A Bait of Dreams

by Clayton, Jo;

  She waited a moment longer, searching the sky for more of the birds, then twisted the shield back over the sensor and thrust the rod into her pocket as she ran to the opening in the stone. Shounach was leaning on Deel, both of them looking anxiously up. “Coming,” she cried. She stepped off the wall. For a terrifying time she fell, the wind whipping at her, then she felt the skin tighten around her, slowing her fall. In spite of this she landed heavily, going to her knees, the breath knocked out of her.

  Deel helped her to her feet, then gasped with fear. Gleia followed her gaze and saw more iron birds circling the place where she’d been standing. She fumbled in her pocket for the rod, turned to question Shounach.

  He was standing, swaying a little, the wind tugging at his matted hair, a wild glittering triumph in his fever-glazed eyes. “Shounach,” she called. He didn’t hear her. Or he ignored her. She didn’t exist for him, only the wall and the birds existed for him.

  She sank to the ground, pulled her knees up against her breasts, tired of fighting, waiting now. Waiting with Shounach for whatever he expected to happen. Deel walked past her, cloak whipping about, silk slapping against her long legs. Not too far from them the river was a shimmering rippling surface whispering past low stone piers toward the sea, opening below the city into a wide estuary where a number of large ocean-going ships were anchored. Smaller boats were tied up at the piers, their owners joining the crowd milling outside the gates. Deel turned. She came back and stood in front of Gleia. “One of those ships could take us anywhere. If you’re worried about passage money, I’ve got plenty.”

  Gleia looked up at her, then over at Shounach. This is the crux. I can’t drift anymore. She closed her eyes. Shounach, Deel, or neither? If I take the easiest way and go on by myself, what will my life be like—day and day and day with no surprises. No pain, no fear, well maybe no fear, no anguish. No highs either. It could be very comfortable. I could go back and live contentedly enough with Temokeuu-my-father. And die a little every day. End up hurting both of us. No. I turned my back on that. What’s the point of going back? Deel. I like her. Friendship without the complications of sex. I’ve had that too. Jevati-my-sister. She smiled with affection as she remembered the slim silver-green seagirl. She glanced up at Deel who had turned again and was looking out to sea. It was tempting, yet.… She shook her head and turned to Shounach. I’ve been playing games with my head. There was never any real question. I just didn’t want to admit it. I need him. I’ve never needed anyone before. I don’t like it. It’s hard, trying to be a companion. Harder than anything I’ve done before. She shivered. Scares hell out of me. Stiffly, slowly she pushed onto her feet and walked over the stony earth to Shounach.

  She touched his arm. The fever in him burned her even through the heavy material of his jacket sleeve. She frowned at him, the fever beginning to frighten her; his intensity frightened her also; he seemed unaware of anything but the city, didn’t even feel the touch of her hand, didn’t even know she was there. Oh Fox, she thought, how am I going to deal with this? How do I reach you when.…

  The sky above the city seemed to open; springing from behind the wall a blue flash fanned out, searing her eyes, covering a large portion of the sky. A moment later there was a sound like fifty thunderclaps; the blast deafened her. Beside her Shounach started laughing. She couldn’t hear that laughter, but seeing it was bad enough. Again she heard the thing he’d told her yesterday night; the words echoing in her mind like the gong strokes of the knelling. I hold grudges. I hold grudges a long, long time. She closed her eyes and saw again his face when the blue ball rolled down the Ironmaster’s belly to sit rocking between his legs.

  He slapped his arm about her shoulders still laughing, then she felt him sag against her; when she looked at him, the strained madness was gone from his face. He said something, but her ears were still ringing and she couldn’t understand him. She swallowed, swallowed again, felt the ringing diminish. Wriggling around until she was more comfortable under his weight, she settled herself then smiled up at him. “What’d you say, Fox?”

  “Coming with me?”

  “If you can put up with me.” She hesitated, added, “It won’t be easy,”

  “I know. We make a cranky pair, my Vixen.” He tugged her around until they were facing the smaller piers, at the far end of the line of landings. “We need a boat before I wash out. Once I crash, love, I’ll be out a good long while.”

  With Shounach leaning heavily on her, Gleia started walking slowly to the east, angling toward the riverbank. She heard a patter of quick steps, a flurry of silk, then Deel was beside her. “You’ve made up your mind.”

