Hath No Fury

by Melanie R. Meadors

  They’d returned to the western harbor after leaving Nadín at the medicum. They’d searched for the ship Nadín had described, and found soon enough that it had left shortly before they’d arrived. They’d readied the ship as quickly as they could, the people of the harbor helping to tow the ship back, to get her moving as fast as they could.

  They’d exited the harbor and sailed north, then eastward around the tip of Sharakhai. They spotted the Condor shortly after.

  Steadily, the Needle crept closer, the sand a bare whisper beneath the runners. Nightfall neared, and they came close enough that the crew on the other ship began firing arrows. At first it was merely to warn them away, but when it became clear they wouldn’t be deterred, they started targeting Djaga at the wheel and the others about the ship. Osman set up some makeshift shields using the hatch cover and the table from the cabin below decks. It worked, and soon Hathahn’s crew abandoned the tactic and, from their hold, brought up clay pots the size of oranges with black wicks sticking out from one end. They lit them and began launching them at the Needle.

  The first struck the ship’s port-side hull. The hull burst into flames, though thankfully most of it splashed downward onto the sand. The second hit the foredeck. Osman ran forward with dousing sand, one of the dirt dogs shielding him with the table to protect him from the renewed onslaught of arrows.

  The Needle ran alongside the Condor now. Djaga called to the other pit fighter, Kaliban. “Take the wheel. Be ready to brake her.”

  “What are you going to do?” he asked as he stepped over.

  Djaga eyed the other ship, where the bulky form of Hathahn had finally come up from the hold. “I’m going to take that rotting ship down.”

  As the crew of the dhow lit another flame pot, Djaga stepped over to the starboard gunwale. She took her long fighting knife from its sheath along her leg and bit down on it with her teeth. Grabbing the mainsail’s halyard tight in her right hand, she crouched, and in one swift, furious motion, she pulled the belaying pin.

  She leapt as the lanyard pulled with enough force to lift her from the deck. The wind in the mainsail, and the weight of the sail and its boom, drew her toward the top of the mainmast. She used her legs to run along it, guiding herself so that she’d be launched in the proper direction.

  When she reached the top, the lanyard whipped her up and over the mast. She flew through the air as a fresh fire pot crashed below and spread its fire amidships. As she flew toward the dhow’s triangular mainsail, she retrieved her knife from her teeth, gripped it tightly in both hands. The knife’s tip met the sail’s canvas, puncturing it with a sound like the beat of a drum. Down she went toward the foot of the sail, her knife sizzling as it sliced the thick cloth neatly in two.

  Hathahn charged across the deck to meet her, but when she reached the boom, she leapt backward, flipping high over him to land on the deck near the pilot’s wheel. Her knife she drove deep into the pilot’s neck. After snapping a kick into his chest to knock him aside, she spun the wheel, turning it over and over. It fought her the more the ship turned, but she kept going, muscles straining, until she’d turned it as far as it could go.

  The ship heeled toward the starboard side as it turned sharply to port. The rudder, the central, rear ski, was now almost perfectly at odds with the line the ship had been moving in. It dragged, throwing Djaga forward against the wheel so hard she lost her grip on her knife. It went clattering forward across the deck, tossing sunlight as it went. The crew, who’d been rushing toward her, were thrown as well. They grabbed for the rigging to steady themselves, but several fell hard to the deck. They slid scrabbling toward the fore of the ship. Not Hathahn, though. He’d grabbed tight to the rigging. He came pounding forward, sending a powerful jab across Djaga’s jaw, an uppercut that glanced across her skull, then a kick that sent her reeling.

  She flailed for purchase, but being so close to the stern there was nothing. The gunwale clipped her thighs as she flew backward over the deck’s edge. She crashed onto the sand, and it knocked the breath from her.

  She slid and rolled. The sand scraped roughly over her skin. Hathahn dropped from the ship moments before the prow of the Needle crashed into it with a sound like thunder. The sails of both ships shuddered as they came to rest at last.

  Hathahn approached Djaga, scimitar in one hand, a fighting knife in the other. “Couldn’t leave it alone, could you?”

