Louise Cooper - Indigo 06 - Avatar

by Louise Cooper - Indigo 06

  Shouldering others out of her way, the fat woman took the last flight of stairs two at a time and pounded along the ledge to where Grimya waited.

  “What is it, Grimya?” Shalune was breathless, her muscular diaphragm heaving alarmingly. Grimya ducked back into the cave; Shalune followed, then stopped as she saw Indigo.

  “By all my ancestors!”

  “Shalune, what’s happening?” Yima pushed in behind her.

  “She’s in a trance.” Shalune’s head snapped around as she heard others approaching. “Send them back, Yima; tell them to return to their own quarters. I’ll deal with this.”

  “Should I fetch my mother?”

  “No. She’ll hear of it soon enough, and I’ll need your help here.” ,.

  Yima hurried to relay Shalune’s message to the anxious crowd now gathering outside. As they started to move away, Shalune hastened to Indigo’s bed, tried to pull her into a sitting position, then swore. “Yima! She’s as rigid as a tree, and she’s choking. Quickly now, help me to turn her on her side!” She was thrusting expert fingers between Indigo’s resisting lips and into her mouth. “Got to … stop her swallowing her … tongue….”

  Yima ran to assist her and they rolled Indigo over. Grimya jumped up, yelping; Shalune pushed her aside.

  “Go away, Grimya—we’re helping her, not harming her. Keep back!”

  Whining Grimya retreated, and Shalune balled her fist and thumped Indigo soundly between the shoulder blades.

  “She isn’t breathing,” Yima said.

  “I know; it’s as though there’s something blocking her throat … ah!” Shalune thumped again and heard a hoarse rattle of expelled air. “That’s it! Lift her back now. We’ll get her sitting up if we can.”

  “She’s like stone! I’ve never seen anything like this!”

  “Neither have I,” Shalune replied grimly. “Try to move her arms. If we can just—” and she jerked back with a cry of surprise as suddenly Indigo’s body went limp and she slumped back onto the bed.

  “Eyes of the Lady!” Yima stared, stunned. “What happened, Shalune?”

  “I don’t know, but we’d best make the most of it before she has another spasm. Bring some more cushions, Yima, and prop them behind her. I don’t want to risk letting her lie flat.”

  Experimentally, Shalune raised Indigo’s right arm and let it drop. Moments ago it had been as rigid as granite; now it felt utterly boneless, and the priestess shook her head in bewilderment.

  As Yima carried an armful of cushions from the hearth, Grimya heard someone approaching. She lowered her head, defensively alert. Then the curtain was flung back, and Uluye stood on the threshold.

  “What’s going on?” Her stare raked the tableau of Shalune, Yima and the unconscious Indigo.

  Shalune glanced back over her shoulder, naked dislike in her eyes. “She went into trance, but something’s gone wrong,” she told Uluye curtly.

  “Into trance?” Uluye stiffened. “How did it happen?”

  “I’ve no idea how it happened. I only knew about it when Grimya howled fit to bring the Ancestral Lady’s servants from the lake!” Shalune snapped. “I came up here and found her in the trance state and choking to death at the same time.”

  Uluye strode across the floor and leaned over the bed, peering at Indigo’s face. “She’s breathing now?”

  “Yes, thanks be, but she’s unconscious.”

  “What did she say?” Uluye looked hard at her subordinate, and even from a distance, Grimya saw the familiar, fanatical glint return to her eyes. “Tell me.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  The High Priestess’s mouth set in a thin, ugly line. “Don’t dissemble with me, Shalune. I won’t tolerate it. What was the Ancestral Lady’s message?”

  “Damn it, there was no message,” Shalune said furiously. “I told you, she was choking!”

  Uluye continued to glare at her suspiciously for a moment, then looked at Indigo once more. “Now you say she’s unconscious?”

  “You can see that for yourself,” Shalune snapped.

  Uluye ignored the tone. “Could she still be in trance?”

  Shalune stared at her with something approaching disbelief. “Is that all that matters to you? For the last time, Uluye, Indigo might have died just now! Isn’t that just a little more important than whether or not she’s still in the trance state?”

  Uluye opened her mouth to retaliate but suddenly became aware of Yima, who stood at the far side of the bed, staring at them both, wide-eyed. The High Priestess raised her head.

