Sword-Bound

by Jennifer Roberson

  With a note of surprise in her voice, she said, “Why are you here?”

  “Couldn’t sleep. Where in hoolies are you?”

  “The sleeping platform. Where people sleep. Where I had been sleeping. That’s what it’s for.” She paused. “It’s truly not big enough for two.”

  I groped my way forward, following her voice. “I know that. I was on a platform in another wagon. But there must be room on the floor.”

  “You want to sleep on the floor?”

  “I want us to sleep on the floor—dammit!”

  “What?”

  I swore twice more. “I just caught my little toe on something. Why is it the most insignificant toe of all ten is the one that hurts the most?” Bent over with arms outstretched, I took smaller, more careful steps. “Say something.”

  “Why?”

  “So I can find you.”

  She muttered something under her breath. In Northern, so I couldn’t decipher it. Once, I was able to; I could read all books and speak all languages when ioSkandi’s magic was in me. But not anymore. I’d rid myself of it all.

  “Just stay there, Tiger.” I heard movement, the sound of rustling fabric. “All right. Bedding is on the floor.”

  “Are you on the floor with it?”

  “If you insist.”

  “That is why I came over here.”

  More rustling. “Yes, I am on the floor.”

  More careful movement from me. I found a leg. Progress. I crawled into a position right beside her, snuggled down beneath the covers and fit myself to her. “Ahhhh. Much better.”

  Silence for a long moment. Then she said, with a subtle ripple of wonder in her tone, “Could you really not sleep without me nearby?”

  “Well,” I said, “actually, it was the crying baby in the next wagon.”

  Del snickered. “A likely story.”

  “There was a crying baby in the next wagon.”

  “Hah. That’s not why you came.”

  I set my mouth on the flesh below her left ear. “There’s nothing wrong with a man wishing to sleep with the woman he loves.”

  “Even if it means he’s crushing the woman he loves?”

  I took the hint and adjusted my position. “Better?”

  “Somewhat. It will do.” She yawned. “Go to sleep, Tiger.”

  I smiled into darkness. Sleep came softly.

  Chapter 18

  NOT LONG AFTER DAWN, the crying baby heralded the day. Now Del would know I hadn’t been making things up the night before. I untangled myself from bedding, crawled to the back end, untied the flap, and poked my head out. Morning mist slowly dissipated with the measured arrival of the sun.

  And then I noticed the body. My son was rolled up in his bedding just beyond the back of the wagon. His bay was tied to it, but showed no inclination to step on his owner. All I could see of Neesha was a tangle of hair poking out from under a blanket. The rest of him was not visible except as unidentifiable lumps beneath bedding.

  How many people can sleep with a crying baby next door?

  The noise had roused Del as well. She crawled up beside me with her head stuck out the open rear flap. “I’m so glad Sula is past the age of infancy,” she murmured.

  “Oh, she still has quite the voice,” I reminded her. “Especially during her many baths. Baths required because she insists on playing in the dirt, with occasional visits to piss puddles.”

  She noticed Neesha below. “What is he doing here? I thought he’d stay with a woman.”

  “Maybe she was crying, too.” I undid the pegs of the tailgate and lowered it, crawled out while trying to avoid the bundle of flesh and blood. I stepped around him, put a hand on his gelding’s muzzle so as to back him up a step; he was now perilously close to his owner’s body. “Though I suppose he might be dead.” I prodded Neesha with a bare foot. “Hey. Are you alive?” No reply. Or movement, for that matter. “Up. You can be hung over on horseback. Let’s get out of here.” I paused, wincing. “And how can you sleep with that baby screeching? It’s worse than a rooster.”

  Del climbed out of the wagon. “He—or she—is not screeching, Tiger. That’s crying. He—or she—is undoubtedly hungry, or wet. Possibly both.” This time it was her foot prodding Neesha. “Up.”

  The bundle of bedding moved. Neesha peeled back his blanket and squinted into nascent daylight. “Can we stay here another day? I met a woman…”

  Del and I shook our heads simultaneously in resignation, exchanging wry smiles.

  “If you met a woman, why are you here instead of there?” I asked.

