Katharine Kerr - A Time of War

‘Well now.’ Dera let out her breath in a puff. ‘Well now. If you were going anywhere but east –’

‘Truly, the name of the Slavers is not one to speak in jest. Among my own people we call them Lijik Ganda, the Red Reivers. An aeon ago they swept down upon us, and the slaughter drove us from our homeland and into sin and degradation. Woe, woe to the people of the horse that our desperation drove us to such sins! Do you think we’ve forgotten such terrible things? I will not lie to you. I take your son into danger, but I would take my own nephew, had I a nephew, into the same.’

‘This thing be as important as that?’ Lael broke in.

Meer turned slightly in the direction of Councilman Verrarc, just a brief involuntary gesture. Fortunately Verrarc was whispering to one of the militiamen and, at least, seemed to notice nothing.

‘It is to me. To no one else, mayhap. My mother laid a geas upon me concerning my brother, and I have reason to believe he’s gone east.’

To Jahdo the bard’s voice sounded entirely too smooth, too glib, making him wonder if Meer were lying, but he supposed that he might have felt that way because he too had something to hide from the councilman. As he thought of Verrarc, he felt words bursting from his mouth.

‘Mam, I want to go.’

The moment he spoke he was horrified, but there was no taking the words back. Dera threw her hands into the air and keened aloud, just one brief sob of sound, quickly stifled. Lael turned to him, his mouth working.

‘If we do owe this thing under treaty,’ Lael said at last. ‘And if you want to go, well, then, there be naught much your mother and I can say about it. But be you sure, lad? At your age and all, how can you know your own mind?’

Jahdo felt his entire body trembling, trying to squeeze out the words his traitor mouth refused to speak: no, no, I didn’t mean it, I don’t want to go, I don’t. His heart pounded the words like a drum, but he could not speak.

‘He smells great things on the move, my good man,’ Meer said. ‘Even a child may sense destiny.’

‘Destiny?’ Dera spat out the word. ‘Hogwash and turnip wine!’

‘My good woman, please. With luck we’ll never even cross the Slavers’ border.’

‘Hah! That sort of luck does have a way of running short. I’m not letting my lad –’

All at once Dera stopped speaking. Meer caught himself as he was about to speak, as well, and turned, moving his huge head from side to side as if he were straining to hear some small sound. Jahdo realized that he himself was – that they all were – turning to Niffa, staring at Niffa, even though she’d said not a word. Her face had gone dead-pale, and in the broken torchlight her eyes seemed huge pools of shadow, as empty as those of the bard himself. Demet grabbed her arm to steady her.

‘Let him go, Mam.’ Her voice was a hollow whisper. ‘He’ll be safer there than here.’

Involuntarily Jahdo glanced at Verrarc, standing just behind her, and saw the strangest smile on the councilman’s face. It reminded him of a playmate caught cheating in a game. Dera considered for a long moment, taking her daughter’s strange pronouncement seriously, as indeed she always did whenever Niffa came out with one. For a moment she seemed about to speak; then she burst into tears and rushed off, dodging her way through the remnant of crowd. Swearing under his breath, Kiel followed her.

‘Well, then, that’s settled.’ Rubbing his hands together, Verrarc stepped forward. ‘Lael, since your son’s fulfilling an obligation for the entire town, the council will of course provide him with a pony and such supplies as he’ll be needing for this journey. Meer, the Chief Speaker and I did think that we could spare you some armed guards, as well, a squad of militia, say, and some pack horses.’

‘You can’t spare them, councilman,’ Meer said. ‘That’s the point of my journey here, wasn’t it now? Besides, the child and I will be safer on our own. I know a trick or two about smelling my way to safety when I have to. If need be, the lad and I can always hide in wild places, but hiding a whole pack of armed men in the forest is beyond me.’

‘Hiding?’ Lael stepped forward. ‘From what? Now wait just a moment, good bard. I had no idea –’

‘Da!’ Niffa snapped. ‘It’s needful that you let him go.’

‘Come now, my good sir,’ Meer said. ‘The lore teaches that one of the fifty-two fixed things is this: when women lay down the law, men must do as we’re told.’

Lael turned to him, utterly baffled by this statement, a gesture, of course, lost on the bard.

‘He does agree,’ Niffa broke in. ‘Jahdo, come home now. We’ve got to get your gear ready.’

Lael started to protest, then merely threw his hands in the air to reproach the gods and followed the two children as they hurried across the by-then empty plaza. When Jahdo looked back, he saw Demet running after as well. Standing where they’d left them, Verrarc and the Gel da’Thae conferred, heads together, while the rest of the Town Council hovered anxiously nearby.

The family spent a miserable evening round the central hearth, where two candle lanterns stood, sending long shadows flickering on the walls. No one wanted a fire on such a muggy night. For a long time Dera and Lael paced back and forth, squabbling and cursing each other and the Town Council both while the family merely listened. Niffa and Demet sat on a wooden bench; Kiel leaned in the doorway and glowered; Jahdo scrunched into a corner with a ferret cradled in the crook of his arm for comfort. All at once he realized that his father was speaking to him.

‘Why? Why did you say you wanted to go?’

Jahdo opened his mouth to answer only to find that he had no words. Although he tried his best to remember what had made him speak, the entire episode by the council fire had blurred in his mind into something much like a half-remembered dream.

‘The adventure of the thing, maybe?’ Lael said, softening his voice. ‘Lad, lad, you can tell me.’ He crouched down to Jahdo’s level. ‘What be wrong? Second thoughts?’

Jahdo nodded. Lael let out his breath in a puff.

‘Too late now, lad, to get out of it. You should have thought of this then. Ye gods, it’s not like we can spare you here. There be a passle of work, this time of year.’

‘Lael?’ Demet broke in. ‘If my sergeant does release me, I’ll come take Jahdo’s place.’

Niffa gave him a brilliant smile that made him blush. Lael pretended not to notice.

‘Now that be decent of you, lad,’ he said. ‘I’ll speak to him myself. It’s been many a long year since I served my turn in the militia, and I wouldn’t mind having someone good with a sword round the place.’

‘Why, Da?’ Jahdo found his tongue at last.

‘Don’t know.’ Lael hesitated, suddenly uneasy. ‘It’s just that somewhat be wrong. I can feel it, like.’

‘Everything be wrong.’ Dera began to weep. ‘Jahdo, Jahdo! Naught will ever be right again.’

Jahdo clutched Ambo so tight that the ferret whipped his head round and nipped his wrist, then slithered free and dashed for the other room. Jahdo stood up.

‘Mam, don’t be crying! Please! It’s needful that I do this.’ He felt as if he were struggling to open a locked door, shoving and pushing and banging against some huge expanse of solid oak, but he simply could not voice the truth, that he’d never wanted to agree.

‘You could at least tell your mother why,’ Lael snapped.

The entire family was staring at him, waiting for him to speak.

‘I can’t. I don’t know why. I can’t say it.’

Lael sighed and threw his hands into the air.

‘To think that a son of mine!’ he snapped. ‘Ye gods!’