Louise Cooper - Indigo 06 - Avatar

by Louise Cooper - Indigo 06

  Northeastward, just as before, the wolf observed, and glanced at Indigo in puzzlement. I don’t understand.

  Watch, Indigo told her. The point of light continued to flicker at the stone’s edge for a few seconds more. Then suddenly it shifted back to the center and began to dart rapidly between the two points like a trapped firefly.

  It did the same thing last night, Indigo said as Grimya showed her teeth in surprise, it’s never behaved in such a way before, and I have a suspicion of what it’s trying to tell me. Northeastward and yet here at one and the same time, as though it can’t decide which is the more accurate message. She gave Grimya a long, thoughtful look. Could that mean a connection with Shalune?

  Grimya understood. With Shalune, and yet also with this place to which she wishes to take you?

  If it lies northeast of here, yes. Indigo looked back into the kemb, where the women were preparing the midday meal. Shalune wasn’t in evidence, but Indigo had an instinctive feeling that she and her cohorts weren’t far away. She turned to Grimya again. If it does, then I think that we may have found what we were looking for. Or rather, that it’s come to find us.

  During that day and the one that followed, Indigo tried by every means available to discover more about Shalune and her intentions. That was no easy task, for although Grimya was slowly learning words and phrases of the Dark Islers’ language and tried to teach Indigo what she knew, it wasn’t enough to allow, yet, for any communication with the four women. Then, on the fifth morning, Shalune came into Indigo’s room, made what had become her customary obeisance and indicated that she wished Indigo to follow her. She seemed pleased about something, and Grimya, picking up the tone if not the gist of her thoughts, warned Indigo that something was afoot. Cautiously, Indigo allowed Shalune to escort her along the passage, through the kemb’s main room and out onto the veranda.

  She stopped dead when she saw what awaited her. How the women had come by it, she couldn’t begin to imagine, but set incongruously on the hard-packed earth before the kemb was a litter, made from bamboo and rattan, curtained with multicolored fabric and hung about with grotesque fetishes of wood, bone, stone and feathers. Beside the litter stood the three subordinate women; they, too, made obeisances, and Shalune, smiling with satisfaction, gestured toward the litter and said something in which Indigo caught only the word for people.

  Grimya stared at the litter. I think she is telling you that the villagers have made this thing, she communicated uncertainly. She also says something about going, but I can’t understand any more than that.

  Shalune, still smiling, indicated the litter again, and abruptly Indigo understood. With no preamble and no apparent preparation, the priestesses meant to depart from the kemb this morning—and the litter was intended to carry Indigo herself.

  She heard movement behind her and turned to see two of the kemb women emerge through the door with her packs in their hands. They carried them reverently and a little nervously, as though half afraid to touch them, and at a brusque signal from Shalune, they hastened past Indigo and down the steps to load their burdens into the litter. Indigo stood still, not knowing how to react. She wasn’t prepared to simply capitulate to the women’s wishes without knowing where they meant to take her or what they meant to do with her, yet how could she make them understand that? How could she voice her protest?

  They were waiting for her, and Shalune’s heavy brows were starting to knit in the embryo of a frown. Indigo looked at her, into her hard eyes, and said carefully in the Dark Isle’s tongue, “What is this?”

  Shalune looked astonished. This was the first time that Indigo had ever addressed her in her own language, and the question caught her completely by surprise. Recovering her composure, she bowed low with a flourish of one hand and spoke rapidly and emphatically.

  Grimya, what did she say? Indigo communicated desperately. She hadn’t understood; the speech had been too fast and too complex, but she didn’t want Shalune to realize how limited her grasp of the tongue as yet was.

  I think… The wolf struggled to match the words she had recognized with the impressions that her telepathic senses garnered from Shalune’s mind. She is saying you will be carried. She talks of esteem, and of something else—I don’t know what it means, but it feels like a good word, a word of praise.

  Shalune was watching Indigo expectantly but warily. Quickly and silently Indigo asked the wolf, What’s the word for “where”? I must find out where they mean to take us!

