by Jay Lake
Return to Copper Downs
C OMING DOWN OUT of the hills with Chowdry, I decided to follow the route I’d taken while fleeing Choybalsan’s army at the beginning of the summer. This was a rough track, so I carried only my knives, some small essentials for cooking and sleep, and of course my belled silk with the needles, thread, and cache of bells. That line of work had been broken too often. I would not abandon it yet again. I did roll the cloth carefully so as to pad the bells that I did not jingle as I walked.
I stayed away from the Barley Road and the banks of the Greenbriar River, and instead traveled along the ridges following goat tracks, tracing the crumbling high road of former times where possible, and indulging in a fair amount of plain old bushwhacking. Following me, Chowdry was not so pleased.
“It was taking a long day to find your cottage from the city as it is,” he complained in Seliu as we rested in the shelter of a wisteria. The weather was sunny but sharp, somehow the worst of both summer and winter in one difficult walk. We shared our bower with a mass of late-season mosquitoes, but I was more interested in being out of the biting wind than in fleeing from the insects. Besides, they were more attracted to Chowdry than to me. He continued his litany: “Now we are walking several days for no reason.”
“You’re spoiled,” I announced with a grin, watching him slap at himself like one of the rough-trade Blade Mothers after a bad night in the rack. “When I met you, you were crewing the rankest little coaster ever to sail Selistani waters. You would have been glad of fresh squirrel over an open fire and a dry place to sleep.”
“I am not seeing fresh squirrel here,” he grumbled.
“You will. But first understand that I have my reasons. I am coming with you. Surely that will be enough, for now. As neither of us answers to the other, nothing else is possible.”
The look Chowdry gave me suggested that he had different theories on who answered to whom, but then he shook his poor humor off and smiled. “Then I am to be cooking the squirrel this evening, so long as you are to be killing it.”
“Perhaps,” I told him.
We made camp that night in a rotten-roofed barn that still sheltered one dry corner. I managed to bring in two squirrels, some windfall peaches, and a collection of herbs and green onions from a long-neglected garden near the foundations of the vanished farmhouse.
Once the supplies were in place, I pushed Chowdry aside and began to do the cooking myself. That was one of the few undiluted gifts of my childhood training. I was able to do far too little of it. What I made was not even stew, for we had no stock and no time to prepare it. Rather I heated a piece of old iron on our little fire, smeared it with squirrel fat and the juice of several onion stalks, then fried the squirrel meat together with the peaches, seasoned nicely enough in the Stone Coast fashion.
Even such primitive cookery was a pleasure. I was glad enough of the good food, and even more glad of the company. Otherwise this would have been the first night I had spent completely alone since arriving at Ilona’s cottage these months past.
As we cracked the bones in our teeth, I turned my thoughts to what lay ahead. “Tell me more of why Endurance wishes me back in Copper Downs.”
“You are already saying how the god has no words.” He toyed with a squirrel thigh, picking seared meat from the bone and flicking the bits into his mouth as he watched me for a reaction.
“Well, yes. A mute god seemed… safer.”
“I am not to be saying you are wrong. Still, this makes troubles.”
“You never meant to be a priest,” I offered.
That made him laugh. “I am never being a priest. I am servant to a god. Others dance in robes and light incense and make up new books of ancient ceremony. I do what Endurance asks of me.” He paused, his mirth falling away. “Demands of me.”
I allowed my voice to soften. “In what manner does the god compel you?” I had already enjoyed far too much experience of divine influence in my own life. Though I only suspected it then, more was all too definitely to follow.
“Dreams,” Chowdry said slowly. “Pictures. Thoughts without words. So I know that such a thing should be done, without it being said. This is not like Utavi ordering a sail to be reefed back aboard Chittachai. Or you, pushing me where I would never be going of my own.”
“Do you dream with Endurance in Seliu?”
He gave me an odd look. “There are no words, I am already telling you.”
Somehow this became very important to me. “But where are you in dreams? In a field under our hot sun?” My father’s paddies, where Endurance the ox had lived and died. “Or on the cold streets of Copper Downs?” This northern city was a strange place for any Selistani.
Almost helplessly, he replied, “I am with the god.”
Having stood far too close to Blackblood for the comfort of any sane person, and been called by the Lily Goddess, I could take his meaning. Gods happened in a place where the everyday world was an incidental detail. As if one could see and hear everything. Which, while possible for the divine, was very difficult for the merely human. As an ant might be confused to view the world as seen from a person’s eyes.
“I understand,” I told him, patting my silk, which awaited this evening’s sewing of the bell.
Gratitude flashed across Chowdry’s face. “So you see, I cannot be saying exactly what the god wishes of you. Only that the god wishes you to return to his domain.”
“Is he afraid?”
That provoked a thoughtful silence. Finally: “That I cannot say either.”
I let the matter drop then, and tucked into the last of my fried squirrel with peaches. I had eaten far worse.
***
Two days later we arrived at the place I’d had in mind on choosing this difficult path back to the city. The last of the inland hills petered out several miles from my goal. They terminated in a final upthrust knee of rock, soil, and trees from where I’d observed the condition of Copper Downs under occupation at the time I’d previously made this journey.
