He didn’t startle, barely glanced at her. But that bare glance was so icy, she felt obliged to say, “I was teasing.”
Few things can be more discouraging than a one-sided conversation, but when Errance turned back to his work, she spoke doggedly on. “I mean, I understand.” She cleared her throat. “You’ve got to keep busy some way. All you’ve been doing for years is work and work, and you can’t suddenly stop. If you stop, you might rest, and if you rest, you might think. And if you think…you get scared. And it’s hard to wait. Because you’d rather just be home at once and have it all over with. It’s something like that, yes?”
Nothing answered her but the back of his rolling shoulders.
She swallowed hard. “I know you’re angry with me. I’ve heard it’s a good idea to release your anger in work, so I guess that’s what you’re doing too.” Biting her lip, she looked down at her folded hands. “Anyway, I guess I upset you earlier with my prying. I have been told I ask too many questions. I’m sorry.”
At that, he stiffened, and his head flicked to the side so he might see her face. Questions swam in his eyes, questions and confusion as he searched for any mocking in her expression, any hint of a lie. As if he had never heard an apology in years. Which maybe he hadn’t. With a jerk, he whirled back to the wall with ferocious vigor.
Clearly, she wasn’t going to get any real response. She should go back and guard the food before Tryss returned with a scolding. Anyway, it was beginning to rain.
“I…” His voice brought her whirling back. He was not looking at her, only at the water swirling around his legs. “If we make it back…I don’t know…if I’ll fit in.”
Her lips shaped a perfect O. That was her problem, not his. She was the one who hoped for home but had every chance of being turned away because her purpose was fulfilled. But he was the prince, he was the heir, he was the king—why did he have to worry about fitting in?
Yet he did. Because those seventy years had mauled him into a new creature, and what would that mean for his country, for his family and friends? He was no longer the elegant and lovely elf, even she had to admit that. He was savage and feral, and how long would that take to change?
“Well,” she said slowly. “This is your chance for a new life.”
“Life.” A bitter laugh choked in his throat. “What is that?”
The last light of the evening was fast fading, dragging the remnants of Tellie’s good humor after it. “Please, Errance. Don’t say things like that.”
Abandoning his rock wall, he sloshed back onto the bank. “Ever consider life is a harsh sentence?” The words were a tight fit, scraping on the edges.
“Most people find death harsher,” she snapped back.
“So I’ve become accustomed to death.”
She hoped the water in her eyes came from the rain dampening her hair and cheeks, but the tightness of her throat suggested otherwise. “But Errance, isn’t life—no matter how hard—worth it?” It was better than the alternative. Because when someone died, they always left someone behind…and how was that fair?
He did not answer, so she wrapped her arms tight around herself to keep from shivering. “I hope we’ll make it worth it,” she whispered.
It was then she noticed the rain was coming down heavier, utterly soaking both of them. She’d always imagined having a dramatic speech in a storm, but it really wasn’t so wonderful after all. It was in fact, wet. “Ugh, come on,” she said, “Let’s see if they’ve built that shelter yet.”
When she reached for his arm, he pulled back like she would hurt him. Like she’d hurt him already.
“Errance! What on earth? I’m not going to harm you, I’m only a kid!”
“Really?” he said, a sardonic lilt to his voice. “I thought you were all grown-up.”
He’d just teased her. She was almost sure of it. It might have been rather spitefully spoken, but it was a jest, and that was something. “I’m almost grown-up,” she hedged. “How about that? Now can we please get out of this rain?”
Silently, he led the way back to camp, and neither of them noticed the figure of leaves and rain huddled by the bank watching them. It hunkered low to the ground as they came and hurried back ahead of them so that when they arrived, Tryss was sitting by the fire as if she had been there the entire time.
Kelm was making good progress on the shelter under the command of Tryss, stacking dead branches around a tree that bent sideways, then weaving a net in between the branches with sticks and grass, then layering it all with the broad, waxy leaves of the jungle.
