by Kate Elliott
His urgency impelled her. She took a step, and a breath of fetid air washed her. She took another step into a spitting salt spray with the crash of surf far below, and another step to warm rain in her face amid the racket of crickets and the smell of damp grass. Her hands smarted as blood rushed back into the skin. The pulse beneath her feet throbbed with a third tone, hot and intense, the presence of blood washing down the path like an incoming tide.
She could not run within the confines of the labyrinths, but because she was compact she could negotiate the path’s twists and turns economically, keeping ahead of the other presence. The muzzy confusion of earlier days had lifted and she felt both the widening focus and the pinpoint awareness of her surroundings from her days as a reeve when her instincts—right up until the last day—had served her so well.
She was back in the game, one step ahead of fear. Flirting with danger, the rush that her eagle had taught her to love. Wasn’t all of life like that: never more than one step ahead until the day death caught you?
The path spilled her into the center of the labyrinth, where the horse waited, looking aggrieved, if horses could look aggrieved, as if to say: “Why did you take so long?”
Gods, she was thirsty. Hands shaking, she filled the bowl and drank her fill, the water blazing into every part of her body. She sank down cross-legged, panting, and rubbed her forehead. Night had fallen. Knowing a cliff plunged away on all sides, she dared not move, not unless the horse was willing to fly at night, something an eagle could not do because they depended so heavily on their vision. She’d heard tales of eagles who could be fooled or forced into flying at the full moon, but she’d never had such luck with Flirt.
But as she sat with a sweet breeze steady against her face, she realized the mare actually had a kind of sheen to it that might be described as a glow. Its coat was not so much pale gray as luminescent silver. Indeed, the horse had an unnatural look, a ghost in truth, if ghosts flicked their tails and tossed their pretty heads.
Why did the cursed mare keep bringing her to Guardian altars? Her chest was tight the way a person gets when they don’t want to breathe for fear of inhaling where they know there will be a noxious smell.
A Guardian altar. A winged horse. A cloak. A simple begging bowl. Light from her palm, if she needed it, and a patterned labyrinth through which she seemed able to speak across distances to others like her.
She knew the tale. She could chant the words or tell it through gesture, as every child could.
Long ago, in the time of chaos, a bitter series of wars, feuds, and reprisals denuded the countryside and impoverished the lords and guildsmen and farmers and artisans of the Hundred. In the worst of days, an orphaned girl knelt at the shore of the lake sacred to the gods and prayed that peace might return to her land.
A blinding light split the air, and out of the holy island rising in the center of the lake appeared the seven gods in their own presence. The waters boiled, and the sky wept fire, as the gods crossed over the water to the shore where the girl had fallen.
And they spoke to her.
Our children have been given mind, hand, and heart to guide their actions, but they have turned their power against themselves. Why should we help you?
For the sake of justice, she said.
And they heard her.
Let Guardians walk the lands, in order to establish justice if they can.
Who can be trusted with this burden? she asked them. Those with power grasp tightly.
Only the dead can be trusted, they said. Let the ones who have died fighting for justice be given a second chance to restore peace. We will give them gifts to aid them with this burden.
Taru the Witherer wove nine cloaks out of the fabric of the land and the water and the sky, and out of all living things, which granted the wearer protection against the second death although not against weariness of soul;
Ilu the Opener of Ways built the altars, so that they might speak across the vast distances each to the other;
Atiratu the Lady of Beasts formed the winged horses out of the elements so that they could travel swiftly and across the rivers and mountains without obstacle;
Sapanasu the Lantern gave them light to banish the shadows;
Kotaru the Thunderer gave them the staff of judgment as their symbol of authority;
Ushara the Merciless One gave them a third eye and a second heart with which to see into and understand the hearts of all;
Hasibal gave an offering bowl.
All she lacked was a staff of judgment, whatever that was.
Really, a reeve who tallied up the evidence might suggest, against all likelihood, that these added up to an obvious conclusion:
Here sits a Guardian.