I wanted that hawk’s-eye view again, from the branches of the great oak spreading amid a stand of bayberries. Not to seek out the disposition of armies, for surely they had not gone that seriously wrong, but just to take the mood of the city. I would count the chimney smokes and look for evidence of either riot or festival. In Kalimpura, those two were nearly synonymous. These Stone Coast folk celebrated with a reserve that was almost depressing.
I had thought also to be able to number the masts in the harbor, which was perhaps the best indication of the health and welfare of any trading city. In that I was disappointed-memory did not supply the view, and in reality too much of the city intruded for me to accurately gauge the density of shipping. At least the day remained clear, instead of misty along the waterside as this season so often could provide. The scattered clusters of hutments and wayhouses at the outer edges seemed normal enough, but that told me little.
Chowdry sat and watched me watch as the sun trundled along the trackway of the sky. Finally, as I paused from my study to sip at my waterskin, he spoke.
“You hunt the city far more carefully than you hunt our dinner.”
“It is bigger game,” I said, meaning that for a joke. The humor rang flat in my own ears. Nothing in his eyes suggested that he took it any better.
“They fear you and love you.”
“Who?” This line of conversation was making me want to change the subject.
“The people. Of this city. Also, more Selistani live here now. They buy passage, or jump ship.”
“ What would possess any of our people to emigrate here?”
“You and I came here,” he said quietly. “Endurance is here. The first new Selistani god in generations, birthed far across the sea from his proper home. Some wish to learn his mysteries and carry his name back.”
I listened carefully to the catch in his voice. “You do not favor that, do you?”
“I do not know what the god is. The god does not know what
the god is. Not yet. We are much too soon to make promises in another country. Even our own country.”
That made a great deal of sense to me. I exhaled slowly, trying to release some of the uneasiness he raised in me. I knew too much of gods already, far too much. I could not unlearn, but I could most certainly avoid more of such dabbling.
So I thought then, at least.
To distract myself, I turned my attention back to the city.
***
We camped on the hill one more night. Chowdry cooked this evening as a gentle, chilled rain descended. That dinner was wasted, as this time the smell of squirrel made me violently ill. I was reduced to gnawing roots while feeling both hungry and nauseous at the same time.
“It is your child,” Chowdry said in Petraean, oddly.
“My child?” I didn’t think I’d shown that much yet.
He switched to Seliu. “The baby inside does not like some foods. My sister, every time she is pregnant, must have plantains, but cannot stand mangoes.”
“Wonderful,” I muttered. Losing my balance and my appetite to my daughter. What was in this for me?
I had to check that thought. Poor, doomed Septio lived on inside me. And through him the seed of the god, if Blackblood was to be believed. Time away from the streets and temples of Copper Downs, and especially the dark, hidden world of Below, had lessened the grip that those same gods held on my imagination. I suppose I’d expected to turn inward, become focused on the child, as women were said to do. So far the baby and I had gotten along well enough not to notice much.
Until these last few days.
I ran my hand over the leathers tight upon my abdomen. Beneath my touch, I fancied that she eased.
Still, I didn’t eat any squirrel.
“Green,” Chowdry said, drawing my attention back into the moment.
“Mmm?” I looked at him fondly, this thin man with the perpetually worried expression who’d so unexpectedly inherited divine responsibility.
“I am to be returning to the city tomorrow. If you are staying up here to eat shoots and berries, that is your business. But the god wishes your attendance. Do not wait too long, I am begging of you.”
He was almost cute about it. I smiled, feeling a wash of tenderness. “Do not fear, old friend. I shall soon be there.”
Chowdry appeared even more worried at my words, but he said nothing more.
***
The next morning, the old pirate took his leave of me with the dawn. He followed our backtrail, stumbling down to the Barley Road well away from camp. I watched Chowdry trudge through the morning mists off the river, until he caught up to a farm family driving their pigs to market. I could not mark him out after that amid the people and the intermittent rain.
I spent the next hour or so examining not just the city, but also myself. What had I been about the night before? The way I had spoken to Chowdry was so unlike me. This pregnancy was making me untrustworthy. I resolved to cultivate a healthy suspicion and maintain distance from people around me, lest unthinking kindness blunder me into greater trouble.
Certainty. The path forward always lay through certainty. The Lily Blades taught that-always be certain, always be prepared to change one’s mind.
That in turn moved me to hone my long knife, test the sharpness of my short knives, and spend several hours sprinting up and down hills and speed-climbing damp-barked trees, all out of sight of the road below. I was slower than I should have been, and did not move quite as I might have liked, but I could still kick, dodge, and roll almost as expected.
The key, of course, was not to get into fights in the first place. As I worked myself, I thought of Mother Vajpai. She could take down almost anyone in a straight match but rarely needed to do so. As dangerous as her body was, her mind was the far deadlier weapon.
Another lesson, surely. One I should have attended to more closely in the days that were to come.
