Sword Bound

Chapter 6

NOT LONG AFTER DAWN, as morning mist lifted, I carried the littlest of us out of the house. Del and I had let Sula sleep in our bed with us for a bit, the night before. She was still sleepy, with mussed hair and a crease-line running down the right side of her face. I held her against my chest, and she set her head on my shoulder as I walked toward Alric’s and Lena’s.

“Will you be good?” I asked.

She didn’t answer.

“You have to be good,” I told her. “You’ll be a guest of the house. Guests must have manners.”

She lifted her head, rubbed the side of it with a fist, and met my eyes with her mother’s eyes, though blurry with sleep. Then she said something that was totally incomprehensible and laid her head back down against my shoulder. I just grinned and carried her onward.

Del walked up from the creek, carrying freshly filled botas. She placed them on a bench, by a door very like our own, and put out her arms. I passed to her the dead weight of our daughter, a dead weight that weighed hardly anything. You could blow her away like a dandelion.

In a low voice Del spoke to Sula in Northern, her lips very close to the tangled hair. She was clearly torn by the prospect of going back out into the world we’d known for so long, and leaving her daughter behind. But there was no place for Sula in this. We weren’t caravaners. We were sword-dancers and ran the risk, all three of us, at any time, of being killed.

Lena was in the doorway, smiling as Del wished her daughter good health—and good manners—while we were gone. In Southron, now, she explained to our drowsy offspring that we would come back to her, back to the life we had built within the confines of a beautiful canyon. Back to our home.

It was Lena’s turn to take her. Sula did not object to being passed from one to another to another. It was true she looked on Lena and Alric as parents almost as much as she did us, to the point of making a wobbly break for next door if Del and I found it necessary to discipline her. She was certain Alric and Lena would rescue her, though they never did. She was ours to chastise. Ours to love.

Del cupped Sula’s head in her hands and gave her a kiss on her forehead. Then she gathered up the botas, slung them over her shoulder, and strode back to our house. I smiled crookedly at Lena, whose expression told me she knew all too well what Del was feeling.

“Go on,” she said. “Sula will be well. Del won’t be for the first couple of days. But it will lessen a little as she’s distracted.” Lena smiled crookedly. “Some of the time.”

I nodded, leaned close to give Sula a quick kiss, then turned my back on them both. I felt a twinge of regret myself and a faint undertone of anxiety. There was so much to live for now. So much more to live for. More than I had ever expected to reside in my heart, my soul.

Then I told myself to get to work. We were burning daylight.

Well, to be completely accurate, we were burning dawn.

Del, Neesha, and I haltered our horses and led them out of the pole corral. Del still had her white horse, but no longer did he wear a wine-girl’s scarlet tassels to shield pale blue eyes against the sun. She had made a headpiece out of soft indigo-dyed leather strips, quite fine and narrow, almost like long fringe. It also served to keep the flies away from his eyes.

My horse needed no such thing. My horse sported a rather luxuriant black forelock to do that work. He was dun with a dark line running down his back from withers to rump. At the end of that line over his rump was a coarse black tail that just at this moment was being whipped back and forth with some force. The stud, as always, had an opinion. Especially in the mornings.

Blanket, saddle, saddle pouches packed with supplies—he bore all these without complaint as, one by one, I attached them to him. He made no complaint when I swapped out halter for headstall, bit, and reins. Then the halter on top, customary for journeys. One might be glad of his quiet acquiescence, except I knew it did not bode well.

Neesha was already aboard his dark bay horse. He was grinning in anticipation. I shot him a scowl and was rewarded by a wider grin. In fact, he swung his right leg over the saddle pommel in front of him and took his ease, arms crossed, knowing his own exceptionally well-trained horse wouldn’t do anything except stand there quietly, waiting for directions from its human.

Sighing, I led the stud out, away from the house and corral. I swung the left rein up over his neck and stuck a foot into the stirrup then pulled myself up and over, reins gathered short, and steeled myself.

The stud didn’t do anything.

“Oh no,” I said. “You’re not going to lull me into a false sense of security.”

He pulled against gathered rein, stuck his head down, and shook it. Then he shook everything else, including me. I hated that. It hurt to have my head, spine, and neck snapped inside out.

