Golden Daughter (13 page)

“How will I recognize him?”

“That I cannot tell you. But my sources say that your so-called high priest hired a person of some legendary prominence—a Golden Daughter, I believe it is called? Funny title. Have you heard of them?”

“No,” Brother Tenuk admitted. “I have not.”

“I would imagine they’re female. Beyond that, your guess is as good as mine. But this Golden Daughter has been hired by your high priest to protect the Dream Walker. She is coming along with the envoy, and you will, I’m certain, be able to discover her identity. Then it’s merely a matter of extrapolation. Whomever she is guarding must be the Dream Walker. Find a good excuse—a careful excuse, for we do not want to draw the attention of your superiors—pack him up, and send him back to Lunthea Maly. Do you understand?”

Brother Tenuk did not answer. He had heard the Dragon’s words, but all in a distant, foggy drone. His attention was fixed on the Dragon’s hand, slowly sliding out from the dove nest, its long index finger extended.

From the tip of his talon hung the dead body of the little white dove. Her breast was bright crimson with her blood.

Kulap
. That was her name. Kulap, who sat upon her first nest. Kulap, whose eggs would now rot away, forgotten and cold.

As he spoke, the Dragon idly twirled the limp form like a child’s toy, then lifted it to his face for disinterested inspection. His mouth opened like a cat’s as he sniffed, as though to better inhale the scent of death. He repeated his question, “Do you understand?” and turned to Tenuk for an answer. As he did so, he bit off the dove’s head.

Tenuk stared, all the color draining from his face. For a long moment he could not speak. Then he said, “You didn’t have to kill her.”

“What? Oh, this?” The Dragon flicked the headless form from his talon into the grass lining the path. “Well. You didn’t have to love her.” He wiped his hand on his cloak and fixed Tenuk with one bright red eye. “Do you understand what is required of you, Brother Tenuk? Answer me.”

Tenuk nodded. Then, his eyes still fixed on the place where the thick grass bent, he whispered, “Yes, Master. I will find the Dream Walker. I will send him back to Lunthea Maly.”

“And you will take care,” said the Dragon. “You will not draw the attention of the knight. And you will send a message in advance to your clan lord, alerting him of your success and informing him where he may find the Dream Walker.”

Tenuk said nothing.

“Aren’t you curious to know how you will send this message to your clan lord?”

“How,” said Tenuk in a thin thread of a voice, “will I send this message to my clan lord?”

“Ah! I wondered if you would ask.” With that, the Dragon threw his cloak back over his shoulder, revealing his other arm, which had remained hidden until now. And there on his arm, clutching with reptilian claws, was a raven. Its eyes were as red as Kulap’s blood, and its feathers might have been dipped in the Midnight of the Black Dogs. It was large even for its kind, and something about it, something about the way it clung to the Dragon’s arm, made a man feel that if he closed one eye and squinted, he would look upon a small winged reptile and not a bird at all.

It turned its head to study Tenuk, and its bright eye was intelligent. Sentient, even. It was no mortal bird.

“My servant here will carry your message. When you have sent away the Dream Walker, you may speak your message to him. No need to tie a missive to his leg. Speak your message and turn him loose after sunset. In the meanwhile . . .” The Dragon turned once more to the little nest where Kulap had rested. He bent, sniffing at the opening.

Then he put up his arm and seemed somehow to push the enormous raven inside. The space was much too small and the bird far too big. But sizes did not matter to the Dragon. He simply ignored such mortal laws and so bent them to his will. The bird vanished inside the nest.

“He’ll be comfortable,” said the Dragon, turning his blackened smile upon Tenuk once more. “Don’t bother feeding him. He’ll look after himself. There is plenty of good hunting around here.” This with a sweep of his arm that indicated the whole of the dovecote.

Tenuk stared at the monster. In his mind’s eye he saw the bloodied stump where Kulap’s head had been. He bowed. “Very good, Master.”

The Dragon folded himself back into his cloak so that only his white face was visible. “Do not fail me, brother,” he said. “Do not bring my wrath down upon you.”

