by Jean Johnson
“Their law-sayer is well prepared for the initial volleys,” Harkut observed. He looked around at the Efrijt standing to either side along the walls of the hall, and flicked his hand, dismissing them. They scattered back to whatever tasks should be occupying each at that hour. The sefo lowered his voice, speaking privately to his triumvirate partners. “But however clever he may be, the Fae has been cut off from any in-depth access to the more obscure rulings that can be applied, for the next two months or so. We should press what advantages we have, in that.”
Parut, oddly, had a cautionary note. “Do not get so involved in bartering and bargaining, arguing and counterarguing, that you lose track of what is most important for the medjant. We wish to stay and continue to mine mercury, both here and elsewhere on this world, in ways that are profitable for us. Keep that firmly in mind.”
“I do know my business, Seso Parut,” Harkut pledged mildly.
Grunting, Parut shoved to his feet. “I know you do, but sometimes it is easy to let such details slide while pursuing others. Now, if the two of you do not need me for anything else, I have my lunch to finish, and the afternoon workers to supervise. In case you cannot secure the best contract possible, despite your considerable best efforts, I will continue trying to extract as much ore as possible. It is not that I lack faith, Sefo Harkut,” he added with dry politeness, “but that I am inclined to match our production rate to the worst-case scenario, and wring as much liquid wealth from the local rocks as I can, before anything shuts us down. Just in case.”
“In that case, should I drag out the negotiations for nearly two months, also just in case?” Harkut asked just as dryly.
Zakal, still disturbed by the memory of those anima-spheres drawing themselves out of the brazier fires with no sign of effort on the Fae’s part, nodded her agreement. “Drag out the negotiations, and wring out the rocks. We can afford to take a bit of time. If nothing else, they may have already realized that we would eventually learn of their Veilway shutdowns anyway. Taking our time with them may lull them into a false sense of security.”
“I agree,” Harkut stated.
“And I agree,” Parut confirmed. “We are therefore in accord.”
“Thank you for your diligence in attending to the mines, Seso Parkut,” Zakal stated. He nodded and headed for the door.
“Enjoy your lunch,” Harkut told him. “Unless it was one of those cactus flower salads that Daro Gotag has learned to make; if you ever suddenly find you dislike them, I will gladly dispose of the leftovers.”
“Get your own plateful, Sefo Harkut,” Parut shot back over his shoulder. “This one is mine.”
The sefo sighed, relaxing back into his chair. “Well, I tried. A pity they cannot be mass-produced. It’s no good trying to sell them as a rare and thus costly delicacy if you cannot get enough people to try them to get the rest of the empire to notice . . .”
“We are here for the mercury, and any other immediate, local ores that catch our interest,” Zakal reminded him. “We are specialized for mineral extraction, and would need a few more decades of profit before we can consider expanding into agricultural pursuits . . . however tasty that concoction is.”
“Don’t let the Fae know how tasty it is,” Harkut muttered. “Or they’ll find a way to use it against us. Now, if you do not need me, I will return to examining precedents for this jurisdiction case.”
She nodded, confirming silently that he was free to go. “The message that delayed you has turned out to be worth more than any social cost it may have caused. Thank you, Harkut, for all your hard work on our behalf.”
Rising, he dusted himself off, bowed his head to her, and headed for the back door, the one that led to Efrijt-only territory. Left alone with her thoughts, Zakal rested a few moments more in her seat, then rose and headed for her workrooms. The guest quarters had been seeded with scrying devices both magical and mundane. With luck, she would be able to spy upon their guests, and eavesdrop on any discussions they held.
Chapter Nine
“So they are spying upon us, and we are spying upon them,” Ban stated, balanced so easily upon the half-egg pods of his new slip-discs that he did not move an inch, despite the wind blowing at this altitude. “It is all very civilized. And slower paced than anticipated.”
