Isle of Woman (Geodyssey)

by Piers Anthony

She smiled, thinking that, though it wasn’t funny. She was in trouble, and her life was in danger. At any point the man’s uncertainty could be resolved in favor of simply killing her and being done with it.

  The moon came out again, but it didn’t help much, because all she could see was where they had been. But this was uncomfortable; she would prefer to be on her feet, no matter where they were going.

  So she did something crazy. She spoke to him. “Hey, man, put me down. I’ll walk.”

  He stopped, listening. Did he understand her? She wasn’t sure what tribe he was from, as there were a number of nomad groups in the area. He might understand, or might not, or might be somewhere between.

  He leaned forward and set her down. She shook herself, and rubbed her belly where she had been chafed. Now she could make a break for it. But he would simply catch her and put her back on his shoulder.

  So she did another crazy thing. She smiled at him, though aware that he might not be able to see her expression, and slowly moved into him. She embraced him, and reached her face up toward his. When he did not bring his face down, perhaps being too surprised, she moved her hands up to the back of his head and pushed it down from behind. Finally she got it in range, and she kissed him on the mouth.

  He seemed stunned. Good. Now he might view her as a person instead of a captive. So he wouldn’t hurt her.

  “Let’s go,” she said. “Where do you live?”

  He spoke his first word. “Home.” He pointed.

  So he did understand her. That helped.

  She walked in the indicated direction. After a moment, he did the same. Now it was as if she had just decided to go with him, instead of being captured.

  “What is your name?” she asked. “Mine is Crystal.”

  He considered, then answered. “Name—Carver.”

  “Carver,” she repeated. “You cut up animals?”

  “Wood,” he said.

  “You are a wood gatherer? For fire?” This was getting almost positive. The more she engaged him in dialogue, the less likely there was to be trouble.

  He hesitated again, then reached into his jacket. He brought out an object.

  Crystal was afraid it was a stone knife, but soon realized it wasn’t. It was a stick. He held it toward her, and she took it. She ran her fingers over it. The thing was irregular, as if carved—

  Carved. He carved wood. And this piece of wood was in the shape of an animal. Perhaps a gazelle. He had carved a figure. He was an artisan!

  “It’s beautiful,” she said, returning it. For though she could not see it, she could feel its intricacies. She had been trying to impress on her captor the fact that she was a person; now she was discovering that he too was a person.

  In due course they reached the camp of the nomads. This consisted of several conical shelters fashioned from cut saplings and overlapping furs. Crystal could see only their tops outlined against the dark sky, but knew the type. She had never thought much of the nomads, knowing them to be primitives. But they were a major source of animal hides, because they lived by hunting rather than by farming. The men of the town traded with the nomads several times a year, giving up good wood and stone tools for hides, and sometimes woven basketwork.

  Carver brought her to one of the rude shelters. Sure enough, there was an old woman, sitting by a low fire. “What’s this? What’s this?” she exclaimed, spying Crystal.

  “I found her,” Carver replied awkwardly. “She was screaming, so I took her with me.”

  “That’s a townswoman!” the woman cried. “What did you think we would do with her?”

  The man stood silent, evidently not having thought that far ahead.

  Rather than have the man think of something, Crystal spoke for herself. “He was taking my flowers. I watched to see who. I thought it was an animal.”

  “Flowers,” the woman said. She gestured at the shelter. Now Crystal saw in the firelight that the door flap was decorated with flowers. “He brought them for me.”

  Crystal turned an appraising eye on the man. This barbarian carved figures in wood and brought flowers to his mother. He was not the savage she had feared. Still, she argued her case. “I was saving those flowers for my mother. Or rather my father. He works all day with the fire, and doesn’t see the countryside as much as he would like. So I bring him flowers, when I’m out harvesting grain.”

  The woman heaved herself to her feet. “Let me look at you, girl.” She approached and ran her hands over Crystal’s body, squeezing her on the arms, breasts, hips and thighs. Crystal realized that she was either blind or very weak of sight, at least in the night. “You’re a pretty one. They will miss you.”

