Blood Seed: Coin of Rulve Book One (12 page)

Sheft leaned over and clapped him on the shoulder. “That’s wonderful news, Etane. I’m glad for you.” 

He spoke sincerely, but also a little sadly. Etane got the distinct impression of someone out in the cold, gazing into fire lit windows. But that was Sheft’s fault. He’d be cold only until he got the courage to ask for Mariat, who would then keep him warm for the rest of his days. “Can I count on you to help at the field-burn? I wanted you to be firstman at our wedding, but…well, it might be better if I ask Leeza’s brother instead.”

“I understand.”

“I’ll still need you as my field manager. When everyone’s gone, you come in and make sure the work’s been done right. What do you say?”

Sheft hesitated, but then said, “Of course I’ll do it. You’re my friend.”

Etane nodded, and for a while they talked about his new field. Moro had originally cleared it when Etane was born and for years kept a cow on it. Except for one beautiful grove, most of the big trees had been cut down, but a lot of brush still remained. They agreed that if the weather allowed, he and Sheft would do some preliminary cutting in the next few weeks.

Activity in the yard caused Etane to turn. Tarn came back alone in the wagon and went into the house, and then another wagon rattled in. It was Gwin, who drove the finest horse in At-Wysher, a brown gelding with two white forefeet. He wore a coat fitted at the waist and what looked like new boots. With a confident set to his shoulders, he entered the house.

Etane glanced at Sheft, whose face had hardened at the sight of Gwin. “Don’t let him bother you. Just finish your dinner.” He waved away a drone-fly that was hovering over Sheft’s plate.

Sheft took a bite of chicken, then began pushing a piece of potato around with his fork. “Did your father,” he asked without looking up, “ever tell you anything about—about the Rites?”

The Rites. Neither he nor Moro had to take part this year, so Etane had forgotten about them. The moon was shrinking away; and two nights from now, the first of Hawk, it would fall into its dark circle. That’s when the Rites were traditionally held—and they would be Sheft’s first. He shifted uneasily on the hay. “All I know is there are twenty men in the circle, including the Holdman, the elders, and their first-born sons eighteen or over.”

“That’s only eighteen people.”

“Yeah. To make it twenty, Parduka appoints a different man and his son on a rotating basis.

Thank Ele she hasn’t chosen us this year. With the funeral and all, it would kill my dad—plus I’m not that anxious to go ever. Maybe she forgot I’m eighteen.”

“I know it’s all supposed to be kept secret, but”—his friend shot a pleading glance at him and looked quickly down again—“but Moro must’ve said
something
more.”

And Tarn, he thought with a pang of sympathy for Sheft, apparently hadn’t said anything at all. “Well, no one’s allowed to talk about what goes on, but he did mention that men have a duty to appease Wask.”

Sheft stiffened. “Appease? How?”

“I’m not sure. But don’t worry about going out that night. The whole Circle is under the protection of Ele.”

For a moment Sheft said nothing. “But I don’t believe in Ele.”

He shrugged. “You’ll get through it. Everyone does.”

#   #   #

Easy for you to say
, Sheft thought. He put his plate aside and rubbed the back of his neck. He couldn’t seem to blot out the mental picture of what he feared regarding the Rites: a sharp blade, sharp eyes watching, blood dripping toward the waiting ground.

The sound of a door closing made him turn. Gwin was leaving the house. Voy, who had apparently been sleeping in his wagon, poked his head up. The two spoke in low tones, Voy laughed, and Gwin drove away. Tarn’s wagon stood alone now in front of the house.

Moro peered toward the barn, looking for them. “Come on, Sheft,” Etane said. “Help me harness the horse. It’s time.” His eyes were sad.

Back in the house, Sheft put his unfinished dinner on the table and saw that only fifteen or so additional candles had been lighted.

“Most of the villagers stayed home,” Tarn reported. “They didn’t think Ane was getting a proper funeral. Don’t take this amiss, Moro, but Parduka complained that a ceremony should have been conducted in the House of Ele, with the cremation out back. Graves in the deadlands insult the goddess, she says. The one who is really insulted, I suspect, is the priestess, who will receive no funeral offering. Dorik sends his respects, but doesn’t want to quarrel with Parduka over this.” 

“Ane put her faith in Rulve,” Moro said with a hint of stubbornness. “She’ll be buried according to her wishes.”

One by one, Mariat blew out the candles. In the dim light, Sheft leaned over the bier and looked at the quiet face he’d never see again. He tucked beside her body the paper with the quote from the book of tales.
How I’ll miss you, Ane. How I’ll miss you
. He still felt numb, even as Mariat wrapped Ane in her new blanket and he helped carry her out to Moro’s wagon. She was so light he could have done it himself. He could have cradled her in his arms like a child.

