The Book of Water (20 page)

—
It’s not a joke, you know.

This starts him laughing again, but he’s got it under control, barely. “You really are my dragon, aren’t you!”

—
What else did you think?

“I mean, the way you talk and all.”

—
What’s wrong with it?

“Nothing. Hey, girl, nothing at all. And you know, you are so right. I should have listened to you earlier. Things woulda made a lot more sense!”

Now Water is wearing particularly self-satisfied expression but N’Doch is too relieved to care, now that he sees he’s not going to have to talk the old-time talk and walk the old-time walk in order to get along with this critter he’s been tied to by no will of his own.

“So. This shape-shifting thing. You wanna try it again?”

—
You bet. I need the practice.

He goes with a different song this time, one of his favorites, about a beautiful woman he met once, walking along the beach. She’d just fallen crazy in love with some guy or other, and that’s what made her so beautiful, passion that consumed her so much, she could spend an hour with a total stranger, telling him all about it. It was like living poetry. Totally unself-conscious. N’Doch had envied her. He wanted to be in love like that, still does and—as he watches the dragon’s animal form slip and change and then reshape itself into the exact image of the woman on the beach—he thinks maybe he is. It won’t be like being in love with a real woman, he knows that, but at least he has a clue about what to do with all these crazy feelings he’d been having. He wonders if this is how the girl feels about her dragon.

He lets the song finish, trailing out the last note. He can’t help but sing it seductively. The beach woman smiles at him and melts away.

N’Doch grunts and averts his eyes. “I think I’m not gonna watch while you’re doing that.”

—
Why?

“It’s . . . well, it’s kinda gross when you’re in between one thing and another, you know? Can’t you do it, like,
faster
?”

—
NO. That is, not yet. I’ll . . . work on it.

She’s a lot less brisk than usual and he sees he’s hurt her feelings. “Hey, look, it’s awesome that you can do it. It’s mega, you know?”

—
But you don’t like process, only results.

“No, I . . . hmmm.” N’Doch decides he’ll have to ponder that one for a while. “How long can you hold a shape? Only while I’m singing?”

—
Maybe. I don’t know.

“And you don’t get worn out or anything?”

—
Not so far.

N’Doch nods to himself. Once again, the old codger is proved right. But he’s not about to point that out to anyone. “So, tell me. Why do
you
think you’re here?”

—
Something terrible is happening.

“Where? How? O God, o God!” He laughs, ’cause her tone is suddenly so dire and serious. Then it begins to work on him a little. “Wait, you mean, to me? You’re here, like, to protect me?”

—
No, jerk. Something much bigger than that. Something much more terrible, if you can imagine such a thing.

He answers her sarcasm with a snort. “Girl, something terrible is
always
happening. Bombs, wars, plagues, famine, you name it. How much more terrible can it get? And so what? Ain’t nothing you can do about it, ’cept move quick and avoid it when you can.”

—
No. There is always something you can do. I wouldn’t be here otherwise.

To N’Doch, this is pure blind faith, kind of like religion and just as stupid. Which means there is no point him arguing it with her. But he can’t let her off too easy. “So you’re here to save the world, huh? If you ask me, which you didn’t, you’re way too late. But I guess you’re not likely to be talked out of trying.”

—
No.

She looks at him, he thinks, a bit sadly, and despite his bravado, he feels a definite pang, a sense he’s let her down.

“Hey, listen, you’re into that, fine. I got nothing better to do.” He’s trying to lighten things up a little. “I don’t know too much about saving the world, but I can take care of the little things. Like, I got it all figured out how we’re gonna get you into the City.”

P
apa Djawara insists on giving the girl the privacy of the house, so he and N’Doch bed down on the cooking porch. N’Doch doesn’t really mind, though he feels he has to grump a little bit so she sees it’s not
his
idea to cater to her. But there are enough mats and cushions to soften the hard slab and the faint coolness of the concrete is actually a relief. And it’s a novel and nostalgic pleasure to be able to sleep outside and not really worry too much about having his throat slit in the night. He figures the dogs will kick up a ruckus if anyone comes around. He’d have a dog in town, if it wasn’t so hard to keep one fed. He sleeps well into the morning and is waked only by the racket of Djawara among his pots, eagerly preparing the midday meal. He’s surrounded by silvery piles of fish.

“They’re perfect!” he croons, scaling and gutting and laying out the fillets to dry. “They brought them this morning! Isn’t it wonderful? Fish for a month! I’ve never seen such fish!”

“Baraga’s,” says N’Doch sourly. “Just hope he hasn’t got each one tagged with a tracer.”

The prospect of fresh fish cheb has made Djawara mellow. “Now,
that
is paranoid.”

“He’d do it. He’s really touchy about holding on to what belongs to him.” N’Doch scratches, looks around. “So where’s the girl?”

“The Lady Erde is inside, looking at books.”

“
The Lady Erde?
” N’Doch mimics mincingly.

“Your companion is a baron’s daughter, did you know that?”

“Yeah, so she told me. Rich girl. But hey, that was back
in 900 whatever, and she didn’t bring any of it with her.” Except of course, one big red stone set in silver. How come
his
dragon didn’t come with a jewel? “She’s no better’n me now.”

Djawara smiles. “Of course not. But if you bear in mind that she’s grown up being treated as if she was, you might understand her better.”

“I don’t need to understand her. Long as she doesn’t mess with me, we’ll get along fine.”

“I see.” Djawara lays several thick white fillets in his rush steamer and fits it on top of his biggest pot. He carries it carefully out to the cook fire.

“What’s she want with books, anyway?” N’Doch calls after him from the shade of the porch.

Bending over the steamer, Djawara shakes his head. “Are you always this truculent?”

