by D. J. Butler
Cal came to within ten feet of the dormitory wall. If he dropped down and walked into the building, he might run into the wrong Sister and get escorted back out again. Plus, what if the convent had guards? If someone shot at him or chased him inside the wall, he didn’t think he’d be able to jump back over.
Nothing for it. Calvin Calhoun started yelling.
“Serafina Tate!” he hollered. “I’m lookin’ for Sister Serafina Tate! I got a message for Sister Serafina!”
“Git down! Git down offa there!” This from the same face that had rejected Calvin at the door, but which now appeared with a body in Harvite robes attached. “I told you no!”
“Sister Serafina!” Cal hollered again. The patients strolling in the garden stared at him and the men on the wall stared at him. Now windows in the buildings began to open, and Harvite Sisters stared, too. “Sister Serafina?” Cal implored them.
Did it really have to be Sister Serafina? Could only she treat the Cahokian rider’s wound? Maybe that was true; Iron Andy had been emphatically confident about his own knowledge when he had commissioned Cal. And in any case, the Elector had been quite specific. If nothing else, for the Elector, it had to be her.
But none of the nuns looking at Calvin through the windows gave any indication that they planned to help him.
“Pull him down from there!” The Sister from the door shouted. Two men Cal hadn’t previously seen, heavy men wearing leather jerkins and carrying cudgels, moved in Cal’s direction.
“I’m here for Sister Serafina Tate!” he shouted one last time. “Sister Serafina, Dancin’ Andy Calhoun sent me, and he told me not to take no for answer!”
The men in cudgels yelled and Cal inched back, nervous they might jump and hit his ankles.
“Sister Serafina!” he cried. “Dancin’ Andy Calhoun sent me!”
A window on the highest floor of the dormitory swung open, and a pale face under wisps of white hair appeared there. “I’m Sister Serafina!” she yelled to Cal. Then she poked her head out the window and yelled at the door-warden, too. “If Dancin’ Andy sent this boy, I’m a-goin’ with him. Send someone up to fetch me!”
“I’ll carry you!” Cal lowered himself into the garden, between the two heavy men who now wore frustrated and baffled expressions. “Gentlemen,” he said to them, “iffen you wouldn’t mind helpin’, I got two horses tethered to an itty-bitty pine tree out back. The patient’s in a bad way, so iffen it don’t bother you, I’m in a rush. I’ll git the nun. You bring the horses around.”
* * *
“Onandagos had a son and a daughter,” Naares Stoach said.
The Zoman captain looked deeply into the small fire, as if it helped him dredge up memories. His two surviving fellow-soldiers of Zomas sat to either side of him, right and left. They drank beer salvaged from a ruined town across the Missouri. Kort and Ferpa had swum the river despite its floes of ice and emerged pink-fleshed and smiling.
Most of the beastkind were highly resistant to cold, as well as to fatigue. They sat farther from the fire than Chigozie or the three Zomans, for whose benefit the blaze had really been kindled. When it got too cold, the beastkind tended to huddle together in piles and just go to sleep.
“Forgive me,” Chigozie said. “I am a southerner, and I never learned the Firstborn genealogies. Onandagos was the founding King of Cahokia?”
“Say rather that he built the Great Mound,” Naares said, “and that the city was founded after him. As I was about to tell you, he had a son and a daughter. The son was older, and should have been King of Cahokia. But he had the great misfortune of falling in love.”
Chigozie laughed. “As a sworn celibate, I have little to say on this matter. I know from observation, though, that some men experience love as slavery.”
“Yes,” Stoach agreed. “Others experience it as great liberation, as a sudden bolt of clarity that teaches a man what to care about, what to do in his life, and what, as a result, is mere dross, to be ignored.”
“And the son who fell in love?” Strangely, the words reminded Chigozie of his brother. “How did he experience love?”
“As the opening of a new world,” Naares said. “His love was from one of the so-called Brother Nations.”
“An Indian.”
“And a princess, of sorts. We understand that her people were relatives of the Caddo, or maybe were Caddo themselves, as the Caddo existed centuries ago.”
