Bone Witch (10 page)

"Because it's ours. When an Enyalian
meets her first battle, she enters it with the blade forged here by our own
bone witch especially for her. Thera, most recently; Uta in the time past. The
handle tip of each sword hilt contains a bit of shaped metal."

"That you heat in the fire –"

"And press into the warrior's skin,
yes." Cai looked pleased. "It bonds her to the blade and through the
blade to all of her ancestors and from them comes her strength."

Thera shuffled about. "We temper the
steel with the ashes of our greatest komandirae."

"And you want to know what leader Gael
is bound to my his mark? I don't know. My father—Corrin—neither of them would
have known of such a ritual."

Cai and Thera passed a look between them
that made Alaysha think there was more than what they were admitting to.

"What? Then you must think Gael is an
escaped brood man, or an escaped slave."

"No. No one has escaped and
lived."

"Then what?"

Cai tapped her fingers against the outsides
of her thighs. "A young Enyalia cast for a boy once. He wasn't a brood
man, you understand. He was born here." The woman inspected a few teeth on
her right circlet, turning it this way and that fastidiously. Alaysha wasn't
fooled.

"I thought only warriors could cast."

"Not perfectly true," Thera said.
"Some stock women may throw down a spoon—her offspring would only ever
become a citizen, never a warrior. But still, allowing it keeps the tribe
diverse. Except this girl was most definitely a warrior. Young, though. She had
just received her own mark."

"And?"

Cai eyed her. "And she was allowed to
have him. Thera and I would be born seasons later, but we are all told the
story. Every Enyalian is told the story."

"Why?"

"Because the girl refused to do her
duty at the end of the solstice. She refused to do that part of the right that
she throws down for."

Alaysha was beginning to grow even more
anxious. "And what happened to her?"

Cai shrugged. "She was forced to leave
the village. Exiled from her sisters forever. Never to return but on the sure
pain of penalty."

Alaysha tried to swallow and found her
throat choked up. "What is this penalty?"

Cai held her gaze. "I think you know
it."

"How would I?"

"Because I believe you saw this
woman."

Alaysha imagined a large, arrogant
Enyalian, the only large woman she would ever recall outside of this border,
suffering pain without complaint. Expecting to die, not caring if she lived.
Her back a mess of stripped and melted flesh.

"Bodicca," she murmured.

A
laysha quickly snapped her mouth closed. So, the scouts had
known Bodicca was there in the desert after all. How much more did they know,
she wondered. She cast about for something to say, unsure where all this
disclosure was coming from, but knowing she could never let these women realize
Theron and Aedus were out there too, working to save Bodicca's life.

She was spared further comment when Thera
leaned towards her. Alaysha couldn't help inspecting the tattau symbols on the
woman's chin and thinking how poorly done they were compared to the beautiful
ones her nohma had created.

"Tell us. Does Bodicca live?"
Thera's eyes were very black, nearly no pupils at all. Alaysha could see the
age in her eyes at that moment.

"She may," she hesitated to
answer, trying to decide how to reply.

"May."

"Yes. She told us about the well
because she knew we were dying. Then we left her to find it. She was pretty bad
off." It was true, at least the first and last half. What did the middle
matter?

Thera's face didn't so much as shift
expression, but Alaysha knew the witch suspected there was more.

"Does she live?" Thera asked
again.

"What does it matter? Surely the burnt
lands will take her if the wounds don't."

Cai started to speak, but Thera held up her
hand, silencing her. "You've had your turn, Komandiri." The witch
leaned back, studying Alaysha, letting whatever things turned over in her mind
travel her face. Alaysha had the feeling the woman could read her every thought
but that was ridiculous, wasn't it?

"Tell me," Alaysha said finally,
thinking to turn the tables. "Why does it matter?"

"She left us your man, knowing it was
quarter solstice, perhaps thinking to buy her way back to her sister land after
all these seasons, but knowing she would have to pay the price."

"Yes, Yenic," Alaysha said,
grasping at the only thing she understood. "His name is Yenic."

"And this Yenic also has my
symbols." Thera's black brow quirked. "Same as you do."

"Yes." Alaysha gave the wary
answer but watched the bone witch's face and thought there might be even more
behind her questions that even Cai suspected. The witch wouldn't look the
warrior's way; her torso was turned away from her co-leader, almost absently
saying there were things in her face she didn't want Cai to see.

