The Godspeaker Trilogy (12 page)

She had never seen her whole body before.

Entranced, she let the stupid fat women coo and chatter and smother her in fabrics. She only snarled when they tried to take off the snake-eye amulet Abajai had given her. Then they squealed and groveled and Retoth demanded from the other side of the curtain to know what was going on! The women rushed to tell him that all was in order, but Hekat said nothing. She looked at her body, and was amazed.

Her arms were long. Her legs were long. Her head with all its heavy godbraids sat neatly on her long neck. In the village there’d been dull dry skin lying thinly over skinny hips and ribs and jutting shoulders. Now . . . she was not fat, but there was flesh on her bones. She’d felt her body changing as she traveled the road with Abajai and Yagji but now she could see it: smooth and sleek, her shape so pleasing to the eye. Her skin, not dull but rich warm brown, glowing in the booth’s mellow lamplight.

Last of all she studied her face. Not as thin as when last she’d seen it, shown to her by the woman Bisla in Todorok. Her eyes weren’t frightened anymore, they were open and fearless. Proud. Defiant. Words she had learned from Abajai, that Yagji said described her, and should be beaten out of her. Abajai paid no attention to stupid Yagji. For herself, she loved those words. She loved herself, shining in the mirror.

I am proud. I am defiant. I am Hekat, precious and beautiful. All of me is beautiful. The god sees me. I am seen by the god.

CHAPTER SEVEN

A
fter the longest time the fat women finished drowning her in clothes. They left her alone to dress and took armfuls of the tunics and pantaloons she’d worn for them out to the front of their booth. When she joined them they ignored her, they were busy squabbling over coin with Retoth. He ignored her too, he cared more for Abajai’s money than for her.

Bored. Hekat wandered a small way from Retoth and the women, threading her way through the jostling crowd. Her interest was caught by a booth full of amulets. She wandered closer. The amulet-seller was busy with a customer. Hekat stood to one side and looked at the merchandise laid out on wooden tables and dangling from ropes stretched over her head.

Some of the amulets were as large as her fist, others smaller than her smallest fingernail. Some were carved out of bone, or fashioned from lizard skulls and snake-skulls and even fleshless human fingers. The bones and skulls were banded in bronze, in silver, in gold. There were tiny stone snake-fangs as blue as the sky. Larger snake-fangs in rock striped cream and crimson. Snake-eyes of pale green crystal, of richest yellow and hot fire-flame. Tiny clenched fists carved out of ivory, and ivory feet with a snake carved into the sole to guard against fangstrike. There were lots and lots and lots of scorpions, in every kind of stone and crystal. One in particular caught her eye, snared her attention like a fly drawn to honey. She picked it up to look more closely.

It was the size of a living scorpion. Shiny black, with deep flecks of scarlet and gold that caught the bazaar’s torchlight and shimmered, like breathing. It felt warm on her palm, almost alive. She almost expected to feel its feet move against her skin.

“What is this? What is this?” the amulet-seller demanded. Her other customer had gone away, they were alone in the amulet booth. “Whose child are you?”

Reluctantly, Hekat put down the carved black scorpion. “I belong to Trader Abajai.”

The amulet-seller was a wrinkled woman, so old her skin was fading to a light and ugly brown. All her greying godbraids were limp. Her eyes were filmed over with whitish scum, she was missing most of her teeth.

“Trader Abajai?” the old woman said. “Returned from the road? The god sees me. Abajai is Et-Raklion’s son, beloved of the god. What is your name, and where are you from?”

“I am Hekat from the savage north.”

“Aieee!” The old woman hitched up her shawl; it was sewn with so many amulets it kept trying to slide off her bony shoulders and rattle to the booth’s threadbare floor. “The savage north. That is why the child is fearless, and stands before me with its head held high.” She picked up the amulet, caressed it, smiling. “Does Hekat like my scorpion? I made it, you know. I made all these amulets. The god speaks to me in the night, in the wind, in the water. I make these amulets and the god sees me in its eye.”

Hekat looked again at the beautiful scorpion. “I like it.”

“Then you may have it,” said the old woman. “A gift for Hekat from the savage north.” She leaned forward. “But keep it secret, child,” she whispered. “This amulet is special. I have never made another like it. The god thundered in my heart as it guided my blade. It thunders now. It wants you to have this.”