  “I’m going upriver with the Juggler.” She watched Shounach with considerable anxiety. His eyes were glassy; he was stumbling along in a daze, close to doing what he called crashing. “If we can reach the damn river.”

  Amber eyes narrowed, Deel moved swiftly ahead, gliding easily over the barren dirt as she walked backward, examining Shounach, measuring what strength he had left. Then she nodded, shifted to his other side and slid her shoulder under his arm, helping Gleia support him. “Mind if I come with you?”

  The scattered flurries of rain merged into a steady drizzle that the wind drove fitfully against their backs. Gleia looked across Shounach at Deel. “If you want.” She smiled. “At least you won’t be bored.” She thought a minute. “Wet, cold, hungry, scared, sore, but not bored.”

  Deel burst out laughing, continued to chuckle at intervals as they slogged through the rain toward a quiet eddy where several small boats rocked unattended. As they stopped beside the best looking of these boats, Deel glanced back at the still glowing city, then up the river. The clouds were matting heavily across the sky, blocking out moonlight and starlight until the river flowed into a heavy darkness. She chuckled again as she helped Gleia maneuver Shounach into the boat. “No. With the Juggler around, we certainly won’t be bored.”

  FIFTH SUMMER’S TALE (PART THREE)

  Currents

  Bursting from the constraints of the Chute, the River spread itself in wide serpentines across the wedge-shaped plain, sucking into itself the rich black earth, growing swollen and dark and powerful until it swept into the Istrin Estuary, a fresh-water ram half a mile wide.

  Slowly losing intensity, the storm blew inland along the River, its turbulent winds countering and crossing the massive flow, teasing the slick surface into cross-hatched wavelets, shattering them again with intermittent gusts of rain.

  Buffeted by wind and water, sail taut-bellied and near to bursting, a small boat edged out from a crumbling pier and began clawing its slow way upstream, leaving behind Istir and the destruction spreading like blue rot within the walls.

  Deel crouched beside a bunk that took half the space in the small crude cabin yet was too short for the suffering man, fretting at her inability to help him, struggling to learn the feel of the boat as the floor pressed up against her buttocks, fell away, rose and fell in a jagged counterpoint to the Juggler’s hoarse labored breathing.

  Though the darkness was intense inside the cabin, now and then the winds tore the clouds apart long enough for the larger moon’s milky glow to wake amber gleams in her dancing silks and summon to the Juggler’s sweaty face a fugitive luminosity.

  Lightning walked. When the blackness closed in again, she still saw him, red hair twisted into spikes about a puffy, battered face. In the moment of light his bandaged hands clenched into fists, he groaned, then his fingers slowly uncurled. Blinking, her eyes watering, dazzled by the harsh glare from the repeated flashes of lightning, she heard rather than saw the cycle repeating itself—fist, groan, opening fingers, over and over as if something in his fever-dream tormented him.

  A vindictive man he’d called himself. Deel drew the back of her hand across her eyes, then blew her nose, memories of the events of the night troubling her.

  Shounach moaned. She pulled herself onto her knees and groped for his face. The heat in him startled her. He’s dying
, she thought and felt a touch of relief. Dying had to be easier for him than living with the memory of what he’d done, the slaughter of all those innocents he neither knew nor cared to know. Her own part in those deaths made her sick, though she kept telling herself that there was nothing she could have done, she’d known nothing of the Juggler’s intentions. Even now she didn’t quite understand why she’d involved herself with the silent brown woman out there guiding the boat and, through her, with the Juggler. A moment’s warmth, revulsion at the thought and sight of torture, a sudden deep loneliness—and here she was.

  She drew her fingertip across the heavy silk where it was pulled taut over the curve of her thigh. Should change; I don’t want to ruin this. Bracing herself against the jerk and shudder of the boat, she stretched across the floor and hooked her bag to her. The rain was drumming steadily now on the low roof; the cabin was tight enough, though several icy drops splattered against her face and arm as she wriggled into a damp, wrinkled cafta. She rolled the silks into a tight bundle and pushed it to the bottom of the bag, her hand stilling when she touched a familiar shape, the shell comb that was the only thing she had left from her brief marriage. Shaken by that sudden and unexpected surge of memory, she snatched her hand from the bag, tied the flap down with quick jerks of trembling fingers. Shoving the unwelcome memories away, she yanked the ties into a bow-knot and tossed the bag at the other two piled against the end of the bunk.

