Jay Lake - Endurance

“I find it more likely that Mother Vajpai has encouraged you to think this,” I told Samma. “To bait me into her grasp once more. I will not return to her again.”

“No, Green.” Samma sounded almost desperate now. Close to tears. “Please listen to me. The plots in the embassy are as thick as silkworm webs on a mulberry bush.”

“That is the way of Kalimpuri politics,” I told her. “And everywhere else, too, I suppose. This does not mean some great effort is being made to slay our goddess. They work for advantage, that their names may be ascendant.”

I was loyal to the Lily Goddess, albeit very irregular in my observances, but I was not dedicated to Her political power, or the particular fortunes of Her temple. If the Temple Mother and the Justiciary Mother and Mother Vajpai wanted to fritter their years on those disputes, it was no game of mine.

There were gods aplenty here in Copper Downs to trouble me.

“I-I brought you something,” Samma said, her voice very small indeed. “By way of proof.”

She reached inside her Blade leathers and pulled forth a small velvet sack that had been lying close to her left breast. I knew how she favored that one when at play, so perhaps she had drawn comfort from having her secrets there.

Samma hefted the sack. I could see it was light. Money? It was not so heavy, not at all. Some ancient sigil, perhaps. But when she tugged the drawstring, two gems spilled into the palm of her left hand: a green tourmaline and a cobalt spinel.

“The Eyes of the Hills,” I whispered.

They had returned to Copper Downs. No wonder the Revanchists were down out of their high forests and meadows. I felt ill as I realized how much of that supposed plot had to be real.

Maybe Osi and Iso were right after all. Set the Selistani embassy and the pardine factions on one another, then simply clear the streets.

“Where did you get those?” I asked her.

Samma shook her head, miserable, as she tucked the Eyes of the Hills back into their velvet bag. “I h-had some gems, to barter for cash or goods or passage, as I began to pursue you. I stole these from Mother Vajpai, but left her with two other gems so she would not note the theft so quickly.”

“You stole from Mother Vajpai?” This was not the Samma I had known.

“I’m no longer the scared girl you dumped when you became a star among the Blades,” she said in a determined voice. “All we do is police Kalimpura, and spend our time there. When Mother Vajpai sent me after you alone, with Captain Padma and those t-terrible men, I think I learned some things. Maybe I grew up.”

“You may not be a scared girl,” I said simply, “but you are a frightened young woman.”

“Possibly. But I c-couldn’t just let it be. Not once I knew Mother Vajpai carried something Surali wanted real bad.”

Ah-ha.

“So they argued over these?”

“Surali has been beside herself for this whole trip.”

Which made me wonder all over again if Mother Vajpai had manipulated Samma into even this betrayal. A way to secure my help without asking me.

Oh, the wheels inside the wheels of this were making my head ache.

A solution of sorts came unbidden into my thoughts. “Give the gems to me.”

She stank of a sudden surge of fear sweat, then closed her fist. “No. I might need to put them back.”

“I can keep them far safer from Surali than Mother Vajpai can.” Which was almost certainly not literally true, but I was willing to hang on to the thought for right now. “Also, I know what to do with them, to ensure that no harm comes to the Lily Goddess through the agency of these gems.”

“They’re powerful, aren’t they?” Every now and then, Samma showed something of what the training mothers had seen in her. She slipped the sack back within her leathers.

I could not allow her to leave with them. “All by themselves, perhaps not.” I grabbed hold of her wrist. “But they have the power of a symbol, and are connected to an ancient magic here in the city which has been stolen and re-stolen.”

“They’re not yours, Green.” Samma tried to pull away from my grip.

Tugging her toward me, I leaned in close. “They’re not yours, either. And they are dangerous.”

Samma yanked herself almost free, rising to her feet. I came up with her, then tripped her ruthlessly by the bad leg I’d injured previously. That dumped her to the ground in front of the temple steps with a hiss of pain. I followed with a body pin of my own weight, pressing her into the graveled soil as my right hand snaked inside her leathers to retrieve the gems in their sack.

Recovering her breath, Samma kicked up with her knee, catching me painfully in the thigh. I dug a thumb into the edge of her eye. “Do not try me further.” I was not pleased with myself, but I had neither time nor patience for her foolishness.

She went limp, surrendering as she used to on the practice floor and in our shared bed. “ Greeeeeeen,” she gasped in whining misery.

I rolled off her and stood, wary of some last-minute trickery on her part. “Not a word of this to anyone, not even Mother Vajpai.” Especially not Mother Vajpai.

Betrayal was written large upon Samma’s face, scratching open a sense of guilt which I rarely experienced. “I was trying to help you,” she sniffed.

“You have.” I glanced down at the velvet bag, then tugged at the drawstring until the Eyes of the Hills spilled out once more, this time into my waiting hand. They tingled with that familiar metal-in-the-mouth feeling of something touched by the divine. It was all I could do not to glance skyward and look for the lightning strike to come.

Instead I leaned forward and kissed Samma gently. “Go home. Back to the embassy, then back to Selistan.”

Her lips surged against mine, an old habit of sexual hunger between us; then she tore away, saying, “I hate you.” But the tone of her voice told me differently.

Watching her totter out, limping yet, I wondered if I should have sent for a carriage. When she disappeared past the far side of the gate, I turned my attention to the pair of gems in my hand. Once again, I had a feeling I’d paid too much for too little reward. Except for their size, the stones were unremarkable enough to casual inspection. Blue and green, a pair of eyes that reminded me muchly of Michael Curry. I was fairly certain no one but a priest would sense the power that buzzed against my hand like a trapped wasp.

What if I had not killed him then? Would all this be different now? What if I had not just bullied Samma, hurt her to force the girl to my will?

I dismissed all of that as fruitless. It occurred to me that my very best source of information would be the Factor’s ghost, for in his guise as the Duke, he had first stolen these away from the pardines.

The flaws in that idea were readily apparent, and so I abandoned it. No, I was done with turning to those who had once held authority over me to ask for help and more help. To the Smagadine hells with the Interim Council, the Factor, and even Mother Vajpai. Armed once again with the power of a god, I would seek out Osi and Iso and craft a response of my own.

Out on the streets once more in my guise as a lad of Copper Downs, I ignored my fading guilt about Samma and instead mused on Erio’s fears. Surely the Eyes of the Hills were what had caught at the old ghost’s attention. His own years far predated the late Duke’s appropriation of the pardine artifacts, but Erio, much like the tulpas of Below, had been focused on the city throughout the entire sorry history of the gems. Their power, both as legacy and whatever remained directly invested in them today, was now too closely tied to Copper Downs. That these gems drew the pardine Revanchists with their atavistic ways back into the city would be deeply frightening to a soul who remembered the older days of pardine Hunts and the brutal wars with the human settlers of this land.