Tellie glanced at the meat-sticks trying to warm over the sputtering fire, and she flinched, expecting a scolding for neglecting her job. But the chema only glanced at them both and said, “We should get inside.”
A distant rumble of thunder confirmed her suggestion, and Tellie grabbed her meat-stick and crawled into the shelter as Kelm declared it as good as it would get. Both the boy and Tryss followed soon after, each with their own meal, but Errance remained standing outside. “Aren’t you coming in?” Tellie asked, poking her head out into the thickening rain.
Errance shook his head, a grey and phantom figure in the failing light and watery veil. “Already wet,” he said. He turned to a nearby tree, caught the lowest branch, and swung himself upwards, vanishing from view.
Tellie huffed in exasperation and huddled against Kelm as she began to tear the meat off its skewer, licking her sticky fingers with each bite.
16
oOo
The chema woman is frightened of me, and some of the knots in my chest relax. So long as my enemies fear me, I have strength, power, advantage. But for some reason the girl named Tellie doesn’t fear me. She would try to pet a growling wolf, I think. Was I really ever that innocent? No, stop. No use thinking of that. But it is strange to see innocence again. She blushes at everything, quick to action, and quick to shame. The world will not be kind to her.
Before dawn promised a fair day after the storm, Tryss woke all the company and led them the last length of the jungle and out into the land beyond. As the world colored, Tellie saw a terrain far different from the jungle—sloping hills covered in stiff dry grass. The further they traveled, even the ground turned from soil to sand. When she inquired how it was possible that two such varying lands should be neighbors, Tryss explained that both hot and cold springs from underground rivers gave the jungle constant humidity and life. “Also,” she said, “the clouds traveling from the sea catch against those mountains and pile there until they release their watery burden.”
Tellie glanced back with a shiver at the mountains, marveling at how high they did reach, even now vanishing into the clouds. And yet…she smiled suddenly…the sun could scale it. Again and again, the morning sun would climb from the east horizon and rise above those dark mountains.
She opened her mouth to voice the thought to Errance, but all fancy fled her mind as they crested a high hill and looked out upon an eternal stretch of shimmering grey that met the horizon. It glimmered and winked in the light, and as is it came towards the shore, crests of white curled the soft, silver plain.
It was the ocean.
She stared, mouth agape and legs weak. “Oh,” she breathed. “I never knew it would be so huge. It’s so beautiful…have you ever seen the like?”
“I’ve seen the other side,” Kelm promptly informed. “At the city of Korince while I was there with my master. The sea is called Niar Ocean, and this is only a small bit of it that carves into Orim. Nobody has ever crossed the ocean to the south to see if there is any land on the other side.”
She glared at him. There were times she wanted to take his vast sum of knowledge and stomp on it.
Tryss laughed and rested her hand on the girl’s shoulder. “I’ve seen it from a distance in the tallest trees of the jungle,” she admitted. “But my breath is still stolen at the sight.”
“What about you, Errance?” Tellie asked, craning her head around to look at him, hoping to gl
impse a little bit of life.
He stared out over the ocean with eyes of stone. “No,” he said. “I have never seen it.”
Well then, she would simply enjoy its splendor by herself. Each wave stroked her gaze forward, then back, then again, before her eyes skimmed further down to the shore near them and set upon the city of Oolum. For the second time, her breath left her lungs, but now more in dismay than awe.
Oolum sat by the shore like an ornate sandcastle, its thousands of flat and domed buildings clustered within a thick square wall. On one side of the wall, ships upon ships anchored in harbor like swans come for feeding, and on all the other three sides of the city clustered a brilliantly colored garden of tents and wagons. A road along the sea vanished into the south side of the city and reappeared on the north. And traveling upon it—hundreds upon hundreds of people and animals, desperate to reach the city walls before the sun scorched them off the sand.
“Good heavens!” Tellie gasped. “Do we really have to go in that crowd?”
“We could try skirting the city to reach the docks,” Tryss said. “But the people there will be lazier and far more likely to notice us. We’ll be the most invisible going straight through the activity and bustle.”
