that curved satisfactorily in all the right places. Feigning interest called for no effort.
He established that the manor house stood farther up the hillside, hidden by trees. There were cattle sheds there, and slave barns, and more cottages. The inhabitants of this tenancy seemed to have intermediate status, not quite farmhands and not quite free farmers themselves. They paid their rent in work for the landlord, but they also grew vegetables for sale to the manor. Wallie at once suspected a company store economy and soon confirmed his guess―to obtain imports, like nails and rope, or local products such as lumber, the tenants must deal with Honorable Garathondi's manager, Adept Motipodi. Everything went back to Garathondi in the end.
The ham had vanished. Fresh strawberries appeared, with cream thick as butter. Not for the first time, Wallie mourned the absence of coffee in the World.
Honakura was enthusiastically attacking the dessert, while attempting to discover more about the landowner and his mother, Lady Thondi. Katanji had set out to charm everyone, not merely the young maidens. Jja was being monosyllabic. Cowie was not communicating with anyone. Nnanji was describing the best ways to push a sword into a man and how it felt to do so, making Nona breathe deeply over his courage and the nobility of his motives.
Then Wallie noticed, and Katanji followed a moment later―Quili and the other women were as jumpy as a pondful of frogs.
Somebody had said something. Perhaps it had been only Nnanji's gruesome attempts at shop talk, but something was wrong.
So more than Nnanji's advances had been disturbing the young priestess earlier. Even the older women were nervous, and they were obviously deferring to her, in spite of her youth. Of course in Earthly terms they were peasants entertaining a general or a duke, and some tension was inevitable. Their menfolk were not there to support them, having been called away by Adept Motipodi for a land-clearing project, or so Wallie had been informed. But the guests had not raped or murdered anyone, they had praised the food and hospitality, and the tension was not decreasing. It seemed to be getting worse.
Wallie tried to establish a little local geography. East lay the River, and there were no significant settlements on the far bank. Westward the mountains of RegiVul were normally visible, he was told, but they were hidden today by the rain clouds. To the north lay the hamlet of Pol and then the city of Ov. Perhaps he was expected to head for Ov, but he decided to put off any decisions until he had met with Lady Thondi.
Southward there seemed to be nothing. The Black Lands, Quili said vaguely ... no people. And even the Black Lands were inaccessible, the older women explained, because there were cliffs. So this place was a curiously isolated dead end? Wallie did not need sutras to warn him that dead ends could be traps. Common prudence would suggest that a move to Ov might be very wise―except that he had no one but Nnanji to guard his back from the alley thieves the demigod had warned about. Stymied!
"You keep no boats here, apprentice?"
Quili shook her head. "Not at the moment, my lord. His honor has one, of course, but he is in Ov." She mentioned a couple of fishing boats that were usually present, and a cattle boat, and one or two others, but for this reason or that reason...
Wallie's scalp prickled―too much coincidence. There was a test coming. The Goddess had boxed Shonsu in for some purpose.
And it was then that he remembered the rain and guessed what was happening. He glanced at his companions. Honakura had felt the unease, but seemed more puzzled than worried. Honakura did not know about the climate. He had not heard Quill's comments about it, and his skill was people―he would not have been able to read the appearance of the semiarid landscape as Wallie had done when he arrived at the tenancy, or even to appreciate that irrigation for vegetables meant poor rainfall.
Katanji was suspicious, but a city boy did not have the botanical knowledge, either. He likely did not even know enough about the swordsmen's sutras. Of course old Honakura would not know the actual words of the sutra in question, but he would know what must result from it. Quili obviously did―she was masterminding the deception.
Nnanji naturally suspected nothing and would have to be kept that way... and then Wallie remembered the oath he had just sworn. My secrets are your secrets. He could keep nothing from Nnanji now.
The gods had tricked him again.
No! He was not going to commit a massacre. It was not fair. He had killed six―no, seven―men the previous day. He had proved that he could be bloody if he had to be. How much slaughter did She want from Her champion?
He was not going to start killing innocent people.
Goddess be damned!
Then he realized that the room had fallen into a horrified silence. He had been glaring at Nnanji, and even Nnanji was wilting under that glare.