Hekat nodded. If she told Retoth he would take this gift for himself. “I will keep it secret.” She reached for the black stone scorpion, and her hand touched the hand of the old amulet-seller.

The woman gasped, she dropped the scorpion onto the table, not caring if it chipped or smashed, and seized her in a grasp too strong for such brittle, claw-like fingers.

“Savage Hekat!” the old woman breathed. Her scummy eyes lost their focus, rolled upwards in her head like a godspeaker’s in the middle of sacred ritual. “The god sees you, it burns you in its eye! Great lady, mother of the god’s desire, mother of the son! Rivers of blood, rivers of greatness! Wastelands of despair!”

As Hekat wrenched free, Retoth appeared at her shoulder. “Hekat, I told you to stay with me! Abajai will beat you when I tell him of your wickedness. He will not abide disobedience beneath his roof!”

She was so shaken by the old woman’s rantings she said, without sneering, “I am sorry, Retoth.”

Retoth’s anger melted. “Oh. Very well. But you must come, it is wicked to dawdle.”

“My new clothes?”

“They are sent to the villa. Now come !”

The amulet-seller was muttering and moaning, rocking on her seat. “Burning! Blood! Aieee, the god thunders!”

Stupid old woman, she was demonstruck and ripe for stoning. Hekat snatched up the scorpion amulet and thrust it into her pocket, then ran after Retoth just as the bazaar’s milling crowds swallowed him entirely.

They left the noisy, smelly bazaar and walked even further to the School district, where Retoth paraded her before a variety of tutors until one agreed to teach her reading and writing and dance in the villa.

“I do not need a tutor,” she told Retoth, as they headed back to the Traders district. “Abajai is my teacher.”

“Tcha!” said Retoth, shaking his head. “The master is too busy to bother with you. Hold your tongue now, you give me a headache.”

On the long silent walk back to Abajai’s villa Retoth dropped silver coins into four of the godbowls they passed on the way. He even gave a copper coin to her, so she could please the god once. She thought, briefly, of giving the god the black carved scorpion. In the end, though, she just gave it the copper coin. The scorpion was so beautiful, and the god already had so many amulets in its godbowls throughout the city. Besides, it meant the amulet for her.

The first thing she heard when they returned to the villa was Abajai’s voice, coming from a room near the entrance hall. Forgetting Retoth, she dashed through its open door to find him.

“Abajai! Abajai! Here I am!”

He was stretched out on a long low couch, nibbling dried grapes from a glazed green bowl. Yagji sprawled on a couch beside him, feeding ripe plum pieces to an odd-looking animal perched on his fat belly. It was brown and white and hairy, it had a little face that looked almost human and tiny hands with four fingers and a thumb and a long curled tail. It saw her and let out a screech.

“Hooli! Hooli, don’t be frightened!” said Yagji, and clutched the hairy thing to his breast. “Stupid brat! Don’t you know it is rude to enter unannounced? Look what you’ve done, you’ve frightened Hooli!”

Hooli? Then this was a monkey . What a creature! Safe in Yagji’s suffocating arms it chattered and gibbered and hid its face behind its hands.

She pointed. “Yagji called Hekat a monkey on the road. Hekat is nothing like that Hooli!”

“No, she is not,” said Yagji, scowling. “My Hooli is worth a thousand times more in pure solid gold!”

“Only to you, Yagji, I promise,” said Abajai, chuckling.

Hovering in the doorway, Retoth said, “Forgive me, master, I could not stop her in—”

“It is no matter,” said Abajai. “Leave us, Retoth. I will have private words with Hekat.”

Retoth bowed and withdrew, closing the lavish room’s door. Abajai looked her up and down. “Your godbraids are pleasing,” he said. “They honor the god. You have visited the bazaar? You have new clothes?”

Hekat dropped onto the nearest couch and sat with her spine very straight. Her godbells chimed softly, singing his praises. “Yes, Abajai. Thank you.”

“What of a tutor?”

She pulled a face. “It would be better if Abajai taught me.”

Yagji snorted. Abajai said, “No. This is best. There are many things to learn from a tutor, he can teach you what I cannot.”

She felt pricky tears, she blinked them away. “I have a tutor. He comes from next highsun.”

Abajai leaned forward and flicked his finger on her knee. “I am pleased. Do you like Et-Raklion city?”

She sighed. “Et-Raklion city is beautiful. Will Abajai show me all of it, soon?”