“No, I . . . c’mon, Papa, I just woke up.”

“No wonder your mama didn’t mind when you left home.”

N’Doch blinks at him. “I haven’t left home.”

“Well, that’ll be news to your mama.”

That slows him down a little. “Yeah? Well, I guess it’s true I haven’t been around much.” But he’s always thought at least she missed him. Certainly he’s liked knowing she was there if he needed someone to take care of him.

He’d like to discuss this further, but the girl comes out of the house with a stack of open books in her arms, and N’Doch doesn’t see that his family problems are any of her business. She greets him politely and sets the books down on the edge of the concrete, then takes the top one out to Djawara at the cook fire and starts questioning him about it. N’Doch sees all the books are open to pictures.

“So, what’s she wanna know?”

“Everything.”

N’Doch laughs. “Guess we’ll be here a while after all.”

Djawara studies the page she’s held up and answers her in detail. She nods thoughtfully and goes back for another book. Djawara says, “She’s trying to find her footing in an unfamiliar world, my boy. Seems she’s not had much help from your direction.”

“Yeah? Well, I’m doing the best I can.”

“I’m sure you are.”

Stung, N’Doch turns away into the house. Already, he’s searching instinctively in his head for the dragon. He’s pretty sure she’ll be glad to see him, even if no one else is.

*   *   *

Waking early, Erde had found herself surrounded by the mage’s extensive library. She studied the books from her pallet on one of the cushioned benches. They were not at all like the books she knew and she longed to touch them. But one did not just go fingering a mage’s books, it wasn’t wise, so she kept her distance until she heard Djawara puttering about outside. Then she went out to greet him respectfully and ask if one of his magical tomes might contain a searching spell to help them locate the Summoner.

The old man laughed gently. “There’s no magic in these books, daughter. Only the magic of knowledge.” He led her back inside, then picked out a fat one and handed it to her.

Erde received the shiny, colorful object in reverent hands. The bindings were hard and smooth but worn, she could see, with serious and important usage. It did not seem to be made of leather, but it did have a pretty design of leaves embossed in fading gold on the top cover. She glanced at Djawara and when he nodded permission, opened the book carefully. Bright illuminations greeted her, exotic fruits and flowers and trees, full of fine realistic detail without a trace of brushwork. Turning page after page, she sighed in wonder and admiration.

“That’s a natural history of the region,” he explained. “It describes the local plant life.”

Erde nodded. His herbarium, then. Every mage must have an herbarium.

He pulled down another, larger volume. “This one’s an atlas. Maps of the world.” He flipped through the pages. “Ah, yes, here we go.” He took the plant book from her and laid the big atlas in her lap. “This is modern Germany.”

At first, the page in front of her was just a maze of colored blocks and lines. She couldn’t even recognize it as a map. Then he traced out the long sinuous snaking of the Rhine and asked her to name a few familiar places. The first one they located was Köthen.

The dragon calls him to come join her, she’s under the trees, but N’Doch won’t go into that place after her. It’s just too weird. She says it’s too hot and dry in the yard for her, so each stays where they are and N’Doch sits down in the less mysterious shade of the lemon tree and sings his songs to her until Djawara calls him for the midday meal.

When they’re seated once more around the communal bowl, with the dragons listening in from the trees to translate and N’Doch’s mouth is watering so from the sweet smell of steamed fresh fish in tomato sauce that he can hardly concentrate, Djawara announces that he knows someone in the City who might be able to help them.

It’s news to N’Doch that his old uncool grandpapa knows anyone in the City at all.

“It’s been many years since we were in touch, but we were good friends then and she was a gifted woman of great promise.”

“Good friends, eh, Papa Dja?” N’Doch grins at him, trying for a moment of male bonding.

Djawara smiles. “Not that kind of friends, my boy. Her interests lie elsewhere. At least, they did at the time.”

N’Doch nods. He knows what that usually means, but he wonders if the girl does. He wonders if they had women who love women back in 913. He hopes so, ’cause if not, he’s not sure he wants to be the one to explain it to her. Like, what if she’s that way herself and doesn’t know it? He wouldn’t want to get caught making any kind of value judgment. Not that he minds it himself or anything.
Chacun à son goût.
He just considers it a waste of good women.

“What is her Gift, Master Djawara?” asks the girl earnestly, and once again N’Doch finds himself wishing she’d lighten up for just one damn moment. He’s seen her smile, but he’s never heard her laugh like she really meant it.

“She speaks with the spirits and with the wandering shades of the ancestors.”

Now,
this
is the Djawara N’Doch remembers. Spooks and spirits and omens and what all.

“Is she a saint?” asks the girl. N’Doch rolls his eyes.

“No, Lady Erde. She is a human woman.”

“All the saints were human, Master Djawara, when they lived. But then they were touched by God.” Her thin face
sobers even further, but N’Doch thinks she looks hopeful. “Is she a witch?”

Djawara chuckles. “I’m not sure what she might be calling herself these days. Then, she was my father’s brother’s wife’s sister, and didn’t call herself anything except her name, which is Lealé.”

“If it’s been so long, how do we find her, Papa Dja?”

The old man looks momentarily bemused. “As it happens, I know where she lives . . . I think.” He gets up, crosses to one of the bookshelves and takes down a slim green book. From it, he extracts a postcard. He hands it to N’Doch.

N’Doch reads it, crinkles his brow, then reads it aloud. “‘D.—When the Time comes . . . you see she’s put a capital ‘t’ . . . ‘this is the place: 913 Rue de l’Eau. Kisses—L.’” He looks up at his grandfather. “Sure this is her?”

“Oh, yes.”

“
Water
Street? 913?” He looks at the postmark. “When did you get this?”