The Book of Fire Page 34

  N’Doch isn’t sure what that means, but he knows a meeting when he sees one. Sure enough, the silence drags on for a bit, pretending to be easy and companionable but actually chock-full of unspoken tension. The girl’s on the other side of the hearth, so N’Doch readies himself to translate for Köthen.

  Finally, Stoksie clears his throat. “Me ’n Luta bin tinkin’ . . .” He looks up at N’Doch, then lets his gaze drift to Sedou, then down to the dirt between his crooked knees where he’s worrying a patch of grass with a stick. “Yu nah frum Urop, ri’? Speek tru, na. Ona a da hart.”

  After a split-second of inner conferencing, Sedou embraces them all with his big soft laugh. “My brother, I do honor your hearth, and I do speak truth.” He slides his thumb at Köthen and the girl. “They’re from Europe. Me and my brother? No. We’re from Africa. Like some of your people, my man.”

  Truth of a sort. Just not the whole truth. N’Doch wonders if the dragon would lie.

  Stoksie’s still digging in the dirt. “Nah. My ole peebles from Bruklin.”

  “Before Brooklyn. Way back. We’re cousins, maybe.”

  N’Doch’s not sure there is a ‘before Brooklyn’ in Stoksie’s mind.

  “Africa,” he repeats, and scratches his bald head.

  “Cud be, na,” Luther remarks.

  Brenda snorts. She stares, not at Sedou resting back next to her on his elbows like a reclining giant, but across the fire at N’Doch. “Howyu git heah frum Africa?”

  Her disbelief is contemptuous and total. N’Doch gets the hint that air travel might not be the usual thing anymore. “Boat,” he lies, and begins to spin out a relevant fantasy in his mind about stowing away on a derelict supertanker like the wreck grounded on the beach near home.

  But Stoksie isn’t really interested in Africa or how they got here from there. He waves Brenda silent. “We bin tinkin’ . . .”

  “Yu bin,” Brenda growls.

  “Me ’n Luta ’n Ysa, den. Dat’s tree ta wun.” Stoksie waits, but Brenda subsides, grumbling. “We bin tinkin’ mebbe yus like ta stay awhile.”

  “Yeah?” asks Sedou softly. “Why’s that?”

  Luther leans forward. He has a big nose and graying anglo hair that keeps falling into his face. N’Doch guesses he’s pretty seriously nearsighted. “Yu lookin’ fuh sum’un, na? We helpyu fine ’im, den yu help us mebbe. Good trade.”

  When N’Doch gets this far in his murmured simultaneous translation, Köthen stirs. “What kind of help do they want?”

  N’Doch repeats the question.

  Stoksie grins at Köthen. “Yer kinda help, bigfella.”

  “I think he means he wants some muscle, Dolph.”

  Köthen looks interested. After a pause, the girl says, “Please explain.”

  To Erde’s surprise, it was the musician Ysabel who answered. And her accent was another surprise, throwing off the dragon translators for at least the length of a sentence. It was rapid and musical and full of rolling vowels, as unlike her own native German as any language Erde had ever heard.

  “. . . so ju zee ter esa tis town aqui . . .”

  The next sentence was more coherent. If she worked at balancing it, Ysa’s accent faded away and Erde heard only the translation, running in her mind. “Dey meke ferry good shuz tere . . . very good. We get good trade for these shoes wherever we go. But it’s a big danger to go to this town.”

  “Why is that?” Sedou prompted.

  “Church wackos,” said Brenda with a dismissive wave.

  “Wacko, huh?” Luther shoved hair from his eyes. “Yu nevah bin deah! Yu nevah seenit!”

  “’Cuz I gotta be heah! Yu wan Blin’ Rachel safe, na?” Brenda retorted hotly, but Erde guessed that Luther’s accusation was true.

  “Sumtimes yu be as dum as a townie, Brenda.” Stoksie dug in the dirt again with his stick. “Look, newfellas, heah’s da ting. Trade round heah’s getting tuffer, yeah by yeah.”

  Luther nods. “Tru, tru. Times is getting tuffer by da minit.”

  “So dis town’s a biggun, and dey make stuff ev’rybuddy want. We need dat stuff ta make owah nut, y’know? Uddawize, we doan eat. But dey’s a problem deah.” Stoksie’s hesitation sounded less like caution than shame.

