Misery's Child (The Cadian Chronicles) (17 page)

“You couldn’t have
been very old then. If she was this Gezana’s great-grand aunt.”

“Ah, I was barely
seven summers. It was my first pilgrimage and I was scared witless that the one
of those awful cadia would put some sort of curse on me for staring at the
consecratia
.”

Scearce laughed.
“If those cadia were anything like Lendenican and that Yanna woman, I’m not
surprised. I don’t think I’ve seen so tall a woman. And those black robes, I’ve
never seen those either. Do you remember those awful stories Whimal used to
tell me about cadia who stole the tongues of bad children?”

Whimal, his nurse
in
childhood,
feared the cadia more than she feared
fever, Tors and slave traders all rolled together. Jeptallans, the farthest
removed from Shallanie, saw little of the sisters and held even more
superstitions about them than other Omani tribes. No cadia-techa had ever been
attached to the Jeptallan royal household, for the simple reason that they had
never, in more than a hundred summers and countless generations produced a
female offspring. Women married into the Jeptallan Seat, they were not born to
it. It was one of the reasons other Omani often regarded the Jeptallans and
their entire province with vague suspicion. What family could produce only
sons?

“What I remember
most clearly is the squalling you set up the first time you actually saw a
cadia! Oman’s beard, your mother was mortified!”

Scearce remembered
it, too, although he couldn’t have been more than two summers at the time. He’d
had nightmares for next four or five seasons, terrible dreams he never recalled
but for the sight of billowing robes and the feeling of unnamable dread they
summoned. He had always thought it a symptom of Whimal’s calla mundies, but it
suddenly occurred to him that Whimal hadn’t joined their household until he was
seven. He was sure of it.

He missed his
mother. Alaida had been the only one who could quiet his hiccuping sobs and dry
his tears. If she were alive, perhaps she could tell him when those nightmares
had started and why.

He realized with a
start that his father had asked him a question.

“Forgive me,
father. What?”

“I asked you to do
me a great favor,” Tullus repeated gravely. He was not smiling any longer.
“Keep a watch on Vidor Rowle’s group. His troops are small and....well, they
are farmers, not soldiers. Most have no beards.”

Scearce nodded,
waiting for his father to continue.

“It’s no
disrespect intended for Rowle, of course. He’s one of my oldest and dearest
friends. His present situation is no fault of his. But if there is any trouble
along the way, I’d feel better knowing you were ready to go to his aid.”

“Do you really
think we might see bandits?” The thought both thrilled and repelled him. “Tors,
I mean?”

“Such pilgrimages
are tempting targets for them. So much gold and precious tribute being carried
out in the open, difficult to defend...”

“Without meaning
any disrespect, father, I don’t think Vidor Rowle has much to worry about on
that account. They barely have a tent and food for the journey. That wagon
looks ready to fall apart at the next bump in the road.”

“On the contrary,
he carries his greatest treasure with him. It sits in that curtained litter.”

Understanding grew
in Scearce’s eyes. There were dangers to the consecratia that no one ever spoke
about out loud, only in distressed whispers and silent glances.
Bandits
kidnapped consecratia for ransom, knowing their
families would pay anything, and quickly, to get them back unharmed.

“For a Torian
slave trader, a consecratia is the finest prize imaginable.” Tullus’ deep
voiced rumbled barely above a whisper. “Though they rarely succeed, the rewards
are so great that they try. Often.”

“I thought I’d
overheard something at the last pilgrimage. A consecratia from up north—”

“She was from
Sealles. Vidor Heubron’s only daughter.”

“And she was
taken? They didn’t ransom her?”

Tullus shook his
head, his eyes hooded. “No ransom demand ever came. Heubron sent men into Tor
Abat to search for her, even to offer bribes just for word that she was alive.
But they found nothing.”

“The Tors, they
wouldn’t have.... killed her? Would they?”

“Killed her? No,
Sweet Mother, they’d have done much worse but they would have kept her alive.
It’s far more likely the girl took her own life as soon as she got the chance.”

Scearce said
nothing for a long moment. He thought of that slender slip of a girl whose eyes
had met his for a tiniest of glances as she stepped back into her gilded
litter. Wide eyes, the color of the Far Sea, like a flash of blue-green ganymite
under golden lashes. She bore little resemblance to the seven-summers child,
full of laughter and wonder, who’d passed a half-season at the Seat so long
ago. How she had struggled to keep up with Scearce and her brother! Over
fences, up into the trees—no matter what rough and tumble mischief Jonil
led them into.

“Yes, father,” he
said finally, “I’ll make sure no harm comes to Rowle’s daughter. I swear
it."

Chapter 10: Bandits

Excerpt
from
The Raiders of The Shumdan Mountains

by
Bene
Ricco:

The raiders that
frequently targeted Omani pilgrimages were widely regarded as Tors, but in fact
most of them did not even regard themselves as such. Part of the nomadic tribes
that once roamed that country and distantly related to the gyspies of Tor Abat,
the raiders were actually a distinct people who had their own culture by the
time of the Jeptallan and Mysirrati wars. They were as apt to attack and rob
Tors as Omani, but as the raider chieftain Bort Cebat has been quoted as
saying: “The Omani are easier pickings.”

Yanna woke with a
start at the thudding of her own heart. Then she realized it was not her heart
she felt but pounding of hooves. Lillitha must have heard it too, for she sat
bolt upright in the corner of the litter, her lips pale and eyes bewildered.

The cadia ripped
aside the muslin curtains, shouting for Rowle. But it was already too late. Her
voice was lost in the screams rising all around them. The bandits were upon
them, sending the pilgrimage scattering in every direction. Yanna had one
glimpse of Rowle through the swirling dust, sword raised, before the litter
lurched dangerously to one side and jerked forward.

