The World Above the Sky (18 page)

“The children would be instructed,” Antonio snarled. “Civilized. She should thank me, not threaten my life. The young savages' souls would have been sav—”

Keswalqw twisted the rope tight and held it tight. Antonio's face flushed scarlet. His features soon bloated beyond recognition. He slumped to the right. The People had come to know the white word savage, and its connotations, especially ugly when uttered by Antonio, whose eyes fluttered rapidly, then closed.

Keswalqw released the pressure. After a long moment of dreadful silence, Keswalqw landed a well-aimed kick to Antonio's ribs. His eyes snapped open. He gasped, then exhaled in a hiss of resentment. “—Their heathen souls would have been saved.”

Henry stooped, untied the thong binding Antonio's wrists.

“What am I to do with you?”

“What would your Lady do?” Antonio demanded, rising to his knees, massaging first his wrists, then his throat.

“If you showed contrition, and made reparation, My Lady would set you free. But it is not her you have aggrieved. Keswalqw?”

“What is this contrition?”

“He will say that he feels sorrow for what he has done.”

“And reparation?”

“Because he stole from you, he will return what he took, and he will give you anything you choose of his possessions.”

“He will give his iron blades, and his blankets.”

“Antonio?”

“Yes.”

“All his blades.”

“Yes.”

“All his blankets.”

“Yes, yes. All—”

“What else?” Keswalqw demanded.

“He will swear that he will never assault The People in this disgraceful way again.”

“I'll hear his words of sorrow. His contrition. For what he has done to our children. His reparation? I'll take his blades. I'll take his blankets.” The edge of the blade lay lightly on Antonio's throat. “And I will take his sacks of the yellow stones.”

Antonio moved to speak. He averted his eyes. Slight pressure from the blade silenced him.

“Where is this contrition?”

He stared up at her, his mouth slack, his eyes blank.

“I'm sorry.”

“I look in your serpent eyes. I see that you have none of this contrition. I see greed and selfishness. I see that you are not sorry. You are
Jipijka'maq
, Horned Serpent Person. You burst from the World Below the Earth. Burst into the Earth World and leave your trail of destruction and of woe.”

“I...am...sorry.”

“I don't believe you.”

“I am sorry I desecrated the graves of your ancestors. I am sorry I lured the little sav— the children aboard my ship. I will give you my blankets, I will give you my swords and daggers. Please. I beg you. You have no use for the gold....The soft yellow stones...”

“You may keep the yellow stones. I'll take your bright red blood instead!”

Her blade, deft and certain, grazed the merchant's skin. A thin trickle of blood, deftly drawn, trailed down to Antonio's collarbone.

Keswalqw held the blade below the cut. Blood pooled on its upper plane. She slanted the blade toward the ground. Antonio's eyes widened. Drop by scarlet drop Zeno blood, Christian blood, vanished into gravel leaving neither trace nor stain. She brought the blade back to his throat. All that he was would soon follow the blood, sink into this foreign soil and disappear, lost, unmourned, despised.

“No, no!” Antonio cried. “Take what you will, but spare my life.”

Keswalqw spit on her blade, drew it through Antonio's hair to clean it. She twisted the bloodied hank of hair into a knot, sliced it from his head, tossed it to Henry. He caught the warning glance that crossed the short space between them. Keswalqw tucked the blade back into its pouch. Her back straight, her face showing no emotion whatsoever, Keswalqw turned and strode down the path, followed by the children, their aggrieved parents and members of the clan.

Henry offered Antonio his hand.

“You are brought low, Antonio.”

Antonio rose to his feet unaided, though unsteady. Fear's aftermath twisted his guts.

“I am alive.”

“And in debt.”

Henry offered Antonio the hank of his hair. “A trinket for the Holy Father.”

Antonio accepted the grim indenture. The hair hung lifeless in his hands. “I acknowledge that I am in your debt.”

“And?” Henry pressed him.

“I owe you my life.”

Antonio's thin, sinewy body, more that of an underfed adolescent than a man in his prime, trembled. A cold gust of wind amplified his shame.

“Your obligation will be forgiven provided you swear you will forget our Templar maps, make no copies, and tell no tales.”

“It's easy to promise the world to a dead man. But I won't. I'll tell the tale of an errant knight and his apostate mistress to whom and when I choose.”

Henry removed his cloak. He held it out to Antonio. Antonio could make no sense of the gesture. Misgiving dissolved when he remembered his chilled and naked state. He reached for the cloak. “They'd already gutted
Reclamation
,” he said as he swung it over his shoulders. “Stripped it all but bare. Over half our arms were stolen. Most of our blankets. Clothing. Personal property. Gone. We're barely provisioned. Now they'll have it all.”

“There's no end of fish in the sea. Or rain water this time of year on the cold grey Atlantic. You have your gold. What more do you need?”

“You did nothing to stop them. You encouraged them from the beginning. Gave them free run of a vessel you didn't own when my back was turned. In exchange for what? They were payment, the trinkets and the children.” Antonio straightened his spine. “This bitter land will bring your lives and this damned heresy of yours to an end once and for all.”

He turned and strode away.

Henry called to him.

“Antonio!”

Antonio stopped, stood silent, his back to Prince Henry Sinclair and Sir Athol Gunn.

“My cloak,” Henry directed.

“What of it?”

“Fold it nicely, will you?”

Antonio turned to face Henry, whose gaze remained soft and benign.

“What?” Antonio demanded.

“Fold it nicely and leave it on the beach.”

Antonio searched Henry's face for traces of contempt or mockery. He found neither.

