Diadem from the Stars

by Clayton, Jo;

  “Azdar commands. Forget about your assigned work. Go to your room now and stay out of sight. I’ll send an asiri with your lunch.”

  “But …” She jumped to her feet. “I have the right.”

  Ziraki pinched his lips together. “Aleytys, don’t argue. This is no time to stand on your rights. If you try to go …” He shrugged. “You saw Qumri. You want to face that multiplied by hundreds?”

  Aleytys swallowed. She stared stubbornly down at her clenched hands. “He should tell me himself.”

  “Sabbiyya,” he said brusquely. “You’re not stupid.”

  “Hah!” Her laugh was short, shaky. “Ziraki …”

  “I can’t answer any questions, Aleytys, so don’t ask.” He moved closer and touched her head lightly. “Be sure to keep out of the way for the next few days. Just to be safe.” He stepped back until he was out in the hall. “Just give us a little time to settle down.”

  After he left the room Aleytys sat down again. “What a day,” she sighed. She leaned back and let her tired arms dangle. Softness flowed past her ankles, then brushed back again with a small mrowrr.

  “Mooli,” she said with delight and got an answering mrowrr. She scooped the vibrating furry body into her lap. The gurb twisted around in her hands and swiped her small rough tongue over the fingers holding her. “Mooli, Mooli,” Aleytys crooned, stroking her fingers across the thick russet fur, back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, until her anger and tension drifted away.

  5

  Aleytys sat up and leaned over Twanit. She was breathing deeply and steadily and seemed likely to continue that way till dawn. Every third intake was a low gurgling rattle, a semisnore no louder than a mouse-squeak.

  As Aleytys swung her legs over the side of the bed, the leather lacing supporting the mattress creaked loudly. She dived off onto the floor and held her breath, a muscle twitching at the corner of her mouth. Twanit didn’t stir. Her breathing clockworked on, in-out, in-out, without a break. Aleytys sighed with relief and pulled the heavy nightgown over her head. Shivering in the cold air of the room, she folded it up and tucked it neatly under her pillow.

  Bare feet flinching from the cold floor, heart bumping, she slipped along the wall and slid the panel back. She scrambled into the first abba that came to hand and fastened the ties with shaking fingers. Then she closed her eyes and leaned against the wall. “Plenty of time …” she whispered. “There’s plenty of time.…”

  She shoved her hair back off her face. “Perfume … got to have perfume.…” She rummaged in the closet, running her hands lightly over the bottles, jumping slightly each time they clanked together. At last she found the right one and pulled the cork. With fingers trembling in excitement she rubbed the scent every place she could think of, her blood heating up again as the prickle of the liquid started shivers in her skin.

  Her sense of the ridiculous suddenly reasserted itself. As she shoved the cork back into the bottle, her stomach was rippling with suppressed laughter. You could track me by smell alone, she thought. Idiot.…

  Out in the hall the night candles were burned halfway down. Twisting shadows danced on the walls like nightmare monsters hunching over her. She swallowed nervously. Running on her toes, she slanted across to the stairs and bolted down them. Even the almost soundless patter of her bare feet sounded like gong-strokes in her cringing ears.

  In the patio she stopped for a moment by the housetree and stroked the glistening bark. “For luck, aziz,” she whispered. Reluctantly she pulled away from the tree and sped through the entranceway tunnel.

  Taking a deep breath, she stepped onto the roadway. The cold soggy sand, wet from the evening rain, squished between her toes while above her head the horan branches flickered back and forth in the light wind and whispered words at her just beyond the threshold of hearing, as though she could understand all the terrible things they were saying if she just listened a little harder. All around her the moon-shadows danced phantomlike across the pale earth and she fled through them, the rhythms of her ragged breathing a discord in the quiet pattern of night sounds.

  Her bare foot splatted down on the bridge with a sound obscenely loud in her straining ears. She gasped and ran up the arch. In the middle of the bridge she paused to catch her breath and leaned against the smooth rail, shaking like those wind-tossed leaves.

