Only the smaller aperture would serve. Better a dunk with Little Brother than to be trapped to this godling’s destiny. The most I would have of him was his story, which I would spread across the Umber Sea. And so long as I lived, far from the grasp of Verdant’s people, Intana would make no effort to protect them. He would be as free as I could let him be, until the day I died.
But I didn’t intend for it to be today.
“Am I to see the golden chain now?” I asked.
“Yes. You will come along and strip out of your clothes.”
I followed, with my alert guards, First Servant to the smaller pool. The last boy had come back already, and stared at me with the remaining pair yet to swim beneath the dome. I ignored them.
The floor here had been roughened to permit better footing for oiled skin. I felt the difference after I took off my boots. Though greasy, I kept my purchase, but just barely. I moved cautiously when I drew my trousers off my legs.
I reached for the loops fastening my vest and slowed. What would they do, seeing Little Brother’s mark on my chest?
There was no help for it. I had to be naked to receive the holy oil that would protect me from Little Brother. Though I had swum with him before and not been taken, that did not mean he wouldn’t take me on the next occasion. Little Brother is a fickle creature.
I removed the first silk loop from the top button of my vest, then the next. “I’ll keep my jewellery on,” I said.
“As you wish. Jewellery will make no difference.”
It would to me, if I could not return to my ship and had to bribe someone for clothes and shelter and, more importantly, a weapon.
I slipped off the last three loops and shrugged free of my vest. No one took the garment when I offered it. “What? I don’t want it lying on the oil,” I snapped.
“That mark…?” First Servant said.
“What of it?”
“Why do you have it?”
“I’m Little Brother’s kin,” I told him.
“Little Brother?”
I jerked my head toward the basin where Little Brother poked his nose from the water. “Little Brother,” I said. “He’s waiting for me. If you don’t want me to risk greeting him without oil, then please pour some on me.”
“Why do you have this mark?” First Servant asked. The grey eyebrows on his wrinkled forehead squeezed together in a ridge of condemnation. “I’ve seen the men of your people on their ships, and not one had this mark on his chest. Not one had any mark.”
“I was the longest to remain in the water during the day of my manhood ceremony,” I answered. “If you want this mark to count for nothing, then let me see the golden chain.”
“How old are you?”
“Forty.”
The expressions: hard, getting harder. They didn’t believe me, or didn’t like the idea I was a man of respectable years. I considered diving for the aperture, sliding on as much spilled oil as I could before I slipped in, but I also needed a piece of sponge to survive the swim. I doubted I could get one easily. The junior servant had them in that sack, which was attached around his shoulder.
No choice. I would have to drag him into the water with me. Little Brother would take care of him after I procured a sponge for myself.
I promised a gift earlier. I’d meant a piece of meat from my table, but an entire man would do better.
“Very well,” First Servant said. “Come closer to the urn.”
He had just saved his junior, and perhaps me as well. I would have the oil and the sponge, and then I would flee Verdant.
Someone accepted my vest, and I moved closer to the urn.
“You others strip as well. You will swim with him and see that he returns.”
Damn. Company. But if they were soft-bodied, perhaps I could still win my freedom, for I was good in the water, better under the waves than above them. In deeper waters, Little Brother seldom bothers with human flesh, especially when a man keeps below the surface as much as possible. I had swum for pearls since boyhood. I doubted these holy men could keep up with me. I only required the holy oil to keep Little Brother from biting me before I swam deep enough.
“Come,” First Servant repeated, and I moved forward, small shuffling steps to keep from slipping, and waited for the oil to fall onto my braided hair.
Chapter Five
“You did not ask my name. Is it of no importance to you?” I said.
“No,” First Servant answered. “Slather the oil on your limbs, Oradhé.”
“I’m not the Oradhé, not until after I see the chain and touch Intana’s seal.”
“Slather the oils,” First Servant repeated.
I passed my palms over my face, my neck, my arms and chest. Movement in the centre of the amphitheatre caught my attention, and I glanced to the side. Intana stared at me from a closer distance, his head lowered, his silver pupils creating a glow beneath a curtain of uncombed hair.
I felt something. Behind that guarded countenance, I thought I sensed apprehension. And why I should be so convinced of this, I was uncertain. It was as if his eyes bored into my soul and put his doubts there.
I didn’t want them. Intana deserved nothing from me but his story told to the world. I hadn’t asked Vaal to send me into harbour at the wrong moment, or to be given this burden. I refused it. Living with the sorrow of Jumi’s death my entire adult life crippled my happiness enough.
“Do you do nothing for him?” I asked First Servant, looking away from Intana. “He wears only a modest cloth over his male parts, and his hair is uncombed.”
“He will permit no one to touch him but the Oradhé,” First Servant said. “If you want his hair combed, you may do so yourself, once you are feeling better after the ceremony of sacrifice.” He dumped a ladle of oil on my head again. “Slather.”
Scowling, I bent and smoothed the oil over my buttocks and thighs. Around the urn, the junior servants had stripped and were dipping into the oil with their hands, spreading handfuls over their bodies. The oil stank, a pungent, spicy, and somewhat rank smell that reminded me of unwashed parts, such as inside navels and behind children’s ears.
