A Bait of Dreams (6 page)

She scratched the end of her nose, feeling warmth stroking down into her thighs from the stone. “I know what you want. Mmm. I could go with Temokeuu and Tetaki. That's a leap in the dark too, but at least I'd have friends.” She smiled. “I have some influence. Hah! Ambassador. My friend, oh my friend.”

Carefully, moving with slow deliberation, she untied the knots in the rag and touched the Ranga Eye. The warmth spread up through her body and once again she saw the fliers. The male spun in ecstatic spirals and the others danced their jubilation. She could feel them drawing her out of her body. She wanted to let go. She wanted desperately to let go, to fly on glorious wings, free and joyous. So easy, it would be so easy just to go sailing away from all the pain and misery of her life here. Why not? Why not just go, let them take her to fly in joy under a butter-yellow sun.

“No.” She jabbed her thumb into the burn on her face, using the pain to wrench herself from the Eye's influence. “No. You promise too much,” she muttered. She folded the rag about the Eye, knotting the ends to make a neat bundle of it. Levering herself onto her feet, she took the bundle to the wardrobe, opened the door and tossed the rag with the Ranga Eye into the back corner. “No. You're too much like a trap. How could I trust you?” She shook her head. “I'm free now. I don't owe anybody anything and I won't stick my head into any trap.”

Patting her pocket to make sure her money was safe, she went down the stairs for the last time, nodded pleasantly to Miggela as the squat figure came out of her nest. No reason to bother about the old rat any more. Gleia laughed to herself as she remembered dreams of telling her landlady just what she thought of her. But it wasn't worth the wasted energy.

She stepped into the cruelly bright afternoon, pulling the cafta's hood up over her head. Without hesitation she turned into the alley, leaving behind with few regrets the drab reality of her past and the glittering dreams of the crystal. Temokeuu was waiting, would wait until sundown for her answer. She smiled and began to run past the stinking hovels.

SECOND AND THIRD SUMMERS

Interlude Among the Shaborn

In the late spring a mammal came among the seaborn on Cern Myamar, walking quietly behind Temokeuu the Shipmaster. At Midsummer Eve the conches were blown to announce her formal adoption into Temokeuu's clan, though there were some who opposed this. After the horning, Jaydugar swung twice more around the double sun while Gleia lived those 2100 days as Temokeuu's daughter, enduring for Temokeuu's sake the scandal and hostility around her until her quiet ways won a place for her and she found a few friends.

2100 days. The snow came and retreated twice. On the mainland, the tribes drove their armor-plated yd'rwe in great loops across the two thousand stadia of grassland of the Great Green and back again to their winter places in valleys heated by scattered hotsprings, fighting their magic wars on both arcs, ceasing only at the tradefair where Caravanners came to buy and sell. And the Caravanners made their spring and summer rounds twice, rumbling along their trade roads and in the mountain valleys where the parsi farming clans twice harvested their crops and three times celebrated Thawsend. As did the other divers members of humankind and otherkind scattered about the world. In little pockets everywhere the descendants of a thousand ships that came crashing down on the shiptrap world struggled with legend and nature back to a nine-tenths-forgotten technology.

2100 days of peace, of study, of swimming and laughing and teasing and testing. Most of all 2100 days of healing. Gleia had two brand scars on her face and far more than that inside. Temokeuu's salve healed the new brand, his affection and care and Tetaki's teasing did more than the passing of the years to heal those old wounds deep inside her.

But as the third thaw came and spring brought warmth and growth to the land, Gleia began to grow restless.

The spring that took the mammal to Myamar brought a ship to circle Jaydugar, brought a man back to a world he'd left behind long ago and thought never to see again and set him on a quest for an ancient evil.

THE FOURTH SUMMER'S TALE

A Thirst for Broken Water

Jevati touched the honor medals dangling over her flat chest. “I think he'll die today.”

“I didn't.…” The sail began luffing the moment Gleia pulled her eyes off the telltales. Her mouth clamped shut. The breeze was maddeningly unreliable, while her patience seemed to have deserted her with the winter ice. A twitch of the tiller filled the white triangle belly-taut again.

