Foxfire (33 page)

“Should I call up the mist to hide us?”

Fellgair hesitated. Then he shook his head.

They picked their way down a winding trail. As they neared the village, Rigat realized it was even smaller than his. Just a dozen mud-brick huts with an enclosure nearby for animals and a tiny field of golden-brown millet.

His stomach growled when he smelled the aroma of roasting meat. Children crouched beside the communal fire pit, turning long skewers over the flames. In the field, women grubbed up weeds. On the lower slopes of the hills, men watched goats cropping the sparse grass. There must be a spring nearby for a shallow stream trickled through the valley. A few scraggly trees clung to its banks and in their shade, girls were scrubbing clothes.

A shout went up when the villagers spotted them. Rigat froze, but Fellgair walked on calmly. From the field, from the stream, from every hut, people converged on him, then suddenly came to a halt and watched his approach in breathless silence. When Fellgair opened his arms as if to embrace them, the men broke into wild shouting and the women into shrieking ululations. If not for their joyful expressions, Rigat would have thought they intended murder.

Fellgair skimmed his fingers over their bowed heads. Mothers held up squalling babes, hunters proffered quivers of arrows. The herdsmen were even driving their goats down from the hills to receive a blessing.

Rigat hung back, conscious of their surreptitious glances. Perhaps they had heard of Keirith's sojourn in Pilozhat and wondered what the arrival of another flame-haired stranger foretold. Or perhaps the color of his hair was simply so unusual they couldn't help but stare.

Aimlessly, he kicked a stone, wondering why Fellgair had brought him here. Surrounded by the herd of bleating goats, his father seemed to have forgotten him.

He kicked another stone, harder than he meant to. It rolled a good ten paces away and came to rest against a small, bare foot.

The boy couldn't be much older than two. Brown-skinned and naked, he stared down at the stone, sucking his thumb. Then he looked up. His eyes grew even bigger when he saw Rigat watching him. Then they disappeared as he buried his face against his mother's thigh.

Rigat kicked another stone toward him. The tousled head came up. The thumb popped out of the child's mouth and hung there, wet and gleaming. Then he giggled and kicked the stone back.

Or tried to. It rolled a hand's length away. He lurched after it, and, after two misses, kicked it again. Zigzagging back and forth across the cracked earth, he came closer, crowing with delight when the stone rolled toward Rigat.

Rigat drew back his foot, once, twice, as if preparing for a mighty kick, all the while watching the little boy whose mouth had fallen open in anticipation. With a grunt of effort, he kicked, deliberately missing the stone, and staggered about like a drunken man before falling to the ground.

The boy's face went blank with shock until Rigat rose and rubbed his arse. Then he laughed. This time, when Rigat sent the stone toward him, he rushed forward. In his eagerness, he tripped, hands and knees slamming into the ground.

For a moment, he crouched there. Then he started to shriek.

Rigat covered the distance between them in three strides. At first, he thought the boy was merely frightened by his sudden tumble, but when he picked him up, he saw blood streaking his left knee. Spying the bloodstained potshard in the dirt, Rigat crushed it under his foot and sat down, pulling the boy onto his lap.

His screams stopped, choked off in a shocked sob. Then they started again, more piercing than ever.

Rigat tried to wipe the blood away, but the boy was kicking and wriggling, desperate to escape. He murmured the sort of soothing nonsense his mam used to offer when he was little, but the boy continued to wail.

By now, all the villagers had heard the noise. The boy's mother rushed forward, only to halt at Fellgair's command. Her body quivered with the need to come to her child's aid, but she remained where she was, unwilling to disobey the Supplicant.

“Hush,” Rigat begged. “Please, hush.”

The crowd circled around him. He knew he should simply pick the child up and hand him to his mother, but he couldn't bear to have them believe he had hurt the boy.