"And this other man of yours,"
Cai said. "He has the Enyalian Mark."

Alaysha noted that Thera's expression grew
impatient as Cai spoke, as though the Enyalian mark was less important to her
than Yenic's marks. Her hand even went up as though to swat the warrior's
question away.

Thera captured Alaysha's gaze with her own
black one. "You met our sister upon the journey."

Alaysha nodded, her mouth dry.

"A woman who brought that marked man
into our village."

Alaysha smiled, thinking perversely that
she'd force them to speak either Gael's or Yenic's name. "And which marked
man do we speak of now?" She wasn't prepared for Cai's slow, understanding
smile.

"The large one, of course," she
said, and Thera groaned under her breath as though it was not the name she
wanted to hear. Alaysha turned her attention to the witch.

"You want to know of Yenic's mark or
Gael's?"

"Uta wants them," she said,
dodging the point.

"The deaths take Uta," Cai said
and faced Thera who glowered silently. "It's not Uta who wants them. Uta
knows more than she tells us; no doubt she has the answers already and lets us
flounder here like babes trying to wield warriors' swords. No doubt she grins
at us in secret as we piece it together." She shuffled her feet absently.
"Since the quaking you have not been yourself, and I tire of it."

Thera's glance fell to her feet and Cai
pressed on. "A man is brought to this village just at quarter solstice by
a sword sister in exile and he wears your marks so you give him shelter and
food and a solid watch, but a man with our mark—
my
mark is brought in
by me and this little maga—who also wears your mark, and you leave him to Uta.
Uta, Thera. Think on it." Cai turned fully to the bone witch, touching the
woman's chin. "You are the bone witch now, Thera. Not Uta. You give her
too much power."

A moment of silence descended and Alaysha
used it to grapple the one thing she'd thought she understood.
"Quaking?"

Thera turned away quickly, but not before
Alaysha saw the way she closed her eyes in alarm; she'd struck a chord, surely.
"Cai?"

The warrior's russet brow rose.
"Little maga, surely you've felt the trembling."

"I have," she said thoughtfully.
Could it be that Thera was releasing power without realizing it? Could she not
know what she was and be wielding her power unconsciously out of some fear for
the solstice?

It was time to test it, see what the woman
knew. She touched her tattaus and caught Thera's eye. "And what is
this?" she asked. "I could ask you the same. It's obvious my and
Yenic's marks are more striking than yours. Why don't you tell me how you came
to carry
my
marks. Why don't you tell me what you know of
Etlantium."

She'd struck something, she knew, but she
didn't have time to assess it. Both women clasped at their necks as though
bitten, first Thera, then Cai, and then in unison they fell forward, landing
heavily on the forest floor.

Alaysha's body went into high alert. She
leapt to her feet and spun this way and that, searching for an attacker. She
could see nothing through the trees, and stepped closer to Cai, all the while
watching the foliage. She tried to kick the huge Enyalian over with her foot,
but the woman in dead weight was too much for her.

Alaysha let her gaze leave the forest for a
fraction of a moment, darting down to the woman's neck. She checked for signs
of attack.

She heard her breath leave her lungs in
relief. There, about a fingernail apart were twin quills leaking a purple
viscous liquid onto the woman's skin.

She turned back to the woods, a smile
playing on her lips.

"They're bigger than your average
enemy, Aedus," she said, spinning slowly. "You don't know how long
they'll be out."

The trees to the right of her seemed to
shift and Alaysha was surprised she even recognized the spindly frame that
showed itself—even if it was just barely. Aedus had spread mud all over her
body, not just in her hair as usual, and then stuck moss and leaves and
detritus to it.

"The bird nest is a nice touch,"
Alaysha told her, grinning.

Aedus came forward, craning her neck
sideways to peer down at the nest she had tied onto her shoulder with dry
grass.

"I ate the eggs," she said then
blinked at Alaysha, seeming to be thinking. A moment later, she rushed headlong
across the clearing, her scrawny arms flung around Alaysha's waist as they met.
It was the best thing Alaysha had felt in days.

Sweet as it was to see the girl, there were
others to worry about. "Theron?" Alaysha had to ask.

Aedus mumbled into Alaysha's belly.
"Tending to Bodicca a day's journey from here."