  “Leave us, Yima.”

  “Let her be,” Shalune said. “I might need—”

  Uluye cut across her. “Now, Yima.”

  Yima’s face was scarlet. “Yes, Mother.” She didn’t look at Shalune but hurried out of the cave.

  “Now,” Uluye said scathingly when Yima had gone, “I mean to make one thing very clear to you, Shalune. When I ask you a question, I anticipate—” She stopped, and both women looked quickly at the bed.

  Indigo had uttered a sound. Not quite a word but a long, exhaled syllable. She might have been trying to say: “You…” or “You will….” To the High Priestess’s vivid imagination, she might have said, “Uluye.”

  “Oracle!” Uluye pounced, dropping to a predatory crouch beside the bed and taking hold of Indigo’s limp arm. “Speak, oracle! I am here, I am listening. What does the Ancestral Lady want of me?”

  Shalune said angrily, “She’s not fit. Leave her.” She moved forward, meaning to pull Uluye away.

  Indigo’s eyes snapped open.

  “Come to me.” It wasn’t her voice, though it had her inflection and her accent. Her blue-violet stare met and locked with Uluye’s wild gaze, and it seemed to Uluye that Indigo’s pupils were surrounded by a shimmering silver corona. “Come to me. Do you dare? Then come to me.”

  Shalune recoiled, uttering a soft oath, and collided with Grimya, who had rushed forward as Indigo spoke. Shalune gripped the she-wolf’s scruff, restraining her as Uluye leaned farther over the bed.

  “Lady, I hear you! I hear you, but I don’t understand!”

  The terrible, alien eyes continued to hold her gaze. “Soon,” Indigo said. “Oh yes, very soon. You will dare. I know you will dare.”

  Like the swift drop of a curtain, the silver corona vanished. A small frown creased Indigo’s brow as she tried and failed to focus on Uluye’s face, looming over her. She turned her head a fraction, said in a puzzled but perfectly natural voice, “Grimya…?” Then her eyelids closed and she began to breathe lightly and evenly.

  Slowly Shalune approached the bed and looked down at her. “She’s asleep,” she said incredulously.

  Uluye rose to her feet. Her gaze was still fixed on Indigo’s face. “Asleep?” She sounded dazed.

  “Yes. Look at her. She’s as peaceful as a newly fed infant.”

  Uluye seemed reluctant to be convinced, but at last she relented and stepped back from the bed. For a few moments there was silence. Then: “Fetch someone to sit with her,” Uluye said. “I want to talk to you in my quarters.”

  Shalune had expected this, and nodded. “I’ll set Inuss to guard her. But if she wakes, I’ll want to see her immediately.”

  “Yes, yes,” Uluye agreed with an impatient wave of one hand. “Don’t waste time.”

  Without so much as glancing at Grimya, she strode out of the cave, leaving Shalune to follow. As the fat woman moved toward the entrance, Grimya whimpered. Shalune stopped and looked back.

  “She’s all right now, Grimya,” she said kindly. “Inuss is a good healer. She’ll know if I’m needed and she’ll send for me.”

  Grimya swallowed back a whine and Shalune smiled, thinking—not for the first time—that the wolf seemed to have an uncanny understanding. Then she too was gone, leaving Grimya alone with Indigo.

  Grimya padded to the bed and stared at her friend for a long time. Indigo seemed, as Shalune had said, to be sleeping naturally and pea
cefully, but the wolf was deeply troubled. She had seen Indigo’s eyes in the moment when they had snapped open, before Uluye leaned over her and obscured her from view. She had seen the glitter of silver. And silver, as Grimya knew all too well, was the sign of Nemesis.

  Footsteps sounded outside, and the curtain parted once more to admit Inuss, a young priestess whom Shalune was training in the healing arts. Inuss saw Grimya and smiled faintly.

  “Ussh now, what are you doing there?” She had a pleasant, husky voice that Grimya found both soothing and reassuring. “Your mistress is asleep now. You should go to sleep too, eh?”

  Resignedly the wolf padded to the far side of the cave, where she slumped down with her muzzle on her forepaws. Inuss looked briefly at Indigo to satisfy herself that all was well, then settled in a chair. She had brought her sistrum; she laid it across her lap and began to murmur what Grimya thought were prayers, every so often shaking the sistrum gently. The muted drone of her voice was soporific; the wolf blinked, yawned, shifted to a more comfortable position.

