Chuki was out in the jungle, gathering the harvest of herbs and seeds for the coming month and leaving Quri and Sumaq free to talk openly. Quri’s mistress had made it quite clear that she was only to speak to Sumaq for matters of health. Besides, Quri’s fingers were still raw from all the scrubbing she’d been forced to do, and she wasn’t sure a conversation about birdsong was worth the blisters.
Yet here she was, talking to him yet again. She couldn’t help herself. He was good at conversation. And if she was honest with herself, she enjoyed the attention. He had a way of speaking that told her how important her words were, how much he cared. He really listened.
Chuki never listened to her like that. Her mistress barely heard two words Quri said most of the time.
Quri caught the ball, a small piece of leather stuffed with straw. “No, she’s not. My parents sought her help in conceiving, but the payment was their firstborn. Me. Or so I’ve been told. Chuki needed an apprentice, and my parents were able to go on with their lives and have more children.” She threw the ball back across the room. “And Chuki is approaching the end of her life. She was desperate for a replacement, so I’m important to her.”
“Don’t you wonder, though? What your life could have been? Do you even know who they are?” His dark eyes pierced her soul, and she flushed with embarrassment.
Truthfully, she did wonder. She wondered all the time what her life could have been, what it could still be if she wasn’t tied to the shaman. If she wasn’t already slated to be the next shaman.
And as for her parents...well, every time she went to market or had time to wander the town, she watched all the people walking by, imagining their lives. Imagining how she might fit in their lives. What else would she do with her free time? It wasn’t like Chuki allowed her to have friends. Shamans are solitary, Chuki would tell her. We have no friends. We have no family. We are power, the might of the gods personified. As if friends and family reduced one’s power.
She turned her eyes back to Sumaq. “Sometimes,” she admitted. “I pretend when I see people. Pretend that maybe they are my parents, and I live with them. Imagine life as it might have been.” She took a deep breath, pushing the thoughts back into the corners of her mind. “But that doesn’t really matter. Chuki cares for me, teaches me. She says I have a real aptitude, that she chose her apprentice well.”
He threw the ball back to her. “And she treats you well?”
She caught the ball and immediately returned it. He had already seen the punishments Chuki handed out when disobeyed or displeased. “As long as I listen to her.”
The ball hit his hand with a loud smack, and he leaned forward, holding it exactly where he had caught it. He studied her carefully, not speaking for several moments. “And when she is simply displeased, she mistreats you? When you’ve done nothing wrong?”
Quri didn’t answer, studying her slippered feet nervously, hesitant to say more. If she admitted the truth, the whole truth, what would Chuki do to her? What would she do to Sumaq?
Sumaq continued to study her. “You could always come home with me. Learn from my people’s shaman. He would treat you well, I promise it. You could even one day...perhaps find a husband among my people?”
Quri ducked her head, her face on fire. Did he mean...did he like her? Was he suggesting she marry him one day? Or was he simply being friendly?
The door slammed open, and she jumped up from her seat as Chuki stormed inside. Sumaq quickly tucked the ball under the blanket. Chuki mumbled something about aphids in her garden, then froze, one hand extended to place a jar on the shelf. She turned back slowly, hand still extended above her, and glared between the two young people.
“What is this?” she demanded.
Did she see Quri’s blush? Sumaq’s guilty averted eyes?
“Nothing, Mistress Chuki,” Quri said, refusing to meet Chuki’s eye. She pulled her spellbook up from where it sat open on the table. “Just studying.”
Chuki turned her narrow eyes at Sumaq, every line of her face a study in suspicion. “You better not be getting any ideas, boy. Aren’t you well enough to get out of here yet?”
He opened his mouth to respond, but instead fell into a coughing fit.
Chuki continued her glare until the fit subsided, not offering him water or medicine. “Fine then. One more day.” With one final glare at the both of them, she returned to stocking her shelves.
