Marion Zimmer Bradley's Sword and Sorceress XXII

by Cirone, Patricia B.

  She stood, lowering her sword so the blade pointed to the congealing blood pooled around the dead woman. An icy breeze zinged through every chink in her armor, succeeding where the swords of many another warrior had failed.

  "Where is the tent of your chief?" she said, formally claiming the rights of a victor. "Where is my bath filled with scented oil and healing herbs, my victor's banquet, my bed above hot bricks? Where are your fair young men, so I may take my pick? Where is my prize—the treasure of your village?"

  A whoop of joy went up from the crowd. As it died, she heard another cry in the distance: the cry she had expected from the villagers, a single voice of defeat and soul-felt sorrow.

  "This way." A black-haired man in rich clothes spoke, a smile of peaceful satisfaction smoothing his face to agelessness.

  She shifted her weight to take a step, then settled back.

  Wrong, she thought. This place is wrong. Dangerous? No, not for me. For someone else? Perhaps. Certainly for her—the woman I killed. It wasn't only I who killed her. Well, then, let me take nothing for granted. Let me make sure the forms are observed.

  "Where is the honor guard for your champion's body?"

  No one came forward.

  Casilda held herself motionless.

  I will count to ten, she told herself. Then I'll tell them what I'll do after I've counted to ten again.

  She had only reached the first five before four men and four women stepped out of the crowd, unwinding the woven scarves from their heads and shoulders. One woman bound the dead warrior's hands and one bound her feet, one swathed her head and one tucked the hilt of her sword beneath her hands and tied it there. The men lifted the body and passed their scarves beneath it. The men and women took the ends of the four scarves and lifted the body between them.

  In the distance, the wail turned to wrenching sobs, inarticulate shouts of despair.

  "Wait," Casilda said. She removed the dead fighter's helmet. Like all armor in Dairu, it was made of overlapping plates of lightweight forgewood—easy to cut and work and rivet together while it was green, hard as iron when it had cured. The woman who had challenged her when she had entered the village, looking for food and a night's lodging, had worn her blond hair short. The sightless eyes, which Casilda closed gently, were deeply blue.

  Why? Casilda wondered. A test of strength, yes, that's common—a form of entertainment—a sort of hospitality, even. But a challenge to the death, to a stranger? And those heartrending cries, sunken to inaudibility—was someone mourning this death, or did a different tragedy wring them forth?

  The crowd parted for them as they carried their dead champion to the pyre prepared for the challenge's loser.

  Despite herself, Casilda let her reddened blade lift perceptibly toward the unarmed people as she said, "This was a valiant fighter. We will all pay tribute to her."

  Grudgingly, the villagers encircled the pyre. With indifference that, toward a fallen warrior, equaled contempt, the richly dressed man lit a torch from the brazier at the foot of the pyre and thrust it into the kindling. He was still smiling.

  As the flames engulfed her fallen opponent, Casilda chanted the Rite of Passage for the Valiant Dead:

  I walk with you so far and no farther.

  Now your steps proceed where mine will follow.

  Soon, my steps will follow, but now they stop.

  I stop and I stay on this side of the border,

  The border of the land you tread without me.

  Defend the land until I come.

  I will come, after.

  The forgewood armor was reluctant to catch fire but, when it did, it burned an incandescent white. Warriors called that a sign the Spirits of Heaven had accepted the departed soul—that flame the color of ice. Casilda thought of the pale skin of the village champion, nearly as fair as her own, and of the crowd's joy at her loss. When she turned from the pyre, the villagers were gone, all but the black-haired man in rich clothes.

  "I am the chief," he said. "Come with me."

  Perversely, she stood her ground.

  "Did she have family?"

  Frowning, the chief said, "Who?"

  "Your champion. Did she have family? Did she have a name?"

  "We guard our names from strangers."

  "Hers is past guarding, don't you think?"

  He smiled again. "Her name was Audris."

  "Did she have a family? ...Family. Did she have one?"

  "In this village, female warriors are chaste."

