Ancient Light

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Ancient Light Page 20

by Mary Gentle


  ‘How long is it since we left Maherwa?’ I asked. ‘It must be more than two weeks.’

  ‘Twenty-five days,’ Haldin Damory said; sipped the arniac, and made a face. ‘What I wouldn’t give for good Morvrenni siir-wine … Yes, you look well. As far as I can tell, with s’aranthi.’ And she grinned.

  ‘I am “well”,’ I said. Knowing as I spoke that it was true, that somehow – at some level below the conscious – I could hold it all in balance: memory, vision and the past. I haven’t resolved the problem, but I’ve learned to live with uncertainty.

  ‘You picked the right time,’ Haldin said approvingly, as she leaned back against the wall, and put her booted feet up on another bench. ‘Our contract runs out in two days. I’d thought of just taking you up the Archipelago, to Morvren Freeport, whether you liked the idea or not – your people in the Freeport might have given my Guildhouse a reward!’

  She chuckled. She would have done it: bundled me on to one of the coast jath-rai, like any other piece of cargo.

  ‘But I don’t want to leave the Coast right now,’ she added. ‘There’s going to be a beautiful fight, t’an.’

  Her enthusiasm was unselfconscious, unashamed.

  ‘There were going to be talks …’ That memory came clear, unbidden. I blinked in the soft mirror-light. Why, it’s gone, I thought. That fog in the head, synaesthesia; gone. I am I, and I know what I know, and the rest is – under my control …

  I smiled at Haldin. ‘Talks between some of the Coast hiyeks and the Hundred Thousand, I remember it being talked about back when I was in the Freeport. Has that happened yet? Or is it over? Or what?’

  She put the curled black mane back from her eyes with one sword-calloused hand, and her dark gaze cleared. ‘Now that’s sensible, t’an, that’s knowledgeable. That isn’t the puling babe I’ve had to nurse from Maherwa to Kasabaarde.’

  Her words hurt. I stood, and walked a few paces to where the underground hall’s ornamental pool lay still and gleaming. Under water, the soft gleam of chiruzeth. The water’s surface showed me a thin face, with dirt ingrained in the tanned skin; hair bleached by the Coast sun. I dipped my fingers in the water and rubbed at my skin, but the paleness round my eyes remained. Of course: I would have been wearing a mask to travel …

  Clear, now, these memories: the metal decks of jath-rai and canal ships, too hot to walk on in the noon sun. Flat land where only the water moves: no rashaku fly, there are no clouds. Only heat-stricken earth. Brown and umber, ochre and black, white and grey. A sea as bright as broken glass. Descending into siiran: the curiosity on pale-maned faces. Midday rests and midnight travel, and I do not recall ever speaking; not to Haldin, not to the telestre mercenaries, not to the Coast Ortheans, whose bright robes are worn and patched, who live crowded under the earth, hiding from that inhuman heat.

  Twenty-five days, heat building to monsoon; all the thousand hiyeks between Maherwa and Kasabaarde; north and west, four hundred miles. And for the last twenty-five days, I’ve walked in a dream.

  Now I’m free of it, I must act.

  ‘So many jath-rai in the harbour settlements.’ I turned to sit on the rim of the pool, facing Haldin. ‘Stormsun isn’t the best season for trade. Why so many ships?’

  Haldin stretched her lean arms restlessly. Her six-fingered hands moved to the harur-blade harness. Ten years ago, when I first came to Kasabaarde’s inner city, they took my belt-knife at the gatehouse. I had been living an Orthean life long enough to feel the lack of it.

  ‘I’m not a Crown Messenger,’ she said dourly. ‘Not even a S’aranth’s Messenger, if there was such a thing. I fight, I don’t spy or collect intelligence. But it’s simple enough. Those jath-rai are warships. The hiyek-families are going to massacre each other, just for a favourable glance from your Company.’

  That thought seemed to cheer her.

  ‘They mustn’t fight. Jesus wept! Molly will have the Company’s Peace Force in to protect our interests –’

  No longer “our” interests. Not any more.

  Haldin said, ‘The great hiyek-families are in Kasabaarde now, talking with us, and with each other. You wait. They’ve been here all of Stormsun. I give it nine days, outside, before they fall out. Then I’ll pick a likely side for my troop, and …’

  Again, that grin. Difficult to hold the thought: what this woman looks forward to with such enthusiasm is harur-blades and winchbows and – for all the bloodless chessboard strategy of mercenary wars on the Coast – inevitable casualties.