The two wagons headed east, picking up Riah on the way. The sky had become so overcast that Sheft couldn’t tell where the sun was. At the gravesite, he watched Moro and Etane remove the frail body from Moro’s wagon and lower it into the earth. At the bottom of the hole, the pale yellow blanket shone faintly, as if with its own light.

Tarn’s shovel scraped. Clods of dirt scattered over the blanket.

No!
He clenched his shovel with both hands, his chest tight. 

“She’s not down there, Sheft,” a gentle voice beside him whispered. Mariat touched his arm. “She’s in Rulve’s hands.”

He looked at her, into her lovely eyes full of both grief and faith, and felt ashamed. He was supposed to be comforting her, not the other way around. He nodded and turned to the work at hand, but the tightness inside him intensified as the yellow blanket gradually disappeared under shovelfuls of dirt. Soon all the light was obliterated from the hole where Ane lay.

On top of the mound they placed in a circle the rocks he and Etane had gathered earlier. In the center Moro planted the torch, and struck the flint. The torch had become so damp it took him a while to light it. Finally it flared, and everyone stood silent, gazing down on the grave. Mariat took his hand, and it was the only human touch between the stony ground and the dead sky. 

The light changed, and he looked up. Clouds streamed past, thinning the veil over the diffuse disk of the sun in the west, until all around them the mist-filled air suddenly glowed gold. For a moment the flame of the little torch was engulfed by a greater light. A bittersweet emotion ached in his chest.

Too soon the glory passed: the overcast closed in once more and Ane had gone forever.

The small group rode away in the wagons. Sheft watched the lonely torch flame grow smaller, until it finally dipped out of sight behind a rise in the land. 

Sitting in the back of the rattling wagon, Sheft looked at Mariat, riding ahead. How could she endure this grief? She’d been home barely three months, been reunited with her family for only one short season, and now her mother had been snatched away. He turned his head to where he had last seen the sun. The grey sky had swallowed it.

But in its place rose an ominous black plume. Dread washed through him. “Something’s burning,” he said to his father. “In our fieldhold.”

Tarn squinted where Sheft pointed, then shouted up to Moro. “There’s smoke coming from our place!” The men jumped out, leaving Riah and Mariat to bring the vehicles in by the road, and ran over the muddy fields. Sheft caught the sharp tang of cinders. He and Etane reached the fieldhold before the older men. “Thank Ele it’s not your house!” Etane cried.

But Sheft had known that already and ran around the corner. Dirt-brown wisps curled around the edges of the closed door of the chicken shed. Tendrils rose from chinks in the steaming roof. Only one frantic hen clucked and flapped in the farthest corner of the chicken yard. Where were the others? He rushed to the door of the shed and, knowing what would happen, darted to the side as he pulled it open. A thick cloud of smoke rolled out. He bent down to look under the worst of it and glimpsed a smoldering pile of straw and old nests in the center of the shed. The recent rain had so far kept the shed from bursting into flames, but the pile seethed with burning embers.

“We need rakes,” Sheft cried. They each grabbed one out of the barn, almost colliding with the two older men as they rushed up. “Get water!” he called to them.

He and Etane, bending low to avoid the roiling smoke, fought their way into the shed and began raking the pile toward the door. Heat beat against his face, and smoke stung his eyes and throat. Tarn appeared, threw a bucket of water on the pile, which hissed out another cloud of smoke, and then dashed out. “The roof!” Sheft cried after him. “Douse the roof!”

Coughing and blinking, he raked, glimpsed the bodies of two charred hens, smelled burnt feathers. Whoever had done this made sure most of the fowl were trapped inside. A gush of soot-filled water from the ceiling soaked his shirt, followed soon after by another. No wind was blowing through the lattice window in the back of the shed, but the humid air wafting down from the Riftwood sent smoke and fumes directly into his eyes. He could hardly see the shadowy form of Etane beside him.

His boots squished over the muddy ground, his face stung from the heat, and his shoulders ached as he raked as fast as he could. He finally got most of the debris out the door and staggered to the side, wiping his eyes on his sleeve and taking gulps of clean air. Etane was out too, bent over and coughing.

Tarn and Moro shouldered past them, armed with hoes. Soon the remains of the debris lay spread out in the chicken yard for the women to pour water over. The last embers winked out, leaving a caustic smell and pall of smoke. Breathing heavily, leaning on their rakes, their faces and hair streaked with soot, they all rested for a moment, then surveyed the damage.

