Queen of Springtime (17 page)

Had the Dawinnans acquired a sudden whimsical liking for conquest? Hardly. Warfare wasn’t Taniane’s style, and certainly not Hresh’s, and in any case those absurd xlendi-wagons didn’t look like military vehicles.

“There’s someone very powerful in that caravan,” said Biterulve. “It’s his spirit that I’ve felt getting closer, all this night past.”

“This must be an embassy,” Salaman murmured.

There’s trouble somewhere, he thought, and they’ve come here to entangle me in it. Or if there’s no trouble yet, there soon will be.

He signaled to Biterulve, and they descended from the wall. Quickly they rode back to the palace. The hour was still very early. The king went to awaken his sons. The struggle to win appointment as Dawinno’s ambassador to King Salaman had been much like the frenzy that occurs when a slab of tender meat is tossed into a cage of hungry stanimanders or gabools. The ambassador would be gone many months; he would have ample time to forge a close bond with the powerful Salaman; he would be one of the prime figures in whatever alliance of the two cities ultimately emerged. And so the great men of the city circled fiercely around, vying for the rich morsel: Puit Kjai, Chomrik Hamadel, Husathirn Mueri, Si-Belimnion, and others besides.

But in the end it was Thu-Kimnibol whom Taniane picked to make the journey northward.

It was a choice she made with no little uncertainty and hesitation, for Thu-Kimnibol and Salaman had quarreled famously, long ago, when Thu-Kimnibol still lived in the city that his father Harruel had founded and Salaman now ruled. Everyone knew that. They had had angry words, an exchange of threats, even, and finally Thu-Kimnibol had fled, taking refuge in Hresh’s new city in the south. There were many, Husathirn Mueri and Puit Kjai among them, who felt that sending Thu-Kimnibol on a diplomatic mission to his old enemy was a strange thing to do, and unwise.

But Thu-Kimnibol argued his case eloquently, saying that he understood the nature of the King of Yissou better than anyone, that he was the only plausible man for the task. As for the quarrel he had had with Salaman, he said, that was something ancient, an episode of his hotheaded youth, a matter of foolish pride, long put aside by him and certainly of no moment to Salaman after so many years. And also Thu-Kimnibol made it known with great force that he longed to serve his city now in some new and strenuous high capacity, to ease the grief that he still felt over the loss of his mate. Pouring his energies into this mission to Salaman would distract him from his pain.

Ultimately it was Hresh who tipped the decision toward his half-brother. “He’s the right one,” he told Taniane. “The only one who can stand face to face with Salaman. The others who’ve put themselves up for the job are small-spirited men. Nobody can say that of Thu-Kimnibol. And it seems to me he’s grown even stronger since Naarinta’s death. There’s something about him now that I’ve never seen before—a kind of greatness growing in him, Taniane. I can feel it. He’s the one to send.”

“Perhaps so,” said Taniane.

Thu-Kimnibol’s journey began in prayers and fasting, and a lengthy consultation with Boldirinthe; for he was in his way a devout man, loyal to the Five Heavenly Ones. There were those who said he was simple for holding such faith in these modern times. What such people said mattered nothing at all to Thu-Kimnibol.

“I’ll invoke Yissou for you, of course,” Boldirinthe said, wheezing as she reached into her cupboard for the talismans. She was a broad sturdy woman, very old now: cocoon-born, in fact, one of the last ones left who had been alive at the time of the Coming Forth. Boldirinthe had gone heavily to fat in recent years: she looked like a barrel, now. “Yissou, for your protection,” she said. “And Dawinno, to help you to smite any enemies you may encounter.”

“And also Friit, to heal me if they do the smiting first,” said Thu-Kimnibol, with a grin.

“Yes, Friit, of course, Friit.” Boldirinthe laughed, setting the little stone figurines out on the table. “And the goddess Mueri to console you, if you grow homesick in the northland. And Emakkis to provide for you. We’ll ask the benefits of all the Five for you, Thu-Kimnibol. It’s the wisest course.” Her eyes twinkled. “And should I invoke Nakhaba for you, too?”

“Am I a Beng, Boldirinthe?”

“But their god is a mighty one. And we accept him as our own these days. We’ve become one tribe.”

“I’ll make my way without Nakhaba’s help,” said Thu-Kimnibol stolidly.

“As you wish. As you wish.”

