Spirit Gate

32

Keshad sat on a mat under a Ladytree. Off in the distance he heard the river's lazy voice, and the haunting call of a dusk wren. Yesterday morning he and Zubaidit had walked free, out of Olossi. They had walked relentlessly, neither of them flagging. In two full days, they had trudged more than twenty mey on West Track. It would take a caravan three or four days to cover as much ground.

He stared at the string of coin draped over his palm. "How could you have had that many debts racked up in town? How often were you allowed to leave the temple? How could any slave spend that much money?"

Bai was sprawled in grass just beyond the farthest reach of the canopy, eyes closed and a smile on her face as a fat golden rumble bug looped lazy circles around her head. For reasons beyond his comprehension, two ginny lizards had accompanied her when she had left the temple. Big enough to be intimidating, they were, fortunately, small enough to be carried. Both had spiky frills along their backs; both, he'd discovered, shifted in color depending on their mood and other less obvious changes. They had disconcertingly alert gazes. At the moment, they basked beside Bai, watching the rumble bug with what appeared to be friendly interest. Neither the ginnies or Bai responded to his voice.

"Bai! We only have eighty-four leya left. Oh. And twenty vey. But we can buy a day's ration of rice with twenty vey. To be split between us!"

She sighed contentedly, without opening her eyes. "I can earn coin, or a night's lodging. Don't worry, Kesh. You worry too much."

"I'm not worrying! I'm being realistic! How are we going to establish ourselves in a new town with so little seed money? We can't afford to pay a leya here and another there for lodging and food as we travel. We can't afford a ride in a wagon. We'll have to walk the entire way. Not at the prices these villages charge. That man at Crow's Gate wanted two leya for us to ride in the back of his cart, only as far as Hayi Fork. That's robbery! And in that village we just passed through, they wanted a half leya apiece just to stay the night in their empty council house! Because their own Ladytree was so ill-cared-for that it had blown down in last year's storms. That's why we have to sleep out here under a wild-lands Ladytree like the paupers we're going to become."

She rolled up to sit. "I heard most of this same speech last night, didn't I? Anyway, I like 'out here.' "

She scritched Mischief under her chin and rubbed Magic on one puffy jowl, then rose lithely to her feet. She moved differently; the change was impossible to ignore. His strongest memories of her naturally involved the years they had been little children together, when she had followed him everywhere, cried when she skinned her knee, or asked him for help at any and every least obstacle, whether a barking dog or a splinter in her finger or a shadow that had to be circumnavigated. Now she strolled to the traveler's hearth with a feral glide and poked in the ashy remains with a stout walking stick she had cut for herself yesterday. It looked like she was stabbing a man to make sure he was dead. The ginnies ambled after.

The light deepened, made hazy by the heat. The wayside was quiet. They were the only travelers to stop here beside the road. Every one else was likely relaxing in a tub of hot water at an inn. Certainly they had seen no traffic in the hour since they had left the last village behind.

"Doesn't it seem strange to you?" he said, watching her prowl in ever-greater circles around the hearth, pacing out the roughly oval clearing as she searched for certain plants the ginnies liked to eat. Magic had paused, scanning the tree line as if for trouble. Kesh swatted away a swarm of gnats. A pair of dark shapes glided out of the trees and swooped over him, through the heart of the swarm. He threw himself flat, and Bai, turning, laughed.

"Just senny lizards," she said. "And a good thing. Sennies will keep the bugs off us tonight. What seems strange to me?"

"How little traffic is on the road."

She shrugged, then walked over to stand beside Magic, looking in the same direction as the ginny. "Everyone says the roads are no longer safe. That no one dares walk into the north, past Horn and the Aua Gap. Maybe we shouldn't have taken West Track at all. Maybe we should have walked into the northwest along the Rice Walk."

"We already talked this over. There aren't any real towns to the northwest where newcomers can set up in business. You know how villagers are. Close-minded, close-fisted, and they smell, too."