The child's screams subsided into hoarse, hiccuping sobs. His thrashing grew weaker, but blood still trickled down his leg. When Rigat placed his hand over the wound, the boy flinched and whimpered. So he started to rock him, softly crooning the lullaby his mam used to sing. He closed his eyes and sensed the power simmering, a banked fire waiting for his will to fuel it.

As many times as he had summoned it, he still marveled at its complexity. Heady as wine, fierce as a sudden jolt of lust, yet as comforting as furs in the wintertime and refreshing as a cool stream in the summer. It was a river flowing through him, the sun's heat penetrating him, the air caressing him, a vine that twined around body and mind and spirit, linking all parts of his being with the eternal power of the elements.

Tamping down the energy, he allowed it to seep slowly from his palm. The boy gave a startled squeak, then slowly relaxed, a limp, heavy weight in his arms.

It was a shallow cut, as easy to mend as a rip in his tunic. As he wove the healing, he forgot the watching crowd. There was only the hard ground beneath him, and the hot sun beating down on his shoulders, and this child, enfolded by his arms and his power.

This was what it was meant for. Not to crush men with boulders or to set up ambushes where they could be slaughtered or to shatter the mind of a man already maddened with grief. His power was meant to heal.

As he wiped the knee clean, he heard shocked gasps and exclamations. The child's mother dropped to her knees beside him and raised his hand to her lips. He shot a silent appeal to Fellgair, who stepped forward and lifted the boy from his arms. He kissed the child's grimy forehead and handed him to his mother, who became nearly incoherent with thankfulness. Then he thrust out his hand and pulled Rigat to his feet.

“You have quite eclipsed me.”

“You're not angry, are you?”

“Every father likes to see his son excel. Whether it's healing an injured child or bringing down a stag with one shot to the heart.”

“You were there? You saw that?”

“I kept an eye on you over the years.”

There was no time to say more. The villagers were too eager to offer hospitality to their guests. The toothless old chief insisted on slaughtering a goat in their honor. While it roasted, he ushered them toward the stream where two rugs of woven goat hair were ceremoniously laid on the bare earth. Two women knelt before them and touched their foreheads to the ground. Rigat thought they were both wives of the chief, but the little man spoke too fast to be sure.

The younger woman—whose plump face and shy, sidelong glances reminded Rigat a bit of Callie's Ela—removed Fellgair's sandals and laid them aside. The older one—as wrinkled and toothless as her husband—had the honor of washing and drying Fellgair's feet. When it was Rigat's turn, their deft fingers became clumsy, and they kept glancing up with anxious smiles.

The other villagers displayed the same awe during the feast that followed. Each time he reached for his cup of fermented goat's milk, their eyes followed his hands. Every polite comment elicited a muted buzz of conversation. By the time the meal was finished, Rigat was so self-conscious that he lapsed into silence, leaving Fellgair to converse with the chief about the prospects for the harvest and the health of—apparently—every goat in the herd. Having exhausted those subjects, Fellgair called for a song.

A young boy brought out a bone flute that looked exactly like Callie's. A man raced back to his hut and returned with a goatskin drum. Under the spell of the music and the gathering darkness, the wariness of the villagers leached away, and Rigat began to relax.

Voices rose and fell with the soft patter of the drum and the throbbing whisper of the flute. And although the tunes were different, they sang about the same things his people did: the joy of a successful hunt, the sorrow of losing a loved one, the fierce winds that screamed through their valley in the winter, the anxious moon waiting for the grain to sprout in the spring.

Rigat watched a woman lean into the arms of her husband, a babe rooting at its mother's breast. And for the first time since arriving in Zheros, he no longer felt like a stranger.

The fire had died to glowing embers when Fellgair rose. The chief offered them his hut, but Fellgair said they preferred to sleep under the stars. If the chief thought it odd, he didn't question the Supplicant. Instead, he bowed very low and thanked them both for honoring his humble village with their presence.

“Your hospitality honors us,” Fellgair replied.

“And your songs,” Rigat blurted. “They were very beautiful.” Realizing he should compliment the chief as well as the musicians, he added, “Thank you for welcoming me. It was . . . you've been so kind. I'll never forget this night.”

