Cold Fire (The Spiritwalker Trilogy)

by Kate Elliott

  We turned a corner onto a dusty lane shaded by trees. He led me in through an open gate to a sprawling courtyard with a cistern, a tree, and a two-story wing abutting the back. About a third of the space was taken up by tables and benches set out beneath a vine-swept latticed roof. Behind the tables stretched a counter like a bar in a tavern. To the left lay an open-air kitchen. In its shade, two girls were grating tubers into moist pulp.

  A healthily stout woman of middle age stood at a stone hearth, cooking on a griddle. Seeing Vai, she smiled as might an aunt who spots her favorite nephew come to visit. Seeing me, she abandoned the griddle to a girl and, wiping her hands on a cloth tied over her pagne and blouse, walked over to us.

  “Never tell me!” she said with a laugh.

  “Yes, this is Catherine.” He turned to me. “Catherine, this is Aunty Djeneba. She owns this lodging house.”

  “Peace to you, Aunty,” I said, in the village way, because she reminded me of the women of the Tarrant countryside and Adurnam’s markets for whom a long exchange of greetings was the measure of politeness. “Do you have peace?”

  “Good morning, Cat’reen,” she answered. “’Tis pleasing to make yee acquaintance.”

  “Cat is fine.”

  “Cat it shall be, then.”

  I wasn’t sure how to go on, so I glanced at Vai for help.

  “Catherine, I’m sure you’re hungry. Rice and peas, or fish?”

  I had never in my life been too stunned to eat. “Might I have both?”

  Aunty Djeneba smiled as if I had called her children the best-​mannered in the city. “’Tis good when a gal likes to eat,” she said with a knowing glance at Vai as if to congratulate him.

  I blushed, although I am sure I did not know why.

  “Things is still cooking, for it is early yet,” she added. “Yee like a bath first? Yee look a bit mucked. The gals shall fetch clean cloth, and yee shall wash and hang that yee have on.”

  “Yes, please,” I said with a reflexive courtesy, dipping my knees.

  Two girls somewhat younger than me hurried over giggling, and I wasn’t sure if it was me and my muck and my foreign manners they were giggling over or the fact that Vai had not yet let go of my hand.

  “Lad,” Aunty said as she patted flour dust off her hands, “yee run down to the harbor and get pargo from Baba. Cat shall still be here when yee get back.”

  “Will you?” he asked, looking at me as if he expected me to vanish in a puff of smoke.

  “Where else would I go?”

  The girls giggled. Aunty swatted them on the arms. His expression got more rigid. With an exhalation that could have been no more pained if he had been pulling a nail from his flesh, he released my hand. For an instant I thought he was going to grab it back, but Aunty nudged him.

  “Go on,” she said. All the folk in the compound—at this time of day five women, the two girls, an older man and a lad at the counter, plus two old men lounging in sling-backed chairs and an ancient crone likewise, and several toddling children—were watching with evident pleasure.

  He walked to the gate. There he halted to look back at me.

  “Go on, maku!” There was nothing insulting in her tone, despite what Drake had said about the word. She sounded positively affectionate.

  Still, he hesitated.

  “I will still be here when you come back,” I said, not adding: Where else do I have to go?

  With a grimace, he left.

  The girls led me past the big tree. In its shade two women were washing dishes in a trough fed by a pipe and drained by a ditch lined with ceramic. They greeted me with what appeared to be genuine kindness. Yet the lilt in their speech and the number of unknown words made them difficult to understand. Everything was so strange, and my head was beginning to hurt.

  Oh, glorious! A brick-paved platform behind screens made a washhouse. After I set aside my cane, the locket, and the stone, the girls took away all my clothing except for my jacket, which I draped over my arm to hide the bite. By a cunning mechanism with pipes, pumps, a big cistern below and a small one on the roof of the two-storied wing, water flowed through a sieve to create a waterfall of refreshingly cool water. In this shower, I scrubbed away salt and spume and grime with sweet-smelling soap.