“Not soon,” said Abajai. “Yagji and I have been on the road many godmoons. My time is for business now. The things you saw upon the road, Hekat—warbands and dead men, blood on the brown grass—have you sharpened your tongue on them to Retoth or any slaves below the stairs?”

He had no time to show her Et-Raklion? Disappointment was a snake-fang, piercing her heart. “No, Abajai. Hekat does not talk with slaves.”

“Good,” he said. “Those things we saw upon the road are our secret, they are things for the Traders and the warlord to know. No-one else.”

Our secret . Aieee, to know how much he trusted her. “Yes, Abajai.”

He nodded, serious. “I tell you this also. We are no longer on the road. This is the city, we must live city lives. Unless you are sent for, you will stay beneath the villa, you will learn your lessons and obey Retoth. That is your world now, below the stairs. Retoth will give me reports of you daily, I will know how you go on. You wish to please me?”

“Only to please you, Abajai,” she whispered. From the corner of her eye she could see Yagji, feeding the monkey Hooli more ripe red plum-pieces. He was smiling. He had never liked her. He was jealous.

Now Abajai smiled, his eyes were kind. “Do not despair, Hekat. From time to time you will see me and I will see you and all the time the god will see us both. If pleasing Abajai is your true want let that be enough for now.”

She was Hekat, beautiful and precious, come from Mijak’s savage north. She was strong and proud and fearless. She plucked the snake-fang from her disappointed heart and flung it away.

“Yes, Abajai,” she said, and left him to sit with Yagji and the stupid monkey. She went downstairs, to the slaves’ world below the villa, and shut herself privately into her chamber, where she sat on her soft bed and bit her lip until her pricky eyes stopped their stupid burning.

The scorpion amulet was still in her tunic pocket. She had meant to show it to Abajai, but his stern words had stolen her thoughts. She took it out and held it tightly, feeling its sharp edges against her skin, recalling the words of the amulet-seller.

Great lady, mother of the god’s desire, mother of the son! Rivers of blood, rivers of greatness! Wastelands of despair!

Stupid scummy-eyed old woman, gabbling nonsense. Demons lived in her babbling tongue, the godspeakers would come for her and cut them out. Hekat thrust the amulet under the pillow, rolled herself into her blankets, and fell asleep.

Days passed, drifting one into the next into the next. A little rain fell, mostly the sky was blue and cloudless. Abajai never went beneath the villa. His feet never touched the stairs leading down to the kitchen and the laundry and the workrooms and the store-rooms and the slaves’ sleeping quarters, and out to the slaves’ garden where fresh fruits and vegetables were grown. The slaves went upstairs, every day they went up to clean the villa or serve Abajai and Yagji and their Trader guests or do the things that Abajai and Yagji needed them to do.

But Abajai never once came down.

Hekat sulked. She was used to seeing Abajai every day. She’d seen him and talked with him every day from newsun to lowsun since leaving the village. Even when they’d traveled in silence, when he pinched her shoulder or tugged on her godbraids to still her tongue, he’d been there with her, a constant reassuring presence at her back. She missed that. She missed him. She was lonely.

The feeling offended her. Loneliness belonged to that nameless she-brat in the village, who’d slept under tables and chained to walls. That ignorant, naked, skin-and-bone creature destined for the dogs, or an end even worse, it had lived in loneliness the way fish lived in water. But she wasn’t that sad she-brat anymore. She had a name now, she wore fine clothes, her godbraids sang with silver godbells. She had a tutor, bought and paid for. How could Hekat, precious and beautiful, be lonely ?

Abajai’s stupid slaves did not talk to her, they talked to each other but not to her. Even when she had to work with them, because the slave Retoth said she must earn her keep , even then they would not talk to her. She thought that might be Obid’s doing, he lived at the villa, the slaves spoke to Obid and he spoke to them about her, she was certain. So they knew where she came from, the savage north, they knew what she used to be, a dirty nameless she-brat. They did not understand what she had become, and they let Obid’s maggot questions writhe in their hearts and only when Retoth said they had to, would they ever speak to her.

Not that she cared. They were jealous because Abajai was Abajai and not the master . They were jealous because he dressed her in silk and cotton and paid a stupid tutor silver coins to teach her reading and writing and how to dance, tra-la. Reading and writing were tedious, but she liked to dance.