"And Bodicca?"

Aedus peered up. "Getting
better." She swallowed as her eyes left Alaysha's face and traveled to the
warriors she'd felled so quietly and efficiently. "And what of my
brother?"

Alaysha shook her head. "Edulph's
captors haven't returned yet."

The girl said nothing and Alaysha's heart
ached for her. No matter what he'd done, the man was still her brother. And she
loved him.

"I'm sure he's fine. After all, he's
with the Enyalia. Unless he's angered them, he's safer with them than anywhere
else."

Aedus let out a dry grumble.
"If," she said. She peered off into the woods as though something
waited there, and Alaysha followed her gaze, squinting into the dense brush.

"Is there something else,
Aedus? Is someone with you?"

"No. No one," Aedus said, and if
Alaysha didn't know the girl better, she'd swear the shuffling that took over
the girl's feet were from guilt. But that couldn't be. No doubt the girl was
anxious for her brother, for Yenic, for Gael.

Best to shift things, Alaysha thought.
"Yenic is here. And Gael."

The girl squeezed and let go, stepping back
quickly. "He's all right?"

Alaysha couldn't help but smile. "Yes.
Both of them. Well. Gael
will
be." She didn't know how to explain
why and for how long.

"But there's something else?"

Alaysha touched the girl's chin because
everything else was too covered in filth for her to reach any skin. "You
don't miss much."

"What else is there?"

Alaysha sighed. "I'm not sure I can
get them out of here."

"I'll help."

"No. I just need time to think."

The nest quivered as Aedus stomped her
foot. "I can help."

"I know you can."

The girl fleeted a look over her shoulder
and turned back, the guilty look resting again on her face. "I know
things, Alaysha. I can help. And my beetles—"

"Are untested on such large foes.
Remember Gael?"

The girl hung her head. She'd darted Gael
with enough to put two men down because he was so large, but he didn't stay out
as long as she'd thought.

A soft groan came from behind them and
before Alaysha could even warn Aedus to run, the girl had already disappeared
into the foliage so completely Alaysha couldn't say which direction she'd gone.
She turned toward the two still lying on the ground. She knelt next to Cai and
swiped away the quills, then moved to Thera to do the same. Just as she was
wiping her palm on the moss to get rid of the dye, she had the eerie sense she
was being watched. Prickles went up her neck to her hairline and she sent a
casual look around the glade, expecting Enud, poised for battle.

There was no one.

Still, the wariness remained. She checked
her palm to be sure the purple was gone, and when she did she caught out of the
side of her eye, a flutter of movement. Cai, sitting up, her gaze hard and
suspicious on Alaysha's hands.

"What happened?" Alaysha asked
her, thinking misdirection was the best tactic.

Cai 's eyelids shuttered down suspiciously.
"You tell me."

Alaysha eased to her feet, offering the
Enyalian her hand. "We were talking, and then you just fell. Both of you.
"It was the truth, and Alaysha had no trouble keeping the warrior's
suspicious gaze, even when Cai brushed the offered help away and stood, her
circlets chattering.

"Thera?" she said.

Alaysha turned to the witch who is still on
the ground. "Still out, I'm afraid, but breathing as you were." It
was hard not to chew on the insides of her cheeks, especially when Cai began a
grid like search of the surrounding foliage for the attacker. Alaysha watched
her, feeling her heart racing like a bird's. She hoped Aedus had been smart
enough to leave. When Cai finished, she strode back to the glade and stopped in
front of Alaysha. The assessing stare reminded her of Yuri—and how he could
deliver a threat without saying a word.

Alaysha tried to make her posture seem less
fidgety. "What do you think it is?" she asked the woman.

She thought Cai would never answer then was
spared the silent examination when Thera gave a short groan of exertion. She
was on her feet as quickly as the warrior had been.

"What happened?" she asked; Cai
squared her shoulders and held a hand toward Alaysha. "Ask our
witch."

"I'm not your witch," Alaysha
said, using the chance to continue leading them away from the real question.

Neither fell for it. Cai sucked on her
front teeth thoughtfully then said, "Apparently we simply passed out
simultaneously."

Thera's arched brow quirked.
"Indeed?" she said, but she didn't question any further. Instead, a
look passed between them that sent a shiver down Alaysha's back.

She could swear the two massive Enyalian
looked afraid.