The farm boy who
drove the litter lashed the mules furiously; in his panic, he was running away
from the pilgrimage instead of deeper into it where Rowle’s soldiers could
protect them.
One of guard, quicker than his comrades, jumped
onto the sideboard of the litter, blocking the door with his body.

“You scriving
arse, turn around!
Turn around!”
he
was shouting.

The point of a sword
thrust through the door and a dark bloom spread across the fabric.

Lillitha screamed.
The sword point disappeared and the shadow of the young guard fell soundlessly
away. There was a sickening thud as one of the litter’s wheels rolled over him.

“Shut up!” Yanna
shouted, “Shut up and take this!’

The cadia pressed
a small dagger into Lillitha’s trembling hands. Had Lillitha not already been
in shock, the hot light in her teacher’s eyes would have terrified her beyond
words. From out of nowhere, Yanna produced another dagger and held it ready in
a hand that did not shake.

Both women tumbled
suddenly as the world seemed to slide and then stop with a bone-shaking crash.
The sounds of screaming horses and splintering wood swallowed all others.

Yanna landed on
top of Lillitha. She did not even bother to check her young charge before she
struggled to her knees and pushed open the opposite door.

“Stay here, your
father will come!” Yanna screamed at her. “Get out of this litter and I’ll kill
you myself. Understand?”

Then she
disappeared into the evening sky.

Lillitha shrank
from the bloody curtain that now lay against her cheek. She wanted to do as
Yanna had commanded, but she couldn’t. Not with the screams rising all around
her. She scrambled to her feet and thrust her head out the door in time to see
her cadia-techa pulling her dagger across a bandit’s throat.

Hands closed on
her shoulders; another groped for her mouth. She bit down hard, tasting blood
and dirt, as a voice cried out. She did not understand the words but there was
no mistaking the anger in them.

Suddenly the hands
fell away. She felt her body lifted off the ground. In the dust and the
darkening night, she could see nothing but shifting shadows.

“Put me down!” Her
voice sounded childlike in her own ears, so choked with tears as to be
unintelligible. “Take your hands off me—”

“Lady Lillitha, be
still and hold tight to me! Please!”

The shadow said
her name with reverence and spoke Shallanie. Surely, she thought, no Torian
bandit would bother to say please, even if he spoke her language. She ceased
her struggle and collapsed into the arms that encircled her as the horse bolted
into the darkness.

***

Scearce paced the
lip of the small cave and stared into the darkness. Behind him, Lillitha sat on
a stone and fought for control, muffling her tears behind torn veils.

“I think we’re
safe enough for now,” he said, barely visible in the blackness. “We’ll hear
anyone who approaches. I’ll make a fire for us.”

“Is that...safe,
do you think?” Her own voice sounded strange and small, echoing against cold
stone. “What if they see the smoke?”

“They aren’t
likely to come up here looking for us, not in the dark. These hills are too
steep and the rocks too sharp. Besides, this cavern is well hidden. I hardly
saw it myself. We’ll need a small fire to keep animals away. These caves are
full of gregas, but they won’t come near a fire.”

She shivered all
over at the mention of gregas, the great striped cats of the hills. Weren’t
Tors
bad enough?

Within minutes, he
had collected a number of twigs and other debris, and spent a long time
laboring over it with a flint. After a few sparks, the pile began to glow,
softly at first, then with greater strength. As the light filled the tiny
space, Lillitha saw her savior for the first time.

She thought that
she must have an injury unnoticed till now. She couldn’t breathe. She could
only stare up at him.

She’d had no idea
men could be so fair or that eyes could be so gentle. Dark waves of hair
tumbled over his forehead and framed his high cheekbones. The soft delicate
features of the boy she remembered had toughened into a manly form, but she
could still see the small graceful bow of his mouth inside the close-cropped
beard, his nose straight and proud, like a sword. The sleeves of his muslin
shirt had come unbuttoned and exposed the tanned, well-muscled forearms of a
swordsman. She saw, with a guilty shock, the pulse at the base of his throat,
and realized he was nearly as frightened as she.

“Scearce.” It was
all she could manage. “Scearce?”

“Yes.” He
hesitated before lowering himself before her on one knee. “I...I am at your
service, milady.”

She held her
ripped veil over her mouth with one hand and lowered her eyes.

“Are you all
right? Are you hurt in any way?”

“No, no..... I think
I’m uninjured, but for fright and a few bruises.” She ventured a glance at him
and the concern in his eyes stopped her breath again.

“I thought—I
beg your pardon, but I thought I saw blood on your face—”

“Oh! Oh!” She
shuddered, remembering the taste of dirty flesh between her teeth. She scrubbed
her lips and chin with the veil, then unceremoniously leaned over and retched
into the dirt.

When her stomach
ceased
its
heaving, she could not look at him. He
pushed his flask toward her.

“Please, take it.
It’s quite all right. I feel a bit like vomiting myself, only I wouldn’t have
you think me a copy-cat.”

A weak laugh
escaped her, as he had no doubt intended. So, his sense of humor had not
changed. He shrugged, as if to apologize for so small a joke, but she was
grateful anyway. She curled her feet beneath her and huddled into her robes,
looking like a small child masquerading in her mother’s clothes.

“You are kind, my
lord. Please pardon my illness—”

“Please, milady!
No apologies are necessary. You’ve been through a terrific fright, it’s only
natural that you would be...uh, unsettled.”

She nodded and
took the flask. “It’s just that I bit one of them. It’s not my blood, but his.”
The very thought made her insides lurch. “I think...I do think I’m a bit
shaky.”