Moongather

by Clayton, Jo;

  The torment went on and on. Outside her window the sky darkened. Stars sprinkled across the dark blue rectangle. Her tongue swelled. She tried to drink, almost could not force water down in spite of her thirst. The hands brought food. The fragrant scents flooded her mouth with saliva but she couldn’t chew. Even swallowing was an agony.

  The night passed slowly. She burned. Time crept along so lethargically it ceased to have meaning. She couldn’t think. Couldn’t move. Couldn’t weep.

  The window paled, was streaked by red and gold. The gloom lightened in the room. Serroi crouched in the center of the Sankoy rug the hands had retrieved and cleaned and replaced. Where flesh touched flesh she burned, but she was too tired to stand.

  The door opened and the Noris stepped quietly inside. She looked up. “Please,” she moaned.

  He spoke a WORD. As the fire died out of her skin, he lifted her, carried her to the bed, sat on the edge of it and held her until her shaking stopped. After stroking gentle fingers over her hair for a few moments, he laid her down on the bed, straightened out her cramped limbs, looked gravely down at her, then left.

  Serroi stretched and sat up, smoothed her hands down her body. Her skin felt sticky with old sweat but the burning was gone, blessedly the burning was gone. Eyes heavy with her need for sleep, she moved to the ewer and began sponging off her body, enjoying the smooth slide of the cool water over her skin. She bent over the basin and poured water through her sweaty hair, shivering with pleasure at the coolness. By the time the hands came, she was dressed and ravenous.

  After her breakfast, she slept. She woke an hour before noon, feeling intensely alive. When she pulled on the latchhook the door opened before her; she circled down the spiraling stairs through tower and stone to the beach, walked along the surf, letting cold salt water coil about her feet. The brush-brush of the water and the warmth of the sun made her drowsy. She curled up on the sand and went to sleep.

  Several hours later she woke to find her lunch set on the sand beside her. She ate hungrily, then went paddling with quiet contentment among the shallows, refusing to think about her punishment. As the afternoon wore on, the shadow of the pain moved closer and closer until she could ignore it no longer. She sat on the sand, her knees drawn up, her forearms resting lightly on them, looking out across the water, wondering what the Noris was going to do to her. She shuddered as she remembered yesterday’s pain and knew she couldn’t endure that again, she’d do anything he wanted rather than endure that again. When she closed her eyes, she saw again the golden valley, knew she couldn’t let the Noris corrupt it, knew at the same time that she no longer had the strength to stop him. How the two pulls were going to balance, she couldn’t tell. She opened her eyes, stared out across the endless flat blue of the sea, wondering where the garden was with the great rambling structure that seemed to grow out of the mountainside and the life of all kinds that seemed so lush and contented. I’m going there. I’ll get away from here somehow. That’s where I belong. She twisted her head up and back, examining the black-brown stone of the cliff that extended into the stone blocks of the tower. The contrast between the life in the valley and the deadness in the stone made her stomach cramp with desire to be there not here; dimly she began to understand the Noris’s desire to possess that wonder, though by possessing it he would end it.

  Rubbing at her neck, she watched the creamy surf creep toward her toes. There were a few islands in sight, barren snags of rock. Beyond them she could see nothing but endless rolling sea. I don’t even know where land is, she thought. Or where that valley is. As she felt that intense desire for the valley, her eye-spot throbbed, tugged her head around until she looked to the southeast. “The valley?” she whispered. “Yes, yes.” She jumped to her feet, danced around and around on the sand. “I can find you, I can, I will, oh yes, I will.”

  The Noris left her alone all that day. She managed a good night’s sleep and spent the next day down on the sands trying to work out a way to cross the water, the blue barrier that mocked her efforts.

  Dawn was red in her window when the Noris shook her out of sleep on the next morning. He was standing over her, his face sad. He put his hand on her shoulder when she started to sit up, shook his head when she started to speak. After several moments of silence he spoke a WORD and left her. The pain was back.

  Morning again. She crawled to his feet, weeping and begging. He took the pain away. Again he held her while she shuddered and sobbed, again he left her, left her alone for three days. Each night she crawled back to her room, expecting more pain, but by the third day she began to hope her ordeal was over. He’d never punished her so long or hard before. She began to wonder if she really was betraying him. She loved him in spite of everything and wanted badly to please him. The valley—she didn’t know anything about it, perhaps it was a trap, only a trap. She shivered each time she thought of the pain, shivered again when she remembered the sadness in the dark luminous eyes of her father, friend and teacher.

