'And he finally gave you one?' I asked.
Polillo gave me a mirthless grin. 'Does a dog favour carrion? Sure, he did. He went after my mother. And I stopped him cold.' She slammed one big fist into the other. I winced at the bone-breaking sound of it. 'One punch. Smashed his ugly jaw. There were teeth all over the place. Even in the soup. Then I drove him out and told my mother that from now on, the tavern was hers.'
'You never saw him again?'
Polillo laughed. 'Never. How could he show his face with everyone knowing his ten-year-old daughter had flattened him? That's the nice thing about male pride. Once broken, never mended.'
'Like the sailor who pissed his breeches?' I asked.
Polillo grimaced. 'Oh, he's not such a bad sort. I've seen him working - and he puts his back in more'n most of the others. And he's not bad in a fight, either. I just surprised him, that's all. He didn't mean to insult me. It just burst out. When I was looking down at him, I thought, Polillo, old girl. How many times have you got yourself in a fix by opening your big mouth when you shouldn't' And then I thought, Corais'd be really angry with me if I killed him. So I didn't.'
She started to take another drink, then stopped. Her brow furrowed in worry. 'You don't suppose people will think I've gone soft, or anything, do you?'
'Do you care?' I asked.
She thought a moment, then: 'Not really.'
As soon as she realized what she'd said, the most marvellous smile lit her features. 'Corais'd really be proud of me, wouldn't she?'
'She would, indeed, my dear,' I said.
After that we spent a wondrous night drinking and giggling and telling lies, just like in the old days, when we were young and guildess and our hopes as bright as the untested steel of our swords.
As we raced east I began making sure I was up before dawn every morning to see the daybreak. It's a sight I never tire of - especially when that pale pink spills across the sky like sugared rosewater. Gamelan had the old man's habit of rising early, so he'd join me and I'd describe the view as he fished.
'When I was a boy I favoured sunsets,' he said one day. 'All the day's petty disappointments vanished and the glow of the skies seemed to speak of the fresh possibilities of the morrow. But when I became old, the setting sun seemed so ... well, final, dammit! You don't know if there's even going to be a tomorrow. With a sunrise you can lie to yourself that your future stretches to at least the end of the day.'
'But, you're a wizard,' I said. 'Don't wizards sense their own departure? I'd think with the Seeker about, a wizard would know it'
Gamelan laughed. 'The only wizard I've met who successfully predicted his demise was my old master. But then he swore at the end of every day that we thick-witted acolytes were going to be the death of him. And, guess what* That moment eventually arrived when he was ninety-two.'
'You'll oudive him, my friend,' I said. 'You'd better not disappoint me. I'll speak harshly to you if you do.'
Instead of polite laughter at my mild attempt at humour, Gamelan turned serious.
'I dreamed about the panther last night,' he said.
'Oh?'
'It was nothing noteworthy,' the wizard continued. 'In my dream she was in my cabin and wanted out. She was most anxious - pacing up and down. But when I went to the door - I'm sighted in my dreams, you know -1 couldn't lift the bar. I called for help, but no one heard me.'
'Then?'
'That was all,' Gamelan said. 'I woke up.' Then he asked: 'Have you dreamed of the panther, Rali?'
I said, 'I haven't dreamed at all. Not since - since I had the vision about the Archon, and first encountered the panther.'
'Do you normally dream?' he asked.
'I always do,' I said. 'Even when I don't remember what it was about, I wake up knowing I've dreamed.' Gamelan sighed and shook his head. 'Does it mean anything?' I asked.
'I don't know, Rali,' he said. 'Greycloak speculated that dreams might be real. That when you dream you're actually in another world. And that world is exactly like your native place, but with some small detail - or even a large one - that is different. Which, as you experience it, becomes the subject of the dream.'
'That damned Janos never did shut up about anything,' I snarled. 'Why does everything have to be weighed or measured down to the smallest detail? Why can't our dreams just be dreams and to hell with it?'
'Still,' the wizard said, 'there could be something to it. And I was only wondering because of the panther. You've said you've imagined you've seen her sometimes.'
'Just at the edge of my vision,' I said. 'And always in the shadows. Probably my imagination.'
'Yes,' Gamelan said. 'I suppose it is.'
