Diadem from the Stars

by Clayton, Jo;

  He broke a snore in half and came reluctantly awake. “What is it?”

  “Those birds.” She pointed. “What are they doing?”

  He looked blearily along her arm. “Ah. I see. Scavengers. They wait for something to die.”

  “I thought so.” As the horses moved steadily along toward the hovering birds, she said sharply, “It’s still alive?”

  “As long as they stay up there.”

  The caravan tilted down then curved around a sandy hillock covered with sparse clumps of dusty grass. Beside the road ahead a bony, sway-backed nag stood head down, cropping with soremouthed care at tough, spindly grass that half obscured a narrow form lying face down.

  Aleytys pulled herself onto her feet, clutching with her free hand at the carving along the side of the caravan to steady herself. “That’s a man!” She dropped the reins and started to jump down.

  “Wait.” Kale caught at her arm and pulled her back. “Let me look.”

  She frowned. “Ahai, Kale. I’m no fragile flower.”

  “Aleytys,” he said patiently, “this is my world.”

  She looked silently at him for a minute then sat down on the edge of the seat, pulling the horses to a stop beside the scrawny nag. Still silent, she watched as he swung down and strode to the recumbent figure.

  He stopped short, stared a minute, then walked rapidly back. Without a waste motion he pulled himself onto the seat. “Go on.”

  She looked at the circling cloud of scavengers. “Is he still alive? Or are we keeping them from their feast?”

  “Forget it. Drive on.”

  “No. Answer me. Is he dead?”

  “Yes. Drive.”

  She shook her head. “You can’t lie to me, Kale. He’s alive.”

  “All right,” he said impatiently. “So he’s alive now. He won’t be for long. Better for him if he dies.”

  “Dead is never better than living!” She swung around.

  “No!” He caught her arm in a bruising grip. “He’s pariah. Leave him.”

  “My god—you mean that!” She pushed at his hand. “Let me go.”

  “No. Keep away from him. If you touch him, we’re all pariah. You hear me?” His fingers tightened further until she gasped with pain. Anger exploded in her.

  “Take your hand off me.” Her eyes glittered. “Now.”

  The Karkesh blade whispered out of the sheath. “Send the horses forward,” he said tensely.

  “Kale, I told you.…”

  “Drive!”

  “Kale.” Stavver stood loose limbed and casual on Aleytys’ side of the caravan, watching coolly as they clashed.

  Kale glanced up briefly. “Keep out of this, thief.”

  “I warn you, groundling. You’d better take your hand away.”

  “So.” The sneer was heavy on Kale’s dark face. “You plan to make me?”

  “Me?” Stavver shrugged, amused contempt on his narrow face. “I don’t give a damn how you ruin yourself, but Maissa seems to think we still need you. Let Aleytys loose or she’ll kill you. I’ve seen her work, little man.”

  Kale snorted his disbelief. Turning back to Aleytys, he touched the point of his knife to her throat, then pulled it down between her breasts maneuvering it so delicately that he never broke the skin. “Drive.”

  A whisper of chimes broke the taut silence. Once again Aleytys felt the air congeal against her face while the single dominant note slid down-octave until it was a blurred vibration barely above the threshold of hearing. Prisoner again in her skull as the diadem took her body, Aleytys crouched in terror whispering soundless pleas—no, don’t kill him, there’s no need, no more killing, please, please.…

  Her hands fluttered up and plucked the knife from Kale’s hand. The pale, featureless landscape swung past her eyes, then she saw the knife released to hang floating in mid-air, close to Stavver’s face. The grassy knolls flickered past again and she was looking at Kale. The hands reached out and pushed.

  Slowly … slowly … painfully, slowly, like a stone dropping through gelatin, Kale toppled off the seat and sank towards the ground. The diadem waited, Aleytys waited. An eon passed and passed again and at long last Kale’s stiff body touched the ground. His arms and legs unfolded slowly, slowly like the petals of a flower in a time-lapse sequence, until he was starred out on the ground. Aleytys whispered: “Thank you, thank you whoever you are, ah God I couldn’t take any more killing.…”

  The diadem chimed again. As the note slid up to its normal range, Aleytys thought she saw amber eyes open and smiling at her, then she forgot it as Kale leaped to his feet, his face contorted with terror.

  “Kale.” She stood up, snapping, “Kale!”

  Intelligence flowed back to replace the animal fear. He rubbed a trembling hand across his face and straightened slowly.

  “Stavver warned you. I could have killed you. Don’t try me again.”

  “Si’a gikeria,” he said, his voice hoarse with sincerity, “Believe me, I won’t.” He glanced uneasily over his shoulder at the body. “But …” After hesitating a minute he went on doggedly. “The boy is pariah. As are all who speak to him, feed him, help him in any way. Even a touch. Do you understand? If you try to help him, and I swear it’s probably too late already, then we might as well get back to the ship and leave.”