  ‘In Morvren Freeport …’ It seems longer than a month ago. ‘It isn’t just the hiyeks, is it? I’ve heard talk. What will you do, Haldin, if the Coast hiyeks attack the Hundred Thousand?’

  Haldin hooked one booted foot up on to the opposite knee, gripping her ankle with thin six-fingered hands. She shook her head with lazy cheerfulness.

  ‘You mean invasion, instead of just raids? Ah, it’ll never come to that. There’s no chance of it. The hiyeks can’t be allies for long enough. They never have. Cuirduzh is going to fall out with Thelshan, and Pelatha with Anzhadi, and … you take my word on it, t’an S’aranth. We’ve only got to keep them talking for a few more days. Then it’ll all fall apart.’

  ‘And if it doesn’t?’

  Haldin put long fingers through her tangled mane, and looked at me with good-natured superiority. ‘T’an, it will.’

  She paused. ‘Is there anything else, before we end the contract?’

  There were footsteps and voices in the dome above, but no one came down the steps. I dabbled one hand in the pool and watched the ripples, and then glanced at Haldin. At least part of her expression was contempt. But she’s seen me all those days between Maherwa and here, I thought, and so there’ll be that certain amount of contempt. When I think back to then, I could agree with her.

  ‘Two things you can tell me, t’an Haldin. I seem to remember … did I ask some of your mercenaries to stay behind in Maherwa?’

  ‘To discourage the Harantish exiles. Shanataru and bel-Rioch.’ She shrugged. ‘You wouldn’t have them killed. They didn’t frighten. Don’t you remember Ty and Gabril caught up with us at Quarth? Said the two Harantish had at last got speech with your t’an Rachel.’

  When each visual image, each sound, each smell, plunges you into a flood of memory – no, one can’t tell what is happening from what has happened.

  ‘How long have I been here in Kasabaarde?’

  ‘Two days.’

  She grew more tense moment by moment, it was visible in the taut line of her back. I have known Ortheans who refuse to enter the inner city of Kasabaarde at all. There is no place on Orthe remotely like it – not even Kasabaarde’s Tower.

  ‘Let’s go outside, shall we?’ I led the way up the steps, out of the dome, and into the air.

  The noon air felt hot and heavy with storms. We stood under the del’ri-cloth awning. The haze thickened to cloud. Heat-lightning flickered over the dome-roofs, and as we watched, raindrops fell like metal bullets to spatter in the dust. Within thirty heartbeats the dust was mud, rain falling in rods, and springing up again a foot high in spray.

  I asked, ‘Do you know where the envoy Clifford is now?’

  ‘He’s here.’ The female raised her voice a little, to be heard over the drumming rain.

  I smiled ruefully. ‘I’ve been something of an idiot … I thought I had to do it all on my own. Someone once said to me: a world is too big for one person’s responsibility. Or even many people. But we’re all there is. I do have friends. We’ll have to see what we can do.’

  Haldin frowned. ‘T’an, I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

  ‘Just thinking aloud, that’s all.’

  The rain eased quickly. Rings spread and faded on the alley puddles, where the last drops struck. Haldin peered out at the sky, moved down the shallow steps; and then spun round as the Su’niar female came to the archway behind her.

  In accented north-west Coast dialect, Haldin muttered, ‘Your pardon
, shan’tai; here, take this –’

  The Order House female shook her head, smiling a gentle refusal of the coins offered. Haldin turned abruptly and strode away. As I caught up with her, she glanced back at the Ortheans who sprawled by the Order House, and as if she spoke to herself protested, ‘But people can’t just do nothing!’

  That was my instinctive reaction when I came here, ten years ago. I let her walk a little further and then said, ‘Where’s t’an Clifford now?’

  ‘One of the Order Houses near Westgate; Cir-nanth, Gethfirle; I don’t know.’ Membrane veiled her eyes, though the clouded sky was not bright. ‘T’an, you don’t need mercenaries here!’

  ‘Medued Guildhouse can owe me the two days’ service,’ I said. ‘Leave when you need to, t’an Haldin.’

