The Horsemen's Gambit bots-2

by DAVID B. COE

  Grinsa nodded. "Of course." He started to ride ahead again, then fell back once more. "Thank you, Q'Daer."

  "For what?"

  "I didn't want to talk about this, but I'm glad we did."

  Q'Daer started to say something, but then stopped himself, his eyes fixed on something to the north. Grinsa turned to look that way as well, and at first saw nothing.

  "What is it?" he asked.

  "I thought I saw a cart on the horizon."

  They both slowed to a halt, still gazing northward. After some time Grinsa began to wonder if Q'Daer had imagined it. But then the Fal'Borna pointed.

  "There." He stood in his stirrups. "They've turned. I think they're trying to avoid us."

  Grinsa stood as well, and after scanning the plain for several moments finally spotted what the Fal'Borna had seen. It was little more than a dark speck in the distance and he was amazed that Q'Daer had noticed it at all, much less known what it was. But the form was definitely creeping along the horizon, angling away from them.

  "A merchant?" Grinsa asked.

  "Quite likely. But we should find out for certain."

  Looking back at the two Eandi, Q'Daer signaled to them that they should turn to the north. And the four of them rode toward that distant dark form.

  Chapter 11

  F'MENUA'S SEPT, THE CENTRAL, PLAIN

  Snice the day Cresenne ja Terba had arrived in this settlement with Grinsa and little Bryntelle she had known that she had no standing of her own among the Fal'Borna. They were a patriarchal clan who judged men by the magics they wielded and their skills in battle. As a Weaver, Grinsa had been welcomed immediately. The Fal'Borna saw in him a man who could make them stronger in the eyes of friend and foe alike.

  But though Cresenne wielded three magics of her own-fire, healing, and gleaning-and back in the Forelands had been viewed as a powerful sorcerer in her own right, here she was seen as little more than a companion for Grinsa, and a poor one at that. Among the Fal'Borna, Weavers were expected to be joined to Weavers. Since she was just an ordinary Qirsi, the men and women of E'Menua's sept did not recognize her as Grinsa's wife. When first they arrived, everyone referred to her as his "concubine." Grinsa and she took exception, and by and large the Fal'Borna stopped calling her this, but that was still how they treated her. And she never doubted that most of the Fal'Borna considered Bryntelle Grinsa's bastard child.

  Cresenne had made peace with all of this; at least she had tried. Occasionally she still overheard people speaking of her as "the concubine" and speculating on who Grinsa might eventually marry, and it made her blood boil. But for now at least she and Bryntelle were stuck here, and Cresenne knew she had little choice but to endure these slights as best she could.

  Only with Grinsa's departure, however, had she begun realize just how much their family had come to depend on the kindnesses shown by the sept to a new Weaver. Upon their arrival, they had been given a z'kal, one of the light but sturdy Fal'Borna shelters; each night food had been provided for them-Cresenne wasn't even certain where it came from; every morning fresh wood had been placed outside their z'kal so that they might build a fire and keep warm.

  The shelter was still theirs. But once Grinsa left, the food vanished, as did the wood. Gathering wood wasn't much of a problem, though she had to borrow a hatchet from her new friend F'Solya, and, because the other families of the sept had already gathered wood for the coming Snows, she had to range farther from the settlement in order to find enough to see them through. Still, she could hardly complain.

  Food, however, proved to be a much more difficult problem. Unlike the rest of the Fal'Borna, Grinsa and Cresenne hadn't been there to plant crops earlier in the year, nor to hunt rilda earlier in the Harvest. Beyond the meager supplies they'd had when they arrived, they had no food stores on which to rely during the colder turns.

  They still carried ample amounts of gold, most of which Grinsa had left with Cresenne. Gold only helped so much, though, when there was so little to buy in the sept's small marketplace. Cresenne went every morning, hoping to find peddlers from whom she could buy food, but on many days the marketplace was virtually empty, and even on those days when it wasn't, she found little food for sale.

  Bryntelle was still nursing, and Cresenne was able to make do with what little she had each morning and at midday, but by the evening Cresenne was famished, and she knew that if she didn't eat well, her child would suffer as well.