  He stood by her bed the next morning. She tried to tell him that she surrendered, but he wouldn’t listen. He was measuring her strength by his and wouldn’t believe her. He spoke the WORD and left, almost running, pursued by her screams.

  This time the pain lasted two days. When he came back, she crawled to him, out of her mind with the torment, no will left in her. He spoke the WORD and the pain was gone, but she lay without moving, still sobbing, still pleading, not even aware that the fire was gone. When he lifted her and carried her to the bed, she cringed away from him, lost in terror, unable to think, unable to control her body. He blurred and cleared, blurred again as she tried to see his face. There was a sadness there but she was unable to relate to that. The terror was etched into her blood and bones. He sat on the bed beside her and tried to untangle her curls, not noticing how stiffly she lay, not noticing her lack of response. “Serroi, my little Serroi,” he murmured. “Don’t fight me, little one. Don’t make me do this to you, my little gate, my daughter.” His voice softened on the last word. “Daughter.” He stroked fingertips along her cheek. “The only daughter I can have in my condition. Be my shadow, Serroi, my other self. You told me once you wanted to be a Noris. That’s not possible, but you can learn more than most. We can be happy, Serroi. Together we can control all that exists.” He smoothed the curls off her forehead, but didn’t see how she trembled at his touch. Calm and content with what he had done, he left her.

  That evening he called her to the fireside and sat contentedly with her while she held herself stiff, shivering whenever he smiled at her or touched her. She hurt inside from remembered pain and from loss; tears gathered in her eyes and she blinked them back. She looked at the Noris’s quiet beautiful face and mourned because of the fear she couldn’t help, mourned joy gone without possibility of return.

  The next day he came for her. She was sitting in the middle of the bed, her legs crossed, her hands limp on her knees, staring blindly at nothing. When she saw him, she gasped and edged away, her head turning, searching blindly for a place to hide. There was no place to hide. The Noris smiled. “Come with me, Serroi.”

  For a moment she couldn’t move, then she placed her hand in his and slid off the bed. He spoke and they were transported to the mountainside above the golden valley. She looked sadly down at it then waited passively for him to use her.

  He turned her to face him and stood looking down into her eyes, one hand closed over her shoulder. His eyes grew and grew, great soft black circles. She stood frozen, blank with terror, waiting to feel him entering her—but her terror blocked him far more effectively than her earlier defiance. Though she was helpless to deny him, unable to protest any longer, she was equally unable to surrender to him; the terror was beyond her control. He raged and slapped her until she was sobbing. She tried to open for him, but he thought she was defying him again.

  He snapped them back to the tower and flung her on the bed.

  She scrambled on her knees to him, pleading. “I tried, Ser Nori
s. I tried. I’m not fighting you, please, please.”

  His fingers shaking with rage, he struck her hands away and set the pain on her again. Blinded by his own limitations, he could not see the difference in her and made his final and worst mistake, rendering her useless to him. He left her in pain for three days, then took it away, let her wander as she pleased along the shore. Though he stayed away, she could feel his fury and his disappointment around her wherever she went. Miserable and uncertain, she sat on the sand and watched the water come in.

  As the days passed, she relaxed tentatively, but still had little appetite for the food the hands brought her. She slept little and what sleep she got was broken by nightmares. The Noris continued to leave her to herself, perhaps because he hoped that time would heal her as it had done before.

  On the tenth day he came suddenly to her room and stood looking down at her as she lay frozen under the covers. It was very early, the sun still behind the horizon, sending up layers of red and gold. His face was a pale blur in the hazy light. She couldn’t breathe, her vision blurred, her heart pounded in her throat, drummed in her ears. She felt him trying to enter her and struggled to batter back the terror but could not. With a buzzing in her ears, she fainted.

  When she recovered he was gone. She waited, sick and faint, for his retaliation. Nothing happened. The day passed.

