Skeen's Return (35 page)

She fell into a half-doze and a succession of dreams, enough to wear her out emotionally and physically, dreams that had her sweating and moaning, working arms and legs, throwing her head about. Pegwai shook her awake a little past noon. “I'm waking you so you can get some rest,” he said dryly, “and give us some peace.”

She sat up carefully, her head felt swollen and sore, her eyes inflamed. “Gahh, Djabo's sorry face, I've got morning after without the fun of the night before.” She pressed her forearms against her temples. “Ehhh, what a head!”

“Come up on deck a while. Some fresh air for your head, some hot soup for your stomach, you'll feel better.”

“Yeah, mother.” She lifted her head, looked startled. “The noise, it's just about gone.”

“We're just about out of the Morass.” He held out his hand. “Come, you're hungry, that's most of it.”

‘Any trouble with the Nagamar while I was sleeping?” She caught hold of his hand and let him pull her onto her feet.

“I'd have waked you, do you doubt that? There were a few moments when things looked tense; nothing came of it though. The Nagamar have their own peculiar honor. They won't harm anyone they've given shelter to, whether that's tacit toleration or the whole formal game.” Pegwai let her stumble out in front of him and precede him up the passageway. He stood beside her at the mast, looking forward along the ship to the storm visible ahead, the curtains of rain like silver veils falling so heavily it obscured the landscape ahead so completely Skeen couldn't tell what kind of terrain they were moving into. She moved into the bow, turned and looked back along the boat. No Nagamar aboard. She walked back along the rail, staring down into the water as she moved, holding onto the rail with her single hand to fight the pull of vertigo. The water was much cleaner here, sandy bottom, pale, almost white. She could see the dark shapes of fish and other waterdwellers drifting backward as the boat blew past them. No Nagamar in the water. She scanned the trees. No groaning mourners in the trees. She drew in a breath, let it out in an explosive puff, threw out her arms and danced in an unsteady circle, a small triumph, had to be small, no space and the deck wasn't that steady underfoot. She went back to Pegwai, moving more sedately. “No Nagamar,” she murmured.

Pegwai stared ahead. “Yes.” His voice merged with the wind, she had to listen hard to hear him. “They left an hour ago after a long argument with Usoq. I don't know what it was about, I tried a bit of prying, but he talked over and around me until he had me chasing my tail.”

“Trouble?”

“Ahhh, ask me again when Petro's back with us.”

“I see. Temptation?”

“What do you think?”

“We don't turn our backs on him ever and we sleep in shifts.”

He stopped talking as one of the crew girls ran past; the wind was erratic, it kept changing direction and force, managing the sails took hard work and close attention. He squinted at the black clouds piling up ahead. “We're coming up fast on that rain. You find a spot out of the way, I'll go fetch that soup.”

Skeen looked into the empty bowl, set it down beside her. “You were right. I needed that.”

Pegwai glanced at the sky again, surprised himself with a gentle belch. “Pardon. Hmmm, yes, even a day like this looks brighter with hot food inside you. Which reminds me. Remembering what happened in Fennakin, you think we need worry about Usoq and the food he provides us?”

She yawned. “I'm not awake yet, I think. Eat in shifts? I suppose.”

A fistful of warm rain splatted down on them. They collected their dishes, went for a leisurely circle around the boat, both of them relaxed, enjoying the quiet, the occasional flurries of rain, the interval between crises, then they went below.

The Pouliloulou plunged into the storm and flounced through it, giving the passengers so rough a ride Skeen was sick over the rail and Timka went wan and flaccid, wondering if she was after all going to suffer a Chorinya of some kind. Both of them snarled at Pegwai whenever he showed his placid Balayar face. Unfair, oh, unfair for him to be enjoying himself, not just enduring the swoops and jolts, the yaws and twists, but enjoying himself. Skeen told him in descriptive detail how obscene his grin was, Timka twitched a cat-weasel head onto her shoulder and hissed loathing at him. He scooped up Rannah (who was a bit pale, no more) and took her topside, telling her in far too audible a voice, a voice too audibly amused, to leave those soreheads with their miseries, the air was a lot better on deck.

