That stopped her in her tracks. “You?” she ventured finally. “Why do you say that?”
“I’m the one he and the others are going to Iskandar to see.”
She blinked. “What for?”
“Seems they heard the Oracle’s stories about the jhihadi.” I shrugged. “They packed up their lives and headed north.”
Del’s mouth opened to protest. But she said nothing. She stared at the religious fool a long moment, weighing what I’d said against the man himself, and eventually sighed, rubbing a hand across her brow.
“See what I mean?” I asked. “You think he’s a fool, too.”
Her mouth twisted. “I will admit that opinions can be led astray, but that doesn’t make him a fool for believing in a man whose coming is supposed to improve his homeland.”
“Right,” I agreed. “Which means the least I can do is get him and his people to Quumi. It seems like a properly jhihadi-ish thing to do, wouldn’t you say?”
“Will you tell him?” she ventured.
I grinned. “What—that I’m a fraud?”
Del’s expression was sour. “He would probably figure that out for himself.”
“I thought you’d see it my way.” I patted the stud’s neck. “Well, old son, looks like we’ll be carrying double again.”
Del hitched a harness strap. “Why not put him with me? Together he and I weigh less than you and he.”
I looked at the religious fool who gazed at Del raptly. “Yes,” I agreed sourly. “He’d probably like that.”
Del frowned.
“Never mind,” I muttered. “Let’s just get going.”
Twenty
His name was Mehmet. Mehmet was a pain in the rump.
He didn’t start out that way. He was what he was: an exhausted, thirsty young man badly in need of help. Trouble was, we’d offered that help, and he’d taken us up on it.
Now, I’m not really as ungracious as I might seem, some of the time. I admit I sound that way upon occasion, but the truth of the matter is, I’m soft-hearted enough to get myself in trouble. So here we were, helping Mehmet, who wanted to help his companions.
Who wanted to help them now.
Trouble was, now meant now, the way he looked at things; while Del and I looked on it as an in-the-morning thing, since the sun had disappeared, and we saw no great benefit from riding through the night.
Mehmet, however, did.
Del, busily unrolling a blanket beneath a dusky sky, frowned across at me as I did the same with mine. “What’s he saying now?”
“What he said a minute ago. That we can’t wait till morning while his aketni is in need.”
“His what?”
“Aketni. I’m not exactly sure what it means, but I think it has something to do with the people he’s traveling with. Sort of like a family, I think… or maybe just a group of people who believe in the same thing.”
“A religious sect.” Del nodded. “Like those ridiculous khemi zealots who shun women.”
“They carry things a bit far. Mehmet doesn’t seem to feel that way.” I glanced at him, standing expectantly between us with hands clutching the front of his grimy burnous. “Matter of fact, about the last thing Mehmet would shun is women, I think—he’s staring at you again.”
Del scowled blackly.
We didn’t bother with a fire, since there was no wood on the crystal sands, and the charcoal we carried with us was for emergencies. We had plenty of supplies for a trip across the Punja, and while we were not enthusiastic about travelers’ tedious fare, we knew it would get us where we were going. So Del and I settled in for the evening. The sun was down, the twilight cool; what we wanted now was to eat and sleep.
Mehmet, seeing this, started in yet again on how we should not stop, but ride on to his aketni. Where, he announced, we would be well recompensed for our services.
“How’s that?” I asked dryly. “You said the guides stole all your money.”
His chin developed a stubborn set. “You will be paid,” he declared, “in something much better than coin.”
“I’ve heard that before.” I unrolled my blanket the rest of the way, shaking out folds and wrinkles. “Look, Mehmet, I know you’re worried about them, but the best thing to do is get some sleep. We’ll start out again at first light, and reach them by midday. If you remember your distance right.” I shot him a baleful glare. “You do remember it right, don’t you, Mehmet?”
“That way.” He pointed. “If we left right now, we would be there before morning.”
“We’re not leaving right now,” I told him. “Right now, I’m going to eat something, digest it in calm, quiet dignity, then go to sleep.”