WAS SHE MERELY spinning and drifting on sweet-smoke, unmoored from the world around her? All she knew for sure was that she was being hunted by forces she did not comprehend, ones her gut—and Hari the out-lander, if that was really his name—warned her never to trust.
She didn’t know what precisely she was now, but she had been a reeve once. She could investigate. And it would help to figure out where the hells she was, where her enemies were, and what they wanted.
“YOU MIGHT WANT to turn back,” said the old woman as she scooped nai porridge into Marit’s bowl. They stood under the triple-gated entrance to a temple of Ilu, where Marit had come to beg for food. “Once you ford the river and cross through West Riding, you’ll have left Sohayil.”
“Merchants will trade, and beggars will beg, and laborers will seek work wherever they can find it.” The nai’s richly spiced aroma made Marit’s mouth water; it was all she could do not to bolt down the food right there.
“In the old days that was certainly true, but not anymore. We can’t be so easy about things in these days.” Morning mist rose off the river and curled in backwater reeds. A last gust of night rain spattered on the waters, and stilled. On the grounds of the temple, an apprentice trundled a wheelbarrow full of night soil to the temple gardens, while a pair of children carried an empty basket to the henhouse. A trio of elders even older than the gatekeeper paced through the chant of healing from the Tale of Patience, their morning exercise. From the round sanctuary rose the sonorous chanting of male voices. “I don’t mind telling you, for your own good, really, that we’ve recalled all our envoys who’ve been walking the roads from here to Haldia and Toskala. Sund and Farhal and Sardia aren’t truly safe, although some still make the journey.”
“You must have envoys carrying messages to the Ostiary in Nessumara, to the other temples of Ilu. Not to mention your work as envoys.”
The old envoy was spry, comfortably plump, and nobody’s fool. “Think you so? Why are you headed that way? If you don’t mind my saying so, your clothes and walking staff mark you as a beggar or a laborer down on her luck—and the gods know we’ve seen enough of them in these days—but your manner doesn’t fit. The cloak’s nice. Is that silk? Good quality.”
Her interest was genuine. She was envious, in an amused way. She didn’t trust Marit, not in these days with any kind of traveler out on the roads and every sort of awful rumor blown on the winds. The region of Sohayil remained a haven of relative calm probably only because of the ancient magic bound into the bones of the surrounding hills as a fence against trouble. But on the other hand, a lone traveler wasn’t likely to cause much trouble unless she was a spy scouting for—
She glanced away, as if troubled, and the contact broke.
“For what?” asked Marit.
“Eh!” The envoy laughed awkwardly as she looked back at Marit. “For what? If I could find silk that good in quality, I’d get a length of blue and make a wedding wrap for my granddaughter. But not white, like that. White is—White’s not a color for weddings.” White is death’s color, but any decent person is too well mannered to mention that to someone who clearly has nothing else to wear against the rain.
“My thanks, Your Holiness. My thanks for your hospitality.”
“Blessed is Ilu, who walks with travelers.” Her smile remained friendly, but it was pitying as well: Especially poor kinless women like this one, alone in the world. No one should have to be so alone.
Shaken, Marit retreated from the temple gate and from its neighboring village of Rifaran. She walked back to the glade where she had concealed Warning. She slurped down the porridge, the spices a prickle in her nostrils, but the comforting nai did not settle her. She worked through a set of exercises with the training staff, but the martial forms did not focus her today. Even the delicate shift of the wind in trees flowering with the rains did not soothe her.
She’d never been a loner. She liked people. But perhaps she liked them better when she didn’t have an inkling of what was really going on in their heads.
She sank down on her haunches, grass brushing her thighs. Red-petaled heart-bush and flowering yellow goldcaps bobbed as the breeze worked through the meadow. White bells and purple muzz swayed. Everywhere color dazzled, and the scent of blooming made the world sweet.