  “So what’s the problem?” N’Doch prodded.

  Luther fidgeted and stretched his legs. “Yu gonna laff at us.”

  N’Doch did laugh, then immediately looked apologetic.

  “Nah, man, I mean, c’mon. Why would we laugh, as good as you’ve been to us? It’s like, some kind of personal problem? Somebody ran off with somebody else’s woman?”

  “Wudna head fer town if we did dat,” murmured Luther.

  Stoksie shook his head with a wry smile. “I tink we cud deel wit dat.”

  “And this other thing you can’t deal with?” Sedou asked.

  Ysa pursed her lips in a silent negative. Stoksie tossed his stick into the fire. Brenda sulked.

  “Okay, den. I’ll sayit if nuna yus will. Heah it is.” Luther shook his gray forelock out of his eyes and cleared his throat. “Dey’s a monsta comes deah.”

  Another stifled laugh from N’Doch. “A what?”

  “A monsta.”

  “What kinda monster?”

  “Shit, yu know—big teet’ ’n wings ’n all.”

  “Wings?”

  “Yah. Wings an’ a tail.”

  Now true silence fell around the cook fire. Erde’s heart surged in her chest until she was sure everyone could hear it pounding. Sedou rose up from his elbows and fixed his inhuman eyes on Luther. For a moment, all the air went out of the world. In another second, they would be gasping like dying fish. Then she heard N’Doch muttering his translation into Köthen’s ear. She took a breath, and the world moved forward again.

  Sedou said, “What does this ‘monster’ look like?”

  “Big gold sum’bitch.” Luther crooked back both his elbows like a hawk stooping to the kill, then bent his fingers and worked them like claws. “Lon’ neck, lon’ tail.”

  Mercifully, Stoksie mistook their sudden intense focus for disbelief. “S’trut’, I sweah. I seenit. Nevah bin close, na.”

  “Lucky,” said Ysabel.

  Luther laughed. “Souns crazy, na?”

  “No,” replied Sedou gravely. “I don’t think it does.”

  “I do,” Brenda offered. “Wacko. Alla dem.”

  “Yu go deah, den!” Luther exploded. “Yu wachim come down outa da sky lika litenin’ bolt. Den yu tell me I’m wacko.”

  Brenda gathered herself as if she was ready to leave right then. “Okay, den, I will! Yu take care a da camp!”

  “Whoa, whoa, wait!” soothed N’Doch. “Say again? Out of the sky?”

  Luther swooped one fist into the other with a resounding slap. “Nevah seen anatin’ like it. Don’ know whaddit is.”

  But we do, Erde wanted to cry out. We do!

  OH, DRAGON, ARE YOU LISTENING?

  WITH EVERY CELL AND SINEW.

  Stoksie said, “So whachu say? Yu come wit’ us?”

  Sedou laughed, barely able to conceal the exultation of the dragon within. “But if this monster’s as big and bad as you say he is, how can we protect you from it?”

  Are they wondering, Erde asked herself, why we aren’t more surprised?

  “Nah frum da monsta,” Luther said. “No way yu cud do dat. Frum da guys who wanda trowyu tada monsta.”

  “Really?” Erde could not hide her shock. “And what does the . . . monster . . . do then?”

  “Broilyu ’n eechu. Onna spot. Whachu tink?” Their stunned silence clearly puzzled Luther. “Yumin sacerfize, y’know?”

  “Wait. No.” Sedou shook his head. “Surely you’re mistaken.”

  “Nah. I saw ’im.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yah, betcha.”

  Erde thought she felt the ground shiver, ever so gently.

  Stoksie agreed soberly. “Meetu. Reel ugly bizness. Parda der religin, kin yu emagin? Jus’ like a town
ie, ta let sumpin li’ dat go on.”

  “Man!” breathed N’Doch. “That’s no better than witch burning!”

  Sedou rose suddenly, a motion as quick and fluid as water, and paced away. “Oh, my friends . . .” A soft cry of pain at the edge of the darkness, answered by a distinct shuddering from the bedrock. A shift and crack. No one but Erde seemed to notice, so she swallowed her own horror in order to send both dragons soothing thoughts. As low an opinion as Lady Water had of her other brother, she had never thought him capable of such barbarism.

  Stoksie watched after Sedou a bit, then shifted his gaze to N’Doch. “He scared off, na?”