“That is a new world, indeed, if he came from Germany.”
“You are thinking of Podebradas and the Wallensteins. Onandagos came much, much earlier. The land he walked in the Old World is many centuries beneath the waves.”
“Of course. Did Onandagos not approve of the Caddo princess?”
Naares’s face was grave, dappled orange in the firelight. “By his lights, Onandagos was a wise man and a kind one. But he could not accept that his son Zomas, a prince of the Firstborn, would marry one of the daughters of the Fallen.”
“The Fallen,” Chigozie repeated. “You mean, the children of Eve.”
Naares nodded. “He gave Zomas a choice. Give up his love, or give up the throne.”
“A hard choice.”
“Zomas refused to do either. He pleaded his case, and when Onandagos’s servile priest-judges ruled against the prince, he raised the banner of revolt.”
“He must have lost.”
Naares shook his head. “When he saw how many of his people had fallen by the spear and by the arrowhead, he withdrew. He never surrendered his claim to the throne of Cahokia, which was his by right of primogeniture.”
“I didn’t know this was the Cahokian rule.”
“It was the rule of the Firstborn until the days of Onandagos. Nor would Zomas surrender his love. Nor would he accept the Cahokian disdain toward the children of Eve, which continues to this day. Cahokia enslaves its own people as severe punishment for grave crimes, crimes against the liberty of the people. But its people freely traffic in slaves descended from Eve. They buy them from Memphis and from the Comanche. In its arrogance, Cahokia believes itself above the Fallen still.”
The tale of old wrongs and ongoing grudges made Chigozie feel tired. “Zomas keeps slaves. It is known for it.”
“We enslave without regard to race. Children of Adam from both branches, beastkind, even Misaabe. We enslave for debt and as punishments. Slaves are only owned by the state, not by a private individual—private ownership of other people would lead to abuse. Slaves are paid wages fixed by law, and they may buy their freedom.”
“It all sounds horrible to me,” Chigozie admitted.
“We of Zomas have long lived shoulder to shoulder with the children of Adam. We have intermarried again and again, so much so that it is very difficult to say who is Firstborn and who is Fallen, if that distinction even matters at all.”
“In Zomas.”
“In Zomas.” Naares’s face was bitter as he nodded his agreement. “Cahokia still cares, of course. It lives a lofty existence, allied with Peter Plowshare against his son, and prospering from his lore and fertility magic. And the other Sister Kingdoms prosper with her.”
“I believe they suffer now.”
Naares shrugged. “They eat the fruit of their own rebellion. Meanwhile, the soldiers of Zomas have ever fought with spear and bow—in recent centuries with gunpowder as well—against the tyrant of the Mississippi. He gave us no great seed-gifts, raised for us no mounds, taught us no secret signs to read in the heavens. What magics Peter Plowshare taught our kingdom were for times of war and disaster only. For us there was always the tusk and the tooth, hoof and claw.”
“You speak truth,” Kort rumbled. His deep voice cut unexpectedly into the conversation, and Chigozie almost jumped. “But only truth of a sort. Truth as you understand it.”
“Is there truth other than the one I understand?” Naares asked. “A higher truth than my blood shed in defense of my children and for the liberties of my children’s children? Show it to me, beastman.”
“Yo
u are interlopers on the Heron King’s land,” Ferpa said. “Onandagos traded with the king for land. Zomas did not. He took land, and so we fought against him and his children.”
“Fought?” Naares asked. “Do you mean you no longer fight?”
“I am Ferpa. I no longer fight. Other beastkind continue fighting in the Heron King’s service.”
“If you settle on a land long enough,” Naares said, “it is yours. Otherwise, no kingdom could stand and no landowner would sleep at night.”
“The Heron King is above this law,” Kort said. “The Heron King is the river. All the land that drains into the river belongs to him.”
“That’s an awful lot of land,” Naares said.
“Yes,” Kort agreed. “And you have fought a very long war to try to take it. When will you decide that your war is a failure and retreat? There is room in the west and also in the south. Why must you raise your tower so close to the king’s?”
