The Dread Hammer

by Linda Nagata

  Now it was her turn to look horrified. “But how can I, Dismay? Surely the King will hear such a prayer? Surely he will know.”

  “You have talked to me all night, but he has not struck you dead.”

  Her voice dropped to a whisper. “I know he hears all the words of men . . . but the cook has told me he refuses to listen to the words of women.”

  “Then you can pray to me. Do so and I’ll come and kill the King.”

  Tears started in her eyes. “But by then it’ll be too late for me. Please, Dismay, won’t you help me? Don’t let them send me to the palace.”

  He shook his head. “It’s not my gift to make lives sweet. The prayers I grant are prayers of vengeance. Who would you have me kill?”

  “I don’t know! No one. Not yet.”

  He nodded. “Only the very desperate should ever pray to me. The cost is always high.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “That a prayer for vengeance won’t save you. I could kill your husband and all the men of his household, but you would still be hunted down.”

  She shuddered, turning half away. “I wish I had not been born.”

  “Show me the way into the palace. Then there will have been a reason for your life.”

  Ui returned with a large basket in her hands. Eleanor took it from her. “Take Dismay’s clothes and clean them. See that they’re ready before dawn.”

  Ui looked startled at Eleanor’s sharp tone. Her gaze darted to Smoke, dressed now only in the bath towel.

  “Now,” Eleanor added.

  “Yes, ma’am.” Ui scurried to gather up Smoke’s soiled shirt, his trousers, and his long coat. She slipped out of the room with a backward glance that lingered on Smoke as he bent to gather up his weapons.

  Again Eleanor made sure the door was locked. Then she brought the basket to Smoke, who had his sword, his bow and his belt slung over his bare shoulders. “My brother’s apartments are in the north wing of the house, alongside the inner courtyard.”

  Smoke studied the threads, nodding as he sensed the place she described.

  “I’ll have Ui bring your clothes at dawn. I’ll warn her not to disturb you before then.” Eleanor hesitated. “Unless you want her to . . . ?”

  Smoke considered it. Ketty had said she still loved him . . . but that was two moons past, a long time ago. A man couldn’t wait forever—though after a bit of thought Smoke decided he could wait another night. “It’s not her company I want.”

  Eleanor’s eyes widened in surprise. Smiling shyly, she stood on her toes to kiss his cheek. “I’m so pleased you chose our home and that I’ve been privileged to meet you.” She handed him the basket, her dark gaze riveted on him as he bent to pick up his boots. “I wish I was Ui,” she added in a husky voice.

  Smoke’s brows knit in a skeptical look. “You wouldn’t like being a servant.”

  Then he reached for the threads, and let his reflection shift so that he appeared to Eleanor as a column of gray smoke that streamed away through the wall.

  The Slant of Moonlight

  Heavy curtains allowed only a parsimonious measure of moonlight into the apartment, not enough for most men to see by, but Smoke was a demon who could see in the dark. He found himself in a sitting room, with a sofa, a divan, chairs, several small tables, a fireplace, decorative hangings on the walls, and a thick carpet beneath his bare feet. An arched passage led to other rooms. The air tasted dusty and stale.

  He put down his boots and the basket, and then he drew his sword from its scabbard and set out to explore.

  All doors to the outside were locked, as Eleanor had promised. He found a study, with books still on the shelves, and six bedrooms. The bedrooms were empty of personal items except the largest, which had an alcove filled with such clothing as a Lutawan man of the Inherent class would wear.

  Smoke had some fondness for dressing well, so he lit an oil lamp and spent some time in the alcove, looking through the shelves. The shirts and jackets were mostly too broad in the shoulder to suit him, but at the back of a corner shelf he found a green tunic in a smaller size. It had a high collar and panels in the front embroidered with a twining pattern of birds and vines, and it fit him perfectly.

