Skeen's Return

by Clayton, Jo;

  The crewgirls were raising sail with the same energetic skill they showed in everything they did; Usoq was leaning on the wheel, watching his boat and the sky with an equal intentness. She steadied herself with one hand and bent her neck slowly because she was dizzy and her head ached.

  The Min were still a disturbed swarm buzzing about high above them, showing no sign they intended to attack any time soon.

  She eased her head up again, raised her brows at Usoq.

  He grinned. “Burned a couple last time I was round these parts. Put your bunch and me together, looks like they don’t want to bite.” Cepo came trotting past him and stood by the anchor winch. “Vohdi, ready?”

  Her voice came back with a happy lilt even in the single word. “Ready, So.”

  “Raise ’em.”

  The Pouliloulou skimmed along the South Rekkah, with Timka, Skeen and Pegwai standing guard turn on turn, but the Min didn’t attack. Most of them disappeared. Four stayed behind to follow them and make sure they didn’t sneak off the ship and try losing themselves among the Pallah and the stray Min who were sprinkled about, salt to season the blander Nemin. Usoq drenched the coals and let the resin cauldron cool, but he kept the setup ready on deck, just in case one of the fliers succumbed to a brainstorm. The first night after the island brought more clouds streaming in, scumbling around; it didn’t rain that night, but the morning was as dark as a night at moon’s full and by afternoon the mast tip almost touched the clouds. By nightfall the winds were so strong and erratic, Usoq hove to and rode out the storm with bare poles and double anchors.

  After she’d downed a few sips of water, Lipitero blinked wearily at the anxious faces hanging over her, managed a crooked smile, then sighed and fainted. Skeen worked over her for some time, cleaning the wounds, injecting her with the last of her antibiotics, spraying the gray film over the worst of the burns. Teeth clenched, struggling against nausea, Rannah helped her. When the work was done, the Aggitj girl signed, bent down and stroked her fingers over the soft silvery down on Lipitero’s cheek. “Will she be all right?”

  Skeen twitched, bit down on her lip and swallowed the ugly comments that leaped to her tongue; no point in spewing her choler and anxiety on the girl’s head. “Probably,” she said.

  Pegwai came in with a cup of the soup he’d been brewing in the galley. He looked at Lipitero, then Skeen. “She should have this.”

  Skeen smiled wearily. “Smells good. Is there more of it?”

  “A pot still simmering.”

  “Safe?”

  “Usoq and the girls are busy. For the moment. Later, I don’t know, I suppose we go back to staggered meals.”

  “Well, then, old friend, you see what you have to do.” Skeen took the hot mug from him and moved back to Lipitero. “Take this, Rannah. When I lift her, you hold it to her lips and give her small sips.” She began rummaging in her pack, brought out the drug disc; she set it on the bed and turned the knob until she had what she wanted, pressed the disc to the inside of Lipitero’s elbow and activated it. Lipitero stirred, blinked open her eyes. Skeen put the disc away, slipped her arm under the Ykx’s shoulders and raised her. “Pegwai’s cooked up some marvelous soup, Petro. Just you relax and drink. It’ll make you feel more like yourself.”

  The Pouliloulou slid into Spalit before dawn on the third day after Petro was taken off the island, sails reefed until the wind drove them barely faster than the current sought to push them, creeping along in fog so thick it was impossible to see more than a meter beyond the bow; both crewgirls were back on duty, moving more slowly, some of their vigor gone, having had only snatches of sleep on those three days. When Vohdi shouted wharves ahead, Usoq eased the boat toward the shore and brought her alongside the first with the sound of wood rubbing on wood but no more than that. The girls had mooring cables over the bitts in the next moments, the ship tidied to quiescence, and were back waiting for Usoq’s orders before Skeen had time to yawn twice and scratch her head.

  “No hurry, none at all,” Usoq said with a lazy amiability that didn’t quite cover the rancor boiling under his surface. He was hating them pretty thoroughly at the moment, wanting control of the Ykx, not daring to try for her. “We’ll be overnighting here. Too much the Rekkah’s been for us, too much,” he smoothed his hand along the flank of the nearest crewgirl. “We need our sleep and meals we haven’t cooked. Eh, Vohdi? And clean slippery sheets to slide between, ah, it’s a healing just thinking about such things.”

  “No doubt.” Skeen yawned again and went below to fetch the others.