  The murmur of the water drifted into her head, comforting her now as it had done so many times before. She sighed and rested on her elbows, watching the water. The river at night had a strange fascination … silver swirling current lines, deep black on black layers of shadow, moving, altering, sliding away beneath her. It whispered to her, the sound flowing like balm over her quivering nerves and melting into the marrow of her bones. She seemed to dissolve through her skin, scattering along the jewel-bright water like moonbeams dancing on the surface … insect wants and busy hungers caught at bits of her … and the long cool thoughts … lives … of the trees … and far-off feral greeds.… Time … time stretched out … out … out … and snapped!

  She gasped and swung around to look at the black bulk of the house. It rested solid and silent against the diamond-bright dust lighting the night blackness of the sky. She shivered again as the whispering leaves rasped across naked nerves. Moving swiftly she slid into the concealing shadows of the trees growing on the far bank of the river.

  At the old horan she put her hand on the gnarled trunk and called softly, “Vajd?”

  The river murmured past and the night around her was filled with mysterious creaks and rustles.

  Aleytys hugged the tree and closed her eyes. “Vajd?” Still no answer. Fear was a cold and growing lump in the region of her stomach. If he didn’t come …

  “Leyta?” The whisper hissed past her ear.

  She clutched at the tree, pressing herself tight against the rough bark.

  “Hai …” He scrambled down to her and lifted her into his arms. “Poor little gurb.”

  Gentled aaginst his chest she tried to answer, but her teeth chattered so loudly she couldn’t force the words past them.

  “Just be quiet, love. Relax … we’ve the whole night.…” He held her close and stroked gentle hands over her hair and down her back.

  Gradually the chill warmed away. She sucked in a long unsteady breath and let it trickle out again. Lifting her head from his chest, she touched his cheek with her fingertips, then sighing with intense satisfaction, she snuggled down against his strong warm body. “It’s been a hellish day.”

  “I know, Leyta, I know.”

  She tilted her head back. “What happened at the malaqat?”

  He didn’t answer but his face looked grim.

  “As bad as that?”

  He tightened his arms around her and dropped a light kiss where her hair parted. “As bad as it could be.”

  “Um. Hadn’t you better tell me?” She trailed her fingers back and forth across his hands, slightly distracted by the hard strong feel of skin and muscle. “Vajd-mi?”

  He nodded but seemed reluctant to begin. She could hear his heart beating fast under her ear.

  “Well?” She wriggled impatiently. “Azdar kept me shut up in my room all day. Twanit was too scared to say anything. After she came back from mulaqat, every time she looked at me she started crying, poor baby, but I found it very frustrating.” She shivered. The cold was beginning to slide up her legs.

  “You’re cold,” he said sharply. “Your hands are shaking.”

  She pushed away from him and frowned. “Vajd!”

  He laughed. “Not here, love.” He pushed her onto her feet and stood beside her. He stretched and yawned the vertical stripes on his black and silver abba shifting back and forth in the moonlight. “The finjan’s out. Too far. Shall we join the horses?”

  “Better horses then some snoopy idiot. Lot better.”

  Vajd’s teeth gleamed as he grinned down at her. “I forgot.” He reached for her hand. “You like animals.”

 
; As they picked their way over the roots, Aleytys tightened her fingers around his and moved closer. “They’re mostly nicer than people. At least to me.”

  He slid his arm around her waist and propelled her ahead of him up the ramp to the stable door. When she tensed at the low rumble as he slid the door back, Vajd chuckled and rubbed his hand on her side. “Relax, love. All sensible people are warm in bed.”

  She snorted and stalked into the stable. After sliding the door shut, he followed her. Around her she could hear soft snuffles and thumps as the horses shifted in momentary dreams. Although a little light crept in through dusty double windows high on each side of the long narrow building, she could see almost nothing except vague bulks rising here and there on either side of a central aisle. The air was rich with animal smells, warm from their body heat. She felt the wavery shivers that were crawling up and down her body begin to subside. “Vajd …”

  “Up the ladder.” He gave her a little shove, his hands warm on the small of her back.

