Watcher's Web (23 page)

“Wait.” Iztho
held up a hand.

The
storyteller shot him an annoyed glance.

“I want to
make notes of this.” He finally sat down, clicked the gun in the
bracket on his arm, took his reader from under his cloak and turned
it on.

Jessica leaned
forward to see the screen. “Is this what you thought?”

He typed while
he spoke. “I’ve heard the story of the buried children and the
three ships before. That’s almost standard knowledge on the history
of Asto, as far as oral history is accurate. The children were
mostly discovered when the Coldi civilisation grew and they started
building. Most of them died as soon as they were taken out of the
chambers. The last one was found about three hundred years ago. But
I’ve never heard there was any kind of planning involved. The known
history says that all of Aghyr was in such panic that
government—they didn’t have elders of course—disintegrated and
within days an entire society was reduced to the level of beasts:
everyone for themselves, and that the rich people with connections
to research appropriated the chambers which had been used to store
artificial humans they had created. The Aghyrians might have been
smart, but they were damn selfish.” He turned to the storyteller
again, speaking Mirani for Jessica’s benefit. “How have these
stories been passed on? Are they told at gatherings and then
repeated by others?”

Ikay replied,
while the storyteller folded her arms over her chest.

He said, “If
that’s the case, how do you know this is the truth?” Then he
translated his own question.

Ikay gave a
sharp response. Iztho frowned at her. “You mean—all of it is
written down in rock? And you can read it?”

The
storyteller jumped forward and argued with Ikay. Her tail had
escaped her clothing and waved at waist level, brushing the hair of
several of her kinsmen. Large eyes shot vicious glances at
Iztho.

Ikay soothed
her and spoke with Iztho. He translated for Jessica. “They are
upset because they do not like our questions. This is how it was,
they say, so one cannot argue with it.”

“But we’re not
arguing. We just want to know what they mean.”

“I know, Lady,
I know. You and I view history as something that has to be
rediscovered, over and over, reinterpreted by generations to come.
They think there is only one version of history, which is how they
tell it. We’d best keep quiet if we want to hear the rest of the
story.” He sat back and nodded to Ikay.

The
storyteller continued. “The ship that carried Anara and her
followers came here when the elder of our tribe was the great
Orrid. All the tribe watched when the silver machine flew over a
few times and landed on the water. The creatures emerging from
it—for strange they were, no tails, so pale, so tall—had drifted
the skies for days. They had found no landing places and had run
out of food. Their silver machine was damaged when it slid through
the marshes. Orrid offered them their first meal in days from our
plentiful supplies. They were grateful and said their people would
always respect the Pengali. In turn for our food they taught us to
read their signs. The Akkar settled on the island and a time of
great prosperity followed.”

After waiting
for Ikay’s signal that she could speak, Jessica whispered, “How
come none of those people are left here?”

“There are.
Akkar live in us through avya.”

Iztho asked,
“Why do you think this young woman is one of them?”

From
somewhere in the dark room a fierce voice in heavily accented
Mirani said, “We do not
think
so.
She
is
one of them.”

“Can you prove
this?”

Ikay whistled.
A small boy ran forward to drop a glowing pearl in her hand, which
she rubbed over the skin of Jessica’s upper arm. Warmth spread out
from it, and tendrils of energy. When Ikay took the pearl away, the
characters glowed pink once more.

Elegant loops,
the distinctive character like the inverted number three. His mouth
open, Iztho reached out and traced the characters in the air
without touching her skin. “What . . . what does it
say?”

“Anmi.” The
fierce voice belonged to a servant female, a young woman perhaps
Jessica’s age.

“And that
means?”

“Anmi. Her
name. Like the Akkar who fell from the sky. They all had their
names written on their skin.”

Anmi, my
name.

Jessica closed
her eyes and let the threads flow through her arms. She reached out
for the web, for Daya.

Did you
know that, about my name?

There was no
reply, no images, no one on the other side. Last time she’d seen
Daya, he’d been captured. Where was he, and what did these people
want from him?

