Women of War (42 page)

They conferred. Then Narjin rose and crossed the threshing ground to Andrasta's side. Although many long glances followed the clan leader, work resumed immediately. Andrasta noted the rise and fall of flails, the bending of bare muscular backs to the labor, and for a moment was strongly aware of her own vulnerability. The intangible force of Gharebi retaliation, not her own strong sword arm or battlefield prowess, was what made her safe.

And that safety, too, will vanish if the road builders have their way,
Andrasta thought.
I wonder if those warlords gathered in my grandfather's tent realize how great is our danger?

“May I speak with you, clan leader,” Andrasta said to Narjin, “somewhere private?”

“My tent would be private,” Narjin answered, “but the afternoon is warm and pleasant. Perhaps we can seat ourselves on that hillock.” She indicated one a short distance away dominated by a tree large enough to create a patch of shade, but far too small to hide any spy.

Andrasta nodded. “That will do nicely.”

Narjin turned to young Utberu. “Grandson, go fetch cool water for the mistress and her horse. Tell your mother to provide appropriate refreshment, and to bring it here.”

Utberu nodded, made his bow to Andrasta, then took off at an excited run. Carrying messages—even hauling buckets of water—certainly was preferable to whatever routine tasks Andrasta's arrival had drawn him from.

Andrasta and Narjin made their way onto the hillock. Flame trailed obediently after, stopping here and there to crop a mouthful of grass. On the hillock, Narjin lowered herself to the ground, while Andrasta leaned her back against the tree truck, unconsciously scanning the surrounding area as she would on watch.

“Narjin, have you heard what I discovered after leaving your camp?”

Narjin did not pretend ignorance. “Your discoveries stirred up a hornet's nest, mistress. The hum has reached even here.”

“Your people are safe,” Andrasta said, “at least from being accused of complicity in the attack on my patrol. My father and uncle have fled, but far from matters being resolved, they have only grown worse.”

“Worse?” Narjin asked.

“The road builders are coming,” Andrasta said. “Their armies are already prepared against us.”

Narjin shook her head, daring to disagree. “Matters are no worse, mistress. These things were already in motion before your discovery. The only thing that has changed is your knowledge of them. Is it worse to know of a storm before it comes?”

Andrasta smiled faintly. “Sometimes, especially when you are far from shelter or on a flat plain where the lightning can seek you out unless you lie flat in the mud. Against the storm that is coming I fear there is no shelter, and Gharebi on horseback tend to draw the lightning.”

“Even the mud,” Narjin said, “can be poor protection. Lightning spreads through wetness as well as striking those who ride high.”

“What we need,” Andrasta said, “if we are to survive this storm intact, is to be the wind that drives back the storm clouds.”

The two women, old and young, slave and free, Ootoi and Gharebi, warrior and healer, looked at each other for a space as still as the moment between claps of thunder. Then Narjin spoke.

“We Ootoi are not warriors. Once, we were a warrior people. The spirit is still there, but we lack the skills.”

Andrasta indicated the threshers with a toss of her head. “Those flails lack edges, but that doesn't mean they couldn't break bones or bruise. Your farmers use scythes, your smiths hammers. Initially, those could be adapted as weapons. Later, there would be time for more sophisticated training. Swords may be difficult to acquire except as prizes of battle—especially if the road builders cut off our trade—but spears are easily enough made, and devastating against mounted opponents.”

“You seem to have thought this through,” Narjin said.

“You forget,” Andrasta said, “someone else already did much of the thinking along these lines. That ‘slave band' that slaughtered my patrol mostly used weapons such as I have named. There were a few swords among them, but not too many else the deceit could not have been maintained. The question is not whether your people could be armed, it is whether they would fight.”

“Rather,” Narjin countered, “it is whether they would be permitted to fight.”

“Convincing Cescu that the Gharebi should permit the Ootoi to fight would be my job,” Andrasta said with more conviction than she felt. “I think I have several arguments that might do so.”