  “Sister.” The shrill, small voice startled all of them. “Take away the curse. You are gikena.” The speaker had crawled out of the caravan and sat perched precariously on the back of the driving bench. “Heal the boy and restore him to his people. That is your first task for Lakoe-heai.”

  “So be it,” Aleytys said quietly. She turned cool eyes on Kale “You hear?”

  Kale looked startled. “I forgot, woman. I forgot you were true gikena and kept thinking of you as offworlder.” He bowed his head stiffly. “I ask your forgiveness for my stupidity.”

  “Yes, of course.” As she spoke Aleytys swung down from the seat. Without waiting for his answer she ran to the boy and knelt beside him. A quiet relief spread through her as she saw his skeletal body still moving as he struggled to breathe. She swallowed painfully as she saw the broken stump of an arrow protruding from his back just under the shoulder blade, the skin around it swollen and yellow with ominous red streaks running like a star of death from the central wound.

  Carefully she laid her hands on his back drawing a moan of pain from him in spite of the gentleness of her touch. She spread her hands around the arrow so that it was the center of a rough triangle formed by her thumbs and forefingers. Gladness warmed in her as she felt the strong steady pulse of life in him. He was badly hurt and nearly starved but the will to live burned so strong in him that he was far from dying.

  Aleytys sucked in the hot, dusty air and let it out in small discrete bundles, sucked in another breath, and let it out, her body slowing into tranquility. Into a quiet oneness with the air and earth. She closed her eyes and reached for the river of black water winding between the stars, her symbolic image of the power that fed her talents. Tapping into the river she sent the power flowing through her arms into the shuddering body beneath her hands. Time passed, how long she had no idea, then she knew the healing was done.

  With a sigh she lifted leaden arms and straightened her aching back. The boy was sleeping heavily, the wound a pale pink star, vivid against the sun-bronzed skin of his back. Lying flat beside the wound the broken arrow moved gently up and down with the boy’s breathing, gummy with blood and pus, having worked itself free as the wound healed behind it.

  She picked it up and tossed it aside into the grass. “Why is his head shaved?”

  Kale stared down at the boy. “He will live?”

  “Why not? I’m a damn good healer. Why is his head shaved?” She cupped her hand tenderly over the short bright stubble.

  “Before his people cast him out, they shaved the hair off his head and body to mark him.” He shifted uneasily. “The stealing … what we plan … it doesn’t bother you?”

 
“The Lakoe-heai know we come as thieves. I don’t like it, but what can I do?” She sensed his growing uneasiness around her. “Relax, Kale. They’ve got some kind of plan to use us. They won’t interfere.”

  “Oh.” He glanced at the boy again, chewed a minute on his full lower lip, then walked nervously away to look down the road. “There’s no need for a guide,” he muttered half to himself. “The road’s clear.”

  Aleytys stretched and laughed. “All right. All right, Kale. You change places with Stavver if it makes you feel better. The boy can ride with Sharl.”

  Maissa came striding around the caravan, her delicate, pointed face drawn into an angry scowl. “What’s holding us up?” she demanded.

  Aleytys met the cold glare with a quiet smile. “We stopped to help the boy.”

  “Well?” The small woman came mincing across the rough soil with its sharp stubs of last year’s grass, not yet accustomed to walking barefoot. She stopped beside the boy’s body and thrust an impatient toe into his protruding ribs. “A waste of time. You finished?”

  “The healing’s done. When he wakes, he comes with us.”

  “Nonsense! Get back on the wagon and let’s get going. We don’t need a strange pair of eyes to spy on us.”

  Aleytys sighed. “Maissa, if I’m supposed to be gikena, let me be. If we go off and leave him, we’ll be outcast ourselves. To take the curse off him, he has to serve me for a time. Anyway, he’s a guarantee the others will accept us as what we pretend to be.”

  “I’m sure you thought of that all the time. Huh!” She turned and picked her way carefully back to her caravan. She paused at the big wheel and looked back at Aleytys, her dark eyes glinting hardly. “I boss this job—you remember that.”

  Behind her Aleytys heard a rustle in the grass and turned around to find the boy sitting up staring at her, his brown eyes huge in his thin face. “Welcome back to the living,” she said briskly. “How’d you get in this mess?”

  His white-caked tongue moved painfully over cracked lips. “Pariah,” he muttered hoarsely.

  “Miks.”

  “What?”

  “Bring the waterskin, will you. Our new friend’s got a big thirst.”

  “Right.” The thief came around the back end of the caravan, swinging the well filled waterskin from its wide, leather strap.

  The boy watched the dripping, cool bladder with desperate burning eyes, then he held up trembling hands palm out warning them off. “Pariah,” he repeated, his voice breaking painfully.

