by S. M. Stirling, Harry Turtledove, Jody Lynn Nye, John Ringo; Michael Z. Williamson
The slender, black-furred females wove a hypnotic pattern, sliding in and out among one another, as if they were attempting to weave a complicated knot out of pure energy. He could feel it, though he was far more sensitive to nuance than sensation. Sherril marveled at the ancient story unfolding before him. No matter how many times he had seen the Tale of Creation, it never palled. That young Dancer at the back, though—she needed more work on her portrayal of the Burgeoning Garden. Too clumsy. He would not dare say he could do it better himself, but he wagered his attempt would show more grace than hers. The rest, though, exhibited litheness and power that made him lust after all of them. The beat of the white skin drum, the wild fluting of the twin-pipes, and the pinging of the lyre only made his blood pump harder.
The priestesses leaped over and rolled beneath one another, drawing power in three dimensions. They wore bracelets and anklets of jeweled silver or gold, as well as charms around their tails and in between their toes. The metal glittered in the sun. Their fur seemed to glitter, too, dusted as it was with powder crushed from precious stones. Sherril smelled the fragrance of their fur warmed by their efforts and the heat of the day. A senior Dancer, Cleotra Mreem, caught a glimpse of him out of the corner of a brilliant grass-green eye. She did not waver for a moment, but shot a meaningful look to Cassa Fisook, the head priestess. Cassa Fisook looked toward Sherril. The dance changed, slowing down. The hot energy began to melt away. Cassa Fisook whirled and leaped as lightly as a leaf until she was in the heart of the circle. Her Dancers came to a halt, facing her. Their voices sounded low in their throats, a gentle burr. She made gathering gestures with her arms, collecting the last of the power. Her long hands tucked it into a ball that she offered to the sky.
The chief of the Dancers bore a few gray hairs around her chin and nose, but was otherwise the upright, slim female who had protected, and mothered, the Lailah tribe of the Clan of the Claw for over thirty years. Her training and condition were so thorough that she was not even breathing fast. Sherril was exhausted from having run all the way from the center of the city. Her chief servant Petru Keoh oiled into view. The huge, nearly all-black male was adorned even more ornately than his mistress. His many bracelets clashed together on his heavily-furred arms and legs, and he had dusted himself copiously with golden glitter. Sherril hated to admit it, but he envied Petru Keoh his thick ruff that made the ladies swoon with pleasure, not that the big gelding ever noticed. He brushed Cassa Fisook’s fur smooth and sprinkled her with fresh sparkles, blue and green this time. Tiny, jeweled glints twinkled from the sable depths of her coat. He moved to adorn the rest of the Dancers, more sparingly, with the exception of that imperious senior female, whom he decorated copiously with precious red glitter. Petru Keoh was not above playing favorites, Sherril thought with a snort.
“I see you have returned,” Cassa Fisook said. “Alive and well?”
Anyone with less self-possession than Sherril Rangawo would have lowered his head at the reproof. The ritual had been performed to protect him and his escort on their journey. Dancing magic took a great deal of effort and energy. Not to have revealed himself immediately was an error. The priestesses could have stopped much earlier, but then he would not have seen them dance. To Sherril, it was worth the possible tussle on the ground with the Dancers or their bodyguards. He strutted forward.
“I am here,” he acknowledged. “My mission is accomplished, and I have brought us all back without hurt or loss.”
“What news, then?” a deeper voice inquired.
Anyone with less self-possession than Sherril Rangawo would have jumped through the open roof. The Dancers parted. He saw Bau Dibsea lounging on a pile of cushions at the edge of the Dancing ground. The talonmaster glared at him. It was one thing to preen before the females. It was quite another to show off before a well-tried warrior with many kills to his name and a reputation for nipping holes in the ears of obnoxious subordinates. Inwardly, Sherril Rangawo cowered, but he covered his discomfiture as well as he could. He bowed.
“Leader, I bring news.”
“I assumed as much. Let us hear it.”
Dancer Cassa Fisook settled on her purple-dyed cushion beside Bau Dibsea. Sherril knew Bau was being honored to witness the Dance because of what might come later, but Sherril Rangawo knew differently. He was pleased to have information that the talonmaster did not. Cassa Fisook gestured to him.