Suddenly the Dragon was leaning over Tenuk, his burning eyes so close that the abbot could feel blisters forming on his forehead, on his mouth, across his cheeks. But this was nothing to the heat of the Dragon’s breath when he spoke, which seared the very hair from Tenuk’s head.

“The time is upon us. The Gold Gong is even now prepared. All is made ready! Do not fail me.”

The voices of cooing doves fell softly upon Brother Tenuk’s ears. He cracked open his eyelids and found that he lay prone upon the white-spattered stones, flat on his face before the dovecote. Had he fainted from the heat of Anwar blazing down upon his head? Had he dreamed that dreadful encounter?

Groaning, Tenuk pulled himself up and slowly, ever so slowly got to his feet. How old he had become! Older even than he had been that morning. He put up a quivering hand and touched his head. All his silvery white hair was gone, leaving him bald save for glaring liver-spots.

Muttering unintelligible curses, he crept to the cote and peered into a certain nest hole. He should see Kulap in there, warming her eggs. Soft little Kulap, only hatched herself last spring. Gentle little Kulap, cooing her lullabies to her growing young.

Instead, Tenuk saw a red, scale-rimmed eye surrounded by dense black feathers.

“Curse you,” Tenuk whispered. But not to the raven, nor even to the Dragon. His hatred had run far too deep to curse either of them. “Curse you for driving me to this!” he snarled.

And, shading his eyes, he glared up into the sky where Anwar and Hulan danced their celestial paces in time to the Song they sang.

Tu Syed considered himself a gentleman. A slave, yes, but a gentleman slave with a certain degree of elegance, a taste for the finer things, and an unswerving devotion to his own dignity.

Which is why he and Tu Domchu huddled close together with their fellow slaves, wide eyes staring at the terrible sight unfolding before them, dreading that they might become the next victims. They watched a man of impressive height and breadth being torn apart, piece by piece, by a slip of a handmaiden.

Tu Syed, as commanded by the Besur, had hired one Master Pirwura to guide them across the treacherous terrain between the rural town of Lestari and the beginning of the road into the Khir Mountains. The wretched handmaiden had been against it from the start.

“It can’t be that hard,” she’d said. “A few days, and we’ll see the mountains for ourselves! We don’t need a guide to get there.”

Tu Syed had given her his most condescending sneer, not a sneer to be taken lightly. She’d smiled back. How he’d come to
hate
that smile in the last two-and-a-half months! “The Besur wishes us to take no chances. This Master Pirwura is the most highly recommended guide in the territory. And he says that Chhayan bandits abound in the countryside around here, bandits who, unholy dogs that they are, wouldn’t think twice before setting upon a band of Kitar pilgrims. He will give us protection as well as leadership.”

Her smile had only grown. “
I’ll
protect you, Tu Syed. Don’t you trust me?”

But of course he didn’t. She couldn’t weigh more than six stone dripping wet! What good was she save for feeding and clothing Lady Hariawan and smiling at people in that unsettling manner?

So he’d hired Master Pirwura, and they’d set out across the wide plains country toward the Khir Mountains. Lestari was considered the last mark of civilization in this part of the nation, and Tu Syed didn’t wonder. No one but peasant shepherds and cattle-herders lived out here, and it was all too easy to imagine Chhayan nomads shrieking their heathen battle cries and falling with dreadful bloodlust upon a gentleman (a slave, yes, but a
gentleman
slave) such as Tu Syed. It was a good thing they had a hero-adventurer type on hand to keep them safe.

So Tu Syed thought with a certain smug satisfaction when, near the end of their journey, even as the Khir Mountains loomed large above them, and nothing but empty wild land stretched as far as the eye could see on all other sides, they heard the first yodeling shriek. The Chhayan bandits! They were come at last! And sure enough, they appeared the next moment, rising up out of the ground like undead spirits, their horses shaking free the debris of their camouflage, their weapons held high above their heads as they set upon their prey!