  Neesha took to rubbing the flesh of his face all out of shape, distorting his answer. “She’s married. Her husband came home.”

  Oh, hoolies. “Not exactly a good thing,” I told him. “Husbands tend to dislike such activity.”

  “Well, she insisted. Kind of.” He shoved blankets out of the way and sat up. “Never should a man refuse a lovely woman when she wants him so badly.”

  “Ah,” Del said. “It’s in the blood, is it not? Tiger acquiescing to women who insist on dragging him to bed. Now his son acquiescing to a woman who insists on dragging him to bed. Fruit of the same tree.”

  This required a reply. “Now, bascha, I haven’t acquiesced to an insistent woman for years. Well, except for you. And before you, it was never with a married woman.”

  Del raised her brows, seemingly intrigued. “How do you know? I don’t think any woman taking you to bed would say she was married.”

  Oh. Well, there was that. “To the best of my knowledge,” I amended.

  Neesha scrubbed a hand through dark hair, causing even more disarray. Stubble shadowed his jaw. Time for him and me to use a razor. “Anyway, I came back here to sleep,” he said, a sentence that transformed into a major yawn. “Didn’t want to bother anyone. Especially not her husband, as he came home before his wife expected him.” He winced. “Are they even trying to shut that baby up?”

  “Let’s gather the horses,” I suggested. “Neesha, you know where they are. Bring them back one at a time…I think you leading three horses that are familiar to other sword-dancers would be too much of a risk.”

  He nodded, rising. After stretching, he went off in search of our mounts.

  “Sandals,” I muttered to myself. Those, plus burnous, harness, and sword were in the wagon. The morning was a little chill. And my feet were damp and cold because Marketfield was almost completely grassy, holding the dew. I leaned into the back of the wagon and pulled out my sandals. “I think it’s best if we don’t wear swords and harnesses on the way out of here.”

  “I doubt any other sword-dancers are up yet, Tiger,” Del said drily. “They are probably still in bed. Even if the beds are borrowed.”

  I sat on the tailgate as I laced up my sandals. “I just don’t want to risk it. I really don’t want to dance again, here. Too many sword-dancers to spread the word that I’m in the North.”

  “Didn’t Khalid say Umir was arranging another contest?”

  I put on my burnous, belted it. “No, just that he’d put a bounty on my head. He wants me to open that book, not dance.”

  Del climbed over the tailgate and disappeared into the interior long enough to gather her clothes. “I suspect word will spread quickly when you’re taken, and many of the sword-dancers would go to Umir’s just to see you.”

  “Excuse me? When I’m taken? Do me the courtesy of saying if I am taken!”

  “Word will spread quickly if you are taken—” She frowned. “Though I suppose word can’t actually be spread for an ‘if.’”

  “There won’t be an ‘if,’” I said. “Not a ‘when,’ or an ‘if.’”

  Del buckled her belt. “Then ‘might.’”

  “No ‘might,’ either.”

  “A ‘maybe.’”

  “You won’t win this one, bascha.”

  Lacing on her sandals, she smiled. Then said, “They’ll think you’re afraid.”

  “Who will think I’m afraid? A
nd of what?”

  “Who will: the sword-dancers here in Istamir. Of what: your preference for sneaking out of town rather than meeting them.”

  I snorted. “I’m a legend, according to Neesha. And the jhihadi, of course. Neither of which—or whom—sneaks.”

  Del shrugged into her burnous. “You are neither legend nor jhihadi if you sneak out of town, which is what you’re proposing.”

  “We are riding out of town. There’s a difference.” I paused, relieved that I was on the verge of being rescued. “And here comes Neesha with the stud.”

  By the time our horses were packed and ready to go, which took very little time, many more people were awake and working, preparing wagons and market stalls for commerce later in the day. When Mahmood exited his wagon and began giving orders, I went over and thanked him for the use of his wagons.

  “But I am grateful to you,” he said. “My men and I might have died when those raiders attacked, even if my former outriders had accompanied me.” He paused. “Perhaps especially if my former outriders had accompanied me.” He smiled as we clasped hands. “I am proud that the Sandtiger rode with me.”