Four
ONE WEEK AFTER Chuki’s deadline of “one more day,” Quri took the prince out into the garden for a walk. For once, Chuki practically pushed them out the door, convinced that the prince needed fresh air and sun to heal, even though the sun was hidden behind clouds, but she didn’t trust that he wouldn’t collapse in the intense humidity of the summer day. And it wasn’t as if Quri could do anything her mistress would disapprove of; Chuki would be watching them through the hut’s large window while she worked. None of the garden plants were taller than Quri’s waist, not enough to hide them from the shaman’s shrewd gaze, and the trees were widely spaced and close to the forest edge.
Neither of them minded being forced out, though. Chuki was in a mood as foul as whatever she was brewing over the hearth, which released a putrid stench that filled every corner of the hut.
They walked side by side, strolling slowly between rows of herbs and fruit trees waving in the breeze, their roots deep into the dark, fertile earth of the rainforest. The odor of the sun-warmed humid earth and leaves rose around them, and the jungle surrounded the shaman’s garden on three sides, held back only by a low stone wall. Yet the wall couldn’t hold back the creeping vines, waving fronds of bushes, and reaching tree branches from the canopy. Nor could it keep out all the monkeys, tapirs, and other leaf-munching creatures.
As they walked, insects chirped, birds called, and wind rustled the leaves of the forest all around them. The sounds of the villagers were soft and distant, muffled by the hut between the garden and the village and by the proximity of the wild. It was something Quri loved about the garden: the peace and quiet.
As long as she stayed closer to the hut than to the jungle. The reaching branches and dark depths of the forest scared her enough to sidle just a few steps closer to Sumaq as they approached the outer edge of the garden. Over everything, the scent of rain hung heavy in the air, promising a storm was on its way and causing the humidity to cling to Quri’s skin like a damp cloak. Within a few steps out the door, she had been coated in a sheen of sweat and moisture from the air.
“My father has many beautiful flowers,” Sumaq said, looking at rows of yellow blooms planted by Quri and Chuki earlier in the season, “yet none of them compares to your beauty.”
Quri blushed as he bent over next to the bed of herbs, warmth in her stomach at his compliment. She should tell him to stop, tell him they needed to keep their distance, but she couldn’t. Instead, she wished she could give him just as many compliments. Tell him about how beautiful and intense his earthen eyes were. How much she loved talking to him. How his kind heart made hers flutter.
Sumaq pushed aside the yellow flowers and grasped a few of the small wildflowers clustered at the base of the stem. They were small, only four petals, and faded from lavender at the center to white at the edges, dripping into the bright yellow sun that marked the middle of the flower. It was a piece of cheer on the otherwise gloomy morning.
Sumaq straightened and handed her the fistful of his harvest. “For you. For all your kindness.” He coughed lightly into his unoccupied hand.
Quri blushed and looked away, but she still reached a hand toward him to accept the gift. She held them close in front of her as they continued their walk.
“You never told me why you’re here,” Quri said, avoiding eye contact. “Only that you haven’t felt up to returning home yet.”
Sumaq sighed. “That bit was only partially true. Truth to tell, I was sent here to look for a bride. And there’s one thing...one person...who keeps me here.” He fixed his intent chocolate gaze on
her.
Quri ducked her head. Her heart fluttered in her chest, and butterflies fluttered around her stomach like the small white butterflies flitting through the garden. He couldn’t possibly be talking about her, could he? “So you found your bride, then?”
A warm hand touched hers, prying her fist open and intertwining his fingers with hers, sending a thrill like the tingle of an approaching storm across her skin. “That all depends on her.”
They had completed their circuit of the garden and now stood just outside the hut’s door. Quri released his hand, checking on Chuki’s progress within, but the old woman was nowhere to be seen. She led them inside and closed the door, then took Sumaq’s hand in hers once again, leading him farther inside. She liked the feel of his hand in hers, of how well they fit together.
The door at the front of the hut struck the wall with such force that all the jars and bowls shook on their shelves. Chuki stood in the door, holding a large wrapped packet of something. Her eyes took in the scene: the closeness of the two young people, the hands clasped together. Her face grew red with rage, and fruits and meats from the market scattered across the dirt as she dropped her bundle to the floor. She was upon them in an instant, snatching Quri’s wrist and yanking her away from Sumaq.