And did that tiny little nothing of a handmaiden do
anything?
She just sat there on her donkey, smiling away. Her mistress was no better. Lady Hariawan didn’t bother to look up from the pommel of her saddle. At least the dogs had the good grace to bark their heads off, useless creatures though they were.

But Master Pirwura, like a true hero, had shouted orders to the slaves, told them to circle their donkeys and form a wall around their mistress. Then he had set to with a will, his hewing blade flying, his voice bellowing. How those Chhayans fled at the very sight of him, knowing his reputation as they must! They hardly put up a fight at all! Cowardly, weak-livered dog men.

So Tu Syed had tried a smile of his own the handmaiden’s way. But it had clashed against hers, and he looked away again quickly, wondering why he suddenly felt so stupid. After all, hadn’t he just been proven right?

Master Pirwura returned from routing the bandits, wiping sweat from his brow and a drop of red blood from his lip. “They’ll not trouble innocents in these parts again!” he’d declared. And then he’d said, “I will, of course, require my ten percent extra for defense.”

“Naturally, naturally!” Tu Syed had said, bobbing and grinning his gratitude.

They’d continued on their way until, that evening, they’d reached the foothills of the Khir Mountains and the beginning of the long, winding, upward road.

“This is as far as I go,” Master Pirwura had said, and asked for his payment. But before Tu Syed could so much as reach for his purse, that sun-blighted handmaiden had urged her donkey forward between the hero and the slave. She dismounted and tilted her head prettily.

“We don’t pay cheats,” she said. “Certainly not extra.”

That’s when it began, the exchange that left Tu Syed and his brethren all but clinging to each other in terror as they watched the battle raging between mighty Pirwura and the girl.

A battle that was frighteningly one-sided.

“What a nice-looking son you have,” Sairu said in a voice of syrup. “A bit pimply, to be sure, but most boys will grow out of that in time. Not much of a horseman, but he did make a great noise. I’m sure he does you proud.”

“What do you mean?” Master Pirwura cried. “I have no son!”

“Nephew then?” the girl suggested. But she shook her head. “No. No, he’s your son. The other one was your nephew, and the third and fourth are friends, I would imagine. What percentage do they get of your earnings for these little escapades? Or do they do it just for fun? It must be exciting to play Chhayan bandit and to see all our frightened faces!”

Master Pirwura protested. He blustered. He roared. He threatened.

And then the handmaiden’s weapons really came out.

“So your wife left you for another man, did she?”

The look upon the mighty Pirwura’s face could have turned the stomach of the most stoic Pen-Chan. He went a shade of green Tu Syed would not have believed humanly possible. His mouth opened, and he seemed to sway where he stood. Then he growled, but with a quaver in his voice: “Where did you hear that?”

“I didn’t,” Sairu replied. “I read it.”

“Read it?”

“In your face, Master Pirwura. Or is that even your name? It means ‘The Honored Warrior,’ which does seem rather presumptuous for a pig-keeper. Don’t try to protest! I figured out your true profession long ago. Pig-keeping has a way of staining the soul, though I mean no insult when I say it. I’ve met pigs I quite liked. But pig-keeping isn’t particularly heroic, and your wife was always ashamed, wasn’t she?”

“I—you—Who told you? Who knows?” Pirwura gasped.

“Oh, that’s right. You’re not from Lestari or this region, are you? No one here knows the truth, because you came from down south, by your accent, possibly as far as Tumbam, though I think I detect a trace of western influence as well, which implies possibly a little Chhayan in your heritage? Oh, those dastardly Chhayans! You know how they wriggle their way into things.”

“No!” Pirwura shouted. “I’m not! I’m not anything like that! I am Kitar, full-blooded!”

“I see.” Sairu blinked slowly. “It was your wife who was Chhayan. That makes sense, that does. A Chhayan woman wants her man to fight. She wants her man to be a hero. Not a pig-keeper. So you couldn’t keep her, not for long. Only long enough to give you that boy of yours.