Just as she said, their approach was unnoticed by the river of folk and so they joined the ragged skirt of the crowd. Despite their best efforts they were soon packed as potatoes in a sack. Never in her life had Tellie been surrounded by so many people, and they were so different than anyone she’d seen in West Orim. Most of them were colored in a variety of dark shades, from golden tan to glistening ebony, and their hair was either short and curly or long and braided. Some wore bright and colorful clothes, others wore hardly anything.
She had lived in Dormandy for a spell, yes, but she’d usually stayed in the orphanage, and the streets were only politely busy. These people chattered in voices thick and thin, words blending together so no language could be told apart. Then there was the smell, not only of sweat and dirt, but of dung from the animals that lumbered along with their masters.
Tellie staggered along with her friends, dizzily wondering why anyone would want to live in such a crowded environment. The pace was slow, and it seemed to take forever till they passed through the wide arched entrance. She craned her head back to look at the mosaic mural faded above the gate, but then the pace became too fast, and she rushed under it without a proper study. Overwhelmed by the close-pressing bodies, she grabbed Errance’s arm, mostly for her own assurance and out of a vague idea that he had to be even more uncomfortable than her. Errance jumped and half-spun around before he saw it was her. With a huff, he pulled his arm out of her hand in a blink of an eye.
A shoulder knocked into her, and she stumbled. One horrid moment, she thought she was going to fall, and images of being trampled by a merciless tide of feet flashed across her mind. But a hand gripped her arm, and she looked up to see Tryss.
The chema was paler than usual, features tight. “Don’t be embarrassed,” she murmured. “I’m not used to all this commotion either.”
Nodding, Tellie clung to her hand as the crowd oozed on.
As a matter of fact, the only one who did seem used to it and thoroughly enjoying himself was Kelm, but this came as no surprise he had to be used to busy markets.
As the main road into the city branched off into several streets, the path became a little less cramped, but no less chaotic. They pushed through the bustle, passing brightly colored tents and bargaining buyers. Filthy urchins and mangy dogs darted through the mass, snatching unattended items, while the glorious rich dined on succulent fruits on shaded balconies. Each and every soul lived entirely in and for themselves no matter how often they rubbed shoulders.
Sellers were always shouting, always calling for attention, and Tellie’s neck began to ache from turning to see whatever demanded her focus. There were stalls filled with embroidered fabric or jars of spices or dried meat. They passed a large wooden stage where people in chains stood in dejected silence while a man in golden robes shouted eagerly at the audience gathered in front of him. She shivered, suddenly cold even in the oppressive heat.
At one point, shouts turned to alarm and people pressed to the side as a coach flew by, hardly caring if the road was clear or not. The horse’s hooves kicked up a cloud of dust that momentarily blinded everyone in a hazy fog.
“Is every merchant city this wild, Kelm?” Tellie coughed, wiping her hair out of her mouth and eyes. He did not reply. She looked for him, then looked again, her heartbeat skipping in fear. “Kelm? Errance, where is Kelm?”
Never in all his travels, which were worthy for a boy his age, had Kelm seen such a market as this one. The intoxicating smells sent his senses swimming, the entrancing sights tugged his eyes back and forth till they burned. Every tasty morsel begged to be sampled, every spice sought to be sniffed, every craft called to be fondled. But he was just a boy, not trusted to touch anything. Still, he eagerly ate up every sight.
When he saw a tent full of wood carvings, he halted mid-stride. The carving of wood was his favorite form of art, a craft he wistfully pursued by keeping a small knife in his pocket to whittle with whenever he found the chance. So he could not deny himself this one chance to take a closer look.
“Hey, hold on a moment, won’t you,” he called over his shoulder, and then without waiting to see if they had, he darted to the closest wooden figure and admired its sand-smoothed surface. And that one over there—that was surely a work of Luthe Lavral, greatest carver to come from Korince in the past century. Throwing all propriety to the wind, Kelm carefully lifted the piece and looked underneath it for initials, but there was no sign. Perhaps it was only an imitation.
A meaty hand thudded onto his shoulder. He gasped and twisted around to look up into the vendor’s face.