  I dressed in fresh drawers and a sleeveless bodice tightly laced up like a vest with no blouse over or under it, which the girls assured me was perfectly acceptable attire for a young woman. I tugged the filthy jacket on over it anyway. They brought a green cloth whose print depicted a pattern of fans opening and shutting, which I wrapped for a skirt. Then they had me sit on one of the benches in the courtyard while they combed and braided my hair.

  The older girl had just finished tying off the end with a strand of beads when Vai returned with a bundle of wrapped paper. He took the bundle to the kitchen, washed his hands, and, at a word from Aunty Djeneba, grabbed a tray of drink and fruit she had prepared while I was bathing. He set it on the table and sat on the bench opposite me. Aunty called to the girls, and they giggled and left us alone.

  He poured liquid into a cup, which he pushed across to me. “You must drink, Catherine.”

  With his hands, he began to peel an orange object.

  I drank. “This juice is the best thing I’ve ever tasted.”

  He separated off a wedge of fruit and held it out. “Here.”

  It looked moist and cool, so I set down the cup and tried it. I had to close my eyes because the texture melted so sweetly inside my mouth.

  “Just spit out the seeds,” he said, holding out a piece of the peel.

  He fed me half the fruit wedge by wedge before I recollected myself and said, “You have some.”

  “You look sunburned and yet you’re pale beneath it, so you’ve got to eat,” he said. “You’d be cooler with that jacket off.”

  My healing bite itched like an accusation. “It comforts me to keep it on.”

  He shrugged, and fed me the rest.

  I licked the sticky juice from my fingers, watching him self-​consciously carve the knife through the peelings as he tried not to stare at me. “Am I still in the spirit world?” I asked.

  “No. Why would you think so?”

  “Are you really wearing a rope as a belt? Working as a carpenter?”

  Had he been a horse, I would have said he bridled. “It’s perfectly respectable work. I’m good at it.”

  “Of course you’re good at it. You’re good at everything you do.”

  “Is that meant as a criticism?”

  Here was the haughty Andevai I knew! The other one—the polite, caring one so intent on feeding me—was beginning to unsettle me. “Why would you think it a criticism? Mightn’t it have just been a description?”

  His mouth twitched down. “I’m not sure how I’m meant to answer that. Agree, and I’m proud and vain. Disagree…”

  “You’d still be proud and vain, and worse, you’d appear falsely humble. You, a cold mage of rare and unexpected potency. The favored son of Four Moons House.”

  “Is that what you think? That they favored me?”

  “You can’t mean they kicked you out?”

  “No. I just meant they resent me.”

  “Yes, I can understand that. A village boy raised to be a laborer whose entire clan serves Four Moons House in clientage. It must have been difficult for the young men raised in all the privilege of the house to see you walk in and best them all.”

  His mouth twitched up, shading his expression to one of nostalgic triumph. “They hated it.”

  “And they hated you, too, evidently. But the mansa cannot want to lose you. Nor would your family, for though you were taken away from them to serve as a cold mage, it was clear they love you. So why are you here?”

  “I might ask you the same question.”

  “Yes, you might. I’m amazed you haven’t yet done so.”

  He crossed his arms over his chest in a way that unfortunately displayed his muscular forearms to advantage. “Good
manners and simple common sense dictate that I should wait until you have a chance to eat.”

  I laughed.

  “Why are you laughing?” he demanded.

  “Why do you think I’m laughing?”

  “Why would I ask if I already knew?”

  “Don’t you remember our first meal together, at the inn in Adurnam? Weren’t you the one who kept rejecting every dish as not good enough for your consequence?”

  “Are you comparing that meal to this one?”

  “Comparing the food itself, or just your behavior?”

  He shoved the platter aside and rested both arms on the tables, gazing at me with a furrowed brow and head cocked to one side. “Why are you answering all my questions with questions?”

  “What makes you think I’m answering all your questions with questions?”

  “I can’t possibly imagine, Catherine.” He refilled the cup with juice, as if to give his hands something to do rather than throttle me. “Unless one supposed that hearing you answer all my questions with questions makes me think you are answering all my questions with questions.”

