by Kate Elliott
“You’ll want to consider how much you tell to strangers, who might not have your best interests at heart. That army was taking slaves. You’re a good age for it. Pretty enough to be of interest. Worth a few cheyt on the open market.”
She stepped away, then looked at the little children, measuring her chances to run.
“Eiya! My sister was a hierodule. She’d never go against the law.”
A woman shrieked. In the deepest part of the river, where the current ran hard in chest-high water, Nallo had lost her footing.
“Nallo!” screamed Avisha. She choked out wordless yelps and started to cry.
“Here, now. Bai’s got her.”
Bai hauled her into shallower water. Nallo sputtered, coughed, spat, and both women began laughing. Bai looped the rope around the farthest pole and with Nallo’s help tugged it taut, then tied it off. Holding on to the rope, they crossed back.
“That’s good-quality rope,” Bai was saying as they dripped up onto the pebbled shore beside Kesh and Avisha.
“My husband made it,” said Nallo with evident pride. “He only made best-quality rope, and for the temples, too, and for festival banners and all manner of ornament. Everyone said he was the best ropemaker on West Track.”
“I was so scared when you slipped,” said Avisha in a gulping wet voice. “I thought we lost you.”
“Well, you didn’t!”
There was the temper. It made even Kesh stand up straight.
Bai said sweetly, “Kesh, you swim the horses across. I’ll take the boat. You two follow. Best we get moving in case anyone else is on the road.”
The crossing went swiftly and without incident.
While Kesh slung panniers and bags back on the packhorse, Bai and Nallo waded back into the river to recover the precious rope. On this side of the river, someone had abandoned a pile of refuse since battered by wind and rain. Avisha ripped through the pile, but except for sodden cloth and a bronze bucket she found nothing worth keeping.
“Where are you two going now?” Avisha asked as she rolled up the cloth.
He shrugged, hoping she would leave him alone.
“It’s true what you said,” she added with a catch in her voice. “We walked a long way to get to Candra Crossing. It’s the only place you can cross the river for days and days. We had to hide a few days after we left the village because there was a group of soldiers, marching Horn-ward on West Track, back the way they’d come. They had tens of children roped up like beasts. Eiya! Just like beasts.” She grimaced, wiped her eyes and her nose, and sucked in breath to keep talking. “We could see from where we were hiding. There was one child who stumbled and another child who helped him up, and then the soldiers come and beat that child to death, the one who helped.”
Kesh had seen such a company of children being marched away as slaves, and he had no desire to relive the memory. If only she would stop talking!
“Just for helping, you know. Just for helping.” She began to rock back and forth like a sweet-smoke addict.
Kesh grabbed her wrist. “Listen! If you want to survive, you have to keep walking. There’s nothing any of us can do for those children.”
A glance from fine, tear-filled eyes could make the world bright, if you were the kind of man who liked pretty girls made tense by a touch of fear. He’d worked as a debt slave in Master Feden’s house for twelve years, and he’d seen men, and women, who did enjoy forcing sex on reluctant slaves. He’d hated them especially. He released her arm as though it burned him and turned away, but the cursed girl would keep talking.
“I thought Nallo was going to abandon us, too, when we got back to the village to find my father dead and everyone dead—you know Dad and the rest, they ran out with their shovels and hoes to try to hold off the soldiers so us children could run away. Afterward, the landlady wanted to sell us as slaves. Nallo wouldn’t let her.”
“Can you tighten that rope for me?” he asked, to shut her up. “We need to get moving.”
Bai splashed through the shallows and jogged up the slope, Nallo limping behind. He recognized the grim look on Bai’s face.
“Get moving.” She slung the rope over the packhorse’s neck, fixing it to the panniers. “Kesh, put the girl in the basket, and tie the boy up on the mare. Nallo, you’ll ride the gelding. Avisha, you’ll either have to leave the wash-tub or carry it at the pace we’ll set. There’s something coming into town. I want everyone out of sight before it gets to the riverbank and spots us. Move! I’ll meet you.” She settled the ginnies into the sling tied to her saddle.