  The fog persisted all day, a dreary dripping day with the sun a faint cold glow that produced little light and less heat. Late in the afternoon Skeen left the taproom of the Spitting Split and wandered out to the riverfront. She settled on the end of a wharf, legs dangling over the edge, her feet dissolving in the fog. She couldn’t see the water, but she could hear it, the melancholy sound suited her mood; the eruption of irritation that had plagued her the last few days had drained away, leaving her limp as boiled spinach in mind and body. She swung the feet she could see as dark blurs and brooded into the knotted fog.

  Suddenly the end was so close she could see it. Suddenly. Three days upriver to Dum Besar. A day, a night and a day across the Plain, one more day through the Mountains to the Gate. A week. One fuckin’ week and we’ll all be dead or through to the other side. Ahhh, Djabo, I don’t know, I don’t know, I don’t know what I … want. Tibo, why? Do I really want to know why? Ahhh, want, that’s nothing. I don’t want to know, I HAVE to know. Can’t run away from this one, can you Skeen old girl? No room for running.

  She struggled to switch her thinking to another track; since the Gate closed on her, she’d concentrated on reopening it, almost everything she’d done was directed to that end. There was still an effort to be made, but it was time, more than time, to start thinking about what she’d have to do once she passed back to the other side. I wonder if the Junks are still waiting for me. Does time here run at the same rate? No way I can tell till I’m back and see how many days passed there. Forget that. Waiting Junks. Nah. Gate’s one way for most folk. Look what happened to me. Old Yoech must have been hanging about when another Pass-Through made the jump. Who knows why, it’s the only way he could have come back. The Junks chase us, we disappear and never show up again, why waste their time hanging around. Satellites? No, I’ve been through that before, the sun’s acting up too much, there’s that much on my side. Three of us to get back into Chukunsa. Ti’s no problem—she can just grow wings and fly in. Hm. Petro? Don’t know, she’s got a lot of instrumentation in that harness. We’ll both be walking. How are we going to transport all this … this stuff we’ve collected? Take a horse through with us? That’s a possibility. To sell the jewelry and artifacts, I’ll have to get them into Chukunsa. Tchah! Easy enough for me to walk out, nothing on me to ring bells. Tibo’s told me often enough not to jump without looking where my feet come down. Djabo’s drippy nose, it’s a mess. Hmm. Can’t take it through the gates. Over the wall? Hah! Here’s a thought. What’s the use having a shapechanger around if she can’t solve these little difficulties. Ti can carry quite a lot if she has time to rest and doesn’t have to go too far. Another thought. She can go places no Junk could reach. Hm. Hide the jewels and things somewhere along the chasm walls. Once Petro and I’ve got a base, Timka can fly the stuff in. Have to work out the details. Might be a good idea to leave most of the stuff stashed until I locate a buyer. Mmm. Some kind of papers for Petro and Ti. Don’t need much to get off Kildun Aalda, it’s getting down again somewhere else. If I prostrate myself before her, will Bona Fortuna have a ship ready to go from Aalda port scheduled to touch at a freebase? I don’t want to hang around once I’ve sold the jewels, bound to be questions.…

  “Skeen.” The voice came out of the fog behind her, quiet and a little melancholy, startling her because she hadn’t heard footsteps.

  “Peg?” She started to get up.

  “No. Stay there.”<
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  She heard a soft grunt as he lowered himself, the thud of his knees on the planks, the pop of his joints, the whisper of his robe. His hands brushed her shoulders, were heavier on them as he smoothed his palms from her neck to her arms and back again. Heavy but gentle, back and forth.

  “You’re very tense,” he said. He squeezed her shoulder muscles, his fingers digging painfully into her.

  “Hah.” There were a lot of things she could say. Too many. So she said nothing.

  His hands stroked her neck, his thumbs rubbed behind her ears. Up and down. Hypnotic. They tightened on her throat, smooth fleshy noose. She couldn’t breath, she didn’t struggle, she let it happen. Gentle easeful blackness.

  When she woke, she was back in the Inn, in her bed. Pegwai sat near the fire, watching the dying flames crawl across the coals.

  “Peg?” Her voice was hoarse, her throat sore.

  He turned his head. “It’s been a while.”

  “No privacy.”

  “That too.”

  “Too?”

  “You understand me.”

  Skeen sighed, winced. “You make me feel too much. It … bothers me. I couldn’t cope with that and everything else going on. Peg, can you understand? I want smaller pleasures. I don’t want to feel so much.”

