Weird Tales - Summer 1990

by Vol. 51 No. 4

  I had seen to the animals while Ma-bruka went to the well to fill a tall water jug. We went back to the front of the house as Nur and the old servant turned toward us from the trail. Ma-bruka took the water jug inside and came back out. Latifa, scowling and ill-tempered, asked her if she'd started fix­ing dinner.

  "No," Mabruka said.

  "What good are you?" Latifa snarled. With a gesture of contempt she disap­peared inside.

  Mabruka asked her mother, "What did Harith say?"

  Nur slipped the shawl off her head. Coppery highlights sparked from her black hair.

  "That Salman was right." Her voice was matter-of-fact, her face calm, but her eyes were worried. "The Bayt Ali want us out and have the support of several important families. Shaykh Sa-lah is opposed and so far the majority of the tribal council is with him. If that changes, he becomes a prisoner of his Bayt-Ali-dominated bodyguard. This situation is why Harith didn't want me to bring up the Ghazala well incident at a public diwan. If Salah judges in their favor it'll happen more often. If he judges in my favor he'll lay himself open to charges of having some private reason for favoring one of us over one of them. Which could get him deposed, or start him thinking we're not worth the trouble."

  Mabruka's face had gone blank, in a kind of little-girl shock. Her eyes snapped suddenly and she stood taller and the little-girl semblance was gone.

  "Did you tell Shaykh Harith that his eager young aide seemed determined that we assimilate into Ghassani law and custom?"

  "Yes." Nur smiled thinly. "He snapped that Zuhayr was only a messenger boy."

  "If we're dispossessed what do we do? Fight?"

  "There aren't enough of us. And we can't buy off the Bayt Ali because then we'd have to buy off their friends and we'd end up with nothing anyway. All we can do is hope the council stays with us."

  "There must be something we can do."

  I said tentatively, "What about Sal­man? Isn't he a sorcerer?"

  "He's a healer," Nur said. "He has no magic for this problem."

  I felt silly for even thinking of it. Then Mabruka touched my arm and pointed past me. I turned and saw Mu-jahid leave the trail and come toward us, his face calm and ruddy in the ap­proaching sunset.

  He seemed unhurried, purposeful, with no sign of the anguish that had gripped him earlier. Nor of his charm. He greeted the women indifferently and came right to the point.

  "You were right, Talal. It can't be done alone."

  I agreed carefully.

  He went on, "Kadhim's leaving by the side gate as soon as it's dark, taking the north road out of the valley."

  "How'd you find out?"

  "Zuhayr told me."

  "Why?"

  "I don't know why! It doesn't matter why!" He made an impatient gesture. "Look, I met him in the city; he'd just ridden in after passing you on the road. He demanded very officiously to know what I was doing, if I was looking for Kadhim I should remember that every man's hand would be against me. I said no, I was just trying to find out when he'd be leaving. He gave that a mo­ment's thought and his manner changed and he said very casually, 'Maybe I can find out for you; wait for me here.' I waited all afternoon, thinking he might be making a fool of me. But he came back with the information."

  "I wouldn't believe anything he says."

  "Neither would I. But suppose he's right. We intercept Kadhim when he gets out onto the desert or we're back where we started."

  "We can't violate hospitality."

  "Of course not."

  That was all the assurance I needed. In a few brisk minutes we had the an­imals loaded and were mounted and on our way.

  We climbed the rock slope leading out of the farmlands, went over the valley's rim and out onto the desert. We stopped then, and turned to look back the way we had come.

  Slender columns of smoke rose from the little mud ovens in which farmers bake their flat loaves of bread. The val­ley floor was in shadow; thicker shadow oozed out of the hollows in the farmlands and climbed the walls inside the city. The light on the western horizon was fading and shrinking. The moon, not quite half full, began to glow, wash­ing out the early stars.

  The city's northern gate swung closed. Either because of the angle or the thick­ening darkness, the side gate wasn't visible. We were apparently well ahead of Kadhim.