Silly comparison. I wanted to laugh despite my dilemma, despite the silver and white godling staring doubts at me, despite Little Brother who kept rushing up into the smaller basin to show me his teeth.
Patience, Little Brother. I will keep my promise and give you a gift soon.
The floor was more slippery than before, so much oil spilling at once. I did not move for fear of crashing onto my back. Then would have been a poor time to knock my head.
“My skin is burning,” I said.
“The oil has that reaction. Worry not. You have a quarter hour to swim to the golden chain and back before it truly starts to burn.”
Damn. And damn! I hadn’t counted on this. I’d have to escape through growing discomfort and hope the oil did not damage my skin too much. I was very glad I hadn’t rubbed it onto my male parts. Just the drops falling there hurt the foreskin. My eyes smarted from the fumes, so too the inner rim of my mouth.
Intana’s doubts penetrated deeper into my side, making the skin prickle like it did for his father’s effigies. I didn’t want to look at him again, but I did, and his expression had lost the blank caution and become accusatory. I thought he’d cry foul, but he said nothing, just stared at me. He knew I didn’t intend to return. He knew and let me go.
I looked away, fighting off feelings of responsibility and shame, trying to keep the anger that sustained my reasons. This wasn’t my fault. I wasn’t of his people. He should have chosen another. Vaal shouldn’t have decided to make me suffer again.
“Step carefully, man of Brellin,” said First Servant. “Open your mouth to receive a section of Omos’s Sacred Bed, swim beneath the dome and return to us a man of Ardu.” He pointed at the smaller pool, ignoring the shark splashing therein. “Aim for the glow you will see beneath the dome. This is the golden chain. When you have accomplished your task, use th
e light of the smaller aperture to navigate your safe return. The sponge will not let you breathe for more than twenty minutes. Perform the rite expeditiously.”
Only twenty minutes? Well. It was enough to get me out from beneath the dome. I turned toward the junior with the pouch. I took small sliding steps, opened my mouth, and received a dry section between my teeth.
“Breathe through your mouth,” the servant said to me.
I nodded and continued toward the aperture, my escort step-sliding alongside. My skin prickled on my back, Intana’s attention there, hurting me, making even the bones feel as if they wanted to creep away, but there was nothing beneath to crawl into. Only my soul.
Get off my soul! Take your doubts away!
In the aperture, Little Brother lifted out of the water up to his fins and looked at me before splashing back in.
“They are unusually excited today,” one of my escorts whispered, taking out his piece of sponge to do so. “Is this your doing, stranger?”
“It is your doing,” I answered after removing my own piece. “They are offended that you come to them packaged in smelly oil.”
He didn’t like my response and hissed between his teeth. I smiled and took the first shallow step down. The step was wider than a cubit, covered in a tacky mat that gave slippery feet a chance to keep purchase. A slick of oil patched the surface of the pool. I had named it the smaller pool, but it was a large semi-circle with a twenty-cubit radius, plenty of room for a man to manoeuvre around sharks that would hesitate to bite, so long as there were not too many of them in the water at once.
I moved to the edge of the first step and lowered to the second. The second step was narrower. An even narrower third step followed, then nothing but a drop into the pool. Beyond gaped the aperture, a black cavern seven cubits long and five tall. Ample space for a group of men, or one or two sharks.
“Wait,” said the escort. His hand grasped at my upper arm but slipped off. “There’s another coming. Don’t go in until the way is clear. They can still kill you if they knock you into the walls.”
Yes. Another manifestation of Little Brother had charged into the pool to shove his nose up into the air. He, too, looked at me, and I understood Little Brother wasn’t pleased that I intended to join him in the water this day.
“What do you expect of me?” I asked. “They mean to ruin me in the eyes of Vaal!”
“Hush! This is a solemn rite! Do not speak to your false gods!” said the man to my left. “Put your sponge back in your mouth!”
Another escort tried to grip my body, perhaps to shake some respect into me, but his hands slipped off as well. A half-formed thought muted both my feelings of unease and the sense of betrayal coming from Intana. A second shark, larger than the one beforehand, intruded within the small pool and flashed close to the steps. I moved back to make room, and the thought became a solid, sharp point in my mind. A tooth driven straight into my soul.
“Little Brother,” I called. “Come out like you did for Rohuri! Slide until you take out the thing that offends you!”
The sharks departed, and the men to the sides and behind me demanded why I had called such a foul thing. Then a most massive breaker shark rammed through the aperture. He charged the right hand section of the shallow steps and launched out of the water. He seized the sponge carrier, and slammed and writhed on the oily floor with the victim screaming in his mouth, until the man had been cut in half and the shark had knocked into the urn of oil.
Such a solid object, but it could not withstand Little Brother’s attack. The ceramic cracked and the oil spilled, and men went tumbling who fled Little Brother in panic, but I took a leap from the less slick watery steps and went sliding through the oil slick toward the dais where the dead Oradhé lay.
The shock of Little Brother’s arrival kept the Ardu brethren from comprehending my actions until it was too late, and the spill prevented them from coming after me quickly. Though I crashed onto the floor once, and injured my right arm and chin, I rose up and caught at the flame colours draping the dais. With a dead man’s weight barely anchoring the cloth, I hauled myself up until I almost lay upon the body. And then I touched Intana’s seal.
