by Tad Williams
The bearded man recognized that Porto was not a native speaker: when he spoke again it was in good Westerling, though strongly accented, each word as full of sharp bits as an autumn pinecone. “You are not from the great grass, I see. Where do you come?”
“Erkynland, though that was not where I was born.”
“Do we muddy the stream, my friend Gildreng and I? Would you have drink? Gildreng is full of his own will, but I think he will move if I make him so.”
“I have water in my waterskin,” he replied, looking around for the man’s friend, wanting to trust but wary of an ambush. “But no food to eat.” The last of their supplies had been in the saddlebags and had disappeared with the horses. Only when he said the words did Porto realize how hungry he was. “My friend is very ill.”
The man looked at him carefully, then said, “Come out so I see you, if you please.”
Porto crawled out of the long grass and stood. The stranger was a Thrithings-man, he could now see, with a serpent tattoo that began at his right wrist, wound up his arm, then emerged on the other side of his sleeveless shirt and twisted downward to wrap around his left wrist. He also wore a necklace of snake bones.
“What makes your friend sick?” the man asked.
Porto hesitated, but decided that it would be better to be honest, in case the stranger knew someone who could help Levias. “He was stabbed. Here.” He pointed to a spot on his own stomach. “We were attacked—we did not seek a fight.”
The bearded man nodded, then slipped down off the donkey. He splashed across the shallow stream, leading the donkey up the bank toward Porto.
“I will look,” he said. “I have some . . . skill.” It took him a moment to find the word, but when he did, he nodded again, as if he had not doubted it would come. “Ruzhvang I am, shaman of the Snake Clan. I know something of healing. How long ago was your friend struck?”
“Two days,” Porto said.
Now Ruzhvang’s hairy face grew sad, and he shook his head. “Too late, I think. But it could be the Earth Hugger will take pity. What clan is your friend?”
“He is from Erkynland, like me.”
Ruzhvang said no more, but followed him back to the hollow where Levias lay hidden. The shaman tied his donkey to a branch and squatted next to sleeping Levias, whose face seemed so pale Porto could not imagine death was far away. The man examined the sergeant’s eyes and tongue, then carefully unpeeled Porto’s makeshift bandages and looked over the wound, making little clicking noises with his tongue as he did so.
At last he turned back to Porto. “Did you pray for help?” he asked.
Startled, Porto said, “Yes. Of course. To our God.”
Ruzhvang waved his hand. “All gods or one god. You must be a man of good deeds for them to hear. We of the Snake Clan are the best healers—it is known.”
“Can you help him?”
“I do not say yes, I do not say no. He is very weak.” He tied his donkey to a tree branch. “The bad spirits are in the wound and in the blood. Only a gift of strength from the Legless—the Earth Hugger—can help him now. Will you bring him?”
“Bring him where?”
“Follow me. Where the water is deeper.”
By the time they stopped, they were close enough to the Thanemoot that Porto could once more hear voices in the distance. Ruzhvang took a packet wrapped in oilskin from his saddlebag and walked down to the stream again, which was much wider here, and then without any hesitation stripped off his clothes and waded naked out to where the water reached his thighs. He began to wash himself all over, singing quietly in Thrithings words that Porto did not recognize. When he came back, he pulled on his breeches and sat down in the dirt beside Levias. “Build a fire,” he said as he began to take things out of his oilskin bag, small earthen jars and leather pouches, then set them before him on the ground. When the fire was going, Ruzhvang sent Porto with a clay bowl to get more water from the river, then crumbled something leafy into it, still singing, and waited for the water to boil. “Now tell me this one’s name,” he said.
“Levias.”
“It is a strange name, but I will try to tell the spirits so they will understand.”