  Grimya told her, and Indigo repeated the phrase aloud. Again Shalune replied rapidly and at length, and Grimya said, She talks of water and … a place, a building, I think. A special place. Like … a temple?

  Indigo nodded. It was what she had suspected, and she met Shalune’s gaze steadily.

  “Where?” she said again, and this time gestured first to her right and then to her left, her eyebrows raised slightly in a clear interrogative.

  Shalune bowed again and turned to indicate the track that ran past the kemb and away, farther into the island’s depths. “That way,” she replied. Indigo knew enough to understand her words this time. “Five days of walking.”

  Indigo stared past the woman’s pointing finger, and her face gave away nothing of the sudden quickening of her pulse. Northeastward. The lodestone’s seemingly ambiguous message was explained. For a moment she stood very still as a mixture of emotions and reactions rioted in her mind. Then she realized that above them all, one clear in stinct stood out, and it swept away all doubts, all caveats, all other considerations.

  She said silently to Grimya: We must go with them. There’s no other choice that makes any sense. And with a grave nod to Shalune, she walked down the veranda steps toward the litter.

  Her hosts heaped gifts upon her before they would allow the procession to depart. Indigo didn’t want to accept them; the family might be modestly prosperous by local standards, but it was by no means rich and couldn’t easily afford to give away the foodstuffs and utensils and bolts of fine-woven cloth that were piled into the litter at her feet. Her protests went unheeded, and all that her erstwhile hosts wanted—hungered for, it seemed—in return for their generosity was for her to lay both her hands on the heads of each of them in turn, from the old granddame to the smallest babe-in-arms.

  Indigo felt like a charlatan, but she didn’t have the courage to refuse them, and when finally the blessing ceremony was over, and amid noisy farewells, the four women bore the litter away, she sank back behind the colored curtains feeling shamed and guilty. What had Shalune and her cohorts told these trusting people? That she was some special being, imbued with the power to bring them good fortune? Did Shalune herself believe that … and if she did, why? What was she to these women?

  She sighed and pushed back the curtain, which was making the already overheated air inside the litter unbearably stifling. Grimya, who disliked confined spaces and had preferred to run alongside the litter rather than ride with Indigo, looked up as the fabric twitched back. She had read her friend’s thoughts and she spoke in Indigo’s mind.

  It seems to me that we cannot hope to have the answers to those questions for a while yet. We must be patient, and trust in the lodestone.

  Indigo smiled affectionately. You’re right, my dear, as always. My only fear is that these women might have mistaken me for someone else. If that’s true, then things might not go well for us when they discover their mistake.

  Grimya considered this for a few moments. Then she said: I don’t think we need trouble ourselves about that. These are not evil people; I sense that clearly. Besides… She hesitated, then glanced up at Indigo again, her amber eyes peculiarly intense. I don’t know any more than you do what these women think you are. But the lodestone doesn’t lie, Indigo—so perhaps they are not mistaken after all.

  Indigo looked sharply at her. Grimya, what are you saying?

  The wolf turned her head away, her tongue lapping the heavy air. Only what I think. What I suspect. But I don’t know if I�
��m right. Another pause; then she met Indigo’s eyes again, though a little reluctantly, Indigo thought. You shouldn’t think about it. Thinking won’t help, not yet, not until we know more. You should sleep. You haven’t regained your full strength, and this journey promises to be tedious. Go to sleep, Indigo. A cajoling, faintly pleading note crept into her mental voice. Go to sleep. That’s what you need now above all else.

  Against her expectations, Indigo did sleep through much of that long, monotonous day. The four women, it seemed, were tireless; they stopped only once during the daylight hours, to eat a swift meal and drink copious quantities of water, and she suspected that they must be using some herbal drug to enhance their stamina beyond natural boundaries. The steady jogging of the litter, together with the sense of claustrophobia engendered by the stifling air and the muted but incessant sounds of the forest, lulled her into a strange, half-dreaming stupor that now and again almost harked back to the fever.

