The Book of Water

by Marjorie B. Kellogg

  That red—the familiar red of Hal’s leather jerkin, worn despite all dangers to attest to his unswerving loyalty to the King. Seeing it, Erde sensed emotion stirring, and saw how cruelly dispassionate she was in this dream, as if she had left all feeling behind to make this journey back to where the battle had finally been joined between the King’s armies and the forces of the usurpers. Men had fought and died, and Erde did not know if Hal or Rainer or King Otto himself still lived. She wished she stood on the opposite hill, instead of with her father and Köthen. At least she would know the worst. But then, she realized, she’d be wondering about Köthen.

  Why was this man so often in her dreams? Not only dreaming about him, but almost as if she was him. She turned back to watch as he tossed the bloodied, dirty linen to the boy.

  “See to my lord of Alte, that’s a good lad.”

  The boy bowed and hurried off toward the gathered barons. Köthen followed more slowly. Erde’s father looked up as Köthen approached. He waved away the boy with the water and lifted a corner of the map to jab a finger at it.

  “What’s left of them will fall back and join Otto’s main force somewhere around here, I figure.”

  Köthen nodded tightly. “Peasants. Farmers. Tradespeople. Hardly a fair contest, wouldn’t you say, my lord?”

  “Ah, but if we meet up with nothing more than peasants, we should catch up with the King in three days’ time, and that should be that.” He let the corner drop and took Köthen’s elbow, drawing him aside. Köthen eased out of his grasp but moved with him to avoid insult. “The good brother has his men spreading rumors in the villages,” Erde’s father continued quietly. “Once Otto is dead, Prince Carl can be accused of trafficking with witches, and gotten out of your way.”

  Köthen shook his head. “No. Call him off. I don’t want the boy harmed. He shouldn’t have to pay for his father’s mistakes.”

  “Brother Guillemo says no bishop will crown you King while Otto’s heir lives. The people, at least, require a semblance of legitimacy.”

  “That foul priest does love the fire.” Köthen’s jaw tightened. “No, von Alte, there’ll be no burning the Prince. House arrest will do fine. Carl doesn’t want to be King anyway. If he did, I’d put him on the throne and rule as his regent. Call Guillemo off.”

  “Brother Guillemo is not mine to call off, even if I might wish it otherwise. You know that as well as I do.” Von Alte took a long look at the younger man before continuing. “A little late for scruples, my lord of Köthen, is it not?”

  “Never too late, my lord of Alte. There’ll be no burning.”

  Von Alte’s glance slipped aside. “You may not have the say on that, my lord. . . .”

  “And why is that?”

  Erde’s father turned, called out to the men behind him. “Bessen! Get over here and report to Baron Köthen what you heard just now.”

  A skinny, scrub-bearded younger knight hurried toward them. “Concerning what, my lord?”

  “Concerning Prince Carl.”

  The man’s worry lines deepened. “Right. The Prince.” He faced Köthen breathlessly and bowed.

  “Come on, Bessen, out with it,” growled Köthen.

  “An escape attempt, my lord. This morning, while you were showing yourself so valiantly on the field . . .”

  “An ‘escape’? As you may recall, Bessen, the Prince is a guest in my tent, free to come and go.”

  “As long as he doesn’t go very far,” put in von Alte.

  Bessen nodded eagerly. “And that’s just it, my lord. The Prince took advantage of your . . . generosity and tried to flee. The White Brothers foiled his attempt and brought him back.”

  Köthen lunged at him, grabbing huge fistfuls of his tunic. “What have they done? Is he alive?”

  Bessen cringed in his grasp. “Of course, my lord baron. The Prince is safe in Brother Guillemo’s custody.”

  Köthen shook him like a rag doll. “SAFE? You call that safe?”

  Von Alte levered an arm between the two men, to pry them apart. “Get a hold of yourself, Köthen. Poor Bessen’s only the news bearer.”

  “And that’s what I’m surrounded with! Everyone reports! No one sees anything! Yet what remarkable detail they all bring to their accounts!” Köthen shoved Bessen away in disgust, then tugged his tunic straight. “My lords will excuse me while I go rescue Prince Carl from his ‘rescuers.’”