  “Yes,” I said hopefully. My lips parted as I released a breath.

  He raised the cup, took a swallow, and lowered it. “Catherine, you are answering all my questions with questions.”

  My heart began pounding as if I were running. “Yes, I am.”

  He turned the cup once all the way around. “Past experience suggests you may be doing it purposefully simply to annoy me.”

  “No, I’m not.” I slid the cup out of his hand. “Although it’s a tempting thought.”

  He propped his chin on a hand and considered me until I bit my lower lip. When he spoke, it was as if we were sharing a secret. “You and your cousin crossed into the spirit world in Adurnam. You met my grandmother there. Let me guess. You’re under some manner of binding.”

  “Yes!”

  “You have to answer questions with questions.”

  “Yes. Thank you for realizing!” I reached out impulsively to grasp both his hands.

  He looked down, eyes widening.

  I snatched my hands back and tucked them out of sight under the table.

  He made a business of coughing. “It’s easy enough to get around. You’re under a binding. If you can tell me what or who has set this binding on you, maybe I can help you break it.”

  A crow fluttered down to land on the roof of the building in back. Its gaze like a hammer nailed my mouth shut. I just sat there.

  Irritation flickered in the tightening of his eyes. Then a thought occurred to him, and his expression cleared. “It makes sense that a binding would bind you so you can’t speak of it.”

  “Cold magic can’t break this,” I whispered, warning him off, for that cursed crow was still watching us.

  “Don’t think you know what I can manage with regard to cold magic, Catherine.”

  “Here in the land of the lowly fire bane,” I agreed, noting how his gaze narrowed at the phrase. “You haven’t answered my question. What could possibly bring you to Expedition?”

  He looked past me. Rising, he left the table. Resolutely, I did not turn to watch him. He returned with a huge platter of steaming rice and peas topped by a slab of fish still sizzling from being fried in oil. The smell almost flattened me with its anticipatory aroma. He set down the platter and offered me utensils.

  “Don’t think to distract me from my question,” I muttered as my traitorous hand accepted spoon and knife.

  He smiled. I did not like that smile. That smile could peel the clothes right off a woman’s body.

  “Go on,” he said coaxingly.

  To my horror, I felt the heat of a blush rising just as if he had voiced that very suggestion and I was actually considering it.

  He rocked back, caught himself, and let out a deep breath.

  “Aunty makes the best rice and peas in the city,” he said in an altered tone.

  He dug in. The sight of him eating with such gusto shocked me into temporary immobility. Then the smell of the food seduced me. The rice and round beans had been cooked in a creamy milk, and had a peppery flavor not burning but warm. The fish was white and flaky and perfect. It was so good and I was so hungry.

  He paused. A disdainful frown creased his face. “Someone hasn’t been feeding you properly.”

  I dropped my gaze back to the food so I didn’t have to look at Vai in case he would guess that I was thinking of Drake, for it seemed obvious he was referring to Drake. “You still didn’t answer. What brought you to Expedition?”

  “A three-masted ship.”

  “Don’t lie to me!” I set down my spoon.

  “I didn’t lie to you. It was a three-masted ship. As for why I am here, I came to help my sister make a new life here.”

  “Kayleigh? And the mansa just let her go?”

  He tucked away several spoonfuls of the rice and peas as he considered. “Obviously it is not that simple, but it’s all I can say. If you thereby feel you cannot tell me what brings you to Expedition, then I will understand your reluctance to trust me. But you must know, Catherine, even if you can or wish to say nothing, I will give you whatever shelter and help you need. Anything.”

  The word hit so hard I closed my eyes briefly out of sheer gratitude and relief. I was not alone and friendless. But I had to be pragmatic. “Anything encompasses a great deal. I have nothing except the clothes on my back and my sword. And my father’s locket, which I have thanks to you.”

  “I won’t abandon you.”

  Mercifully he did not add as your lover evidently did, but when he looked at me with that accusatory gaze, I knew he knew I knew he was thinking it.

