Isle of Woman (Geodyssey)

by Piers Anthony

  Faint as it was, the knight still heard. His horse turned, and he oriented directly on the girl. Then Tree realized that it wasn't just the sound. Her hair had worked loose under her cap, and was falling down around her shoulders in a yellow tangle. She was being unveiled.

  The knight advanced. For the moment, despite all the activity around them, the scene seemed to be reduced to just the four of them: Blaze, Candleflame, Tree, and the dread Christian. The three had tried to stay out of actual combat, but the fourth was a creature of violence. In his blood-smeared armor, on his sweating horse, he was a fiend ready to destroy two of them and carry away the third for eternal damnation.

  The horse charged at Candleflame. She threw herself down, sliding across the ice. Blaze leaped for the knight, but was knocked aside by the horse's shoulder. Tree found the knight's leg right by his face.

  Tree's knife was in his hand. He thrust it at the leg. It slid off the leather armor. He thrust again. This time it found a crevice and penetrated. He rammed it in as hard as he could, feeling it cutting into flesh.

  The knight vented a vile-sounding Christian oath and turned on him, lifting his sword. Tree knew he could not retreat quickly enough to avoid that weapon. Instead he dived forward, under the horse. He slid by the fidgeting hooves, afraid he was going to get stepped on.

  Then the horse leaped away, bearing its rider. Tree realized that somewhere in the melee of violence and sound there had been a call. The knight had had to move to rejoin his formation, lest it get scattered again. They had escaped, perhaps by the intercession of the gods.

  “Tree!” Candleflame cried. “You've been hurt!” She skidded toward him, heedless of the gore on the ice. She dropped beside him and put her arms around him.

  “I'm all right,” Tree said dizzily. “Don't—don't compromise yourself by touching me.”

  “Oh, I don't care about that, after this! You were so brave, stopping that evil knight from getting me. Then you went down, and I was so afraid—”

  Blaze approached. “Get back to the sled, and tie it to its neighbors,” he said. “This day is not yet done.”

  Embarrassed, they let go of each other and did as told.

  Now it was getting dark. The battle had gone on all afternoon. The Teutonic Knights had command of the center, the Lithuanians were scattered and disorganized, and the sled wall had been breached and severed in several places. But the mounted knights did not like to fight in the dark.

  The Teutonic flanks had also had enough. Their commander, himself wounded, ordered a Christian withdrawal. The cavalry prevented the Lithuanians from harassing the retreating soldiers, then retreated itself. The Lithuanians were left holding the field, such as it was.

  Tree, safe by the sled with Candleflame, relaxed. The Lithuanians had won the battle! But it was already evident that their side had lost twice as many men as the Christians had. It had been a costly victory—and but for the complication of the ice, it would have been a loss.

  Nevertheless, they were the victors, and the spoils were theirs. The men went to work stripping the dead and dividing the booty. In due course they hauled their own dead soldiers to the land and labored to bury them. The Christians they left out on the ice, naked, as befitted their ilk. Then they marched for home in good order.

  Tree knew he had not done anything especially noble or outstanding. But Candleflame thought he had, and she seemed to be changing her mind about being a virgin priestess. The experience of the battle had been horrible, but now his prospects in life seemed wonderful.

  The uneasy relationship between Lithuania and the Teutonic Knights continued, with each having more success elsewhere than against each other. In the course of the following century Lithuania expanded south and east, largely at the expense of the weakening Khanate of the Golden Horde, until it reached from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea. Then it joined with Poland, by a royal marriage in 1386, became nominally Christian, and for the following century was perhaps the dominant country of Europe. Eventually the growing powers of Russia and Germany squeezed it from east and west, and before 1800 it was partitioned between them and disappeared. Both Lithuania and Poland were restored to existence in the twentieth century as separate countries. In this manner a small and insignificant country grew large and powerful over the course of five centuries, and finally shrank again. Today its onetime greatness is largely forgotten.

