Eric Flint: Mother of Demons

Another pause.

"Then, there is the problem of the Pilgrims. Many of them will want to join the army. Some were warriors themselves, in times past. From Ansha, and other prevalates. But most are helots, with little skill or training in the craft of war."

Another pause.

"And finally, there is the problem of the former Utuku. Warriors all, and brave ones. Do not deny it, simply because of your distaste for their former habits. They have renounced those habits, and they too must somehow be incorporated into the new army."

A long pause.

"You see the problem? It is not enough to have a commander. She must be able to command an army-an army, a whole and well-knit cloth. But we do not have such a cloth, today. Nor do we have much time in which to weave one."

Ushulubang looked at Rottu. "You estimate that the Beak and the main army of the Utuku will arrive at the Chiton in three eightweeks, am I not correct?"

The spymistress made the gesture of tentative affirmation.

"Approximately. The former Utuku whom I interviewed all agreed that the Beak took the main army south after the battle of the Lolopopo. Leaving only two ogghoxt to watch the Swamp in case Kopporu emerged. One ogghoxt we destroyed. The other will remain in its assigned position south and west of the Swamp. In the meantime, the Beak is preoccupied with completing the conquest of the Papti Plain. Not all of the tribes joined with the Kiktu. Several retreated south, and are still opposing the Utuku."

She made the gesture of certainty.

"They will not succeed in that opposition. But they will keep the Beak occupied for some time. Enough time-barely-for us to weave a new army. And there is an added benefit. Refugees from broken tribes are trickling north. Some have already reached the Chiton. At my suggestion, Kopporu has already dispatched small battle groups into the plain to seek for such refugees. We can add their threads to the cloth."

Rottu fell silent. Seamlessly, Ushulubang continued.

"We have everything we need to weave our army. We have the nashiyonu, which is our loom. And we have the warp and the weft-the ummun, the tribespeople, the Pilgrims, the former Utuku, the new refugees. But-"

"We need a shuttle," said Kopporu. "Someone-it will have to be gukuy-who knows the Anshac methods of war. And the ways of the tribespeople."

"Just so."

Kopporu's mantle turned black.

"And someone who will be able to instill discipline of bronze. A warrior so feared and respected that none will dare challenge her."

"Just so."

After a moment, one by one, all who were present began staring at Dhowifa.

PART V: The Shuttle

Dhowifa himself brought the summons. As she watched her little lover approach their yurt, Nukurren found it hard not to whistle derision.

He's getting fat, the lazy little creature. Look at him waddle along! Even slower than usual. He's gotten used to riding in Ushulubang, and working no other muscles than those of his siphon. Which he works constantly.

But, as always, Nukurren did not begrudge Dhowifa the new life he had found on the mountain. She did not begrudge him the comfort of his new friendship with Guo's malebond, nor the joy he found in Ushulubang's company.

No, not at all. After eightyweeks of misery as an outcast, Dhowifa had found acceptance. More than that, he had found hope and purpose. He was well into the Coil, now, learning the Way of the Pilgrim, and learning it very well. Still shy at times, uncertain, diffident. But Nukurren knew that if Ushulubang had, at first, called Dhowifa the best of the new apashoc out of her desire to shake the error of the Answer, she did so now because it was the simple truth. And many apashoc, especially the younger ones, were learning to shed their bigotry and seek discourse with the unnatural truemale whose understanding of the Question was subtle, supple, and uncanny.

Dhowifa's happiness stemmed from other things he had found on the mountain, as well. He had spent hours in the company of the Mother of Demons, during meetings of the council. Returning each time with new awe and wonder at what he had heard. And a growing adoration for Inudiratoledo herself, and the new world she was making.

No, Nukurren loved Dhowifa, and was glad for him, and listened, patiently if not attentively, to everything which Dhowifa told her. But she herself said nothing. It was not that she disbelieved. Simply that-she didn't care.

She didn't seem to care about anything, anymore. It was as if she had lost her soul along with her eye. Her heart kept beating, her lungs kept breathing. Beyond that-nothing. She had no need of shoroku to keep her mantle gray. Her soul itself was gray. All around her, day after day, she watched a new world being created. A strange new tapestry, woven of mysterious alien threads, colored in dazzling hues.

With, as always, no place in it for her.

It was not that she was outcast. Not at all. Oh, no, not at all.

She was admired, now. Respected, praised, even adulated. New chants were being chanted, throughout the Chiton, of the battle which was called Shatalunungurdu. (Ushulubang had decreed that strange name, for reasons known to none, save, perhaps, the Mother of Demons.)

Glorious, triumphant chants. (Longwinded ones, too, but none complained.) Chants which told of the exploits of heroes and champions. Of the sagacity of Kopporu, and the battlecraft of her warriors, and the might of Guo, and the honor of her malebond (and none objected to the presence of males in a battlechant, unheard-of though it was), and the valor of the Pilgrims against the shield wall, and the ferocity of Ludumilaroshokavashiki and Takashimidudzhugodzhi, and the fleetness of their apalatunush, and the spearcast of Yoshefadekunula, and the courage of his Companions (for so, in fact, they were called in the chants), especially the great warrior Dzhenushkunutushen.

And, most of all, of Nukurren the Valiant. Many new chants had been composed, over the past eightweeks, by chantresses of all peoples. Pilgrim chants and Kiktu chants, and Opoktu chants, and chants by former swamp-dwellers, and even, in a strange unrhythmic meter, a short chant by a young demon named Anagushohara. Each chant was somewhat different. A Kiktu chantress might dwell on the details of the battle on the Utuku left flank; a Pilgrim chantress, on the fury at the shield wall. But in one respect, all chants agreed:

The height of the battle, the decisive moment, the turning point, the pivot of history, the opening of the Way and the salvation of the peoples, had been the Charge of Nukurren. The Kutaku of the Coil, as many chants called it.

Oh, glory and grandeur and triumph and hope!

Oh, valor and courage and heroism and nobility!

Nukurren the Mighty! Nukurren the Bold!

Nukurren the Champion!

Nukurren had heard the chants. Had been unable not to hear them, for all that the chants grated on her soul. During the long days after the battle, she had remained in the hospital at Dzhenushkunutushen's bedside. Nukurren herself had suffered only minor mantle-wounds during her charge, quickly healed. But Dzhenushkunutushen had lain near death. He had not suffered any single great wound. But he had nearly bled to death, for it seemed as if his entire body had been flailed.

As, indeed, it had been. Most of his wounds had been received at the very end of the battle, in the last moments before Nukurren reached the little band of human warriors in the center. For, at the end, Yoshefadekunula had fallen, knocked down in the press of the fray by the staggering body of another demon, mortally injured. Unhurt, but helpless, the demonlord had been the target of all the remaining Utuku. At last, the cannibals had seen their chance to destroy the implacable demon who had been the most terrible of them all, and they had fallen upon him.