Riding the Serpent's Back (44 page)

“Your cousin? I thought—”

“He came back yesterday. Just marched in as if nothing had changed.”

“And...?” said Piet. “There’s more, isn’t there? What happened today? What has upset you?”

Ellen looked away. “Nothing,” she said.

Piet pointed a finger at her – the one smeared with the orange pigment from her cheek. “You went to a pagan place of worship,” he said. “And now you are upset. Why won’t you tell me what has happened? Are we losing you, Ellen? Is it guilt that binds your tongue?”

Ellen swallowed. “It’s Leeth,” she said. “I found out that he’s only my half-cousin. I heard them talking about it.
Laughing
about it.”

Piet nodded. “Then it’s natural for you to be upset,” he told her.

He seemed disappointed, as if he sensed that she was not telling him everything. Ellen opened her mouth to speak, then stopped herself, but he had noticed. He waited for her to continue.

“I heard who his real brother is, too. His real brother is the rebel leader Chichéne Pas. That’s where Leeth has been all this time: fighting the True Church alongside Chichéne Pas!” The tears came now, she couldn’t stop them.

Piet Udelai nodded. He took Ellen’s hand. “I’m glad you told me,” he said, although he didn’t show it. “Now everything will be all right. Believe me: it will be all right.”

Morning, but only just.

Monahl woke in the hut of the former missionary, Qobi, the dim light of dawn’s first awakening seeping in through the doorway almost apologetically. Qobi was still asleep, curled up like a baby on his rush mat. A ribbon of drool trailed down from the corner of his mouth.

Monahl couldn’t quite work him out: he was True Family, yet he claimed to be grateful that he had been driven out to live the hard life of these people. He said he was happier here than he had ever been at home. Was mere acceptance worth such a price?

She peered around at the domed interior of the small hut. Qobi had carved a frieze into the mud walls: the profile of the big-nosed Samna was clearly identifiable, along with others she assumed must represent the remaining gods of the True pantheon. The outlines were faded and poorly defined, though, as if they had been carved a long time ago and neglected for years. Only a single figure – clearly modelled on the physique of the Morani – had been looked after. Fresh daubings of red pigment identified it as the only god recognised by these people: Huipo, god of war.

She squatted and went through her pack. When she set out again – if they allowed her to go – she would have to discard much of this, taking only what she could comfortably carry herself. But that was not her concern at present. She had been dreaming of Freya and her Brothers and Sisters in the Order and now she felt a powerful need to soothe her battered spirit with prayer.

To travel, she had only worn her basic necklet and a few bangles, but now, after removing her smock, she took the rest from her pack and fixed them about her neck and arms.

She went outside, otherwise naked, and walked through the quiet centre of the village. Her blessed silver jewellery made her feel closer to the women of this place, although by their standards she was still virtually undecorated. She wondered how the Morani’s perceptions of her would change if, or rather when, she was seen like this. Would they suddenly ignore her completely: a woman without bells to identify her? Perhaps that was the best way to ensure safe passage – they could hardly kill her if they refused to acknowledge her existence.

Apart from a few scrawny hens scuffing up the dust, nobody was around. Just beyond the village, she had seen a greystone crag rising up out of the otherwise featureless land. Now, she scaled it until she came to sit on the small level area at the top.

She crossed her legs, in the manner so familiar from her lengthy vigils at Zigané.

From here she could see all the way back over the village to the causeway she had crossed the day before. The sun bulged heavily just above the horizon, its early morning rays painting the soda-plains purest gold. She had expected visibility to be better this early, but it was not: the heat haze must be the result of the internal heat of the soda-plains, not merely the work of the sun. As she watched, the landscape twisted and flickered. A flock of red spoonbills flew in formation low over the flats; it made Monahl dizzy simply to track them through that all-distorting screen.

She closed her eyes and started to hum a prayer to Samna, preserver and sustainer of all life.

After a short time, the repeated atonal hum of the prayer lifted Monahl away from awareness of her body. Aches, stiffness, raw skin...all gone. She had become no more than the essence of her own being, the animus.

