Jo Clayton: Wild Magic

Then they waited.

The Manasso acolytes came for Juvalgrim midmorning of the day after he woke in the cell. They threw an old patched cloak over him, then set him on his feet, unbuckled the straps about his legs and made him walk ahead of them.

It was time for his burning. He knew it though the only words they spoke were curt commands to get a move on, turn right, turn left.

Hurting and hungry, he didn’t know if he had the strength to walk all the way down the Jiko without falling on his face, but he set himself to the task, one foot then the other and after a while, his body took over and his mind floated free. Fear was something far off, like a stain of smoke on the horizon.

Reyna.

He smiled as he thought about Reyna. The Salagaum that Yoyote despised was a better man than both of them. Twenty years of… something. Love? Who knows. It was good, what they had; no need to put a name to it.

One of the acolytes grabbed his arm and turned him onto the ramp that led down to the Outer Ring Road, sinking fingers into one of his ,larger bruises and star-tling a sound from him, a low gulping moan that he cut off as soon as he could.

The pain went away.

The cloak fluttering about him, he walked on.

The Cheoshim towers were silent, the Parade Grounds emptied out, the windows like holes in a skull.

The Biasharim towers were desolate, with broken windows, char marks from the fires that burned to ash the dried-out women’s gardens.

The Prophet had purified the city all right. It was so pure, so sterile, nothing could live there.

Sadness drifted along beside him. He remembered what had been and mourned it. A little.

The Sok Circle was dusty and deserted. The hot wind blew scraps of paper, straw, cloth across the paving stones, plastered them against the pyres built there. One in the middle and a dozen others scattered around the rim of the Circle. Stacks of wood torn from abandoned houses and limbs from dead trees were piled neatly around the tall poles to make platforms for the prisoners to stand on.

The Salagaum were there, all of them that were left. Not many. Tied two to a pole, their feet sunk into the wood piles. Reyna was alone. In the middle. Tied to the pole that was waiting for him.

When Juvalgrim saw him, he struggled to say something, but all he could make was a breathy gurgling sound that no one could hear two steps away.

“Be quiet, you.” One of the acolytes slapped him, hit the wound on his head, and he catapulted into darkness.

He woke as cold water splashed into him, heard a splat and clatter as the bucket man jumped down. He was strapped to the pole; his hands were pressed against Reyna’s back; he could feel Reyna’s hands against his.

His detachment frayed, blew away.

Fire.

He’d never been Ole to deal with pain.

All his life he’d slipped and slid to avoid even the hint of pain-and not just for himself. There was that. Not just for himself. A flare of pleasure at the thought. It died fast. Pain was now. He swallowed and struggled to keep his resolution. Don’t give them the satisfaction. Don’t let them see you crawl!

A drift of oily smoke blew into his face, stung his eyes.

Torches. They’re really going to do it.

“Pervert! Destroyer of families. Demon lover!”

Juvalgrim blinked away the smoke tears that blurred his vision, angled his head so he could look down. Prophet. He gazed at the man with weary contempt. Satisfied, Prophet? Behold your labors and rejoice. You’ve killed love and happiness, joy and sharing. You’ve killed the city as thoroughly as your… no… our god has killed the land. The Sibyl says it was unavoidable. I spit on unavoidable. He managed a kind of chuckle, a gulping gurgle at the back of his throat. Or I would. V you gave me back my tongue. Afraid of a word, are you? My doom is yours, fool. Another gurgling chuckle. Too bad I won’t be around to see it. He trembled, wrenched his mind away from the torches and what they meant. Drooping against the straps that bound him to the pole he watched the Prophet stride about, mouthing curses and anathemas, overriding the Manasso Prime who wanted to get the burning started. Good boy, keep it up. The longer you go on, the longer we keep breathing.

On the Iron Bridge the Rite began.

Adjoa Prime and Anaxoa Prime were slick with sweat again as they brought the Great Hammers down on the Sacred Anvil:

Iron Father, come and bless us

Giver of Strength and Might

Come O Lawgiver, make this wrong right…Anacho Drummers stroked the tall Drums of the Dead doom da doom da doom…

The hand drums the pages held rattled tank t tank t t t tank tank…

The small bronze hammers of the kassos beat against their small bronze anvils, the tinka fink; sinking into the chant and emerging from it, sinking again…

A wall of SOUND funneled along the Iron Bridge, hammered at the Barrier.

At the rim of the South Eka Kumata, the attack of the army began.

Swordsmen from the hostas spread along the Barrier, poked and slashed at it; when they tired, others took their places.

Heavyarm Lancers rode their warhorses at the Bar-

rier. The horses reared, slammed their armored fore-hooves into it, reared again and again. They withdrew. Came at it again. Hammered at it. Hammered. Others took their places when they tired. Hammered and hammered.

Lightarm Lancers slammed butt and point against the Barrier, rode the rebounds, slammed at it again and again; when they tired, others took their places.

The hosta Captains prowled along behind their men, followed by drummer pages counting cadence to keep the blows thumping together to set up a resonance in the Barrier and crack it that way.

More impatient and hostile, the Cheoshim Commanders mixed with their men; even Champion Om-mad, the Commander Prime of the Lancers, swung down from his warhorse, tossed the reins to his page and took his saber to go the Barrier.

On and on. Endlessly hammering. Slicing. Thumping. On and on.

On the Northbank of the River, Riverman stood under the Camuctarr Gatt and shook water from his ears. He climbed the bank, hesitated on the edge of the weedy wasteland that was the lower slopes of Mount Fogamalin, then began toiling upward, a small brown shadow in the dessicated dead landscape.

In the Great Grove at the center of the Low City, teeth grinding in anger, fighting her NEED to wrench free of the god’s claws, Faan leapt and turned on the damp earth, in and out of the arching, embracing Sequba roots, threads spinning out from her, calling to her side the Honeygirls, calling among others Ma’teesee and Dossan.

A sword hacked at the Barrier. She grunted with pain and kept on dancing, a red line running across her shoulder. Hooves slammed down. Red curves bloomed

on her thigh and she whined through her teeth-and danced.

She drew strength from the Earthfire. From the Honeygirls who came and danced with her, weaving through the Grove. From the Wild Magic swirling in a silver mist about her. And almost none from the god.

The moththeries that belonged to the trees came dripping like rain down the Sequba trunks and flittered about her, drawn like mundane moths to a flame.

Blood bruises lacing every inch of her body, swaying and groaning, goddriven through an endless wheeling Dance, she fought to HOLD.