She looked at him. "I thought from the way you were talking that you'd been up West Track recently."

"No. Better profits to be made trading south into the empire."

She grunted. "Those empire men-drovers, mostly, and mercenaries guarding the caravans-they would come sometimes to the temple. It isn't the law of the Merciless One to turn any devoured man or woman away, but I tell you, those empire men were dogs. It was just a dirty hump to them, nothing sacred. They would say all kinds of prayers afterward, like they were ashamed of what they'd done! Anyway, they didn't smell good. I don't know how you could stand trading with them."

"My last drover was a good man. He kept silence for the whole trip, and he saved my life by sticking by me when he could have run."

"Maybe." With a shrug, she dismissed him.

"Why don't you believe me? Without Tebedir, you wouldn't be free!"

"Never mind. It doesn't matter, Kesh. What matters is that you're finally free, and I'm with you. For a few days at least."

"A few days? I don't have any intention of indenturing us out, not when we're free of debt."

"That's not what I meant." She paused to look down at the male ginny. Magic gave a slight head-shake, then bobbed his head, as if he were actually communicating with her. She walked back to the cold hearth and set the walking stick on the ground. Both ginnies followed her. The sun had set below the trees, and the entire clearing had turned soft and handsome, like an eager lover glimpsed in shadow. "Help me walk the boundaries. I want to pray."

"I won't."

"I can't do it alone!"

"How can you worship her? After what she did to you?"

"What she did to me? The Devourer has kept faith with me. It was that old bitch who runs the temple who cheated me and abused me!" She crossed her forearms out in front of her chest in the warding sign. "That's what you don't understand, Kesh. They'll try anything to get me back. We're not free of them."

He patted their packs. "We have our accounts bundles. It's legal. There's nothing they can do."

"Don't believe it!"

"Why do they want you back? You're a good-looking girl, Bai, I'm sure, but there were plenty of sexier women there."

"Like Walla?" she said with an annoying laugh. "I saw you sizing her up. She's a real devourer, though. You have to be careful of them, they like to chew men up."

"Why would they want you back, if you're not a 'real devourer' like Walla?"

"Because I'm the best."

"Been sucking up too much sap lately?"

"Don't give me that look. I'm not some vain hierodule who serves the goddess for a year in order to have men drunk on wine and fumes worship her as if she was the Merciless One herself. My redemption price would have been much higher-"

"It was robbery!"

"-would have been much higher. You don't know how hard I worked, the things I agreed to do. Gods, Kesh! You don't know the things I did just in the days right before you arrived. All that, just to pay off the debits that accrued from my training."

"How could your debt have cost more to pay off than it already did?"

That shrug was her way of casting him off, like slipping a cloak when you don't want to wear it anymore. "Let it go. The faster we walk away from Olossi, the better for us."

"If we don't starve along the way, or puke out our guts from drinking bad water because we can't afford decent wine."

She circled back to Kesh. Mischief scuttled alongside, and Magic hesitated only long enough to give one last intense stare toward the trees before hustling after the two females before they got too far away.

Crouching, Bai grabbed Kesh's wrist. Her grip was strong. "We did it, Kesh. Let that be enough for today. We did what we swore when the aunts and uncle shoved us up on the block and started counting their profit. They had enough, they could have kept us and raised us with their own. I'd like to spit in their faces."

"It wouldn't be worth it."

Her jaw was tight. She had braided back her hair so no curl or wisp strayed, and then coiled it up atop her head, out of her way. All of her was like that now, streamlined, efficient, sleek, and without ornament. Her expression was unreadable to him. His little sister's face stared at him, grown up and filled out, with that bruise she wouldn't discuss. Little whiny weepy sweet-hearted Zubaidit had gone through a transformation and he did not know the woman before him.

She released his wrist. "No, it would be foolish. We'll walk, and leave the old life behind." She cocked her head to one side. "About that ghost you brought out of the south… or is she a demon?"