She felt her soul being cleansed.

When awareness returned, she was renewed. The turmoil of her thoughts was back in rein again, about as close to balance as she ever achieved.

She stretched and opened her eyes. The sun was only a little higher in the sky, but the redness had gone and it had become a fierce white patch behind the smoky cloud. The soda-plains had turned from gold to their daytime garish pink. Down in the village Monahl saw the Morani moving about, starting their day.

Suddenly, she felt exposed and aware of her own nakedness. Earlier, her need for spiritual cleansing had overridden everything, but now, as she looked down upon the wakening village, she was suddenly scared.

“You’re here,” she muttered to herself. “All you can do is be brave.”

She climbed down from the crag and walked back into the village.

The first to see her was a group of jingling women. They put their hands to their faces and leaned towards each other, whispering, eyes flitting towards Monahl and back to each other. One of them was clutching a baby to her drooping breast, the infant’s head still encased in wood; with her free hand the woman pointed at Monahl and laughed.

Monahl tipped her head up, jutted her chin and continued to walk.

A man paused in the doorway of a hut and stared at her. She felt his eyes crawling all over her body like slugs. She met his look and nodded twice, in the greeting she had observed in the men the day before. He hesitated, then nodded at her and turned away.

By the time she was back at Qobi’s hut, she felt that everyone in the village had turned out to view her progress. Her host stepped aside as she entered. She removed most of her jewellery in silence, then pulled some underwear and leggings on, then her smock and boots.

“I gave up prayer years ago,” said Qobi.

Monahl gestured at the aged frieze, then the well-tended figure of Huipo.

“Edri-ab-Halahm likes it,” he explained. “He would kill me if I did not ask Huipo to protect my home.”

“And will they kill me?”

Qobi shook his head. “I hope not,” he said. “You intend to leave today? I would advise it.”

Monahl nodded.

“Then I will go and consult with Edri-ab-Halahm.” He bowed his head and backed out of the hut.

~

A short time later a young Morani appeared. He stared aggressively at Monahl and she wondered what she was supposed to do. Was this some kind of test? Or merely a curious youth?

Eventually, he turned and walked away. After a short distance, he paused and tossed his head sulkily. Monahl realised she was supposed to follow him.

He led her to the long hall. Inside, Qobi stood with Edri-ab-Halahm and two others. They all nodded as she approached.

She returned the gesture.

The Morani leader spoke first, and Qobi translated. “Edri-ab-Halahm has no wish to eat Kunapat-pal this morning,” he said.

“I’m not hungry, either,” said Monahl. “But what is this Kunapat-pal? “

Qobi smiled. “You were observed this morning – I explained to Edri-ab-Halahm that you were praying to Huipo for protection and he approves. Your nakedness led them to change your name to Kunapat-pal. You are no longer merely Strange Man With Sunset Skin: you have become Sunset-Skinned Man With Cunt.”

She nodded. “Have you explained that I must go?”

Qobi’s eyes darted across to Edri-ab-Halahm, then back to Monahl. “I have,” he said. “My friends pray for Huipo to bless your journey.”

“I thank them.”

“They will allow you to take water and food. Edri-ab-Halahm assures you that you have provided great entertainment, and that your penis will one day regrow.”

“I’m sure you can phrase for me a suitable compliment in return, and thank your people for their generous hospitality,” said Monahl. “Will you tell me the best route from here to the City of the Divine Wall?”

Qobi spoke to the Morani men, then turned to Monahl and said, “Edri-ab-Halahm asks me to tell you that you should leave this settlement in the direction you took this morning. Approximately one leap past the crag upon which you prayed is a path marked by a clump of thorn bushes and a small cairn. This path crosses the soda-flats for a short distance, then takes you through scrub directly to the start of the Olt-os foothills.”

Monahl bowed, and said, “Then I will go immediately, before the sun gets too hot.”

