Jacqueline Carey - Naamah's Curse

Master Lo Feng.

I bowed and breathed the Breath of Trees Growing, drawing strength from it. “Forgive me, Master,” I whispered, turning away from my past. “I will do my best to be worthy of the sacrifice you made.”

Beneath the vast blue sky, the distant horizon beckoned me.

“You are going alone,” Chen Peng said with regret.

“Aye.” I had nearly forgotten his presence. “I am.”

Grass.

Grass, and grass, and grass.

Once the Great Wall was no longer visible behind me, that was all I saw. Grass and sky. Grazing animals here and there, mostly sheep and cattle. Those, I avoided, knowing it meant there were herders nearby. Betimes, herds of wild gazelles.

It was lonely and peaceful.

I gave a wide berth to the Tatar encampments I saw, the distinctive domes of white felt dotting the plain. If Bao was living among the Tatars, sooner or later I would have to come into contact with them and discover if they were as fearsome as their reputation, but I was content to let it be later. There was no need to go begging for trouble, and I had no need to ask if anyone had seen Bao. Always, always, I could sense him ahead of me.

Hoping to catch up with him before the temperature dropped further, I travelled as fast as I dared; but even in the vast, empty plains, there were constraints. Travelling alone as I was, I couldn’t carry much fodder for my mounts. Chen Peng had assured me that the horses would find sufficient grazing to sustain them, but that meant a good portion of each day was devoted to allowing them to graze.

Then there was the matter of water. Again, I had waterskins that allowed me to carry enough for myself to live on for days, but not enough for the horses, too. I didn’t dare go more than a day or two without being in sight of water. When I found rivers winding in Bao’s general direction, I followed them.

Bit by bit, I made progress.

The nights were the hardest. During the day, I had the sun to warm me and lift my spirits.

At night it was different. It was cold-gods, so cold! It frightened me to think how much colder it could get. I slept in my clothing beneath a fur blanket in the small tent of felted wool that was the bulk of the burden my pack-horse, Coal, carried. Inside the tent, the warmth my body generated was enough to sustain me for now, but every night seemed a little colder than the night before.

The Tatars may have lived behind felt walls, but their walls were thicker and they had one gift I lacked: fire.

It wasn’t for lack of skill. I carried a good flint striking kit. And I’d helped my mother tend our hearth since I was four or five years old… but, of course, I’d grown up in a forest.

There were no trees on the empty plain.

From time to time, I passed through an abandoned pasture where I could collect dried dung. Not often, for the Tatars scoured the plains and left little behind when they moved to new pastures. On those occasions when I was able to collect enough to build a campfire, it seemed like a profound luxury. I would fill the little iron pot I carried with water, dried noodles, and bean curd and nestle it amid the burning dung-coals. The resulting soup was chewy and flavorless, but it was wonderfully warm in my belly.

Alone save for the horses, I would huddle over my tiny, smoldering fire, watching the immense sky change colors as the sun sank below the horizon.

Most days, I made do with tough strips of dried yak-meat, gnawing as I rode, chewing and softening it until my jaws ached.

Most nights, I crawled into my narrow tent without the comfort of a fire, tying the flaps tight against the bitter cold and burrowing under my blanket.

It was harder than I had reckoned. Anywhere else in the world, I would have been well equipped to survive. I’d grown up in the wilderness. If there had been edible plants to forage, I would have found them.

There weren’t.

I was skilled with a bow. If there had been game to shoot, I could have shot it. But mostly, there wasn’t. Such birds as I saw were poor eating-buzzards and raptors. The small game mammals of the plains were already hibernating.

There were the occasional wild gazelles, growing shaggy with the increasing cold. If I’d had fodder for a proper fire, it might have been worthwhile.

But I didn’t.

It is a thing we take much for granted, fire. When all is said and done, it is the first, most primordial thing that separates humans from animals. Being children of the Great Bear Herself, the folk of the Maghuin Dhonn are closer than most to the animal realm; and yet, deprived of fire, I craved its reassurance.

I found myself scheming ways to attain it. I eyed the fresh, steaming turds of dung Ember and Coal deposited on the plains, wondering if there were some significance to the fire-names I had given them, wondering if I might rig some manner of woven rack that would allow their dung to dry as it was transported.

Of course, if I had had the materials to build such a rack, I would have had materials to build a fire.

I didn’t.

So I gnawed on my strips of dried yak-meat while we plodded westward, ever westward. I did my best to meditate on the lessons Master Lo had taught me. I cycled through the Five Styles of Breathing. I measured the dwindling distance between my diadh-anam and the spark of Bao’s.

I let my thoughts wander as far away as Terre d’Ange…

Jehanne.

It was at night that I thought of her most, when the immense canopy of stars flung itself across the night sky. As fair as she was, with silver-gilt hair and skin so pale it was nearly translucent, blue-grey eyes that held an impossibly charming sparkle, I’d always thought of Jehanne in terms of starlight and moonlight.

She would have been appalled to find me here.

But she would have understood it.

I pictured her, her fair brows frowning. This peasant-boy, do you love him?

I think so .

Jehanne would have shrugged, her slender shoulders rising and falling. Well, then, mayhap you do . She would have smiled and beckoned to me anyway, her eyes sparkling. But you are still mine for now, my lovely savage .

And I would have gone to her. Once, on the greatship, I had asked Bao why he was jealous of Raphael but not of Jehanne. Might as well be jealous of the moon for shining as that one, he had said in a philosophical tone. There was no one in the world Jehanne couldn’t charm when she chose.

Thoughts of opulent Terre d’Ange were an incongruous thing on the Tatar plain, riding with dung beneath my fingernails, but they helped sustain me. It was good to remember that there had been a time when my world had consisted of more than endless grass plains, frigid, shivering nights, and dried yak-meat. There had been feasts with all manner of delicacies, bottomless pitchers of wine. There had been balls with music and dancing, splendid garments, a thousand shimmering lanterns. I’d had my own quarters at the Palace, the enchanted bower that Jehanne had caused to be made for me, warmed with braziers and filled with every kind of green, growing plant imaginable. Fragrant orange and lemon trees, dwarf firs in pots, tall fronds of ferns casting green shadows over my bed.

Here, there was grass, grass, and more grass.

I missed trees.

One day, I came across an unfamiliar structure. From a distance, it looked like a mound of sticks tied about with blue rags. Wary of human presence, I hesitated to approach it, but I sensed no one, and the prospect of wood drew me.

At closer range, I saw it was true. It was a conical cairn built of weathered branches-wood, firewood, enough for half a dozen merry campfires. I dismounted in haste, already calculating how best to bundle and load it, and how much additional weight Coal could carry, my cold fingers reaching eagerly to dismantle the structure.