Narjin nodded. “Need and fear are both strong prods. Many times I have convinced patients to agree to a course of treatment that otherwise would be anathema to them on the grounds that otherwise they would die.”

Andrasta smiled. “Such as drinking some noxious potion?”

“I was thinking more of amputation,” Narjin replied without humor. “That is what you must convince great Cescu to agree to—an amputation of sorts. Only one incentive will make my people rise and fight on behalf of those who have kept us enslaved for generations. Otherwise, we might as well wait and see who our next masters would be. That would be the safer course, for as slaves we have some value.”

“Only one incentive, you say,” Andrasta said. “Would that be a promise that no repercussions will follow your taking up arms?”

Andrasta had already thought of this. One of the often debated points of the Gharebi code regarding the treatment of slaves was what should be done about a slave who took up arms in a good cause—in defense of self, or of a master, a child, or some vulnerable animal.

The conservative argued that this was still a punishable offense, for slaves must never bear arms. The more liberal argued that self-defense, and by extension defense of those incapable of self-defense, was a natural law, one that superseded later codes. Great Cescu's views fell in between these two groups. With an enemy pressing, Andrasta thought she could get Cescu to accept the more liberal interpretation.

“I think I can convince my grandfather that any slaves who took up arms against the road builders would be free from punishment,” Andrasta said aloud.

Narjin slowly shook her head. “That is not the incentive I meant, Andrasta, though such concessions would be automatically contained within it. No. What must be given to us is our freedom—pure and absolute, with no conditions attached.”

“Freedom for those Ootoi who fight?” Andrasta asked woodenly, knowing this was not what Narjin meant.

Again Narjin shook her head. “Freedom for all of us, every single Ootoi: men, women, children, and aged grandlings. Each and every one. What use would freedom be to us if a husband was freed while his wife was still a slave? How would a married couple feel if they were free but their children and parents were still slaves?”

“They would feel they had traded one form of bondage for another,” Andrasta said, answering as she might some instructor.

“Exactly,” Narjin replied. “Freedom must be extended to each and every Ootoi—that is the only promise that will bring us to fight willingly and with strength at your side. Otherwise we will stand aside to live or die as the invaders will. Consider this, too, without the promise of freedom some slaves might indeed rise up and fight against the Gharebi or take this opportunity to flee.”

“Other Ootoi might not feel as you do,” Andrasta said, a trace angrily. She had thought her offer to have Cescu defer punishment quite generous, and didn't like realizing how callow, even cruel it had been.

“True,” Narjin said equably. “You might win a handful here and there to fight for you on other terms, but tell me, young warrior, would you want a woman fighting beside you who would leave her kin enslaved? I wouldn't.”

“I wouldn't either,” Andrasta said slowly. “You're right. How will I ever convince Grandfather Cescu to understand this?”

Narjin looked at her, her expression wry. “Tell him about the coming storm. Tell him about lightning. Tell him his clan, perhaps his entire people, face extermination.”

“I'd rather,” Andrasta said, thinking of Rangest's words, “steal fire from the sun.”

Utberu was approaching now, a waterskin over his shoulder, a pair of buckets slung from a yoke about his neck. Andrasta accepted the waterskin with a polite nod, drank, then offered it to Narjin. She took the buckets from Utberu and went to water Flame. Even as she took care that the horse did not drink too deeply or too fast, Andrasta's mind was racing, confronting the impossibility of the task before her.

Her thoughts were broken by Utberu's voice raised in alarm.

“Riders!” he cried. “Gharebi warriors.”

Andrasta wheeled. Her trained eye added to Utberu's words. Gharebi warriors, yes, but among them, mounted on a strong buckskin stallion, was her grandfather Cescu. In front, mounted on a blue roan, rode a young warrior Andrasta knew from their shared training. Ignoring the Ootoi, this outrider pulled up alongside Andrasta and spoke without pause.

