The Eyes of God (33 page)
Authors: John Marco
“Great Fate,” Lukien gasped. “What is
that?”
that?”
“That,” said Figgis, “is a kreel.” The librarian got off his horse as the beast and rider approached, moving with a graceful gait toward them. Too stunned to move, Lukien and Trager simply watched the kreel in disbelief. They had talked about the great lizards during their ride south. Figgis had said they were not to be feared, but seeing one close up made being afraid easy. Lukien’s hand fell instinctively to his sword. The crowd outside the shrana house parted as the lizard sauntered near, but they did not seem surprised or frightened by the creature. Figgis smiled as if a stray dog was approaching.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?” he said. “It’s been years since I’ve seen one.”
The kreel and its rider noticed Figgis and stopped before him. The rider’s dark eyes studied the old man.
“Uh, Figgis, I think you should get out of its way,” Lukien suggested.
But the librarian held up his hands towards the man and beast in a gesture of peace, then began to say words Lukien didn’t understand, speaking with effort as he pronounced the words.
“Jadori?” Trager guessed.
Lukien shrugged. He didn’t know Jadori from Ganjeese, nor any other of the strange tongues he heard around him. But remarkably the rider seemed to understand Figgis. There was no malice in his eyes, only a sort of surprised humor. Figgis struggled with the language, pausing in long stretches between each sentence as he groped for the right words. The rider waited patiently, amused by the old foreigner.
“Figgis?” probed Lukien. “What are you doing?”
“He is from Jador,” said Figgis. Childlike exuberance shone on his face. “And he understands me!”
“Yes, all right,” said Lukien. “Just be careful what you say to him.” Lukien slid slowly off his horse and went to stand beside Figgis. He whispered, “Remember why we’re here.”
“Of course I remember.” Figgis smiled at the Jadori, then began to speak again. The man nodded. “He says he has come for trade,” said Figgis. “He’s only just arrived from Jador.”
“Will he be staying long in the city?” asked Trager. “Maybe he could take us back with him.”
“I’m afraid not. He says he will be going east from here. We don’t have the time to wait for him.”
“Agreed,” said Lukien. “Then we’ll find a guide in the shrana house.”
Figgis kept talking to the Jadori, asking questions. The man answered each one, patiently waiting for Figgis to form his sentences, and when he spoke he did so slowly, making sure the old man understood. Figgis had told them during the journey that the Jadori were peaceful people, gracious in every way, and now that seemed true. The rider didn’t even have a sword, and his great reptile seemed as docile as a pony. It lowered its head onto the sandy ground as its rider spoke, oblivious to the conversation.
“Come on, Figgis,” growled Trager. “What are you going on about? Hurry up.”
Figgis ignored the lieutenant. He exchanged smiles with the rider, who then got down off his kreel and looked at Lukien and Trager. Amazingly, he bowed to them. Not knowing how to reply, Lukien bowed, too.
“Lukien, he is thanking you for looking after his kreel,” Figgis explained.
“What?”
“We are going into the shrana house. I’ll buy him a drink and find out what I can about Jador. I told him you’ll be outside looking after our horses, so—”
“So you thought I’d look after this big lizard? Are you mad?”
Figgis tried to cover Lukien’s anger with a smile. “Easy,” he said. “I won’t be long, and the kreel won’t be any trouble. I told you—they’re peaceful creatures. Just stay out here and look after it, all right? Make sure the children keep away.” Figgis turned toward the beaded curtain, parting it for his new friend. “I’ll bring you back something to eat.”
“Figgis!”
The librarian disappeared into the tavern with the Jadori, leaving Lukien and Trager with the kreel. The two soldiers looked at each other, aghast. The kreel had closed its eyes and laid its giant head in the sand. Its broad back rose and fell with easy breathing.
“Well?” asked Trager sharply. “What do we do now?”
Lukien looked at the resting kreel. “Hope it doesn’t get hungry.”