The spark was tremendous, a great glow of silver that fired over my arm, shot down to my feet and spiralled up to my head. In the nimbus, I looked toward Intana and gave him my first command.
“Do not let them take out my eyes! Let no one harm me! No one!”
“Understood,” he said, and that was it. I was Oradhé, and no one could injure me without Intana intervening.
“And clean Little Brother up!” I shouted. “His skin is hurting from that damned oil! So is his mouth!”
Intana’s lower jaw dropped, but he clamped it shut again and turned toward the shark rolling in the pungent slick of oil and blood.
I sniggered, a little crazed, still tingling from the nimbus, though it had begun to dwindle, and well aware that an entire amphitheatre of men looked upon me with horror as I crouched over a dead man. But I could not help laughing over the predicament I had given Intana.
I wondered if Little Brother would bite him. At that moment, I hoped he would, but Little Brother stopped writhing the moment Intana approached. The godling merely shoved the shark toward the larger pool and dumped him in. Intana immersed himself in the water, swam to Little Brother’s side and rubbed the soaps into his rough skin until most of the oil was removed. Little Brother was perfectly polite for the duration of the treatment, even when Intana reached in to scrape off as much oil as he could from the shark’s gullet.
During all this, I watched, still resting overtop the old Oradhé, still burning from the oils, still hurting in my right arm and chin, and wondering how I could be so stupid as to believe Little Brother would jump out of the water for me. But Little Brother had, and I had been certain he would beforehand.
Vaal had set a shark’s tooth in my soul. I could not have acted otherwise without it cutting my spirit in half.
Intana dipped beneath the surface of the pool, where he broke open with his bare hands the bars keeping Little Brother trapped within. Through this new opening, Little Brother escaped. Intana then rose up and looked toward me.
“You must wash before your skin comes up with blisters.”
“Too late.”
He scowled at me. “Then you should have ordered me to wash you first! Not the shark!”
“Shut up about the shark! I can’t move. My limbs are shaking. My arm is broken, and my jaw hurts. I think I may pass out.”
“Take your hand off the seal,” he said, coming toward me. “It doesn’t matter where you go now. No one can hurt me with the seal but you, until the day you die.”
“Oh. Good.”
I passed out with my hand still on the seal, but I recovered consciousness in the water only minutes later. Intana held me, his free hand laving my chest with mild soap. His fingers paused over the scarification marks on my left side, and he frowned as if angry.
His hand quivered, and a tiny shock went into me, a spark of… Yes. He was angry. It lived in his touch. Resentment, suspicion. Suppressed hope.
“What stupid thing did you do to make your father shove you into this snare?” I said.
He looked up from my torso, startled, his eyes flashing wide. The silver pupils constricted and became two mistrustful points. “Why do you ask this?”
“Curiosity. Why do you think I asked?”
“To mock me.”
“Well. Yes. I might.”
His body stiffened, and I thought he’d dump me in the water, right there next to Little Brother who glided lazily by. Fast way to be rid of a new Oradhé—feed him to Little Brother.
But no. Intana needed my eyes.
“Yes. I’m going to mock you for it,” I confirmed. “The moment you tell me.” I began to lose my grip on the world again. “I want on my ship after you wash me, and don’t forget to bring my clothes. Those were my best boots.”
“Understood,” he sai
d, and I let the world go away.
***
When my eyes fluttered open again, a vague disquiet clouded my mind, but I could not recall the circumstances provoking it. The ordeal within Celestial Dome had submerged into the nebulous infinity of forgotten dreams. The familiarity of my cabin nudged its shadow further off.
Warm yellow wood over my head, the gentle toss of the ship in a sheltering harbour, the comfort of a good mattress beneath, a light silk cover above; I blinked at the ceiling of my cabin, frowned, felt inexplicably itchy and blistered everywhere over my body, and suffered an ache in the bones of my right forearm. I attempted to lift it, but let out a pained gasp.
“It’s splinted and in a sling,” someone said, and I turned my head to confront the anchor waiting to sink me into emotional disaster.
Intana.
The ordeal solidified in my mind, crunched hard enough to make me flinch.
He knelt at the bedside. The expression, the blatant hope I witnessed, silver pupils blazing with determination. He leant closer. Above the smell of healing oils, I scented him—the freshness of the sea far from shore, the strange charge in the air after a lightning strike.
From his eyes, my gaze travelled to uncombed hanks of white-silver, flitted away and landed upon his lips. They opened the tiniest bit, then opened more. Blatant hope again. Need.
A surreal tint lit the confines of the cabin; a silver haze not quite a silver haze, more like a breeze passing through the air, a force bordering on the visible. I panicked and shut my eyes. Intana gasped and begged me to open them again.
“No! Please! Please look at me!”
“Gari! Gari!” I shouted.
My cabin boy. I knew he had to be within hearing range. He came thumping down the cabin hatch mere seconds after my hail.
“Lord?”
Loved Him to Death: Haru of Sachoné House Page 5