  Aleytys groped her way into the loft and slid over the loose slippery straw to one corner, where a window permitted a few stray moonbeams past spider webs and hay dust to light the downslope of the small hill. Sighing with pleasure, she dropped down on the straw and rooted around until she had a comfortable hollow, then she leaned back and sniffed. “Smells good here.”

  Vajd slid down beside her and she smiled up at him. “Leyta …” His eyes glinted in the moonlight as he bent over her and slid gentle exploring fingers down the side of her face. “Soft …” His voice trailed off as he settled beside her and touched the sensitive hollow at the base of her throat with her lips. “Bless …”

  She rested fingertips on the shallow curve of his neck, pleased by the soft springy feel of the shorter hairs there. His cheek was faintly rough against her skin. She brought her hand around and pushed his head gently back so she could see his face. “I couldn’t steal any pills this time.…”

  He laughed, his lips vibrating against her throat as he settled his head against hers. “So the prophecy begins tonight.…”

  Aab slid down across the window, shining softly on the two golden figures, her opaline glow highlighting changing portions of their bodies as they moved. Then they stilled into an abstract design in chiaroscuro.

  After a long warm while Aleytys stirred. Vajd sat up and touched her cheek with a forefinger. “Leyta?”

  She pulled his hand over her mouth and kissed the wide palm. Then she flung out her arms and stretched luxuriously. “Mmm.”

  He laughed and pulled her abba around her. “Before you freeze. No, don’t move.” He tied the ties and smoothed the material over her body. She sighed with pleasure and watched as he shrugged back into his. He caught hold of her hand. “Happy, love?”

  “Very.…” She sighed and sat up. “Prophecy?”

  He pulled her closer until her head rested on his chest. She felt his heart beating strongly beside her ear. Somehow, in spite of a vague apprehension hovering at the back of her mind, she felt warm and secure and only half listened to the words ruffling through the hair on top of her head.

  “Blood and violence,” he said, his voice soft and slow. “I’ve dreamed the same dream the same day every year since … Blood and violence. Whichever way I turned.…” The words seemed to drag out of his mouth. “People falling dead around you. The Raqsidan raped by strangers. Not now. I felt that. Not now but when our son …” He felt her jerk in surprise against him. “The son we make this night … when our son will be grown. Men spreading fire … a redheaded man with angry green eyes laughing fiercely at the destruction.…” His hand slipped from her breast to stroke the incurve of her waist. For several minutes she felt his breath stirring in her hair in time with the smooth rise and fall of his chest. “Then a strange image expanded all through my dream. A blackness shot with stars spreading out, out, out … so far it seemed to encompass the whole of the universe, and wheeling slowly in the middle of this all, you … your body misty, a thousand suns tangled in the tossed-out strands of your hair and a thousand suns glowing through the translucent smoke of your body. I felt a vast sadness in you, a terrible power … you had traveled far in ways I couldn’t begin to comprehend and you had a long and complex journey before you.”

  “Haia!” She was silent a minute. “You dreamed … did you sing that at the mulaqat?”

  “The important parts. Leyta, I’m dream-singer for the Raqsidan, what could I do?”

  “I understand.” She sighed. “That’s not going to make my life any easier.”

  “You’re at a node point in your life, Aleytys; you’ve a decision coming up. There are too many in the valley like Qumri.” He shifted, his body rippling under her. The straw rustled slightly. “I think you’ll have to leave the Raqsidan.”

  She shivered. “Vajd, I’m afraid.”

  “I know.”

  “No!” She jerked away and sat up. “I won’t! Aschla’s bloody claws, what can they do to me? I’ve got my rights. Clan law …”

  “Aleytys.” He shook his head, negating all she was trying to say. He reached out and touched her cheek. “Even as my consort you wouldn’t be safe. You see, Leyta, you don’t really count as one of the clan.”

  “Huh?” She stared at him, astounded.

  “Your mother wasn’t clan. I can feel the hate and anger growing. And the fear. The fireball stirred it all up again like a storm wind stirs the sludge at the bottom of a stagnant pond. Soon, too soon, it’s going to explode and burn you to ash if you’re still here.” His deep voice dropped into his compelling persuasive mode and he continued to explain, but she wasn’t listening any longer. Her mind kept going back to the word consort. Even the news of her outclan status paled as delight, joy, and triumph drove away anything else. She interrupted him. “You want me as consort.”

