by Dana Marton
Ina turned toward her thatch-roofed cottage and gestured me to follow her.
“How is it that Ishaf is still free?” I asked.
Her expression tightened, multiplying her wrinkles. “The Emperor wanted to conquer the mountain countries first, befer their harsh winter reached ’em. He succeeded fer the most part, but his wars there took longer than he expected. Now winter is here. He might wait until spring befer comin’ against us.” She sighed. “Maybe some sudden disease will take ’im, the spirits be willin’.”
I stared at her. No Shahala healer would ever speak those words. Ishafi herb women were a different breed, it seemed.
She had tea steeping over the embers of her kitchen fire. She pointed me to a chair, then filled a cup for me with the hot amber liquid.
I let the tea roll around my tongue. “Mersion pear, elne, penin grass. And sistan,” I added. “A very good tea for winter. It will ward off colds.”
She nodded with approval, then looked at my herbs again. “How much are ye sellin’?”
“Everything.”
“These old bones…” she said after a moment on a sigh. “I cannay walk as far as I used to. I can give ye bread and eggs fer these, and nay have to go into the forest mineself. Mine hens have slowed down fer winter, but they are still layin’.”
I thanked her most sincerely and asked if I could have the eggs boiled. She agreed readily to that. To repay her for her kindness, I helped her collect the eggs from pretty brown-black hens in a coop at the end of her garden.
“Tell me,” she said, holding the basket while I handed out the eggs. “Do ye know the Tika Shahala, Chalee?”
Tika Shahala was a title of great respect among my people, signifying the best healer among healers.
“Yes, I knew her. She has gone to the spirits,” I said, but did not betray that I was Chalee’s daughter.
I was a stranger in Ishaf. I did not yet know whom I could trust. There had been Shahala healers kidnapped for their healing skills.
The old woman clicked her tongue and bobbed her head from side to side. “A sad shame that. If half the stories ’bout her are true, there will never be another like her.”
After we took the eggs in, I offered to help in the garden. I yet had time before I had to be back at the inn.
“Are ye travelin’ with family, then?” the old woman asked.
“With a merchant and nine children,” I told her, and recounted our unfortunate voyage with the pirates, how we escaped with our very lives. I said nothing about Batumar or the true goal of our journey.
“Sailin’ with pirates.” She sighed. “I s’ppose it could nay be helped. The Gate is closed, I hear.”
“It is.”
“A shame fer the island people. Thank the spirits Ishaf is on the mainland. I cannay imagine to be stuck on an island, be cut off from the rest of the world ferever.”
I nodded, but in truth, I thought if the Gate somehow reopened, it would be even worse. Emperor Drakhar’s mercenaries would pour through then.
Inside, I helped her clean and bunch the herbs, hang them up to dry. I ground the seeds already collected and tied them up in pouches, marked them with their names.
When dusk fell, she boiled twenty-two eggs, two for each of us in our small traveling party, and gave me two loaves of round herb bread, much more than my work was worth. I gratefully accepted.
“Will ye come back on the morrow?” she wanted to know.
“I do not know, Grandmother.” I did not know what the merchant’s plans were.
She took my hand and peered into my eyes. “Ye have a shadow on yer heart, Granddaughter.”
Her tone of compassion undid something inside me. So I told her the truth about the merchant, and how the children were little beggars, and how I intended to trade myself for them.
“Foolishness.” She bobbed her head from side to side. “Ye cannot change the will of the spirits.”
“The spirits did not will those children to be maimed. The merchant did.”
“And ye would sell yerself to such a man?”
“I cannot go back to my home. And I have nothing here.”
“Ye could come and live with me,” she said after some thought. “I could use the help.”
But I was not even a healer anymore. My gift had deserted me. I shook my head.
“Dinnay let that shadow settle on yer heart overly long, Granddaughter,” she advised, true concern in her eyes. “A shadow like that can darken yer very spirit.” She made some kind of warding sign with her gnarled fingers.