  CHAPTER 18

  * * *

  KUBA

  The civilizations of the continent of Africa have been generally disparaged by those who destroyed them in their quest for ivory, minerals and slaves. Though technologically behind the peoples of Europe and Asia, the Africans had their own cultures and arts. One such was the group of tribes others call the Kuba, or “people of the lightning,” in the Congo region of central Africa, in the period between A.D. 1500 and 1800. The lightning was not that of the storm, but of the flashing of their complicated, deadly throwing knives used in war, a terror to opponents. Yet the Kuba culture was civilized and generally peaceful. At least one Western historian, Leo Frobenius, a German anthropologist, considered Kuba to be the acme of native African culture. It had a formidable oral tradition, including a listing of some ninety former kings, a body of laws, and a sophisticated court system replete with an appeals process. None of this derived from contact with the white man, a strange creature known only by the legends of neighboring tribes. About 1620 there was a question of succession, because of the king's lack of male heirs. It was settled by negotiation and compromise, as were most issues.

  RAFFIA Flower, perhaps I have a good marriage for you,” Crystal said as her daughter chewed on a fat roasted grub.

  Flower grimaced. “I don't want a good marriage, I want the best marriage.” She was sixteen, and knew exactly what she wanted, except for the dull details. She was pretty enough to have some reasonable hope of getting it.

  Crystal smiled, used to this. “How about the king of Kuba? Then you could feast on sweet bananas instead of tough plantains, and have warthog venison every day instead of fish.”

  Flower laughed, thinking it a joke. “And all the palm wine I need to make me silly! Mother, he's already got eighteen wives—one from each clan of the Bushoong—and dozens and dozens of concubines from the insignificant clans. Besides, he's old; he got daughters older than I am.”

  “I was not speaking of King Shyaam,” Crystal said evenly. “I was speaking of his heir.”

  "What heir?” Flower demanded. “He has sired only girls. I think something's wrong with his manhood.”

  “But he has broadened the laws of succession to allow any legitimate son of a royal wife to be the heir. I was at the council where that was confirmed.”

  “Anyway, we don't know who'll be the next king, because he hasn't designated his heir.” Flower started cleaning her abdomen, so that her small ceremonial clan scar showed more prominently. It would never do to have someone mistake her for the wrong clan.

  “Ah, but we know who will be designated,” Crystal said.

  Flower looked at her, surprised. “We do?”

  “His cousin Mboong aLeeng.”

  “The Hawk? But he's not like King Shyaam at all! They don't even get

  along with each other. He's a fierce warrior, a terror with the lightning. King Shyaam never fought a war.”

  “Nevertheless, Mboong will be the one. I happened to be near when it was being discussed; I think the king does not know how sharp my hearing is. How would you like to marry him?”

  Flower considered. “Well, he's older than I am, and violent. I might have trouble managing him.”

  Crystal smiled. “Especially with seventeen other major wives competing to manage him themselves.”

  “Well, I would be the First Wife, of course, since I'm of the Nbong clan. My word would govern.”

  “You would send him to the others only for sex, not advice,” Crystal said, this time suppressing her smile.

  “Yes. That's what they're for, after all.”

>   “And all this time I thought it was to give all the tribes fair representation.’’

  Now Flower had to smile, sensing the humor. Men were notoriously hard to manage, even those with single wives. “But it doesn't matter. Mboong's not going to notice me, and I'm not going to chase him.”

  “I think he will notice you,” Crystal said seriously. “Because he will need you.”

  Flower glanced down at her full brown breasts and loosely wrapped skirt. “He can get the same from any number of women who will be glad to marry him the moment his status becomes known.”

  “It is your mind he will need. I know this man, Flower; he is strong in combat, but weak in knowledge. The council will not confirm him unless he proves himself by reciting the King List.”

  “Oh, that's right! He'll have trouble with that. There are more than ninety names and histories.”

  “That's right. So he will have to learn them well. And whom do you think he will learn them from?”

