Old Mars Page 24

  “And so you buy it with an emblem of the lost,” she said, but consideringly, without condemnation. I could see that she was thinking fast.

  “If you like.”

  She gave a swift gesture of assent. “Very well. What else did you understand of the girl? ‘Princess’ is not a term we know.”

  I affected disinterest. “I’m not familiar with your hierarchies.”

  “Very well, I shall explain them to you, though no man can apprehend how the Tribes are governed.” She turned her head and spat. “You with your male-ruled cities—you cannot understand our matriarchies. Hafyre is ghost-touched, grass-haunted. There was a comet at her birth, and we believe that is a herald from the carrion lords who live between the winds, the land where death is. She is an oracle, a harbinger, and she is marked for power.”

  “Then you’ll be wanting her back.”

  “As you say. She went missing a year and a half ago; we had thought her dead, but the wind brought no messages from her, and I confess that I did not understand why.”

  I looked away. “How do you plan to retrieve her?”

  “Ah,” the Shan-hai said, “I don’t think it wise to tell you that.”

  “It’s none of my concern, really. But you’ll guarantee safe passage?”

  “Yes. You have done me a service. Even though you are a man, I won’t forget it. There’ll be a ceremony tonight because of this—you will stay. I say this not because I wish to honor you: It is the best way to inform as many people as possible of your presence, at once.”

  “What does this ceremony involve?”

  “A call to the winds and the gods who ride them. No more than that. You won’t be expected to do more than watch. The priestesses run things here.”

  “Then it will be an honor indeed,” I said, and saw her cold, forest-eyed smile.

  To the citizens of Cadrada, these people are barbarians. Remembering Halse’s palace, and the things that happened there, I rather think it is more even-handed than that. The ceremony to which I had been invited was held up in the rocks, on a low plateau looking out across the darkening plain and the red sun falling. The air grew colder swiftly and smelled of snow. Huge harps of sinew were threaded between tall poles, and, as the dusk breeze grew, they began to whine and sing. The priestess moved among them, whispering, in a dance that grew steadily wilder as the evening wore on. By the time the actual ceremony was due to begin, some three hundred people had gathered. I saw the banner of the Ynar again, but others, too. The women gathered about the fires; the men stood sullenly on the fringes, standing guard.

  The Shan-hai called on the carrion spirits of the wind. They use an older tongue for these ceremonies, a language that has been dead for thousands of years and has nothing to do with the builders of the canals or the cities of the plain. It is wilder, stranger, not at all human. It made my skin crawl to hear it, and yet it filled me with a strange ascetic sense of longing: the reverse of the sex-songs that they sing in the palaces to inflame all those who hear them. This spoke of purity and deliberate isolation. Perhaps it was what I needed. I became lost in the thin harmonies, as the priestess berated or cajoled or implored the carrion gods; I did not know which. But then I became aware that someone was close to my shoulder. Casually, I turned.

  His tea-colored eyes caught the firelight. His coat was frayed, but originally of good quality, and he wore a hat with an emblem upon it—the same form of emblem that I had brought to the priestess. Close to, his face was sallow and long, like a chiseled candle, under a fall of fawn-brown hair. I had last seen him on a black-furred mount, pursued by the sorcerer from Ithness.

  “You rescued me,” he said. He sounded amused. His voice was low, like silk and razors, with the sibilants of the plains. “Why?”

  “I don’t like Ithness.”

  “The hotels? The shopping?”

  I inclined my head, though my smile was hidden by the mask. “Neither are good. The hotels are verminous and the shops overpriced. Their sorcerers are worse.”

  “This one isn’t dead, by the way. Regrettably. You’d need a bolt or poison for that, or one of their own spells, not a barb gun. But it was a kind thing to do. And altruism always worries me.”

  “It worries me, too. That’s why I never practice it. What did you do, to be pursued so far and so hard? Are you a traveler? You’re no tribesman, yet you wear their sign.”

  “Well,” he said, “I am indeed a traveler, and as for why I am permitted to wear the sign of the Ynar, that’s a longer story. If this was Scarlight, I’d offer to discuss it over a drink. But here—”

  “The tribes don’t indulge in wine or spirits. Unless you like fermented tope milk.”