They came through the storm into a grassy wasteland, clouds still thick and low over banks that were tangles of briars and a few stunted grayish trees, though part of that grayness might have been the clouds that seemed to suck color from everything and everyone. Washboard knolls rose in packed waves beyond the banks, covered mostly with sparse bleached-out grass, old growth from last year. Skeen had left this part of the world toward the end of summer and was returning to it in time to catch the dregs of winter; even this far south there was a chill in the air once the sun went down, a damp cold that settled into the bones. Timka dealt with it by shifting to cat-weasel and spending most of her time nose to tail in one of the upper bunks. Pegwai hauled out a pair of knitted trousers and a soft wool undershirt. Skeen dug out Angelsin's fur-lined cloak, cut nearly a meter off the bottom and had Rannah hem it for her. And so the second day out of the Morass slid by.

Shortly after nightfall Skeen was standing in the bow, staring ahead, worrying (though she'd deny it ferociously if challenged) about Lipitero. The river island was on the edge of the cultivated land; according to Usoq they'd reach it soon after dawn tomorrow. She'd deny too that she'd expected Lipitero to come sliding onto deck most of the day; the Ykx surely knew they were getting close. All day she'd watched the boiling gray sky, but she saw only a scattering of birds dipping in and out of the clouds. She cursed the clouds and cursed the missing hand that meant she was useless about the boat, couldn't even work to use up excess energy and pass the time away. Couldn't sleep, too many nightmares when she did manage to doze a little; she was sick of nightmares and the ruts her mind trudged over and over. What she could do was keep away from the others as much as possible. Her nerves were too naked to endure the abrasion of much contact with them and she didn't like how she felt when she was nasty with Pegwai or Timka and she didn't want to start on Rannah. She knew herself well enough to know she'd savage the child with as little restraint as she would the adults. A hand touched her arm. She jerked away, her heart clenched and thudded, she swung around ready to claw, caught hold of herself and stood shivering, glaring at Timka. “What is it?” She heard the snarl in her voice and wasn't sorry for it. If Timka wouldn't take the hint, she could take what came.

“Min,” Timka said. “Up there. Over us. More ahead.”

“Ah.” Skeen raked her hand through her hair until it stood in spikes about her face while she struggled to put the pieces of her head together. “Ah.…” She bent at the waist and leaned closer to Timka so she could get a better look at her face. “They know about you yet?”

“I don't.… No. Unless Telka's there or one of her top Holavish. And I'd feel them if they were.”

“How soon before they know?”

“If they don't swing this way, maybe no more than a half hour. If they do, any minute.”

“They know it's you?”

“Might. Once they get close enough. Someone like me and who else would be coming this way?”

“All right. I hear. These like the little birdboys that followed me out of Spalit time when?”

Timka closed her eyes and concentrated, her features squeezing down into fine curved lines. She was shivering from the cold, she'd thrown on one of her loose cotton robes, her feet were bare; she'd come the moment she'd felt the touch. Skeen watched her a moment then turned to scan the darkness overhead. If there were bird Min up there, they were above the clouds.

Timka came out of her trance, cleared her throat. “Holavish,” she said. “Fighters, I think, not scouts. Well, some scouts but most not.”

Skeen glanced at her ringchron, then past Timka at the crewgirl at the helm. “Let's go below.” She grinned. “It's time Peg shared a little of the miseries.”

Morning.

Clouds high, raveled dirty wool. Patches of remote and chilly sky. Angular black silhouettes of large birds of prey, drifting in broad slow circles high over the boat. Beyond the range of crossbows. Also beyond the reach of Skeen's darter.

Brisk wind, drier, the smell of it smoky and herbal, taint of animal droppings heavy on it.

Small herds of deer-like beasts with palmate horns grazing on the rippling ridges. Rodents bustling about low hutches mounded close to the waterline, tending tuber gardens they planted haphazardly in the mud, the vines crawling everywhere, new leaves uncurling, the old hanging in limp folds. Fingerlength bugs like a cross between ant and centipede rushed about in chaotic swarms along broad runways, their bodies brushed amid the pebbles.