  More lightning. The Juggler lifted his head a few inches; his eyes opened and stared blindly at nothing. His tongue dragged across dry lips. New sweat beaded his forehead. After a moment he collapsed again. Water. He needs water. Shivering at the thought of facing the icy rain beating against the low roof, she rubbed bits of crust from the corners of his mouth, moved her fingers over his face, feeling the flutter of his eyes under their closed lids. The husky rasping note in his moans woke a sympathetic dryness in her throat. I could just open the door, I suppose. Her lips twitched. And let the storm rain on him. She sighed again. And on me. Oh well. She groped for her cloak, swung it around her shoulders, fought the door open and struggled out onto the deck.

  Her arms aching, Gleia fought to keep hold of the tiller bar and the sodden straining sheet. The rope rasped at her cramped fingers burning her palm and the bar slipped through her hand like a thing alive, slamming into her or wrenching away as wind and water battled for control of the boat, while the continual changes of direction and the need to strain through the gloom for the uncertain line of the bank (her night-sight lost over and over to the walking lightning) kept her strung tight. Then the boat rounded a wide bend and nosed into a stretch where the curves were shallow enough to permit her to run before the wind without fear of ramming into one of the banks. A sharp slamming cut through the howl. When she lifted her head, blinking water from her eyes, she saw Deel come from the cabin, her cloak whipping about her slim calves, one hand holding her hood in place. The Dancer stood a moment bent into the wind as she adjusted herself to the rise and fall of the boat, then she straightened and shouted something Gleia couldn’t make out as the wind tore the words to fragments. Fear for Shounach was a moment’s catch in Gleia’s throat, but only that. The Dancer looked too buoyant to bear that sort of news.

  As lightning flickered and the wind snatched the hood from her clutching fingers, whipped her aureole of tiny tight curls into a wild tangle, the Dancer crossed the planks with quick light steps and tumbled in a heap by Gleia’s feet. She looked up, grinning, scraping the water off her face with one hand, leaning on the other. “You look beat,” she shouted.

  Gleia nodded, smiled tightly, alternating her gaze between the Dancer’s face and the water in front of them. “Shounach?” When her voice cracked, she cleared her throat, then waited with returning anxiety for the Dancer’s reply.

  “He needs water.” Deel pushed herself higher, rested one hand on the seat beside Gleia. “Let me take over here. You tend him.” She nodded toward the squat blotch where the cabin walls projected a double handspan above the front half-deck.

  Gleia flexed the fingers of one hand, then the other, felt weariness like a blanket smothering her. Fighting it back, she dipped her head closer to Deel’s. “You’ve handled small boats?”

  Deel grinned again, wiped water from eyes that were lit with mischievous enjoyment. “Island born,” she shouted. “Swam before I could walk.”

  Too tired to resist any longer, Gleia slid from her place, hanging onto tiller and sheet until Deel took them from her. Uncertain about how well her legs would carry her, she crawled to the water bucket, pulled it loose from the spring-catch keeping it in place. Clear cold rainwater was sloshing out over the wooden sides as the boat jerked and heaved. She spilled more away until the bucket was half empty, then tumbled inside the cabin, surrounded by rain-laden wind.

  Once the door was closed the darkness in the cabin was profound. She moved uncertainly about on her knees until her groping fingers found Shounach. She knelt by the bunk, eyes closed, forehead resting on the hard mattress, hearing Shounach’s struggle to breathe, feeling the heat from the arm pressed against the top of her head. With a struggle of her own, she pushed up, undipped the dipper, filled it, lifted his head and held the dipper to his lips. She got a little water into his mouth; more ran down his neck. She raised his head higher and tried again, her tension draining away as she felt him swallow. When the dipper was empty, she settled his head onto the small hard pillow, turning away quickly to sneeze twice. Sinking back to sit on her heels, she plucked at the front of her cafta, the chill from the sodden cloth seeping into her bones.

  She stripped off the cafta, threw it into a corner and pulled another from her bag, along with a scrap of katani left over from a handkerchief she’d embroidered and sold. When she was dressed again she crawled back to Shounach. She wet the cloth and bathed his hot puffy face, dipped it into the bucket again, wrung it out and laid it on his forehead. It was all she could do; it made little difference as far as she could see but it was something to do while she waited to see if he’d live or die.

  After a while she dropped her head on her arms and knelt beside him in a half-doze while her body slowly warmed.