Inside the shed, the charred roof sagged open in the center and the remains of four hens, their bones poking out of ashes, lay on the floor. More ominous, eggshells crunched underfoot, and trails of yolks and whites were cooked onto the smoke-blackened walls. They found the rooster near the back window, its neck twisted. Whoever started the fire had killed the rooster and hurled eggs against the wood.

“Who in Ele’s name would do this?” Moro cried.

Sheft remembered the odd way Gwin and Voy had acted at Moro’s house earlier that day. He knew exactly who had done this, and why.

Under the soot, Tarn’s face was white. “Whoever started this fire could have torched our house and barn. This was merely a warning.” He turned on Sheft. “This happened because of what you did at the market-fair. Admit it!”

It was as if he had been hit by a board. His own anger flared. “Why do you believe every village gossip, but not your own son? What I say isn’t good enough for you, is it? Nothing I’ve ever
done
was good enough!”

Tarn thrust his face into his. “So you’re blaming me for this?” he shouted.

Sheft kept his gaze averted, but the father who rarely looked at him now glared into his soul. Tarn demanded the truth. And the truth, he realized with a cold wash of insight, was that he himself bore the ultimate responsibility. This destruction happened because of what he was. Those who had done it hated him, and he alone should have borne the burden of that hatred.

He raised his eyes to meet his father’s gaze. He laid bare the alien silver, the cursed blood that crawled in his veins. He’d always been a devastating disappointment to his father and his only hope for forgiveness lay in this difficult confession. “I know what I am,” he rasped. “I don’t deny my part in this.” His throat tightened so much he couldn’t continue, but an instinct urged him—an instinct deep in his spirikai and reaching as far back as he could remember—to speak from the heart.
“I was never the son you wanted. Please forgive me. Help me—somehow—to get it right.”

Red suffused Tarn’s cheeks and he grabbed the front of Sheft’s shirt. “How dare you glare at me in shameless defiance!”

Stunned, Sheft felt ice rush to his heart, as if his father’s words had been a slashing blade. Too late, he lowered his eyes. “I’m sorry,” he choked out. “Sorry you see it like that.”

Tarn’s grip trembled with intensity. “How else should I see it? What are you sorry for? For what exactly do you take responsibility?” He pushed him away. “For nothing!” He turned to Moro. “Is this what you want for your daughter, Moro?”

“This is not the time for family quarrels,” Riah said.

“This goes far beyond family quarrels! What if tomorrow I’m summoned like some criminal before the council, to answer for Sheft’s behavior?”

“He did nothing but defend himself at the fair,” Etane objected. “Some fathers may have been proud of him.”

“Proud of a man who attacks from ambush? Who takes up a weapon against one who has none?”

“That’s not how it happened!” Sheft cried.

Mariat stepped to his side. “I was with Sheft at the market-fair. He did nothing wrong. I will swear so, under any oath, to the council.”

“The council would never accept your word,” Tarn retorted. “If you went to the fair with Sheft willingly, you would be too involved to tell the truth. If you went unwillingly, then you were under his influence and had to lie.”

“Under my influence!” Sheft turned to Moro. “What is he
saying
?”

Moro put his hand on his shoulder. “Some are spreading a tale that you abducted Mariat at the fair and forced yourself on her. It’s only silly girls gossiping in the village, lad. Pay it no mind.”

“Pay it no
mind
?” Sheft looked at Moro in horror. So this is what Etane wouldn’t tell him. “Moro, I would never do anything that would hurt your daughter! That would be the
last—”

“I know, lad. I know.”

“This is all madness!” Mariat cried.

“Madness or not,” Tarn said, “someone wrung the neck of that rooster, trapped our hens, and set fire to our property. Something instigated that. Such actions don’t arise from pure air.”

Etane extended his hands as if to show him the obvious. “They arise from cowardly prejudice!”

Moro wiped his soot-stained forehead on his sleeve. He looked deeply tired. “Dorik is a sensible fellow,” he said to Tarn. “He won’t summon you in front of the council without better ground than rumors. If anything, you should demand an inquiry into who started this fire.”

Riah had been looking around uneasily and now spoke. “It’s getting dark, Moro.”

They had been too distracted to notice, but their faces were beginning to blur in the last of the twilight.

“I think we can make it home,” Etane said, “if we hurry.”