Iztho had
taken his reader on his lap. A deep frown on his face, he flicked
through images and turned the screen towards the onlookers. Jessica
recognised one of the pictures from the cave he had shown her that
afternoon. “Read for me what this says.”

The young
female didn’t hesitate. “May life guide you in the future, Cara
Ivedra Arellan.”

“Ivedra!”
Iztho’s voice boomed through the hall.

At the sound
of the name, a wave of goosebumps went over Jessica’s back. “What
is it? Is anything wrong?”

Iztho’s eyes
met hers in an intense gaze. “No, she’s right, that’s the problem.”
He gestured to the screen, displaying the picture of the circular
chamber. “This was the chamber in which three hundred years ago on
Asto one of the last surviving buried children was found: a baby
girl, Cara Ivedra Arellan. The Coldi woke her up and raised her on
Asto until she died at nineteen when the heat became too much for
her. For most of that time, she was locked up because of her
strange mental abilities. It was said she could kill a person just
by looking at them.”

Jessica pulled
up her knees against her chest and rocked to and fro. She wasn’t
sure if she wanted to hear the rest, but everything he said made
too much sense.

“I am a
survivor from those chambers, aren’t I?”

Daya,
did you know that?

Iztho closed
his eyes and gave a single nod. “The characters on your arm are
clear enough.”

“And the
images I see.”

He raised his
eyebrows. “Images?”

Jessica spoke
in a barely audible whisper. “When I was in that cave
. . . Someone runs down the stairs with me and puts me in
that water. My mother, I think . . . and then the earth
rumbles . . . and I drown and . . .” She
fought back tears in her eyes, hearing, again and again, those
footsteps, that thudding of the door, the panting breaths. Her
mother saving her while she herself had perished?

Iztho stared
at her, his eyes wide. “You . . . you remember that?”

Jessica
shrugged. “How long ago did this happen?”

How long had
she floated, hovering between life and death in some dark, watery
place? Could any of her family still be alive?

Without
speaking, Iztho groped in the pocket on the inside of his cloak and
produced a disk-like piece of equipment. He fiddled with it until
red lights danced across the screen; he held it out to her.

At first, the
simple characters made no sense, but then she recognised a clumsy
attempt at roman script. Blazing across the screen was a date: 17
April 47,513 BC.

What?

He had to be
kidding.

No way she
could have survived for—

Iztho inclined
his head. “My Lady.”

Jessica jumped
up, blood rushing to her cheeks. “Oh stop that, stop that! I’m not
a lady, I’m just Jessica. Just ordinary Jessica!” But she knew her
protests were futile; it all made far too much sense, and she had
left ordinary Jessica behind long ago.

She took a
deep shuddering breath.

All Pengali
around the hall stared at her with huge eyes which glinted in the
dark. Ikay knelt at her feet and someone murmured, “Anmi.” Before
long the murmur travelled through the hall. Anmi, the name which,
years beyond understanding, someone—her parents?—had tattooed on
her arm.

Jessica just
stood there, ignoring voices around her, shaking uncontrollably.
Tears flooded her eyes, trickled down her cheeks. She wiped at her
cheeks, but new tears fell. Her mouth trembled. She sank down on
the floor, biting her lip. All alone. There would never be any
relatives of any kind.

Chapter
20

W
HEN
J
ESSICA stumbled up the steps
of the guesthouse, clutching Iztho’s arm, a wave of fatigue washed
over her. It must be well past midnight. Most of the windows facing
the street were dark, and only a faint glow of light radiated from
the archway into the entrance hall. That afternoon, when Iztho had
taken her into the guesthouse after their visit to the dressmaker,
the hall had bustled with activity and patrons of all races and
sizes lined up to talk to a keihu woman with an enormous bird’s
nest of hair. Now, the lectern-like table that held the matron’s
booking system—a concertina-folded stack of paper tumbling to the
floor—stood empty and deserted, lit by a small light in a sea of
darkness.