  Suitable trousers were easier to find because the Lutawans favored a loose fit anyway, and the extra length was easily overcome by stuffing the hems into his boots. He chose dark brown trousers made of heavy linen. It was so damn hot in Lutawa he didn’t bother trying on a coat. After he was dressed he examined his reflection in a mirror. He had left his hair loose around his shoulders so it could dry, but now he gathered it up and nodded in satisfaction at what he saw. “I make a better looking Lutawan than most Lutawans,” he said aloud. He lifted his chin and added, “Ketty, you are foolish to be angry still.”

  He felt hopeful, though, more so than in a long time. Ketty might still be angry with him, but at least now he had a goal, a purpose.

  He returned to the basket to see what Ui had packed. There was a bottle of wine, but he left that untouched, because drinking stirred in him an embarrassing inclination toward mercy. He ate all the food though, and then, taking his weapons and his boots with him, he went to lie down on the wide, soft bed in the largest bedroom.

  He slept peacefully for a time.

  Then he heard Ketty speaking. He startled awake—and her voice vanished. The shadows of the dead man’s bedroom loomed around him, unchanged except for the slant of moonlight. He tried to recall what she had said, but he couldn’t. Was it only a dream?

  Closing his eyes again, he listened. Across the threads he heard the murmur of women’s voices, many women, still awake despite the hour. They called to him, Dismay, Dismay, whispering their dreadful stories and pleading with him to avenge them. He ignored their bitter prayers and, holding his breath so that he could listen better, he waited for one special prayer to reach him.

  But it didn’t come.

  Ketty, why?

  Why did she offer him nothing but silence? Why could she not forgive him? He had never hurt her. He had never betrayed her. She was the cruelest of wives!

  He got up. A green light sparkled across the room, startling him, but it was only the reflection of his eyes in the mirror, the reflection of his anger. He had resolved not to go back to Ketty until she begged him . . . but if he killed the Lutawan king, slit His throat and let His divine blood spill free in a scarlet fountain, then surely that would atone for his own misdeeds and even stubborn Ketty of the Red Moon would have to forgive him.

  To kill the King though, he would first have to find the palace. Eleanor thought it was south, but how far south? Lutawa was a vast land. He might have to hunt for many more days before he found it . . . unless he could find a map to tell him the way?

  That’s when he remembered the study full of books—and where there were books, there were maps, or so it had been in his father’s library.

  He hurried through the hall to the study, and there he searched the drawers and shelves, but he found no map.

  He turned next to the books, remembering that maps were sometimes drawn in their pages, and even if there was no map, there might be a story that told the way to the King’s oh-so-holy palace. Taking a book at random, he stepped to a window and pulled the curtain aside. Moonlight poured onto an open page, revealing gibberish: column after column of meaningless scribble.

  Smoke flipped through the pages, but it was all the same: every page of the book was filled with unreadable scrawl. What idiot would fill a precious book with useless marks? He dropped the volume on a table, went back to the shelf, and grabbed another. This one too contained the same sort of nonsense, and though there were drawings of military formations among the pages, there was no map.

  He picked up another book, and another. When a glance at the pages confirmed each to be as useless as the first, he hurled it onto a growing pile of discarded volumes. Only when the shelf was nearly empty did it occur to him that the scribble must be writing, but of a kind he’d never se
en before and that he could not read. This thought infuriated him. It was as if the Lutawans had conspired to keep him ignorant—and in his frustration he was tempted to set the whole pile of books on fire. He resisted only because Ui and Eleanor had been kind to him. It would be poor manners to pay them back by burning their home to the ground. Still, he could bear the oppressive air of the apartment no longer.

  He returned to the bedroom for his boots and his weapons, and then he reached for the threads—but as he dissolved into gray mist he remembered the basket, still in the sitting room. He wanted no suspicion to fall on Ui and Eleanor, so he fetched it. Then setting his mind again to the threads, he perceived Eleanor, lying awake and alone in a bedroom not so far away.

  He went to her.

  The smoky gray mist of his presence seeped through the walls and then he was standing at the foot of her bed.