  “I didn’t mean to come here,” Crystal said.

  “Take her back,” the woman told Carver. “Before the town sends men to overwhelm us in vengeance. Get her back before morning, so we don’t get the blame.”

  Carver hesitated. “I like her,” he said after a moment.

  “Well of course you do!” the woman snapped. “She’s got a good body and a good face. But she wouldn’t like it here. We’d get little good use of her. See, her hands are hardly callused, and her teeth aren’t stained. She doesn’t know how to chew hides. Take her back to her own kind.”

  Crystal was not inclined to argue with this assessment. All she wanted to do at this stage was get home.

  Carver nodded regretfully. It was evident that he was indeed impressed by Crystal’s appearance, and perhaps by her kiss, but had little knowledge of women.

  The man started walking, and Crystal hastened to join him. “Thank you, Mother,” she called back over her shoulder.

  It took time to cover the distance to the town, because the moon had faded out and there was no good path. Carver was better able to see than Crystal was, perhaps because he was familiar with this country, having hunted in it by night. She kept blundering into brush and even trees. Her jacket and skirt kept snagging on branches and brambles, and her arms and legs got scratched. She stepped in a hole, took a fall, got snagged again, and her skirt got ripped off her body. She recovered it, but couldn’t repair it in the dark, so had to carry it. Finally Carver had her put her hand on the tail of his jacket, so she could follow in his footsteps while he picked out the way.

  As they approached the barley field, points of light appeared. These turned out to be torches. “Those are townsmen, maybe looking for me,” Crystal said. “You must go back now, before they see you.”

  Glad to be freed, Carver started back. Then he paused. “I wish—” he started, but couldn’t finish his thought.

  “I am not your kind,” Crystal reminded him. “I can’t chew hides.”

  He put his hand in his jacket. He brought out the carving. He shoved it at her. “For you.”

  “Why, thank you, Carver,” Crystal said, touched. “I will cherish it.”

  He started back again. But now the light of torches appeared between him and his route home. The townsmen had surrounded them and were closing in, not yet knowing the identity of the two figures.

  “Carver, wait,” Crystal cried. “I don’t think you can get through, and they won’t understand. Stay with me, and I’ll try to explain.” Because the man had turned out to be a decent sort, and she didn’t want him hurt.

  They waited until the torches came within hailing range. “It’s me, Crystal!” she called. “I’m all right.”

  “Who’s that with you?” a townsman called back. “Did he hurt you?”

  “No, he just—showed me his home,” Crystal explained. “Let him go; he’s all right.”

  “He raped you,” the man said, coming close enough to see her bundled skirt, which she was holding before her in a haphazard attempt at modesty. “We’ll kill him.”

  Carver made ready to bolt, knowing he was in trouble. But Crystal knew it would be futile. If he tried to run, they would riddle him with spears. “No,” she told him desperately. “Stand still. I will protect you.”

  But she knew by his nervous loo
k and the determination of the closing townsmen that he would not stand still and they would not let him go. She was about to be responsible for a needless killing. Carver’s poor ailing mother would have no one to support her. So Crystal did one more crazy thing.

  She dropped her loose skirt and flung her arms around Carver, holding him in place by sheer determination. She turned her head to scream at the others. “No, he’s mine! I love him! I will marry him! We had a tryst!” She gripped Carver tightly and hauled up her bare legs, wrapping them around his torso. He staggered, trying to keep his balance, hardly understanding what she was doing.

  The townsman’s jaw dropped. “It’s that way?”

  “Don’t you dare touch him!” Crystal cried. “I’ll bring him home to meet my family now. He’ll join us. He has a skill we can use. He can carve figures.” She hiked herself up on the man and planted a kiss somewhere on his face.