  “You’re not coming back here. To Mistommerk, I mean. Once you’re on the other side.”

  “Peg, I don’t belong here, I’m used to … oh, a life that’s more, what, more enabled, ahhh, faster, not better—” The last two words came hastily, trailed off as he made an impatient gesture. “Say this, with a different kind of comfort, a different kind of problem. Look at me fumbling for words, but I can’t really explain because you don’t know both worlds. It’s like trying to explain blue to a blind man. Oh shit, anything I say is wrong. No, I won’t be back.”

  “Let me stay with you. A last time.”

  “Djabo.” Skeen moved restlessly on the bed, the too familiar darting burn flashing from groin to nipples. She tried a smile. “I don’t know if Maggí or I should trust you with her daughter.”

  “Skeen!”

  “I didn’t mean it.” She brushed her hand across her breasts, bit back a groan. “Trying for psychic pain, icing on the cake, ahh, gods, yes, Peg, yes.…”

  Lipitero sucked in a breath as Skeen came across the room toward them, scratched and battered, one eye half closed. Before the Ykx could speak, Timka’s hand closed on her arm. “Don’t say anything, I’ll explain later.”

  Timka poured out a cup of tea. “This isn’t as hot as it might be; if you want, I’ll have the girl get us more.”

  Skeen pulled out a chair and sat. She reached out a long arm, brought back the cup. “Never mind, it’s the caffein I want, not the heat.”

  “They get off all right?”

  “No sign of trouble. I talked with Nossik,” a jog of her elbow indicated the man behind the bar idly wiping at it with a folded cloth, “he put me onto one Brampon who has a boat and is willing to sail it upriver to Dum Besar for the paltry sum of a gold for each of us. I didn’t much feel like arguing but for the look of the thing I beat him down to one gold ten silver. Brampon and Nossik agree that the fog’s going to hang about for a while yet, but it should thin out some in the afternoon; he says it doesn’t bother him, he navigates by the feel of it most times anyway; I have a notion he travels a lot in weather like this,” she grinned, “if you know what I mean.”

  “Travel with Skeen and see the halfworld.”

  ‘Just about. I mentioned we might have a bit of trouble and he should look out for hostile Min between then and whenever we left. He didn’t seem much worried by that.”

  “You think they’d go after him?”

  “Me, I would. Break some bones and burn the boat. Discourage the other boatmen, leave us stranded here. We want to travel, it’s on foot or horseback; in either case, it’d slow us down considerably, leave us far more vulnerable, give them more chances to attack us.” She drained the cup, passed it across the table for Timka to refill.

  Timka hefted the pot, shook it, waved one of the serving girls over to the table and ordered more tea. When the girl was gone, she frowned at Skeen. “You don’t look very worried.”

  “No?” Skeen stretched, patted a yawn. “It’s not me that’s flying around up there. Brampon knows how to take care of himself. If he doesn’t, too bad.” She yawned again and settled to staring drowsily at the fire that crackled cheerily in the fireplace a short distance away from the table.

  “Conceited, aren’t you.”

  Skeen chuckled. “Truthful.”

  The serving girl came back with the pot. While Timka filled Skeen’s cup, one for the silent brooding Lipitero, finishing with her own, Skeen ordered a large breakfast for herself. Watching her, Timka wasn’t too surprised to see the edginess that barbed her tongue and put harsh angles into her movements was dissolved away. Despite what she’d learned from the dreams she’d siphoned out of Skeen, she couldn’t understand that combination of pain and pleasure, though she could make some guesses about what lay behind it. Ah, well, that didn’t matter as long as it didn’t get in the way of what they had to do. She sighed. “When are we leaving?”

  Skeen glanced at her ringchron. “Another hour.”

  “Plenty of time.”

  “I hate to sweat. What about our shadows, they still up there?”

  “All four of them. One flew off to the east a while, but he’s back.”

  “Nosing around the Pouliloulou?”

  “Checking to make sure they haven’t mixed up their Min.”

  Skeen leaned forward, interest vivid in her face. “They can’t tell Min from Min from up there?”

  “Not them.”

  “You?”

  “Depends.”

  “Telka?”

  “We’d know each other as far as we could reach.”

  “Hm. Oh well, might as well go with Brampon now that I’ve made the arrangements.”

