The Totem-Maker (part one hundred one)

The Totem-Maker

Chapter Ten

Crafter Becomes Maker

(part one hundred one)

His Alëenon speech was of a dialect; at least, his vowels were differently said.

“Pravor Tnoch,” Wosogo said, “is captain of the city of Husdor, the only other of this land.”

I said after a moment, catching the captain’s eye, “Not Lord Tnoch?”

“No. I am a climber, I am not blood of the Nagnish who ruled the Husdor plain. Disease came to them, for they were uncleanly. I won my command with a ship of the Emperor’s, a pirates’ bounty I did not return to the Emperor. But what should a bride want, where inheritance cannot be? I give her the management of my house, and if she is wise, she will take my son in hand.”

Now I chafed, being included in talks among the lords. The Prince came to the garden, said no word to me, saw me try Lord Ei’s patience, bear gibes from the friendly Tnoch, and thawed…

To an air of ownership when I spoke.

Husdor was easternmost, exposed on a southern border with the sea. Her harbor’s approach in its season was plagued by piracy. The city of Balbaec faced west; the land that flanked the Balbaecan plain’s south sat low and miry, a portal to the hauntings below where ships and men vanished.

“…crying their starvation and thirst, but we do not, for we cannot, aid them, not even to set the ships afire.”

The pirates were a loose band, holding tribal ties. They were thieves among the forest and built light vessels to skim down cataracts…cataracts that poured to the sea when the winter snows melted. The ceremony of a vessel’s launch, and the ceremony of her death were rites of the tribes’ odd religion.

“Soon,” the Prince said. “A party may venture, by… I have been told the Alëenon guard a pass, a traders’ way cleared, that crosses the border, and that those lands…”

“Whose trees the Emperor covets.”

“Have no ruler.”

“A party may,” said Lord Ei.

The pirates were the Prince’s answer to the problem I’d given him; he had brooded and returned with this makeshift to busy his men, to teach the virgin warrior his craft.

Tnoch laughed. “But Balbaec’s ragged sister has ventured that crossing, that sneaking by the coast cliffs. Ask me.”

“The traders, then,” I said. “No one has advanced upon them a persuasion of loyalty, even a leaning to our side. Strangers blocking their roadways, encamping in their fields, starting their game and trampling their grain, naturally argues for their choosing an allegiance…”

“Now you understand,” the Prince cut me short. But the whole of the Citadel, the reason for making war upon the Zhatabe, lay in the traders’ disregard for sides. “The Emperor wills not to rely on a treacherous people, such as weigh the greater profit in one choice or another.”

“Weighing profit is treacherous?”

“Less of that!” Lord Ei spoke. “To be put through paces at every turn! I will answer to Ami, Totem-Maker, and if in your power you can produce him, bring him forth. Great Ami, let my sword shed no innocent blood. There!”

“Well, there,” I said.

105

The Recalcitrant One

The Totem-Maker (part one hundred two)

(2018, Stephanie Foster)