  Djaga stood.

  “You could have let us leave. Live out your life in peace as the greatest warrior the pits had ever seen.”

  Djaga ignored him, undoing her leather belt.

  This day, Sjado, I do not ask for your favor. I demand it.

  She wrapped the belt around her knuckles once, then let the rest hang, the iron buckle weighty.

  This day, I do not give. I take what is mine.

  With these words, the soul of Sjado filled her as never before. Not since the day she’d slaughtered her loved ones in Kundhun. She wished she’d never listened to Afua and gone to the barrow. But she had. And she’d paid the price. Now, she didn’t care if she killed another. She didn’t care if Sjado was appeased. She only wanted to feel Hathahn’s hot blood coursing over her skin.

  Hathahn swiped with his sword. Djaga skipped away. He cut for her legs, then drove in with the fighting knife. Djaga dodged, then swung her belt, going for his eyes.

  Hathahn leaned out of range, a smile coming to his lips as he looked her over. “The golem must not have given you much trouble. Or are you truly that good?”

  In a blink, she snapped the belt at him. The buckle caught him across the chin, sending him stumbling backward. Blood collected along a thin line, staining his short brown beard. “Perhaps you are.” He took two quick steps forward, flicking the tip of the sword across her line of retreat, scoring a light cut against her thigh. “I wasn’t lying, girl. I will fight you until my dying breath.”

  Beyond Hathahn, swords clashed: Osman and his dirt dogs engaged Hathahn’s crew. A newcomer stood at the Condor’s stern. Afua. She leapt down from the ship but came no closer. She merely watched as Djaga and Hathahn fought.

  Djaga felt the anger inside her become something else. She became resolved to what she must do. The furnace in her heart was no longer directionless fury, but a straight-flowing river of purpose.

  She slipped the end of the belt through the buckle, and held it like a noose. She baited Hathahn several times. He swiped his sword at her with each one, then charged on the third. She was ready. She ducked beneath his first swing, sidestepped the thrust of his knife. She kicked his knee when he came in too close, then pivoted around a downward thrust. She was a dervish, moving inside his defenses, spinning along his body as he tipped ever so slightly off balance from an awkward, overreaching thrust. Each and every move of her body felt like a prayer to the goddess, prayers that Sjado was answering by granting her grace and foresight and supple movement.

  In one simple motion—an act as pure as Djaga had ever felt—she grabbed Hathahn’s elbow, lifted it while treading past him in one willowy stride, and slipped the belt over his head. After powering her heel into the back of his knee, sending him staggering, she snapped the belt tight and dropped onto her back. Her foot against the back of his head provided all the leverage she needed. She pulled hard on the leather. Her whole form tightened. Her foot turned Hathahn’s head to one side. He swiped at her blindly with his sword. He missed with the first but gave her with a deep gash along her right arm with the second. When his head jerked, there came a loud crunch like kindling breaking, and his body went utterly still.

  Djaga stared at his unmoving form. She heard only the sound of her own breath, the beating of her heart. Warm blood slicked her left arm as she let the belt slip through her fingers. In slow increments, the rasp of her breath and the thump of her heart were replaced by the rhythmic shush of footsteps. She picked up Hathahn’s sword and turned.

  Ten paces away stood Afua. She held her hands before her, the way a bride might in th
e moments before her right hand was bound by a grass cord to her groom. Behind her, Osman and Kaliban approached, but they remained a healthy distance away. They were bloodied and bent. Of the other dirt dogs, she could see no sign.

  Djaga stepped closer to Afua, sword in hand. The two of them stared at one another, pure opposites, Djaga the essence of battle, of purpose, Afua the embodiment of peace, a woman resolved to her fate.

  “Why did you do it?” Djaga asked in Kundhunese.

  Afua stared at her, stone-faced. “When you killed our people, I felt Sjado within you. I witnessed the slaughter of three of my cousins. I saw you drive a spear through the neck of my own sister. I watched her die, writhing. I didn’t care, Djaga. I didn’t care at all. Her death was like the fall of a leaf from an acacia. Meaningless. I knew I should be horrified by it, but I wasn’t. The only thing I felt was an itch, a yearning to get back what I had lost. That was why I left, not because I feared what would happen to me, but because I knew that no one there—not you, not my family, not our king—could restore my soul. That could only come from two-faced god.”