  More days passed. She ate little and slept less. Flesh melted from her bones. There were great dark circles under her eyes. Sometimes she thought she saw her mother standing in front of her, scolding her for something, though she couldn’t quite make out the words. Other times her brothers and sisters came and tormented her as cruelly as they had back on the tundra. At times the beach sand or the Sankoy rug turned to chill earth with its soft easily bruised grasses and thick scatter of spring blooms; the chinin would come and play with her, circling about her, barking with ecstatic joy, wrestling with each other, knocking her over, licking her face—then turning vicious, snarling and nipping at her, driving her into sobbing, screaming flight. At times, she knew these were hallucinations; other times she was lost in them. Sleeplessness and slow starvation weakened her until she seldom left her bed, but still she could not make herself sleep and could only force a little food down without bringing it up again.

  The Noris came and stood at the foot of her bed, his face troubled. “Serroi, why?” She stared at him terrified. “What can I do?” His voice was soft and unsure. She blinked and tears flooded her eyes. She reached toward him, her hand shaking. He took it, stood holding it a moment then moved close to her and pulled gently at one of her curls. Sobbing and shaking, she threw herself against him. He dropped onto the bed, holding her against him until the worst of the storm was past, sat stroking her fleecy curls, saying nothing only holding her. Finally he dried her eyes on the sheet, then laid her back. He touched her cheek, smiled and left her.

  Half an hour later he brought her a chini pup.

  Serroi shrank away, horrified eyes fixed on the pup.

  The Noris looked puzzled, then his dark eyes twinkled. “I don’t need any more chinin, Serroi. I brought this pup for you, to keep you company.” He scooped up the cowering chini and dumped him into Serroi’s lap.

  She let the pup sniff her fingers, then carefully scratched him behind the ears. When she looked up, the Noris was gone.

  A month slid past. Spring eased into summer. The days were long and hot but she spent hours on the sand playing with the chini pup. She slept better, ate with a good appetite; though she didn’t tan, her skin toughened and thickened as she splashed naked in the salt water or lay on the sand. Her tough resilient body rebounded into health and her strength returned.

  One morning she woke early with the chini pup whining in her ear. Blinking, apprehensive, she sat up wondering what was wrong.

  The Noris was standing at the foot of her bed, his face somber. He waited in silence while she rubbed the sleep from her eyes, then said, “Get dressed, Serroi.”

  She closed her eyes, stiff with fear. “The valley?” she whispered.

  “No. Do as I said, Serroi.”

  She scrambled into one of the white silk robes and pulled the soft slippers onto her feet. Hesitantly, her eyes on his still face, she took his hand.

  The room blinked out, changed into rolling hills of sand with scattered clumps of scraggly brush. The Noris spoke. A dark robe dropped onto the sand and rock beside him. He spoke again, a small WORD, and a banquet was spread out beside the robe, steaming savory food on delicate porcelain, wine in a single crystal glass, a crystal pitcher full of water.

  She glanced at the sun, frowned. It was a lot higher than it should be. When they left the room it was barely dawn. Here the morning was advanced enough for the sun to be the width of her hand above the horizon. And it was getting uncomfortably hot. She and the Noris were standing on a slight rise in the middle of the most barren and inhospitable land she’d ever seen. Her eye-spot vibrated but she could find no touch of life as far as she could reach—at least no larger forms, she wasn’t probing for lizards or rats. There were only ripples of rock and sand, cut across by straggling black lines where rainy season run-offs had eaten into the earth. She looked up at the Noris, wondering what she was doing here.

  He laid a hand a moment on her head, then stepped back. “Good-bye, Serroi.” And she was alone in the middle of a desert.

  THE WOMAN: IX

  Serroi stretched and yawned, then rolled out of her blankets. Dinafar was crouched over the fire, cutting the borrowed tabard into small pieces and dropping them onto the flames, making quite sure they burned to ash. When she saw Serroi sitting up, the girl smiled and put the cha pot onto the fire. “Good morning, meie. Sleep well?”

  “Mmmm.” Serroi smoothed her tunic down then began rolling her blankets into a compact cylinder. Humming a burring tune, she dealt with Dinafar’s blankets, then crawled from under the groundsheet, glanced up at the sky and gasped with dismay—half the morning was spent. “Dina, why’d you let me sleep so long? You know.…”

  Dinafar sniffed. “I know you were making yourself sick. You needed that sleep.” She tossed the last of the tabard into the fire. “I don’t see any virtue in rushing to get killed.”