It occurred to me to wonder who I was planning to fight with. Body or mind, I had no serious enemies roaming the streets of Copper Downs. Endurance could hardly wish me ill. Blackblood was, well, complex, but not precisely an enemy. I no longer feared Skinless, as that silent avatar of the god seemed to hold a mute, deep regard for me.
Finally I shook off the mania of preparation for combat and cleaned my campsite. While I’d worked my body the wind had blown in a few flower petals that might have been lilies, so I burned them with reverence and gave the ashes back to the air as I buried my fire. It was close to midday before I gathered my belled silk and my few other belongings to scramble down toward the Barley Road in order to join the travelers following Chowdry into Copper Downs.
***
Entering the city was like cooking in a familiar kitchen. I knew the pans by touch, did not need to look for the cutting knives. So with these streets. The fall harvest was being brought in to the bourses and markets for auction to the cellarmen and canners and warehousemen. That meant an unusually large number of carts with confused horses and even more confused country lads atop the drover’s bench. Still, they laughed at one another and shouted rude names in booming voices instead of jumping from their seats to brawl.
I marked their progress and watched for other signs of commerce. Did the bankers’ boys trot past at double time with their lacquered boxes slapping against their chests? What of the runners from the Harbormaster’s office and the shipping exchange? How many clerks hurried along the streets mixed among the ladies’ maids and shrieking children with their stick-a-hoops?
I was surprised at the brown faces I saw. A fair number of my countrymen lived here now. Only one in a hundred, perhaps, but that was still ten times what I could recall from even last summer, let alone the years of my training when I might have been the only Selistani in the city aside from the handful of resident trading families and a few passing sailors.
Rarely did I pause to think on the color of my skin-there always seemed to be more urgent matters which needed attending to-but it pleased me to see faces as brown as my own. My child would not be so alone in this place as I had been.
Endurance’s temple stood not in the Temple Quarter, where the houses of the gods generally were to be found, but rather was a building amid the Velviere District. I avoided both those areas at first. In due time I would need to see to the god I had helped birth, and call on Blackblood as well. For now, I had a different destination in mind.
The breweries were busy as ever. So far as I knew, not war nor famine nor fire nor outright bankruptcy had ever succeeded in stilling this city’s thirst. The Stone Coast was not wine country, not at all. Distilleries were common enough, and some of their product was magnificent, but beer was the bubbling heart of these northern people.
I was headed for a quiet alley amid the breweries, where I might find a certain tavern. Last I knew, Chowdry had been cooking there most nights, though his duties to Endurance had probably taken him away from the Tavernkeep’s kitchen more often now. This nameless place was the heart of the small community of the pardine people in Copper Downs. My old Dancing Mistress was the first of that race I’d ever known, but I had yet to meet one I did not like and respect. Even the Rectifier, a violent and difficult old rogue with an unfortunate tendency toward murdering human priests, was charming in his strange way.
However, when I turned the corner into the brick-walled alley with its familiar cracked flagstones now damp and slick, the area before the tavern entrance was full of people. Humans, not pardines. And Selistani at that. Chattering, almost angry, a buzz of voices arguing in Seliu.
Startled, I tugged up my hood and dipped my face. I was far too easily recognized with my scarred cheeks and notched ears. Until I understood what mischief this restless crowd was about, I did not want them to know me.
I eased into a crowd of men in white linen kurtas, a few women in colored sarongs scattered among them. My black leather would have been more conspicuous if they’d been paying much attention to me, but these people were focused on a woman st
anding in the doorway of the Tavernkeep’s establishment, arguing both with someone inside and with several men outside.
Moving closer, with a cold stab of my heart, I recognized the one at the heart of this brangle. It was the Bittern Court woman, whose name I had never known. How wrong I had been in my sense of being safe from her. Nameless, she was only a power to me, a persecutor. This woman had pursued me to exile back in Kalimpura, while calling for my head over the matter of Michael Curry’s assassination. I owed the Bittern Court no loyalty and even less affection for their conflicts with the Temple of the Silver Lily, not to mention their attempts to persecute me. To see her, here, could only be very bad news indeed.
No wonder I’d felt a need to sharpen my knives this morning. I would be lost to the Wheel before I would place myself under this woman’s influence.
Pulse pounding, I backed slowly through the crowd, pushing toward the open street beyond. Someone bumped me, then shouted out my name in Seliu. This was not the time to confront whatever had brought people across the Storm Sea in search of me. I ran, sprinting out of the alley, down past the Cooper’s Brewery, and away on the stones of the city. I might not have been as fast as before, but I was still faster than those behind me.
***
Winded, but safe, I paused for breath in an empty lot near the old wall, now simply a dividing line between the Greenmarket and the Ivory Quarter. Crumbling bricks rose forty feet to a walkway that joined four surviving towers. It was pretty enough, in a desolate way, and a tribe of indigenes had made their stick-and-daub homes atop the walkways and tower crowns, so that the whole thing looked as if it had been colonized by enormous raptors.
A firecart offered meat sticks, while the strange little people who lived atop this section of wall passed in abundance on their own errands. No Selistani were in evidence.