* * *
• • •
By the time the sun had slipped past noon and the shadows had begun to stretch toward the east the shaman had bathed Levias’s wound with the herb-water, singing all the while, then covered it with the boiled leaves and bandaged it with long, dried leaves from yet another a bundle in his saddlebag. Then he had Porto fetch more water and boiled this as well, this time with sections of some kind of root or tuber. When the broth had cooled a little, he held it to Levias mouth and poured some in. The Erkynlander’s throat moved as he swallowed, but the movements seemed almost accidental; Levias did not look any better at all, at least not that Porto could see.
“Feed him the rest slowly,” said Ruzhvang, handing Porto the bowl. “Until the sun is down. The Legless will help him if he is worthy.”
“He is worthy,” said Porto, thinking of Levias’s good humor, his bravery, and his faith.
“Not for us to decide, but the spirits,” said Ruzhvang a little sternly. “But now I tell you about Gildreng, my donkey. He is fierce but if you do not put your hand near his mouth, no injury will you suffer.”
“Why? Why do I need to know that?”
“Because I leave him for you. I am a long way from my people, and if I must walk now, longer still will I be gone. Six days ago they left the Thanemoot, back to our clan lands in the east.”
“You’re giving me your donkey?”
“Even if the Earth Hugger spares his life, this one cannot stay here,” he said, gesturing toward Levias. “But even with my donkey, you do not carry him so far as Erkynland without him dying.” A sudden thought came to him. “But I saw a camp of your people as I came back from trading with shamans of the Sparrowhawk and Bison clans.”
“My people?”
“I think it must be Erkynland’s flag—two dragons on their banner, and a tree. Do you know it?”
Porto’s heart sped. “That is the banner of Erkynland, yes. Did you really see them?”
“It is all the talk of the lands north of here—the clansfolk say the stone-dwellers have come to bargain with the new Shan for an important man that was captured.”
“Count Eolair? Could that be the name?”
“I do not know more. A shaman has other thoughts.” He shrugged, his braided beard wagging on his chest like the tail of a sitting dog. “They say Unver seeks to trade him, perhaps, or ask something else from the stone-dwellers who rule your Erkynland.”
“Do you know where they are keeping this man who was captured?”
Ruzhvang cocked an eyebrow as bristly as a spring caterpillar, and his darkly tanned face showed amusement. “You ask the wrong man. The Serpent gives me strength to heal and no more. But if the new Shan bargains to return him, then the new Shan must have him, do you not think?”
Porto sat back, full of astonishment. Why would a troop of Erkynguards be on the edge of the Thrithings? Even to bargain for Eolair, important as he was? And then he remembered Prince Morgan and the destruction of their mission, and shame stabbed Porto as deeply as the clansman had stabbed Levias. He had failed on all counts. But perhaps if he could find the Erkynlandish camp, he could at least tell them what he knew.
But I cannot leave Levias behind, he realized. I must stay with him as long . . . as long as he lives.
“I go now.” Ruzhvang lifted the saddlebags from the donkey’s back and draped them over his shoulder, making himself look more egg-shaped than ever. “I leave some white currant berries for you and your friend—you see them piled there. You must chew them in your mouth before giving to him.”
“But I cannot keep your donkey!”
“You can. You must. So the Earth Hugger tells me and the spi
rits do not lie. Treat him well and he will bear your friend with care. He is not so evil as he seems, old Gildreng, though he will kick when he is in a foul mood. I will miss him.”
And while Porto sat, astonished, Ruzhvang shouldered his burden, stopped to pat the donkey on the nose—Gildreng looked away from him, as if he could not believe he had been given away so easily—and then walked off down the winding path beside the stream. “Remember—keep your hands from his mouth!” he called back, then he was gone into the trees.
Porto spent the rest of the dying afternoon beside Levias, dabbing the sweat from his forehead and giving him little sips of the broth. He was hungry himself, but the smell of it did not tempt him at all, so he ate two of the fruits and found them very satisfying, but not enough to quell his hunger much.
