Cybele's Secret (27 page)

“I can’t see anywhere at all where there could be a track over,” I said to Stoyan. “What do you think he’ll do?”

Stoyan frowned. “He will not return home,” he said. “Such a man never abandons his mission. Besides, he must continue to evade this pursuer. He will search for another way.”

We gazed up at the impossible slopes, where mountain goats, if they were especially nimble, might perhaps find a path.

“I don’t suppose it’s our problem anymore,” I was saying when I caught sight of it out of the corner of my eye: a tattered scrap of black against the white of the
Esperança
’s bellying sails. I hardly dared turn lest she vanish the moment I did so. “Stoyan,” I hissed.

“What?” He had heard the change in my voice and answered in hushed tones.

“She’s there. Tati. I can see her up amongst the sails. Over there, near the mainmast.”

After a moment, while we both pretended not to be looking, Stoyan said, “I see her, Paula. What now?”

“She’s pointing,” I said. “That way, back toward the shore but beyond that rocky headland to the east of us.” Still I did not turn directly toward her, but I could see her figure perched improbably halfway up, her feet on a spar, one hand clutching the mast, the other gesturing with confidence in the direction I had mentioned, as if to command the course of the ship. I could not see what lay beyond the headland; the mountains seemed as impassable as they were here, but maybe there was a path. On the deck and on watch atop the mast, crewmen went about their business as if there were no robed woman clinging to the timbers of their ship. It seemed she was invisible to them.

“She’s fading,” said Stoyan, and before our eyes the dark figure wavered and broke up and vanished. “Do we tell him?”

“Maybe we don’t need to,” I said, seeing Duarte coming across the deck toward us. I addressed the captain with what confidence I could muster. “There could be plague all the way along this shore. You realize that, I suppose?” I said. “Landing anywhere nearby might risk the lives of your entire crew. May we see your maps?”

Duarte was looking haggard. “Why not?” he said flatly, as if it hardly mattered.

Pero showed us our current position on the map and the site of the stricken village. I shivered to think of that. Plague had spread across our region more than once and had swept whole towns and districts bare of living souls. It was indiscriminate, taking men, women, and children alike, the poor, the wealthy, the wicked, and the saintly. That settlement had looked so small. I imagined the inhabitants perhaps gathered at their little mosque to pray, fewer by the day. I imagined mothers watching their children die or children left alone, confused and helpless. The worst thing was, there was nothing to be done about it. To land and offer assistance was to invite a death sentence. Still, it had felt bad to sail on by.

I found what I thought was the big headland, and beyond it a pair of narrow, slitlike bays. The map was lacking in detail. I could not tell if any paths led up the mountains from one or the other of these.

“You could put in here,” I said, stabbing the spot with my finger. “There may well be a way up into the mountains, perhaps a path that meets the one you intended to walk. And the ship could anchor in the second bay, out of sight. Of course, you may find plague in the settlement over the pass; it might be everywhere in the region. That’s your risk, which I suppose you must take on behalf of your whole party. You could always sail back to Istanbul, taking care to evade the Mufti’s vessel. You’ve got a fine crew. They could do it.”

Duarte looked at me, his dark eyes inscrutable. “Put yourself in my place,” he said, for once not mocking but entirely serious. “What would your decision be?”

I blinked, surprised. “I could not make it so quickly,” I said. “I know which choice is right but…I understand what it means to be dedicated to a mission, too. My head and my heart would do battle over it. I would need time to decide.”

“I have no time. We are here, and sooner or later the other ship will find us. If we go ahead, it must be quickly.”

I looked at Duarte closely. There were lines on his face that I had not noticed before, grooves between his nose and the corners of his mouth that made him look older. His dark brows were drawn into a frown. “You have a little time,” I said. “Until we sail around the headland and into the bay, and then until we see if there’s a path. You could talk to your crew.”

He gave a curt nod, then turned his back and went to the rail, where he stood looking ahead as the
Esperança
sailed on a steady course toward the promontory. I remembered how I had said before that I believed his crew would die for him. That was what he had to decide now: whether to put them in the path of death.

Without further talk, Stoyan and I went down to the cabin. It was cold. Out on the water, at times it was hard to believe the season was late spring. I held my cloak around me, watching Stoyan as he stood by the porthole staring out. He was tall enough to do so without standing on anything; indeed, he had to stoop a little.