“No,” Riah said firmly. “All of you will all stay the night. Etane, bring in the leftover food your sister packed for us. It will be enough for our dinner.” She left the ruined yard and headed toward the house. The others, too tired to argue, followed while Sheft took care of the horses. By the time he finished and went inside, the lanterns had been lit and water heated. He looked down at his best clothes, which were wet and streaked with soot. His hands were covered with greasy ash, which must be all over his face and hair.

He joined the men and washed at basins set up on the kitchen table. Riah and Mariat emerged newly scrubbed from the bedroom, carrying bowls of soot-colored water which they dumped outside. Clothing that reeked of smoke was thrown on the doorstep until it could be laundered, and Riah found clean shirts and pants to more or less fit everyone except Moro, who made do with a blanket while his trousers dried by the fire. Wearing one of Riah’s dresses, loose but belted at the waist, Mariat placed a pan of leftover chicken and potatoes over the hearth and set out a jar of preserves.

While they were waiting for dinner to heat, the two older men sat at the table. Tarn spoke ostensibly to Moro, but loud enough for Sheft, who was sitting on the rug in his customary corner near the hearth, to hear.

“At council meetings, Moro, time and again, I have listened to certain fathers hotly deny accusations made against their wayward sons. They claim lies were being told against them, or that someone else did the deed. I always vowed I’d never excuse any wrong-doer merely because he lived under my roof. It’s only just to treat an accusation against my house as seriously as I would any other.”

Moro sighed. “Of course we must have justice. But the older I get, the more I value mercy.”

Sheft sat with his damp head in his hands. He was what he was, but had never intended to endanger his father’s position as a council elder. Tarn was a proud man, and earning his respect, much less his love, would never happen now. Without his conscious decision, his spirikai tensed as if he were being cut. Since when did it act on its own? He made an effort to unloose the inner knot.

The food was finally set out, and he ate what he could of it. Everyone was too tired and disheartened to talk much, so after the plates were cleared away, Riah passed out blankets. She and Tarn withdrew, closing the door to their bedroom, while Moro and Etane stretched out on the floor in front of the hearth, leaving a place for Sheft. Soon, soft snores came from the large mound that was Moro.

Mariat, who had been looking pale and strained, had fallen asleep on the nodding chair. After putting a clean blanket on his mattress in the loft, Sheft reluctantly shook her awake. “Sleep upstairs,” he whispered.

“I don’t want to take your bed.”

“But I want you to.”

She glanced around to make sure no one was looking, gave him a quick peck on the cheek, and disappeared up the ladder.

Sheft lay down, but even though he was bone-weary, could not sleep. This morning he had imagined that Mariat needed him, but the events of this day proved he was the last person she needed. He couldn’t be seen at her mother’s funeral or take part in her brother’s wedding. And because of him, her name had been dragged through the mud
. “Is this what you want for your daughter, Moro?”

No. He must let her go. It was what love demanded.

With a deep breath, he turned onto his back and stared at the reflections from the low hearth-fire flickering on the ceiling. Above him in the loft, Mariat was lying on his mattress. His blanket covered her. In a manner, she shared his bed.

But it would be the only time, and the only way, he could ever let that happen.

#   #   #

Everyone except Sheft left for Moro’s house at dawn. Riah went to help Mariat clean up after the wake and the others to collect odd-sized boards that had been sitting in Moro’s barn for years. Sheft worked inside the chicken shed, scraping cooked egg and char off the walls and then helped unload the wagon when the other men returned. They fixed the roof; but even when Sheft and his father worked shoulder to shoulder, Tarn said nothing to him the entire time. 

Moro and Etane returned home in the early afternoon, and Tarn drove off to purchase another rooster and a few hens. It occurred to Sheft that no one had checked on the barn after the fire, so he went inside and looked around. Nothing seemed amiss. No damage had been done and the box holding the few unsold carved items brought back from Ferce lay under the stored paper-drying tables, just where he’d left it.

So why did he feel so uneasy?

With no answer to that, he went back to replacing the nest-shelves in the shed. Thoughts about the Rites—only a little more than twenty-four hours away—crept into his mind. He was aware when his parents came home, but quit his work only when twilight began slipping out of the Riftwood.

Dinner was eaten in grim silence. After it was over, Tarn took his seat by the fire while Riah rearranged the clothes she had washed on the drying rack. Sheft was putting away the last of the plates when his father spoke. “No one in the village would sell me any hens. Therefore, tomorrow morning, I must go all the way to Greak’s.” He cast a cold glance at Sheft.

He knew it would be ill-advised to offer to go to Greak’s himself, so he shut the cabinet door, climbed the ladder to his loft, and flung himself onto his mattress. He stared into the shadows. Tomorrow night he would be out in the dark, trying to deal with the bloody Rites.