At last, when darkness had come, he fell asleep sitting up, the wet rag of Levias’s shirt still clutched in his fingers. When he woke again in the dark hours of the night, certain he had dreamed the whole day, the donkey Gildreng was still tied to the tree nearby and his friend Levias was weakly asking for more broth.
* * *
Eolair did not much like that he was still a prisoner, but Unver’s people treated him reasonably well. He had been put in one of the many wagons that had once belonged to Rudur Redbeard. Its door was locked from the outside, but the window in the door, although too narrow for him to have crawled through even in his youngest and slenderest days, allowed him to watch a little of the life of the Thrithings camp as the Thanemoot came to a close.
The madness of the first few nights after Rudur’s death had ended. Eolair would have been hard-pressed to see any difference between what he saw now and ordinary life at Blood Lake, the women tending fires and cooking, the men bartering animals and engaging in games of chance and strength. But Eolair thought he could see a change in the peoples’ spirits, from the aimless excitement of the first days of the Thanemoot to something calmer and more directed. He wondered if that was somehow Unver’s doing, or merely what happened each year at the end of the raucous gathering.
The first time grasslanders approached his wagon bringing food, Eolair was amused to see that the man carrying the tray was accompanied by two huge, armed guards.
If they fear an old man like me enough to send three guards, they must think me a very devil, he thought.
But when the man with the tray climbed the steps and came to the door, Eolair saw that the servant was utterly hairless on head and jaw and upper lip. It was uncommon enough on the grasslands, where a man’s whiskers told much about him, but as the tray bearer stood before the door, Eolair saw that even the man’s eyebrows were hairless, although a stubble grew there that suggested something other than illness had denuded him. Still, Eolair needed information, and even if the man was a foreign slave he might know something. In fact, as Eolair well knew, a slave was often more likely to talk to an outsider. He made sure that the two clansmen guards were standing too far back from the wagon to overhear much.
“I thank you,” he said in the Thrithings tongue as the door was unlocked, and he took the tray. “What is your name, man?” The smell of warm bread and hot soup made his mouth water. He had not eaten well among Agvalt’s bandits: the bandits had not eaten much better themselves.
The man looked at him in mild surprise but said nothing. Up close, Eolair could see that his face and shaved head both were bruised.
“My people must know the name of the one who serves us or we cannot eat,” Eolair continued, an improvisation that would have made his fellow Hernystiri nobles laugh uproariously, since few of the richest knew the names of most of their servants. “Please, tell me, so I may tell my gods.”
The man shook his head. He would not meet Eolair’s gaze. “I have no name,” was all he said.
“What? Everyone has a name.”
The hairless man shook his head again, but this time he looked up. The hatred and despair in his face almost made Eolair take a step back, and he had trouble holding onto his end of the tray. “My name has been taken from me,” the hairless man said, but quietly so the others could not hear. “I betrayed my clan. I betrayed my people. I no longer have a name.”
“But I must call you something,” said Eolair, wondering now at this man’s story, “or the gods will not know who to reward for feeding me.”
A light kindled in the man’s eyes. The skin around them was purple with the marks of old blows. “I told you, I have no name. Now I must go.”
As he let go of the tray and began to turn, Eolair tried once more. “Just tell me something I can call you.”
The man’s hairless brows gave him the look of something unnatural. “They called me Baldhead.” For a moment his mouth curled in a humorless smirk. “That can still be my name, as you see. When you speak to your gods, tell them they have made a very poor world.”
The two armed clansmen followed him closely as he walked away, and Eolair realized that he was not the only prisoner in the Shan’s camp.
* * *
• • •
Eolair’s second visitor came late that same day, in the dark watches of the evening. He did not hear her coming, nor realize she was there until he heard a voice through the hole in the door.
“Count Eolair, can you hear me?” Whoever it was spoke Westerling, which was a little unexpected, though her accent was barbarous.
He rose from the narrow bed and went to the door. “I hear you,” he said. “I speak your tongue, at least somewhat. Would you rather use it?”