  “That’s why I brought a hipflask.”

  We both deemed it prudent to wait until the ceremony was over before returning to a tent and pouring out measures. I was feeling insecure. He was flirting, I could have sworn it, and that was a problem. Either he knew me for a woman, or he thought I was a man. Neither possibility was reassuring. I kept to the shadows and made sure that the mask was securely tied, nor did I drink much, although the man I had rescued watched me all the while.

  He had not told me his name, but he did not need to. He was called Nightwall Dair. He was the only man who had ever gone beyond the Nightwall of the far north, the great glacier that separates Heth from the plains, or at least the only man who had done so and lived. He had brought back a captive, a strange black thing with golden eyes, who had lived for a time before spilling its secrets to the sorcerers of Cadrada. I’d seen it, and him, at Lord Halse’s palace, and, as I’ve said, we’d crossed paths on several occasions before that. Dair was a manhunter, just as I was, and a hunter of other things, too. Not an easy man to trick, and I did not know if I had succeeded.

  We spoke of Scarlight, and Cadrada itself, lightly enough, as men do when they meet in a strange place. At length, he said, “I know you, I am sure of it.”

  I shrugged. “Perhaps we have met on our travels. There is something a little familiar about you.”

  “Many people know me,” he said. He spoke as if it did not matter.

  “Perhaps, then, we have met. But I have still not heard your name.”

  He gave a grin filled with teeth. “Just as well. If you had, you would have reason to be afraid.”

  “Many say the same of me.” I rose to my feet. “It’s getting late, and I have a long way to go.”

  There was a faint curiosity in his face. “Where are you headed?”

  “Coyine.”

  “The Tribes don’t like travelers.”

  “That’s why I’ve paid for safe passage.”

  “They don’t use money.”

  “I wasn’t talking about money.”

  He laughed. “I think you’ve been here before.”

  “And you? But of course you have, with that emblem.”

  “Me? I’ve been everywhere.” He put his head on one side, looking up at me from beneath the lock of hair that fell across his face. His long countenance was wry, amused, like one who anticipates a negative reply. “Do you want a companion for the night?”

  “Not fussy, are you? You haven’t even seen my face.”

  “As you say, I’m not fussy.”

  “Unfortunately, I’ve recently taken a vow of celibacy,” I said.

  He laughed again. “And you have seen my countenance. Well, I shall choose to believe you—it’s more flattering than the alternatives.”

  I bowed, then headed to the tent that the priestess had told me I could use. I don’t like tents. They’re hard to secure, and I spent most of the night in a light doze with my blade over my knees, just in case. But Dair had obviously taken my refusal in good spirits: I knew that he would not have found entertainment among the tribes, who are prudish in the extreme, but he did not bother me.

  In the morning, I woke to find the priestess sitting outside the tent.

  “The woman you saw,” she began, without preamble. “I want to use you for a divi
nation.”

  “Very well,” I said. The sun was only just coming up. “What did you have in mind?”

  “I need to take you to the scrying pool.”

  “And if I prefer not to?”

  “You still want safe passage to Coyine, I believe?” She glowered. “And my magic can fry any man at seven paces.”

  “Good point. I’d like some tea first, though.” I wasn’t at my best first thing.

  “It’s better on an empty stomach,” she said, unsmiling.

  The scrying pool lay up in the woods. A narrow track that looked as though it had been made by an animal led up to it, and when we sat down by its glassy black depths, the air rose cool and dank through the ferns. Red earth, green leaves … they reminded me of Hafyre.

  “What do you want me to do?”

  She was lighting something in a tiny censer, held by a dangling bronze chain. A pungent smell twined out in its smoke, making me cough. It reminded me of something: one of the strong perfumes of the south that are brought forth by heat.

  “Close your eyes,” she instructed. I did so, though not too trustingly. I felt a warm breath on the skin around my eyes, the only part of my face that was visible. The smoke penetrated the mask, seeping into my throat, and, against my better judgment, I felt myself grow slack and relaxed. I had a sudden vision of the long pale face of Nightwall Dair.

