Sunbird (69 page)

^{Pursing his lips thoughtfully he let four drops of the clear liquid drop from the blue glass vial into the wine. He stoppered the bottle and stirred the wine with his forefinger, sucking his finger thoughtfully and wrinkling his nose at the faint musty taste of the opiate. He added a little wild honey to mask it, tasted again and at last satisfied he set the bowl on one of the wooden stools beside the pile of cushions. There was a dish of cakes and sweetmeats there already. Huy covered the wine bowl with a silken cloth, then surveyed his preparations with pleasure. He picked up his lute, and climbed the staircase to the parapet of the roof and seated himself. He tuned the instrument and strummed upon it, loosening his voice and fingers, watching the narrow lane that led up to the front gate.}

^{In the bright morning sunlight the lake waters were a cheery blue, only slightly darker than the sky The breeze had flecked the surface with little floppy waves, and one of Hab-bakuk Lal's galleys had shipped her oars and was running in towards the harbour under a big lateen sail. The sea birds followed her, planing and soaring across her stern.}

^{High above the lake the midday clouds were building tall, frothy thunder-heads. There would be rain before sunset, Huy thought, feeling the thunder in the air, in the touch of his garments upon his skin and the curl of his beard.}

^{His breath caught, and the music died under his fingers as two figures turned into the lane and came up towards the gate. They wore the coarse brown-hooded robes that the priestesses of Astarte affected while travelling abroad. However, the bulky garments could not disguise the quick step and youthful carriage of the taller figure that hurried ahead, nor the age and aggravation of the bent figure that hobbled after her. The ancient voice, breathless and high, called with exasperation.}

^{'My lady, slower! I pray you.' And Huy grinned. A slave opened the gate, and as they crossed the courtyard Huy struck a single authoritative note on the lute, and Tanith stopped dead. The old chaperone, unhearing, moved on into the house mumbling and muttering while Tanith looked up at Huy upon the parapet of the roof.}

^{He began to sing, and the girl below him lifted the hood from her face and let it fall back on her shoulders. She shook her hair loose, watching his face with large green eyes and her expression was rapt and solemn. He sang the song he had written in the wilderness, the song to Tanith inscribed in the golden book, and as he let the last sweet note fall on the bright morning, Tanith's cheeks were flushed and her lips trembled.}

^{Huy went down the staircase and stood close to her, without touching her.}

^{'You are my soul,' he said gently, and she swayed towards him as if drawn by a force beyond her control.}

^{'My lord, I cannot trust myself to be with you where other eyes may see us. I fear I shall betray my love to the blindest of them. Be strong for me.'}

^{Huy touched her elbow, guiding her towards the house. As they passed through into the main room, Tanith stumbled slightly, for a moment pressed against him.}

^{'Oh! I cannot bear it,' she said, and Huy's voice shook as he answered.}

^{'In a while, my love, In a very short while.'}

^{The old priestess was seated on the cushions already, mouthing a cake with bald gums, dropping crumbs and spittle down her robe and mumbling bitterly about her pains and aches.}

^{Huy moved around behind her, and picked up the prepared wine bowl in both hands. Secure in the old priestess's deafness he asked Tanith, 'Is she strong?'}

^{'As strong as most men,' Tanith smiled. 'Though she'll not admit it.'}

^{'She does not complain of chest pains or shortness of breath?'}

^{'Never.' Tanith was intrigued. 'Why do you ask?'}

^{'I have placed star-drops in her wine,' Huy explained. 'But I do not want her sleep to be eternal.'}

^{Tanith's smile flamed, lighting the green depths of her eyes and sparkling on her teeth. 'Oh, Holy Father, how clever of you.' She clapped her hands, a childlike gesture that never failed to touch Huy to the core of his being.}

^{'How many drops?' Tanith demanded}

^{'Four,' Huy admitted.}

^{'Perhaps a few more would not hurt her,' Tanith said. 'I have not seen you in many weeks, Holiness. There is much to discuss.'}

^{During this exchange the old priestess had been nodding and grimacing intelligently, quite as though she had understood every word. Huy studied her a moment, then firmly thrust aside the temptation.}

