Spirit Gate

PART FOUR: TRAVELERS
16

AFTER THEY CLIMBED out of the Mariha Valley, they traveled east and north for ten, twenty, forty, sixty and more days along the eastern slopes of the spine of the world, that interlocking chain of mountains and massifs that formed the northern boundary of the world Shai knew. The southern and western deserts-Kartu Town itself-lay three or more months' journey behind them. Dusty trails led them along grassy hills and through sparse woodland. This late in the year, well into the dry season, the streams falling out of the highlands were running low, although there was still enough water for horses and soldiers alike. In Kartu Town, where water came from a trio of precious springs, water cost a tidy price. Here in the wilderness, water was free.

Tohon took Shai under his wing, as an uncle might. They rode forward to scout every day.

"You're not skilled enough to be a tailman," the soldier explained to Shai, "but you're cousin to captain's wife, so the men humor you. Better learn a few things."

"My friends are teaching me to fight," said Shai, embarrassed by this talk.

"They're just having fun, beating you up. I'll teach you a few tricks. Then they'll respect you."

Had they been making fun of him all along, in the guise of friendship? Was he that great of a fool, just like his mother and elder brothers-all but Hari-had always said? Had he mistaken all the signs?

"Herdsmen," said Tohon, pointing toward distant slopes.

Shai saw nothing. Escarpments limned the sky, although there were never any mighty peaks to be seen glittering on high. But the landscape kept no secrets from the scout.

"That cliff. Track, down. Here, now, follow my hand. Those aren't a field of stone. Those are sheep. Captain will send Chief Tuvi up there to trade. We'll eat mutton tomorrow night. You try that throw I taught you on Jagi and Pil. You'll see."

The Qin loved to wrestle. When Shai threw Jagi the next night, catching his ankle behind a heel and upending him flat on his rump, the soldiers hooted and hollered in a way that shamed and pleased Shai.

"Didn't think you could do that," said Chief Tuvi. "We'll make a tailman of you after all."

Having bet on the outcome, Tohon won a cupful of millet, which he shared in halves with Shai. "Not much of this left," he said. They washed the thick porridge down with pungent fermented mare's milk. He seemed unconcerned that the field rations they'd been issued by Commander Beje were, at long last and after being carefully rationed, running out. Mostly, they ate meat killed on the march.

They were camped beside a stream. Mai, with Priya and Sheyshi in attendance, had gone a little ways upstream. Shai could see her scrubbing at her arms and face, although the water was snowmelt, gaspingly cold. In the last light, men set snares, and one of the foreign camp men netted for fish. Anji was seated cross-legged, repairing a harness while chatting with a pair of veterans as easily as if they were family.

"Why are you teaching me?" Shai asked Tohon.

"Eh? Because we Qin respect a man who can fight."

"No. I meant, why are you willing to teach me?" If it's true that the others were doing nothing but beating me up. But he didn't want to speak that thought aloud.

"You're tough. You don't complain. You have the hands of a man who works, not like those soft-handed Mariha princelings. Anyway, I miss my sons."

"What happened to them?"

"One is dead. Another is a soldier. The youngest tends the herds in the range given to my clan by the ancestor gods. Anyway, these here are Itay men. I'm Vasay."

"I don't know what you mean."

"The ancestors. It's an old feud between two clans. I give glory to my Vasay mother by teaching you to win a few rounds and get their respect."

The next day Tohon paused to eye a pair of hawks hanging on the winds above the long ridgeline to their west. Although this land was tough and dry, it was still handsomely fertile with tall grass and copses of birch, pine, pipe, and thorn-brush trees. Game animals were plentiful.

"Deer. See. There."

With Shai hanging back, out of the way, Tohon went after the herd, and killed three before the rest scattered out of range. Shai retrieved a few of the arrows that had missed their targets. He'd been given a knife big enough and sharp enough to butcher with, and he set to work as Tohon studied the eastern horizon.

"Smoke," said Tohon now, but although Shai squinted, he saw nothing except tender wisps of high cloud strung along the reach of sky above the endless rolling hills. The wind was pushing up out of the southeast, and it eddied here where the higher ridge fell away into the broken hills through which they rode. "Must be coming into empire's territory. You can see how the line of trees begins to break into denser growth. That means the land falls away pretty quickly up ahead, into some kind of valley. There's another pair of hawks riding the wind where the secondary ridge falls away."

Shai didn't see them, but he nodded.

"You ride back. Let captain know. It's a decent-sized place up there, forty hearths at least. He'll want warning. Decide our tactics."

"Who lives out here? There's been no one for days. Except those herdsmen."

"We've stayed in the wild lands for a reason. Any farther east, and we'd be in the empire. Now, the mountains are pushing us there, so we have to go."

"Do the Sirniakans think of the Qin as enemies, or as friends?"

"Best hope the official who rules the lands out here got the news that the Qin are allies now. Maybe he didn't. Anyway, even if they treat us as friends, they'll have orders to kill Captain Anji. If they can catch him. If they figure out who he is. Go on. Send Jagi up to finish the butchering."

The hooves of Shai's horse kicked up dust as he rode back the way they had come. Captain Anji deployed many layers of scouts. Soon enough Shai hailed the second rank forward, and sent Jagi ahead to join Tohon while Pil headed off the path to signal the two men riding singleton as rangers, one to either side. As he rode up to the main company, he saw Chief Tuvi call a halt. It was an impressive group that made a lot of dust with a big herd of horses and over two hundred mounted men, Mai, and the slaves: Mai's two female attendants, Mountain, the nine bearers, and a youth who had seen them at Beje's villa and been given a choice between death or exile.

"What news?" asked Anji as Shai came in.

Mai bent close to listen. Her cheeks and forehead were powdered with dust, and she had wound a cloth tight around her hair to keep it as clean as anything could be in these conditions.

Shai repeated Tohon's words. There came after this a silence as the captain considered.

"Avoid, or confront?" asked Chief Tuvi.

Anji shaded his eyes. He was scanning the heavens. His gaze had caught on the same pair of hawks that had gotten Tohon's attention. Shai could see them now. "No choice, I think. The highlands will pinch off these high trails and leave us stranded. We have to dip into the lower lands to reach the road that leads north into the Hundred. There will be some smaller towns, but we aim for the market town of Sarida. That's where we'll find our caravan."

"How do you know this?" All looked at Shai, who had rudely interrupted the considerations of the captain.

"You talk too much," remarked Chief Tuvi.

Anji replied with no change in expression, watchful as he examined the raptors. "A boy in the palace is trained in an exacting manner. The palace priests command a map room with every temple and way station marked on a vast table sculpted in the manner of a model of the land itself. Every mother of a royal son would whip her boy if he answered a question wrong."

"Were you whipped?" asked Mai with a laugh. She was the only person bold enough to ask, and not be scolded for asking.

Anji did not smile. He did not frown. The hawks interested him more than the question. "Never," he said, absently. "Never would I have given my mother any reason to be disappointed in me. Tuvi. Pull in the scouts. Mai. You must play a part."

"Yes." She agreed without asking what part she must play.

Shai envied the trust and loyalty she granted her husband. Yet what choice had any of them? They were riding into the enemy's country now, and Anji was the only one among them who knew the lay, and the law, of the land.