  “No,” I heard the priestess hiss. Another image floated before me: the girl with green eyes and hair the shade of earth. The priestess gave a breath of satisfaction. “There she is. Hafyre.”

  The girl’s face was downcast. She stared down at something she was holding in her lap, a crystal globe with a spark at the heart of it, like a little flame. A shaft of lamplight came over her shoulder; she wore a filmy ochre shift. Her face was as beautiful as I remembered it, all ovals and symmetry and that sudden, flaming smile. The slave brand was stamped white on her shoulder and the priestess cursed when she saw it.

  “Defiled!”

  I’d met her in a slave palace, after all. They’re not convents.

  “This is the past,” the priestess said, with authority. “She is not there now.”

  This was dangerous ground. I didn’t want the woman looking into my head and discovering that the girl was the reason I was here, that I’d been sent to bring her back. That—well, I did not want to let her in and that was an end of it.

  “Is it so?” I said, deceptively dulcet.

  “Try to see where she is now.” The smoke grew stronger. Against my will, I looked into the black and saw the girl. This time, she wore black leather riding gear and she was sitting beside a hearth of ashes. But she was still the same person I had known back in Cadrada, the girl who could, in an instant, throw another person into desire like the flick of a whip.

  “Ahhhh,” the priestess said. “I know where she is.”

  “Where?”

  “Enough.” The smoke abruptly ceased and my eyes fluttered open.

  “Why did you choose me for this?” I asked. I didn’t know whether she’d seen that I was a woman.

  “An outsider is better, even a man.” That answered that question. “Those of the Tribes—they bring too many assumptions to it.” She stood and nodded thanks. “You can go now. You’ll have safe passage to Coyine. When you reach the next ridge, you will find a settlement on the far side. Give them this.” She handed me a token: a brass coin bearing a sigil. “They will exchange it for another. Thus, with luck, and if you do not meet too many wild beasts, you will reach Coyine alive.” There was a flicker of contempt beneath her words.

  And so I mounted up and rode swiftly into the morning light. I did not see Nightwall Dair again, but before I reached the ridge, I turned the mount and headed up into the woods. I doubled back until I could see the tents. The priestess was speaking to two warriors: They saddled up topes and she swung up behind the leader. Then they were riding northwest, fast. I followed.

  By the middle of the afternoon, we were high into the mountains and the air had grown an icy bite. I was quite a long way behind, but when I came up over a ridge, they had halted and were standing below. The ruin was so decrepit that at first I failed to realize what it was: another stump of a tower. I reined in my mount and watched the little pantomime enacted below. The priestess came out of the tower and waved her arms. I got the impression that she was blaming the warriors for something. There was an argument, then they all mounted up again and rode off. Greatly entertained, I waited until they had disappeared from sight and rode down to the ruin.

  Inside it was as I had seen it in the vision. There was no sign of Hafyre. The ashy hearth lay undisturbed, or so I thought at first. Then I looked closer. In the ash, someone had inscribed a few symbols. To anyone unfamiliar with the secret slave signs of Cadrada, which was most people, it would have looked like the footprints of a bird, or the scratchings of vermin. To me, it was a message.

  Northwest, then west again. A rock below a star.

  I digested this for a moment, then made a thorough examination of the ruin. She had not been the only person here. There had been someone with her, a man, I thought from the footprints. Someone had pissed up against the wall; it was still faintly damp. I knelt and sniffed. Not a native of the south, but someone else … It wasn’t wet enough to have been one of the priestesses’ warriors—not as recent—and it was too high on the wall to have been a woman. So someone else had been here with Hafyre, someone who did not know the slave-signs.

  Someone from Ithness? Or had Dair beaten me to it?

  Well, that was what I intended to find out. I went back out, cautiously, climbed back on the tope, and kicked it into a gallop in a westerly direction.