Quri’s heart leapt to her throat, galloping within her. Her wide eyes sought Sumaq’s and found strength and peace in his face. It was enough to steel her nerves, to fortify her against Chuki’s coming onslaught.
“Well, boy? Are you trying to seduce my apprentice now?” Chuki glared at him, one hand clutching Quri’s wrist so tightly that Quri’s fingers were numb. “If you’re well enough for that, you’re well enough to leave!”
Quri held the handful of tiny wildflowers close to her heart. She tugged against Chuki’s grip, but the old woman only held on tighter. Pins and needles prickled under her skin.
“I think you should let go of her,” Sumaq said calmly. His voice was even, but she could hear the tremor of anger just barely controlled, could see the muscle twitching in his clenched jaw.
Chuki spoke through gritted teeth, spitting with every word. “You had better leave, boy. If you have even a grain of intelligence in that thick Kumya head of yours.” She twisted Quri’s wrist as if to emphasize her point, eliciting a strangled cry. Chuki wouldn’t go so far as to kill Sumaq, not as long as he was prince of the Kumya, but she would use Quri to get what she wanted. It was just as she’d always said: shamans could have no family and no friends...including apprentices.
Sumaq didn’t move, and Chuki twisted even harder. The flowers fell from Quri’s hand, scattering on the floor, and she dropped to her knees, the hard-packed dirt scraping and bruising them the instant they hit. It was the only way to keep Chuki from snapping her arm like a twig. Tears stung her eyes, and she blinked furiously. She couldn’t cry. Wouldn’t cry. She had to be strong.
Sumaq glared at Chuki, but Quri barely saw it through the haze of pain as her bones were bent almost to breaking. She squeezed her eyes closed against the agony and focused on her breathing, on keeping it calm and steady.
“I’ll be back,” Quri heard through the blur. Sumaq’s voice was tight, harsh. “You hear me, Quri? I’ll be back for you.”
She heard the door slam, and Chuki dropped her arm.
“After all I’ve done for you,” Chuki spat.
Then she stormed out into the garden, leaving Quri to nurse her battered arm. The flowers lay where they had fallen, watered by the tears finally falling from Quri’s eyes.
Five
SUMAQ STORMED FROM the hut, wasting no time in finding where his men had been quartered during his convalescence. It wasn’t hard to find the guest house in the small village. If he had been home, the sprawling city would have taken hours to search, but here there were no more than one hundred huts peppering the mountainside.
Thank the gods.
He had a horrible, sinking feeling that Chuki would do something awful to Quri, perhaps even go so far as to kill her, and he wasn’t sure his heart would survive such a loss. He had been there three weeks, spent every moment of every day with Quri, talking to her, walking with her, playing games behind Chuki’s back. As prince of the Kumya, he had never been so close to someone else with no expectations. She made every day wonderful.
It pained him to leave, but he feared if he hadn’t, Chuki would have broken her arm.
The witch.
But there was still a solution. He was prince of the Kumya, and he could declare Quri a Thunder Bride. The Inti were under Kumya rule, subject to Kumya laws, and any dissensions would mean war. Chuki had already proven she wasn’t willing to risk war when she accepted him as a patient. Would she risk it to keep Quri from him? His blood gave him the right to take the apprentice, even if the idea of forcefully removing Quri turned his stomach. If he had the choice, he would have preferred to pay Chuki the bride price, to woo Quri like his father had wooed his mother.
That no longer seemed an option.
He stalked up to the hut that served as the Inti’s guest house and threw the door open to see one of his guards, Kochik, sprawled in a chair by a window, apparently asleep. The man jolted awake when the prince entered, and he jumped up and folded into a bow.
“Prince!” he said, a grin covering his face. “Are you well?” His eyes ran over Sumaq, no doubt noting the huffing of his breath, his sweaty skin, and the fire in his eyes. His smile faded while his fists clenched as if preparing to fight. “What’s happened?”