"Don't speak of it. Let it go."

"Why not? She was so… so…"She raised a shoulder, shifted her hip, scratched her bare knee. "Seeing her, I just wondered what it would be like-"

"Leave it!"

She rocked back at his tone. Both ginnies hissed at him. They had fierce-looking teeth, and their bite was said to be infectious.

"Heya!" he yelped, taken aback.

"Hush." She stroked Mischief under the jaw, and the female lifted her chin a little and "smiled" warmly. Magic got a spot on his forehead rubbed. While they were looking at her, she gestured. "Go on, then. Brother's just jumpy, that's all."

Mischief moved off, but Magic looked right at Kesh and bobbed his head decisively, as if to remind him who was in charge.

"Heya," said Bai with a little more force. Magic moved after Mischief.

"Listen," said Kesh, surprised at how powerfully his anger had erupted. "Let's not argue. I'm sorry."

"No. You're right. Let it all be gone. Leave the aunts and uncle and ghosts and bitches and masters to the dying moon where they belong. Our old life is dead twice over, once on the block, and once in inner court three days back." She rose from a crouch to the balls of her feet, swaying like a woman drunk on fumes. "Gone gone gone. Gone altogether."

Branches rustled. Both ginnies stopped, and looked in that direction, but neither seemed alarmed when an apparition draped in rags stumbled into the clearing.

"Gone. Gone. Gone altogether beyond," it echoed, spinning entirely around, arms pinwheeling. Its voice was a crazed whisper.

Kesh jumped to his feet and drew his sword, but Bai stepped inside his guard and pressed a palm against his chest.

It faced them, rheumy eyes blinking. It was a very old person, as thin as if built of sticks, with skin weathered from sun and wind and hair turned entirely to silver, not even one strand of black to be seen. Kesh could not tell if it was male or female.

"Walking north," it said in a voice all raspy, neither high nor low. "Best not go that way. It's all run to blood."

"Where's your string?" Bai whispered into Kesh's ear. He had closed the string of coins into his weaponless fist, and she pried his fingers open, slipped off ten half leya, and strode across the grass to the creature. She sank gracefully to both knees-kneeling, she was still almost as tall as that shrunken, wasted body-and held out an open hand.

"An offering, holy one. Go in peace."

The crabbed hand moved so fast that it was too late for Kesh to protest. It grabbed the silver, and scuttled away. "A blessing on you, child! Do not kiss ghosts. The twice dead cannot love. Also, a fire gnat has just bitten your left ankle. Don't scratch! It only spreads the poison."

It staggered out onto the road as Bai reached down and-as if bespelled-scratched at her left ankle, then barked a curse, jumped up, and repeatedly slapped the skin where she had just scratched, as though she could batter the stinging bite into submission.

"Five leya!" cried Kesh. "No wonder you ran up debts!"

"Are you blind? That was a gods-touched vessel!"

"Some old beggar, you mean. Anyone can wear rags and stumble along the road mumbling well worn phrases. 'The twice dead cannot love!' Burn it! Now what do we do?"

"I have a hankering to get ourselves into the trees and hide for the night. Scout ahead at dawn."

"You don't believe in all that ranting?"

But she did believe. She had been raised in the temple, at the heart of the goddess, if the Merciless One could be said to have a heart.

He touched the blessing bowl at his belt, thought about his evening prayers, and shrugged. "The woods it is. Must we take turns at watch?"

"No need. The ginnies will warn us if any come close."

HE SLEPT HARD, curled on his side, but an animal pushing up against his back made him snort awake.

"Hush," murmured Bai. He saw her form sitting upright beside him. Her hand touched his hair. "Don't move."