  Before long, she too slept.

  •CHAPTER•XI•

  Uluye’s quarters were located on the citadel’s second level. As befitted the dwelling of the cult’s High Priestess, the cave that housed her was larger than any other save for the oracle’s own, and signs and sigils had been carved over the entrance. Shalune glanced at these decorations as she approached the cave, and read the familiar messages that, like the oracle’s cave on the level above, proclaimed these quarters and their occupant sacrosanct and entrance forbidden to any unauthorized person. Her lip curled in a faint sneer at Uluye’s arrogance in placing herself on a par with the oracle, and ignoring the protocol that obliged her to call out meekly and await a summons, she thrust the curtain aside and walked in.

  Uluye was sitting in an ornate chair, waiting for her—and behind her, face muscles rigid and eyes miserable, was Yima. Shalune knew instantly what her presence implied, and her heart sank. She avoided the imploring gaze that Yima directed toward her behind her mother’s back, and made a cursory formal bow.

  “How is she?” Uluye’s eyes glinted in the cave’s relative gloom.

  “Sleeping, as before. I don’t think she’ll wake for some time yet, but I’ve told Inuss to alert me if there’s any change.” Uluye hadn’t offered her a seat; Shalune took one anyway.

  Uluye folded her hands with a slow and deliberate movement. “I have told Yima of the message that the Ancestral Lady imparted to us,” she said and met Shalune’s eyes intently. “You, I presume, also heard the oracle’s words?”

  Again Shalune took great care not to look at Yima. “Yes,” she replied. “I heard.”

  “There can be no doubt of the Ancestral Lady’s meaning, Uluye went on. ”So we must waste no time, Shalune. Yima’s initiation trial must take place as soon as possible.“

  Shalune stared down at her hands where they rested on her knees. “I see,” she said, then looked up. “You are sure, Uluye? Sure, I mean, that Yima’s ready?” Now she did venture a glance at the girl, but it was brief and gave nothing away.

  Uluye smiled with utter confidence. “Even if I were uncertain—and I presume to think I know my own daughter well enough—the Ancestral Lady herself clearly is not. Can you possibly doubt her message?”

  “No.” Shalune had to admit it; she might wish that the oracle’s words hadn’t been uttered, but she couldn’t deny their validity or place any other interpretation on them. “No, I can’t.”

  “Then I take it you have no objections?” Uluye’s tone suggested that any dissent would not be well received.

  Shalune couldn’t dissemble without arousing suspicion, and that was something she dared not risk. She said, keeping her voice even, “None whatever.”

  “I’m glad to hear it. Now; the moon is waning, and of course that isn’t auspicious. However, the coming new moon will coincide with a favorable seasonal augury. I will perform the necessary divinations, and if all’s well, the rite will take place on the first night after dark moon.”

  Fortunately, Uluye was too preoccupied to hear Yima’s sharply truncated intake of breath. Shalune flicked the girl a rapid warning glare and said cautiously, “The first night after dark moon? That’s very short notice, Uluye.”

  “Are you telling me you’re not able to make the preparations in tune?”

  “No, no. That isn’t a problem. I was thinking of Indigo. Yima may be ready, but will Indigo?”

  “Her only duty will be to act as Yima’s escort; she need do nothing more. Besides,” a small, surreptitious gesture conveyed a clear warning to Shalune to speak guardedly in Yima’s presence, “I’m sure I don’t need to remind you of our recent discussion, especially in the light of this morning’s events.”

  So she had decided to put Indigo to the test. Shalune wasn’t surprised, though she didn’t like the prospect at all. She licked her lips. “I’m not happy about it, Uluye; not so soon. We’ve hardly had time to make any judgment—”

  “That’s no longer relevant. The Ancestral Lady has made her wishes known to us, and it’s our duty to obey her. She will be Indigo’s judge. It is her will; that is quite clear.”

  Abruptly Uluye rose to her feet. It was a signal, Shalune realized, that she had issued her instructions and therefore considered any further debate irrelevant. “A full gathering will be called this evening and I’ll tell the citadel of my decision then. In the meantime, I leave it to you to inform Indigo and to instruct her in what she’ll be required to do. If she wishes to ask me any questions, I shall be available.”

