Golden Daughter (12 page)

The night had left a new film of undisturbed snow upon the whole of the city, but already the Chhayan buffalo, nervous in their harnesses, had stamped it all into brown muck. The Chhayans stood nervously at the heads of their animals or worked to secure the gurta flaps and test the wheels. But the moment Sunan appeared in the doorway, every one of them turned dark eyes upon him, questions and threats in every face.

Their leader, a large man named Vibul whom Sunan remembered as a lieutenant of sorts in the Khla clan, strode forward to face Sunan. It was strange to gaze upon Vibul’s face once more, recalling the old scars, noticing the new. It was an ugly face, full of the Tiger that raged within every Chhayan man, woman, and child.

“Where is Jovann?” Vibul said with no other greeting, not even the salute due the son of his master. His small eyes flashed. “Where is Juong-Khla’s heir?”

The words were intended to wound, this naming of the second son as heir. They cut into Sunan’s gut, into that place he had long thought suppressed and surmounted. But he would not allow himself to react, no matter how deep the wound.

He held up the scroll he had written. “You will take this to my father,” Sunan said, and his voice was deep, his throat thick. “You have journeyed far for this purpose, and I give it to you now.”

“Where is Jovann?” Vibul repeated, and took a threatening step closer, his hand moving to a large knife at his side. “He has not been seen since he dined with you. What have you done to him?”

“I have done nothing,” Sunan said, still holding out the scroll. “Jovann is where he is. I know nothing more. If you have lost him, then—”

“Lost him?” The knife was out now, held in Vibul’s great scarred fist. The clansman took another threatening step, but Sunan dared not recoil. He quietly reached back to grasp the doorframe, as though to hold himself in place, to face whatever came—even a deathblow—with honor and not the shame of retreat.

“Lost him?” Vibul repeated, bearing down upon him. “We have not lost him! What have you done with him? Where is our young master? Have you dishonored yourself still deeper, Pen-Chan scum? Does the blood of your own brother stain your hands?”

The knife was up now, flashing in Anwar’s early light. Sunan paled but refused to break Vibul’s gaze. In a voice as calm as he had ever heard Uncle Kasemsan use, he said, “Your accusations are unjust. You dishonor your tongue.”

“You? Speak to
me
of dishonor?” Vibul roared like a bull and took one more step.

One last step.

For, the next moment, even as his arm flexed for a killing stroke, he fell flat on his back, thudding thickly into the mud-churned snow. A bright silver dart tipped in black feathers was embedded in his throat.

Vibul gurgled. He tried to speak. One hand, fluttering like a butterfly over a blossom, moved to his neck and touched the black feathers, delicately, making no effort to withdraw the dart. His eyes bulged, and he sought Sunan’s face but could not find it in the darkness, the velvety shadow crouching above him, reaching down, overwhelming.

In ten seconds he was dead.

All eyes in the courtyard stared in horror, Sunan’s included. But Sunan rallied himself first and called out to another of the Chhayan men. “Come here!” he cried. “Come and take this message.”

The Chhayan, his gaze flickering to the still form of Vibul, hastened to Sunan, bowed, and took the scroll. “See that you place it in my father’s hands,” Sunan said. “See that you do so, or you . . .”

He faltered. After all, what did he know of these new, terrible friends he had somehow made? The Crouching Shadows, men or monsters, who had taken him on his blood oath and now guarded him from unseen places? What did he know of their plans or their purposes?

But he had come too far to back down now.

“. . . or you will suffer the same fate as Vibul.”

“Yes, Juong-Khla Sunan!” the poor Chhayan stuttered, bowing again and again as he clutched the scroll and backed away. Then he fled back to the gurta and safety among his brethren. Only then did he turn back and cry out in a desperate voice, “What of Jovann? What of the master’s son?”

Sunan felt the blood draining from his face, as though the last of his courage drained from his spirit. But he steadied his voice and replied, “He may . . . He may yet join you on the road. Watch for him. But if not, you must bear word of his death to Juong-Khla. That is . . . all.”

With those words he fell back into his uncle’s house and drew the door shut, dropping the bolt. Jovann was dead. He must be! The Mask had promised him his dearest wish, had it not? And what had he ever wished for more than the death of his father’s favorite? The favorite who stole all his hopes, all his chances, stole the love and respect that should have been his! Who wouldn’t wish as much? Who wouldn’t welcome the fulfillment of a lifetime’s desire?

Sunan stood in the darkness of the passage, filled with the sickness of a dream come true.

The monks of Daramuti assumed that their abbot, Brother Tenuk, was old. Seventy, possibly even eighty years, a venerable age worthy of honor and reverence. His hair was silver, his face lined, his skin white and paper thin. His hands, as they turned to their work of prayer, or blessing, or even the task of weeding the kitchen garden (a task the abbot of Daramuti traditionally took upon himself to prove his great humility among the brethren), shivered like little flowers in a summer gale. Every vein stood out thick and blue. His lips were thin, and his teeth, though all accounted for, were yellow, set in pale, bruise-colored gums.

In truth, he was no more than forty-five.