  “You did all of this”—with the tip of the scimitar, Djaga pointed at Hathahn’s lifeless form—“to be free?”

  Afua laughed, her dark skin reflecting the deep orange of the sunset. “Djaga! Don’t you see? I did this to free you! All I’ve done since leaving Kundhun has been in the hopes of finding a way to force Sjado to release you. You didn’t deserve this. I did.”

  Djaga stepped forward. “You murdered Nadín.”

  “And I’m sorry for that.” Despite her words, Afua’s stone-face expression told Djaga how little she cared. “But Sjado demands sacrifice. You know this as well as I. You’ve known it from the moment our god took us. You just haven’t been able to admit it. But now you can, yes? You can admit it and be free.”

  Afua’s smile was mad. It was wrong, and it made Djaga sick to her stomach that she could act so after causing so much pain. Djaga gripped Hathahn’s sword. It begged her to use it, as did Nadín’s honor. In that moment, all Djaga could think about was how different Afua’s toothy grimace was from Nadín’s shy smile. How different Djaga’s life had been from Afua’s since their days in Kundhun. Until now, Djaga had thought Afua cursed in the same way she had been. Of course it hadn’t been so. Jonsu, the aspect of peace, had taken Afua as Sjado had taken Djaga.

  What would it be like to be cursed with utter tranquility? What would it be like to live and feel no pain, no anger? Those were necessary for laughter and joy. Afua had been made a husk of a woman by Jonsu. But she was no longer. Djaga could feel it in herself, and she could feel it in Afua as well.

  Djaga looked over her dirty, bloody hands. She took in the world around her, the desert, Hathahn’s dead form, the ships, crashed against one another like two drunks sleeping off their night at the end of an alley, and suddenly wished she’d never come to the desert. If Nadín were going to die—and certainly that was her sentence, a gut wound like hers could lead only to a slow, painful death—she wished she’d stayed to spend as much time with her as she could. Console her. Usher her into the next world with a kiss, their hearts beating as one.

  Suddenly, it was very important that Djaga return to Sharakhai.

  WITHIN THE MEDICUM, DJAGA SAT by Nadín’s bedside, holding the lax fingers of her hand. Nadín’s eyes had been fluttering closed for the past several minutes. Her face was pale as fresh milk.

  Djaga had been telling her the tale, but had stopped when she’d come to the last. The realization had struck her like a hammer blow in the desert, and it was no less impactful now. Wind and grass, how she wished she could sit here forever with Nadín. Tell her stories of the rolling hills of Kundhun. Have Nadín tell her the tales of her life growing up in the desert with her people.

  “Go on,” Nadín said, her eyes still closed.

  “What does it matter?” Djaga replied.

  “I would know before I depart for the further fields.”

  Djaga took a deep breath, then exhaled. “Afua wanted release. I could see it in her, all the emotion that she’d been unable to feel since our ritual coming back to her in a rush.”

  There had been regret and self-loathing in Afua’s eyes as the sun had slipped below the horizon. More than anything else, though, there had been a bottomless well of sorrow. At the same time, all the rage Djaga had felt over the years drained from her like water through a crack in a rain barrel. So much had been kept from her, hidden behind an impossibly high wall. How long she’d wished she could truly bask in Nadín’s love. But it had been impossible. Her anger had prevented it.

  It’s still impossible, Djaga thought, just for completely different reasons.

  “Do it, Afua begged me, pointing to Hathahn’s sword. Kill me.” She paused, debating on lying to Nadín. Surely, she would learn the truth of it in her next life. “Forgive me, my love, but I could find only pity for Afua in my heart. We’d done wrong, but what our god had done to us was worse. Afua hadn’t deserved it.”

  Nadín opened her eyes and turned to look at Djaga. When she spoke, her voice was a whisper. “Neither did you.”