He stood still. I waited. Finally I ventured a question “Are you done?”

Of course not.

He stuck his head up in the air, dropped it, bent his spine upward, tail slashing back and forth, and proceeded to back up rather swiftly. Which was not the direction in which I wished to go. “Quit,” I said. I glanced over my shoulder to see if we were approaching anything, person, or horse—possibly even a house and furniture—that might trip us up. “Quit.”

So he stopped backing up and moved forward, stomping as he went, trying to yank the reins out of my hand. Horses are powerful, and stallions more powerful yet. It was always a fight to control a snuffy stud-horse. Especially this one.

Eventually, as I applied pressure to the bit, he hopped up and down. Stiff-legged. Which caused me to swear most vehemently.

Then Neesha appeared. He leaned down from his saddle, caught one of the stud’s reins to control his head, and quietly asked, “Is this any way for a well-mannered horse to act?”

Well-mannered, my ass.

“We discussed this,” Neesha continued. “This is not the way to treat the man who feeds you. And his bones are old. They’ll break.”

I gritted my teeth. But Neesha had grown up on a horse farm, and he’d conquered the stud the first day he met him. He conquered him now. The stud blew out one tremendous, breathy, damp snort, and settled. All the protest died out of him. I could feel it go.

“My old bones still have a lot of life left in them,” I muttered, “and I had him under control, thank you very much.”

“I know that. He doesn’t.” Neesha released the rein and sat upright in his saddle again. “So, where are we going?”

“This was your idea,” I reminded him sharply, still disgruntled. “Don’t you have a place in mind?”

“Well, no. I didn’t think you’d agree to go.”

I glanced at Del, who’d finger-painted black circles around her horse’s eyes to cut down on the sun glare. Now she was in the saddle, blacking pot tucked away, saying nothing. Her face was expressionless. She just waited to see if I’d settled on her suggestion or ignored it utterly.

I looked back at Neesha. “Let’s go north. Let’s go visit your mother.”

His mouth fell open. “My mother?”

I used Del’s argument. “It’s been two years.”

“Yes, but…” He trailed off and ruminated a moment, frowning faintly, eyes gone blank. Finally he came back to himself and met my eyes. “All right.”

A sudden thought struck me. “She wouldn’t try to beat me up with a shovel, would she? Or hit me over the head with a stool?”

“No.” He was utterly baffled. “Why would she do either of those things?”

“Well, I slept with her one night, then left the next morning. And she’d never been with any man before. I’m sure she had better dreams than that for her first time.”

Neesha made a dismissive gesture. “Oh, no, she understood. She told me about that. She didn’t expect you to stay. Admittedly, she didn’t expect to conceive, but she did, and she said I was worth it.” He paused. “I am.”

“That’s humble,” I said, echoing something he’d said the day before.

Neesha laughed. “Oh, but the Sandtiger’s cub is never humble.”

Del observed, “If we stay here any longer, we may as well go back to bed.”

I made an expansive gesture. “Lead on.”

She rode by me on her white, blue-eyed gelding. The stud reached out to bite him. I smacked him on top of his head. “Don’t be rude.”

The big oasis was a popular stopping place for folk of all kinds, from single families to caravans hauling goods and people, nomadic tribes, merchants, any number of others on business of their own, guides hoping to be hired, and sword-dancers also looking for work as caravan outriders or settlers of disputes. Tanzeers knew to send servants here to find such sword-dancers. It was a place of palm trees weighted with heavy ribbed fronds, dripping dates in season; trees with frothy limbs, wide canopies, thorns, spiked bark; succulent ground vegetation, such as alla plants, growing in the shade; catclaw, creosote, cactus; even tough, webby grasses rooted so deeply that sand didn’t block their growth. Shade was sought and treasured, but the most significant attraction was water. Here, an underground stream bubbled up between a drift of half-buried stone, surrounded by a short man-made wall built of rocks and mudbrick.

I had been here countless times on my own, and occasionally with Del; with Neesha, once, when we rescued him from Umir by trading him for the Book of Udre-Natha—part of Umir’s eclectic collection of things for which he conceived a desire, though perhaps obsession was a better word. Once, that had been Del. I, on the other hand, he merely wanted to kill.