  There wasn’t much the townsmen could do except accept her word. They agreed to let her bring the stranger to the town. Crystal picked up her skirt with whatever aplomb she could muster and wrapped it around her hips. She held it in place with one hand, and used the other to lead Carver toward the town. “It will be all right,” she told him. “You’ll see. Once they know you’re tame, they’ll let you go home to your mother.”

  But it turned out to be less simple. Scorch and Ember were understanding, having pretty well figured out the situation, but couldn’t speak of it openly because it would make a liar of their eldest daughter. The town did not just admit outsiders without challenge, especially not nomads. There was a solid core of unbelievers in the town who thought Crystal was just protecting the nomad to cover her shame for being raped, and they wanted to settle that shame the honorable way, by castrating and killing him and defiling the corpse. She didn’t dare let him out of her sight. But she was dead tired and had to sleep. So she had to have him sleep with her, in the family hut, behind the hearth.

  The hut was vaguely like the shelters of the nomads, but larger and better constructed, with linings of stone rubble. They were sunk half a body length into the ground, with stout posts supporting the roof. Instead of animal skins they had reed matting, and the sleeping section was raised above the packed-dirt floor. This was much better than a sewn-skins shelter!

  Behind the hut was a privy trench. Crystal took Carver there and used it herself, just as if they were lovers who had no secrets from each other, because she knew that others were covertly watching. She insisted that he use it too, while she watched, because she feared that if she allowed him decent privacy he would instead try to flee the town, and get killed. She had been his captive; now he was hers. Until the townsmen were satisfied of the legitimacy of the association.

  Reluctantly, he performed. Then she took him back inside and to her mat, and made him lie there with her. “My people do not understand,” she murmured in his ear. “They want to kill you. You must pretend to love me, until they lose interest. Then you can go home.”

  “I do like you,” he said. “I could love you.” Indeed, she was becoming aware that he was aroused, and would want to have sex with her if she didn’t discourage him quickly.

  “Yes, but you wouldn’t want to leave your people and live here, would you?” she asked pointedly.

  “All I want to do is carve,” he said.

  “Oh, that’s right—I must return your carving.” She fished in her jacket for it. “It isn’t right for me to keep it, when you didn’t get to go home.”

  “No, that is for you, because you are nice. I know you saved my life.”

  She was touched again. “You’re nice too, Carver. You bring flowers to your mother, and you brought me back.”

  “I didn’t mean to take you,” he said apologetically. “I just didn’t know what to do, when you turned out to be a woman. I thought you would rouse the town against me.”

  “I understand,” she said. Indeed, now she did. “Look, I’m awfully tired. I’ve got to sleep now. Don’t go anywhere without me, because the townsmen don’t like strangers.”

  “I sleep too, in the daytime,” he said.

  So they slept. He did not try to rape her, and she appreciated that.

  In the afternoon Crystal woke to the sound of talking, and realized that her parents were having a dialogue with Carver, who had gotten up but not left the house. She did not mean to eavesdrop; she just was slow to wake, being partially conscious for awhile, and gradually realized what she was hearing. Then she just lay there and listened some more.

  “No, we are not lovers,” Carver was saying. “She just said that to stop them from killing me.”

  “She always did have a soft heart,” Ember said. “She gets angry if someone even hurts a flower.”

  “Well of course,” he said. “Flowers are beautiful.” Then, after a pause: “I should not have taken her flowers. I did not realize—”

  “How could you know?” Scorch asked. “Flowers are for anyone to pick.”

  “But these are special,” Carver said. “They bloom at night, and make the shelter smell nice. I got them for my mother.” Another pause. “Oh, she will be worrying! I should have returned before this.”

  “We shall have to resolve this quickly, so you can return,” Ember said. “Crystal said you carve wooden figures.”

  Crystal, listening, wondered what that had to do with it. But she knew that her mother did not waste time when something was on her mind.

  “Yes, I wish I could stop hunting and just carve,” he agreed.

  “Here is a piece of wood,” Scorch said. “Can you carve it?”