  “Why, the chief historian, of course.”

  “Who is of a different clan, and not partial to warfare. How patient do you suppose he will be when Mboong stumbles frequently?”

  Flower tittered. “He might even slip Mboong some wrong information, to make him mess up. I wouldn't trust the historian from any farther away than I could kiss him.”

  “And Mboong wouldn't even care to kiss him,” Crystal agreed. “So where else can he turn?”

  “I suppose he'll have to come to you,” Flower said thoughtfully. “You know the kings, though it's not exactly your job, because of all the songs and praise poems relating to their mothers and wives. You have access to the palace and knowledge of the King List because of your position as chief singer. Why, even I know—” She paused, realizing something.

  “I have business enough to hold me,” Crystal said. “But you are free. You have learned much of the King List from me. You could teach him, and no one would know.”

  “Why shouldn't anyone know?”

  “Because no king or future king would humiliate himself by taking instruction from a woman.”

  “But then how could—?”

  “He might, however, romance a prospective bride from a prominent clan.”

  Flower considered the prospects. “He would say it was romance, but his interest would be in the kings. However, by the time he learned all the kings—” She inhaled.

  “Precisely. If you can not make a man notice you when you have him alone for prolonged periods, then you may have to scale down your ambitions.”

  Flower nodded. “I will have to review the kings myself, because I never tried to learn them all.”

  “Speak to your grandmother Ember; she knew them all before me.”

  “Yes, I will do that.” Flower jumped up and ran out of the house.

  The capital city of Nsheng was huge and spacious. It would be about all a girl could do to walk the length of it in a day, yet it was completely surrounded by a palisade: a wall of sharpened stakes higher than she could reach. Within this extensive enclosure the city was aesthetically laid out with wide streets, plazas and marketplaces, so that no line of sight became dull because of its length. The main avenues were blocked by public buildings of various heights and widths to mask the approaches to the main plazas. Trees were placed with an eye toward enhancing horizontal lines and further reducing the monotony of too great an unobstructed view. The architects had understood that the proper way to experience a city was to move through its streets, rather than to stand still and view it as if the observer were a statue. Flower loved it, and was sure there was no other city like it in the world. Certainly not among the tribes around Kuba.

  She approached the house of her widowed grandmother Ember. Its walls, like those of most buildings, were fashioned of wickerwork and decorated like mats. They were movable, because every few years the entire city was moved to a new site. It had happened three times in Shyaam's reign as king, and would continue to happen under his successor. This kept the city perpetually fresh and vigorous as well as beautiful.

  Grandmother Ember was an ancient sixty-eight years old, an age Flower found difficult to imagine. Surely she had seen all the ages of mankind! It was amazing that she was still so spry. Perhaps she had been toughened by helping her husband with the ironworking, before he died. She had developed a bit of a twitch in her cheek, but her eyes were still sharp.

  She listened with interest to Flower's case, then set to work rehearsing her on the missing kings and histories. There was more of it than Flower had realized, and it was harder to get it all straight than she had expected. But the appeal of the notion of being First Wife to a future king made the effort worthwhile.

  In due course Mboong aLeeng did inquire, in the guise of other business, and Crystal did refer him to Flower, suggesting that the appearance of a romance would effectively mask his real purpose. He was quick to appreciate the potential. Thus it was that he came to her house in a formal manner, to obtain her father's permission for him to court her. He was a highly athletic and reasonably handsome man, black of skin and blue of skirt, a redoubtable warrior, and of royal lineage; such a suit could hardly be declined. Carver had of course been given the word, so he would have approved the matter anyway.

  Flower, taking pains to appear somewhat diffident, took a walk with Mboong. This was important; it meant they were being seen alone together in public, and therefore were considering marriage. Not all such couples did marry, of course; when either of them was seen with someone else, the people would know that the romance was over.