  Aleytys smiled at him and took his shaking hand in hers despite his attempt to avoid her touch. “I am gikena, boy. When you’ve had the water, we’ll see about taking away the curse on your head. Do you understand? I’ve already cured the wound in your back. Have you forgotten that?”

  Stavver handed him the waterskin and helped him drink. The boy took a mouthful of water then pushed the skin away. His face drawn in lines of fatigue and suffering, he held the cool liquid in his mouth, working it around and around. Then he spat it out and took another drink, a small one. He swallowed. Fascinated, Aleytys watched his throat working, appreciating the stern discipline that controlled his desperate need for water. He drank twice again, then pushed the waterskin away though his eyes followed it greedily.

  “I thank you, si’a gikena.”

  “Will you tell me your name?” Once again Aleytys smiled at him, warming inside as the wary suspicion left his eyes.

  “Loahn, si’a gikena.”

  “You will serve me as required?”

  He startled her by bowing swiftly until his head touched the earth in front of him. As quickly he sat up, dark eyes bright with renewed hope. “I serve as long as you want—till the end of my life, si’a gikena.”

  She laughed and stood up, reaching out for his hand. It felt warm and dry and curiously strong. “It won’t be that long, Loahn. Not nearly.” She mounted the steps at back of the caravan. “Come in, but be quiet. My son is asleep.”

  The interior of the caravan was hot and close. Loahn looked curiously around. The inside was neatly made, the wide, flat bunks doubling as seating in the day, the mattresses covered with coarse ticking. Below these a series of deep drawers marched in neat rows. One was pulled out and turned into a nest for the placidly sleeping baby. Aleytys stopped to touch him, feeling as always the warm outpouring of love he evoked in her. When she looked up she found the boy looking hungrily at her. He blushed and turned away.

  “You lost your mother?”

  His thin body stiffened, then he nodded. “When I was a child.”

  “Well, sit down. You’d better ride in here. We’ll be going on till light fails. Rest and think what to tell me when we camp for the night.” A smile twitched the corners of her mouth upward. “I need to know just what to do about you.”

  “Yes, si’a gikena,” he said with careful politeness, the wary look back on his face.

  “Olelo, come here.” She smiled at the boy, amused by his skepticism. “I need you to speak for me again, little one.”

  The speaker swung through the front curtains. Loahn’s eyes widened then he relaxed, his suddenly shaky knees dumping him onto the bunk.

  Aleytys chuckled. “So you’re convinced at last.”

  “Pardon, si’a gikena,” he stammered.

  “Nonsense. A little skepticism’s a healthy thing. I’d think you foolish if you believed everything anyone told you.”

  His mouth curved into a tired smile, his eyes dropping heavily as fatigue flooded over him.

  “Unroll the quilt and go to sleep. If you need water, the man and I will be outside. Call. You understand?”

  He nodded sleepily.

  “When you ride with us, you’ll see things—things that may seem strange. If you find yourself puzzled, come to me. Don’t talk to outsiders about what troubles you. Understand?”

  He settled himself on the mattress, wadding the quilt into a pillow for his head. “No,” he said quietly. “How can I?” He stretched out, laced his fingers together behind his head. “Only that I come to you and accept what you tell me.”

  She eyed him coolly, then burst out laughing. “No fool, indeed. You’ll accept what I tell you even if you suspect it’s not quite the truth?”

  He grinned sleepily at her. “When I got my life back, when I saw your beautiful and wonderful and kind face, I gave my soul into your keeping as long as you want it.” He yawned, then waved a hand. “You needn’t bother asking, gikena. Just tell me and I’ll do it.”

  Aleytys crawled through the curtains and joined Stavver on the seat. “That’s a sharp one in there.”

  “Dangerous?”

  “I don’t think so. I could always put the curse back.” She glanced at the sky. The streaks of color were beginning to thicken, leaving patches of clear blue sky. “Let’s get started,” she said crisply.

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  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Jo Clayton (1939–1998) was the author of thirty-five published novels and numerous short stories in the fantasy and science fiction genres. She was best known for the Diadem Saga, in which an alien artifact becomes part of a person’s mind. She also wrote the Skeen Trilogy, the Duel of Sorcery series, and many more. Jo Clayton’s writing is marked by complex, beautifully realized societies set in exotic worlds and stories inhabited by compelling heroines. Her illness and death from multiple myeloma galvanized her local Oregon fan community and science fiction writers and readers nationwide to found the Clayton Memorial Medical Fund.

  All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely co
incidental.

  Copyright © 1977 by Jo Clayton

  Cover design by Andy Ross

  ISBN: 978-1-5040-3839-3

  This edition published in 2016 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.

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  New York, NY 10038

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