  She walked away, with no other farewell, heedless of the rain’s last drops that soaked her mane and tunic, hurrying back towards the inner city’s wall and gatehouse, where she had left harur-nilgiri and harur-nazari. Going back to where people can’t just do nothing. What she hadn’t said, but what had been plain in her face from the moment she entered the inner city, was, This place is a mad-house! Certainly it’s inexplicable, I thought. What will PanOceania make of it?

  I turned and began walking briskly through the muddy alleys, going towards Cir-nanth and Gethfirle and the other Westgate Order Houses. I passed several Ortheans gathered under one of the del’ri-cloth awnings. One called out, accent thick, hostility apparent. I walked on, heart hammering.

  The alleys widened into avenues, still lined with low white domes. Kazsis-vine budded on the curving walls, and an ash-blue plant grew along the base of the domes. Rashaku called. Despite the cloud and heat, the ground under my bare feet was cold, and when I looked down I saw the scratched translucent surface of chiruzeth, the underground canal waters dimly visible beneath.

  And this too was a city of the Golden Witchbreed.

  At the end of that long avenue I stopped a young, white-maned Orthean female. ‘Are there s’aranthi here?’

  She looked up with veiled eyes. ‘Oh yes, shan’tai. And some of them wear Orthean faces.’

  She walked a few yards and then knelt down, and began to wipe the mud from the steps of the nearest Order House with bare six-fingered hands.

  ‘Lynne? Lynne!’

  Bemused, I swung round; and before I knew it, Doug Clifford gripped my hands and then hugged me (which seemed to surprise him rather more than it did me). The twenty-five days since I’d seen him had wrought changes; Carrick’s Star had tanned that lined skin, begun to bleach the sandy-red hair. To Service coveralls he had added Orthean boots and belt-knife. Now he stepped back a pace and looked me up and down, still the same small, neat man.

  ‘Lynne, is that you?’

  ‘Ah, I see – the difficult questions first, eh?’

  He snorted, shook his head, regarding me with wonder. I thought, This is one of the few times I’ve ever seen you speechless.

  ‘Haldin Damory told me you were in Kasabaarde,’ I remarked. ‘Why the inner city, though? Or is that because of these talks between the hiyeks and the Hundred Thousand –’

  ‘Jesus Christ, woman! You’ve been gone for a month, the Company’s got you on the missing persons list, and now you come back and ask me questions!’

  The livid sky shed a few drops of rain, but he took no notice. Faces appeared at Order House entrances, made curious by the sound of a foreign language, and this man so plainly s’aranthi. He frowned. Then he shook his head again, helplessly.

  ‘I don’t believe it! The difference between the way you were then and the way you are now – Lynne, why didn’t you let me know where you were? Of all the irresponsible, stupid actions …’ He paused, recovering a little of his natural reserve. Then he added: ‘You have no idea what I’ve been afraid of for you. Which is somewhat imperceptive of me, I don’t doubt; I seem to recall that in your Service days you made a habit of going walkabout.’

  ‘It was stupid,’ I said meekly. ‘It’s nice to see you too, Douggie.’

  He fixed his mouth in a prim line, then laughed. ‘Why do I even try?’

  ‘Let’s take it that was a rhetorical question.’ I linked my arm through his. ‘Can we talk inside? I think it’s going to rain again.’

  Doug Clifford looked appealingly at the heavens. ‘She vanishes for a month, and then she turns up out of nowhere and talks about the weather. Why me? What did I do to deserve her?’

  I could do nothing but laugh, still knowing he used that humour to distance himself from some very real emotion. We walked a few yards to an Order House, and entered the dome. The rain-twilight gave an odd luminous glow to the walls inside. In the underground chambers there would be no mirror-reflected light now, and so we sat in the ground-level chamber. An Order-robed ashiren brought arniac.

  Clifford walked to the window, and looked out. That self-observing theatricalism vanished.

  ‘David Osaka and the Ishida girl are here. Or do you know that? Have you seen them? I wasn’t aware that you would attend these talks.’

  ‘Or that I’d been in any condition to do so.’ I sidestepped the questions: ‘I could say the same thing to you.’

  His face was turned away. I could see his expression.