“You asked what My Lady would do. She would give her cloak and never ask its return. I'm not so generous. In her stead, I wish you well.”

Antonio wrapped the cloak close against the freshening breeze. “I'd return the sentiment, but in truth I feel only scorn and pity. None but brute beast and savage will survive the coming cold, if what we're told is true. You're welcome to this bewitched, uncivil place. I leave it all to you. And be damned.”

Antonio gained the path and disappeared.

“You should have let Keswalqw slit his throat for sport.”

“A ship, no matter how sturdy, loaded with that much gold? Scantly provisioned? The North Atlantic in her full autumnal tumult is my revenge on Antonio Zeno.”

Henry walked to the edge of the cliff. Alone and naked, Antonio struggled to steer the ungainly coracle, over which he had no mastery, toward his ship. Henry's mood was briefly eased by the pitiful ineptness of the man.

Antonio was handed naked aboard
Reclamation
. Henry felt a great weight descend, the same choking grief he suffered the day Eugainia and Mimk
ɨ
tawo'qu'sk fled, leaving sorrow to thicken, then harden into anger in his heart.

“I've a stone in my chest and a head full of wasps,” Henry said.

“You've...what?” Athol asked.

“I don't know what I'd do if she appeared before us now; fall on my knees, my own sword, or fall upon him and do her harm.”

“You'd fling your sword aside and fall upon your knees. You'd ask her forgiveness for thinking such things. We are Clan Sinclair, Henry. We've always known our purpose. Our lives are not our own, I say, our lives are not our own. And if you've forgotten that, you'd do better to throw yourself on Antonio's mercy and beg him to take you to Rome, where you can fall upon your sword or worse...your knees before the very devil himself. You're useless here, worse than useless, unless you set your foot upon the proper path.”

Henry stood chastened. As he struggled to formulate a response, ship's orders bounced up the cliff from rock face to rock face.

Her sails puffed full, her anchors weighed,
Reclamation
swung nose-first to the south, settled to the sou'east. In the out-rush of the falling tide, the galley sped down Turned Up Whale Belly Bay.

The stone in Henry's heart turned to water. In his head, blessed silence.

“Feel that breeze, kinsman,” he said. “What lends the day this sudden pleasant air?”

“The stink of greed is purged.”

“
Au revoir
,
Reclamation
. Or I should say
Adieu
.”

Keswalqw emerged from the forest, a bulky leather bundle under either arm.

“I will tell you the truth, Henry Orkney,” she said gravely, setting her burdens on the ground. “All the signs tell that the coming winter will be a starving time. Little snow. Great cold. Great hunger.”

“Yes. Winter. Cold. I understand.”

“No. More than winter. More than cold. There will be great cold. The beaver's house will be hard as stone: we'll not break his roof and capture him. There'll be little snow; the game will flee with ease, will not offer themselves to The People. Our round cheeks will vanish; the sharp bones of anguish will appear. Nonetheless, you are here. We will not abandon you. I have gifts for you, gifts from The People.”

Keswalqw unfolded and then spread two luxuriant beaver robes at their feet, guard hairs glistening in the sun. Thick underfur resisted the wind's attempts to ruffle it. Keswalqw placed the first robe on Henry's shoulders, the second on Sir Athol's.

“Thank you, Keswalqw.”

“Thank you.”

“Thank The People.”

Henry produced his wineskin. “Then here's to The People.”

Keswalqw produced her pipe and clamshell. The punk-packed ember released the sacred smoke. She sent a prayer up to the Great Spirit with the first exhalation. Henry presumed she offered her thanks for the safe return of the children, or her gratitude that Antonio no longer walked among them. Henry exhaled the same prayer then, with the upward spiral of rising smoke, asked forgiveness for consigning good men to the care of the Venetian viper. Would their souls be rewarded, as Henry had promised, should the north sea devour them? He prayed it would be so.

Keswalqw sensed his apprehension. “Kluscap rides the backs of the whales.”

“I beg your pardon?” said Henry.

“Seabirds are his messengers.”

“I don't—”

“Kluscap will send lesser spirits to oversee the journey.”

“Kluscap. The Creator?” Sir Athol ventured.

“No, no. Kisúlkw is the Creator. Kluscap is more like your Jesus, maybe. But with a sense of humour. Kluscap likes a joke. He makes what you call...miracles, but only with the Great Spirit's help. Like your Eugainia and your Christ.”

“Miracles?”

“Kluscap created men's bones from the heart of the ash tree, his flesh from the mud of Turned Up Whale Belly Bay. Not long after, Kluscap opened man's mouth and the names of all the animals came out. He gave the names of all the animals to The People. And told The People the animals' stories. Like that cliff, there, across the water. Before Kluscap's time the beavers were huge, powerful beasts. They had built a great dam, eh? Anchored it here, and across the water, at what you call Cape Split. Made a huge pond. One day, by speaking a word he knew and waving his stick, Kluscap became a giant beaver, bigger than the others, broke the dam and let the fierce Turned Up Whale Belly Bay tides rush in and out, as they have done ever since.”

“Is this story true?” Athol chided.

Keswalqw looked Athol Gunn dead in the eye. “It's a story we tell to our children. Of course it's true.”

Athol grinned. “Really, Keswalqw. A beaver that big?”

“Tell me again your story of that man born of a virgin and nailed to a tree. The same man, wasn't it, who turned air into fish and water into brandy wine?”

Athol contemplated the miraculous.

“Has anyone seen them?” Henry asked.

Keswalqw answered in time. “They left Apekwit.”

“Where would he have taken her?”

“A place he knows.”