The river looped east as the land changed again. Beyond the west bank the ridges grew higher and stonier, turned into low rounded hills with few trees but much thorny brush and low writhing bushes with dark purple red bark and small stiff round leaves. The east side was different, the land was much flatter, with patches of cultivation, large herds of ruminants in fenced pastures, now and then a wheel for raising water from the river, smaller horse herds, some woolies on the wild lands with shepherds on the slopes beside them.

The Pouliloulou clawed steadily upstream, Vohdi at the wheel, Cepo sleeping and Usoq below somewhere. The wind was blowing off the east pastures; as the boat followed the curve of the river, she shifted balance and began to lose way, but as long as the wind was steady and the curve easy, the boat was rigged so the girl could handle it alone. Timka watched as she worked cranks with one hand, kept the wheel steady with the other, seemed to have one eye on the sails and the other on the river ahead and all the while her lips were pursed for a happy lilting whistle, her dark eyes were crinkled with pleasure and her whole body seemed to dance. Rannah crouched by Timka's knee, watching also, fascinated. “It's like Rak'yagel on a horse,” she murmured. When Timka bent down, brows raised, she said, “Back home there was this old man, a Pallah, he took care of the animals for us. There are wild horses up in the mountains around our place. Sometimes they came down and tried to raid our herds, so he made some traps. He caught this stallion in one of them. Big and black as the heart of night, not pretty, rough and covered with scars, but wonderful. I don't know how to explain it. Anyway he tamed the stallion and used him to sire some of our best horses, but even when the stallion was old and, oh, you know, seeing Rak'yagel riding him it was like seeing a storm riding a storm. It was kind of beautiful and kind of terrible and it made me, I don't know, want to do things—not just ordinary things, something kind of wonderful like that.”

Usoq came on deck carrying a broad, flat stone; it was grayish white and looked like someone had put it together from cement and reeds. He settled it in a boxy object close to the steering gear, stood and dusted his hands. “You feeling helpful, you two,” he said, “you could give me a hand bringing up some things. 'Course now I wouldn't want to be spoiling your morning for you. Though maybe those might.” He waved a hand at the bird Min over them. “I'd like to get together some little surprises for them, case they come to visit.”

“Why not.” Timka pushed away from the rail and followed him down.

They brought up a brazier and a sack of charcoal bits, a small cauldron half-filled with a tarry substance that looked rather like brownish black glass, five crossbows (which Usoq cocked and set carefully down beside the box) and a wicker box filled with crossbow bolts that had straggly collars of firemoss bound behind the points.

“Nasty,” Timka said. “And this?” She dug a fingernail into the resin in the pot.

“Little secret of mine.” Usoq set the brazier on the stone inside the box, piled charcoal in it and used a firepot and pitchy splinters to start the charcoal burning. He set the cauldron on the grill and stepped back, dusting his hands and giving the bird Min overhead a feral grin. “A half-hour thereabouts, those fuckers better think twice and then some before trying on anything with me. They burn fiercer 'n pitch once you get the fire going.” He looked a little startled as he remembered suddenly he was talking to a Min, but didn't bother with disclaimers, being intelligent enough to refrain from making bad worse.

Rannah made a soft, disgusted sound and walked off, thin shoulders rounded, her not-hair flattened to her skull.

A half hour later Skeen came yawning up, Pegwai stumbling behind her. She sniffed, wrinkled her nose. “What's that stink?”

Timka turned round. “Usoq's secret weapon. For the Min up there, if they decide to atttack us. Fire arrows. That goo in the pot is supposed to make the fire hot enough to kindle Min flesh.” She shivered, sounded gloomier than she liked. Though these were her enemies, they were also kin of sorts. Burning was a hellish death for a Min. Even thinking about it made her sick to her stomach.

Pegwai moved back to stand beside Usoq who was stirring his mess so it wouldn't burn, Skeen joined Timka in the bow.

She glanced up, “More of them this morning, if I can still count,” hitched a hip on the rail. “Usoq say anything about when we see this island where Petro's supposed to be waiting?”

“No, he's been fiddling with the glop, that's all. And Vohdi never talks, you know that.”

“Where's Rannah?”

“You didn't see her? She was upset. Usoq said something about Min burning like pitch pine and she didn't much like it, so she went below.”