“This is hard for Duarte,” I said. “It’s one thing asking his men to defend him against attackers; I expect they do that quite often. It’s quite another expecting them to enter what may be a plague village. What if he got there with Cybele’s Gift and found everyone dead?” A shiver ran through me; I could see the scene, what should have been a triumph turned to ashes. “He can’t attempt the climb alone. That would be foolhardy. If he sails back to Istanbul, he’ll be sacrificing the mission. And putting himself in the way of the Sheikh-ul-Islam.”

“So what would your answer be?”

“I don’t know. Imagine watching a friend die of plague, knowing you could have prevented it. Can a mission really be worth that?”

“I ask myself,” Stoyan said solemnly, “what would my choice be if I had to risk the lives of companions, of friends, in order to find my brother. Not so long ago, I would have told you yes, I would do so without hesitation.”

I waited for more, but it was not forthcoming. “And now?” I asked him.

“I believe that, like you, I could not do it. That I could not bear what might ensue. And that wounds me; it is as if I have set Taidjut aside.” His voice was full of pain now.

“Then we must both be glad the decision is not ours to make,” I said quietly. “Do you think of him all the time? Taidjut?”

“I count the grief I have caused, the losses, in my quest to find him. Salem bin Afazi, slain through my neglect of my duties, because I asked for leave to follow a thread of information. Your father, alone and unprotected in Istanbul because I did not keep a proper watch on you. Others before. I have acquitted myself miserably, Paula.”

I stood and laid a comforting hand on his back. “You’ll find him, Stoyan,” I said. “You’re strong of heart. And you’ve acquitted yourself bravely. When things went wrong, it was not your doing. It’s my fault entirely that you and I are in our current predicament.”

I pondered the future. If Duarte decided not to risk the climb, we could be back in Istanbul sooner than we had expected, and I would be able to end Father’s anxiety. He and I would sail back home, and Stoyan could pick up his search for his lost brother again. That was good. But I was filled with sadness: for those who were suffering in that little village, for Stoyan and Taidjut, for Duarte, torn between the duty laid on him by his friend’s sacrifice and his responsibility to his crew. And what about Cybele’s Gift? How could I set aside my own mission? How could I ignore my sister?

“Maybe the decision will be made for us,” I said. A cold feeling came over me, a certainty that what I had just said was true. “Maybe…” No, I refused to believe the plague had somehow been sent so that we would land in another bay, take another path, do the will of the Other Kingdom. That was too dark a possibility to be contemplated.

“What is wrong, Paula?” Stoyan turned, putting a hand on my shoulder.

“Nothing, I…no, nothing.” I shivered, drawing the cloak tighter. “I just…” I realized that I was afraid. “Stoyan…”

“What? You frighten me, Paula, when you look like that. Come, sit down.” He sat me on the bunk, squatting in front of me, unclamping my hands from the cloak and putting his around them. “Now tell me.”

I shook my head. “It’s nothing. A fit of the vapors. But stay there, please.” His grasp was warm; it pushed the fear away a little. Soon, very soon, I suspected, nothing would have the power to do that.

After a while, Duarte came down to the cabin. We had sailed around the promontory and were heading into the first of the narrow bays. Stoyan had got up from time to time to look out and report to me. I was trying to read aloud—
Aesop’s Fables—
and he was seated on the floor with his back against the bunk, next to my legs. It was extremely hard to concentrate.

“I have a question to ask you.” Our captain was standing in the doorway, hands up on the frame, expression neutral.

“Both of us?” I asked, closing the book and feeling my heart pick up its pace.

“Stoyan only. If I find a track from this bay or the next, will you come up the mountain with me?”

We stared at him in stunned silence.

“I cannot,” Stoyan said after a little. “My place is with Paula. You cannot expect her to put herself in the path of plague. And if she stays on the boat, I do not go.”

“And if she comes, too?” Duarte’s dark gaze moved to me.

Now I was really cold. I knew why I had been afraid. At no point in the journey thus far had I really believed that I might die. Perhaps that was not quite true; the whirlwind sail around the cliffs had had its moments. But this…“Before, you said you wouldn’t take us,” I said, trying to sound calm. “What has changed your mind?”