  He laughed and hugged her. “Leyta, Leyta.…”

  Excitement exploded in her. “Then … then that’s the answer.” She leaned back tautly against his encircling arms. “If we were wed, no one could touch me.”

  He shook his head. “You haven’t been listening, Leyta.”

  “But …” She tugged at his arm. “I wouldn’t be outclan then. Would I?” She scanned his unresponsive face. “Would I, Vajd?”

  “You would be safe then. Except for one thing, Leyta. And that one thing negates all the rest. Your mother, Leyta.”

  “My mother.” She broke out of his arms and sat back on the straw, her hands falling loose in her lap. “I keep hearing about my mother. You. Qumri. And Ziraki was shaking to the bones afraid I’d ask him about her.”

  “I’m breaking oath even to say her name.”

  “You’ve already broken shura’ law by loving me. What’s an oath? Anyway, you already said you’d tell me.”

  He laughed. “Trust a woman to see the practical.” Crossing his legs, resting his hands on his knees, he let his face go slack, his eyes blank as he sank into the Mutrib’s memory trance. His voice was quiet, remote, as it recounted the history of the curse.

  “It was in the year of the Azdar in the Yarazur month of high thaw in the red days when Horli occluded Hesh. In that hour of subsurud when Horli’s disk had just cleared world-edge the sky spat forth a ball of fire. It whistled over the valley and skimmed the teeth of Dandan, where it split into two pieces. The larger disappeared behind the mountains and the smaller skimmed the ridges southward.

  “We huddled in our houses muttering to each other in whispers, too frightened to speak aloud. The day passed. The night passed. On the third morning we ventured out, creeping through our work with necks permanently bent upward. Badr, my master, tried to dream, but the shapes were so twisted he couldn’t read them. I tried. Nothing. But the Sha’ir of the herders came ranting about evil and doom. He read it in the smoke. He tried to stir the shura’ to the Atash nau-tavallud. But we weren’t quite that afraid.

  “Day faded in today and our necks straightened; even the aches passed away as nothing happened. Then, in th
e month Gavran, the caravan came to the valley.

  “That night Aab and Zeb rose early, kissing, and the clouds piled high around Dandan were whipped to rags by dry and roaring winds so the night rains were aborted before they were born. On the common the bonfire leaped red and gold into the silver-sprinkled sky, painting warm highlights on the tawdry fair booths and the posturing slave women and the drovers selling their flesh to the curious mardha.

  “Azdar, heated by his ever-ready lust, strolled between the wagons and watched the slave women dance in the firelight. I wandered about by myself watching everyone but was too shy to join the revelry. Finally I came around the end of one of the wagons. It was set off to one side and I was curious about it.

  “A woman dressed in black and white sat on the steps of that caravan. Her hair was long and straight, curling only at the ends, shining like avrishum fiber in the light of the small silver lantern that hung just above her head. I stared and stared, feeling utterly bewitched.

  “She was a glowing woman with eyes like greenstone, glittering with fever. Her hair was redder than the crackling fire, red as Horli. Her bones were delicate as a bird’s, but she was richly curved. And she was beautiful.… There is a beauty that catches you in the throat, stirring your whole being until each beat of your heart calls out in answer.

  “She sat very, very still, looking at nothing, her hands, long fingered and slim, resting in her lap. I edged along in the shadow, but before I got courage to speak to her, Azdar came. He stared at her, the pale tip of his tongue moving around and around his lips.

  “I crouched in the shadow of a second caravan—I think it was one of the fodder wagons—and watched them. I had leaped puberty seven months before and found my dreams. I had left my father’s house, broken my ties with my brothers and sisters, and gone to sit at the feet of Badr. It was a lonely, difficult time for me and I was terribly vulnerable to her then. Azdar saw her hair and her body and wanted her. I saw something else, some strange wild thing in her that drew me with cords stronger than life.