Nallo mounted awkwardly, stomach over the saddle, then pumping her legs until she got the left one over. Thanks to the gods, the horse remained quiescent despite her obvious lack of experience. Swearing under his breath, Keshad lashed the horses into a line and set out at a brisk pace. Avisha hurried after, lugging the washtub. On the mare, Jerad was grinning at the ginnies.
As Bai crossed the river back into town, all Kesh could think of was his old friends Rabbit, Twist, and Pehar, the worst companions a man might fear to have. He hoped they were all dead now, but he was sure they weren’t. How anyone could defeat the army that had been descending on Olossi he couldn’t imagine, which was why he and Bai had left and more honorable or foolhardy people had stayed behind. Like she was doing now. The road cut into the woodland, and he lost sight of the far shore.
“What about your sister?” said Avisha with an anxious look.
“Shut up. Keep moving.”
No one spoke as they strode along. For the longest time he just walked, thoughts shut down. The horses were obedient, the children quiet, the girl steady.
After a long time he heard hurried footsteps pattering on the earth, coming up from behind. He drew his sword. Avisha started to cry.
But it was Bai, loping like a wolf chasing prey. She was wiping her hands on a scrap of cloth, and although she threw away the cloth before she reached them, he was sure it was bloody.
10
Nallo knew the tales, how the persistent, fortunate, clever child fought past obstacles and won through to a good life in the end. But she’d never believed in them. She’d watched three older brothers die, too weakened with diarrhea to do more than stare mutely at those tending them. She’d been sent to Old Cross market with her uncle and littlest niece, both girls meant for debt slavery, but although her little niece’s labor had been bought up quickly, not one soul had bid on Nallo. Too thin, too sour-looking, too tall, too old, not pretty. There were plenty of desperate folk on the roads, farms failing, laborers out of work, too many children and not enough food to feed them all. The folk who could afford to purchase the labor of those unfortunate enough to be selling had the leisure to be choosy.
Her husband had made the contract with her family through intermediaries. He’d needed a wife quickly; there was a newborn to care for. Everyone had told her she was fortunate. It was the best life she could hope for.
He’d been a gentle man, patient and kind. Everyone in the village had said so, reminding her again and again that she was fortunate. And it was even true.
She wasn’t gentle or kind or patient. Everyone had said so, and it was true.
She had no obligation to stay with Avisha and the little ones. But she had nowhere else to go. That had been her husband’s last, if unwilling, gift to her: a reason to keep going and not just walk into the hills, lie down in the grass, and die.
THEY WALKED FOR half the morning, and at length halted to let the horses water at a pond ringed by mulberry trees. The children peed, and got a scrap to eat and a swallow of old wine. Then they walked on.
Avisha moved up to walk alongside the man. She tried to draw him into conversation. When he wouldn’t talk about himself, she talked about her old life, about her father, about her mother; she chattered about plants and their uses.
“She’s a pretty girl,” remarked Zubaidit over her shoulder, addressing Nallo. “She seems knowledgeable about herbs.”
“Her mot
her taught her.”
“That’s a good piece of knowledge to have. She’s old enough to think of marriage.”
“We’re too poor to think of marriage. We’ve no kin. We’ve nothing.”
“Perhaps you can find a man willing to look no farther than youth and herbcraft.”
“One who is desperate enough to take on a destitute girl with no marriage portion and no kinfolk to sweeten the net of alliance? It was hard enough for my family to find a man willing to marry me.”
“Why is that?”
“I’ve got a bad temper. I say things people don’t want to hear. I ought not to, but they just slip out.”
“Which god took your apprenticeship service?”
“The Thunderer. After my year was up, my kinfolk asked if the temple would take me on for an eight-year service, but they didn’t want me either.” She hated the way she sounded, like a child whining for a stalk of sweet-cane to suck on. “Never mind. It wasn’t so bad. My husband treated me well. The work wasn’t so hard. We didn’t go hungry.”