An hour later, Figgis finally emerged from the tavern. The Jadori man was with him, smiling and laughing as the two spoke among themselves. Figgis held two packages of food in his hand. As he approached Lukien and Trager, he held them out.
“For you,” he said, then went back to talking to the Jadori. Lukien looked at his food—a large, flat circle of bread stuffed with meat and spices. He gave it a wary sniff, decided it smelled good, then bit down hungrily. Trager did the same, glaring angrily at Figgis.
“What took you so long?” he asked through a mouthful of food.
“I had things to discuss with Tamaz. I learned a great deal.”
“Tamaz?” asked Lukien. “Is that his name?”
The Jadori looked at him, then pointed at himself. “Tamaz.”
Trager wasn’t satisfied. “You leave us out here starving, looking after that monster?” He gestured to the kreel. “What were you thinking?”
“Easy,” scolded Lukien. The kreel hadn’t been a problem. Only now did it rise, seeing its master return. “No harm done. What did you learn, Figgis?”
“First, I got us passage to Jador,” said Figgis happily.
“Really?” Lukien looked at Tamaz. “Is he taking us there?”
“No.” Figgis looked back toward the shrana house. “He is.”
Coming through the beaded curtain was another man, big and dark-skinned with a weathered face and beard. He was older than the Jadori man, almost as old as Figgis himself, and carried himself with an air of authority that made Lukien stop eating. As the Jadori man mounted his kreel and said his good-byes to Figgis, the new stranger stepped up and gave the trio a slight bow. His drab robes rustled as he moved, but he never took his eyes off the foreigners. Then another figure emerged out of the tavern, directly on the heels of the first. To Lukien’s surprise, it was the young woman he’d seen earlier.
“Who’s this?” asked Trager.
Figgis stepped between them and introduced the man. “This is Jebel. He is the leader of a caravan that will take us to Jador. The girl with him is his daughter, Cahra.”
“Caravan?” asked Lukien. “You mean they’re traders?”
“They are like nomads, Lukien. They travel from place to place, living off the land and bartering for what they need. They live in the desert mostly, but come into Ganjor when they need things. Now they are going to Jador. Tamaz introduced them to me.”
Trager’s face lit with alarm. “What? You mean you told Tamaz we’re going to Jador?”
“It seemed like the thing to do.”
“Figgis, that was very stupid,” said Lukien. “He could have warned them—”
“Stop,” said Figgis, putting up his hands. He took Lukien by the arm and turned him away from Jebel and his daughter. “Watch what you say. Jebel speaks our language.”
Lukien looked at the man, who stared back with a hard expression. “Jebel. Forgive me,” he offered. “I am Lukien. This is Trager.”
Jebel nodded at them. His daughter Cahra did not.
Lukien smiled awkwardly. “You will take us to Jador, Jebel?”
The dark man said, “My family rides in the morning. You may come with us, and we will guide you. But you will need your own drowa.”
“I’ve already explained that to them, Jebel,” said Figgis. “We will trade our horses for drowa. Then we’ll meet you back here and go to your caravan. Agreed?”
“It is agreed.” Jebel looked at Trager, who was still eating with both hands, and cringed in disgust. He said to Figgis, “Teach them something of manners before you return.” Then he turned and went back into the shrana house, calling his daughter after him. Cahra hesitated a moment, studying the three strangers before hurrying after her father.
“What was that all about?” asked Trager. Meat drippings dribbled down his chin.
“It’s my fault,” said Figgis. “I should have explained this to you before I brought the food. We’re in Ganjor now; we can’t eat like we usually do.”
“Bah,” scoffed Trager. “If I’m too messy for them, screw ’em.”
“That’s not it,” said Figgis. “You don’t eat with both hands here, Trager. You eat with the right hand only.”
Puzzled, Lukien frowned. “The right hand? Why?”
“Because that’s your clean hand. Your left hand is for . . . well, you know.”
“No, I don’t know. What do you mean?”
Figgis smiled. “In this culture, the left hand is used for bodily things, Lukien. You know, cleaning yourself?”
Suddenly Lukien understood. He looked down at his hands, then at all the Ganjeese people around them.