But he kept this knowledge to himself. If word were to get out that he was half the age expected, he would lose the loyalty of the temple. Abbot or not, they would call him cursed and turn from him in fear.

They would be right to turn away. For he was cursed. And he fully intended to betray them all.

Brother Tenuk walked with a cane, his abbot’s hood pulled low over his forehead. This time of year, with the warmth of the summer rising even into these high, cold reaches of the Khir Mountains, Anwar would deign to turn his face and shine on the white stone pathways of Daramuti.

The warmth was welcome. The glare, however, was not, and the abbot gripped his hood with one hand to make certain it shaded his eyes. And he muttered to himself words that none hearing would have expected from a holy servant of Anwar and Hulan.

“Blast you, Lordly Sun, even as you blast us.”

No one did hear him, of course. Brother Tenuk was careful to keep his blasphemy to himself. Besides, his voice was so thin and quivery that it took some effort on the part of the temple monks to understand him even when he stood shouting within inches of their faces.

Monks and acolytes bowed and made reverence as their abbot passed. There were no servants or slaves at Daramuti, for each man there considered himself too meek and humble to be served by another. They all worked the grounds; they all maintained the house. They traded a little with the lower villages of the Khir mountains, their gift of writing their most valuable commodity. So they got by. Once in a while the great priests of Lunthea Maly would remember to send a small something to help maintain a remote mountain shrine, but this happened too infrequently to be counted. Some of the young monks grumbled about this forgetfulness on the part of their richer brethren. Brother Tenuk, however, never did.

Sometimes it is good to be forgotten.

Up the stone path Brother Tenuk climbed at his achingly slow pace. It was a long walk to his destination, and some had urged him to make the journey no more, to send others in his place. But years of mountain living had made him much tougher than he looked, and Brother Tenuk was not a man to be swayed from any determined course. Otherwise, he would never have become abbot of Daramuti.

What a relief it was to escape the main hall and some of the more obsequious acolytes now and then. Up here by the dovecote, one mostly dealt with doves. Brother Tenuk liked doves. They were loyal. Furthermore, they were
uncomplicated
in their loyalty. A complicated loyalty, such as that which he commanded at Daramuti, was tenuous. But the doves could always be trusted.

They were rock doves, bred carefully for their pure white plumage. They soothed the nerves with their gentle cooing chorus, and Brother Tenuk liked to think they sounded pleased to see him when he drew near.

“Good morning, my beauties,” he said as he approached. He did not open the door to enter the cote itself, for he did not feel it right to invade the doves’ privacy unless absolutely necessary. They must raise their young and live their lives free of interference. But he peered into the empty crannies of those doves long gone: the messenger birds with whom he hated to part, but which he was obliged to send every year to Lunthea Maly and the Crown of the Moon. Not that he was given any of their doves in return! Oh, no. The Besur had no interest in
receiving
messages from Daramuti, only in sending them as he saw fit.
If
he saw fit.

Most of the Lunthea Maly doves were never seen again. And the loss of each one left a hole in Brother Tenuk’s rather battered heart.

But today, to his surprise, when he peered into what should have been an empty crevice, he saw a bundle of white feathers and a bright, blinking eye.

“Nejla!” he cried, for he knew the names of all his birds, though the other monks couldn’t tell them apart. He dropped his cane, dropped his hood, and put both trembling hands in to cup the bird and pull her out. He inspected her little body, checking for signs of harm. Other than travel-wear, however, she was well and whole and beautiful. He clucked and cooed at her. The youngest acolyte of Daramuti—who had received a caning from his abbot just that morning—would not have believed Brother Tenuk capable of such tender sounds.

The abbot’s shivering fingers felt the dove’s leg. Sure enough, he found wrapped there a small cylinder of parchment tied with string. “What do they want now, Nejla?” Brother Tenuk said, his tone still soft though his brow darkened. He removed the message and, still holding the bird gently in one hand, unrolled the slip of parchment with the other and read:

Envoy coming. Send guide for Khir Road. Three months.

That was all.

“Envoy? Guide?” Brother Tenuk muttered. Disgusted, he dropped the missive, letting it fall to the stones. Why would an envoy journey from Lunthea Maly? Daramuti sent people
to
the great city; they never received people
from
it. It simply wasn’t done. And three months? What was that supposed to mean? Send a guide three months from now? Expect a three-month visit?

“And what happened to my other birds?” Brother Tenuk growled. He began stroking Nejla with one quivering finger. And as he stroked her, he thought of her two sisters. He knew that, just to be certain, the Besur would have sent all three birds, hoping one would get through to Daramuti. But where were the other two? Still holding Nejla, still stroking her with his finger, he peered into her sisters’ boxes, gently calling their names. They were not to be found.

They had not survived the journey.

Darkness fell upon the abbot’s heart. A darkness that had less to do with the birds than he might have realized.

“If you stroke that bird any harder, you risk crushing its skull.”

A rush of fear spread from the back of Brother Tenuk’s brain, flowing through his spirit and body alike. His hands clenched, and the poor dove struggled and flapped to escape his clutches. To escape him! Her master! Her master who loved her more than anyone else ever could love such a humble creature! How could she betray him with such distrust? For a moment he hated her.