  When her knees began to cramp, she lifted her head and eased her stiffened body around, listening to Shounach’s breathing as she sought a more comfortable position, trying to convince herself that it sounded more natural. She touched his face. It was cooler. She smiled, then turned about so she was sitting with her back against the bunk, her knees drawn up. Sipping at a dipperful of water, she listened to the noises outside. Like Shounach’s fever, the storm seemed to be abating. The boat was moving smoothly, the dip and lift under her nicely rhythmic. The Dancer was handling it as well as she handled her body. Gleia felt a touch of jealousy, made a face at her foolishness, dropped the dipper back into the bucket and wriggled around to smooth the sweat-sticky hair from Shounach’s forehead and run her finger along the line of his long nose, the curves of his upper lip; except when they were making love, he didn’t like to be touched so she felt defiant and a bit uneasy at indulging her own needs when he couldn’t take note and defend himself. You scare me, Fox. You bother me. She sighed and hoped he wouldn’t remember too clearly what he’d done this night. Reason to control rancor, that’s what you said to me before we slept. I’ve had three hundred years to learn that lesson, that’s what you said. Reason to control rancor—until the Ironmaster and the fever and the pain beat reason out of you. I wonder what you’d do to me if I made you angry. She shivered, yawned, scrubbed her hand across her eyes. With a last glance at the dim blur of his face, she tucked herself into a corner with her bag under her head, the rocking of the boat easing her into a deep sleep despite the bruises on her body and the hardness of the floor.

  When she woke, a broad beam of red light was streaming through one of the window slits and painting a horizontal crimson rectangle on the wall above her. She yawned and stretched out cramped legs, wincing as pains shot from her knees. The boat was
lying at rest in water that gurgled slowly past its sides. She could hear bird song and the rustle of leaves and small scrapings as something scratched the boat’s side. Wondering why Deel hadn’t bothered to wake her, she sat up, groaned as stiff sore muscles protested, rolled onto her knees and crawled to the bunk.

  Shounach lay deeply asleep, his chest rising and falling in long slow breaths. His skin was cool and dry. The puffiness was gone and the bruises were rapidly fading. A corner of her mouth curled up. How much more do I have to learn about you, Fox? An ordinary man would have the courtesy to spend at least a week recovering from hurts like those. One day, hunh! She stroked gentle fingertips across the flat taut planes of his face. All that worrying. A waste. Feeling a little foolish, she sat on her heels and looked around. The bucket was gone; a locker low in the forward wall had been broken open. I missed that? The cabin door was unlatched, tap-tapping against the jamb in time with the gentle rocking of the boat. After a last look at Shounach, she climbed into the crimson dawn.

  Deel had turned the boat’s nose downstream and used the current to wedge it in among a thicket of suckerlings, young shoots growing from the drowned roots of an ancient horan. Five fingered leaves were dark green spangles marching in pairs up the lengths of the reed-slim suckerlings, brushing against each other and the sides of the boat in spasmodic whispers, dancing in the thick red light from the great red half circle on the eastern horizon. High overhead a falcon cried out, the harsh wild sound snapping her head up; the bird was gliding through overlapping loops a crisp clean silhouette against the red-violet glass of the cloudless sky. The morning air was fresh and invigorating, sharp with a thousand smells and songs. Her blood sang in her veins and she laughed aloud with the sheer joy of being alive. Almost dancing, she walked to the bow where the boat was tied to the huge old horan. Its trunk was lightning-split into two great limbs, one more or less vertical, secondary branches providing abundant concealment for the mast and raised boom. The second limb sprang away from the trunk in a low arch, supporting part of its weight on the steeply rising riverbank, providing a natural bridge from boat to land. Sobered by the implications of what Deel had done, Gleia swung herself onto the low limb and ran along the springy rebounding arch. She stopped where the limb touched the earth, looked up the bank to a small clearing where Deel was kneeling beside a bed of coals, humming a lazy tune as she stirred something in a blackened pot. Her thicket of sorrel curls was neatly combed, her dark skin was taut over the bones of her face, glowing with the sheen of hand-rubbed hardwood. She tasted the mixture in the pot, wrinkled her nose, dusted a pinch of salt or some other seasoning across its surface. Gleia stretched and stepped from the limb and started walking toward the fire, her sandals rustling through sun-dried grass, crunching over debris-strewn earth.