In the half-clouded night, the faint, three-dimensional projection of Jintaya’s figure flickered a little, her voice sounding slightly tinny, a reminder that he was not close enough to touch her. The kite-flown spying device allowed such projections to pass both ways, if one knew how to activate the artifact on each end. It did, however, require him to fly up to within arm’s length of the kite, since its ability to observe stretched a lot farther than its ability to project.
She smiled wryly at his sardonic observation, and lifted a phantom-hand toward his cheek. He couldn’t feel it, of course, but the gesture touched him. “Your patience is appreciated, Ban. I will trust in Kefer and Jinji to handle the pacing of the initial negotiations. How fare the humans?”
“Our lot is faring just fine,” he told her. “Tuki has already made friends among the younger set, and Zuki has been garnering admiration from everything she has been sharing with the local animadjet. The warrior-hunters we brought aren’t quite as popular, but then the locals aren’t sure why we brought three, yet. Krue has wisely instructed them to remain together and not go off wandering into uninvited territory, as a visual reassurance we are not here seeking weaknesses.”
“And my human?” she asked lightly. “How are you faring?”
“Well enough,” he admitted, shrugging. “A little disappointed that Éfan no longer needs to eat or sleep. And I plan to head northwest in the morning, up the pass, to visit with my acquaintances from when I came down. I heard that the sejo went that way to interrogate those I spoke with. I wish to make certain they are well.”
She smiled at him. “You are starting to care about others again, all your scars healing and easing in their pain, I think. It warms the whole world to see such positive change and growth in you, Ban. Let me know what you find . . . and for both your sake, I hope they and you will both be found well.”
Lifting his own hand toward her gossamer face, Ban murmured, “I have a good teacher . . . even if her pupil is very slow to learn.”
“What was damaged over the course of many years will not be healed over the course of a single day,” she reminded him. Not for the first time, either. “You have been running on the equivalent of shattered legs for a very long time, Ban. But I am patient, and quite capable of waiting decades more for your innermost injuries to heal.”
He started to reply, but a yawn caught him off guard. Stifling it behind his hand, Ban suppressed a frown of annoyance, settling on a sigh instead. “I should go back and rest. I was up most of the night, helping Éfan guide the barge . . . and yes, I know he probably didn’t need it.”
“I am certain he enjoyed your company,” she replied. “Goodnight, my Ban. Sleep well.”
“And you, Jintaya,” he reminded her. “You promised me at least an hour of rest each night.”
“Of course.” Her hand shifted upward, and her image vanished, leaving him in the dark. In the cold and the dark, with clouds steadily creeping eastward across the sky, blocking off more and more of the starlight illuminating the land.
Shivering in the damp, chilly wind coming off the mountains to the west, Ban swiveled his hips, guiding the slip-discs away from their static position under the scrying kite. He angled back down toward the valley where the Efrijt had dug homes for themselves and their human workers, lit here and there by stone-sheltered oil lamps meant to illuminate paths. Apparently, some of the workers dug up the ore even during the hours of the night, not just the day—mines that went underground relied on artificial illumination, not on sunlight.
Tempted though he was to aim for the valley where that mining took place, Ban refrained. The Efri
jt would be expecting that. Better to come back when they think I’ve gone away, and sneak around when they’re not on the watch for whatever spying a visitor might try.
***
Tanaluk held up his hands, which trembled visibly. He didn’t speak as if drunk on palraca, no slurs or mumblings in his speech, but his muscles did twitch now and then. “These last few days, my hands as well as my feet are starting to hurt. Touching things is more and more painful. Even just resting, they can hurt. I am told I will have the crazy extracted from me when the spring rains end, since I can still do my work in the mines for half a year more.”
“It hurts already, but they’re going to make you wait to cure you?” Tuki asked. “That’s not right! They should fix you right away. Djin-taje would fix you right away, if she were here.”
The other teenager shrugged. “The Red Skins say the spells are very difficult, and take much from them to perform, so they would rather only do it once a year than try to find the energy to do it twice in the same length of time.”
“Why do you even dig the ore for them, if it hurts you so much?” Tuki demanded, frowning. He picked up a stick and poked at the fire in the hearth area of Tanaluk’s cave home.