  We moved fifty or sixty paces back from the rim and Mujahid dismounted. Nothing was going to happen; but the distant confusion spreading under my ribs I recognized as excitement tinged with apprehension, which I tried to quiet; while Mujahid seemed seized by an odd calm that made him move slowly, almost dreamily. Without a word he strolled back to where he could watch the road up from the valley and sat on his heels, his back to me, and didn't move a muscle until the sky had darkened and the moon glowed fully yellow and the stars were everywhere as bright as the moon would allow. Meanwhile I waited patiently on my camel listening to the sounds of the night, the howl of a distant jackal, an occasional raised voice from the farm­land below, mostly to the sounds of the camels' breathing and the grumbling of their guts.

  Then Mujahid stood up and wandered back.

  "Three riders approaching, Talal. Have your bow ready."

  "We're not going to ambush them."

  "Three riders on horses, leading their camels. They're expecting an attack."

  "So Zuhayr betrayed you."

  "Don't tell me you're surprised." He took the back hem of his thaub and pulled it up between his legs and tucked it into his belt, turning the long gar­ment into something like a pair of breeches, then unhooked the sheathed sword from his camel saddle and slung it around his waist. Disconnecting the mare's lead rope, he checked her headstall and saddle and mounted.

  That alone was almost a' declaration of war.

  I reminded him urgently, "We can't attack,"

  "We won't have to." He spoke in a disinterested murmur. "I suppose Zu-hayr saw this as a chance to get rid of you. Be glad you're not lucky, Talal. Luck changes. You never know if you still have it, only that you had it the last time you needed it."

  He sighed, a faint whisper out of emp­tiness. I bent my bow around my sad­dle's pommel, holding one end behind a knee and slipping the looped string into its notch at the other end.

  Three horsemen came over the lip of the hill, followed by four camels on lead ropes. The horsemen came to a cautious halt, the camels moving aimlessly be­hind them before deciding they'd come to a rest stop and settling down. The three men stared at us.

  Even with the half moon behind them I could tell that the one in the middle was Kadhim, and that he was drawing his sword. The man on his left made a series of familiar movements, drawing an arrow from his quiver, fitting it to his bow. Automatically I did the same, without thinking, my mind calm, my fingers on the arrow at once thick and unpracticed, skillful and deft. This wasn't supposed to be happening! I couldn't really believe it was. Surely I must be so calm because I was stupefied with fright. I didn't feel frightened, only caught up in something utterly unfa­miliar. My bones and muscles knew what they were doing, it was only half my mind that was at a loss, having to resist the urge to look around and go back and find its bearings.

  The metallic whisper was Mujahid's sword leaving its scabbard. He turned to me with the big careless confident grin of the Mujahid of old.

  "Don't worry, little brother. Shooting a man's no different from shooting a dove, only easier."

  "You promised no violation —"

  From fifty paces away Kadhim's voice scraped like millstones.

  "Mujahid!"

  "I'm here," Mujahid called back easily.

  "I warn you, I'm under the protection of Shaykh Salah and Bani Ghassan."

  "You could be under the protection of the Mother of the Gods herself and it would do you no good. I'm going to kill you."

  "Try it, braggart."

  It might not have done any good but Mujahid could have answered, "Not here" or "Not yet" and given us an ar­guable claim of having respected Ka­dh
im's protected status; but that didn't occur to me until too late, and what I actually said as Mujahid started his mare toward Kadhim was, "Not against three of them!" As the mare broke into a charge, hooves drumming against the rocky desert, the man on Kadhim's left went into another series of familiar movements. I ducked low against my camel's neck and heard his arrow rip the air above my head. I released my own arrow from low over the pommel of the saddle, a moment later heard a coughing grunt. I thought his bow jumped out of his hands, then one hand clawed the air and he lay back almost onto the horse's hindquarters. The horse dithered and sidled, and Mujahid's charge brought him up against Kadhim and the other bodyguard.

  Hitting a man with an arrow in near-dark was nothing. Following blurred action involving three horsemen wield­ing swords against a background of dis­turbed camels in the same dark was impossible. Voices came in desperate half-articulated shouts, someone's horse stumbled and almost went down, and then one of the other horses was trot­ting toward me.