It was near sundown, which meant that sites beneath almost all of the trees had been claimed already by various travelers. The smell of roasting meat, yeasty bread, spices, and pungent liquor blocked other smells. We rode the path through the oasis and fetched up at the spring. All three of us swung off our horses, but Neesha held back as Del and I led our mounts to the spring. There wasn’t enough room for all of our horses; another burnous-clad man watered two oxen on the other side. He marked the swords jutting up behind our shoulders, saw clearly that Del was a woman, and immediately goaded his oxen from the spring.

I turned to tell Neesha there was room to water his horse, but he had disappeared. Likely looking for an acceptable area to bed down. We wouldn’t need shade at night, but it would nonetheless be nice to have a tree of our own.

“I wonder,” I commented, “if our friend with the oxen departed because we are sword-dancers or because you’re a woman.”

Del shrugged as she allowed the gelding to dip his head down into the water. “Probably because of me. I’m foreign to Southroners still, and I wear a sword-dancer’s harness. How dare I? How dare I go against everything they’ve ever been taught? How dare I take on a man’s role by stepping into the circle?”

No longer was there bitterness is her tone when she spoke of such things. Del had not—and would not—accept that every woman in the South was expected to serve men, but she also had learned to pick her battles. One woman at a time.

I brought the stud in next to the gelding, and leaned down with a gourd scoop to bring water to my mouth. “Of course it could be me. People do recognize me.”

“It’s the scars,” a male voice said. “And missing fingers. And the Northern woman who rides with you.”

I looked up, then violently dashed the contents of the gourd back into the water. “No,” I said. “Oh, no. Not again. Didn’t you learn anything? Don’t you recall what I said?”

Khalid’s jaw was tight. “That I wasn’t good enough to even step into a circle with you.”

“Yes,” I declared, seriously exasperated. “That’s exactly what I said. I meant you to heed it.”

Though the sun was going down, I could still see his face and his expression. He glared at me. “I don’t want to step into a circle with you.”

I blurted a rough laugh. “Well, that’s the first smart thing I’ve heard you say. But why in hoolies are you here?”

With some belligerence, he said, “It’s an oasis. Anyone can come here. And I told you I’d go wherever I wanted.”

I shook my head in disgust. “What did you do, run your horse all the way to get here before us?”

Del’s voice was very quiet. “Who is this fool?”

And I remembered that she had never seen Khalid. Only I had, and Neesha. “This fool,” I said, “challenged Neesha to a dance. And he cheated. He—”

“I didn’t cheat!” Khalid, stung, raised his voice over mine. “I tricked him, yes, but that is something all of us can do, who dance. He was the fool for not examining the circle before we began.”

“Well,” Del observed, “then it’s not entirely accurate to accuse him of cheating, Tiger.”

Khalid looked at her warily, not certain if or why she was agreeing with him.

Neesha appeared out of the setting sun, leading his unsaddled, unpacked horse. His tone was exquisitely dry. “Are we inviting him to dinner?”

Khalid sneered. “I wouldn’t eat with you.”

“Then why are you here?” I asked. “Neither of us will dance with you, so it makes no sense for you to follow us.”

“I’ve danced with him.” He meant Neesha. “And I’ve danced with you.” Now Khalid looked at Del. “This time, I challenge her.”

“No,” Neesha and I said simultaneously.

“Excuse me,” Del said pointedly. “I accept or reject my own dances.”

“He’s a fool,” Neesha blurted.

“Sandsick,” I said.

“A fool, sandsick; neither matters.” Del met Khalid’s eyes. “Tomorrow.

Khalid inclined his head. “Tomorrow.” And then he stalked away.

“Well,” Del observed, “at least one Southroner doesn’t care if I’m a woman, only if I can dance. Progress.”

I scowled at her as I backed the stud away, leaving room for Neesha’s horse. “Beat his ass, bascha.”

“Of course,” she said matter-of-factly.

