Jo Clayton - Drinker of Souls

They left the last huts of the indigent behind before the sun was fully up, negotiated the waste, cursing ruts and briars, then rocked onto a country lane where the going was a bit easier. There was dew on the grass and low bushes, the morning was cool and bright, the smell of damp earth and soft wet grass almost strong enough to overcome the pungency of cow dung and dog droppings. They hauled the cart through long crisp shadows cast by fruit trees, nut trees, spice trees and an occasional cedar or sea-pine. All the bearing trees were heavy with ripe fruit or nuts or pods of spice. As the heat of the sun increased and licked up the dew, it also woke the heavy sweet perfume of the fruits and spices, the tang of the cedars. Bees and wasps hummed about, nibbling at late peaches and apricots, nectarines and apples, cherries and pears. The air was filled with their noises, with bird song, with the whisper of needles and leaves-and with the squeals, groans and rattles from the cart as it lurched in and out of ruts, one of the not so small irritations of being Hina or foreign in a Temueng-ruled world. If they could have used the paved Imperial Way, they’d have cut in half the effort and time it took to reach the causeway between Selt and Utar, but bored Temueng guards harassed even the wealthiest of Hina merchants using that road; what they’d do to a band of players didn’t bear thinking about.

FIVE HOURS AFTER they left Taguiloa’s house, they came out of a lane onto the rocky cliffs where a few skinny long-legged pigs rooted among the grass and weeds, trotting sure-footed on the edge of cliffs rotten and precipitous. Jaril eyed them warily, looked up at his soaring sister who had long since decided that she preferred wings to feet, made a face at her then shimmered into a tall fierce boar-hound and went back to trot beside the sweating straining adults; the small wild pigs were the only nonworking livestock on the island and had tempers worse than hungover Tern ueng tax-collectors.

The causeway towers were visible ahead, a barrier that had to be passed no matter how unpleasant or malicious the guards were; they needed to get their credeens there, the metal tags they had to have to show in every village or to any Temueng who stopped and required them. Taguiloa had travel permits for all of them, but the credeens were more important. It meant more bribes, it meant enduring whatever the guards wanted to do to them. These Temuengs were the scrapings of the army, left here while the better soldiers were off fighting the Emperor’s wars of conquest. Taguiloa saw them every time he looked up, saw them watching the clumsy progress of the tilt cart, talking together; the closer he got, the worse they looked. He began to worry for the women’s sake. The guards had to let them by eventually, but they knew and he knew that nothing they did to him or Brann or Harra or Linjijan or the children would bring them any punishment. His stomach churning, he kept his eyes down, his shoulders bent, hoping to ride out whatever happened, knowing he had no choice but to accept their tormenting. Resistance would only make things worse.

THE EMPUSH TURNED the papers over and over, inspecting every mark and seal on them, asking the same stupid questions again and again, jabbing a meaty forefinger into Taguiloa’s chest, hitting the same spot each time until Taga had to grit his teeth to keep from wincing. Only two of his four-command were visible, the others probably even drunker than their fellows and asleep inside the tower.

Brann endured the comments and catcalls, the ugly handling, though she was strongly tempted to suck a little of the life out of the Temuengs; might be doing the world a big favor if she drained them dry. She watched Harm and Taguiloa both stoically enduring their hazing and kept a precarious hold on her temper, but when the guards left their tormenting of the women and began leading Negomas and jaril toward the tower, she’d had enough. She went after them, covering the ground with long tiger strides. Harra bit her lip, then started whistling a strident tune that brought a large dust-devil whirling up the dirt lane and onto the Way where it slapped into the empush, distracting him so he wouldn’t see what was happening. Brann slapped her hand against a guard’s neck. He dropped as if she’d knocked him on the head. A breath later and the second guard followed him. Shooing the boys ahead of her, green eyes flashing scorn, she stalked back to Taguiloa and the empush.

Before he could object or question her, she caught hold of his hand and held it for a long long moment. By the time she released him, his face had gone slack, his eyes glazed. “Give us our credeens,” she said crisply.

Moving dreamily, the empush fumbled in his pouch and drew out a handful of the metal tags. She counted the proper number and tipped the rest into his hand. “Put these away.” She waited until he pulled the drawstring tight. “Give me the travel papers. Good. You’re going to forget all this, aren’t you. Answer me. Good. Now you can go into the tower with your drunken men and get some sleep. When you wake, you’ll remember having some fun with a troupe of players, but letting them go on their way after a while. The usual thing. You hear? Good. Never mind the men on the ground. They’ll wake when they’re ready. Go into the tower and crawl into bed. That’s right.” She watched tensely as he turned and stumbled into the tower, stepping over his men without seeing them.

Taguiloa raised a brow. “They dead?”

“Just very tired. Take them a couple days to get back to their usual nastiness.”

“Thought you wanted out with no trouble.”

“Comes a time, Taga, comes a time.” She gave him the travel permits and passed the credeens around.

“As long as he really forgets.” Taguiloa ducked under the shafts and got himself settled once more against the yoke. Linjijan looked mildly at him, then away again; he’d ignored most of what had gone before, looking at the guards with such calm surprise when they poked at him that they left off in disgust.

Brann drew her hand across her sweaty, dirty face, grimaced at the streaks of mud on her palm. “It’s worked before. In Tavisteen, well, you wouldn’t know about that. Let’s get moving. I feel naked standing around like this.”

THEY WERE STOPPED at the Utar end of the causeway, but that empush was only interested in his bribe and let them pass without much difficulty. He had a sour spiteful look, but his men were out of sight, perhaps even out of call and he wasn’t going to start trouble, not on Utar with his commander a sneeze away.

They curved around the edge of the terraced mountain that took up the greater part of Utar, keeping to the broad Way on the lowest level where the haughty Temueng lordlings wouldn’t have to look at them, passed a third empushad of guards, and were finally freed of hindrances, rumbling along the causeway that linked Utar to the mainland.

At the widow’s farm where they’d pastured the horses, they transferred the gear and supplies from the cart to the gaudy box-wagon Taguiloa had purchased from a disbanding troupe whose internal dissensions had reached the point of explosion in spite of their success on tour. They left the tilt cart in the care of the widow and after a hasty meal, started on the two-day journey through the coastal marshes. Taguiloa drove, Linjijan sat beside him coaxing songs out of his practice flute. Negomas rode on the roof with his smallest drum; he liked it up there with the erratic wind pushing into his stiff springy hair and blowing debris away from him. He played with the drum, fitting his beat to Linjijan’s wanderings or playing his own folk music, singing in the clicking sonorous tongue of his fathers. Brann and Harra rode ahead of the wagon, Harra on the gray gelding, Brann on the dun colt forcegrown by the children, a well-mannered beast as long as she or one of the children were around and an ill-tempered demon when they weren’t. Brann was working on that, but it would take time.