  They halted for the night as dusk began to fall and shadows closed down like a blanket on the forest. There was no sight of any human habitation, and before preparing a makeshift meal, the women made a circuit of their chosen site, chanting and leaving small parcels of food in a wide circle around the litter. Grimya told Indigo that as far as she could tell, these were offerings meant to placate ghosts or demons that might otherwise be tempted to attack the party, and throughout the night, the forest’s susurrations were augmented by more low-pitched chanting and the staccato sound of rattles being shaken as the priestesses kept watch turn by turn.

  The pattern of that first day continued through the five days and nights of their journey, broken only by two more violent rainstorms. They took shelter while these storms were at their height, huddling with the litter under a swollen-trunked species of tree with eight-foot leaves as broad as the span of a man’s arms, then trudging on again through the sweltering humidity when the downpours slackened. Several times they came upon human settlements, and on each occasion they were welcomed with awe and delight. More gifts were heaped upon Indigo, and again the givers wanted only her blessing in return. Shalune held court, dispensing advice and justice, and then, after perhaps two or three hours, the litter was lifted once more and they continued on their way.

  The fifth morning dawned humid and oppressively still, with the promise, Grimya said, of another big storm. The women had pressed on late into the previous night, halting only when the moon set and the darkness grew too intense for them to make safe progress, and as soon as the first glimmer of light touched the forest, they broke camp and were away again.

  There was an air of eager anticipation about Shalune and her cohorts this morning. The litter-bearers sang as they walked, a rhythmic walking song with a faintly disturbing minor harmony, which Grimya—who could understand a few of the words—said was to warn off any creature, human or otherwise, that might wish the party ill. It seemed to be an unnecessary precaution, for they had passed no settlements for a day or more, nor even any sign of human activity, in what appeared to be untouched virgin forest; but as the morning wore on and the air sweated into a sweltering hell, the song became more emphatic, more urgent … and just before noon, they reached their journey’s end.

  Indigo was dozing fitfully and uncomfortably behind the litter’s closed curtains, but Grimya’s telepathic alert woke her with a start. She raised herself on one elbow, pushing the stifling shrouds aside to look out, and her eyes widened with amazement.

  The tangle of trees and undergrowth had ended as abruptly as though a giant’s scythe had cut a swathe through it, and they stood on the shores of a circular lake that reflected the sky’s stone-hard blue like a huge mirror. The sun, almost directly overhead at this latitude, battered down blindingly, bleaching the vista and making Indigo’s eyes ache with its intensity. All around the lake’s edge the trees crowded thickly, but on the far shore, their gray-green wall was broken by a gigantic bluff of red rock, stepped and flat-topped to form a ziggurat that towered high above the trees. The ziggurat’s face was pocked by what looked like unnaturally symmetrical caves, and at the truncated summit, too distant for its source to be discernible, a thin plume of smoke rose into the still air.

  The women set the litter down. They were staring eagerly across the lake to the rock bluff, and Indigo made to climb out of the litter and join them. Seeing her, Shalune made a negative gesture, indicating for her to stay put, then rummaged in the bag she carried and brought out a disk of brass-colored metal some ten or twelve inches in diameter. The disk’s surface was polished to a brilliant sheen; Shalune squinted up at the sky, then took a few paces toward the lake and held the disk up, angling it back and forth so that it caught the sun’s rays. They waited, and seconds later a brilliant pinpoint of light flashed high on the bluff as the signal was answered. Shalune grunted, satisfied, and thrust the disk back into her bag; the women picked up the litter once more and they set off around the lake’s perimeter.

  They had covered perhaps half the distance to the ziggurat when the quiet was shattered by a cacophonous and brazen fanfare. Grimya yelped a shocked protest, and Indigo, leaning perilously out from the litter, saw a group of brown-skinned people on a ledge near the summit, with long brass horns raised to their lips. Twice and three times more the horns blared out deafeningly, and then there was movement on the bluff and Indigo saw that a procession was coming down to meet them.