It had been a good life. She saw that, now it was gone.
“It’s a hard path to walk, away from what you can never go back to.”
“Is that how it is for you and your brother?” Nallo asked boldly. Since she could not see the hierodule’s face, she watched her walk instead.
The woman wore a plain linen exercise kilt, tied with a cord at the waist, and a tight sleeveless vest. Her limbs, thus displayed, were smooth, sculpted, and strong. “I’m not sure where this path will lead us.”
They hit a steep stretch, too difficult to climb while talking, and afterward Nallo could think of no way to resume the conversation. Up ahead, Avisha had started in again.
Late in the afternoon they halted for the night near the dregs of a stream. They shared out a leather bottle full of vinegary mead and finished off a sack of dry rice cake and mushy radish, although these scraps could not cut the hollow feeling in their stomachs. Avisha got the little ones settled to sleep while Nallo went to wash in the stream, to take a little privacy to do her business. Coming back, walking slowly because her ankle ached, she came up behind the sister and brother where they had moved away from the camp to talk between themselves. She paused in the cover of a stand of pipe-brush, too embarrassed to reveal herself.
“What is wrong with that girl? She won’t shut up.”
“You’d be more agreeable if you’d look at people with a little compassion. I worry about you, Kesh. You aren’t happy.”
“We were slaves for twelve years! In what manner am I meant to be happy? Or does the goddess have an answer for that as well?”
“The gods have an answer, if you take the time to pray.”
“I pray that we get rid of them. We’re moving so slowly, Bai. Why did we have to bring them with us?”
“We had to get everyone out of sight, because if that lot marching into town saw these on the far shore they might think to cross and grab them, and then they’d find sign of our passage. I don’t want any trouble.”
“We’ve got trouble enough with these refugees. How long will you let them burden us? Or do you mean to hand out our coin to them, too, until we have nothing left for ourselves?”
She chortled, but it was a bitter laugh. “We have plenty of coin, Kesh.”
“Stolen from Master Feden’s chest! I’d have liked to have seen when you grabbed those strings right in front of his fat face. Aui! What do you think is happening in Olossi?”
“Captain Anji has found a way to defeat them, or he’s dead and Olossi is overrun.”
“Then best we not drag our feet helping every sad traveler on the road. We can’t help everyone.”
“We can help these.”
“Nallo?” Along the track from camp came Avisha.
The brother muttered a complaint under his breath while the sister laughed softly and said, “I’m going to make the prayers for a safe night. Do you want to help me?”
“No. I’ll go take a piss.”
“As you wish.”
“Aui!” That was Avisha, meeting them on the trail. “I didn’t see you here. Did you see Nallo?”
Nallo rattled the pipe-brush, then moved into view as if she’d just come walking that way. Keshad pushed past her. Nallo noticed what had been staring her in the face all along: the man had the debt mark tattooed at the outer curve of his left eye. Twelve years a slave. He had said so himself. He wore no bronze bracelets to mark his status as a slave, but those were easy to take off. Zubaidit’s face was unmarked, but that wasn’t unusual in those dedicated to the gods, which was a different form of servitude and obligation than that taken on by those who sold the rights to their labor or their debt on the auction square.
They were runaway slaves, who had brazenly raided the master’s strongbox. Wasn’t there a penalty, assessed at any assizes court, for those who aided or abetted slaves running away from their contract?
At dawn, Nallo took the children and their few possessions aside. She saw, in the man’s face, a rush of relief at the thought of being rid of them, and she supposed that Zubaidit’s complicated frown disguised relief as well.
“Our thanks for your aid,” Nallo said politely. “May the gods watch over you and grant you the same courtesy you have shown others.”
Zubaidit snorted, and her brother looked alarmed.
“Can’t we go on this way together, Nallo?” Avisha asked plaintively.