He was offended. “How can you go to sleep when my aketni is in need?”
I sighed and scratched at claw scars. “Because,” I said patiently. “I’m not part of your aketni, whatever the hoolies it is.”
Mehmet drew himself up. He was a slender, dried out stick of a young man, with very little fat beneath his flesh, which made his desert features sharper than ever. Punja-born, all right—he had the prominent nose that reminded me of a hawk, but his brown eyes lacked the predator’s piercing impact.
He stood rigidly between Del and me, glaring down at us both. He was young and full of himself, if in a more subtle way; Mehmet wasn’t as obnoxious as a cocky young sword-dancer trying to earn a reputation, such as Nezbet, but he had that mile-wide streak of youthful stubbornness that eclipsed the wisdom of experience and age. To him, Del and I were simply being selfish—well, maybe only me; I don’t think he looked on Del as anything other than a wonder, and wonders aren’t selfish—and purposely difficult.
Behind him, the night sky unrolled its own version of blanket bedding, spangled with glittering stars. A sliver of new crescent moon glowed overhead.
And Mehmet continued to glare, although I noticed he stared with more virulence at me. Trust Del to escape the wrath of a male firmly smitten by her beauty.
“It is an aketni!” he hissed. “A complete aketni!”
Del heard his tone, even if she missed the context. “What’s he so upset about?”
“Nothing new,” I explained. “He’s singing the same old song.” I sat down on the blanket, automatically settling my knee in the position least likely to stress it, then looked up at Mehmet. “I don’t know what a complete aketni is, let alone what it means. So why don’t you just spread out that spare blanket, settle in for the night, and worry about it in the morning?”
He stood so rigidly I thought he might break. But he didn’t. He wavered eventually, then collapsed to his knees, bowed his head as he spread one hand over his heart, and began mumbling in the dialect even I didn’t understand.
“That again,” I muttered.
Mehmet stopped mumbling. He appeared to be applying tremendous self-control. “Then may I borrow a horse?” he asked quietly. “And water? I will go now; you may come in the morning.”
It crossed my mind that if we let him take a horse and water, we wouldn’t need to go. But that gained us nothing we hadn’t encountered before: two people on one horse, with less water than ever. “No.” I dug through pouches to flat, tough loaves of traveler’s bread, and two twisted sticks of dried cumfa meat. “Just bide your time.”
Abruptly, Mehmet turned to Del, who, arrested by his fervor, stared warily at him as he spewed out an explanation to her, along with a request for her mare and some water.
“She doesn’t understand,” I told him. “She doesn’t speak your language.”
He considered it a moment. Then began again in dialect-riddled Desert.
Del glanced at me. “If I say no, he won’t try to steal her, will he?” She as much as I wanted nothing to do with riding double and walking again.
Smiling, I repeated Del’s question to Mehmet, who was horrified. He leapt to his feet, then fell down to knees again, clutching his tattered burnous as if he meant to rend it, and gabbled on in something akin to a reproachful dialogue, e
xcept parts of it were addressed equally to Del, to me, and the sky.
“I don’t know.” Before Del could ask. “But I’m guessing we’ve offended him.”
“Oh.” She sighed and reached into the pouch to dig out her share of the evening meal. “I’m sorry for that, but if he’s so horrified, he probably won’t try for the mare.”
“Better the mare than the stud.” I chewed tough bread while Mehmet muttered prayers. “Do you think he’ll do that all night?”
Del’s expression was perplexed as she stared at him. “If he is so worried—”
“No.”
“If they are in danger—”
“They aren’t. They’re probably pretty thirsty, but they’ll survive the night. These are deep-Punja people, bascha… going without water for a day or two won’t kill them. They know how to adapt. Believe me, if you know the tricks—”
“Mehmet is afraid—”
“Mehmet just thinks he’ll get in trouble for taking so long.” I stuffed too much dried cumfa into my mouth, and chewed for a very long time.
Del clicked her tongue in disgust.
Bulge-mouthed, I grinned.