But he knew from whence that hatred came. He knew that if he acted on it—even as his whole heart willed him to—he would regret it in another minute. So he forced himself, by superhuman effort, to let the bird go. She fluttered away into the cote and out of sight.

Brother Tenuk rubbed his hands slowly together, as though he could somehow rub away both the fear and the loathing. Gathering himself with as much dignity as his ravaged body would permit, he turned to face the one who had spoken.

The Dragon smiled at him.

It was not a pleasant smile as smiles go. One cannot expect a dragon to smile pleasantly, even one wearing a form very like a man’s, as this Dragon did. But it was only
like
a man’s form, and not a very good likeness at that. He was seven feet tall and more, and frightfully emaciated, skeletal even. Indeed, at first glance one might believe one looked into the face of a living skeleton, so white and thin and strangely elongated was this fantastic figure. On second glance, however, keen eyes would see that the skin was pure white, translucent, and so tightly stretched that the black bone beneath could be seen. As though this form of flesh and blood only just contained the true form, striving to keep the sinister reality from bursting forth.

Yet none of this gave away the Dragon’s true nature. He might be merely some ghoul or specter risen up from the grave. No, the truth of his spirit was revealed in the deep sockets of his eyes.

For there burned a fire that could not be suppressed.

When he smiled, he revealed a mouth full of black, sharp teeth, rather too long to fit properly into that jaw. The Dragon, when assuming a guise, couldn’t be bothered to concern himself with correct proportions and such nonsense.

“Greetings, Tenuk,” he said, and the air shimmered around his mouth.

“Master,” said Tenuk. With a sigh and many creakings, he lowered himself to the ground, knocking his forehead against the guano-spattered paving stones. “How may I serve you?”

“Oh please,” said the Dragon. “How many times have I told you to call me Brother?”

Many times, Tenuk was sure. But he thought he would rather die than obey. So he merely repeated, “How may I serve you?”

The Dragon moved around Tenuk’s prone body, his black cloak sweeping the stones. That cloak shrouded him, from the high collar about his shoulders all the way down to his feet. He kept his arms tucked away inside, and the effect was such that the first time a young Tenuk met the Dragon he had believed a disembodied head floated toward him out of the darkness. He’d been so frightened, he’d aged a good ten years in the space of a single scream.

Now he knew better. And he thought a disembodied head rather less frightening than the reality looming above him.

The Dragon looked over the dovecote, inspecting it with a curious eye. The doves had gone silent, frozen on their perches as though caught in the sights of a great, wicked hawk. The Dragon sniffed, unimpressed. He turned to look down once more on Brother Tenuk, who was still kneeling, still pressing his forehead to the ground.

“I need you to do something for me. And you must be very cautious how you go about it. You have enjoyed anonymity for years, able to pursue your work unobserved. But now”—and here the Dragon grimaced, showing his fangs—“now one of those thrice-cursed Knights of the Farthest Shore is on his way up to this temple. He’ll be watching for any sign of treachery, of that you may be certain.”

Was the Dragon afraid? Brother Tenuk lifted his head just enough that he could turn and glimpse the gruesome figure from the tail of his eye. No, he wasn’t afraid. Disgusted, perhaps. Or nervous.

“I hate them,” said the Dragon, meeting Tenuk’s gaze. He smiled again, and his voice was unsettlingly calm. But both venom and flame scored every word. “I hate them so much, those pathetic knights. I wish I could burn them all to little piles of ash. But
He
would notice. And I do not want to draw
His
attention. Not just yet. Soon. Soon . . .”

Brother Tenuk sighed and, after a considering moment, straightened upright. His back protested with sharp cracks, and he could not find the strength to stand. So he remained kneeling, his hands folded in his lap, servile as any new acolyte. “How may I serve you, Master?” he asked again, hoping the Dragon would come to the point and be on his way. It was an unlikely wish. The Dragon had a fondness for talk, particularly if it made those around him uncomfortable.

The Dragon turned from Tenuk and peered into one of the little alcoves where a mother dove sat on her nest. He licked his pale lips slowly with a long red tongue. Then he said, “The company coming from Lunthea Maly brings the Dream Walker. The one we seek.”

“Do they?” said Tenuk, suddenly interested despite his fear and revulsion. “The one of whom we’ve heard tell? The one who can—”

“Yes. The very one.” The Dragon put out a hand, reaching into the alcove, but his knuckles were too large to fit. So he stretched out one long, searching finger.

Tenuk struggled up to his feet against all the pains of his aged body. “That’s good!” he cried, hoping to distract the Dragon, to draw his attention away from the dove on her nest. “That’s very good. At long last, eh? And will you be taking the Dream Walker back with you to Lunthea Maly? Back to my good lord?”

“No,” said the Dragon. “I dare not get caught within sniffing distance of this place. Not with that knight on the loose. I’ve encountered him in the past, and I’m not eager to renew the acquaintance.” His tongue flicked out again like a snake’s testing the air. “Indeed, you will not see me again for some time. You must discover the identity of the Dream Walker yourself. And when you do, you must invent some pretense to send him on to Lunthea Maly.”