  The curtain was open; the room awash in moonlight. Eleanor lay naked in its glow, profoundly beautiful, her dark eyes fixed on the night sky as if her thoughts were far away. Desire rushed through Smoke, but though he was sure he could have her for the asking, she wasn’t Ketty, and all he really wanted to do was leave.

  He set the basket at the foot of her bed and only then did she realize he was there. She gasped and sat up, pulling a thin sheet to her chin to hide her body. “Dismay!”

  “I am going.”

  If she replied, he didn’t stay to hear it.

  Guileless, Pretty, and Submissive

  Ui hung Dismay’s clothing beside the kitchen hearth to dry, then she spent the night in the kitchen, ready to hide the lot of it under her skirt if anyone came, but no one did. As dawn neared she folded the shirt, the trousers and the coat, then she wrapped them up in a square of white cloth so that they looked like an ordinary bundle of laundry. She set out through the house, intending to return them to Dismay, but to her disappointment she encountered Eleanor in the dark hallway.

  “Young mistress, why aren’t you sleeping?”

  “And how much did you sleep, Ui? Or did you stay awake all night praying to him?”

  Ui lowered her gaze. Eleanor was her half-sister and Ui loved her, but that didn’t change the fact that Eleanor was the mistress and Ui only a servant. “I stayed awake all night watching over his clothes, El, and I go now to return them.”

  “He is gone.”

  The hurt in Eleanor’s voice aroused Ui’s suspicion—and her jealousy. Eleanor was the mistress. If she was not a virgin on her wedding night her husband could return her to the master and demand he cut his own daughter’s throat. Ui, though, was only a servant and in fact she was not a virgin. At worst she would be beaten for it, but with luck her future husband would be too wise to complain. “Eleanor, did you go to him last night? Did you let him possess your demon flower?”

  “No!” Then she added in a softer whisper, “I would have, if he—”

  Suddenly their father’s deep voice rang through the hallway in a shout of alarm. “Steward! Steward! Come at once! Come and see!” His shout came from the direction of the locked apartment.

  Ui’s heart raced with fear. “He has found Dismay.”

  She started toward the apartment, but Eleanor put out a hand. “Stop! Dismay is gone. Go hide his clothes before someone asks whose they are.”

  Ui ran back to the room she shared with her mother. As she arrived at the door, her mother came out. She was dressed in a yellow shift like the one Ui wore, pulled tight by a belt so the master could admire her body that was still lovely and slim. She looked past her daughter. “Ui, what’s happened? Why does the master call out?”

  “I don’t know, Mama. El sent me to—”

  There was no need to make up an excuse; her mother was already hurrying away to discover the cause of the commotion for herself.

  Ui ducked into the room, pulled the box of winter blankets from under the bed, stuffed the bundle of clean laundry beneath them, and then shoved the box back out of sight. As soon as that was done she followed her mother, running full tilt down the hall to see what trouble Dismay had left behind him.

  Ui arrived in time to hear the master shouting at the youthful manservant, Hammond. “Go, Hammond. Go now. Summon the captain of my men-at-arms, and then ride on. Find the sheriff and tell him his Hauntén demon has been here, and he must come at once.”

  Hammond asked no questions, but set off to obey. Ui followed after him as he trotted down the hall. Hammond was always sweet to her, helping with hauling the water and fetching heavy bags of provisions from the cellar. So she didn’t hesitate to speak. “Hammond, what’s happened? Please tell me, what is a sheriff? What is a Hauntén?”

  When he turned to look at her, fury blazed in his eyes. “Quiet, woman!” he snapped. “And return to your duties.” Then he darted outside and raced away toward the stables.

  Ui stared after him, slack-jawed with astonishment. Hammond had never spoken to her like that before—but other men had. Some of the army officers who came to see her father, and even some of his men-at-arms when the master wasn’t nearby to hear. She knew then that Hammond wanted to be one of them—a man-at-arms or a soldier—and with a spike of jealousy, she wished that she could dream such dreams too.