“Jamail used to do that,” she remarked. “Of course, he was considerably younger, and didn’t know any better.”
“See there?” I glanced at Mehmet, who glumly unrolled the spare blanket. “Just like a woman—always trying to remake a man. The thing I can’t understand is, if she liked him in the first place, why does she want to change him?”
“I didn’t like you,” Del answered coolly, as Mehmet stared at me in blank-faced incomprehension; was he really that young? Or just slow to assert himself in the way of a man with a woman?
I chewed thoughtfully. “You’ve done your share of trying to change me, bascha.”
“In some things, I’ve even succeeded.” Del bit off a small piece of cumfa from her own dried stick and ate it elegantly.
I indicated her with air-jabs of my stick. “See there?” I said again to Mehmet. “What kind of women do you have in your aketni?”
Mehmet gazed at Del. “Old ones,” he answered. “And my mother.” Which said quite a lot, I thought.
I hefted a bota. “And I suppose they’ve done their best to change you, too.”
He shrugged. “In the aketni, one does as one is told. Whatever is cast in the sands—” He broke it off. “I have said too much.”
“Sacred stuff, huh?” I nodded. “Women’ll do that to you. They twist things all around, make it ritual, because how else can they convince anyone to do some of the things they want? Old, young—doesn’t matter.” I slanted a glance at Del. “Even Northern ones.”
Del chewed in stolid silence.
I looked back at Mehmet. “About this recompense… anything worthwhile?”
Mehmet pulled cumfa from the pouch. “Very valuable.”
I arched a skeptical brow. “If it’s so valuable, how come the ‘guides’ didn’t relieve you of it?”
“They were blind.” Mehmet shrugged. “Their souls have shutters on them.”
“And mine doesn’t?” I beat Del to it. “Given that I have one, that is?”
Mehmet chewed cumfa. “You are here.” Which also said something.
I shifted irritably, rearranging my knee, and sucked down more wine. “Well, we’ll see to it you get to Quumi. It won’t take long—you’re not that far off the track. Maybe your guides didn’t really mean for you to die.”
Mehmet shrugged again. “It doesn’t matter. Their futures have been cast.”
I quirked an eyebrow. “Oh?”
But Mehmet was done talking. He ate his cumfa in silence, washed it down with water, lay down on his back on the blanket, and stared up into the sky.
Murmuring again. As if the stars—or gods—could hear.
I kinked my head back and stared up into darkness. Wondering if anyone did.
I roused when the stud squealed and stomped. I was on my feet and moving before I remembered my knee, but by then it was too late. Swearing inventively, I hobbled toward the stud.
Mehmet turned as I arrived. He held the saddle pad. When he saw my expression—and the bared sword—he fell back a step. “I meant only to help,” he protested. “Not to steal, to help. By readying him for you.” He placed a hand across his heart. “First light, you said.”
It was first light, but just barely. More like false dawn. But I was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt; if he’d really meant to steal a horse and ride out quietly, he’d have taken the mare. He knew that already, having ridden with us the day before.
Del, too, was up, folding her blanket. Pale braid was loose and tousled, flopping against one shoulder. “We can eat on the way.”
I scrubbed grit from eyes and face, turning back toward the bedraggled encampment. The blade glinted dull black in the weak light of a new dawn. A little more sleep would have been very welcome; dreams had awakened me on and off all night.
“Come away from him,” I told Mehmet. “He’s surly in the morning.”
Del snickered softly, but forbore to comment.
Mehmet came away with alacrity, glancing over a shoulder at the thoroughly wakened stud, and knelt to refold his blanket. I bent, picked up harness, slid the sword into scabbard. And cursed as a fingernail caught on the leather lip and tore.
It didn’t hurt so much as implied it. Blackened nail loosed itself from cuticle and peeled away entirely, vacating my finger. It left behind the knurled bed of pinkish undergrowth.
I wavered on my feet.
Del came over, inspected the “injury,” looked into my rigid face. “It’s a fingernail.”
“It’s—ugly.”
