Earthly Crown (65 page)

She hesitated, but she had never found him in such a forthcoming—in such a vulnerable—mood before, so she went on. “What about your father?”

He laughed. It was a fragile sound, brief enough, but it heartened her. “My father was a strange man. He was an orphan. Did you know that? He was a Singer. He never said much. He never tried to counsel my mother, and she dearly needed counseling, sometimes. Not in all things. She negotiated with other tribes skillfully enough. They all said so, and it was true. But her own headstrong desires…those she never learned to control, and he never tried to help her. I’m not sure he cared. But he loved me. He only stayed because of me. He said the gods had told him that he would have a child who would have fire in his heart. He said the gods had told him that this child would change forever what the jaran were, that the gods would take the child on a long journey, a Singer’s journey, to show him what he must do to bring the light of the gods’ favor onto their chosen people.”

“And that child was you.”

“That child was me.” His words were slurred, now. “And now I have gone on the Singer’s journey twice, once in body, once in spirit. That makes me a Singer, like my father.” He lay heavy on her, where an arm and leg were draped over her, and he sighed and shut his eyes again.

“Go to sleep, my heart.” She stroked his hair. A Singer. He was now a Singer. It seemed a doubly heavy burden to bear.

He slept soundly all that night. The next morning he insisted they start out down toward the Habakar heartlands. He rode a placid mare, but by mid-morning he was so exhausted that, given the choice between halting the train of wagons on the trail so that he could rest or riding in a wagon instead, he agreed to ride in a wagon. Tess sat next to him, one arm around him, propping him up. On his other side, Sonia drove. A constant stream of riders—women and men both—passed them, just to catch sight of him, just to see if it was true, that he had defeated the Habakar sorcery and come back victorious and alive.

By mid-afternoon he trembled as if with a palsy. Tess and Sonia overruled his objections and halted the wagons and made camp. He was so tired that Tess practically had to hand-feed him, and then he fell asleep before he could hold an audience. Vasil came by that evening.

“He’s asleep,” she said. She sat under the awning in the cool evening breeze, reading by lantern light from Cara’s bound volume of the complete works of Shakespeare.

“You look tired,” said Vasil. Without being asked, he sank down beside her. “Karolla is pregnant, too.”

That startled her. “A third child. You must be very pleased, Vasil.”

He smiled. “I love my children. Is he really asleep?”

She closed the book and set it to one side. “Vasil, what do you want? Or do you even know?”

All at once his expression lost its casual self-assurance. “Oh, gods, I thought he was going to die. I couldn’t have borne that. At least, even banished from him, I knew he yet lived.”

His vehemence shook her. “Why did you come back? You must know that he can’t see you, that it will never be acceptable.”

“I had no choice,” he muttered. He dropped his gaze away from her shyly, forcing her to stare at his profile. The lantern light softened him, giving him the lineament of an angel.

Tess sighed. She had long since discovered that she was susceptible to brash men who hid behind modesty. She leaned over and took his hand. “Vasil.” Then she faltered. She did not know what she needed to say.

Daringly, he lifted her hand to his lips and kissed her knuckles, and then turned her hand over and kissed her palm once, twice, thrice. She shivered, and not from the cold. “You’d better go,” she said, and was shocked to hear how husky her voice sounded.

Without a word, without looking at her, he placed her hand back in her lap and left.

“Oh, God,” she said to herself as she watched him walk away. As she watched him as any woman watches a man she is attracted to, measuring the set of his shoulders and the line of his hips and the promise of his hands. No wonder Sonia had warned her against him.

T
ESS REFUSED TO GO
on the next day. Ilya raged at her, but she simply smiled and kissed him, and Sonia backed her up. So he rested. The day after, she agreed to go on only if he would ride in the wagon all day. Furious but trapped, he submitted.

That day they came down onto the Habakar plain, and scouts and patrols came by in increasing numbers just to get a look at him. The next day, and the next, and the next, he grew stronger in stages. They journeyed at a leisurely pace, attended by his jahar and visited by an ever-growing number of riders. Bakhtiian, they would say, pointing at him from a distance. Some came forward to pay their respects. He gave brief audiences in the evening. Tess always had to cut them short before he was ready to quit, but he was pushing himself constantly, and Cara shook her head and disapproved.