  By the fifth day after Grinsa left, Cresenne was already growing weak from not eating enough. She slept poorly and woke later than she had intended. She went to tan rilda skins as she usually did, but arrived well after most of the other women, including F'Solya.

  Her friend looked over at her as Cresenne sat in her usual spot and reached for her first hide and the foul tannins the Fal'Borna used to soften the skins.

  "Trouble waking up this morning?" F'Solya asked, a smile on her round face, her bright golden eyes shining in the morning light.

  Cresenne nodded. "A bit, yes."

  F'Solya's smile faded. "You don't look well." She leaned toward Cresenne and laid the back of her hand against Cresenne's cheek. "You don't have a fever. Are you feeling all right?"

  Cresenne made herself smile. "I'm fine. Just… just tired."

  The Fal'Borna woman frowned. "I don't believe you. Is your little one sick?"

  "No, Bryntelle's perfectly well." She smiled again, and this time it was genuine. She longed for Grinsa's return, but there could be no denying that she had at least one friend who cared about her. "I promise you, F'Solya: I'm fine."

  "You miss your man, don't you?"

  "Very much."

  F'Solya nodded knowingly. "That can be an illness of a sort."

  For a long time they simply worked, saying nothing. After a while, F'Solya began to tell her stories about her family and other people she'd known in the sept. It was something she did often and Cresenne had come to enjoy the tales quite a lot. She knew only a few of the people F'Solya mentioned, but hearing the stories taught her a good deal about the history of E'Menua's sept, and even about the ways of the Fal'Borna clan. That, she thought, may have been why F'Solya told them in the first place.

  Near midday, they paused in their work for a meal. As usual, two of the younger girls who cared for the children while the mothers worked brought Bryntelle and F'Solya's twin boys so that the infants could be fed. After the young ones had been nursed, the girls took them away again, leaving the mothers to eat. Cresenne had only a few pieces of dried fruit and a small block of cheese, which she ate in just moments. When she had finished, she reached for her skins again. F'Solya was still eating.

  "That's all you brought for today?" the woman asked between mouthfuls. F'Solya had a huge amount of food in front of her. Fruit, cheese, bread, dried rilda meat; a veritable feast. At least it seemed so to Cresenne.

  "I'm not very hungry," Cresenne said, intent on the hide she was holding.

  F'Solya shook her head. "I couldn't live on the crumbs you eat. Not with those boys crying for milk a hundred times a day. It's amazing to me that…" She trailed off, her eyes fixed on the food before her. She even stopped chewing. At last, she swallowed and looked at Cresenne. "Where have you been getting your food?"

  Cresenne shrugged, not meeting her gaze. "We had some with us while we were journeying, and I've bought some in the marketplace."

  "They were feeding you before, weren't they?"

  A faint smile crossed Cresenne's lips and was gone. "They were feeding Grinsa. I just happened to eat some of what they gave him."

  "And now that he's gone, they've stopped."

  "It's all right, F'Solya."

  "No, it's not. I realize now, you don't look ill, you look half starved."

  "It's not that bad."

  "You and your daughter will have your evening meal with us tonight."

  "That's really not-"

  "Don't argue with me," F'Solya said, sounding more like a stern parent than a friend.
>
  She smiled to soften the words, but Cresenne could tell that she was serious, and also that she was concerned. And thinking about it, Cresenne decided that she had cause to be. How long could Cresenne expect to go on eating as she had been before she did become ill? There were times when pride mattered more than other considerations, but this, she realized, wasn't one of them.

  "All right," she said, smiling. "Thank you."

  It wouldn't solve their problem beyond this one night, but at least for this day she would be able to enjoy some adult conversation with her supper. At least on this night, she wouldn't feel that she was so utterly alone in the sept. The thought of it should have been enough to raise her spirits. It wasn't.

  The more she considered the matter, the more she realized how dire her situation had grown. It must have been her imagination, but she could actually feel the air growing colder, as if the Snows were determined to begin today. Where was she going to get food? She was as capable as anyone-before Grinsa entered her life she had never needed a man to keep her fed and clothed and sheltered.