  HERE’S WHERE WE SKIP AHEAD AGAIN, COVERING GROUND THEY CREPT ACROSS WITH THE USEFUL DEVICE OF THE NARRATIVE SUMMARY. UP THE LAZY RIVER WITH BRAMPON, THROUGH AN ALTERNATION OF FOG AND TEMPEST, THE FOUR MIN FOLLOWING WITH DOGGED PERSISTENCE AND NO IMAGINATION. THE TRIP WAS UNCOMFORTABLE, OF COURSE, IT WAS AN OPEN BOAT, THEY GOT WET AND STAYED WET, GOT COLD AND STAYED COLD, ATE TOUGH LEATHERY POCKET BREAD, CHEESE AND DRIED MEAT, DRANK FROM THE RIVER (NOT SKEEN, SHE WAS BLUNT ABOUT HER DISLIKE OF THE THOUGHT) AND A BARREL OF ALE FROM NOSSIK’S CELLARS. BRAMPON DROPPED THEM AT A DESERTED LANDING NORTH OF THE CITY AND HENCEFORTH IS GONE ENTIRELY FROM THE STORY, NEVER HAVING MADE MUCH OF AN ENTRANCE INTO IT. AT ONE OF THE ESTATES BEYOND THE GROVE WHERE SKEEN AND TELKA NOT SO MUCH MET AS COLLIDED, THEY ACQUIRED A LIGHT CART, A FAST TEAM AND SUFFICIENT HARNESS TO CONNECT THE TWO BY (a) A QUICK NIGHT RAID ON A BARN (b) A STOCK AUCTION THEY CHANCED TO STUMBLE ACROSS—WELL, IT COULD HAPPEN (c) THE EXPENDITURE OF THE LAST OF SKEEN’S GOLD AND SOME HARD BARGAINING. YOU CHOOSE THE ONE THAT APPEALS TO YOU AND COLOR IN THE DETAILS WITH YOUR OWN IMAGINATION. TIMKA DOES THE DRIVING AS THEY START TOWARD THE MOUNTAINS; NOT ONLY IS SKEEN MINUS A HAND, SHE IS MINUS THE LEAST FRAGMENT OF KNOWLEDGE ABOUT HOW TO HANDLE A TEAM. LIPITERO IS EQUALLY USELESS, SO TIMKA HAS TO SCRATCH UP ANCIENT MEMORIES, STRUGGLE WITH THE STRAPS AND BUCKLES AND CONVINCE A PAIR OF HIGH-SPIRITED BEASTS THEY WANT TO GO HOW AND WHERE SHE DIRECTS THEM. BEING MIN IS A HELP HERE. WHEN THEY GET TO FEELING TOO INDEPENDENT, SHE FREEZES THEM IN PLACE UNTIL THEY GO MORE WILLINGLY. SO THERE IT IS, THE LAST RUSH BEGINS.

  While they bounded along rutted dirt lanes (the cart was a light, well-built vehicle with graceful hand-turned spokes in the wheels and an iron tire shrunk onto the rim, but its springs would be flattered if you called them primitive), Skeen dozed, ignoring the bumps and lurches, and Lipitero brooded.

  While Timka slept, exhausted by her labors, Skeen and Lipitero stood two-hour watches; they’d planned no more than a four-hour stop to let the beasts rest and graze; there was really no point in pushing too hard, they weren’
t racing anything but impatience. Telka and her army were in place, waiting for them; they could have rested longer, but as Timka said, why make Telka impatient and bring her after them too far from the Gate. Skeen took the first watch, woke Lipitero and lay down to snatch some more sleep. Lipitero watched and brooded; toward the end of her second hour, she got firewood from the cart and started water boiling for tea.

  When she had breakfast ready, she woke Skeen and Timka.

  “I’ve been thinking,” Lipitero said, raising her voice over the rattle of the cart and the horse noises. She pointed at the Min visible intermittently through the ragged clouds. “They should be told about the Ever-Hunger.”

  “Waste of breath,” Skeen said. “They won’t believe you.

  The leather cushions on the driver’s seat squeaked as Timka slid around so she could see Lipitero. The horses slowed to an amble, but didn’t quite dare stop completely. “I’m afraid Skeen’s right,” she said, hesitating over the words as if she didn’t want to believe them, as if she wanted Lipitero to convince her otherwise. “They’ve got too many lives invested to dare believe you.”