As the villagers headed to their huts, Rigat became aware of two still hovering nearby. The mother of the little boy, he realized. The young man beside her must be her husband.

“It is you who are kind,” she said softly. “We will always remember you in our prayers.” Her glance strayed to her sleeping child, nestled against her husband's bare shoulder. “He is our firstborn. And very precious to us.” Once again, she raised his hand to her lips, and then hurried away.

Rigat lay on the rug, listening to the sounds of Fellgair's breathing, the trickling water of the stream, and the drone of night insects drawn to the dying fire. Too much had happened for sleep to come easily: the shock of seeing that formidable palace in Pilozhat; his fury at the temple of Zhe; and then the unexpected peace he had found in this remote mountain village.

These people were supposed to be his enemies. But how could he hate them?

“I'll listen,” Fellgair said. “If you want to talk.”

Rigat sat up, struggling to find the words. Finally, he said, “You brought me here to show me that the people in this village are like the ones in mine.”

“Yes.”

“Did you know . . . did you plan for me to heal that little boy?”

“No.”

“It's just . . . it felt so . . . right.”

“Did it?”

He strained to detect mockery in Fellgair's voice, to glimpse scorn in his expression, but found neither.

“Go on,” Fellgair urged.

“And later . . . sitting with them. Listening to their songs. It made me . . . happy.”

“I'm glad.”

“And it made me think. About why you created me. To change things, you said.”

“Yes.”

“I don't think my power should be used just to make me feel good. Or heal a few people. Or even save some lives. Besides, then I'd have to decide who to heal and . . .” Rigat swallowed hard, thinking of Madig.

“Who should die,” Fellgair finished quietly. “No matter what I say, you'll always wonder if you could have—or should have—healed Madig. But all you can do now is go forward. And learn from what happened.”

“I think I see a way. To go forward. And to change things. Not just by healing one boy, but by healing two peoples.”

He spoke slowly, still thinking through his idea, but as the plan solidified in his mind, the words tumbled out. Mercifully, Fellgair refrained from teasing him, only interrupting with an occasional question to clarify what Rigat was saying.

When he was finished, Rigat shot a shy glance at his father. “You're the Trickster and the God with Two Faces. And I'm your son. What better way for me to use my power than to try and bring about a peace between my people and the Zherosi?”

“If your plan is to succeed, you must learn to think of the Zherosi as well as the children of the Oak and Holly as your people.”

“And if I do?” he asked eagerly. “Will it work?”

Fellgair sighed. “These are very different cultures, Rigat, with different religions and customs. One, an empire ruled by a queen, the other a fragmented group of tribes, each of which is guided—but not ruled—by a chief.”

“But all people want to live in peace.”

“In theory. In practice, a great many prefer war. For one thing, it keeps the warriors busy. It's expensive to pay them to loaf about the homeland. And dangerous, as well. War brings new slaves to cultivate the fields, new tribute to enrich the coffers, new goods to trade.”

“Like timber,” Rigat muttered.

“Indeed. And who requires timber? Shipbuilders. Merchants. Craftsmen. And generals who need ships to carry their warriors.”

“To get the slaves and the tribute and the goods to trade.”

“A bit simplistic, but you see my point. As for the children of the Oak and Holly, they've always squabbled over hunting grounds and marriage portions. They're equally divided on how to deal with the Zherosi. Some want to fight, some want to collaborate. Most just want to be left alone.”

“So it's hopeless.”

“On the contrary. It might work.”

Rigat's breath left him on a helpless exhalation of excitement.

“Mind you, it could also fail. Horribly.”

“But the plan could work. It really could.”

Rigat caught the gleam of teeth as Fellgair smiled. “Yes, my son. It really could. If you're patient. Change doesn't come about in a moon. Or a year. And in the web of possibilities—”

Rigat groaned.

“The odds of success are slim. So let's discuss your idea further and see if we can improve them.”