  “You might want to reconsider that,” said von Alte.

  Köthen turned back sharply. “I beg your pardon?”

  “The good brother thinks the Prince is better off in his hands. You had better go well-armed and well-accompanied if you think to change his mind.”

  Erde felt rather than saw rage boil up inside Baron Köthen. She also sensed how well he controlled it—unlike her father, who would have raved and thrown things. Köthen’s rage spoke only through a certain stiffening of his spine, a narrowing of his glance. He stared at von Alte a moment, then nodded brusquely. “I see. So that’s how it is.”

  “That’s how it is.” Though her father’s reply sounded smug, Erde read the terror in his eyes. The awful priest still held him in thrall.

  And then she was drifting away from them, as if someone was tugging on her arm. Other voices were calling her. She resisted, wanting to hear what Köthen said before he turned on his heel and stalked away. The voices, insistent, urgent, drowned out his reply. She wanted to stay to find out what would happen to Prince Carl. She wanted to know if Hal was all right. She . . .

  “Wake up, girl!”

  . . . was aware of her body again. Someone was shaking her, hard. She didn’t want to come back to the heat and darkness.

  “C’mon, now, wake up!”

  —Breathe! You must breathe! You cannot leave now!

  Erde let go of Köthen and her father, let herself relax, let her chest heave to draw in the hot, smelly air. It made her cough.

  “There she goes. She’s okay. She’s awake now.” Strong hands hauled her up into a sitting position. “Whadda ya say, girl? You awake?”

  —Are you returned, Lady Erde?

  —I am here, dragon.

  Erde flexed her hands, rubbed her face. Her body tingled, as if the whole of it had gone dead numb and was reawakening. N’Doch leaned over her, a darker shadow in darkness softened by the faintest scatter of light filtering down from above. She gripped his arm to steady herself. “I was somewhere else.”

  His laugh was relieved. “I’ll say you were.”

  “I went home.”

  —You went there without me. Do not do it again.

  That’s what was so strange, Erde realized. She and the dragon had always shared their dreams since they’d been together, but not these recent ones of home and her father and Baron Köthen.

  —It just . . . happened. How will I prevent it, unless I stay awake?

  —I will keep watch. It is the priest who draws you.

  “No!” she cried out, aloud.

  N’Doch jerked his arm away. “You talking to him or me?”

  —Yes. I believe this is so. My sister agrees.

  —But how, why would he do that?

  —How, I do not know. Why, because he seeks to separate and thereby weaken us. He is learning new powers. As ours grow, so do his. But I am alerted now, and will keep watch.

  Now the waking, fetid darkness would be a sanctuary from the perils of her dreams. Erde slumped in dismay and felt N’Doch watching her.

  “You with us, girl? You all right? It’s time we got moving.”

  “I am fine, N’Doch. Thank you.” But when she got to her feet, it was a struggle. The dream had left her weakened and trembling. “Will we break our fast before we go?”

  N’Doch laughed.

  * * *

  “Yeah, we’ll eat up, for sure. Don’t want to be carrying food around in the City, not where anyone can see it, at least.”

  N’Doch breaks out the water and some of the fish and vegetables that Djawara packed up for them.
He’s hoping to actually buy bread and cheese with the cash the old man’s laid on him. And wouldn’t some coffee be radical. . .?

  It might be the dimness of the light falling through the grating above, but it strikes him that the girl is looking really flat out right now. He hands her an extra section of cucumber. “You wanna stay here, like, rest? Let me scout out Lealé?”

  “No!” she comes back fast, like she doesn’t want to miss this trip for anything. But he’s worried now that she might slow him down.

  “Won’t he, y’know, be lonely?”

  It’s a nice try, but it doesn’t work. She lays a caressing palm on the big guy’s flank. “He will be with me, even while he’s here.”

  He understands that she likes that part, the constant lurking presence that makes him feel crowded. “Hunh. Okay. Ready, then?”