  “Nah. Just, y’know . . . upset. That’s terrible news. Ought to put a stop to that right away.”

  “Betcha,” muttered Luther. “If we could.”

  “Well, den, whachu tink?” Stoksie asked. “Yu come wit?”

  “I’m ready.” N’Doch raised his voice slightly. “What say, bro?”

  Sedou turned back toward the light, reclaiming his smile with enough effort to render it defiant. “I say, sure. We’ll come. We’ll come see your monster, and offer whatever help we can. Wouldn’t miss it. Who knows? We might find this friend we’ve been looking for right there in that village.”

  N’Doch snorted grimly. “Yeah. Wouldn’t that be a surprise.”

  And underneath Blind Rachel, new water flowed.

  PART FOUR

  The Meeting with Destiny

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  The God has given her a day to get ready, and she’s been at it since the previous noon. Now it’s getting on toward six in the morning, and Paia sits cross-legged in the middle of her bed, defiant in her sweat suit as she directs the swirl of servants packing and repacking her luggage. It had not occurred to her, as she worked so hard to sell the notion of her Visitation, that her greatest concern would be having nothing to wear.

  She hasn’t been past the Temple’s outer gates in fourteen years. Even her ceremonial forays into the open air of the Temple Plaza have been kept as brief as possible, for the sake of her safety and her health. But Paia recalls the elaborate precautions taken whenever she went out as a child. Over the multiple layers of sunblock creams went the long sleeves, the high collars, the thin reflective gloves and hat. All made of the lightest possible materials, but still they were stifling hot. The God always says Paia should daily thank her mother and nannies: to those strict precautions she owes her flawless skin. Even then, going out was rare. Usually she was on her way to some special local event that the landowner’s family was expected to attend, a christening, or a funeral. Leaving the house was less a pleasure than a duty.

  But right now, Paia is thrilled by the prospect, even though the sunblock has long since dried up, and all that protective clothing, even if it could still be found, would no longer fit. Even though her extensive wardrobe of revealing Temple garments is woefully inadequate for a trek across the open countryside. Paia has been improvising all night.

  And then there’s the issue of something to put it all in. There hasn’t been a thorough search of the storerooms in a long time. Paia was shocked to discover how much has vanished from those rooms where the locks are disabled. Her immediate response was to storm off to Luco in a rage over this silent and systematic looting. The God would hear of it! The First Son took time to soothe and calm her, but she sensed an unusual impatience beneath his dutiful concern, as if such invasions and inconveniences are only to be expected. She’d pouted. If it didn’t involve the God, he didn’t care about it!

  Now, looking over the bits and pieces she’s been able to gather, she’s more intrigued than outraged. They have a motley, rough-and-tumble aspect, laid out on her mother’s fine Turkish carpet: a black nylon duffel, one boxy plastic trunk, two big blue satchels, a silvered metal case, and an ancient but well-preserved mountaineer’s pack in leather. Leather is an absurd luxury, but the pack bears her father’s initials. Paia unearthed it in one of the unransacked storerooms and fell in love with it instantly. That storeroom, keyed open by her palm print, is a virtual time capsule. She could have spent a whole week in there, revisiting her life before the God. But that would have been a lonely exercise. She has no one to share these memories with.

  The God is right, she decides. Nostalgia is a useless luxury.

  The chambermaid spreads another armload of clothing on the bed. Paia allows her to display each garment for inspection, nodding a yes to this, a no to that. The chambermaid hands off the single yes to a packer, sweeps up the rejects, and goes back for another load. Paia wonders if there is time to have a few more sensible items made up: long-sleeved shirts and pants with handy hidden pockets for the God’s little gun.

  Out in the hallway, the red-robed Twelve are gathered in a weepy cluster, mourning her departure from their sight for even a moment. Paia has forbidden them entry. No doubt they’re convinced that this trip is a forced order. Why would anyone leave the Citadel willingly? A contingent of Honor Guard is milling about as well, relieved that their watch hasn’t been chosen for escort duty. The moist chanting and murmuring of the Twelve breaks off briefly as a brace of Luco’s Third Sons shoulder them aside importantly, bearing through the doorway a shrouded rectangle. Paia has had the mutating landscape brought downstairs, to be hung on the wall opposite her bed, another expression of her newly assumed autonomy, though no one will read it that way but herself and the God. She hopes it will be like having a new window cut into the room, a mystical kind of window where the view changes each time you look out. She’d take the painting with her if she could. She’d like to know that it’s safe. But she suspects that even the suggestion might render Luco, in his present state, apoplectic. Paia waves at the young priests to lean the covered canvas against the wall. What vista would it reveal to this room full of servants? She will wait until she is alone again to unveil it.