  When they were out of sight of others, in a parklike section of the city, they settled down and reviewed the list of kings. Mboong was really ignorant, but eager to learn, and Flower took pleasure in telling the earliest of the stories about the kings:

  Back in the earliest ancient days, the whole region was an impenetrable forest. The Kuba lived as a small tribe under their chief Lukengo, together with the more powerful tribe of the Bieeng on the left bank of the Lulua River. One day the chief of the Bieeng demanded tribute from Lukengo. He refused, saying that he was equal to the Bieeng chief, and not his subject. This led to an impasse, because the two tribes were related by blood and did not wish to fight each other.

  Finally they found a means to decide who among them should be paramount. Lukengo and the Bieeng chief would each fashion a copper plate in a special shape. Then the chiefs would throw their plates at the same time into the Lulua. The one whose plate floated would be the victor, and recognized as the greater chief. So they retired to make their plates, so as to be ready for the contest on a later day.

  But on the evening before the day of decision, the Bieeng's young wife overheard her husband and his tribesmen planning to cheat. They had taken palm wood and covered it with such a thin layer of copper that it was too light to sink. Now, it happened that the woman was from the Kuba tribe, and her blood called her, and she knew she could not allow this to happen. So during the night she stole the false plate and ran with it to Lukengo. She told him about the planned deception, and showed him the plate as evidence. Lukengo was deeply annoyed by this, for he had made an honest copper plate. But faced with this evidence of his opponent's cheating, he decided to reverse the ploy. So he gave the woman his plate and told her to return it to the place she had found the false plate. So the young woman took his plate and substituted it for the one she had taken. Then she retired, and her husband never realized what she had done.

  Early next morning Lukengo came to the bank of the Lulua with all his followers and called for the Bieeng to come and participate in the contest. The Bieeng chief was embarrassed, for he had slept later and been upstaged. He took up the plate and hurried to the river. Then the two of them threw their plates out into the broad river. Lukengo's plate floated, while the Bieeng chief's plate sank. Lukengo declared himself to be the paramount chief of all the people, and the other could not refute him.

  However, Lukengo remained disgusted with the way the other chie
f had tried to cheat, and decided not to remain his neighbor. He crossed with his people to settle on the right bank of the Lulua. There he founded a kingdom in the middle of the forest, with himself as the first king. In time he extended his rule to the tribes of the northeast and became a greater king.

  However the Bieeng chief discovered what his wife had done, and was very angry. She fled his vengeance, going across the river to seek refuge with Lukengo. Seeing her thus in daylight for the first time, he realized how pretty she was. He owed her a debt of gratitude. So he rewarded her by marrying her himself, and made her his First Wife. He issued a law that in remembrance of her patriotic deed his followers should be allowed only monogamous marriages with Kuba girls. Hence every Kuba man may have only one legal wife from his tribe. His other wives, whose number is not limited, have to be slaves.

  Mboong nodded. “She was surely beautiful,” he agreed, contemplating Flower's torso. “She surely deserved her reward.”

  “To be his first and only wife among the Kuba,” she agreed. “As is the custom for Kuba men.”

  “But not for Kuba kings,” he reminded her. “A king must have many wives, as well as slave concubines.”

  “But only one First Wife, who must be of the Nbong clan.”

  “True.” He gazed at her body a moment more, then returned to the work at hand.

  They drilled on the other kings and their histories. But Mboong had a problem. “I would not criticize the record,” he said, “but parts of it don't seem to make much sense. It's as if some of it repeats, and some is missing.”

  “You're right,” Flower said. “I was distressed about the same thing, but my grandmother explained it to me. You see, what is important is not what actually happened, but what is authenticated by consensus. True history has to be properly interpreted. Only then is it part of the official record.”

  “But some of the history differs from itself,” he protested. “I mean, one story of Lukengo tells how they threw anvils into the river, instead of copper plates, and then the water turned red, yellow, and white, and the trees shook and a giant crocodile appeared. Lukengo stood on its back, and rode out across the river. How can we explain such differences?”