  It slowed as it came, was almost half way here before I saw it was Mujahid's horse and that he no longer had his sword.

  Behind him one of the two men had jumped to the ground, began with an air of desperation to search for some­thing while hanging onto his horse's halter rope and half dragging the ani­mal behind him.

  The approaching horse was walking now. Mujahid's right hand plucked at something near his breast bone, then fell listlessly away. A sword hilt and a hand's span of blade protruded from his chest. He must have been run clear through. He never said a word. He died, I think, there in the saddle. I heard a faint breath dribble from his throat and then he sagged forward and toppled sideways and fell to the ground, as limp and unprotesting as a discarded cloak.

  The man on the ground found what he was looking for, picked it up. Mu­jahid's sword. He jumped back onto his saddle. Kadhim was rearmed. He and the other man rode away from each other to attack from different direc­tions.

  I watched Kadhim turn his horse, facing me.

  "Do you have a quarrel with me, Talal?"

  "Of course I do," I called back, looking around to keep track of the other horse too. "You killed my father and my brother."

  A heartbeat's pause. Then the hoof-beats starting Kadhim's charge sig­nalled the other man to attack from the other angle.

  Kadhim first. The bow was up, the arrow pulled back to my temple and let fly and I was reaching for another even before the horse's lurch as its rider was hit and shifted weight told me I'd aimed well. Actually I'd hardly aimed at all. Even by half-moonlight a man was eas­ier to hit than a dove. I loosed a second arrow at Kadhim, reached for a third arrow and turned atop my saddle when there was a slithering, scrabbling noise as the second horse lost its footing on a sloping patch of gravel and loose rock and stumbled and threw the rider over its head.

  Man and horse were less than ten paces away. Behind me now I heard Kadhim's horse falter, stop, and the in­ert thud as Kadhim fell from the saddle. His horse suddenly shied away and bolted, while the second horse found its footing and pranced away, scattering the camels. . . and the thrown man got to his feet.

  "You don't have to die," I told him, but he was already running at me, sword raised. I hardly got the arrow drawn back enough to have the force to pierce skin, much less bone, but I did. It took him in the middle of the fore­head. He fell over backward, knees buckling, the sword still in his hand.

  He neither spoke nor moved, except for a while his free hand kept rising listlessly, as though to make some tired complaint, and falling back to the cool­ing ground. When I slid off the camel and looked closer I found he was the scarfaced guard from this morning at the palace.

  Of course Mujahid was dead, as I'd known he had to be. I felt only a con­tained and far-away sorrow then, as though I were still tensed to fight off attackers and had no time to mourn a brother. Neither had I time to think of Mabruka, nor to examine too closely the suspicion, either sent by the spirit world or dreamed up by an anguished mind in the aftermath of bloody action, that by lying with Mabruka I had some­how ended Mujahid's luck.

  It finally struck me how stupid I had been not to realize before Mujahid told me that he had never known if he was still lucky. Of course he hadn't! Luck didn't mark the palm of your hand, or leave a sign like a tribal tattoo on wrist or cheek or chin, to fade when luck left you. How lucky I was not to be lucky! There was even a small spark of solace — bitter and unworthy and shameful though it was — to be taken from know­ing I would no longer live in the shadow of Mujahid and his luck. Though I might not live among the Numayris. Who knew what they would do when I returned unharmed, alone? I might get sent back into the obscurity I came from, forever a man with no ancestors.

  Kadhim had taken one arrow in the throat and one through the ribs. He wasn't quite dead, though I never knew if he heard me saying it was disgraceful how easy he had been to kill. I retrieved my arrows and cleaned them on his cloak, undid his dagger belt and pulled it free of him and buckled it around my waist.

  The man I'd traded arrows with was still on his horse, holding himself up­right with stiff arms braced on his cloth saddle. The arrow was lodged in his side, and his eyes were closed and he made small moaning sounds with every breath. Helping him dismount might injure him worse. I asked what I should do but got no answer.

  Then I heard faint cautious sounds approaching up the incline from the valley.

  I nocked another arrow, crouched, waited until a man on a tall dark horse rode slowly over the valley's rim. Alone. No lance or bow. I assumed he had a sword and dagger but couldn't see them.