  ‘The Rachel woman gave me a choice. Stay out of the Company’s dealings in Maherwa, or find myself recalled to the next world on this circuit. So I came here, to Kasabaarde. I should have had to attend these talks in any case. Or so I tell myself. The Company’s busy in Maherwa. You know the Harantish have let Rachel put a research team into the canal system?’

  Fear at last realized into reality: it made me go cold. I had a vision of that dome and pillars, of Calil bel-Rioch’s golden-eyed face. No need to ask which Harantish. Does she want the Company as an ally, or is she just hitting back at the Emperor in Kel Harantish?

  ‘Have they come up with an analysis?’

  ‘Lynne, I’d be the last to hear.’

  A flash of lightning illuminated the low dome, and a moment after, thunder crackled. The warm spring air blew chill. Another of the north Coast’s brief tempests. Clifford walked back to the low table. I saw him scrutinize my face.

  ‘Are you sure that you’re all right?’

  ‘If you mean, do I still have someone else’s memories in my head, the answer is yes. What I’ve done by going walkabout, as you call it, is learn to control them. Instead of having them control me.’

  I expected disbelief, was braced to see that look on his face. Instead, he nodded slowly. Those bird-bright eyes were thoughtful.

  ‘I’ve had a scan through your old reports. Lynne, I still think you’re misinterpreting something that happened to you, but – I could be convinced otherwise.’ Doug smiled. ‘One sees much, in the Service. Don’t underestimate my ability to comprehend the alien. But I need to know what did happen to you. And then I need more evidence than – forgive me, Lynne – merely your unsupported word.’

  Warmth and relief swept through me. I wiped my hands on the dirty meshabi-robe; I hadn’t realized my palms were sweating. Searching for words, in the instant between intention and speech, I made a controlled recollection of memory; held down sound and vision until it was mine to use.

  ‘Douggie, I’ll tell you how it was. It begins with the Hexenmeister, in the Brown Tower –’

  There is a room lined with shelves, on which rest scrolls and parchments. Evening light falls on woven del’ri mats, on a table, and chairs. A library? Yes, this could be any library-room on Orthe; and the summer breeze that drifts in is soothing – but through the window arch I see the last spire of the Rasrhe-y-Meluur, that stands outside Kasabaarde, that is a millennially-old reminder of the Golden Witchbreed.

  There is a room in the Brown Tower that is like a library because it is a room (the only one) that is sometimes seen by outsiders. It is designed to reassure, to allay fears of long-dead technology. I stand in that room. Before me, in a chair by the cold hearth, is the Hexenmeister of Kasabaarde.


  Like most Kasabaardeans he is a head smaller than me, and bent with age besides. His hands are bird-claws, his skin a diamond-pattern of wrinkles, and his mane gone except for a crest from forehead to spine. A brown sleeveless robe covers his tunic.

  ‘What do you know of me?’ he asks.

  I say, ‘I know that you dream no past-dreams because you’re immortal, that you see all that passes in the world, and that the Archives of the Brown Tower hold all knowledge.’

  These are all stories Ortheans have told me.

  ‘Such superstition!’ he says mildly, amused. ‘Well, you and I have much to speak of, envoy, and I will tell you why. I know much of what passes in the known lands – because most news comes either here to this city, or is heard by my people who travel. And it has been the custom, since before Tathcaer was a city, that they bring such news to me. The Archives hold much knowledge – but not all. No, not all. And for the other, that is answered more simply – yes, I am immortal.’

  ‘I’m sorry, I don’t believe that. I can’t.’

  ‘You must believe, envoy. Or else you’ll believe nothing I tell you, and that could affect the relations between two worlds.’

  He eases forward in the chair, lifting himself with the weight on his wrists, as the old do. I automatically move to help him. His warm hand closes over mine, a frail, many-fingered grip. He stands.

  ‘I think I must prove to you what I am.’

  We walk along a diffusely-lit passage, slow, at an old man’s speed. His weight on my arm is considerable. We pass a door that opens, slides shut behind us as we step into a small chamber. There is pressure underfoot, a sickness in the stomach. We are descending. Then it stops, the door opens. A great hall. The light changes quality; the air is cool, dry.

  ‘That causes you no fear,’ the old male says. ‘Well, it is not to be wondered at, you come from the stars.’

  Disbelief that paralyses. I think, Kirriach was awesome, that city in the Barrens, but Kirriach’s safely dead; and this …

 

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