Behind them Horli's giant bulge was a velvet crimson half-circle above the jagged line of Cern Myamar's central ridge. She risked a glance at her friend. Jevati stirred, Horli's light sliding like bloody water over the delicate angles of her face. “Keep on this tack much longer and we'll be in the Dubur's Teeth,” she said.

Gleia tightened her fingers on the tiller bar, suppressing her irritation, uncomfortably aware that she was overreacting to nearly everything these days. “Watch your head.” The boom came sliding across in a smoothly controlled jibe, skimming just above the seaborn's tight blue curls. The sail filled again and the
Dragonfish
began gliding along the port tack.

“Nice.” Jevati straightened. “For a mammal.”

“Fish.” After a minute, Gleia said. “You look better.”

Jevati tugged at the son-honor. “It was a hard birth.” Her hand fell into her lap, fingers pleating her fishskin swimtrunks. “It'll be a long time before I go through that again. I'm sorry the old man's dying, but I don't want another of his wigglers.” She lifted her head and let the breeze blow drops of water across her face.

Gleia frowned at the fluttering telltales, more worried than she cared to admit by her friend's frailty. “You're not much more than a wiggler yourself. If you don't marry again, what are you going to do?”

“Wiggler!” Jevati slapped at the rail in disgust, then shook her head. “I don't know. Depends.” Her fingers moved back and forth along the rail. “I have to survive the Widowjourney before I make plans.”

The red sun was giving the air a real warmth even this early in the day. Thaw was over and the long summer was finally more than a memory frozen in the ice of deep winter. Jevati let the silence build between them, comfortable with it—unlike Gleia who worried at what she'd heard.
Widowjourney? Survive? Ask or let it rest?
The breeze teased tendrils of brown hair from the leather thong she used as a tieback and whipped them about her ears. Even after six years-standard with the seaborn she still came upon occasions when she was uncertain about what she should do. She sighed and surrendered to her curiosity. “Widowjourney?”

“Home to Cern Radnavar.” Jevati stretched, delighting in the feel of the wind and spray playing over her body. “Thanks for getting me out of that tomb. I was about ready to escape through the underways.”

“Firstwife didn't like my coming around. I thought she was going to snap my head off.”

Jevati sniffed. “Firstwife Zdarica never has approved of me.” She grinned. “Matter of fact, I don't know what she does approve of.” Her mother-of-pearl teeth glinted crimson like small bloody needles as they caught and gave back Horli's light. “Idaguu's woman-ridden. I've always wondered how he got up enough nerve to add another wife to his household. Temokeuu-your-father is a man of sense. Only one soft little mammal to tease him.”

“Jevati!”

Jevati stopped giggling and looked wistfully at her webbed fingers. “I'd give this hand to be you.”

“Head down.” Gleia eased the boat into the final tack that would take them into the mouth of the small bay at Cernsha Shirok, the smaller volcanic island out beyond Radnavar's harbor. “Why did you marry him? Sixth wife. You must have known how that would be.”

“My clan owed Idaguu a lot of money. From the time our own Cern blew its top and we had to move to Radnavar. He was a Shipmaster and Councillor then and tighter than a starving suckerfish.” She scratched absently at the skin on her knee. “He came to Radnavar to arrange for payment and there I was. He liked what he saw and said he'd take me instead of the pile of oboli that would have beggared the clan.” She arched her body, bending her head back until her skull rested against the rail, cushioned by the springy blue hair that wasn't hair at all but a complex sense organ. “It wasn't so bad. He was nice enough to me. But old. And the other wives … well, they were all from Myamar clans and I was an outsider.” She straightened, smiled at Gleia. “Till you came I was lonely as a schoolless herring. There's not much news from Radnavar.” She waved a hand to the south. “It'll be good to see my people again. If I survive the swim.”

“Get the sail, will you?” Gleia's voice was sharper than she intended. Jevati's nose wrinkled again, but she uncleated the halyard and let the sail slide down. As the boat rocked gently in the calm waters of the small bay, Gleia examined the seaborn's bland face. “What did you mean by that?”

“What?” Jevati walked her fingers along her thigh muscle, apparently absorbed in the small dents they made in her flesh.

“Idiot! You said it twice. If you survive the swim.”