Tanaluk gestured at the furniture, the wool-stuffed pallet on the bedframe, the three chairs with their cushions, two of which they sat on by the fire, the pottery bowls and cups, the bits of metal tools. “I have earned so much, I not only gave my parents many nice things for their home, I now have my own. It can take a man until he is twenty-five or more to be able to put together his own household, and often he must have the help of a mate. But I have one all of my own without the assistance of a mate.
“The women look at me as a provider, as someone who will give them and their children fine things in their life. I have a lot of their tally metal saved, so that I can pay for things for other members of the tribe,” Tanaluk explained. “I traded the metal chips for cloth for my sister to use when the weather was too hot for her to wear her leathers. Being pregnant makes a woman very sweaty and cranky in the heat of summer. I can even pay for ice in the heat of summer, which the Red Skins store in deep caves, fetched down from high up the mountains in winter. All the good things in life we could not have before, we have now.”
“But your hands and feet hurt,” Tuki pointed out, wondering how the other young man reconciled the two clashing viewpoints.
Tanaluk nodded. “They hurt. I have been working in the mines for two years now. The crazy has had time to work its way into me.”
“What if you slowed down?” Tuki asked next. “You said you have lots of trade markers. Do you have to work every day?”
“The seso says we must work even harder, now that your yellow people have come. We must dig up twice as much ore. And if we do not dig, then they will start taking away our trade markers, because they say we owe them work, that it was in our agreements with them.” The Red Rocks youth shrugged, legs spasming a little. “I was not there when Taje Ulanni made the agreement, but her grandson, Ulec, insists that this is so. And . . .”
He hesitated, then looked over his shoulder at the curtain-framed doorway of his stone-dug home. Tuki looked as well, but didn’t know who might be lurking outside this late at night. Tanaluk lowered his voice and returned to gazing at the fire.
“. . . Ulec has beaten those who tried to refuse to go back into the mines. Some tried to point out that we are not to be beaten, and they went to Sejo Zakal . . . but she said that her people are the ones not allowed to beat us. Sefo Harkut adds that is it within Ulec’s right as his grandmother’s heir and helper to enforce our agreements however he sees fit. I agreed to work in the mines . . . so I must work in the mines—Ulec is right,” he insisted, slashing a trembling hand through the air. “We agreed to do these things, so we must uphold our word once it is given. And it was their fault they tried to break their word, their shame that stained the tribe’s honor. Taje Ulanni cannot punish the oathbreakers, as she is too old, but Ulec can, and has. It is his right.”
There was something wrong in that, but Tuki couldn’t put his finger on it. Abruptly, Tanaluk jerked. He twitched for a moment, hissing to control the pain, then stood and gestured at the door.
“I need to sleep. You need to go back to the guest place.”
Rising, Tuki moved to the doorway, then hesitated before pushing the curtain aside. “Do you want me to ask Muan-taje if she will come try to heal the crazy pain? Taje Djin-taje-ul said Muan-taje has many healing spells she can use, since the Taje-ul could not come herself on this trip.”
Tanaluk jerked again, and the Flame Sea teen wasn’t sure whether the twitch was a side effect of his pain, or an actual shrug. After a moment, though, he nodded tersely. “Bring her, next time.”
“I’ll bring her right now,” Tuki countered. “You shouldn’t have to spend the night in pain. It’s not right. I’ll be back soon,” he promised, and ducked past the curtain into the night.
The rain outside had subsided to a mere drizzle during his visit, but it still blocked all of the starlight that could have guided him, and the dampness had extinguished some of the oil lamps dotting the settlement. Needing to see the unfamiliar terrain, Tuki concentrated, summoning up some of the anima from within his body, and a little bit more from the chilly, damp air. Coalescing it into a spark-ball, he squeezed it down with his hands and his will, just like Zuki had taught him, until it shone in a steady blue-white sphere the size of a goose egg.