  Son Luco has been in and out at least twice this morning, in high gear and at the earliest hint of dawn. First he came to remind her of their schedule of departure, then to describe the instantaneously devised ceremony slated for 0800 sharp in the Temple Plaza. He was at his most abrupt and efficient, but beneath the official mask thrummed true eagerness. His bronzed skin was almost luminous, as if lit from within by suppressed anticipation. His subordinates whirled around after him, basking in the glow of his energy. At one point, Paia glanced through her open door to discover him in a one-way consultation of gestures with the chambermaid—whom, as far as she knew, he had never before even noticed. Why should Luco be so charged up, she’d wondered a bit sulkily. He gets to go out all the time.

  An unfamiliar kitchen servant hesitates in the doorway, balancing the breakfast tray. Paia bites back an urge to snap her fingers and yell at the girl to hurry. The child’s confusion suggests she’s never ventured so high in the Citadel before. Paia gestures her over to the bed, studying her as she approaches. Paia has resolved to be more observant of those around her, either servant or priest, especially since she’s discovered how hard it is to remember to do so. This girl looks decently fed, but her eyes are dull and she is ghostly pale. Her cheeks have almost a blue cast, no doubt due to a life spent entirely in the Citadel’s subterranean levels. She walks with her shoulders crooked, struggling to hold them straight as she weaves a cautious path across the crowded room to the High Priestess’ bed. Despite a concealing sleeve, Paia sees that her right arm is withered, just managing to steady the heavy tray. Again Paia controls a tart response. It is the God’s stated policy to forbid deformities within the priesthood and among the Citadel workforce, but even Paia knows exceptions must be made, or the housekeepers would have trouble filling their staff. Only the high frenzy of preparations has brought this child out of the concealment of the kitchens.

  Unable to repress her reflexive shudder, Paia reminds herself that she will have to observe much worse when she gets outside. Best to practice ignoring things now. She nods neutrally at the girl, then terrifies her with a brisk thanks when the tray is s
et down without mishap. The girl bows clumsily and flees back through the crowd.

  An hour later, Paia is dressed and fed. The little gun is tucked against the small of her back. The luggage has been fastened and sent downstairs. She has followed Luco’s advice in her choice of a Leave-taking outfit: the softest and most comfortable of the glittery Temple garments underneath a long hooded silk robe that can be worn open for the ritual, then fastened up tight for the road. The chambermaid is offering up for her approval a belt of jewel-studded gold mesh, when a relay of shouted orders echoes down the hallway and the disconsolate mutter of the priestesses goes suddenly silent.

  Paia shivers with the usual thrill of fear, but she cannot repress a prideful grin. He is out there, filling the whole length of the corridor with his heat and speed and magnificence. What is he doing here? The God has never accompanied her in any sort of procession. All the rituals dictate that she must come to him. Paia waits. His approach is noiseless. Not a sound but the Honor guard snapping to shocked attention, followed by the soft flopping of twelve terrified young women flattening every possible inch of their bodies against the threadbare rug. The chambermaid has her back to the door and cannot sense the God’s entrance. When he sails through the door, it’s only the shifting of Paia’s eyes that alerts her.

  Paia tries not to look at him and fails. He is as tall and broad as the corridor will reasonably allow, and caparisoned in gold and flashing jewels, like a barbarian emperor. His vest shimmers with thousands of tiny sun-disks that ring like breathy cymbals as he moves. Luco may have seemed to glow, but the God actually gives off light, and he brings with him a hot, crisp scent, as if he’s just charged through a furnace. The chambermaid nearly strangles on her own swallowed squawk and collapses into the tiniest ball she can manage. But even she is sneaking a peek.

  Paia bows deeply, as the God expects her to do when the Faithful are about. Their relationship may be evolving all of a sudden, but it would be folly to air the process in public. “You look absolutely splendid today, my lord Fire.”