  He pulled the horse to a stop, moving his head slowly to take in the scattered animals, the prone forms if not their identities, straining to see farther into the darkness . . .

  I imagined his fastidious nostrils curling at the smell of blood.

  I stood up.

  "Ahlan, Zuhayr. Evening of good­ness."

  He quelled his surprise and gave me a long stare.

  "Did you do all this with your bow?"

  "Not all of it. Mujahid's dead. So are Kadhim and one of the escort, the one with the scarred face. The other one's hurt."

  Zuhayr glanced briefly at the injured man then back at me. He had thinking to do. I wasn't supposed to have sur­vived. That I had was bad enough — but that one of the escort had, too, I thought, might really complicate things for him.

  And he already knew that he would live no longer than a heartbeat if he tried to bolt.

  At last he sighed and shook his head sympathetically.

  "You don't believe in making things easy for yourself, do you? Kadhim was under the protection of both Harith and Salah. They can't let you get away with killing him. The fellow on the horse is one of us, a Hilali. If he lives, so what? The other guard was of Bayt Ali. You're not rich enough to buy yourself out of a blood feud with them."

  "You're going to advise me to run, aren't you?" And of course not to come back. Coming back alone would only be a suicidal gesture. Coming back with a raiding party would be pointless too, because rescuing Mabruka would be no rescue, only an abduction. And anyway, how could I recruit a raiding party?

  I went on, "Would you let me go with­out wiping out the disgrace to the two shaykhs?"

  "You're the bowman. I couldn't stop you."

  "What about your friend there?"

  "I'll go back down the hill and bring some men with a litter. He can't walk. Riding would kill him."

  "You're a smooth liar, Zuhayr. You know very well you'll have to kill him yourself."

  "Are you mad? Why should I kill him?"

  "Because he knows you told Kadhim that we'd be here waiting to ambush him. So Kadhim and his two body­guards rode out of the valley on horse­back, ready for a fight, as you'd planned — to get rid of me. You set up a Hilali guard to get seriously injured and a Bayt Ali guard to get killed in a fight that wouldn't have happened but for you. The Bayt Ali won't like that. You think you're in league with them but they're only using you."r />
  Zuhayr laughed. It was raucous and jarring.

  "You insulting little shit!" He snatched at the sword hilt I only now saw but had the sense not to draw it.

  "Your Shaykh Harith says you're only a messenger boy," I went on, "but you know enough about what's going on to know the Bayt Ali are trying to get the Hilalis dispossessed. But you still want to get your hands on Ma-bruka's inheritance. It's land she'll own that you want even more than her. There'll be no advantage to owning land, though, unless you've worked out some arrangement with the Bayt Ali to let you keep it. What do you have to do in return?"

  He said blankly, "What are you talk­ing about?"

  The moon was behind him. His chin came up, his face moving side to side as though he were scanning the desert behind me. His chin came down again. While I maneuvered around so my back was less exposed, keeping my undrawn arrow pointed his way all the time, he said in an oddly bodiless voice, "What dispossession?"

  The voice was more convincing than the raucous laugh or the hand-on-sword bluster. Mother of the Gods! — had I over-estimated him?

  I said slowly, "The Bayt Ali are trying to get Shaykh Salah and the Ghassani tribal council to rescind the old agreement with Ahl al-Hilal."

  "Who says so?"

  "Your own Shaykh Harith."

  I think his mouth hung open a while. Then he turned away from me to the open desert, without any attempt at concealment, craning his neck from side to side but not finding what he was looking for.

  His head swiveled back.

  "I don't believe you!" Breath whistled in his nostrils. Then, in a petulant whine, "Dispossess us? After all these . . . lifetimes?"

  I gestured with the point of the arrow at the fallen men, the blood, the scat­tered beasts.

  "You mean all this was just over Mabruka? All the talk this morning of coming change was just an empty ig­norant threat to frighten her into mar­rying you on your terms —when she wouldn't have you as a servant?"

  "Oh, she'll have me — in my bed."

  "You're forgetting. One of the men your treachery killed was my brother."