That night I tried to force a dream. I thought of Xia - built her image until she seemed almost alive. Then, just as I drifted off, I tried to hold onto that image. It slipped away as soon as I closed my eyes. I roused myself and tried again, with the same result. I attempted fixing other images, both pleasant and the opposite, but no matter how hard I concentrated, they fled as soon as I began to drop off. Then I couldn't sleep at all, tossing and turning and growing hot and cold by turn.
And the whole time I thought I could hear the scrape of a large animal's claws. I knew it was the panther - pacing, pacing, pacing.
Finally I went on deck. The night was quiet, the seas calm. I went to Gamelan's cabin and pressed my ear against the door. I could hear the click of claws inside.
I tugged at the latch string. It was stuck. I pulled harder, and the bar lifted. I carefully opened the door. The wizard was sleeping peacefully.
I felt a hot rush of air and I stepped back as something pushed past, me. It had no form, in fact, I couldn't swear there was anything there at all. But I distinctly felt fur brush my skin and smelled the powerful odour of a big cat. I looked around and didn't see anything. I checked Gamelan again, then shut the door and returned to my bed. Instandy, I fell asleep.
I dreamed that night. I dreamed of the black panther. She was speeding through a great forest and I was riding on her back.
Twenty-Three
The Demon Seas
As THE DAYS passed, the wind held true from the west or west-southwest, carrying us steadily into what the maps said would be home waters and eventually to Orissa.
The weather continued balmy, and the tensions of our long chase began to ebb, and our ships could almost be described as happy. My women sat yarning, trying to figure out what they'd do with all their riches, even after the city of Orissa and the Evocators took their legal shares. Two of them even sought me out, and wondered, oh so carefully, if someone as honey-tongued as I might consider appearing before the Council and asking for a boon - since so many of us had given our all for the city, the least Orissa could do was forswear its unearned portion of our gold. I gave them both the same answer: greed ill becomes a soldier. One, Pamphylia, said impudently that fighting for gold didn't seem to slow the sword-hand of Cholla Yi or his men. She'd obviously been around Gamelan too long, and he'd tolerated her flippery. I told her to report to Flag Sergeant Ismet and ask for a particularly smelly task of Ismet's choice that suited insubordination. Secretly, though, I was a bit pleased my women still had spirit left, after the long death-lists and months of hardship.
The other, Gerasa, had the same request, but when I answered as I had to Pamphylia she looked at me intendy and, after asking my permission to speak, wondered what made me think she had any intent of remaining in the Guard once we returned.
I made no response to that, but dismissed her after saying the law was the law, and it wasn't for her, or me, to question what Orissa did with its gold.
She'd made me wonder, though. I'd never thought much about the future, I realized. I always assumed I'd soldier on with the Guard, eventually be given a medal, a wine-drenched banquet and promoted to a distinctly honorary, since I was a woman, generalship and retire to my family's estates. Either that or, more likely, fall in some nameless border skirmish. I'd never much thought of a life beyond the G
uard. It had been my mother, father, lover and home since I was a girl, as much or sometimes more than anyone named Antero, Otara or even Tries, as much as I loved them all.
I tried to set those thoughts aside - it isn't healthy for a soldier to think about the future, because while she's walking her post, dreaming of warm taverns and supple bed partners to come, it's most likely someone with eyes only on today is slipping up behind her with a bared dagger. But it didn't work.
Besides, I knew very well what would come next. We still had the Archon to deal with. My first duty when I returned home would be to join Gamelan before the Magistrates and Evocators and tell them what we feared.
All this made me somewhat bleak, although I tried not to show it. My sleep was uneasy, and I woke often. I was hot, then cold. I know I dreamed, and the dreams were not pleasant, but I couldn't remember them when I woke.
One of those nightmares saved my life.
I'd lurched awake, sitting upright in my hammock, trying to come fully alert, my body wanting me to lie back, and I was resisting, knowing if I didn't get up, pace about and collect my wits I'd return to that awful dream, whatever it had been. I vaguely knew it wasn't far from dawn. Over the creaking of the ship's beams, and the rush of the sea beyond them, I heard a low rustling, as if someone were trying the slipstring of my door latch. The door opened, and a shadow oudined itself and came forward, sliding across the deck towards me. From its dark bulk emerged an arm, holding a weapon, a long double-edged dagger, and the knife plunged down towards where I lay.
Except I wasn't there.