  Nice to be appreciated. I mounted the stud, taking a rein from Del. I looked at Neesha, clearly hung over. Still, he was already on his bay with the blue roan to be ponied alongside. “Are you going to be able to stay ahorse?”

  He peered at me out of one squinted eye, the other squeezed closed. “Of course.”

  “Then let’s get out of here.”

  “See? We’re sneaking,” Del murmured.

  I ignored her. “Let’s loop around the buildings and bypass the main road.” I looked again at my son. “Will you be able to direct us to the farm?”

  He scowled at me. “Ride to the end of the paved road and go west. That’s really all you need to know right now.”

  Unfortunately, this was not accomplished. Even as we turned our horses south before going west, someone shouted at us. For a fleeting instant I thought it was Mahmood, and we’d forgotten something, but the actual reason for the shout was very different.

  A man dragged a woman out from one of the narrow alleyways. She was in tears, dark hair and clothing in disarray. Her lip was split, and a bruise bloomed on one cheekbone. The man was all Southroner; dark skin, black hair and eyes. He dragged the woman to a stop in front of us, which naturally caused us to rein in the horses immediately.

  He was so angry he sprayed saliva. “You!” he shouted at Neesha. “You have defiled my wife!”

  To Del, I quietly said, “Uh-oh.”

  “I should have her stoned,” the man shouted, “but I have been convinced this was your doing. She had no wish for what happened to happen! You forced her!”

  I knew better than that. It was too easy for women to attach themselves to Neesha. There was no need for him to force a woman, even if he was the type to do it. And he wasn’t. However, this was a tidy little trap. He couldn’t very well admit he’d forced the woman, which he hadn’t; but if he said he hadn’t forced her, it would place her in danger of an even worse beating. Perhaps a beating that would kill her.

  My son glanced at me. I shook my head slightly and spoke quietly. “You’ll have to find a way to settle this.”

  “Coin?” he asked.

  “That could go either way. He might be greedy enough to take it, or it will inflame him further because you’re insulting his wife by suggesting she can be paid for.”

  “Oh, hoolies,” Neesha muttered.

  “Yup,” I agreed. “Best ask him what he wants…short of your death, that is.”

  “Well, yes,” he said sourly. “I’d much prefer to avoid that.”

  “Stop talking!” the man cried. He thrust the woman down hard enough to drop her to her knees. He ignored Del, not surprisingly; she wasn’t capable of defiling anyone. He stared hard at me, then at Neesha. He grabbed a handful of his wife’s hair. “Which one? Which one was it?”

  Sobbing, she looked at Neesha. It was clear she wished not to indicate either of us. But her husband was too angry, and she’d already had a taste of his violence. “Him,” she said. “The young one.”

  Neesha didn’t deny it. A wave of color rose in his face. It wasn’t shame; it was anger. “Beat me,” he challenged. “Beat me instead of her.”

  “Did she consent?” the man cried. He shook her head by the hair. “Did she consent, or did you force her?”

  Either answer was dangerous, for the wife or for himself, and Neesha knew it. But he found a novel approach. “I was drunk,” he answered. “Too drunk to remember. Much too drunk. Men in the cantina with me—even the cantina owner—can attest to my drunkenness.”

  “He was drunk,” I put in. “He reeked of spirits when he came to sleep by our wagon.”

  Del added, “Very, very drunk.”

  The husband glared at all of us but reserved his enmity for Neesha. “I will have this settled. I will have this settled. You will see!”

  And so we did. A man came out of the gathering crowd. Borderer by the look of him: brown hair, not black; grey eyes, not dark; skin color close to my own. A sword rode high on his left shoulder. And hired, I realized, by the angry husband.

  He looked straight at Neesha. “My name is Eddrith,” he said, “and I challenge you.”

  Without looking at one another, Del, Neesha, and I muttered simultaneously, “Oh, hoolies.”

  And then another man stepped out from the crowd. He looked straight at me. “And you.”

  I blinked. “Me?” Here I’d been thinking about Neesha’s first true sword-dance, and this man was challenging me. Though I guess I should have been glad of the advance warning. It was no longer required that I be given one.