Tess was shocked at the wasteland the army had made of these lands. She could tell they had been rich, once, that they had been rich just a month before—before the jaran army had descended on them. They passed no village, no city, that was not torn by war or deserted. They passed no field that was not trampled into dust. Once they passed a pasture strewn with corpses rotting in the sun. Tess saw not one living person, except for the jaran. Ilya muttered to himself and that evening he sent messengers forward to prepare the main camp to receive him. He sent a messenger to Mother Sakhalin, asking that he and she hold an audience once he had arrived.

Riders lined the path of their train’s progress, to watch him go by. The closer they came to the main camp, each day that passed, the more riders appeared along their route. Three more days passed. At midday on the fourth day—twelve days after he had emerged from his coma—they made their triumphal entrance to the main camp.

It was noisy, both the camp and their reception. Over the protests of almost everyone, Ilya mounted his black stallion and rode at the head of the procession, Tess on his left, Josef and Mitya on his right. Tess knew well enough that Josef’s presence served to remind them all of why they were here in Habakar territory, and Mitya’s to remind them that Bakhtiian had heirs. Vladimir, bearing the gold banner, rode behind, and after him came Bakhtiian’s personal guard, the members of the Orzhekov jahar, resplendent in their armor. After them came Sonia, driving a cart in whose back sat the other Orzhekov children who were with the tribe. Then rode the rest of his jahar, followed by the wagon train and the rearguard.

The members of the camp and the army had assembled, making an avenue between them down which Bakhtiian rode. The way was straight and clear through the huge camp, angling in to the center where lay the Sakhalin encampment and a broad empty field reserved for the Orzhekov tribe. Sonia had sent a wagon ahead in the night, with Aleksi and Ursula, containing the great tent. Now it stood alone in the center of the field. Ilya was glad enough to dismount and recline on the pillows lying there for his use. He was tired, but not as tired as he had been, and his face shone. Tess sank down beside him. They watched as the wagons trundled in and made their spiraling ring around the central tent. The camp grew up around them.

Mitya and Galina brought them food and drink. Ilya dozed a little. When he woke, he gazed at Tess with a quizzical look in his eyes.

“What is it?” she asked. She smiled. She felt deliriously happy. She had gambled, and it had paid off. It made her feel reckless. He looked stronger already, In another ten or twenty days, it would seem as if the entire episode had not happened at all.

“I haven’t seen you wear jahar clothes since—” He shrugged. “Since I don’t know when.”

“Men’s clothes don’t fit a pregnant belly.”

He smiled suddenly, “A child, Tess. Think of it.”

“My bladder thinks of it constantly. We need better plumbing.”

“What you wish, you shall have, my wife. But, ah, do you have any designs in mind?”

“I wish David was here. He’s the engineer. He could design something simple and efficient.”

His eyes narrowed. “David ben Unbutu. Tess.” He hesitated.

“Yes?”

“Never mind.” He shook his head. “I’m hungry.”

“Still?”

But his expression changed, and an entirely new gleam lit his eyes as he examined her. “Just now.” He reached out to take her hand, caught it up, and hastily dropped it again. “Tess. We’ll go to our bed early tonight.”

Demurely, she straightened out the folds in her tunic so that the brocade lay smooth over her crossed legs. “Whatever you say, my husband,” she replied, smiling. “Are you sure you won’t have some important audience to attend?”

“Quite sure.” He propped himself up on one elbow. “There is Mother Sakhalin. You see, after I’ve seen her, then there’s no one else I need see, no one but you.” He got to his feet carefully and walked across to greet Mother Sakhalin and to escort her to a pillow next to him. She came attended by a huge retinue: etsanas, dyans, ambassadors, and even, to Tess’s surprise, several members of the acting troupe.

“Bakhtiian,” said Mother Sakhalin, acknowledging him. “Well met. It is with joy that I greet you this day.”

He accepted her benediction with becoming modesty. Pleasantries, sweet cakes, and tea were passed around. “Most of the news of the army I have heard,” he said, after a decent interval had passed. “Is there other news I ought to hear?”