  She nods, a little too brightly to be convincing. He turns to the blue dragon. “What about you? All set to boogie?”

  —Remind me.

  N’Doch chuckles. “Sure thing, girlfriend. Here we go, then.” He does a few soft bars of the song they’ve agreed on.

  —More.

  “You forgetful or what?”

  —I like listening to you.

  The pleasure this brings surprises him. But hey, why not? An audience is an audience. He sings a bit more, starts to get into it, and finishes the verse. He’s moving on to the chorus when he spots the girl gazing at him in wonder and admiration. He finishes the chorus directly to her, then grins and sketches out a little bow.

  She claps her hands, delighted. “Why, you sing very well, N’Doch! Like a true bard!”

  “A bard, huh? You mean, like one of those guys who used to go around the place singing about Robin Hood?”

  She looks sort of blank, but she nods. “Sometimes the bards do travel, yes, if the weather’s good and the roads are passable. Mostly, they sit by the kitchen hearth and make up songs about doomed lovers and great battles, at least that’s what my grandmama’s bard Cronke did. And then he’d sing them for her in the great-hall on feast days. His songs always made me sad, though.”

  N’Doch finds himself smiling. The picture is there in his mind, and he understands he’s getting it from her through the dragons—like a window opening onto the past. He sees the long room, hazed with smoke from the great stone fireplace that takes up one whole wall. He feels the need to stoop away from the low-slung ceiling beams, dark and rough and as big around as his thigh. Women in long skirts are moving about in the dim light, hauling pots and kneading dough, and an old man sits in a corner, scrunched up over a stringed instrument that N’Doch doesn’t recognize, ’cept he knows it’s an old one. He wishes he could hear the music. He’s sure it would be plaintive and sweet. But there’s no sound in this memory.

  “Can you sing one of his songs?”

  It’s as if the idea had never occurred to her. “Oh, no. I could never sing.”

  “Why not? Everyone can sing.”

  “They can?”

  “Sure. Don’t you ever, like, sing in the shower?”

  N’Doch can’t remember the last time he was near a working shower, but he figures there’s probably still plenty of water where she’s come from. But she gets that blank look again that reminds him they’re speaking different languages in more ways than the obvious one. “Never mind. I’ll show you one sometime.”

  Meanwhile, behind her, the blue dragon’s been going through her transformation, and he’s been distracted so he didn’t have to watch till she’s just about finished. Even though this is the one they’ve practiced most of all ’cause it’s easiest for her to maintain, it still gives him a chill to see his song come to life like that: there right in front of him, his little brother Jéjé, as he imagined he would have been if he’d lived to be nine or ten. N’Doch is glad he’s warned the girl ahead of time.

  “‘Kay, man. All set,” the apparition squeaks.

  N’Doch swallows hard. “Gotta work on the voice a little.”

  “Sure, guy. Anything you say.” Now she’s taken up a higher, lighter version of his own voice, which makes more sense for a ten-year-old kid, but doesn’t go too far helping N’Doch feel any less weird about the whole business.

  But the girl’s smiling at the thing, her hands clasped in glee. “O excellent, Mistress Water! O wonderful and marvelous! What shall we call you?”

  “Not Jéjé,” N’Doch puts in quickly.

  The boy/dragon pouts. “No? Then how ’bout . . . L’Eau?”

  The girl picks up the game. “Or Wasser! I’ll call you Wasser!”

  N’Doch tries it. He can get his mouth around the syllables easy enough, so it seems as good as any made-up name except that anytime he hears it dragon-wise, in translation, he’s gonna hear his own name, which is just about as strange as hearing his own voice. He shakes his head hopelessly. “All right, we’re off, then. Stick close and keep your eyes open every minute.”

  The boy child salutes him saucily. The girl giggles. N’Doch pulls up short at the door. He has a sudden heart-stopping image of his younger self razzing Sedou. Now he’s glad he never got around to writing songs about his older brother. “Look, this ain’t no picnic, you got me? Hang tight, don’t attract attention, or you get left behind.”

  The girl touches his arm. “She will behave, N’Doch.”