  Any other time of year, she would have gladly planted her own crops, or even learned how to hunt, if only the Fal'Borna allowed their women to do so. Now, though, there was nothing she could do. Would F'Solya feed her every night? She dismissed the idea immediately. It was too much to ask of anyone, and Cresenne didn't want to become a burden on her friend and her family. Already, just because of this one invitation, she felt as though she had become a beggar and made one of her daughter. She knew that F'Solya would scoff at her for feeling this way, and that she was being foolish. Still, she couldn't help herself.

  "Perhaps I can bring something," she said after a lengthy silence. "The cheese we've been eating is quite good, and so is-"

  "Stop it," F'Solya said, a kind smile on her face. "The idea isn't for us to eat what little food you have left. It's to give you a decent meal so that you can take care of your little girl."

  Cresenne relented with a nod, and she said nothing more about the supper until they had finished working. After they put their skins and tannins away for the evening, they retrieved their children from the care of the younger girls and made their way to F'Solya's z'kal.

  Their shelter was somewhat larger than Grinsa and Cresenne's and within, a bit more cluttered, but in most ways the z'kal felt familiar. Cresenne marveled that it should be so. She and Grinsa had only been with the Fal'Borna for a short while, and she still remembered how alien everything about the sept had felt for the first few days.

  F'Solya picked some roots from her stores and placed them in a cooking pot, which she took back outside. Cresenne followed her, feeling useless.

  "I should be helping you," she said.

  The woman shook her head. "I do this every day. If you want to help, you can keep an eye on my boys, particularly I'Jeq." She pointed as she spoke so that Cresenne would know which of the twins she meant. It seemed amazing to her that F'Solya could tell them apart, they looked so alike.

  Cresenne sat on a low stone, and quickly came to understand why F'Solya wanted the boy watched. Unlike his brother, I'Jeq had learned to crawl, and he seemed to delight in careering from one danger to the next. If he wasn't reaching for F'Solya's knife, he was crawling toward the hatchet that leaned against their woodpile, or toward the fire that his mother had just kindled. Bryntelle, who wasn't crawling yet either, watched him with fascination and delight, clapping her hands and squealing each time Cresenne had to scramble after him.

  "He moves so fast," Cresenne said after rescuing him from the hatchet a second time. "How do you ever get anything done?"

  "Wait until they both can get around like that," F'Solya said, a rueful smile on her face. "I swear I don't know if they're most likely to kill each other or themselves or me. But no good will come of it."

  Cresenne smiled, then stopped the boy from diving headlong into the fire. "I suppose I'll be putting up with this before long."

  "Girls are easier," F'Solya said, sounding sure of herself. "At least at this age."

  F'Solya didn't have daughters of her own, but it occurred to Cresenne that in a settlement this small she would have watched parents raising their children since she was old enough to walk. Cresenne, on the other hand, had spent her early years traveling with the festival in Wethyrn, back in the Forelands. There hadn't been many families in the festival, and she'd had few friends her own age, much less opportunities to watch mothers and fathers bringing up their children. She'd always counted herself fortunate to have grown up with the festival, traveling the land with her mother. Until this moment, she had never stopped to consider that she might have missed out by not living in some quiet village in a remote corner of the Wethy Crown. But listening to her friend speak, she found herself wishing that she understood the ways of children so well.

  F'Solya retreated into the z'kal for several moments and emerged again bearing several small pouches. "Herbs," she said, seeing Cresenne's puzzled look. "Some we grow here. Others I trade for. Most Fal'Borna think that silverroot and rilda have enough flavor on their own." She wrinkled her nose. "I don't. I was bored with the taste of rilda before the end of my second four." She opened each of the pouches in turn and dropped small amounts of the herbs into her stew. In moments, the air around the z'kal was redolent with the aromas of thyme, watermint, and several other herbs that Cresenne had never smelled before.

  "What did you put in there?" she asked.

  F'Solya appeared surprised. "Surely you have herbs in the Forelands."

  "Some, yes. The thyme and watermint I know. But the rest…" She shook her head.