Tess enjoyed watching Mother Sakhalin and Ilya together. They respected each other, and yet they remained wary, too, of the power the other one wielded. Mother Sakhalin had a vicious sense of humor and Ilya enough aplomb to match her. Tess suspected that they were the kind of pair who, had they been of an age, might have been lovers but never, ever, husband and wife. Sakhalin presented Ilya with various events, and he exclaimed over her wisdom and adroitness in handling them.

“The barbarian ambassador, the one with the slave, may yet learn wisdom,” she said finally. “He has asked that his guardsmen be allowed to marry khaja women and bring them into camp.”

“Has he, indeed?”

She considered him with amusement. “Of course, that is not how he asked, but he did his best to bring the matter forward modestly and with good manners. I told him that as long as they treated the women as they would treat their own wives, I might allow it.”

“That was generous of you, Mother Sakhalin. But can you be sure they treat their own wives well?”

She looked affronted. “Surely any wife is treated with respect? Even savages must know such simple courtesies.”

“Is this all that has happened in camp in my absence, Mother Sakhalin?”

For an instant, and no longer than that, the old woman hesitated. Then she went on. “There is nothing more that needs to be brought to your attention. Six horses were stolen. We have sent out a jahar to look for the thieves.”

“Horses stolen? In the midst of this army? The thieves must be desperate souls, indeed.”

But instead of answering, Mother Sakhalin took her leave, and her retinue departed with her. Except for the actors. They tarried. Tess waved them forward: an embassy of four, Ginny Arbha, Yomi Applegate-Hito, Diana Brooke-Holt, and Gwyn Jones.

“Well met,” Tess rose to greet them, but their sober faces told her immediately that all was not well. “What’s wrong? Has something happened?”

“Mother Sakhalin didn’t tell you?” began Diana, and then broke off, looking embarrassed.

“Is something wrong?” asked Ilya in Rhuian. “May I help?”

Ginny turned to Tess. “There’s been a disaster,” she said in Anglais. “Hyacinth has run off with a man and his sister, and he stole things from our camp.”

“Oh, God,” said Tess. “What did he take?”

“His own gear, which included a little solar-celled heating unit and his computer slate, a thermal blanket, some other things.” She faltered and looked to Yomi.

“A water purifier. A frying pan. Some rope. A tent, which has heating coils in the fabric, as you know. One hundred bags of tea. A lantern, solar-celled. A medical kit. A permanent match.” Yomi faltered as well.

“And a knife,” finished Ginny, “with an emergency transmitter and broad field stun capability built in.”

“Oh, God,” repeated Tess. “Have you let my brother know?”

“Immediately.”

“What did he say?”

“He said to contain the damage, if we could. He said to leave the problem in your hands for now.”

“I’ll have to thank him,” said Tess wryly, “when I see him again.” She glanced down and surprised a peculiar expression on Ilya’s face. “I beg your pardon,” she said in Rhuian, and immediately all the actors begged pardon as well.

“Not at all,” said Ilya, so softly and politely that she knew he was furious. “I beg your pardon for disturbing your reunion.”

“One of the actors has run off,” Tess explained. “But you never did explain why,” she added, glancing at Ginny.

“Tess,” said Ginny, again in Anglais, “evidently they have some kind of taboo on same-sex relationships in this culture. Poor stupid Hyacinth was caught with one of the young men, the young man was exiled, and his sister and Hyacinth ran off with him, to share his exile, no doubt. The Goddess knows, the only thing they’ll share is an ugly death. We’re heartsick about it, but what can we say? It’s their taboo. Perhaps you would like to explain this story to your husband. Evidently Mother Sakhalin did not.”

Tess said, “You’d better go. Let me know if you hear anything. I’ll have to think about this.”

They made polite farewells and hurried away.

“It is one thing,” said Ilya in a low, taut voice, “to go to their tents and speak with them in their own tongue. It is quite another to speak it in front of me so that I can’t understand what you’re saying. Couldn’t you have been more discreet? At least gone aside. Gods, Tess! How do you think I felt sitting here like a damned idiot? I’ll thank you to treat me with more respect in the future.”

“Ilya.” She sat down. “Now listen. You must recall that they come from another land, and they didn’t know whether what we were discussing might embarrass or offend you.”

“Well? Surely Mother Sakhalin gave me the entire report. There was nothing offensive there. Why did the actor run off?”