  His mouth tightens. He nods. He’s forgotten for a moment that he’s yelling at a dragon.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  Up on the surface, it’s already hot, though the sun has barely cleared the broken eastern skyline. N’Doch would have preferred to emerge in darkness, so as not to give away the entrance to their hidey-hole, but that chance is past and besides, he doesn’t see anybody about when he peers cautiously over the top of the stair well. He gets the others out, the hole covered, and them well away from it before he halts for a reconnaissance.

  There’s not much left to look at, out here in the Wedge. Collapsed, burned-out buildings, rubble, dust. N’Doch picks out the distant profile of the Diouf, a half-built soccer stadium. Ran out of money after the last coup, so they never did finish the seating. The soccer team belongs to Baraga now, and plays in his private stadium for the cameras and five hundred of his most intimate friends, but on-the-rise rock groups use the Diouf if they can afford the security. The really hot groups don’t play live gigs any more. Too much risk of getting blown up or shot, or having the so-called fans riot and trash the place, then having to pay up the damages. When you get big, you gotta go remote. It’s the one thing N’Doch figures he’ll regret about being famous, not being able to perform live any more.

  The apparition stands beside him. “Move it or lose it, bro.”

  N’Doch curls his lip. “Who taught you how to talk?”

  “You did.”

  “No way.” But it makes him wonder. Is that what he sounds like to the girl?

  He leads them away from the wrecked processing plant, cutting across parking lots, keeping to the wide-open spaces as much as he can. In the early daylight, the buildings and the lots and the unpaved roads are all stained the same dry, hot red of the dust. N’Doch sees a few souls stirring here and there, bent over, languidly picking through the rubble, probably the same rubble they’ve picked over a million times. He keeps his distance and moves on.

  The main road into town is still paved, but junk-strewn, full of potholes and sifted over with a fine layer of red silt.

  “Not many trucks through here lately,” N’Doch remarks. Lots of footprints, though. Lots more than you’d expect, given how deserted everything looks. He hears a few copters off in the distance, and waves the boy/dragon over to him. “You hear any of those gettin’ close, you let me know, okay?”

  The apparition nods. Being out in the open seems to have sobered it considerably.

  The girl is doing what he said, sticking close, gazing about like she’s trying to memorize everything. “Was there a war?” she asks him finally.

  “Nah.” Then he reconsiders. �
�well, actually, yeah—a lot of little ones. But really it’s, y’know, the climate thing.”

  She gets quiet a moment, in the way he’s familiar with now, waiting for the dragons to puzzle out a particularly opaque translation problem. Finally she says, “You mean, the weather?”

  “Ha. It’s much bigger than weather. I mean, the weather’s the result, but . . . well, the way the vid guys say it, all our bombs and factories and cars and stuff have really screwed everything up, which means the air and the water and even the dirt, y’know? The whole gig.” Now that he’s into trying to actually explain this global warming thing, N’Doch realizes he doesn’t really know what the hell he’s talking about, just the garble he’s heard on TV. But it’s okay, ’cause this girl’s not gonna know any better. He could tell her it’s all a space alien conspiracy and she’d buy it just as fast. At least he’s got the basic idea. “So it’s getting hotter all the time and we don’t get the rain any more when we should, while some other part of the world is being flooded out, which means the farmers can’t hardly grow anything in either place. And then, half the time, what they do grow is full of chemicals and all kinds of toxic shit from the ground, so you shouldn’t eat it even though you’re hungry enough to eat the toxics raw if they was right there in front of you.”

  He takes a breath. She’s staring at him, wide-eyed. He thinks, just in case she is picking up on some of this, maybe he should feed it to her slower, ’cause it’s a big one, maybe the biggest. If she really doesn’t know what “climate” means, doing a major core dump on her all at once is gonna be a waste of time. Plus get him all riled up, since nothing makes him madder than the notion of someday soon not being able to eat, drink, or breathe. But it does occur to him that he’d better start keeping her out of the sun. Pale as she is, she’ll burn up like an old scrap of paper.