“But you’ll show her. You’ll show them all! You’ll make a hero of yourself, one way or another, and earn some coin while you’re at it. Hahaha!” Here she laughed, but her laugh was far more pitying than her smile, and almost sounded sad. “Poor man! Even
I
know you can never purchase the respect of a Chhayan. You might as well try to catch the wind in a net.”

The big man’s nostrils flared as he drew a deep breath. His chest, already broad, expanded, and Tu Syed watched his hands clench into massive fists. Oh, Anwar’s light! Oh, Hulan’s mercy! He’d smash the girl flat as a rice cake!

But in that moment, her three stupid dogs set up their barking. And, though Tu Syed could have sworn they’d been secure in their carrier baskets, they leapt forth suddenly and swarmed Pirwura, biting at his ankles, tearing at his calves. The big man screamed and tried to kick, but the lion dogs were used to dodging kicks from irked Masayi slaves, and they avoided his feet with ease and dove in again with their vicious sharp teeth. At least one landed a solid bite and, though Pirwura was huge and the dog no bigger than a sack of sugar, the man doubled over with pain.

The girl caught him by the arm. She twisted, and he gasped and fell to his knees. “We don’t pay cheats,” she said again. “Not extra. You take your earned pay and be on your way, pig-keeper.”

With a final wrench, she flattened him. Then she let go and backed away carefully, avoiding his grabbing arms with the neatness of a dancer. And then she smiled at him.

That was the end. The final blow. Pale and shaking, Master Pirwura turned to Tu Syed and held out his hand. Afraid to go anywhere near him, Tu Syed tossed him three bright coins as originally agreed upon. No one spoke a word, not until their guide was mounted on his own shaggy pony and well on his way back down the narrow road they had followed.

“Give my best to your son!” Sairu called out to his back.

He made a rude gesture. Then he was gone.

Sairu turned to the servants. They cringed. Every one of them had secrets he did not wish read from his face, certainly not out loud! Though they knew they could gain no help from that quarter, they all lifted pleading eyes to Lady Hariawan, who sat upon her mule, unaware of all that went on around her. Her gaze was fixed upon the little dogs milling at Sairu’s feet.

Sairu, sensing some distress in her mistress’s placid face, picked up Sticky Bun and hastened to the side of the tall mule. “Here, my mistress,” she said, holding up the dog.

Lady Hariawan received him into her arms, and he settled down, panting and licking his chops with pleasure at a rending well done. Lady Hariawan remained silent, but she stroked the dog’s head with one long finger.

Sairu took hold of the mule’s reins and rubbed its broad brown cheek. “Shall we continue?”

The road up into the Khir Mountains was clear this time of year and would be for a few more months. The winter snows were melted, and rushing spring torrents had passed on their way, dragging chunks of the road along with them. It was not a safe way to travel without a guide. The Besur had done everything in his power to impress this truth upon Sairu. “
I will send messages to Daramuti,
” he had promised. “
A guide will come for you. You must await him.
”

But though they made camp and waited that night and well into the next day, no guide appeared.

“We must continue to wait,” Tu Syed insisted, nervously watching how the handmaiden’s gaze kept turning to the road and following it into the thick trees, then on up to the lofty mountain heights. He half expected her to go plunging in at any moment, and he dreaded what he would have to do then. Because he couldn’t, as a gentleman, let a maiden like her go traipsing off into the wild on her own. Or could he?

He twisted his fingers together. “Please, my dear young woman,” he said, which was condescending to the extreme, and earned him another of Sairu’s smiles. But he soldiered on bravely. “The Besur assures me that slavers use this road to transport their wares across the mountains into Nua-Pratut. Is this not true, Tu Domchu?” He turned to his second for support.

Tu Domchu spat a thin stream from between two teeth. Then he twisted his lips as though limbering them up for better expulsion. Feeling Tu Syed’s gaze upon him, he lifted one grey eyebrow and glanced his way. “Yup,” he said, and no one could say whether or not he’d heard the question.