  “Dammit, Dina.…” Scowling, Serroi ran her weapon-belt through her fingers, opened the pocket she was searching for and took out a small enamel case. “Quit trying to run my life.” She dipped fingertips into pale cream and started stroking it on her face. “You want to help, make sure I cover all of my face with this goo.”

  The water started bubbling in the cha pot. Its small lid bounced rapidly, letting out puffs of steam. Dinafar snatched the lid back, dumped in a handful of cha leaves; her hand protected by a fold of her skirt, she pulled the pot off the fire and set it on a flat stone beside her. “The macain have gone off somewhere.”

  “Just as well. As long as you’re coming with me, we can’t use them any more. Too conspicuous.” She sighed, began working the cream into the skin of her forehead, cursing softly as she tried to keep her tumbling tangled curls out of it. Holding her hair up, she scowled at Dinafar. “You really shouldn’t have let me sleep so long. Have I got it on smooth?”

  Dinafar’s green-brown eyes twinkled.

  “Stop grinning, girl, this is serious.”

  “Yes, meie, of course, meie.” Dinafar’s lips twitched again. She swallowed, smoothed her fingers along her throat. “You forgot your nose, meie.”

  “Hunh!” She dabbed hastily at her nose.

  All the spare gear cached high in one of the brellim, blankets and groundsheets tied onto rucksacks, rucksacks settled as comfortably as possible on their backs, Serroi and Dinafar stepped from the grove and started downhill to the Highroad. Serroi grimaced. “Crowded already.”

  Dinafar stumbled, caught herself. “I’ve never seen anything like that. How did they ever build it?”

  The Highroad ran straight as a knife slash from the Biserica in the south to Oras in the north. It was a twenty-foo
t-high embankment with the top smoothed flat and covered with a thick rubbery surface, a dull black tarlike substance. The top was perfectly level and wide enough for two farm carts to pass without crowding.

  Serroi tugged at the chin strap of the cap. She was rested and relaxed for the first time since she’d left Oras; no nightmares, not even any dreams she could remember to disturb a deep, deep sleep. The cap fit close to her head and was a minor irritation. She’d never liked wearing anything that covered her ears, but it was necessary as part of her disguise. She glanced at Dinafar. The girl was walking easily, looking down at the grass under her feet, a small satisfied smile quivering on her lips. “Cream-licker,” she murmured.

  Dinafar grinned, then she nodded at the Highroad. “How did that get built?”

  “The Domnor’s grandfather got tired of bad weather and muddy roads delaying his tax gatherers. He hired a second-rank Norit to build him a road that wouldn’t fall apart under the first storm. The sorcerer did it in a day and a night and old Kleorn paid him well. And squeezed the land to replace the money he’d laid out.” She waved a small gloved hand at the slope. “One used to pay tolls to use the road. Domnor Hern stopped that about ten years ago when his father died. Said the road’s paid for a dozen times over. No use forcing a lot of folk to spend coin for what they already owned. Irritated the hell out of Floarin and Lybor.”

  Dinafar smiled shyly at her, reminding Serroi how young she was. She felt a surge of affection for the girl, a gladness that she was out of that village trap.

  They climbed up the steep side of the embankment and eased unnoticed into the stream of humanity ambling along the black ribbon, most of the travelers heading north to Oras and the Moongather. The families traveling on foot moved steadily along, enjoying the day and the walk. At times macai riders came clawing through the mass, ignoring the protests of the walkers. Some of them were Plaz guards, their faces gaunt and weary, their green and black tabards thick with dust and stained with sweat. Others were Stenda, blond and arrogant, the men on high-bred macain of uncertain temper, women and girls in curtained wagons with huge iron-tired wheels. The Stenda pushed all walkers off the sides, paying no attention to curses and complaints, ignoring the men and women on foot as if they didn’t exist. Some were wealthy merchants on placid malekanim whose gold-plated horns stretched three feet on either side, winning their riders room without need for asking; their veiled wives sitting in open carts followed with less fuss but just as much arrogance. Now and then Sleykyn assassins rode by, swishing their velater hide whips on armored thighs. No one cursed or complained when they passed, only moved quickly out of the way.