"You don't want me to tell about the battle, my lord brother?" he asked nervously. Nona was standing beside him, and he had his arm around her.
Wallie had not heard a word. He pulled his wits together. "I don't care," he said, "although I doubt that these gentle ladies will be interested in such a tale. No, something you said reminded me of another battle. That's all."
Everyone relaxed, including Nnanji. He leered up at Nona. "You don't need me for a little while then, do you, my lord brother? Farmer Nona has offered to show me her house." For him, this sudden interest in domestic architecture was a surprisingly tactful way of describing what the two of them obviously had in mind.
"Yes, I do need you," Wallie said. "I'm putting you in charge for... for a little while. I want to see Apprentice Quili's house."
Quili blanched. Then she bared her teeth at Wallie in an attempt at a smile. "I shall be greatly honored, my lord." It came out as a whisper.
"Then let us go right away. Ladies, I thank you for the meal. It was superb."
With varied expressions of surprise and amusement, approval and disapproval, the company moved out of the way as Wallie followed Quili around to the door. The outside air seemed cool and fresh after the stuffy room, flapping his loincloth as if to mock such unswordsmanlike dress. The rain seemed heavier.
Huddled again in her cloak, the priestess pointed to the far side of the pond. "That one, my lord. We should run!"
Hers was the smallest of the cottages, badly in need of a new roof from the look of the sag in the present one.
She would not run very fast in her gown, so Wallie announced that he would carry her. He scooped her up and ran, mud splattering below his boots. She weighed very little, less than Katanji.
The door was not locked. She lifted the latch, and he carried her across the threshold, wondering as he did so if that gesture had the same implications in the World as it did on Earth. He set her down and closed the door and looked around.
It was very small and, obviously, very old. One of the walls leaned inward, and the floor was uneven. Probably the present bowed roof was far from the first that these ancient stones had supported. There were two stools and a chair, a table, and a rough dresser. The floor was made of flagstones, with straw on them by the entrance. Cooking would be done on the fire, of course, and there was an oven built into the fireplace. Faint scents of woodsmoke gave the place a homey air. A bucket and two large baskets stood in a corner; a couple of garments hung on pegs; a small and very rough image of the Goddess sat on a shelf with flowers laid before it... There was no great comfort, but the room was clean and friendly.
He looked around to speak to Quili, and she had vanished. Quiet creaking of ropes came from the other room. He ducked through the other doorway in time to see her stretching out on the bed.
"Very pretty," he said harshly, aware of his sudden physical response. Her body was every bit as fine a
s the tight gown had promised.
She twisted a smile and held out her arms to him, but he could see her hands shaking.
"You're very pretty, apprentice, but you're trying to distract me. Now put your gown on again and come out here. I want to talk to you."
He went and sat on the more solid looking of the two stools. In a moment Quili crept in from the other room, dressed again in her threadbare yellow robe, but barefoot. She lit on the edge of the chair, hands clasped, eyes staring down at the floor, long hair falling to hide her face.
Wallie forced his mind back to business. "Tell me about the murdered swordsmen."
Again, all the color drained from her face. She stared at him.
"Men do not go to clear land on the wettest day since winter, Quili."
She slid to her knees. "My lord, they were not at fault! They are good people!"
"I must be the judge of that."
Quili crouched over and began to weep, covering her face with her hands. That was another approach, and probably the last she had left to try. It might be very effective, though―Wallie was not good at bullying little girls.
He let her sob for a while and then said, "That's enough! Quili, don't you see that I'm trying to help? I want to hear this story before Adept Nnanji does. Now tell me the truth―and quickly!"
Nnanji was sworn to uphold the sutras. His reaction to an assassination would be as automatic as blinking. A cover-up made it much, much worse, and there was no other explanation for the men's absence. Nnanji would snap out a denunciation. He was far too impetuous and idealistic to look for extenuating circumstances first. In fact, to a swordsman, there could be no extenuating circumstances for assassination. Nnanji would be prosecutor and Wallie both judge and executioner. He also was sworn to obey the code of the swordsmen, and if he found against Nnanji, then Nnanji had brought false charges and must pay the penalty. The only penalty in such a case was death.