“Sherril Rangawo, come forward and tell us what we must know.”
Sherril gestured at his person, flicking a morsel of dust from his breast.
“Your Sinuousness, forgive the state of my fur. I haven’t had time to wash since I returned.”
“No matter,” the Dancer said. “It is more important that we hear what you have to say.”
Cassa Fisook twitched a finger, and Petru stepped forward. The valet held a painted wooden tray on which balanced a beaten-silver pitcher and a silver cup. Not the first-quality cup, as should have befitted Sherril Rangawo’s station. He let out a hiss under his breath as Petru poured out wine for him. Petru retorted with an almost inaudible snort. He knew that Sherril could say nothing. He was going to get away with his insult. One day, Sherril Rangawo vowed, he would make the valet pay. But the Dancer swiveled her ears toward him. Sherril offered a drop to the God, Aedonniss, and his gentle bride, Assirra, then drank deeply. If he had been alone he would have drained the cup in a gulp. Sherril Rangawo didn’t realize how dry his tongue was.
“What says the lizard?” Bau Dibsea demanded.
Sherril looked longingly at the cushions, but Bau Dibsea did not invite him to sit down. Cassa Fisook was kinder. She waved to Petru, who arranged a seat just under the lip of the tent where the heat would beat down on Sherril’s back but his face and toes would be cold. That’s two, he thought. But he curled up on the down-stuffed pouch and tucked his feet beneath him.
“Greetings to you, Dancer Cassa Fisook, and Talonmaster Bau Dibsea, from Tae Shanissi, lord and self-proclaimed deity of the sovereign city-state of Ckotliss, master of ten thousand and a domain of great span and fertility.”
“Gack!” Bau Dibsea spat. “Even their names are sickening to say.”
“Did he hear you out?” Cassa Fisook asked, ignoring the male’s interruption.
“All my words and movements were heard, lady,” Sherril said. He sipped more wine to wet his tongue. The heady fragrance helped dispel the foul dust of the road and the cloying smell of the Liskash city. “He and his lords listened to me in the great hall of that stone keep that we observed from the ridge. He gave me sweet water to drink and flat cakes of some foul grain or bean that I ate only out of courtesy. I explained exactly as I was instructed to that we are peaceful travelers in Lord Tae’s land. The mountains and the sea preclude our passing to either side of this valley, so we must go through. That we want to do as swiftly as possible. I also requested to trade for supplies to see us on our way.”
“And…?” Bau Dibsea asked, impatiently.
Sherril hated to be rushed. The Liskash were more appreciative of his full explanations and the spooling out of the Lailah’s journey from their homeland. He wrinkled his nose slightly, sweeping his whiskers back.
“He is agreed, Talonmaster.”
Bau sprang to his feet. “Excellent! Then we will break camp at once. Will he provide us with guides or maps?”
Sherril patted the air with his palms. “Not so swiftly, my leader. There is a price.”
“A price?” piped up Ysella Ehe, the young Dancer who had stumbled. “What price? They enslave our kind. I hear they even eat them.”
“Ysella!” exclaimed Cleotra, the Dancer with lush, sleek fur dusted with red. “It is not your time to speak.” But it was not a formal council, and the young one had asked a question the rest of them wanted answered.
“We are not to their taste, except as slaves,” Cassa Fisook said. “But it is true, Lord Tae might demand such a price.”
“In truth, I saw many Mrem in the city,” Sherril admitte
d. The sight of scrawny, ill-kempt Mrem yoked to a wagon as if they were beasts of burden or carrying heavy loads behind their Liskash masters was a deep insult. Their faces wore despair that he could not and did not want to imagine. The Mrem in the noble household looked as miserable, though not as ill-fed or groomed.
“None of us will submit,” Ysella insisted.
Cassa Fisook gave her a look of kindly patience. “No gift is ever really free, my daughter. There is always a price, even if that is simple gratitude. What do they want?”
“It is not as onerous as slavery, Your Sinuousness,” Sherril said. “Lord Tae said that he is a student of our race. He wishes to know more about us. He admitted that once a Mrem’s mind is in his thrall it ceases to think as one of us. Lord Tae said he was perhaps too quick to subsume something interesting. He would know more of our culture and customs.”
The Dancers murmured among themselves.