  His smile was edged. “I want Umir’s bounty. You lose, you go with me.”

  The stud jangled bit shanks and pawed at the earth as I sat at ease in the saddle, leaning against the pommel on stiffened arms. “And if I win?”

  “Then another sword-dancer will have the honor—though it’s not truly that, is it?—of hauling you to Umir.” His eyes were an icy blue, his hair white-blond. Definitely a Northerner. “But I think that will not happen.”

  “Rather full of yourself, aren’t you?” I asked lightly. But before he could answer, out of the corner of my eye I noticed a third sword-dancer slide out of the crowd. By all the gods above and below—and sideways, for that matter—what was going on?

  But this latest sword-dancer I knew.

  Darrion was very solemn, but he looked neither at me, nor at Neesha. Only at Del. “I challenge the sword-singer trained at Staal-Ysta.”

  “Oh hoolies” indeed.

  Chapter 19

  DARRION, I BELIEVED, wasn’t smart enough to look beyond his immediate goal, which was meeting a Staal-Ysta sword-singer in the circle. That left Neesha’s man and mine, the ice-eyed Northerner.

  Three of us. Three of them. It must have been planned, challenging the three of us all at the same time. “Happenstance,” the Northerner said casually.

  At my questioning glance, Neesha’s challenger, Eddrith, simply shrugged. The mechanics didn’t matter to him. Merely the opponent and the outcome.

  In an undertone, Neesha asked me, “So, what do I do?”

  “You’ve been challenged. Accept, or decline.” Meanwhile, I said to my opponent, “Now? Where—here? Or in the pegged circle?”

  “Now. And here will do,” he said lightly, unbuckling his belt.

  Del observed, “Sneaking didn’t work.”

  “No sneaking!” I said with vigor. “We rode.” I swung down from the saddle. “Well, I suppose we didn’t actually ride. We intended to ride. I think we took two steps, did we not?” I glanced at Neesha. He was not afraid, my son. But I knew his thoughts raced like creek water over stone. I unbuckled my belt and began to take off my burnous. Very quietly, I said, “Remember what I’ve taught you. You’re good enough. You’re ready.”

  Neesha looked down at me from the back of his bay. “I was never hung over when yo
u taught me anything. Or if I was, I was so drunk I don’t remember it.”

  “Hah,” Del said as she dismounted and ducked under her gelding’s neck. “You see? You drink too much, and the next day you are challenged. An argument, don’t you think, for not drinking at all?”

  Neesha sighed. “Ask me when I’m in the land of the living again.”

  “Enough!” cried the husband. “No talking. Dance!”

  A man stepped up beside me. Mahmood. “Must you?” he asked. “Can you refuse?” Color rose in his face. “Should I ask that? Is it an insult?”

  “No insult,” I said, “but the answer is yes and no. Yes, I must; no, I can’t.” He looked bewildered. “If you don’t mind,” I said, “will you hold the horses?”

  “But of course!” He held out his hand for the stud and very soon had a clutch of reins in his hand. Del’s white gelding, my stud, and Neesha’s bay along with the roan mare tied to his saddle.

  I poked the stud in the shoulder. “Be kind. He’s doing us a favor.”

  Three of us. Three of them. Obviously planned.

  Three challengers drew three circles. Del, Neesha, and I stripped out of burnouses, freed feet of sandals. At my suggestion, we had carried swords at our saddles, not on our backs. Each of us unsheathed from harnesses looped around saddle pommels.

  It was anger I felt. Anger, annoyance, aggravation, and frustration. It was so very clever to challenge all of us at the same time, to insist on simultaneous dances. Neesha would doubt himself because he’d receive no coaching from me; I’d worry about him because I couldn’t not worry; and then of course there was Del to think about, too. And she’d think about me, and think about Neesha; and he about me, about Del. Each of us had more to think about than only ourselves, than only our own dances.

  In the meantime, our opponents—led, I was certain, by my challenger—knew we would individually wish to rush our dances to see how the others were doing. And rushing a dance can end in disaster.

  What he didn’t realize is that I was as good slow as I was fast. Patience often won the dance. But in this dance, patience would drive me mad.