Lofting it over his head a couple feet, he let its glow show him the safe path down the half-natural, half-rough-hewn steps forming a rugged staircase on this side of the valley. He passed a few other homes, saw firelight through the cloth-draped window openings, heard tired voices murmuring. These homes were all located near the mines, and some of the speech of the miners sounded slurred.
A toddler giggled in high-pitched delight, only to be shushed by the father, who murmured soothingly to his child. In another one, something sizzled on the fire, filling the air with a hint of smoke and cooking meat. He heard a rustling behind him, glanced over his shoulder, and saw a woman poking her head out her window, blinking at the blue-white glow of his anima-light. Smiling at her, Tuki waved, trying to seem friendly.
She frowned a little and pulled her head back inside. He didn’t stop to listen, didn’t go back to see if she chatted about him with whomever she shared her quarters. The thought of Tanaluk’s pain and suffering kept him going forward through the chilly mist-rain drifting down from the sky. But in the dark, he found himself faltering at a crossroads of paths. Two of them angled into the one he was on, each fairly close to each other.
This wasn’t his home; he couldn’t remember which one he had come up along. Tuki turned around, trying to squint at the night-cloaked landscape, needing to find a landmark from his memory. He turned forward again, squinted some more, and finally paced along one of the paths several lengths, turned and squinted, turned some more. Walking back to the crossroads, he tried the other path, trying to find a familiar bush, a distinctive rock or scrubby tree. Even one of the weird cacti that grew in this area would suffice.
A figure loomed up on the path, startling him with a deep-booming demand. “What are you doing, boy? Are you dancing?”
Sucking in a startled breath, Tuki pressed a hand to his chest, feeling his heart race. The tall, muscular Efrijt facing him gleamed with rain-damp skin about the color of the darkest rust, auburn red hair tied back in a tail, and pale orange-amber eyes. Teeth bared in a grimace meant his unnaturally long tusks showed. Having appeared without warning, Tuki felt like the man had conjured himself, like some sort of anima-being.
“Well?” the Efrijt demanded. He was shirtless, but covered in a soot-stained leather apron that hung down to his knees, his trousers tucked into boots. “What are you doing here?”
“I . . . I . . . uhhh . . . I’m lost,” he finally stammered. “I’m trying to get ba
ck to the . . . the guest quarters. A friend I made,” Tuki added, pointing up the way he had come, “he’s hurt, and Muan-taje, she’s a healer. I want to get her so she can heal him.”
“Muan . . . taje?” He wrinkled his nose in distaste. “Don’t you humans put your titles in front? Show respect!”
“I . . . that’s just the way they are!” Tuki stammered. He didn’t dare mention the southlander word god, so he flopped his hands in a helpless shrug. “She’s a Fae!”
“. . . Muan?” The Efrijt quirked a brow. “That name means Love in my tongue . . . What Fae names their child love in Frijsh?”
Again, he didn’t have an answer. “. . . I don’t know? I think Djindji-taje said her name—Muan-taje’s name—um, it means some sort of flower?”
Rolling his eyes with impatience, the Efrijt slashed his hand. “Go! Go find your flower-love person.”
“I don’t know which way to go! That’s why I was dancing,” Tuki added tartly. He flinched when the muscular male growled, and flinched again when that large, callused hand came down on his shoulder. Gripped and turned, he found himself pushed along the path.
“I will take you to her.” He pushed Tuki along the path, then clenched his fingers a little, stopping the teen. “Do you know how to get back to the human that is injured?”
“Uhh . . . not really? I only went there once. It’s Tanaluk, the young miner who’s close to my age?” Tuki added over his shoulder, hoping he wasn’t getting the Red Rocks male in trouble.
The Efrijt grunted. “I know where the human boy lives. Keep moving down this path.”
“Of course. Down this path . . . Do, uh, do you have a name? And a title?” he added, since the Efrijt anima-beings seemed to place a lot of importance on their weird titles.
“I am Daro Dakin Urudo.”
“Oh! You were there, with your sister, when we arrived! Anza—Taro Anzak is your cousin, right?” Tuki asked.