“So he can conquer ones like us more easily?” Bau growled. “Knowledge is power!”
“How does he want to learn about us?” Cassa Fisook asked.
Sherril opened a hand. “Before we pass through his land, Lord Tae proposes to have representatives of our tribe visit him in his citadel. They will be welcomed as guests, free to come and go as they please—with certain restrictions, naturally. He would hear our songs and poetry, see our art, and learn the history of our people. He specifically said he wished to meet the Dancers.”
“To deprive us of their magic,” Bau said at once. “Once in, the visitors are certain to become prisoners. I am wary of his intentions. My warriors will feel the same.”
“It is quite understandable that he wants to know us,” Cassa Fisook said, blinking her wise green eyes. “It is also undeniable that it might be a trap.”
“Whoever goes in will have no assurance of getting out,” Sherril said. He felt his own sacrifice was going unnoticed. After all he had been through! “As I had.”
Bau snorted. His golden eyes gleamed. “We are well aware that you have just gone into the serpent’s mouth and emerged unscathed,” he said. “You want gratitude; you have it. Well done. Now, we must plan to achieve the same with a greater number.”
Cassa Fisook saw the disappointed expression on Sherril’s face and regarded him with sympathy.
“Your deed will not be forgotten, my friend. It shall be added to the annals of our tribe. Rest now.”
Sherril feigned a convincing collapse into exhaustion though he held up a hand to protest. “That won’t be necessary, Your Sinuousness. I am prepared to lead our visitors back to Lord Tae’s stronghold, immediately if necessary.”
Bau was fooled neither by the sudden show of weakness nor Sherril’s self-sacrificing offer.
“The elders and warriors need to hear slimy Lord Tae’s proposal,” Bau said. He flicked a hand toward a white-and-black mottled servant. “Go tell them to gather in the hollow up on the ridge. I will address them there. We will decide which of us will go into the trap.” The servant bounded away, running.
“I will give them a full report, of course,” Sherril said, complacently. “They will want to know how many doors lie where, how high the walls are and how many guards stand upon them.”
Bau had to hand it to the old scamp. He would gladly have done without him—would rather have done without him—but he realized now that he could not. For the same reason that they had sent Sherril there as their emissary, he would be of great use on the return journey. Sherril had well-developed survival instincts. He seemed to sleep with one eye open, and no one had yet caught him off guard for any of the beatings that he had earned and undoubtedly deserved. Sherril was capable of preceding you through a doorway but ending up behind you as if he had the dinos’ own evil magic. His powers of observation were legendary throughout the camp as he had been in their own land, many leagues behind them to the east. If he had been able to wield a spear or hold up that bulk of his longer than three breaths in a fight, he could easily have maneuvered himself into the position of talonmaster. But no one would ever trust him. Bau knew better than that. But he always managed to find himself a vantage point. He was a Mrem. Better to give him his chance than to have him working against the group because he was thwarted.
“Very well, then. Come and make your case.”
* * *
The high hollow amid the thin-branched trees made a natural amphitheater. The remaining warriors, only three hundred sixty in number, settled themselves on the cool earth. With a hiss and a meaningful look, Cleotra made the younger females settle down and stop whispering. Only twenty-three Dancers and apprentices, out of fifty that had lived in the old land before the floods came, had made it this far. She fervently hoped they would lose no more. Her friend and fellow Dancer Nolda Ilu lay in a cool spot on the grass, attended to by a couple of the apprentices. She was due to kitten any day. Her last pregnancy, even in the safety of their old home, had almost finished her. Cleotra feared that having to give birth on the road would be too much for her. The baby in her belly kicked once in a while, showing the outline of a tiny foot, as if impatient to be free. Cleotra begged the tiny one to wait, at least until they knew they had safe passage through Ckotliss.
Many of the females of the clan were near to their time. By all rights they should be making up nests for themselves in a comfortable corner of their homes, laying in special treats and nourishing foods to see them through their confinements. Mrem females liked to give birth in private. The custom, admittedly, was a throwback to their uncivilized days, when males hoping to force females back into estrus would kill kittens who did not bear their scent, but Cleotra simply didn’t care for an audience when she was on her side, straining to produce her baby. No one would dare to watch her in that undignified time! She cherished her son and daughter, but was glad that no siblings for them were in the offing.