  “Oh, yes! Oh, this is a nice piece. See the grain of it. There is a bird in there, waiting to be expressed.”

  “A bird?”

  “I will show you.” There was the sound of wood being scraped or carved.

  “My daughter said she had a tryst with you,” Scorch said. “She said she loves you, and will marry you.”

  “No, I already told you—”

  “Let me finish,” Scorch said firmly. “My daughter is many things, but never has she been a liar.”

  “I would not call her that,” Carver said. “But if she became a liar to save my life—”

  “Oh, I see the bird!” Ember said. “You are bringing it from the wood.”

  “It was always there,” Carver said, pleased. “I just had to uncover it.”

  “You do have a rare talent for evoking the essence of wood,” Scorch said. “A figure such as this could have mystical significance. A shaman might have use for it.”

  “Anyone would like to have it near,” Ember said. “It’s almost alive!”

  “I just reveal what I see. It can be anything. This wood has a bird. Another might have a flower.”

  “It’s beautiful,” Ember said.

  “There is no need for Crystal to be a liar, or for you to lose your life,” Scorch said.

  There was a silence. Carver evidently did not understand the thrust of Scorch’s words, but Crystal did. She strongly suspected that her father knew she was listening, and that his words were meant for her.

  She would not be a liar, if she really did marry Carver. If her ruse became the truth. Her parents approved of Carver, perhaps because they had always liked pretty things, and it was evident that he not only liked such things, he made them. But marriage—Crystal was not at all sure she was ready for that, though she was of age.

  In fact she was more than of age. Other girls married at thirteen or fourteen, whenever their breasts developed enough to attract men. Crystal had been ready in that sense for two years, and had had her chances, but still found the young men of the town to be singularly uninteresting, and the older men worse.

  Yet she would have to marry sometime. Those who did not became social outcasts, and eventually full outcasts, being expelled from the town. That was not what she wanted. Now she realized that her parents were in the process of taking action to prevent it.

  “Suppose you could be given work carving,” Ember sa
id. “Here in the town. All day.”

  “I would not care where I was, if I could do that,” Carver said. “But I could not stay here. My mother—”

  “Suppose your mother came here?”

  “I don’t think she would like it. She—”

  “She depends on you,” Ember said. “She does not go out much now.”

  “Yes. She is lame and does not see well. She weaves mostly by feel. I have to tell her the colors of the strands. Since my father died, I—”

  “If you could continue to provide for her here,” Ember persisted. She, too, was evidently speaking for Crystal’s ears, guiding her course. Scorch and Ember would rather have her marry Carver than remain unmarried.

  “I suppose she wouldn’t mind. She stays mostly in the shelter. She can still use her hands, so she keeps the fire and cooks. I bring the wood and food.”

  “The townsmen must approve any person who seeks to join the town,” Scorch said. “But normally they allow those who marry townsfolk.”

  “How well do you like our daughter?” Ember asked.

  Carver finally got their drift. “Oh, I like her well. She is pretty, and she likes flowers. But I know nothing about the ways of the town, and—why would she want to be with the likes of me?”

  “She must like you well enough to protect you,” Ember pointed out. Of course she knew that wasn’t it; Crystal would have protected a baby ox from harm, if it lowed at her. She took all creatures personally, and if they were not enemies they were friends.

  Crystal decided that it was time for her to get up. “Hello,” she said, stretching.

  “Carver needs to see to his mother, who is alone and worried,” Ember said.

  She knew she had to decide now. The townsmen would not let Carver go unless she married him. She had known that the moment she brought him in, but had not let herself realize what it required of her. So was she ready to commit, though it forever changed her life?

  Maybe this was the way her life was to be. She had not made the decision on her own, so it had been made for her. If she didn’t go along with it, she might not like the next choice any better. Carver wasn’t a bad man. He was talented, and he wasn’t arrogant in the way of a city man. She could probably manage him, and that notion had appeal.