Boldirinthe lit her candles, sprinkled her incense. Her hands trembled a little. Age was lying more burdensomely on her these days. Thu-Kimnibol wondered if she might be ill. A kindly old woman, he thought. A little mischief in her, perhaps, but not of any malicious sort. Everyone loved her. He wasn’t old enough to have clear memories of Torlyri, who had been offering-woman before her, but those who did said that Boldirinthe was a fitting successor, as warm and kind as Torlyri had been. Which was high praise, for even now, so many years later, the older people spoke of Torlyri with great love. Torlyri had been the offering-woman of the People in Koshmar’s time, first in the cocoon and then in Vengiboneeza after the Coming Forth. But when the People had left Vengiboneeza to make their second migration she had stayed behind, for she had fallen in love with the Beng warrior Trei Husathirn, and hadn’t wanted to leave him. That was when Boldirinthe had become the offering-woman in Torlyri’s place.

Hard to understand, Thu-Kimnibol thought, how a woman as widely beloved as Torlyri had been could have brought forth a serpent like Husathirn Mueri as her son. It was the Beng blood in him, perhaps, that had made Husathirn Mueri what he was.

Boldirinthe said, “How long will the journey take you, do you think?”

“Until I get there. No more than that, but no less.”

“I remember the City of Yissou. Seven miserable wooden huts is all the place was, every one of them very crudely made, even the one they called the royal palace.”

“The city is somewhat bigger now,” said Thu-Kimnibol.

“Yes. Yes. I suppose it is. But I remember it when it was next to nothing. I was there, you know, once. We passed through it, on our way from Vengiboneeza to here. I saw you there, then. You were a little boy. Not so little, in truth. You were always large for your age, and warlike. You killed hjjks in a great battle that was fought at Yissou around that time.”

“Yes,” Thu-Kimnibol said indulgently. “I remember that too. Shall I kneel beside you, Mother Boldirinthe?”

She gave him a sly look. “Why is Taniane sending you to be the ambassador?”

“Why not?”

“It seems strange. There’s bad blood between you and King Salaman, I understand. Isn’t it true that you were his rival for the throne of Yissou? And now you come back to him as an envoy, but I wonder if he’ll trust you. Won’t he think you’re still trying to push him aside?”

“All that was very long ago,” Thu-Kimnibol said. “I don’t want his throne. He knows that. And I couldn’t take it from him even if I did. Taniane is sending me because I know Salaman better than anyone else, except perhaps Hresh and Taniane themselves, and they can hardly be the ones to go. Pray me a safe journey, Mother Boldirinthe, and pray with me also for my mate Naarinta, whose soul is on a journey of its own. And then let me be on my way.”

“Yes. Yes.”

She began the Yissou invocation. But after a moment she halted, and disappeared for a moment into a long silence, so that Thu-Kimnibol thought that she might have fallen asleep. Then she giggled.

“I coupled with Salaman once. It was in the cocoon. He was younger that I was, four or five years younger, just a boy, ten or eleven. But full of lust, even then, and he came to me—he was very quiet, then, a short dark boy, very broad through the shoulders, and so strong you wouldn’t believe it. He came to me and took me by the breasts—”

“Mother Boldirinthe, please. If you would—”

“And we did it, Salaman and I, right on the floor of the growing-chamber. Rolling around and around under the velvetberry vines. He didn’t say a word. Not before, not during, not after. He never said much in those days. It was the only time we coupled, the only time I had anything to do with him, really. Afterwards it was all Weiawala for him, and I was with Staip, anyhow. If I had known Salaman was going to be a king some day—but of course how could I, we had no kings, the word itself meant nothing to us—”

“Mother Boldirinthe,” said Thu-Kimnibol, more urgently.

He was afraid the old woman would go on to recount her entire life’s history, every coupling and twining of the last fifty years. But she was done with her recollections. Her mind was on her work now. Lightly she touched him with her sensing-organ. She made the Five Signs, she uttered the words, she handled the talismans, she brought the gods into the room and opened Thu-Kimnibol’s soul to them. They were vivid before him, so real that he knew them each by sight, even though they had no shapes, only auras. They were bright clouds of light, encircling him in the darkness. This was loving Mueri, this was fierce inexorable Dawinno, and this was Emakkis who provides, and this was Friit, and this was Yissou, who would protect him. In the sanctuary of Boldirinthe’s offering-chamber he reached out to them and found them, the Five Heavenly Ones who ruled the world, and mantled his soul in their warm protective presences. It was a deeper communion than he had ever known, or so it seemed to him at that moment. A great satisfaction came over him, and a deep and abiding peace.