  Stairs had been cut into the rock, zigzagging down the steep terraces past ledges and cave mouths to a patch of sandy ground that formed an open arena between the bluff and the lake’s edge. Moving down the stairs like a slow, bright stream came some dozen women, led by a tall, raw-boned figure dressed in a thin skirt and matching breastband of multicolored fabric and crowned with a headdress of feathers. They reached the foot of the last flight as Shalune and her party arrived, and Shalune stepped up to the tall woman and spoke a formal greeting. The tall woman inclined her head, said a few clipped words in response, then walked past Shalune to the litter. Grimya, who had crouched down in the litter’s shade and was watching the stranger warily, communicated: I think she is the powerful one here, the ruler. Be careful, Indigo.

  I shall. Indigo had already noticed that the tall woman’s attendants were armed with long spears and that some also carried machetes in their leather belts, and she was as wary as Grimya as, slowly, she eased herself out of the litter and stood up.

  For a few seconds she and the newcomer stared at one another. Indigo was tall but this woman was a good half-head taller, and the headdress emphasized her height so that Indigo felt dwarfed. Dark, intense eyes in a strong face with a stubborn jaw looked hard at Indigo; then the woman stretched out a long-fingered brown hand and pressed the first two fingers to Indigo’s forehead. Indigo caught her breath but didn’t move, and after a few moments the hand withdrew. Then, to Indigo’s surprise, the woman bowed her head with arms outspread in an unequivocal gesture of respect.

  “My name is Uluye,” she said in her own tongue, which by now Indigo knew well enough to understand a few words at least. “I am—” and an unfamiliar word followed. Grimya supplied silently, She is a priestess, like Shalune. And I was right: she is the ruler here.

  Indigo bowed gravely in the old Southern Isles manner, which even after all these years still came naturally to her. “I am Indigo.”

  She didn’t have the inflection right, she thought, but Uluye seemed to comprehend well enough, for she launched into a speech in which she repeated Indigo’s name several times. Grimya, struggling to keep up with and translate the flow of words, told Indigo that it was a speech of welcome and of thanks—thanks not only to Indigo herself, but also to something or someone else, the nature of which she didn’t understand.

  A deity, perhaps, she said, but not the Earth Mother, or at least not as we think of Her. A pause while Uluye continued to speak, then: She wants us to go with them, up into that cliff.

  Uluye finished her speech and held out an arm to point toward the staircase. Indigo n
odded acquiescence and turned to face the climb. The others formed up behind them, Shalune close on Indigo’s heels, and the horns blared again as they started up the long zigzag of steps. The climb was tiring, but after five days with no more to do than rest in the litter, Indigo had recovered a good measure of her strength, and although before long her thighs ached fiercely, she knew she could reach the summit without too much difficulty.

  The lake, with its fringe of forest, fell away below them; it was, Indigo realized as it took on a new perspective, almost perfectly circular, and from above, the water looked like blue-green glass. She suspected it was very deep, perhaps the site of a long-dead volcano, though were was no high ground other than the bluff itself that might have formed the walls of an ancient crater. But whatever its origin, one thing was certain: this settlement was an ideal and virtually impregnable fortress.

  They were clear of the treetops now, and there was no shelter from the heat that beat down on them like hammers. Grimya was flagging, her tongue lolling and her eyes dull, but she refused any help and padded stoically on. Higher still, and now at each turn of the stairs, ledges led off to the caves that pocked the wall. Each cave’s mouth was covered with a curtain of colored fabric, and as they passed by, the curtains were lifted aside and people emerged to watch them. Indigo saw to her surprise that from the eldest to the youngest, all of them were women. Were there no men here? she wondered. Or were the men away from the settlement, or staying out of sight for some unfathomable reason? Whatever the truth, the women certainly seemed to welcome their arrival, for every face wore a smile and several voices called out in tones of eager greeting.

  Uluye waved acknowledgment but didn’t halt, or even pause, and before long they reached the final ledge, some twenty feet or so below the ziggurat’s summit. Uluye turned along the ledge, which was broad enough to leaven the effects of its giddying height a little, and led the party to another cave mouth, larger than its neighbors, surrounded by carved sigils and covered by a woven curtain. Shalune stepped forward to lift the curtain aside, but Uluye was there before her. They exchanged a sharp glance; then Uluye led the way through, and Indigo’s eyes widened in appreciative surprise as she saw what lay beyond.