To sleep, they had crawled into a thicket situated on a rise that allowed them to see the road with little risk of being seen themselves. One of the ginnies was pressed against his upper back and neck as if trying to hide behind his body. He found himself staring through the patternwork of branches, toward the road. Torches flickered a dull red. Banners tied in fours drooped from poles. People tramped along, too many to count, strung out in a line and jangling with the ring and clatter of armed men. They had many horses, all on leads, but only one man was mounted. He rode in the middle, surrounded by the shield made by the rest. The hood of his long cloak shielded his face and fell in massive, lumpy folds over the body of the horse. Except for the sound of their steps and the occasional soft whuffle of a horse, the group moved without talk, striding briskly as they moved west-Olossiward-along the road.

The light faded away. A night-hatch chirped, answered by a second.

Bai leaned so close against him that her hair tickled his cheek. Her breath was hot on his ear. "We'll go just before dawn. Follow after them. See what they're doing."

"We won't! We'll head east and then north!"

She shifted away, but remained silent. The ginny-he still didn't know which one it was-stuck its head up to look over his neck, then ducked down again, pressed right up against him most uncomfortably. He didn't want to shoo it away because he didn't know if it would bite. It was as uncomfortable as a branch sticking into his back. The dreary hours passed in an agony of slowness, but at length he discovered that the mass of shadow off to the right was dissolving into the discrete twigs and leaves of the vast tranceberry bush that had helped shelter them. It was the wrong time of year for berries, which would, he noted with that part of his mind that never stopped toting things up for their market value, have brought thirty vey for a bucketload.

"Come on!" Bai rose. She slung the rolled-up cloak and jacket over her back. "Let's go. It's light enough to walk the road."

"Who do you think they were?"

She was already moving through the brush, pausing at the sloped verge to listen and look. Then she scrambled up, the ginnies surprisingly agile, racing in front of her up the slope. She was already fifty paces ahead before he got on the road, and she glanced back, slowed, and waited, tapping a foot. Birds sang their dawn songs in anticipation of day.

"Come on, come on."

"What's the hurry? The sun isn't even up."

"Just a feeling in my bones."

From Olossi to a short way past the East Riding, West Track ran on an almost due west to east axis, parallel to the River Hayi. Past the East Riding, the river curved to the northeast and the road with it, the river dwindling as it moved upstream toward its source and the road reaching for its terminus at Horn.

Standing on the road, Kesh faced Hornward. Bai faced Olossiward. He began to walk east, not looking back. The idiocy of throwing away coin on a useless old beggar still made him burn. His stomach gnawed at nothing. He was hollow and he was angry. But at least he was free. Even free to walk away from Bai, if need be. From everything and everyone, alone in a way that made a smile tic up on his face every time he bit it down, because if he let that smile hit his face in full he would laugh, or he would cry, and he wasn't sure which.

She padded up beside him. The ginnies were draped over her shoulders like an expensive bit of ornament. She didn't look at him. She said nothing. For a long while-at least a mey-they walked east on the road in a silence that was both at odds and in harmony.

How could anyone be so stupid and pious as to give away coin that recklessly? To rack up debts the way she had?

And yet, did it matter? After all these years of toil, of being separated, they had actually succeeded. They were free, and together, able to walk where they willed and disagree as they wished, and no one to tell them otherwise!

Even the road welcomed them, although it could be said that the road welcomed all travelers. It was the coolest part of the day, and the sweetest. But at last the sun rose above the trees and chased away the shadows that protected them.

"The ginnies smell something that's making them restless," said Bai. The lizards were raising their crests and kneading their feet into her shoulders, tongues flicking as they tasted the air. "I didn't like the looks of those men. That looked like an army to me. Three hundred and twelve. Enough to cause serious trouble."

"Three hundred and twelve?"

"I probably missed a few. Three cadres should have three hundred and twenty-four, plus their sergeants and captain."

He whistled softly, wondering if she were joking, or if she had really been able to count them all.

Her stride caught a hitch; she skipped a step to catch up with him, grabbed his elbow, tugged him to a staggering halt. "Look! Crows and vultures."

North, above the trees, the dark wings circled.