Before my assassin could grunt surprise I came up from where I'd knelt in the sheltering darkness and was on him, casting my thrown-off blanket like a fisherman's net, letting it wrap around his body, and then I spun in a full circle, snapping my leg up to waist-height as I did. Like a club it struck the man in the midsection, and sent him sprawling.
I dove after him, both of us blind in the darkness, but my muscles and my fists had eyes given them by endless hours of practice, and I hit with the heel of my hand once against his forehead, hammering his head back against the deck, my backhand struck his temple and then I caught myself before I launched the deathstroke into the softness of his throat. The man gargled pain, sagged and I was off him, and to the gimballed lantern. I flipped its cover open, blew on the punk that smouldered inside until a flame grew, twisted the valve and let oil feed the flame. I thought of shouting the Guard up, but decided to wait a moment. My attacker was forcing himself up on his hands, trying to shake off his befuddlement. I swept up his dagger, knelt and yanked his head back by the hair. It was Stryker.
His eyes unglazed, and stared at the blade I held just beyond his chin.
'Your idea? Or Cholla Yi's?' I demanded.
His lips clamped shut. I drew the blade's edge across the side of his neck, and blood oozed.
'Cholla Yi,' I said, knowing if it had just been some piece of insane rage from Stryker he would've instantly pleaded for an appeal to his superior. 'Why?'
Stryker clamped his lips stubbornly, and I started to cut him again.
'You're leadin' us t' our doom,' he said hastily. 'There's somethin' waitin' out there. Cholla Yi said he c'd feel it, an' I c'n feel somethin' too. An' I know what it is.'
'The Archon?'
'Now ain't you th' smart one,' he said.
'What'll killing me get you?'
Stryker looked cunning, and once again I cut him.
'Talk, man,' I said. 'Or I'll hail Polillo in with her axe, and let her trim your fingers one by one until you do.'
'So what?' Stryker said. 'You'll be killin' me anyways.'
'Now's for certain,' I said. 'A minute, or an hour... that's maybe. What would my death bring?'
'C'n I sit up?'
'You'll talk as you are. Or bleed as you lie.'
'Cholla Yi fin'y told me what was happenin'. Tol’ me he's been havin' visions. Like he was an Evoc'tor. Said th' Archon come to him, e'en though he di'n't see any face or form, but it hadda be him. Said th' chase wa'n't over, an' there'd be no way we c'd come safe to Orissa wi' his spells opposin' us, an' y'r damned Mag'strates'd ne'er pay what they owes us anyway. He said those who're wi' him now'll be remembered long, an' those who stand 'gainst him'll be ripped by demons f r all 'ternity.'
'And you ... or Cholla Yi believed theArchon!’
'I know it don't sound like there's sense to it,' Stryker said, 'but Cholla Yi says we ain't got no choice when a wizard like him- talks. 'Specially when he makes promises, an' says he'll be needin' men, real live men, t' help him get his throne back. Throne an' more.
'Now he's got th' real power, Cholla Yi told me. That spell I heard you an' that damn' Gamelan whisperin' T)out some time ago, when you thought no one was about.
'Looks to me like th' Archon ain't far from bein' a god,' Stryker went on. 'Man don't stand 'gainst gods. Best you c'n do is try to make accommodation with 'em. Maybe serve 'em well, an' hope t' get some of th' loot they ain't gonna be wantin'.'
Stryker grimaced. 'Guess I shoulda known, when I cast death's eyes, back gamin' aboard Cholla Yi's ship, all 'cause you was in th' ofBn'. Since I first signed on wi' Cholla Yi, weren't for bad luck, I wouldn't a had none at all.
'E'en back th' first time we come on th' Archon, I shoulda knowed I was cursed, when I tried to end matters like I was s'posed to. Back 'fore th' volcanoes went an' spat us out int' these waters.'
'What does that mean?'
'I'll tell you. Might's well give you all, an' hope that weighs th' scales. When you an' that black bitch went 'cross t' th' Archon's ship, an' up th' foremast?'
It came to me most clear, and I gasped, and without realizing it slid back, away from Stryker, until I was kneeling about a yard away. I remembered when Ismet and I had clambered to the foretop of the Archon's ship, and an arrow had plunged between us and sliced Ismet's arm, a shaft from an archer neither of us could spot. Of course we couldn't have seen him below, for that arrow could only have come from our own galley.
