Shadow Gate

  Words filled Kirya’s heart, but they would not climb onto her tongue. The cloth subsided against her legs, and she folded it, in halves, and halves again, until it was a manageable bundle that she wrapped in a scrap of dirty hide scrounged from the ruins of the burned camp. She took her time, so Mariya and the children could walk out of camp.

  Deliberately, she tossed the bundle to the dirt. A young man had crept up behind her. The gelding kicked, hard, and he yelped and hobbled back. Ears laid back, the gelding sidled around, looking ready to clip anyone who had the temerity to approach. Kirya began walking in Mari’s dust, hand on the reins, the gelding behind her.

  The assembly remained silent for a few breaths, then burst into a babble of voices and exclamations and laughter and arguments. A man leading a horse pushed into her way, confronting her. She glared at him. When he did not move, her grief-blinded gaze finally saw him.

  Estifio held the halter of the bay mare, the prize of their tiny herd. Without a word, he shoved the reins into her hand and slid away into the tribe. The mare settled in beside the gelding, content with this familiar place. Kirya kept walking, and somehow no one noticed because they had all crowded up to see the precious cloth the head-woman had acquired. Who cared about one more horse among the many the Vidrini owned? Who cared about the straggle of useless children, who were just more mouths to feed?

  Precious mouths.

  By the time they reached the grass beyond the camp, out of sight of the tents, Kirya was fighting sobs as rage and grief squeezed her. The gelding breathed hot on her neck.

  Mariya halted. The children ran to her, huddling around, crying until she cracked stern words over their heads. “None of that, or we’ll never get home! Hush now!” She looked up, and saw the bay mare. The piebald greeted her companion with a friendly snort.

  “Kiri! The mare!”

  “Estifio handed her over to me while I was walking out. He ran away. I didn’t talk to him.”

  “He’s not the one who betrayed us,” said Mari. She turned to the children. “Asya, you’ll ride the bay. You’re skilled enough to manage the trip bareback. Stanyo, you’ll ride with Kiri. Danya, you’ll ride with me.”

  “No,” said Kirya. “I’m going after Kontas. You heard what she said. They traded him away just yesterday. I can catch up. The gelding is good for it. He’s the toughest horse we have.”

  “What will you offer this eastern merchant? He’ll not care about the laws of the gods.”

  “Neither did that motherless hag!”

  “Hssh! Kiri! Of course she did. She doesn’t dare spit on the laws of the gods. A foreign woman sitting as headwoman over one of the tribes! She had to make the trade, or be seen to scorn the laws of the tribe that took her in. What could we truly have done to her? Nothing! So she didn’t have to give us anything, or even make the trade. That she feared looking like an outsider in the eyes of her tribe is the only reason we have the children back.”

  “Maybe you’re right. But she wanted that cloth.”

  “They took Kontas.” Asya tugged on Mariya’s arm. The girl had a black eye, and the grime of tears and dirt smeared on her face and arms, as if she’d been pushed into the ground. “I tried to hit them, but I couldn’t stop them from taking him.”

  “I know, dear one,” said Mari. “I know you did what you could. Now we’re going home.”

  “I’m going after Kontas,” said Kirya. “We can’t abandon him, Mari. I can’t. How will my mother ever rest at peace among the gods?”

  Mariya rubbed her forehead, pretty face creased, and Kirya saw suddenly how much effort it had cost her cousin to endure the taunts of the youth she had lain with, who had whispered endearments and promises which had all along meant nothing to him. How much courage it had taken her to stand in front of that crowd as if their sneers and scorn did not touch her, who had been taken so thoroughly for a love-struck fool and had her foolishness announced to everyone.

  “Oh, Mari.” She dropped the gelding’s reins, and hugged her beloved cousin fiercely. “I have to go.”

  Mari glanced in the direction of the camp, but no one had come after them, not yet. “Asya, you’ll walk with me. Stanyo and Danya will ride the bay, but we’ll saddle it first. Kiri, you’ll take the piebald, in the halter. Trade the gelding if you can, although why anyone would take that misbegotten beast I don’t know, not once they’ve seen his temper. Trade the piebald if you must.” She tugged the three lapis-lazuli nets off her braids, and wept as they kissed. “I don’t need these. Maybe they’ll be worth something. We’ll wait four days for you at the pond where we camped last night. Otherwise meet at the gar-deer sink. Now go. Go.”