Duarte gave a bitter smile. “If I could go alone, I would,” he said. “But I must have two men with me at least, one as a guard, a second to come back for help if one of us is injured. Pero has volunteered. Stoyan is the strongest man on board, an unparalleled fighter.”

“And the others?” I asked, knowing the answer before he spoke.

“Pero is a friend; we understand each other. I will not ask the others to risk their lives out of personal loyalty. Accidents, mishaps, bandits, yes. Plague, no.”

“You didn’t ever consider not going yourself?” I queried, clutching my hands together to conceal the way they were shaking. Because, of course, I did want to go. Despite the plague, despite the danger, I still believed I was meant to go.

“No. Paula, will you release Stoyan from his obligation to you? My crew will keep you safe. They will treat you with respect. You have my word—”

“I said no.” Stoyan’s voice was heavy with finality. “I will not go, and neither will Paula. She stays, and I am her guard. Take your little statue and make your climb, pirate, and if your loyal mate loses his life to those ills you list—bandits, accidents, plague—live with the knowledge of that. You will not take Paula with you.”

Duarte’s brows shot up. For a moment, he looked like his old self. “Ah, but Paula is very much her own woman,” he said. “I thought you’d have learned that by now. Besides, she’s your employer, unless I’ve got things wrong. Why don’t we let her answer?”

God help me. I had to say yes; everything that had happened up till now made that clear. A force beyond the worldly wanted Cybele’s Gift returned. My instincts and the messages of the Other Kingdom told me all three of us were required to make that happen. I was prepared to go. Terrified, but willing. I was not so sure I was ready to put Stoyan in the path of plague.

“We need to talk about this alone,” I told Duarte. “Stoyan and I.”

“There’s no time.” The captain’s features had a set look.

“It won’t take long. Please.”

He went out without a word, and I got to my feet. Stoyan stood, too, his face ashen in the bright light from the porthole. His scar made a sharp line across his cheek; his lips were pressed together.

“I don’t want to argue with you,” I said. “I believe I must do this. But I don’t want you to come because of duty, because it’s your job to look after me and protect me. I couldn’t bear to put you in such peril because of that, Stoyan.”

“That was the reason you hired me. As a bodyguard.”

“Then I’ll unhire you, if that makes this any easier. Consider yourself no longer in my employment. You are your own man, and you can make your decision based only on your own wishes. You can make it not as a bodyguard but as a…friend.” My voice had started to shake. I so much wanted him to come with me, but I shrank from the prospect of watching him perish from plague, or in combat, or from cold or injury. I realized, with a jolt of the heart, that I would not be able to bear it. I reached out and took his hand, and his fingers closed around mine. I had never seen him like this; he looked stricken.

“I will ask you one question, Paula,” he said.

“Ask, then.”

“You will go, I see that, despite anything I may say or do. I know you. I know how determined you are. Do you want me to come with you?”

I nodded, tears of relief and sadness brimming in my eyes.

“Then I will come,” Stoyan said on a sigh.

“Duarte!” I called, and he was there in the doorway again; probably he’d heard the whole thing. Side by side, Stoyan and I faced him, our hands still clasped. “We’ll come,” I said. “Both of us. It’s what we’re meant to do. But no more mockery. No more dismissive remarks. We’ll do our best to help you, and you’ll treat us with respect, as equal members of your party. Now ask Pero to find us some really warm clothing. It looks as if we’re going to be up there overnight.”

Four crewmen rowed us ashore and waited while we searched for a path. The shore was rocky here with only a tiny flat patch for landing, and the tree cover came down almost to the water. The pitch of the hillside was steep. There was no obvious track up from the shore. We were about to give up and sail around to investigate the second cove when Stoyan, who had scrambled higher up the rocks, called out, “Here!”

There was a tree there, a juniper that crawled over the stony ground and up the rock wall with a tenacity like that of a strong old woman. Its gnarled branches were festooned with offerings, scraps of cloth, lengths of colored wool, snippets of braid, human hair twisted and tied, beads, fraying threads, and tarnished buckles. Behind it, the slightest of gaps in the close-growing foliage could be observed. Nearby, a tiny stream of freshwater trickled through a natural channel in the rock to fill a bowllike indentation before spilling over and down into the sea. Stoyan’s eyes met mine, questioning, and I gave a nod. Everything about this place suggested the Other Kingdom. When Duarte and Pero climbed up to us, I said, “This is the way.”