  Ah, she thought. One of those places.

  She neither moved nor spoke.

  Reluctantly, he offered: "Her mother died at her birth. Her father died ten years ago. This is as far as we count kinship here."

  Sensing there was more to be had, Casilda fixed him with her stare. She was still wearing her helmet, a casque of forgewood dyed forest green as it cured; all it showed of her face were her eyes, so pale a blue as to be almost silver.

  As she had suspected, the chief was uneasy under her scrutiny. Irritably, he said, "Come. You'll see."

  She shouldered her travel pack and followed him, passing from the arena at the edge of the village, threading through the irregularly placed wood huts. The huts were rectangular, the eave work of the shingled roofs carved with totems and floral elaboration. Children playing in the fenced gardens stopped and watched her pass, wide-eyed at the drying blood on her armor and her still-unsheathed sword.

  He led her to a hut apparently no different from the others, though perhaps its carvings held meanings of authority for the villagers. The interior was familiar to her from more welcome stays in other places: Decoratively carved chests with hinged lids stood around the walls, each six feet long and three feet wide, each both storage and bed. In the center of the room, a mud-brick charcoal-burning oven, the same general size and shape of the chests, was the bed of honor at this chilly altitude.

  At this time of day, just before lattermeal, the oven fires were stoked and the bricks shimmered with heat.

  A girl—seven? eight?—with unkempt hair the color of dark honey struggled to carry two wooden buckets from the stove to a tin bath tub. Ropy muscles stood defined on arms devoid of baby fat. She dumped the water into the tub, and the scents of bay and rosemary floated to Casilda's nose—the smell of triumph, after a contest of arms. The smell of death, after this strange challenge. The smell of compulsion, manipulation, desperation.

  The girl tugged at a folded screen, spreading it to conceal the tub from the rest of the room.

  Eyes lowered, head bowed, she said, "The bath is ready."

  "Congratulate her on her victory," said the chief, with his strangely peaceful smile.

  "Did you fight with honor?" the girl asked, voice clear, eyes still on the floor.

  Casilda's gloved hand deflected the chief's blow.

  "Your servant is my servant until I leave. She is mine to punish, not yours."

  Rubbing his arm, the chief nodded.

  "I'll go bring the pick of our young men," he said. "Will you look at them before the meal or after?"

  "I want none of your young men—nor your young women. I will bathe and eat, take my prize and go. Now, if I could have privacy?"

  "Then I'll fetch my wife to cook our meal."

  The thought of breaking bread in this village tempered her appetite.

  "Have her fix something I can carry. I can stay no more than two hours."

  Many warriors refused to linger in a place where they had killed. Let him believe she had taken a general vow to that effect, which she had not.

  "I'll fetch her." His smile broadened as he turned. Then he was gone, leaving the atmosphere clearer.

  "Did you fight with honor?" the girl asked again.

  "I did. So did the Warrior Audris."

  The filthy head bobbed a nod.

  "May I attend you?"

  A less subservient request to serve, Casilda had never heard.

  "If you think me worthy."

  The head bo
bbed again.

  Casilda laid her sword on the floor, silver and garnet, steel and lost life.

  The girl held up her hands for Casilda's casque. She dipped it into the bath, rubbing it with the scented water inside and out, then set it on the floor.

  Meanwhile, Casilda slipped off her forgewood-plated gloves and tunic, her armguards and shinguards. One by one, they went into the bathwater and were set out to dry. She untied the broad pepperbark leaves that protected her precious leather boots and dropped them into the bath, where they added their spicy aroma—and their burden of dried blood. The water was distinctly pink, now. Off came her gray silk tunic and trousers, so much tougher than their delicacy suggested. Normally, she would let them be cleaned and aired, but now she would roll them up and take them away to do herself.

  Finally, she raised her sword and held it on both hands, pommel on her right and blade on her left. She knelt and lowered it into the water.

  "By the sacred tree," she said, "I have done no wrong."

  She felt the vibration as the sword—or her hands beneath it, she could never decide which—discarded all residue of the fight.