“You take this as a very personal issue, beastman,” Stoach said.
Kort hung his head and was silent for long moments. Finally, he said, “you are right. I serve a new king now. And my new king does not begrudge you land, wherever you choose to live.”
“But my king begrudges my absence,” Naares said. “Or he believes I’m dead.”
“You once said that you impressed us all into your king’s army,” Chigozie said. “Turim Zomas the second, if I remember right.”
Naares leaned away from the fire and said nothing.
“You’re not denying or retracting,” Chigozie said.
“Turn the other cheek,” Ferpa murmured.
Chigozie nodded. “We forgive you for saying that. We understand.”
“We forgive you,” many animallike voices whispered together.
“But we have renounced violence,” Chigozie continued. “We hide here in the Still Waters. We cover our tracks to prevent others from learning where we are. We want only to live in peace.”
“I would not raise my club to defend myself,” Kort growled. “I will certainly not raise it to defend your king’s desire for land.”
“Could you swear an oath?” Chigozie asked.
“What kind of oath?” Stoach narrowed his eyes.
“To preserve our secret. To tell no one of this place, or of this people.”
“I have sworn other oaths of allegiance,” Naares said. “Those oaths come first.”
“Perhaps they do not know the way here.” Ferpa eyed the three men. Chigozie did the same, trying to gauge their reactions. “Perhaps we can blindfold them and lead them home.”
But Chigozie saw in the eyes of the three men that they did know where they were. Even before Naares Stoach hesitated in response to Ferpa’s suggestion, he knew that if they took the three Zomans to their land of the white towers, sooner or later, Zoman soldiers would return to the Still Waters and enslave his people.
“We will have to move,” Kort said. “I do not like it, but what else is there?”
Chigozie studied Naares’s face very carefully. “What if we sent an embassy?”
“What sort of embassy?” Naares’s expression was noncommittal.
“What if I came to speak with your master, Lord Turim Zomas?” Chigozie asked. “What if I explained who we are and why we cannot fight either for him or against him, and asked to be left alone?”
“I cannot promise you anything,” Naares said. “As of now, I’m captain of a skirmisher unit that no longer exists.”
“But tell me about Lord Zomas. Is he a reasonable man? Are his judgments wise? Can he be negotiated with?”
Naares considered. “Lord Turim Zomas is a reasonable man, but he lives in an unreasonable time. The war of banked fire he inherited from his father has exploded into a conflagration that threatens to destroy his kingdom. In better times, he might find you a pleasant curiosity. In these days, he will need to draw strength from you.”
“We are returning three of his soldiers,” Chigozie said. “Three of his men whom we could have killed, or even merely left to die. Instead, we bring you back to the war.”
“And still,” Naares said. “I don’t think it will be enough.”
Was the Zoman negotiating on behalf of his sovereign? But Chigozie was unwilling to surrender any of the Merciful into slavery. Better to uproot the community and move again. And again, and again, if necessary.
“I will go alone,” he said.
Ferpa and Kort squealed together in protest, a sound like an entire herd provoked to anger.
“I will go alone,” he repeated. “If I do not come back, take that as a sign that it is time to move.”
“You will not go alone,” Kort rumbled.
“Once, you would have had me as your king,” Chigozie said. “Will you not obey me in this?”
“You refused to become king,” Ferpa said. “You chose to be the Shepherd, instead. And the shepherd does not travel without his chosen.”
Chigozie smiled ruefully. “Very well, then. But only a few sheep.”
* * *
Philippe and François were tough, capable men, with flexible consciences but loyalties as rigid as steel. Achebe the wrestler had curiosity and maybe also a devotion that Etienne didn’t understand, but also didn’t doubt.
Still, Etienne missed Armand. Especially when dealing with smugglers. He’d have been useful.
The four men stood in the dockmaster’s office in Natchez-under-the-Hill. The lights in the office were snuffed and the night outside was dark, but for a few torches and the trickle from very few windows. The dockmaster stood with them, or rather, she leaned against Etienne and purred like a cat.