“Andrasta, you left the council suddenly, and when you did not return, your grandfather grew concerned. Nothing would suit him but to come immediately in search of you.”

Andrasta saw the hand of the gods in great Cescu coming to her at this time in this place. She tapped Flame upon her shoulder and the mare knelt.

“I will come immediately,” Andrasta said, vaulting onto Flame's back. Then she turned and faced Narjin. “Time to steal fire from the sun.”

Narjin's face lit like that very sun, but it was the surety that just for a moment Andrasta saw Rangest standing alongside Narjin that gave the young warrior confidence that she could triumph. Then Andrasta the Dawn Rider wheeled her bay mare Flame and rode forth once again to do battle.

—Anaïs Nin

—Juvenal

 

 

M
AMA, how many Ghastlies have you killed?”

Delia forced a smile to her face. There was a picture on the nightstand alongside the bed, and Delia glanced at it, seeing the echo of her child's soft, bright red curls frothing around her earnest, round face. “That's not important, darling,” she said. “Go to sleep now.”

“But I want to know, Mama. How many?”

“I don't know,” Delia admitted. “I'm afraid I really don't know. It's not really possible for me to know. Now, it's time to go to sleep and let your Mama rest for tomorrow. Do you hear me?”

“Yes, Mama,” Cailin answered sweetly. “I hear you. Would you sing me a song, then, before we go to sleep?”

Delia sighed. “Honey, I'm so tired ...”

Cailin giggled at that. “Then I'll sing, Mama. Can I, Mama?”

Delia smiled. “Yes, that would be lovely. A nice, soft lullaby.”

“Good dreams, 'kay?”

“I'll try, love. Good dreams.”

Cailin began singing then, in a quiet, half-whisper. Listening to her daughter's voice, Delia closed her eyes.

 

Padding silently across the tiled floor, she placed the cold edge of the dagger against his throat as he sat in the chair, reading from one of the several scrolls on his desk in the golden candlelight. She shook her head as he started to turn. “Be still and quiet,” she said, “or I will kill you here and now.” He went still. “Good,” she told him. “Now, put your hands underneath you and keep them there. If I see you so much as twitch, you'll die in the next instant.” He complied, and she slowly moved around the high-backed chair, keeping the point of her long dagger always at his throat. She stopped just to one side, so that her shadow didn't stop the candlelight from reaching his handsome face; the face she hated.

“How did you get in here?” he grunted. He was trying to hold his bearded chin away from the point of her blade, glaring at her.

“That doesn't matter, does it? I'm here. I wonder if you can guess why.”

“You're an assassin.”

She smiled a bit at that. “Aye,” she told him. “I am.” She took a step away from him then and laid a dagger, the twin to the one she held, on the desk. The
clack
as the hilt hit lacquered wood made him flinch, and she saw his gaze go to the weapon as she took another step back.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

“Giving you the chance you never gave my family,” she told him. “I think that if you're willing to kill someone, you should also be willing to look them in the face as you do it. Don't you?” She smiled at him. He still hadn't moved. “Oh, that's right. You don't. You send your people to do those things for you, don't you? You hate to sully those pretty little hands. Well, your people aren't with you now. I am. I'll even give you the chance you never gave my family and my people.” She nodded to the dagger. “Take it,” she said, the smile collapsing. “Now.”

His eyes widened. She saw his throat pulse as he swallowed. He lurched forward, his fingers stretching toward the knife's hilt. She waited until he had it in his hand, until—grimacing, his eyes bulging and frantic—he started to slash wildly in her direction, half-rising from the chair. Then she moved, a quick and graceful turn and slide that evaded his attack and left her dagger buried in his heart. His weapon clattered to the floor as he gasped; his free hand grasped her arm, fingers clutching at the bunched white cotton sleeves. She felt his grip relax, saw his stare go distant and fixed. A thin rivulet of blood trickled from the corner of his mouth and down his chin. He fell back into the chair.