“Oh. Nothing much.” She pushed herself onto her knees and looked over the side. “Want me to let Vlevastuu know you're here?”

Gleia pulled the tie from her hair and ran her hands through the curly mass. “Little fish, sometimes.…”

Eyes twinkling, Jevati settled back in the bottom of the boat. “Gleia, Gleia, you make it so easy I couldn't resist, I have to tease you.”

Gleia wiggled her fingers. “You forget your little weakness. Talk, fish, or I—”

“About what?” Jevati opened her eyes wide in exaggerated innocence then shrieked as Gleia raked fingers across her too-prominent ribs. “Truce,” she squealed. She pushed at Gleia's hands and lifted herself on an elbow.

“Truce.”

When she caught her breath, Jevati shifted out of her awkward crouch to a more comfortable position leaning against the side of the boat. “After all, it's not so funny for me. Widowjourney. Simple. When Idaguu dies, all his wives must go back to their birth clans.”

“I don't see …” Gleia rubbed her hand across her forehead. “What's the problem?”

“Obiachai. I've got to make it on my own.” She slid her shoulders against the side, her glassy scales moving with a papery sound over the wood. “The others, they swim a few body lengths. Me, I head for Radnavar. If I make it, fine. If not, too bad.”

“Obiachai!” Gleia clenched her hands into fists. “I'm sick of that word. When Temokeuu brought me here that's all I heard. Obiachai! That's the way things have to be done because that's the way they've always been done. It's a matter of clan honor. Don't disgrace us. You can't do that. Hunh!”

“Yelling doesn't help.”

Gleia sucked in a breath and blew it out again. “You're right, dammit. I really must be dim this morning.”

“You are. Where's Cern Radnavar?”

“Huh?”

Jevati nodded gravely. “I thought so. Listen and learn, little mammal.” She paused then spoke in an exaggerated singsong chant. “Cern Radnavar swims six hundred stadia south.” She laughed at the consternation on Gleia's face. “Two weeks, swim in untamed water. Now do you see?”

“Why can't Temokeuu give you passage on one of his chis-makkas when they go trading south? He won't worry about being paid.”

“You're not listening. Obiachai binds him as much as me. He'd be exiled if he tried to help me.”

“That's stupid.”

“That's the way things are.” She took hold of the mast and pulled herself onto her feet. “Vlevastuu obviously doesn't know you're here. Temokeuu won't want to wait for his breakfast melons.” She slid over the side and disappeared into the depths of the bay.

Gleia paced restlessly along the edge of the water, her cafta brushing against salt flowers and trailing kankaolis. This room was built out over the harbor and took in a portion of the shoreline. The roof was checkered with panels of translucent kala shell, letting in enough light to keep the plants growing and healthy and was supported by rough beams of twisted sinaubar wood exensively imported from the mainland. This was Temokeuu's study, his particular retreat. No one came here except by invitation and he seldom invited intrusion. Gleia was the single exception to this rule. He watched her prowl about for a while then looked down at the papers in front of him.

“Seems god-Meershah speared another starfish.”

Gleia dropped onto a bench. “Translation please.”

“A starship came down in the sea by Cern Vrestar. Jaydugar has gathered to herself another branch of man or other kind.”

Gleia smiled. “The Madarmen would say the Madar saw man-corrupt and plucked him from his wicked ways as she did my parsi and your seaborn and all the other sorts. Plucked them from their evil paradises and set them here to be men again by the labor of their hands.”

Temokeuu leaned back in his chair and smiled affectionately at her. “They didn't make much impression on you.”

“They caught me too late. The streets taught me to believe more in my hands and feet.” She chuckled. “And teeth.” She jumped up and came to stand beside him, one hand on his shoulder. “Those are reports from Tetaki?”

“Mmh. As you see. He says the starfolk are starting to clean out the ashes from the house on Vrestar. Apparently they're land dwellers.”

“Mammals?”

“He doesn't say.” Temokeuu turned over the top sheet. “They're small, dressed in bulky gray coveralls.” His long slender forefinger touched a few lines of writing. “With tails they can use like another hand.” He sighed and looked worried. “He says he's going to try talking to them.” He picked up a stylus and began twisting it through his fingers.