  "We call it rivermint here, but I'm sure it's the same thing. I also put in rildagreen, which grows here on the plain, and Qosantian sage."

  "Can I smell them?"

  F'Solya handed her the pouches and Cresenne sniffed lightly at each one. The Qosantian sage reminded her of sages she'd had in the Forelands, but it was sweeter, more pungent. "They're lovely," she said, handing the pouches back to F'Solya.

  "The next time we're in the marketplace together I'll show you where you can find them."

  F'Solya took the herbs back into her z'kal. Cresenne steered I'Jeq away from the knife once more.

  As F'Solya reemerged from the shelter she smiled and waved her hand over her head. "Here comes I'Joled."

  Cresenne's eyes snapped up, first to her friend, and then to the burly man approaching the z'kal. Until that moment, despite playing with the twin boys, she had forgotten completely about F'Solya's husband. Now she felt a rush of fear, though she wasn't certain why. I'Joled had no reason to dislike her; the fact that F'Solya had befriended her should have made him more inclined to accept her as a guest. But she knew that people in the sept had been speaking of her and of Grinsa since their arrival, and that to many she was nothing more than the woman who shared the new Weaver's bed.

  I'Joled slowed when he spotted her, the smile fading from his face. He was a handsome man, like so many of the Fal'Borna warriors, with his golden skin, long white hair, and pale yellow eyes. He wasn't much taller than F'Solya-Grinsa would have towered over him-but he was barrel-chested and broad in the shoulders.

  "Who's this?" he asked in a deep voice, his eyes straying to F'Solya's face for just an instant before studying Cresenne once more.

  But Cresenne was sure that he knew already. How could he not?

  "This is Cresenne," F'Solya said evenly. She pointed at Bryntelle with the end of her stirring spoon. "And that's her daughter, Bryntelle. A beauty, isn't she?"

  F'Solya must have heard the wariness in her husband's voice. Cresenne had never met the man, and she heard it. But her friend seemed to ignore it, and so Cresenne made herself to do the same.

  She stood and forced a smile. "It's nice to meet you, I'Joled. Thank you for allowing me to sup with your family tonight."

  He looked at F'Solya, who just stared back at him. Finally, he faced Cresenne again. "Of course." After a moment he added, "You're welcome." He entered the
z'kal, pausing at the entrance to glance at F'Solya. The Fal'Borna woman smiled thinly. "Excuse me for just a moment," she said before entering the shelter as well.

  Cresenne heard I'Joled say something, though she couldn't make out the words.

  "She has no food," F'Solya answered. "The a'laq had food brought to them while her man was still here, but now they have nothing."

  I'Joled said something else.

  "Oh, we have plenty, and you know it. In fact I've been thinking that we ought to let her come here every night until her man comes back."

  This time she heard I'Joled's response clearly. "And what if he doesn't come back? What then?"

  "Shhh!"

  Cresenne couldn't make out anything more after that, but a few moments later F'Solya came out of the shelter, paused briefly in front of Cresenne, and then crossed to her pot of boiling stew.

  "I'm sorry about that," she said quietly.

  Cresenne feared that she might weep. Loneliness, fear for Grinsa, embarrassment; she couldn't say which lay heaviest on her heart at that moment. Probably all three. "Maybe we should go," she said, walking to where Bryntelle still sat, playing with the grass and dirt around her and watching the crawling boy.

  "No need for that." F'Solya wrapped a cloth around the handle of her pot and lifted it from the fire. "Let's get these children inside. The food's ready."

  It took some time to arrange the children and serve out the food, but soon enough they were all seated around a small fire in the z'kal, eating the stew, which was wonderful. Cresenne made quick work of one bowl and shyly asked for a second. F'Solya grinned and spooned her more. Cresenne sensed that I'Joled was watching her and she assumed that he disapproved, but she didn't look his way, and he said nothing. In fact, for a long time no one spoke, though Bryntelle and the boys made enough noise for all of them. Eventually F'Solya and I'Joled shared a look and the man put his bowl down on the floor, threw another stick of wood on the fire, and looked Cresenne in the eye.