He felt ready to undertake his departure. The gods were with him,
his
gods, the ones he understood and loved. They would guide him and shelter him as he made his way north.

Thu-Kimnibol had no use for the more complex theologies that had sprung up among the People. There were some who worshipped the vanished humans—who believed that the humans were gods higher than the Five. Others knelt before the Beng god Nakhaba, saying that he too held a rank in heaven above that of the Five, that he was the Interceder who could speak with the humans on the People’s behalf.

And then there were those—mostly University people, they were, old Hresh’s crowd—who spoke of a god superior to all the rest, above the humans, and Nakhaba, and the Five. The Sixth, that one was called. The Creator-God. Of him, or it, nothing was known, and they said that nothing ever could be, that he was fundamentally unknowable.

Thu-Kimnibol had no idea what to make of any of this profusion of gods. It seemed needless to him to have any but the Five. But he could understand a willingness to pray to these others more easily than he did the position of those few, like his impossible niece Nialli Apuilana, who seemed not to believe in any gods at all. What a bleak existence, to walk godless beneath the unfriendly sky! How could they bear it? Weren’t they paralyzed with fear, knowing that they had no protectors? To Thu-Kimnibol it seemed crazy. Nialli Apuilana, at least, had an excuse. Everyone knew that the hjjks had tampered with her mind.

Slowly he came up out of his communion, and found himself sitting slumped at Boldirinthe’s rough wooden table, while she went puttering about, putting the gods back in her cupboard. She seemed pleased with herself. She must know the intensity of the communion she had created for him.

Silently he embraced her. His heart overflowed with love for her. Gradually the power of the communion faded, and he made ready to go.

“Be wary of King Salaman,” Boldirinthe said, when Thu-Kimnibol was about to leave her chamber. “Salaman’s a very clever man.”

“I know that, Mother Boldirinthe.”

“Cleverer than you.”

Thu-Kimnibol smiled. “I’m not as stupid as is generally thought.”

“Cleverer than you, all the same. As clever as Hresh, Salaman is. Believe me. Watch out for him. He’ll trick you somehow.”

“I understand Salaman. We understand each other.”

“They tell me he’s grown wild and dangerous in his old age. That he’s had power so long that he’s gone mad from it.”

“No,” Thu-Kimnibol said. “Dangerous, yes. Wild, perhaps. But not a madman. I knew Salaman a long time, when I lived in Yissou. You can tell who has madness in him and who doesn’t. He’s a steady one.”

“I coupled with him once,” Boldirinthe said. “I know things about him that you’ll never know. Fifty years, and I’ve never forgotten. Such a quiet boy, but there was fire inside him, and in fifty years the fire burns through to the surface. Be wary, Thu-Kimnibol.”

“I thank you, Mother Boldirinthe.”

He knelt and kissed her sash.

“Be wary,” she said.

As Thu-Kimnibol descended from the offering-woman’s cloister his path crossed that of Nialli Apuilana, who was coming toward him up steep cobblestoned Minbain Way. The day was bright and golden, with a perfumed wind blowing out of the west, where groves of yellow-leaved sthamis trees were blooming on the hills above the bay. Nialli Apuilana carried a tray of food and a flask of clear spicy wine for Kundalimon.

Her mood was brighter, though still not bright enough. After her startling breakdown at the Presidium she had gone into hiding, more or less, keeping out of sight for days, going out only for the sake of making her twice-daily journeys to Mueri House and hurrying back to her room as soon as Kundalimon had had his meal. Some days she hadn’t gone at all, but left it up to the guardsmen to feed him. Yissou only knew what they brought him. Most of her time she spent alone, meditating, brooding, going over and over everything she had said there, wishing she could call half of it back, or more than half. And yet it had seemed so important finally to speak out: all that talk of the hjjks as bugs, the hjjks as cold-blooded killers, the hjjks as this, the hjjks as that. And they knew nothing. Nothing at all. So she had spoken. But she had felt edgy and exposed ever since. Only now was she starting to realize that scarcely anyone in the city had heard about her outburst at all, and most or perhaps all of those who had witnessed it had chosen to see it as nothing more than a little show of hysteria, the sort of thing that one would expect from someone like Nialli Apuilana. Not very flattering, really: but at least she didn’t need to worry about being jeered at in the streets.