“Great Lady,” she whispered, “don’t abandon me, who has always been your faithful apprentice. Let me be strong enough for the road ahead. Let me be strong enough to stop thinking of Joss, to let what was in the past stay in the past. Let me be wise enough to know that what we shared then, we can no longer share. My eyes are open, and there are some places and some hearts I do not want to see.”
Tears slid from her eyes. She wiped them away. “Hear me, Lady. I’ll stay away from him. In exchange, please watch over him even though he belongs to Ilu. Surely we are all your children. I’ll follow this road, wherever it takes me. I will always act as your loyal apprentice, as I always have. I will serve the law, as I always have. Hear me, Lady. Give me a sign.”
Warning stamped. A red deer parted a thick stand of heart-bush and paced into the meadow. Twin fawns, tiny creatures so new that they tottered on slender legs, stumbled into view behind her. The deer stared at Marit for a long, cool hesitation, and then sprang away into the forest with the fawns at her heels.
Marit smiled, her heart’s grief easing a little. The Lady of Beasts had heard her oath, and had answered her.
SHE NO LONGER needed much sleep, and anyway she didn’t fancy the flavor of her dreams, which seemed to cycle between Lord Radas whipping hounds and archers in pursuit as she fled into a dark mazy forest, or her lover Joss aged into a cursed attractive middle-aged man except for his habit of drinking himself into and out of headaches and flirting up women at every opportunity. She’d never thought of him as a person with so little self-control.
She napped in the middle of the day, hiding herself and the mare in brush or trees. In early morning and late afternoon she worked through her forms diligently. She rode at night. Under Warning’s hooves, the road took on a faint gleam that lit their way. It was funny how quickly you got accustomed to a piece of magic like that, when it aided you. She minded the night rains less when she was awake. They washed through and away, blown by the winds, and afterward her clothes would dry off as she rode.
One night, Warning shied and halted, refusing to go farther. Marit led her into cover just before she heard the tramp of marching men. They were a motley group; she could see them pretty well despite overcast skies that admitted no light of moon. They had torches, and all manner of weapons, and they were moving fast and purposefully, heading southwest. Their captain with his horsetail ornaments had a ragged scar crudely healed across his clean-shaven chin, and he had the look of a real northerner, hair and complexion lightened to a pale brown by outlander blood. They all wore a crude tin medallion on a string at their necks, a star with eight points. In a cold moment, set against the misty-warm night, she recognized the men who had tried to capture her in the mountains.
She moved on once Warning was willing to go, but she could not shake the sight of those men. Most likely Hari had confessed that he’d seen her, and identified the Guardian altar where she had been standing. It seemed likely they were marching to the Soha Hills, hoping to trap her.
They’ll never give up. They want me that badly.
She plotted a path in her head that would, she hoped, lead her to Toskala. She and the mare pushed north through Sund for days, begging at temples and farmsteads at dawn or twilight. She was always looking over her shoulder.
Warning, deprived of her favored sustenance at the Guardian altars, began to graze with the same enthusiasm a dog might display eating turnips. She deigned to water in streams and ponds as if the process disgusted her.
When they reached the region of Sardia, where the tributary road they were traveling on met the Lesser Walk, they turned east toward Toskala. Late in the afternoon they set out through woodland on a track running more or less parallel to the paved road. Just before dusk they began moving through managed woodlands, skirting an orchard and diked fields marked with poles carved at the peak with the doubled axe sacred to the Merciless One.
She found a copse of murmuring pine and left Warning in its shelter. Walking along the embankment between fields, she headed toward a compound lying in the center of cultivated land. From here she could not see the main road, but she knew it was close. She circled around the high compound walls, ringed at their height with wire hung with bells to keep out intruders. Drizzle spat over the ground as she stepped up onto the entry path and walked to the gate.
The doors were shut with the dusk, lamps hanging high on the wall. She ventured into the light and raised both hands to show she was holding no weapon.
“Greetings of the dusk,” she called. “I’m a traveler, begging for the goddess’s mercy by way of a bit to eat and drink. Maybe some grain for the road. Withered apples? Anything you have to spare.” She held out her bowl.