  It was a dismissal, and there was nothing Shalune could say. She made her farewells, bowed and left the cave. Emerging into the full, searing heat and brilliance of the sun, she started along the ledge, then paused and looked up to the highest level of the cave system. She wanted to run up the staircase to Indigo’s cave, find Inuss and speak to her immediately, but a deeper instinct warned her against rashness. She should take time to think clearly and rationally before making any move, for her entire strategy must now change, and that meant a need for detailed and very careful planning. She’d take an hour to collect her wits and marshal her thoughts. Then she would speak to Inuss; not before. It was safer that way.

  She walked to the end of the ledge and onto the next downward flight of stairs. She was almost at the bottom when, from somewhere overhead, a voice hissed her name. Shalune looked up and saw Yima on the ledge above her. The girl gestured urgently; the fat woman glanced down, then along the ledge at her own level. There was no one else about. Looking up again, she nodded quickly and beckoned.

  They moved into the shade of one of the rough-hewn pillars at the staircase junction. It was cooler here and, more pertinent, anyone traversing the levels above or below would be unlikely to see them. Yima took hold of Shalune’s hand and clutched it, gasping to regain the breath drained from her by running in the heat. “Shalune—oh, Shalune, what am I going to do?‘

  “Quiet, now.” Shalune extricated her fingers and laid a gentling hand on Yima’s shoulder to stem her trembling. “It’ll do no good to get hysterical. We have to think before we act.”

  “But there’s so little time! Dark moon’s only nine or ten days away, and we’ll never persuade Mother to grant me longer. You know how she is—once something’s fixed in her mind, she won’t be swayed.

  “I know, child, I know.” Shalune was frowning, thinking hard.

  “Once the ceremony takes place, I’ll be lost!” Yima continued, on the verge of tears now. “I can’t let it happen, Shalune, I can’t! I’ll have to run away, I’ll have to flee the citadel—”

  Shalune interrupted her emphatically. ‘ ’That’s out of the question. Your mother would miss you immediately and she’d order a hunt. She wouldn’t rest until you were found. There must be a better solution than that.“

  “But what?” Yima shut her eyes tightly for a few moments, then quickly opened them again. “I could feign illness. Better still, I could become ill.
You’re our finest healer, Shalune; surely you could give me a potion that would bring on a fever and force the initiation to be postponed?”

  “That’s possible,” Shalune conceded cautiously. “But it’s an option I’d rather not take unless all else fails.”

  “It would at least give us more time.”

  “True, but I’m not anxious to risk your safety. The fever herbs aren’t to be trifled with, and something could easily go wrong.” Shalune held up a hand to silence Yima, as she seemed about to protest. “No, listen to me. I’ll speak to Inuss. It may be that we can make ready in time to fall in with your mother’s plan, and if that’s possible, it’s our best solution.”

  Yima wasn’t happy with that. “It’s dangerous, Shalune. You’ll be putting yourself at risk, and I don’t want you to do that for me.”

  “I have a selfish reason, too, Yima. Don’t ever forget that. It’s for all our sakes, not yours alone. Now, you’d best go before your mother sends for you again. You’ll have little time to call your own from now on.”

  “But what shall I do about Tiam? I must see him, Shalune. I have to tell him what’s happened!”

  Shalune shook her head firmly. “No, child, you can’t see Tiam again for the time being. Your mother will be watching you too closely. I’ll see to it that he knows what’s happened here … and if there are arrangements to be made, I’ll make them. Trust me.”

  Yima acquiesced, though reluctantly. “I do trust you, Shalune. I’ll do as you say.”

  “Good girl. I’ll see Inuss, and I’ll speak to you again later if I can. Go now.” She patted Yima’s arm. “And try not to fret.”

  She watched the girl hurry away. Her mind was clearer now, and she believed she knew what must be done. A lot depended on Inuss, but Shalune was prepared to gamble that her protegee would be willing and ready to act now. Whether she would prove able was another matter, but that was a perennial risk, and the date set for the ceremony could make no difference.

  Running footsteps on the ledge above alerted Shalune suddenly, and she looked up to see Inuss herself at the top of the stairway.

  “Shalune?” If Inuss was puzzled to see her mentor lurking inexplicably by the pillar, she didn’t show it. “Indigo’s awake.”