'I remember,' I said. Stryker pushed himself up into a sitting position. His fingers touched the blood on either side of his neck, and he winced. 'You shot that arrow?'
'I did. An' missed. Damn near took out th' black bitch, tho', which wouldn't've been all bad.'
'Cholla Yi ordered it?'
'Nobody ordered nothin',' Stryker said. 'Cholla Yi jus' told me that Gen'ral Jinnah made it clear that you was his worst enemy, an' when we come back, he'd be sittin' high in th' Magistrates' Council, an' if he didn't have th' bother of dealin' with you, our accounts'd be settled faster an' better and we was more'n capable of dealin' wi' th' Archon ourselves back then, afore he got all his powers.'
'Fools and gods-cursed fools! Why d'you not try again until now?' I asked.
"Cause I ain't a pure idjiot. A'ter we come over those reefs, int' unknown waters, I figgered, as did Cholla Yi, we'd need all th' swords we c'd muster. He said it'd be time t' worry about Orissa an' Jinnah an' shit like that when, an' if, we closed on their shores agin.'
'You're both a pair of stupid bastards,' I said. 'You believed the Archon would find a place for you? Look at The Sarzana. He thought he could cast the dice with him, too. I've never seen ...' I broke off, realizing I was about to sound like a fool myself. Of course the Archon's spirit, or demon, or whatever it was, wouldn't have tried to work his wooings without casting a spell of persuasion and belief like some golden cloud around these two scoundrels.
'All right,' I began. 'We'll deal with matters as they occur. First you, then Cholla Yi.'
I did not know what I intended doing with Stryker just then, and had only turned my mind to considering it. But the ship's captain mistook my words, and thought his fate was determined. I hadn't noticed he'd slid his legs back under him, and now he sprang straight for me, one hand grabbing for my knifehand, the other for my eyes.
But again my muscles spoke for me, and I went down, flat on my back, the sharp fang of the dagger sticking up, free hand bracing
it, and Stryker impaled himself on his own blade. Blood poured over me, and he moaned shrilly, stiffened and died. I rolled from under his bulk, and was on my feet, dropping my tunic over my shoulders and grabbing for my weapons belt. I burst out of the door into the lower deck, shouting for the Guard to turn out, turn out, and as my women floundered into wakefulness I raced up the companionway, onto the main-deck and the beginnings of dawn, my blade whipping out of its sheath.
Seventy feet away, Cholla Yi's flagship bore down on us, armed men in its forepeak, gangplanks rigged for boarding. In the forepeak was Cholla Yi himself, in full armour. He saw me, yet alive, and screeched rage. Behind him came two other ships - one was Kidai's, I didn't remember the captain of the other. Evidently he thought he only needed those three to kill us, or else hadn't been able to convince 1 the officers of the other ships to mutiny.
My women poured on deck, pulling on their helmets and buckling their armour. Among them were Stryker's seamen, bewildered by these events. Evidently Cholla Yi, experienced at treachery, had known enough to conspire with as few as necessary. If I'd been murdered below, there would've been time enough for Stryker to rouse his men against my women. But now ...
'Kill them!' Cholla Yi was shouting. 'Kill the bitches! Kill them all! They're in league with the Archon!'
A few sailors looked at us... and then at the ready-racks of swords.
'Any man who moves against us will die!' I shouted in return. 'Cholla Yi's the traitor!' I swore at myself - all I was doing was adding to the confusion, and changed my tactics: 'All sailors, fall below! Now! Or you'll die! Stay out of this!'
Some started moving towards the companionways, others were motionless, still amazed. Duban must've been told something, because he snatched a dagger from his belt. Before he could find a target Ismet cut him down, and sailors shouted anger.
But I hadn't time for them - Cholla Yi's ships were very close.
'Repel boarders,' I shouted. 'Gerasa! Target the helmsmen! Cholla Yi!' My best bow-woman, whom I'd promoted to sergeant in spite of her protests, gaped, then shouted her own orders as her section formed up along the rails and opened fire. But it was too late. I saw a shaft take the man standing next to Cholla Yi, grimaced that the archer's aim hadn't been better, and then Cholla Yi's galley crashed into ours, the spiked crow's-feet gangplanks thudded down and we were tied, ship to ship. Another ship bore alongside to port, but slings hummed and stones spat across the heaving waters between us, and the three men on the quarterdeck fell, chests or skulls splintered and the helmless ship drifted clear.
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