Her name was Adisalem. She was Amhara, judging by the bones of her face. She spoke English with an accent that was pure Mississippi—a little German inflection, a little Igbo bounce, and a dash of Appalachee twang. She was nearly as tall as Etienne and smelled of cinnamon and tobacco smoke.
Not enough tobacco scent to appease the Brides, however. They toyed with the woman, dominating her and placing her firmly under Etienne’s control.
Monsieur Bondí had picked this site. He had done it as only an accountant could, examining the records of the dockmasters of New Orleans and interrogating them as to the origin and points of call of ships that periodically docked there. Many Memphite barges called in New Orleans. Far fewer had come from Youngstown and the northern Ohio River, and fewer still made the journey on a quarterly basis.
One that did was the Favor of Nephthys. According to the stevedores Monsieur Bondí asked, she stopped at the Hansa town of Natchez-under-the-Hill.
She was due.
Monsieur Bondí was proving to have talents beyond those merely of an accountant. Or perhaps it was more accurate to say that his accounting skills had uses beyond merely keeping, interpreting, and disguising financial records. Etienne would promote the man, except that his work in keeping the cash flow coming to Etienne was more important and more dangerous and more costly than ever, with the chevalier behind them at every step.
Bondí was needed on the books.
But perhaps he could be persuaded to train some of Etienne’s other men in his investigative skills.
“There she is.” Adisalem’s voice had a metallic twang in it, like a harpsichord.
The Favor was a trireme. The narrow, rowed barges moved quickly up and down river regardless of wind and could be sailed in very shallow water, which made them powerful on the Mississippi. The great disadvantage they suffered was cost—since the barge was crewed by two hundred men, most of them rowers, only a person of enormous wealth—or a person commanding many slaves—could afford such a vessel.
Memphis used the barges.
“Why would they not simply beach the ship?” François asked. It wasn’t a terrible question; beaching the barges was common enough.
“The beaches here are too wooded,” Adisalem said. “The Natchez Trace is infested with road agents. And on the far bank, beastkind. Especially now. The beastkind are rampaging.�
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“Therefore, they shelter here for the night,” Etienne said. “Under the watchful eye of the Hansa.”
“They aren’t Hansards,” Adisalem said. “The captain sails out of Memphis. But he knows whom to pay to buy safety on the river.”
“He has a precious cargo,” Etienne said.
“I understand your plan better now,” Philippe said in French. Once Monsieur Bondí had identified the Favor of Nephthys, Philippe had suggested that they seize the barge and its cargo. But the barge was a large one, a trireme, and Etienne didn’t have enough men to take it in an assault. Counting now, he thought he saw twenty free sailors, all armed, and as many armed men idling—guards. “But must you come? It would be safer here, I think.”
“The vessel will be warded,” Etienne said, also in French. “It will be much easier to walk within the warding than to try to send power across it.” He spoke in English to Adisalem. “Is it time to go?”
“Come with me,” she said.
All five of them exited the dockmaster’s office and walked down the creaking planks. Etienne smelled the fertile Mississippi and the acrid smoke of the few torches that more or less illuminated the river.
The men weren’t dressed in Etienne’s blacks and whites. Etienne himself wore his scarlet sash, but he wore it underneath his clothing. They all wore quilted jackets against the cold, plain corte-du-roi trousers, and hemp rope shoes.
Etienne felt the comforting tug of the weight of the bottle in his jacket pocket and managed not to pat it.
The trireme, bobbing alongside the dock and bumping against it, let down its gangplank. Etienne heard men inside shouting curses in Amhara, Oromo, English, and German, as well as the crack of a whip—the Memphite sailors were doling out water and driving the rowers from their benches to the floor, where they would sleep.
Adisalem stroked Etienne’s arm, breathing hard.
“After you, Dockmaster,” he told her.
The Favor’s captain might have Adisalem’s underlying high, fine bones, but they were hidden beneath layers of gristle. His mate was a scowling Bantu with a knife blade in place of a hand. Etienne avoided making eye contact, reminding himself that he was a dock laborer, a Hansard whose job was menial at best.