“No. We’d just slow them down.”
“Let’s go.” Keshad was already looking up the path as the sun rose.
The hierodule’s gaze was a terrible thing; she might see anything with such a stare, that pierced right through you as though she could read your every thought just in the way you scratched a bug’s bite in the crook of your elbow because you were uncomfortable and embarrassed. How could you ask two armed and strong adults if they were runaway slaves? It was better to remain silent.
Zubaidit nodded. “It’s true we’ll make better time not burdened with you. Yet are you sure?”
“We’ve been traveling on our own for days now,” snapped Nallo. “I know the Soha Hills well enough. There won’t be many folk traveling, if there are any traveling at all in days like these with so much trouble on the road. We can take care of ourselves.”
The brother left without more than a barely polite fare-thee-well. The hierodule offered them a pouch of food, another bottle of old wine, and five precious leya, just as if they were beggars, which they were, so Nallo took it and with thanks. Jerad wept to see the ginnies go.
As soon as the horses were out of sight, Avisha burst into tears. “Why did you make them leave?”
“They’re runaway slaves, and thieves in the bargain. We’ll get fined if we’re caught with them, and that will throw us right into slavery. Is that what you want?”
The little ones hunkered away from her temper.
Avisha sniveled, wiping her eyes, but the tears kept flowing. “Eiya! The slave mark on his face. How he was so anxious to get on. He wouldn’t talk to me. You’re so clever for seeing it, Nallo.”
But she wasn’t clever. She was angry, and embarrassed, and she couldn’t stop thinking about that woman. She couldn’t stop hating herself for never having once in three years as a wife looked over her kind and patient husband with the kind of unexpected and thrilling desire that had hit her smack between the eyes the moment she had seen Zubaidit. Who had treated her with respect and courtesy, but nothing more. Nothing more.
“Where are we going, Nallo?” Jerad asked.
She swung Zianna up onto a hip. “Just walk!”
THAT WAS THE day everything began to go wrong. Not that it hadn’t gone all wrong from the day the army marched into the village and killed her father, but Avisha had begun to hope they would escape, find a safe refuge, and make a new life. Keshad and his sister had appeared, as though sent by the gods, to help them across the river. He was so handsome! But not very talkative. Burdened with doubts and concerns, most like
ly. Why should he want to hear the chatter of a dreary, irritating girl who couldn’t keep her mouth shut? Avisha was so ashamed of herself, knowing she had prattled on trying to impress him, when after all a man as good-looking and intense and experienced as him couldn’t possibly be interested in her.
Then Nallo realized that their two companions were runaway slaves, and thieves in the bargain, and therefore dangerous to travel with. Isn’t that what Papa always said, when he scolded her for being vain of her looks? A sincere heart is better than a pretty face.
So they set off on their own, again, tramping along the road at a snail’s pace with Jerad sullen because the ginnies were gone. The wind picked up, and it started to rain, a big gusting downpour that soaked them through. It came down so hard and fast that the road churned with muddy water, but they had to keep going. They walked in the rain all morning, and rested where they could find shelter. Midday the rain slackened and ceased. Soon after, the sun came out between shredded clouds, and they walked in the steaming heat until Jerad could not go one step farther.
Ahead lay a village, surrounded with a fence to keep livestock in and wild beasts out. Stands of fruit and pipe and mulberry trees broke the expanse of field, and in the distance rose denser woodland not yet cleared.
It had been so many days since they had seen folk walking about their daily lives that it seemed strange to Avisha to see it now. Men sowed rice in seedling fields. Younger men guided their draft animals, plowing furrows through the larger fields, mud and water splattering until they and the beasts were coated. A pair of young women stood on the raised earth that separated the fields, holding trays with drink and food for the working men; they were chatting and laughing as though they’d no idea what had happened to Candra Crossing not three days’ walk away. Seeing the refugees, the young women splashed away into the cover of trees.