“Mayhap saving the children will lift some of that shadow,” I offered, if only so she would not worry about me.
“Mayhap.” She tilted her head. “If ye manage yer trade, send the children to me. They can help in mine garden and with mine chickens. Mayhap one of ’em will have a feel fer herbs.” She sighed. “I cannay promise much. They might still have to beg. But I can offer shelter.”
The children going to a kind woman was more than I had dared hope. For the past few days, the light had gone out of my world. But here she was, suddenly, a bright spirit.
I would rather have the children in the warmth of Ina’s heart and hut than serving in a cold stone temple. I would save them. Yet I ached to do more, to save my people.
“I am but a woman.” Frustration pushed the words from me. “I wish I had a man’s power.” I would challenge the merchant then for the children. And I would negotiate with kings for armies.
Instead of chiding, Ina shook her head. “Every man has been brought into this world by a woman. Ye have plenty of power of yer own, and no need to wish fer the power of another.”
She hugged me so warmly, as if I was enfolded in my own mother’s arms. Then tsked as we pulled apart. She was looking at my boots. “Ye dinnay mean to go on the road in those, do ye?”
She didn’t wait for an answer but shuffled off and fished around under her bed with a broomstick until she nudged out an ancient boot, then another. “Mine old man’s. He’s got nay need of ’em nay more.”
I thanked her with all my heart, put on the boots that felt as soft as a babe’s breath compared to my old pair, then took my bundle of food and walked back toward the inn, ready to make my bargain.
Chapter Thirteen
(Never a Slave Again)
Times being lean, Ishaf full of refugees already, the children did not collect much, but enough so Graho was able to secure a pile of hay in the inn’s yard for the night, along with a couple of blankets.
The innkeep’s wife smiled at the merchant, swishing her wide hips and tugging her doublet down so her oversized breasts could not escape his attention. Did she think him handsome? Did other women?
I could not, for I knew that greed ruled his heart, but I could allow that his visage had improved since we had left the ship. The meals Marga had provided us in the woods had filled out all our cheeks. And we had cleaned up in the creeks we had passed. Even the dark shadows were gone from around the merchant’s eyes, and those blue eyes seemed to have acquired a sparkle.
But despite the woman’s interest in him, Graho seemed to have no great interest in her. Once he spotted me, he bowed to her in short order, and strode to me and the children, a new rapier at his side. His mouth curved into a smile, as if he was relieved to see me there.
“I wish that you would share our accommodations, Lady Tera modest though they be,” he said.
“I thank you for that kindness.” I settled down by the children and laid out the food I had brought back for them.
The little ones were talking and smiling and seemed not the least tired from their day’s work. They seemed to like the safety of the courtyard, the softness of the hay, and the warmth of the blankets. Those luxuries were a considerable improvement over our sleeping arrangements in the forest.
We each ate an egg and a piece of bread, leaving the rest for breaking our fast in the morning. Once again, the children asked me for a tale. Talking with the herb woman about my mother
reminded me of some stories she used to tell me as a child, so I recounted a couple, tales meant to teach as much as entertain.
Shahala children’s tales taught kindness, cleanliness, and honesty for the most part—different from Kadar tales that valued strength, bravery, and loyalty above all other traits. I used to think we were right and they were wrong. But the siege of Karamur had taught me that the world was a complicated place, and so I included a Kadar tale.
When the children fell asleep at long last, I looked up at the night sky, gathering the strength for what I meant to do next. For a moment, I thought I heard a tiger’s roar in the distance, but it did not repeat, so I could not be certain.
I hoped Marga would not steal any more horses. She could stay hidden in the forest and live. But if she came to hunt among the peasants who lived outside the city, she would be hunted and killed. I asked the spirits to keep her safe.
Then I filled my lungs with cold night air and looked over at the merchant. He was lying on his back, his hands folded under his head, his eyes open. He was looking as intently at the stars as if he meant to count them.