  24

  Kirya’s tribe had never ridden south to see the Golden Road, but she had heard tales of a path on which foreigners traveled east and west along the southernmost range of the vast grasslands roamed by the tribes. East lay the brutal Qin, and south lay the mud-feet, people who stank from living in their own garbage all year around. Sometimes the tribes raided them, taking what they could grab. Sometimes the mud people marched into the grass to take vengeance, but any tribe could simply pack up and move; even a child like Danya could outride the mud-feet’s boldest warriors.

  She paced the gelding, switching off to ride bareback on the piebald at intervals. South of the Vidrini camp, the hills flattened and the grass changed variety, turning brittle with heat. She had a pair of filled leather bottles, but anyway she knew the signs that revealed sinks of water waiting a short dig beneath the surface; she could smell a swale or rivulet before she saw it. Now that she thought about it, Orphan had taught them a lot about surviving in the wasteland. Poor tribes were always driven off the best pasturelands, pressed toward the deadlands, and maybe Orphan walking into their tribe two years ago had been the gift of the gods after all.

  Midway through the afternoon, a long upward slope brought her to a tipping point in the landscape, beyond which lay a dry lake bed so wide she could not see the far side. Clumps of brush dotted the flat. She searched for the golden gleam that must mark the road, but saw only ruts in the hard ground running east and west, so many crisscrossing the dead lake that they tangled like a child’s unsteady weaving.

  To the east spun a thread of dust.

  To the west, a huge herd of sheep spilled over a distant rise, hounded by riders and dogs. Somewhere, west and north of here, a tribe had set up camp. A moment later, a pair of outriders galloped into view. The two youths circled her at a prudent distance and raced back to their tents. She debated whether to ask for shelter within their camp for the night, but she dared not stop. She had to follow what trail she had, lest she lose Kontas entirely. Turning the gelding, with the piebald in tow, she rode down onto the dead lake and turned east.

  Hooves kicked up a fine dust, making her cough. Her eyes watered as particles stung her face. Sound echoed oddly, magnifying the fall of hooves into many more than two horses.

  She looked over her shoulder. Four riders followed her, three male and the fourth dressed in female garb, long felt jacket reaching to her knees and a quiver slung by one knee.

  “What do you think?” she asked the gelding. She wasn’t in the sanctity of camp, but after all, what would they do to a lone girl? The laws of the gods forbade any insult done to women; that was how it had always been among the tribes. What if they had news of Kontas, or the eastern merchant?

  She reined over and waited for them to catch up.

  The males—two she recognized as the youths who had first scouted her—pulled up and let their companion approach, as was proper. She was not much older than Kirya, with her golden hair divided into a trident braid and a headdress adorned with silver atop her head to mark that she was married. She wore necklaces of gold and silver and bronze across her chest, displaying her family’s wealth.

  “Good riding, stranger,” she said, greeting Kirya. “I am cousin to the headwoman of the Orzhekov tribe. Are you one of the Vidrini?”

  “No, I’m Moroshya.”
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  “I don’t know you,” said the other girl in the formulaic way that meant she’d never heard of that tribe. “This is dangerous ground, between the grass and the border of demon lands. Why do you ride here?”

  Kirya saw nothing to distrust in her open face. “The Vidrini raiders stole my young brother. I’ve brought a horse to trade for him, if I can catch the eastern merchant who took him.” She indicated the east and the dying thread of dust spun up from the darkening horizon.

  The other one smiled with a twist that made Kirya uncomfortable. “Your tribe doesn’t trade down here, does it?”

  She shrugged, realizing how foolish she was, blabbing her errand to these strangers.

  “You’ve seen your mistake now, haven’t you? We might track you, and once you have the boy, what’s to stop us from stealing him and trading him again to the merchant?”

  Kirya indicated her quiver and bow. “I am not unarmed. Would your riders attack a woman?”