Everyone had had to fight their natural urges to beget more young, at least until they were safely on their way to rejoin the clan on the north side of the new water. It wasn’t easy when so many of the males were attractive and virile, and the tantalizing spice of spring was in the air. It would be the most natural thing in the world to choose this year’s mate from among the ebony-coated warriors and tear the night apart with longing cries and wails of satisfaction. Look at that foolish child, Ysella, making eyes at the lieutenant of the guard. She had not even had her first estrus yet! Luckily, Scaro Ullenh’s gaze was wandering among the mature Dancers, as if he had a hope of mating with one of them! It wasn’t for want of trying; that was sure. There wasn’t a female of bearing age he had not propositioned, many times, over the course of the last months, including herself. Handsome he was, to be certain, with a deep chest, a narrow waist, and strong, springy thighs, but what an ego!
Nature was against them. Cleotra believed—she must believe—that Aedonniss had not turned his face away from his children.
On one side of the ridge lay the verdant valley ruled over by the odious Liskash. On the other was the desert through which the Mrem had lately come. Personally, she liked the heat, though it was making her luxurious fur come out in handfuls. She refused to think the shedding was the result of a lack of decent food. Rations had become distressingly thin. They usually were at this time of year, just before the first planting of spring, but she and her fellow Dancers had sworn to make do on what scanty supplies were left, along with the results of hunting. The local wildlife, mostly lizards and other mindless Liskash-kin, fled on their approach. Cleotra was sick of chameleon stew, fried iguana and roasted flitter—when the hunters were lucky enough to get sufficient food for all the tribe.
She missed meat, red meat. Once when she woke from a dream of eating a thick, juicy haunch of venison, she almost cried. When she got over the disappointment, common sense had returned. Oh, she could have pulled rank and demanded a piece from a herd beast that died on the road. Those carcasses were a rare treat, and there were plenty who needed it more than she did. What easily-digested and most nutritious food
they had must be saved for the very young, the sick, the elderly, and the warriors. None of the herd beasts could be spared. They were being used to haul wagons at the moment, but they would form the kernel of new herds when they reached the safe haven where the rest of the Clan awaited them. Out in the desert, there were few palatable sources of meat, almost all Liskash-kin. The sea, which had flanked them on their right all the way from their drowned home, was too perilous for all but line fishing, an unreliable and slow process. The rest of the Mrem could, and did make do on what was left, dried meats, pulses, insect-ridden grains and the disgusting small prey they could snare or shellfish they could dig out of the sand. Sometimes Cleotra hated being so responsible.
She could almost have borne a further trek through the desert better than what lay before them. From the hollow on the ridge she could not only see the valley of the Liskash, but she could smell it. The black earth, fresh and smelling of rain, had been freshly turned for planting, and lay in neat squares awaiting seed. The sour-sweet odor of composted manure did not sicken her, except possibly to make her homesick. Her mother’s household should have been planting now. All those farmers, swept out to sea! She lifted her hands to the sky and swayed them in a pattern of prayer to Assirra. May their souls be at rest. For a while when the Lailah had started traveling to the west, Cleotra had felt their presence, but only as far as the borders of their land. The dead had stayed behind. Cleotra missed the comforting sensation. In its place, she felt the imposition of the Liskash’s magic. And the stench.
Who would have thought that magic had an odor and a sound of its own? Since childhood, when she had joined the corps of Dancers, the magic of the Mrem’s prayers had been a part of her life, her coming and going, her lying down and rising up, the food she ate, the air she breathed and the people she loved. Though she had Danced many a ritual for protection from them, she hadn’t had to interact with Liskash nobles, until one month into their journey the Lailah had to fight against one who had suddenly noticed that the tribe was cut off from its kin and vulnerable for the first time. He had tried to take over their minds. Only Cassa’s swift realization that something was wrong had saved them. She had whipped the Dancers out of bed and made them dance for their lives. Their talonmaster at the time, Mowar Echirr, had driven back the Liskash’s forces. Cleotra had never forgotten the unbelievable smell of decay that had permeated the camp, and the off-tone of everyone’s voices, birdsong and frogsong. When the Liskash noble fell, everything returned to normal.