“You miserable thief,” the man growled. “Get your filthy hands off my wares!”
“But I’m not a thief, I—” Kelm’s protest cut off as the man clouted him across the mouth. Jaw stinging, Kelm looked quickly about for his friends. He gasped again and his stomach dropped. Where were they?
“Dor, go and fetch the wardens!” his captor shouted to a passer-by. “I finally caught that pesky urchin.”
“You’ve got the wrong person, I wasn’t doing anything wrong!” Kelm argued. He was rewarded with another heavy smack on the head. With a quick drop, he tried to twist out of the man’s grasp. But the grip only tightened, and he was yanked back to his feet.
“A little rough, doncha’ think, darling?” said a woman’s voice.
Kelm felt the change in his captor’s hold and he wiggled around to see who spoke.
A woman stood a few paces back, one like he had never seen. Her skin, a dark shade of brown with hair matching color, and deep black eyes were common among many of the native people of East Orim, but her eyes were so huge and her smile so large and brilliant that they did not seem able to fit in her round-cheeked face. She wore a sleeveless tunic of royal purple, tied with a beaded sash of orange and her leggings were yellow. Furthermore, she wore several necklaces, bangles, and clasps. There was something unsettling about how she stood there as if she owned the entire world, hands on her hips, eyebrows raised.
The vendor smiled and removed one of his hands from Kelm’s collar. “Well, if it isn’t Zizain! What interest do you have in this flea-ridden brat?”
She tossed her head. “What interest? Why, you dog, he’s my wage-collector, as honest as they come!” Every word she spoke was thickly accented with a sharp ‘z’ sound, rolling off her tongue as fast as wasp’s wings.
Gaping in astonishment, Kelm glanced at his captor to see if he was buying it.
The man narrowed his eyes. “What was he doing poking through my wares?”
“Why, he wants to be a carver of course!” she cried, throwing up her hands. “He’s always admired you, poor boy, and you smack him on the head!”
A guilty expression crawled onto the features of the carver. Sheep
ishly, he released Kelm. “Sorry, lad,” he said, giving him a pat on the shoulders that nearly knocked him down. “You can’t tell an honest person from a truthful one in this city anymore.”
“Isn’t that the truth!” agreed the woman. She took Kelm’s arm. “Come along, Hari, we have work to do.”
For a moment, the idea of breaking free and dashing off flashed across Kelm’s mind. But as the woman’s strong fingers encircled his arm, he suddenly realized he had no more chance of escaping her than the vendor.
“Now then, boy, my name’s Zizain,” she whispered as she subtly guided him through the crowds. “Perchance you can tell me what you were doing with his things?”
“I’m a merchant’s apprentice, I was just admiring it!” he gasped.
“Where’s your master?”
His mind reeled. “Um…he’s not here. I’m traveling with friends.” A convincing story, if there ever was one, no doubt a true original. He could have slapped himself.
“Well then, you show me your friends and all will be well, yes?” Zizain smiled.
He nodded frantically and led the way through the crowd, seeking the faces of his friends. The woman’s grip on his arm was disconcerting at best, unnervingly strong and yet unmistakably feminine. What if he couldn’t find them? What would she do? She didn’t look particularly cruel or capricious, but—
There they were! Huddled in the shadow of a stall, speaking anxiously to each other. Gasping with relief, Kelm struggled through the last barricade of bodies and waved wildly. “Ho! Here I am!”
Tellie yelped, Tryss exhaled heavily, and Errance…Errance grabbed his arm with the ferocity of a wolf.
“Kelm!” he hissed. “Do not wander off like that! You could have been—” His voice trailed off as he realized that Kelm’s other arm was occupied.
Zizain fluttered her lashes. “My,” she drawled. “If you’d told me your friend was so handsome I would have come much quicker, see?”
A scowl scored deep into Errance’s face, and he took a cautious step back. His wary eyes swept up and down her liquid posture and flashy clothing.
Moonscript (Kings of Aselvia Book 1) Page 19