The children slept between us. I slid from under the blanket I shared with two of the little ones, Nala and Mora, and went over to the merchant’s side.
I crouched next to him, hugging my knees. “I wish to make a trade,” I whispered.
He turned to look at me, his blue eyes as black in the darkness as Batumar’s had been. He had that look of hunger on his face that Batumar used to have when we were alone in his bedchamber. Pain punched through my empty heart and banged around inside.
I swallowed hard, hugging my knees even tighter. “I wish to trade,” I said again, willing my voice not to tremble.
The merchant waited. With his arms up, folded under his head, I could see the bulge of muscles as his shirt sleeve pulled tight. Merchant or not, he was built like a warrior. He was much stronger than me. If he meant to, he could force me to his will. Mayhap I was foolish to try to bargain with a man such as he. But I had to try anyway.
“You are taking the children to Muzarat to sell them to some beggar lord,” I began.
He said nothing.
“You could leave them here. Ina, the herb woman, would take them in. All nine.”
He kept watching me, his intent gaze never leaving my face.
“I will go to Muzarat with you instead of the children.” Saying the words aloud left me breathless. I felt cold inside at the thought of the life waiting for me, and the cold spread through me, to the tips of my toes.
Graho’s shoulders tensed. Anger narrowed his lips.
“I know one woman is not much to replace nine little beggars,” I rushed to say. “But I am a hard worker. I have been a slave before. And I am a healer.” I hoped my powers would come back to me. “I am a good herb woman.” I swallowed. “You will journey easier with me. You will not have to carry me.” He’d had to carry me before. I looked at my feet. “Again.”
“No,” he said, tight-lipped.
“I will gather herbs along the way. I will sell them. I will heal people. I can make baskets. I will earn as much as the children would.”
“No.” His shoulders stiffened even harder.
I was drowning in desperation like I had been drowning in the sea. Without thought, I reached for my knife and pulled it from its sheath, grabbed the handle tightly.
He saw but did not move. He held my gaze in the moonlight, his chest rising and falling evenly.
Despite the cold, sweat beaded on my brow.
With everything I was, I hated the man before me. But I could not reach out my hand to harm him. I slowly slid my knife back into its sheath, tears burning my eyes. I hoped he could not see them. The thought of this man seeing me weak and broken once again was intolerable.
But he did not laugh at me or mock my weakness.
“I fear for you, my lady,” he said on a deep sigh.
I shook my head. How could he fear for me, when only a moment before I had the blade out to cut his throat?
“What would you wish to do,” he asked quietly, “if all things were possible?”
What a strange man. We were without means, refugees in a world at war. Our possibilities were most limited. Truly, we were little above slaves ourselves. We had our freedom, but no shelter, no protection.
“I would give these children a loving home,” I said.
“Beyond that,” he pressed.
I would save my people. I did not dare tell him that, for fear that he might yet turn out to be one of Emperor Drakhar’s spies. What better disguise than a traveling merchant?
“Do what it is you wish to do,” he suggested. “We live in a time of war. We’re all likely to come to a bloody end. We might as well meet that fate while doing something we believe in.”
I barely heard the second half of his speech. Raise an army? I bit back a bitter laugh. “It is not possible.”
“Who but you makes it impossible?”
“The world.”
“You want this thing very much?”
With all my heart and soul. “Yes.”
“Then you must conquer the world.”
Spoken like a man who was used to power and riches. He must have been a very wealthy merchant before he had become trapped on our side of the Gate.
But he had neither power nor riches now. Now he sounded as if he had lost his sound mind.
“Come with us to Muzarat,” he offered again.
He wanted it all, the children and me. No man was as greedy as a merchant. No doubt, he was in a hurry to build his wealth back.
When I said nothing, he pushed on. “Do you want to go back to the High Lord’s Pleasure Hall? Serve the next Kadar barbarian?”