  To this, Djaga only shrugged. “Perhaps she deserved death. There’s still a part of me that wants to find her and kill her for what she did to you. I denied her. We set her ship aright and sent her on her way to Malasan. She left alone, to find a new life. To find the one she’d lost in whatever way she could.”

  Nadín squeezed Djaga’s fingers. “I care only about one thing.”

  Djaga knew, but she still asked, “What?”

  “Are you free?”

  Djaga nodded, part of her wishing it wasn’t so if only she could have Nadín back. “I am.”

  Nadín’s eyes fluttered closed. A wan smile lit her face. “Then I go with a light heart, Djaga Akoyo, for I have unchained my one true love.”

  Djaga stood, tears streaming down her cheeks. “You have, my love.” As she leaned over and kissed Nadín’s forehead, a lone tear fell upon her cheek.

  ECHOES OF STONE

  ELIZABETH VAUGHAN

  IS THERE ANY CHANCE SHE will live?”

  The moment every healer dreads. Ercula had faced the question before, and she knew she would face it again. She’d decided long ago, against the advice of her teachers, to always meet it with honesty. “No,” she answered, direct and simple. “Your babe has passed beyond my skills.”

  She knelt at the bedside of the mother and child, to be closer to her patients, and so saw the spasm of pain that crossed the thin, almost skeletal face of the mother. Months of illness and lack of food reflected in both mother and child.

  “And I not far behind her,” the mother whispered.

  Ercula reached out and put her hand over the mother’s where she clutched the naked babe to her breasts. She let the silence speak, giving only a simple nod. The few remaining bangles in her faded head scarf chimed at her movement, covering the quiet hiss of her snakes.

  The dirt floor beneath her knees was hard, the hovel made of not more than dung and wattle. There was a dank smell to the place, rife with despair. The roof was thin bark; their lord would not spare thick thatching for the least of his people. No fire, no food. No hope.

  “Damn the Duke and his headman.” The mother’s voice was weak but her hate was clear and sharp. “My man gone, his work and sweat poured into the fields. None of his kin left, and all of my blood gone before. No one left to care or grieve. No charity for the sick.”

  Illustration by M. WAYNE MILLER

  Again, Ercula let her silence speak. Where she could not heal, she could at least bear witness.

  Pale, rheumy eyes looked into hers. “I prayed in the Old Ways, and you came, healer, and I thank you. I have no coin to offer.”

  Ercula quirked her lips and shook her head. The bangles chimed, and her snakes slithered beneath her head scarf in approval.

  The babe no longer cried. She lay quiet in her mother’s arms, more bone than flesh, her breaths soft and slowing.
r />   “I’ve a further request,” the mother whispered. “I’d ask for release. For both of us.”

  Ercula nodded, expecting–

  “Not your poisons.” The woman shook her head weakly. “Your other gift, if it still exists.”

  Ercula did not expect that. She pulled her hands away, sat back on her heels.

  “And not here,” the mother said. “I want them to know. Want them to see.”

  “I–” Ercula stared for a moment, at a loss for words.

  “Not what the dying usually ask?” The mother’s mouth contorted into a wry smile.

  “The Great Mother gave us two gifts to ease the way.” Ercula took a deep breath to calm herself. “Few remember us. Fewer still remember that the power was a gift.”

  “The Gods are gone,” the mother said.

  Ercula nodded. “But the gifts she gave us remain.” She closed her eyes as memories flooded in. “I can still hear her voice when she blessed me so.”

  The mother’s eyes widened with wonder. “Healer, how old are you?”

  Ercula almost smiled, for mortal beings were always taken aback at something so normal as her lifetime. “Old enough,” she said.

  Old enough to have served at the altar. To have offered her body and heart to the snakes of the Great Mother and been accepted into their service.

  Old enough to have experienced the Great Silence that descended between the world and its Gods.

  The Great Mother’s voice had gone silent, but the snakes had remained. Without the Goddess it was hard to interpret, harder still to heal. But they’d learned, oh, they had all learned. Only to see the Order become a hated symbol of evil. To see the Holy Temple torn down and burned, its precious snakes killed.

  She’d fled to the shelter of those she had healed in the past, until it grew too dangerous for them to hide her.