  For some time, I’d been getting the impression that I might be being followed. A fleeting scent on the wind, a prickle at the back of the neck, nothing more. If so, there were two obvious likely candidates: the sorcerer and Nightwall Dair. But there wasn’t a lot I could do about it. If I doubled back, my pursuer would know, and I stood little chance of losing him in this terrain; on the pale tope, I stood out like a moon in a clear sky. And the message hadn’t exactly been clear, although once I’d been riding for a bit, I saw what she’d meant. The only possible westerly passage was a funnel of rock as the mountain wall closed in, channeling me in the direction of the setting sun. And at the end of it, as we rode into dusk, a pinnacle of stone reared up over the narrow valley, wearing the Lovestar like a hat. When I saw that, I smiled under the mask and spurred the mount on and under a lip of rock. Then I dove off it, falling the ten feet from its high humped back and sprawling with a gasp in the dust. The tope, astonished, bounded away. I knew it wouldn’t go very far: it would come back eventually if it thought there was a chance of food. I lay in a twist of limbs.

  I knew when he was close. I could smell the tope, and a shadow fell across my face. There was a light step, then a foot in my ribs. He reached down and snatched off the mask. I felt my hair spill down into the dirt. I didn’t stir but lay still with my eyes shut. He didn’t say anything, but I heard him laugh with surprise. He shoved me again with his boot. Then, when he still got no reaction, he picked me up and hoisted me up over the back of his tope. And that was when I kicked him in the head.

  That’s one of the good things about being a professional dancer. I felt his jaw snap back, then he was down in the dirt. I dropped onto him from the back of the tope and flattened him for good measure. Then I took a good look at him: at the long face and the fawn hair sprawling in the dust.

  “Nightwall Dair. My apologies.” I almost felt sincere.

  I tied his arms behind him: I thought he was out cold, but I didn’t want to take the chance that he’d try the same trick with me that I had with him, and I wanted his wrists secured, at least. He was too heavy to lift onto the puzzled tope, so I left him lying there and ducked back under the lip of rock, making my way down the canyon. I dusted off the mask as I went and replaced it. On the way down, I met my mount wandering back up. It was now almost
dark.

  “You stay there,” I told it, and tied its harness to an outcrop. Then I looked for what I’d been expecting to find, and found it.

  The ancestors of the Tribes, or those who came before them, had done something stupid once. I don’t know what. Some kind of poisoning of the atmosphere, a souring of the soil, thousands of years ago. It had made them take to the mountains for a time, burrowing into the rocks against the killing cold. Their tunnels could still be found, used now as winterings, and a round stone door showed where the closest one lay. It stood half-concealed behind a boulder. I gave it a push, judging the pivot point, and when it opened, I climbed through. It led into a passage, traveling downward. I could smell a perfume that I knew well, plus sweat and smoke. I followed.

  Hafyre was huddled in a makeshift bed of furs, still in her riding leathers. She gasped when she saw me, and I saw her become more sinuous, sliding into the furs as she assessed this new threat.

  Slowly, I took off the mask and watched her face change.

  “Zuneida Peace,” she breathed. “All the way from Cadrada. I didn’t think you cared.” Her forest eyes were wide with surprise. “Of all the people I thought might come after me …”

  “Your lord paid well.”

  “Good enough,” she said, briskly. She got to her feet.

  “Where is he? The sorcerer?” I demanded.

  “He’s gone to find my aunt,” she said. “I don’t know when he’ll be back. I tried to get out, but I couldn’t move the door from the inside.”

  “We need to go.”

  On the way back up the passage, I said, “Did he rape you? The sorcerer?”

  “No.” Our eyes met.

  “What were you doing with him?”

  “He took me from the palace. We’d been sleeping together.” She told me this without a hint of shame, as though what she and I had experienced did not matter, and perhaps, I thought with bitterness, she was right.

  “He bound me with a spell and took me out of Halse’s palace through the cellars. I thought at first that he was taking me to Ithness, to the markets there. But he brought me here, instead. He wants leverage over the Tribes. He planned to use me as a bargaining chip with my aunt.” She paused. Her face grew downcast and demure, a little sly. She ran a hand over my arm and murmured, “What are you planning to do?”