Iztho’s high
boots clacked on the mosaic floor. He hadn’t said much on the way
back, as if he sensed she wasn’t up to speaking. She was thankful
for that.

Now he led her
up the stairs to the first floor balcony, where he had booked two
adjacent rooms overlooking the courtyard. Jessica longed for the
softness of the bed. Yet she didn’t want to be alone with the
truth.

He stopped in
front of the door to her room. “Are you sure you’re all right?”

The ghostly
light from a single pearl on the wall a few rooms down cast deep
shadows over his face.

“I can
understand if you are upset.”

Jessica
turned away. “No, really, I’m fine.”
Just shut up or I’ll start crying and I’ll never
stop.

“All right,
sleep well.”

The door to
her room rolled open. A rectangle of moonlight slanted through the
window, edging the oval, dog-basket-like bed in a golden glow.

Jessica froze
in the doorway. Alone. Her mother and her father had died millennia
ago, saved her life. For . . . for what? So that she
could lead her life in loneliness?

Except for Daya who lives only in my mind.
But he wasn’t replying, and
maybe he, too, was only a vivid memory.

She stifled a
choking sob.

A few
footsteps and Iztho’s hands were on her shoulders. “You are not
fine.”

His
moonlit-edged face blurred in a haze of tears. He led her into the
room and sat her down on the couch in the corner. “Let me get you a
drink.”

Jessica bit
her lip, fighting tears, staring blindly at the opposite wall, but
seeing only black eyes and a gentle male face surrounded by dark
curls. A memory. He was nothing but a memory. What was the point of
knowing her history if none of her people were left? What was the
point of anything in her life?

The door
rattled and Iztho came back, carrying a carafe, two cups and a
large case, the strap slung over his shoulder. Jessica frowned
through her tears. “What’s that?”

He set the
cups on the stable, unstoppered the carafe and poured. A scent of
sweet flowers drifted on the air. One cup he passed to her.

“Just sit and
drink for a while.”

He clicked the
case open. Folds of blue satin-like fabric glimmered in the
moonlight, cradling an instrument like a lute, the body trapezoid
with rounded corners. Its metal surface shimmered with delicate
engraved patterns. He picked it up by its short neck, caressing the
strings with a soft musical tingle. Eyes closed, he took his cup
from the table, drank deeply and put it back down. Then he set his
fingers on the strings and music filled the room. A soft, lilting
melody; baroque-like, but with a hint of something wild and
untamed.

Jessica sipped
from the sweet drink, not daring to make the slightest noise. His
eyes were still closed; a strand of hair had slid off his
shoulders, part-obscuring his face. He hummed, then whispered words
which formed into song, his tone deep and warm.

The Mirani
words were too archaic and formal for her to understand, but every
now and then he repeated the lines:

My heart goes where I
know

I will always be at
home

Where my love smiles
at me

Tears pricked in
Jessica’s eyes. When the song ended, he reached out for his
glass.

The sudden
silence unsettled her. She wasn’t sure if he expected a reaction,
so she said, “You play beautifully.” It sounded clumsy.

His eyes
didn’t meet hers. “A Mirani folk song.”

He set his
fingers on the strings again. “Do you want to hear more?”

“Yes.”

He played a
few notes, then looked up at her. “I’m a Trader. I talk about
buying and selling. I’m afraid I’m not much good at talking about
. . . personal things.”

“Neither am
I.” She fiddled with the hem of her tunic. “But your music speaks
beautiful words.”

He played
another chord. “That’s an accident. Life would have been a lot
easier for me if I hadn’t . . .” He sighed and put
the instrument aside. “But that’s me. Let’s talk about you, your
incredible history—”

“There is
nothing incredible about it!”

“Yet there
is.” His voice was soft.

“But I’m
. . . all alone.” She fought to keep her voice from
breaking.

“I don’t think
so.”

“What do you
mean?”

“
There
are
others.
Men, mostly.”