“Go away,” said a woman’s voice from atop the walls. “Our gates are closed.”
Among other things, Marit had been at pains to discover what day and month it was, now that she knew she had slept through nineteen years and by doing so walked from the Year of the Black Eagle, with perhaps a slight detour through the Year of the Blue Ox, directly into the Year of the Silver Fox.
“I’m surprised to hear you say so, holy one. I thought Ushara’s temples kept their gates open all day and all night of the day of Wakened Snake. So it always was in my own village.”
“The gates are closed, day and night,” said the woman. “Shadows walk abroad. No one can be trusted, so we no longer let anyone in. Go away, or we’ll kill you.” Marit sensed the presence of five others along the wall.
“How can this be, holy one? The Devourer turns no person away. Her gates are always open.”
She received no answer, and no beggar’s tithe, and when they shot a warning arrow to stab the dirt at her feet, she walked away.
SHE HAD BETTER luck in the villages and towns set up as posting stations along the Lesser Walk. The folk there might be wary and reluctant to share with a mere beggar, but the laws of the gods were clear on the duty owed by householders and temples toward indigent wanderers.
“Greetings of the day to you, verea,” said the shopgirl, a pretty young thing in a shabby taloos that was frayed at the ends. She tried a smile, but it was as frayed as the fabric, barely holding together. She looked ready to duck away from the hard slap her father would give her if she didn’t close more sales this month than last month, even if it wasn’t her fault that so few travelers were out on Sardia’s main road, the principal route through this region to Toskala.
“Greetings of the day to you,” said Marit. The girl’s cringing attitude disturbed her, so anger gave bite to her tone.
“I’m sorry. How can I help you? I’m sure there’s something here you must need. What are you looking for?” Desperation made the girl’s voice breathy. She was trying too hard.
Marit forced a kinder tone. “I need a brush. For grooming a horse. And something to pick stones out of its hooves. It’s a nice shop. You must get a lot of customers here, you’re in a good stopping point along the road.”
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�Custom used to be better,” admitted the girl, relaxing a little. She had a round face and a honey-colored complexion, smooth and unblemished. “Folk don’t travel anymore.”
“Why is that?”
The girl glanced at the entryway. Wide strips of hanging cloth, stamped with the gold sigil of the merchants’ guild, were tied back to either side, so with the doors slid open, she could see straight down the road along which the posting town sprawled. The girl sucked in a sharp breath. Fear rose off her like steam. Marit turned.
She should have noticed the cessation of street noise, followed by the ominous slap of feet. A pack of armed men strode down the street, breaking off in groups of two and three to climb onto the porches of shops and dive through the entrances without even the courtesy of taking off their sandals.
The girl reached over the counter to tug on Marit’s sleeve. “We have to hide!” she whispered, but her thoughts screamed: They’ll take me like they took Brother. Father won’t protect me this time. “Quick, duck down over behind the chest there, they won’t look. Papa!” She opened the door to the back and vanished as she slid the door hard shut behind her.
Shelves lined the shop front, but pickings were scarce: a pair of used brushes polished to look new; a single piece of stiff new harness, and several neatly looped lead lines recently oiled. A few other refurbished items also catered to travelers whose gear might have broken along the road. The chest had the bulky look of a piece left behind by a prosperous merchant fallen on hard times; not many people could afford the weight of such an oversized container.
The door to the back snapped open.
“Cursed beggar!” A sweat-stained man slammed the door shut behind him. Marit realized she had let her cloak open, which revealed her ragged clothing still damp from the dawn’s shower. “Get out of the shop, or duck down behind that chest. I don’t want trouble from you! Beyond what I’ve already got!”
She dropped down into the narrow gap between the chest and a set of lower shelves. The space was so small she had to turn her head to breathe, facing into the open shelving. A pile of brushes and combs had been shoved back here, pieces missing teeth or with wood cracking.