The woman standing outside was dark-haired and handsome, but her eyes were wide with unease. By the dim light from the wagon she looked to be just past childbearing age. Something seemed familiar about her features, but he had seen so many Thrithings-folk in the last months that he could not say why. “No!” She looked around and then spoke more quietly. “Better to use these words, though I do not speak them well, in case anyone hears.”
He was intrigued, and not just by her admirable face. “Very well, my lady.” He could not resist the honorific—she seemed different from the Thrithings-women he had seen, if only in that she spoke another tongue beside her own. “Who are you, if I may ask, and what do you want from me?”
“I am Hyara,” she said. “The Shan, as I now must call him, is my nephew.”
He was surprised; it took all his practiced skill not to show it. “I am pleased to meet you, Lady Hyara, but I admit I cannot guess why you are here.”
“Unver plans to release you—or at least so I am told.”
“So he suggested to me, although I am certain there will be a price, and my king and queen may not wish to pay it.”
“Unver is no fool. He wants you to go back. He wants you to keep your rulers sweet. He does not want a war with your Erkynland.”
“It is not my Erkynland, to be truthful, but their interests are mine.” He looked her over closely. She looked worried but not frightened, a good sign. Still, he could not help wondering if he was being drawn into some family struggle, or perhaps something even more dangerous. “I ask again—what do you want of me, my lady?”
“I want you to tell your queen and your king that the Thrithings does not want war with your land. Rudur is dead, but Unver is no fool. His anger is pointed at Nabban. Tell that to your masters.”
“But Nabban too is part of their kingdom,” he pointed out. “They are not king and queen of just Erkynland or my own Hernystir. The High Ward surrounds Nabban as well.”
“Then the Nabban-folk must stay in that ward!” she said, and in her flash of anger he saw a strength of will he had not suspected. “They steal our lands, they kill our people, then they blame us. Unver comes from the south, where they must fight the stone-dwellers always. He has a hatred for them that cannot be . . .” She searched for a word, but could not find it. “He hates them,” she said finally. “And he will push them back behind their borders again. Blood will spill
on the grass and there is no stopping it. But he does not war against the north as well.”
“Why would he? Only a fool fights enemies on two different sides.” Eolair shook his head. “I will tell my rulers that Unver does not wish to fight them. But they still must watch over Nabban as if it were their own nation. That is what the High Ward means.”
“Then they will bring the world into despair,” she said flatly. “Widows, orphans, that is all that will remain. Do you know how many men will come from the grasslands to fight? Many of them hated Rudur because he claimed to be the Thane of Thanes and yet did nothing to stop the Nabbanai. They are as ripe for war as fruit hanging on autumn branches.”
“Where did you learn to speak our tongue so well?” he asked, distracted despite himself. “Did you live in what you call the stone-dweller lands?”
“No, though others of my family did,” she said, but was clearly impatient. “My father was a thane. Many outsiders came to us. I learned because I heard it spoken, and because I wished I could go away to see those lands.” She looked around again to make sure they were still alone. “Why do you ask so many questions?”
“Because that is my nature, good lady—and also my trade. Does Unver speak Westerling as well? What is he like? How can I speak to him, to learn what he truly wishes of my masters? I have asked to see him, but no one will bring me to him.”
“He was badly hurt by that mad dog, Redbeard,” she said. “Unver barely lived after all those torments—only the will of the spirits let him survive. And he is a man, too—he will speak to you when he can do it without looking weak and hurt. But when he is strong again he will also take these clans in his hand like a man with a team of horses, and make them work together, make them go where he wishes. Your masters do not know how strong Unver’s will is, how clever he is and how fierce his angers, but I have seen him, and I have seen that the spirits fight for him, too. I saw them send the ravens to destroy his enemy, and that enemy was my husband Gurdig—though I do not mourn him. Your masters must not provoke him!”