Sumaq held up his hands. “Peace, brother.” He paused, trying to form the right words through his anger and fear. “I...” Did he dare name her Bride? “I believe I found my Thunder Bride. But I will need help to retrieve her.”
“Of course,” Kochik replied instantly, the smile returning to his face.
Sumaq smiled back. The two had grown up together, trained together. Kochik had been Sumaq’s most trusted guard since they had both graduated their training courses. And now, it was good to have such a trusted friend and fighter at his side.
The gods knew he would need it.
“We must return to my father at once.”
***
Sumaq dragged himself through the gates of the city, trying his best to brush the dust of the road from his garments. He hadn’t bothered sending a guard ahead to alert the palace, partly because he traveled only with Kochik and two other soldiers and partly because he didn’t want to wait for the formal announcements and parade to the city center, but part of him still wished for just enough of the fanfare that would have provided him a palanquin to ride. As it was, he could barely place one foot in front of the other without dragging it across the ground. They had been traversing the dense undergrowth, steep mountainsides, and dangerous jungle beasts for three days, and he could feel every step deep in his bones.
But he couldn’t stop, couldn’t even make himself slow his steps to preserve what little energy he had remaining. Every moment, Quri’s life depended on him. And he wasn’t about to disappoint her or leave her in danger any longer than necessary. Alone, he didn’t have the strength or power to fight Chuki. But with his father’s help, he stood a chance.
None of the citizens seemed to recognize them as they made their way through crowded, busy roads, past market stalls, priests shouting prophecies outside the temple, and patrols of palace guards. They made their way straight to the heart of the massive city, a towering pyramid cut of gray stone and decorated with the jewels and gold befitting the royal family.
He stepped through the door and shrugged off his traveling cloak, sneezing as the bright blue, red, and yellow feathers tickled his nose. He handed the garment to the waiting maid.
“Please request an audience with the king at once,” he said to her. He would waste no time. Could waste no time.
The maid nodded mutely and scurried off. She was gone only a few moments before returning and beckoning him into the throne room.
Sumaq strode across the vast room toward the throne with the
confidence only a prince or a king could possess. The room was mostly empty; none of the usual courtiers were present between the massive columns lining the walls. They had no doubt already retired for the day, as the sun was low in the sky and the bright harvest moon was just rising.
“Father, I have returned.” His voice boomed through the room, echoing in the empty spaces without so much as a cough to betray his convalescence.
His mother, who had been standing at the king’s elbow, took a step toward her son with a bright smile on her face at the same time his father stood and descended the steps. Their smiles were almost identical, their expressions mirrors of each other. His parents had been together for a large number of seasonal cycles, and they only grew more alike every year.
Sumaq, on the other hand, was the prized son who was nothing like his parents. Where they were stern and at times elitist, he wanted a different reign for himself. He wanted the people to truly be a part of his kingdom, not just subjects. He wanted to be one of the people. More like his mother, who at least tempered his father’s attitudes with her gentleness and compassion, though she still carried that same arrogant air at times.
But despite the differences, none of that mattered in this moment. The king welcomed his son with a hearty embrace, the queen standing back to wait her turn.
“Welcome, my son!” The king’s voice shook the walls like thunder. “I am glad to see you well again. And home, at my side. Where you belong!”
“As am I,” Sumaq responded, pulling away from his mother’s embrace. “But I have an urgent matter to discuss.”
“I see,” the king said, his eyebrows furrowing. “Why don’t we sit down together over supper, and we will discuss this matter. I am sure you’re tired from your journey and could do with some refreshment.”
Sumaq nodded and followed his parents down the hall behind the throne into a simple dining room. For once, the king didn’t make them sit at the massive dining table in the banquet hall, allowing a family dinner instead. In this room, a mahogany table intricately carved with birds, flowers, and jungle cats filled the center of the room, surrounded by finely crafted benches and stools and set for six. At the head of the table was the king’s chair, the only seat with a panel of wood for the king to lean his back against. A servant was already filling wooden cups with fresh, clear water at each of the settings.
Seasons of Magic Volume 1 Page 2