  Ui didn’t dare go near the apartment, but she also didn’t want to go to Eleanor’s room, knowing that no gossip was ever to be had there, unless she brought it herself. She wandered past the kitchen, but Cook looked as if she had chores in mind, so Ui grabbed a duster and hurried to the front room to wait for Hammond to return. It seemed to take forever, but finally she heard a clattering of many hooves on the stone driveway.

  She hurried to the window, standing sideways in the shadow of the half-open shutters so she would remain unseen. She counted five men with Hammond. All were dressed in black riding tunics and loose black trousers, and all were armed with swords and bows. Three had whips coiled at their waists, and another carried a short club.

  They dismounted in the court, handed the reins of their horses to Hammond, and then advanced on the front door.

  Ui’s eyes went wide. Hammond had hold of the horses, the steward was with the master, and Cook was in the kitchen. There was no one around to open the door but her.

  The black-clad men came up the steps to the veranda, led by the oldest among them, though he was not old. Ui guessed him to be in his thirties. He had short, curly black hair and a neatly trimmed beard. His eyes were dark in an unsmiling face.

  Not knowing what else to do, Ui scrambled to pull the door open for him—it would be insulting to leave him waiting on the veranda—but at the same time she tried to disappear behind the door, fearing to be noticed by such a man.

  It was not her fate to escape notice that day.

  Seeing no one there to greet him, the man turned, and spied her behind the door. “Come forward, bitch. Where is the master?”

  Ui was suddenly awash in confusion and shame. She wanted desperately to run and hide—but she knew better. The rest of the men crowded in, so she closed the door. Then, keeping her gaze lowered, she whispered, “My master is in the heir’s wing. Will you follow?”

  “Go.”

  She scurried past them, taking swift, mincing steps as her mother had taught her to do when dangerous strangers were in the house. Be guileless, pretty, and submissive. Don’t offend, or such men will demand the master beat you.

  She did not dare look back, but she listened to the clacking of their boot heels. She imagined their eyes on her. Her filmy dress was only a slave’s veil after all, designed to show her figure. She wanted to shrink away into nothing, but since she couldn’t manage that, she mouthed a prayer instead, addressing it to the woman god, the Dread Hammer, asking for protection.

  Her prayer was answered.

  The apartment’s double doors stood open, and when the steward heard them coming, he looked out. Ui caught his startled eye. He was a kindly man, who took in her dilemma with a look of alarm. His gaze shifted to the men behind her, his expression transforming to fawning rel
ief. “Sheriff!” he cried with an enthusiasm that startled everyone, and drew all lingering eyes away from Ui. “God bless you for coming.” He subtly flicked his hand at her, urging her to disappear.

  Ui ducked aside, bowing her head as the sheriff and his men tramped past.

  A smart girl, Ui knew, would take this chance to slip away before someone thought to ask if the serving girl had heard anything unusual in the night. A smart girl would run to hide in Eleanor’s room until the sheriff was gone . . . but Ui was driven by curiosity, not wisdom. As soon as the last of the black-clad men disappeared into the apartment, she scurried after them, taking up a post beside the doorway, just out of sight. She heard her father, the master, speak. “Greetings, Sheriff, and God bless you. It’s to God we owe our thanks that no one in my household has yet been harmed.”

  That was all Ui was privileged to hear before her mother swept out of the apartment, with such a look of apprehension on her face Ui was sure she too wanted to escape the eyes of the sheriff’s men. But then she saw Ui. Her expression shifted: first to shock, then to fury. Without a word, she seized her daughter’s arm in a bruising grip and hauled her down the hall to the servants’ quarters.

  “Are you stupid?” her mother whispered the moment the door of their little room was closed behind them. “Do you want to be a whore for such men?”

  “Hammond took their horses. I was the only one left to open the door—”

  “Do not answer the door to strangers! Let the steward do it. Let Hammond show them in! Never show yourself to such men!”

  “But—”

  “What if the master invites them to stay? What if the sheriff asks for the pretty slave to be sent to his room? You are not Eleanor! Don’t imagine the master will always refuse such requests!”

  “But what is a sheriff?” Ui pleaded.