“Ugly?” She stared, then laughed a short, breathy laugh of disbelief. “After all the wounds you’ve had—not to mention the gutting I nearly gave you on Staal-Ysta—this bothers you?”
“It’s ugly,” I said again, knowing how it sounded.
Del caught my wrist and pushed the back of my hand into my range of vision. “A fingernail,” she repeated. “I think you’ve done worse shaving!”
“You’re enjoying this,” I accused.
Del let my hand go. A smile stole the sting. “Yes, I think I am. I find it very amusing.”
I rubbed the ball of my thumb across the ruined bed of index fingernail, and suppressed a shudder. I don’t know why, but it made my bones squirm. Also weak in the knees—and since one was already weak, I didn’t need the help.
“Let’s go,” I said crossly. “Mehmet’s aketni is waiting.”
Del snickered again as I turned away. “Now he wants to move swiftly.”
“Never mind,” I grumbled, and knelt to roll my blanket.
Del went back to her own, laughing quietly to herself.
I hate it when women do that. They take their small revenges in the most frustrating ways.
Twenty-one
By midday, I’d lost the nail off my right thumb and two other fingers, and very nearly my breakfast. But we’d found Mehmet’s aketni.
Five small wagons, huddled together against the sun, with domed canopies of once-blue canvas now sunbleached bone-gray, stretched tautly on curving frames. Unhitched danjacs hobbled but paces away in a bedraggled little herd brayed a greeting as we rode up. I wondered if Mehmet’s bad-tempered one had come back to join the others.
As expected, everyone was excited to see Mehmet again, but more excited to learn he’d brought water. Del and I handed down botas as Mehmet jumped off the mare and quickly doled them out, answering excited questions with enthusiasm of his own in the deep-Punja dialect I’d yet to decipher. Dark eyes shone with joy and relief and browned hands stroked the botas.
But no one drank. They accepted the botas with fervent thanks, yet stood aside as Mehmet turned to Del and me. We still sat atop our mounts, staring down in bafflement.
“It’s yours,” I told him in Desert. “We’ve kept enough back to get us all to Quumi—go ahead and drink.”
Mehmet shook his
head even as the others murmured. I counted five at a glance, heads wrapped in turbans, dark faces half-hidden by sand-crusted gauze veils. I couldn’t see much of anyone beneath voluminous burnouses, just enough to know the five were considerably older than Mehmet, judging by veined, spotted hands and sinewy wrists. But then, he’d told us that.
“What is it?” Del asked.
I shrugged, reining in the stud, who wanted to visit the danjacs to show them who was in charge. Horses hate danjacs; the ill-regard is returned. “Nobody’s thirsty.”
Mehmet took a single step forward. “We owe you our thanks, sword-bearers. The gratitude of the aketni, for bringing water and aid to us.”
I started to shrug it away, but broke it off, stilling, as Mehmet and his companions dropped to knees and bowed heads deeply, then tucked sandaled feet beneath buttocks and rocked forward to press foreheads against knees. Deep, formal obeisance; much more than we warranted. Five of them turbaned, with narrow, gray-black braids dangling beneath the neck-flap meant to shield flesh against the sun. All women? I wondered. Who could tell with so much burnous swaddling and veiling?
Mehmet intoned something in singsong fashion, and was answered instantly by a five-part nasal echo. They all slapped the flat of a hand against the sand, raising dust, then traced a line across their brows beneath turban rims, leaving powdery smudges of crystalline sand to glitter as they raised their heads.
Four women, I decided, and one old man. Six pairs of dark desert eyes locked onto blue and green ones.
I felt abruptly alien. Don’t ask me why; I just did. I realized, staring back, there was nothing of me in these people. Nothing of them in me. Whatever blood ran through my veins was not of Mehmet’s aketni.
I shifted in the saddle. Del said nothing. I wondered what she was thinking, so far away from home.
“You will come,” Mehmet said quietly, “for the bestowing of the water.”
“The bestowing—?” I exchanged a puzzled glance with Del.
“You will come,” Mehmet repeated, and the others all nodded vehemently and gestured invitation.
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