  “Thank you.” I lowered my gaze to the mundanity of the platter. Gracious Melqart! Between us, we had eaten through almost all of it. “Are you sure we’re not still in the spirit world?”

  “I’m sure. But I wonder why you might think so.”

  “I just never saw you eat like a normal person before. You said once that cold magic fed you. Doesn’t it here?”

  “The secret belongs to those who know how to keep silent.”

  The words ought to have annoyed me, but instead they reminded me of the other thing I possessed. I fished the stone from the jacket’s hem. “I found…this.” I handed it to him.

  He gasped.

  “Your grandmother walked with us for a while. I must say, she scolded me on your behalf. She favors you. It was very irritating.”

  His smile twitched but did not quite bloom. Wisely, he said nothing.

  “Then she was caught in the tide of a dragon’s dream. It swept over her, and she was gone.”

  “Not gone, Catherine. Changed.”

  I dropped my voice to a whisper. “Is the stone your grandmother?”

  “Of course it isn’t my grandmother!”

  “Her—uh—her soul, then?”

  “What odd notions you hold, Catherine. Is this some sort of Phoenician belief ?”

  “Can’t you remember that it is properly Kena’ani, not Phoenician?”

  “I beg your pardon. You told me before, and I forgot.” He closed his fingers over the stone. “Something of my grandmother touches this stone. By holding it close, we are close to her. If we sit down to a meal and pour the first drops of our wine on the stone, then she will be called to dwell close beside us.” He rose, still clutching the stone. “If you’ll excuse me…”

  “Go and do what is proper. I’ll see if Aunty needs help.”

  He took a step away but turned back to brush my hand with his own as if checking to make sure I was a solid creature and not an illusion woven out of light like the one he had once woven of my face. He walked to the two-story wing, hurried up the stairs, and vanished into a room.

  If I had a thought, I am sure it was too faint to register. At length, I stopped staring after him. I finished the food and carried the tray back to the kitchen sideboard.

  “A good appetite is a precious thing,” Aunty Djeneba
remarked. She was back at the griddle.

  “The food was splendid. My thanks. Can I help in some way? I’m a good worker. I know how to sew, cook, read, and write. I must tell you, I have nothing, no coin, no possessions, nothing but my labor to offer you.”

  “Yee’s married to Vai, is yee not?”

  I blinked. At least four times. I had no idea what my expression looked like, but Aunty Djeneba glanced away, and the girls giggled.

  “Is that what he told you?” I demanded.

  She considered me thoughtfully. “Everyone around here know the story. He and he sister come here six months ago. He is handsome and charming. He work hard. Know how to make friends. He manners is so very good, I should like to meet he mother. Such a young man is like a flower. The gals will come round to see if they can pluck it. But yee know, Cat, never a hint of that with him. Always he is talking about the gal he lost, that one he married. How can he look at another when he don’ know what had become of she he had lost? Yee know all this, don’ yee?” She grasped my arm. “Yee need to sit down?”

  “Why would I need to sit down?” But I could not get out the other questions foaming up in my thoughts: How had the world come unmoored? Who was this baffling personage pretending to be my husband the arrogant cold mage? Was I actually going to be safe here? How could I save Bee?

  “Yee’s looking unsteady, gal.” She guided me to a sling-backed chair next to a toothless old woman who smiled at me but spoke no word. “Sit.”

  I sank into the sway-backed canvas and shut my eyes, overcome by a sense of extreme disorientation and by the unrelenting heat.

  I dozed off. When I woke, the shadows had drawn long across the courtyard and a dozen children of varying ages were standing in a semicircle watching me with great round stares. As soon as my open eyes registered, one of the little lads raced across the courtyard over to the long counter where men gathered, drinking and talking. Vai was deep in conversation with men his own age who looked vaguely familiar, likely carpenters from the yard, the ones I’d thought had been teasing him. Except they hadn’t been teasing him at all.

  Someone laughed; a couple of the men made sparring gestures, play fighting. The little lad tugged on Vai’s arm, and he turned. His gaze met mine, and he made excuses and threaded through the crowd and over to the shelter. The children crowded around as he crouched beside me.