  She withdrew the weapon and slid it, spotlessly shining, into its scabbard. The water it left behind was clear and pure—cleaner than it had been to start with.

  Unbinding her waist-length hair, the startling color of scraped carrots, she lowered herself into the bath.

  "Three times, I attended her," the girl said, pouring thick soap into Casilda's upturned palm. "Three times before this, since I've been old enough to remember, her challenge was accepted. She always won, before. I thought she would always win."

  The regret was almost too faint to be heard beneath the simple statement of fact.

  The girl scooped up water in a wooden cup and poured it over the warrior's back-tilted head, then worked soap into the bright hair.

  "She told me if she ever lost, it wouldn't be for lack of will. She said I should attend the winner as I attended her, if the fight was won with honor."

  Casilda ducked into the water to rinse. When she came up, the girl had raised her head and Casilda looked into her eyes—proud eyes—blue eyes—deeply blue, the living eyes of the dead champion.

  In our village, female warriors are chaste.

  And if one fails in her vow.... If she carries her "shame" to term and gives birth to a living reminder... the child is taken and used as a servant? The warrior becomes a village champion, forced to challenge all comers to mortal combat? She looked into those eyes and understood she had just been bathed by the daughter of the woman she had killed. And the child knew it.

  Before she could speak, the chief's voice sounded outside the hut, ordering someone to be silent.

  "My wife is here. May she enter and prepare your food?"

  "She may enter. You may not."

  "The warrior speaks and I obey."

  The chief's wife shuffled across the floor as if her sight were poor. A muffled sob, a smothered groan escaped her.

  It was this woman, Casilda realized, who had cried out at the news of Audris' defeat.

  "Help her," she said to the child.

  She regretted the order a moment later, when the woman hissed, "You!" The child yelped as if hurt.

  Casilda hurriedly dried herself and dressed in fresh silk from her pack. She twisted her baby-fine hair into a knot at her nape and pushed back the screen.

  The wife of the chief was a young matron, her eyes swollen with tears.

  The warrior took pity on the woman's grief, until she saw the bruise on the child's upper arm. An expert in reading wounds, she recognized a savage pinch.

  Still, she kept her voice gentle as she asked, "What was your champion to you, woman?"

  The chief's wife spat into the fire, her face twisted with loathing. That was the only answer she gave.

  Quickly, the woman mixed flatbread and rolled two translucent rounds onto the top of the oven. She chopped a mara root next to them and left it there to soften in the heat, flipped the bread, and swung a stew pot from its place above the coals.

  Casilda had made many a quick meal for herself; she could see she would be on her way within five minutes. She put on her armor and sheathed sword, lashing her casque to the travel pack. By the time she was dressed, the woman had two bundles wrapped in pepperbark leaves and tied with mara vines.

  The warrior folded her arms when the woman tried to hand them to her.

  "I was promised a prize."

  The woman bit her lips.

  So that's her trouble, Casilda told herself. It isn't the champion she hates to lose—it's the prize.

  The chief stuck his head in at the door. "I have it with me. May I bring it in?"

  With her hand on her sword, she said, "You may."

  A boy strode into the hut, a travel pack over his shoulder. Casilda guessed him to be around six, but he had a dignity of bearing many kings would envy. His hair was thick and black; his face was a miniature of the chief's wife's, even to the swollen, red-rimmed eyes. Those eyes, the color of wet ashes, stared blankly, in odd contrast to his assured manner.

  "Here is your prize," said the black-haired man. "My son. The son of a chief."

  The chief's wife groaned and wrung her hands.

  "I will not take your child," Casilda said.

  "Look!" said the chief. He raised the short sleeve of the boy's tunic, showing a red and blue tattoo of interwoven vines. "This is my mark. All the traders know it. Whoever owns my son can claim special trading status with us. Our pottery and woven cloth are much in demand. My son is a prize of value. Or keep him for yourself. He's been trained to serve a warrior. He'll make a good squire for you."