  “Don’t insult us!” The girl’s hard expression softened to one more thoughtful. “That’s the kind of thing the Vidrini might do, now they’ve raised a foreign woman to be their headwoman. They might do anything, with a hard-hearted Qin woman having put her claws into their hearts. Still, it’s a rash choice on your part, to ride into demon lands.”

  “They’re not so far away. I can catch them by tomorrow, surely.”

  “Take only one step into demon lands, and anything might happen. If you die in demon lands, the gods will never find your spirit and bring you home.”

  “He’s my younger brother. Our mother is dead.”

  “Yes, I can see you are obligated to retrieve him, although I wonder why your war leader has not—well—” As Kirya sucked in a sharp breath and tightened her hand on the reins, the girl broke stride and changed course. “The Easterners speak words smeared with honey, but you can’t trust them.”

  “How do you know?”

  “My people trade with the caravans. The Easterners are not people, not like us. Yet I suppose you can do nothing else, not if you want to keep your honor. May the gods ride with you, cousin.”

  She signaled to her companions and rode back the way she had come, back to the familiarity of tent, herd, and grass.

  KIRYA CAMPED THAT night on the lake bed, staring up at the stars, the campfires of the gods’ tribe. Beside which of those fires did her mother now shelter? She could not tell.

  She moved out at first light. Not long after dawn she began to taste the caravan’s dust. Soon after that, she rode past the disturbed ground where they had camped. Soon after that, she saw firsthand the ponderous creature that foreigners called caravan. This ungainly beast was made up of a tightly controlled herd of sheep and unsaddled horses, a line of grindingly slow-paced wagons dragged by worthless dray beasts a toddler could have outpaced, and various human figures—maybe some demons, although from here it was difficult to tell—walking alongside and within the ranks. Between two wagons, six ranks of boys and youths, most blond, trudged along. She scanned the rows. Was that Kontas? He had his head down, so she couldn’t be sure.

  Swinging wide, she rode parallel alongside the caravan. She willed Kontas to look up, and the pale head shifted, face rising to look at the heavens . . . even from this distance, she could see it was not Kontas. She felt as if she’d been kicked.

  The caravan guards saw her, but for a while no one seemed to react. The caravan lumbered forward like a beast staggering on its last legs, while her horses made it known they couldn’t understand why they must walk here when it was obvious they did not like the bones of the dead lake and the smell of demon lands. It was getting hotter as the sun rose swollen and fat. She licked chapped lips.

  “Hoy! Hoy!”

  A fat man on a sleek mare rode out from the wagons, waving at her. She kept riding at the same steady walk, and eventually he pushed up beside her. He had a funny complexion, like clay, and he was perspiring and licking moist lips and looking her up and down in a bold way that made her think he must be a demon, since men knew better than to look directly at women. Therefore, she ignored him.

  He said, in labored and very precise speech, “You are a tribeswoman, are you? Never before see I one tribeswoman so close. Whew!” He wiped his dripping forehead with a cloth. “Why ride you here?”

  “I will only speak to a man, not a demon,” she said, trying to shame him by meeting his gaze deliberately, but of course demons cannot feel shame. He did not look away.

  “Whew!” He said words in demon language, then thought better of mumbling on in words that only proved he was not a man. “I say good things about your blue eyes. Very pretty! Your hair! Very pretty! I am a man. I am not a demon. I am obligated to say I am only a—” He spoke a word she did not know. “For this reason my—” Another demon word. “—sends me out here to speak at you.”

  Despite the demon words, he spoke human speech well enough to make her wonder if he might be a human person after all, just a very ill-mannered one.

  “I have come for my brother. He was traded to an eastern merchant. I want him back.”

  Without turning, he indicated the caravan behind him. “One of the boys, eh?”

  “Yes.”

  “Hrm.” He scratched his bare chin. “I go ask my sarvar if he negotiate with you. You ride here, meantime?”

  “I will ride here.”

  He rode back to the caravan. He had a heavy seat that disturbed his horse’s natural grace. She was trembling as she considered her options. She had two horses. If she could get Kontas up onto the piebald, she and Kontas could outrace them. They wouldn’t know how to track her in the grass.