~

She left a short time later. She gave what she couldn’t carry – blankets, clothing, some of her blessed jewellery – to Qobi. “You should try to pray again,” she told him, aware of the small party of Morani waiting outside the doorway of the hut.

Qobi shook his head. “It’s been too long,” he said. “I don’t dare.”

She left the former missionary standing awkwardly outside his hut.

The whole village had turned out, either to bid her farewell or to ensure that she had gone – she was not sure which.

At the edge of the village, something stung her calf. She looked back and saw that some of the children were throwing pebbles at her. She continued on her way, feeling that she had learnt little, if anything, about these strange people of the soda-plains.

It was going to be a long walk.

The track took her along the edge of the soda-flats. Thorn bushes formed clumps at such regular intervals that she suspected trickery: how would she find a path marked by a thorn bush? After a short time, however, she came to a triangle of three round stones, supporting a fourth balanced in the centre. Was this the cairn Qobi had told her about? She could so easily have missed such an insignificant marker.

A raised track angled out across the mud, losing itself rapidly in the flickering haze. She took a drink from one of her water bottles, then set out.

To either side, the flats were crusted pink, regular cracks dividing the surface into the now-familiar polygonal scales with their raised edges. The acrid smell of the place rose up immediately to burn at the lining of Monahl’s nose and throat.

Eventually, she had to stop to take another drink.

She looked back. The track disappeared rapidly into the haze. Ahead, it looked just the same. It was as if her world had contracted until all that remained was a short stretch of slightly raised path surrounded by the almost-featureless terrain of cracked pink mud. If it was not for the direction of the sun, she could easily have forgotten which way she was heading.

For a moment, she wanted to turn back, but she knew that would be foolish. In such disorientating conditions she could be a mere twenty or thirty paces from the end of the track and still not be able to see the rising ground ahead.

She walked another twenty or thirty paces, and nothing changed.

Another, and she paused to drink again.

Overhead, a bird carved lazy circles in the sky. A tawny eagle – she had seen these birds yesterday. They were scavengers, quartering the soda-flats in search of scattered corpses. It was easy for animals to become trapped by the mud, plunging through its apparently solid surface. Others, Qobi had told her, were drawn in by the visual disorientation of the place: they came in search of the less caustic water bubbling up from hot springs but it was always a tantalisingly short distance ahead; in this way a huge variety of animals were lured deeper and deeper into the soda-flats until they became trapped, or dropped from exhaustion.

Monahl walked, deeper and deeper into the heart of the soda-plains.

Soon, the track was at the same level as the pink crust. All that marked it out as a path was the fact that the cracks between the crusted plates did not cross its unbroken surface.

She looked back, and the view was no different to looking ahead.

She had been tricked, she realised. No wonder Qobi had seemed so uncertain of himself this morning, and the Morani had made sure he was never alone with her to warn her.

She considered turning back. Would they be waiting for her by that tiny cairn? Would they send her back out along the track again, or perhaps merely slaughter her there and then? In a moment of near-visionary clarity, she knew what would await her if she returned: a crowd of laughing children, hurling rocks and stones so that she could not get back onto solid ground. One last jibe at her expense.

She made herself stay calm. She was suddenly immensely grateful that she had prayed this morning: now, she recovered that spiritual stillness of worship and used it to master the fear in her body. She made a mental note of the sun’s elevation. If she could just maintain an inner sense of the passage of time, that could translate to the passage of the sun across the sky, which she could then use to guide her.

She started to walk. There was nothing else she could do.

~

Her right boot broke through the crust and she sank up to her calf in the glutinous ooze below. She cried out as the mud scalded her leg. Then she heaved her foot free and continued on her way.

She found it impossible keep a perfectly straight course through the soda-plain. She had to skirt the frequent muddy basins, with their bubbling springs spitting gobs of black mud high into the air. One time she had to back-track when she realised that her relatively firm ground dwindled away, becoming a tapering promontory surrounded by mud.

But in her head, a mental clock ticked, and she always resumed a steady course guided by the passage of the sun across the sky.