“I don’t get it,” said Trager. He continued eating with both hands. “What do you mean, clean yourself?”
Figgis sighed hopelessly. “Forget it. Let’s just get those drowa.”
That night, Lukien and the others rested with Jebel’s caravan on the outskirts of the city. They had traded their horses for three drowa, then had met again with Jebel in the tavern, who took them out to his caravan near sun-down. There they had met with the rest of the desert leader’s huge family, a similarly-featured band of some hundred people spanning multiple generations. Jebel introduced them perfunctorily to his wife and his brother, then had his youngest children line up for inspection. He explained to them that they had visitors from far away, and that they were to teach them what they could of their culture and their god, Vala. Because they were foreigners, Jebel explained, they could not be expected to know how to eat and clean themselves. Lukien listened to Jebel’s speech in embarrassment, and more than once saw Cahra giggle. Now that she was with her family again she had doffed her veil, revealing her pretty face. She was not glamorous, but she had dark, deep eyes that reminded Lukien of Cassandra.
Jebel’s caravan was an impressive sight, easily seen from the city. There were at least two dozen wagons, strangely designed vehicles with large, wide wheels and a high clearance beneath them. There were also numerous, hump-backed drowa laying lazily around the camp. Torches and candles had been set in the sand, and the moonlight shone on the dunes. Lukien, Trager, and Figgis had all taken their ease at the camp, supping with Jebel and his wife and sharing his water-pipe, a strange but pleasant device that Lukien had never seen before. Now they were full and content as they sat around a fire, listening to the odd music of the desert and gazing at Ganjor in the distance. To the west lay the Desert of Tears, an endless stretch of forbidding sand. The setting of the sun had cooled the world considerably, and all of them wore the gakas that Figgis had purchased. Lukien found the garb remarkably comfortable. He stretched with a yawn, yearning for sleep. Tomorrow they would begin their trek to Jador, making their way along the caravan routes, the well-traveled lanes that Figgis had promised could accomodate the wagons as long as they weren’t swallowed by sandstorms. Lukien wasn’t sure he was up to it. Of the three, only Figgis was eager to break camp. He sat slightly apart from Lukien, talking with Jebel on the far side of the fire. Trager had his eyes closed, half asleep. Around the wagons, children giggled in hushed voices and played with mangy dogs. Lukien watched Figgis converse with Jebel, amazed by his stamina. He knew that without the strange librarian, their mission would have been hopeless.
While they had shopped for their drowas, Figgis had explained his conversation with Tamaz, the Jadori. He had learned from the lizard rider that Jador was still at peace, just as Figgis had suspected, and that they still had a kahan and a kahana, just as they did decades ago when Figgis was a young man in Ganjor. Back then, Figgis had recalled, the kahan had been a man named Kadar. So it had surprised and elated Figgis when Tamaz told him that the Kahan of Jador was still Kadar, apparantly the very man who had ruled Jador all that time ago. It might have been his son, Figgis supposed, but he prefered to think it was still the same man, and that a magical amulet was keeping him alive. Kadar’s wife, the kahana, was called Jitendra. This news draped a pall over Figgis’ theory, because he remembered Kadar’s wife as having a different name. Still, it was enticing.
Deciding there was no harm in explaining their pretense to Tamaz, Figgis had told him that they were emissaries from King Akeela of Liiria, and that they had brought gifts for the Jadori kahan in hopes of opening up diplomatic relations. The news had pleased Tamaz, who told Figgis that Kahan Kadar would welcome the Liirian visitors. But he had refused to speak more about Kadar, and that puzzled Figgis. The librarian had decided not to push the man further, but had taken his evasiveness as a good sign.
“Perhaps they are not allowed to speak of the kahan’s magic,” Figgis had theorized.
Lukien didn’t really care. He was just glad they were on their way to Jador, and that soon he might confront this Kahan Kadar. If he and his wife did indeed have the magic amulets, he would steal them. In the quiet of the desert, it seemed a remarkably simple plan.
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