His cold tone turned the word serve into an insult. The denial that the Kadar were not barbarians was on my tongue, but I swallowed the words. Had I not thought the same, not that long ago? For certain, they were a hard people and given to war and violence. But I had also found much honor and nobility amongst them.
“I will never be a concubine again,” I said. And, in that moment, I knew that I would never be a slave again either, not willingly. Never again would I meekly go along with my fate.
That thought filled me with sudden strength, more than I’d had in days. I felt as if I had been underwater all these past days still, only now reaching the surface, only now being able to breathe or open my eyes fully to see.
I stood and looked around, at the merchant, at the children, at the inn. Suddenly the night noises of Ishaf reached me. My lungs expanded.
Without making a conscious decision, I was walking. I walked out of the inn’s courtyard, walked through the sleeping city, to the city walls. These I climbed and stood on top of the ramparts, looking past the ships in the harbor, out over the moonlit sea that had swallowed the warlord I loved.
The dark waves called to me still. But, no, I was not meant for the waves.
I looked into the night, my heart aching for my island of Dahru. And for a moment, I felt as if could see it, just on the horizon, behind the moonlit clouds, the lovely shape of home. I felt as if I could hear every heartbeat.
Batumar was no longer.
But I was.
Maybe I was no longer a healer. Maybe I was no longer the High Lord’s concubine. But I was here. I was the only one who could bring help.
Batumar had taken many a life. But I had saved just as many. Was that not as powerful? What if I could, by myself, accomplish the goal of our journey?
I had not died in the waves. I had not died on the rocks. I had not died of the injuries I had taken upon myself. They were healing little by little.
I could live with Ina, be an herb woman here, and a healer if my powers came back. But had I been kept alive for that by the spirits? To be safe behind the city walls of Ishaf while my people were conquered and killed?
While the children were sold in Muzarat?
My mind raced along with the night winds. Muzarat lay far to the south. T
he caravans to Muzarat left from Ker, this much I knew. And from Batumar’s maps, I knew that Ker lay a day’s journey south of Ishaf. Muzarat lay at least a mooncrossing’s journey by caravan from Ker.
Regnor, Lord Karnagh’s city, had been lost to the enemy, but Seberon, the country of the Selorm, had yet a free city left, now ruled by a warrior queen, somewhere to the east of Ker. The Silver River began in the hills of Seberon and flowed to the South Sea, going right through Muzarat.
I could travel to Seberon’s last free city, negotiate with the warrior queen. She was another woman, the most likely to talk with me. She would know much about strategy that I did not. She could teach me. She could advise me on how to free my people.
Would she teach me? What did I have to trade for her help? Nothing. Yet who else could I turn to?
Lord Karnagh.
If I could find him. He had disappeared when his lands had been overrun, but he had not been reported slain.
Lord Karnagh would come to our aid; he was Batumar’s strong ally. He had aided us during the siege of Karamur, and we had become friends of a sort. I was the only woman in the castle who did not cower from his battle tiger. He was a Selorm, an ancient race of warriors who bonded with their battle tigers and fought as one. His people were great in courage and fame.
If I could find Lord Karnagh… I closed my eyes for a second and clenched my teeth. I would find Lord Karnagh.
With Lord Karnagh and what warriors he might have left, we would travel south, making more and more alliances.
I had to somehow earn coin on the way, then book passage on a barge, float down the river and reach Muzarat before the merchant sold any of the children. For good coin, as much or more than he would receive at the market, I thought he would make the trade.
I would have the children, and have a full army, and then we’d go to Landria to ask them for their ships. If the pirates could sail the hardstorms, so could the Landrian navy.
Batumar’s cloak with the star map was lost, but I had embroidered it and I remembered every stitch.
A plan for a fool, a small voice said inside my head. Yet Batumar’s plan had seemed no less impossible, and we had made it halfway through before tragedy hit. Mayhap another foolish plan would receive luck enough from the spirits to accomplish something.