Neesha had found us a tree. There was even a fire ring beneath it, but it wasn’t lighted since there were no coals, and we didn’t feel like kindling a flame for cooking. We had perfectly good food in our saddle pouches. We ate the fresh meat first, rather than the dried and salted supply from the house stores. All of us were greasy-fingered within moments. Del used a rag to wipe her mouth. Neesha and I resorted to the backs of our hands.

“How far do we have to go to reach your mother’s place?” I asked around a finger as I sucked fat from it. And its neighbor.

“Two days, unless the weather stops us,” Neesha answered, wiping his chin. “There’s another stopping place, though much smaller. We can reach it tomorrow night, if we push.”

I gnawed on the joint bone, then leaned over to spit out gristle. “Well, it depends on how quickly or how slowly Del defeats our friend tomorrow.”

“I won’t waste time.”

I’d told her, in great detail, how things had gone, first with Neesha then with me.

“We’ll make Neesha’s stopping place,” she said.

“It’s much smaller,” Neesha noted. “There won’t be as many people, if any. But there’s good water.”

“And I take it you’ve got water at the horse farm.”

He nodded. “It’s close to the border. More water, lusher vegetation, good grass. My stepfather raises horses of a quality many people travel to see. And if they’ve got the price, they buy.”

“If they’re anything like the one you ride, indeed the quality is good,” Del told him.

Neesha smiled proudly. “I raised this one from a colt. He’s eight now and ready to be serious. My father—” he caught himself, “my stepfather said I should not grow too attached, because the colt would likely be sold. But when a buyer asked for him, my mother said he wasn’t for sale. My stepfather wanted to argue, but of course you don’t do that in front of a buyer. Afterward, when the buyer had taken a different horse and my fa—stepfather addressed the topic with my mother, he lost the argument. And so the horse was mine.” Neesha glanced over at the hobbled bay, who nosed contentedly at grain and grass.

“That man raised you,” I said briefly. “And if you called him ‘father’ for all of your life prior to finding me, you should continue to call him that.”

My son stared down at the bota in his lap, giving away nothing in his expression. Then he looked up to meet my eyes and dipped his head in a nod.

“Good.” I washed down the meat with a slug of bota water, then said I was turning in. I mentioned that Del might want to as well, considering she had a dance in the morning. She was willing, and Neesha said he’d check on the horses.

It wasn’t necessary, but Del and I both knew why he did it. We unrolled our blankets, flattened folds, and lay down, burrowing together for warmth. In the distance I heard the scream of a sandtiger, the yips of desert dogs.

“That was well done,” she said very quietly; the horses were not picketed particularly far away.

“What?—oh.” I spoke as quietly. “Well, the man is more his father than I am.”

“Neesha has much to think about. He has found you, found his dream of wishing to be a sword-dancer.”

I couldn’t argue with that. It was far safer living on a horse farm than dancing, but being safe was not what aspiring sword-dancers desired. Neesha might well have sought the life even if he weren’t my son, but he was, and he had tracked me down. He’d taken a handful of lessons from Abbu Bensir, when Abbu stopped over at the horse farm, and had spent much of his life practicing the forms; first those he made up, then those Abbu taught him. But I had beaten him in the circle, my son. Beaten him badly.

Which put me in mind of another young man who’d danced with me and lost. I shifted closer to Del, speaking very softly. “You don’t think he’s my son, do you?”

It startled Del, though she spoke as softly. “Neesha’s your son!”

“No, no—not Neesha. The fool. Khalid.”

“Why would you think he’s your son?”

“Because he’s doing very much what Neesha did, insisting on dancing against me. And now that I know Neesha’s in the world, there could be more offspring scattered throughout the South.”

“Don’t brag, Tiger.”

“Hoolies, Del, you know as well as I do that before I met you, I wasn’t exactly chaste.”

“You weren’t chaste even after you met me. I remember the caravan and Elamain.”

“Who?”

“Elamain. The woman we guarded on the way to her wedding.”

It took me a moment. It had been about six years since Del and I met. “Oh. Her.”

“Yes. Her.”

“I was a fool, bascha. And then I wasn’t anymore.”

“No. You gained wisdom, once I beat it into your head.”

I grinned into darkness.

“Go to sleep,” she whispered. “Neesha’s coming back.”

I wished her goodnight and allowed myself to fall off the precipice. Sleep is a good thing.