  Trained to serve a warrior. To serve Audris? Audris' daughter here, their child there....

  "Take him," Audris' daughter said. "Please. If you leave him, they'll kill him."

  The chief's wife crossed her arms, holding her own shoulders as if to restrain herself from rushing to her child.

  Casilda read the truth in the woman's body, in the chief's eyes.

  "Why?" She asked them all, but knew it would be the girl who answered.

  "Because he's blind. They would have killed him when he lost his sight, just as they would have killed me at birth. My mother bought my life by agreeing to challenge every passing warrior who would accept a fight to the death. As long as she lived, I would live. When the chief's son lost his sight—"

  "A curse from the gods!" the chief shouted.

  His wife, to whom the shout had been directed, shouted back. "Because you spared the warrior and her spawn! You cursed our son!"

  As if they hadn't spoken, the girl went on, in her clear calm voice. "My mother and I bought his life by trading me for him. While she lived, he would live and I would serve. Now that she's gone—" The girl's eyes flickered, the only sign of emotion she had displayed.

  "I'll take him, then. Give him the food to carry. We leave immediately. Say your goodbyes, boy."

  His head turned toward the girl. His proud young face was pale. "Goodbye," he said. "You and I and my mistress your mother will meet again, under the roots of the sacred tree. Until then, I envy you."

  The chief's wife said, "Here. Take the food." She pressed the bundles into his outstretched hands. Her fingers strayed to caress his, but he pulled away.

  "Corrupted!" the woman growled. She glared at the chief. "More of your doing."

  The chief stood away from the door, the relaxed, contented smile back on his face.

  Casilda could read him now: The gods' curse was leaving the village. She had rid them of the impure warrior and was taking his imperfect child. She was quite the benefactress.

  She placed a gloved hand on the boy's shoulder and they left the hut.

  As they entered the forest beyond the settlement, she felt freed of a strain, as if the air of the village had become difficult to breathe. "I am Casilda. Where I come from, we guard our honor, but give away our names."

  "My mistress told me
the real world worked like that." His voice was vague, as if his mind were on something else. "My name is Cecilio."

  "And the warrior's daughter? What is she called?"

  Bleakly, he said, "She was Izella. She was my only friend. She would talk to me. She would give me sweets and toys she made out of scraps. My mistress loved her. I loved her."

  Casilda shook his shoulder gently. "Don't put her in the past. You may meet again. She isn't—"

  She stopped, her hold on Cecilio's shoulder stopping him, too.

  "You traded places," she said. "She told me you traded places. I heard, but I didn't understand. With her mother gone and you gone, they'll kill Izella. Won't they?"

  He nodded, tears reflecting the green of the leaves, the green of her armor.

  She dropped her travel pack.

  "Wait here."

  Though she ran, the path to the arena seemed endless.

  They were back—all the adults, and the older children—lining the arena's rim. One figure stood in the center. Izella. As Casilda shouldered her way through the ring of villagers, three stones struck the child, one of them drawing blood from her cheek.

  The warrior stood behind the girl, her gloved hands protecting the delicate face, the deep blue eyes.

  "Stop!" she commanded.

  "Outlander!" the chief shouted. "Our ways will not be mocked! We have been more than lenient with our law-breaker. We have been more than compassionate toward our living curse. What we're doing now, we have to do. How dare you interfere?"

  "A warrior broke your law. It's your own child you call a curse. And yet it isn't a warrior you stone. It isn't your child in this circle. How dare you use me to give yourselves an easy mark for your hatred?"

  The chief's gaze swept his people. When he had gauged their mood, he said, "Very well. Let the gods take you both."

  He nodded. Casilda heard the thuds of stones hitting her armor, was buffeted by blows from all sides.

  Then she was on her hands and knees, her head spinning and blood running into her eyes. She reached forward and pulled the fallen child under what shelter her armored body could afford.

  She drew her sword.

  "You can't," Izella said, turning to look up at her. The girl's face was a mask of red and dusty brown. "You can't raise your sword to them. They aren't warriors."