  Six armed guards appeared from the vanguard of the beast and rode back to get a look at her. They were Qin, with demon-scratched eyes, coarse black hair pulled up into a funny knot, and broad faces, part human and part demon. Circling her with the easy grace of men raised on horseback, they called to each other in their barking language. They stared rudely, not civilized men at all.

  She ignored them. But their ugly faces made her think of the Vidrini headwoman, who might as well be their sister for all that they looked so similar. The Qin were a brutal-hearted, demon-tainted people, always happy to hire themselves out to fight for whatever foreigner paid the most. She doubted she and Kontas could outride these.

  “Hoy! Hoy!” The fat man returned, bouncing awkwardly on his trotting horse. Two riders followed him.

  The Qin soldiers rode away toward the rear of the caravan.

  “Greetings, greetings,” called the younger of the two men. He had a dark face that looked reasonably human, and kept his gaze averted in a mannerly fashion as he kept talking. “Greetings, tribeswoman. My sarvar say to me, you desire to trade for a boy.”

  His companion was wiry, sour-mouthed, and funny-looking, his features mismatched. This old man looked her up and down as impertinently as if she were a horse he meant to acquire.

  Nervously, she glanced toward the retreating Qin soldiers. “I will trade this horse for the boy. That is good value.”

  The younger man grinned at his hands, cast a glance at his narrow-eyed companion.

  The old man said, “These horses are shit, ugly as my wife’s face.” He scratched at his groin. “We no take them for the boy. Not worth the boy.”

  “Both horses, then,” said Kirya desperately.

  “No,” said the old man. “The horses are shit. No boy.”

  The younger one smiled as a man smiles when hearing a pretty melody that reminds him of a lover. “We offer a better trade,” he said. “For you, five boys. You pick, any five boys from the herd.”

  “For the two horses? What about my brother?”

  “No, no,” said the younger man, chuckling now, although Kirya could not see what anyone might find funny in this situation.

  The old man said, irritably, “You trade your person, for five boys. Including the boy you say is brother to you.”

  Dumbfounded, she could not fathom what they meant. “Trade wha
t?”

  “You. You are girl,” said the old man. “With the ghost hair and the demon eyes, and a female, you are worth five boys. Worth plenty. You want the boy, the brother? Or no boy, and we ride on? We will not wait. Weather changes, hot days come, we cannot wait. We ride far, go fast. Decide now, or ride away with nothing. Now, now. Decide.”

  Now. Now. Decide.

  On the caravan rumbled, lurching forward like a wounded beast. A pair of wagons stuck in an irregularity in the track, and the ranks of trudging boys staggered to a halt behind it. One boy, at the end of a row, stumbled, fell to a knee, and hastily jumped up just as a guard closed in with whip raised to strike him on the shoulder.

  “Kontas!” she shouted.

  He raised an arm to shield his body from the blow. He didn’t hear her, and as the whip came down he jerked back, knocking into another boy, who shoved him into yet another, and the guard slashed at their heads with the biting whip until all cowered and wept.

  Kirya said, “Ten boys. I choose them, and another three horses. Also, provisions for their trip. One year I work in servitude to you. Then you release me to return to my tribe.”

  It was a desperate gamble.

  The younger man laughed.

  The older said, as swiftly as a snake striking, “Done. You hand yourself, of free choice, into our hands. Ten boys of your choosing, and three horses we release of our choosing, in exchange.”

  “I serve in your tribe for one year only. No pursuit after the boys. No raid on them. They ride free to the grass.”

  “Done, done,” said the old man, his gaze as hard as stones and his mouth pursed as if to keep secrets.

  The younger man whistled as folk do at a narrow escape. Then he giggled, an odd sound coming from a grown man. He turned to bark orders at the fat man.

  Commands shouted up and down the caravan brought the beast to a jerking halt. The six ranks of lads were chivvied out like so many baffled sheep, about sixty in all, and all but a handful having light hair and blue eyes, like hers. Kontas ducked out from the group and ran to her, and when a guard struck out after him, the old merchant called the man back. The boy was crying as he halted beside the piebald mare, but he grabbed the mare’s halter and, looking up at her hopefully, said,