^{'No,' he said. 'Four is sufficient.' And he came around in front of the priestess. The wrinkled monkey-like face split into a huge toothless grin and she reached for the bowl with a pair of bony claws, on which the old-age blotches and blue veins stood out clearly.}

^{'You have a kind heart. Holiness,' she keened.}

^{They seated themselves in front of her, and while they talked they watched her anxiously. The crone was drawing out her pleasure, sipping the wine and rolling it noisily around her mouth before swallowing and smacking her gums.}

^{'Since we have been apart, I have thought much upon what has happened between us,' Huy admitted, without looking at Tanith.}

^{'I have thought of nothing else.'}

^{'As a man whose life is devoted to the service of the gods, I was greatly troubled that we had sinned against them,' Huy told her.}

^{'There can be no sin in something which gives so much pleasure and happiness.'}

^{'I asked the gods to set a test for me, a trial of my sins.' Huy had still not looked at her, but Tanith glanced at him sharply and her voice snapped.}

^{'You did not indulge in foolish risk, did you?'}

^{'The trial was a fair one - the gods were not cheated.' Huy wanted her to understand, and she understood too well.}

^{'I forbid you to do these stupid male things. I shiver to think of what madness you committed out there in the wilderness.' She was angry now.}

^{'It was necessary. They must have the opportunity to express their wrath.'}

^{'They could as readily express their wrath with a lightning bolt or a falling tree! I will not have you provoking them to destroy you.'}

^{'Tanith, please let me--'}

^{'I can see, my lord, that you will require stricter supervision in the future. I want a lover not a hero.'}

^{'But, Tanith, the gods' answer was favourable. Don't you see, now we need feel no guilt.'}

^{'I never felt guilt, then or now. But, Holiness, I will feel wrath beside which that of the gods will pale if again you risk your life needlessly.'}

^{Huy turned to her, and shook his head with mock sorrow.}

^{'Oh Tanith, what would I ever do without you?' And her stern expression softened.}

^{'My lord, that question will never arise.' And at that moment the empty wine bowl slipped from the old priestess's fingers and spun on one end across the mud floor. Its circles narrowed, until it settled into silence and the priestess let out a long contented snore and bowed forward. Huy caught her and eased her backwards onto the cushions. He laid her out comfortably, and arranged her robe modestly about her. She was smiling and burbling and whistling in her sleep.}

^{Huy straightened up and Tanith stood close beside him. They turned to each other and embraced, coming together slowly and carefully. Her lips had a glossy feeling, cool and firm. Her soft hair brushed his cheeks, and her body pressed boldly against his.}

^{'Tanith,' he whispered. 'Oh Tanith, there is so much I want to tell you.'}

^{'My Lord, your voice is the most beautiful I have ever heard. Your wisdom and wit are celebrated throughout the four kingdoms - but please do not talk now.'}

^{Tanith pulled gently out of his embrace, took his hand and led him softly from the room.}

^{Over the months that followed, Tanith's chaperone developed a peculiar taste for Huy's wine. At the temple feasts she was wont to disparage the quality of the wine served by the Reverend Mother, comparing it most unfavourably against the other, and she would always end with a word of praise for the Holy Father himself.}

^{'A dear, dear man,' she would tell her audience. 'None of the nonsense you find with some of the others. Did I ever tell you about Rastafa Ben-Amon, the Holy Father in the reign of the forty-fourth Gry-Lion when I was a novice? Now there was a one!' Her old eyes went a little misty, and she drooled a thread of saliva.}

^{'Drink!' She said with outraged virtue. 'Fight! And other things.' Then she nodded sagely. 'A terrible, terrible man!' And she grinned fondly at her ancient memories.}

^{From the leather pipe, with its pitch-sealed joints, feeble gusts of air puffed like the dying breaths of a dinosaur. Driven by the great bellows at the surface, the circulation of fresh air had lost most of its force here, seventy feet below.}

^{Timon leaned against the sweating rock surface, pressing his face to the hose outlet gasping at that scanty trickle of air in the hellish heat and sulphurous atmosphere of the underground workings. He was lean, every rib showed clearly through the black skin, each sinewy muscle was outlined. His head was skull-like, with gaunt cheekbones and deep eye-sockets in which the smouldering fires of his indomitable spirit still burned.}

^{All fat and spare flesh had been burned off him by the ceaseless toil and the heat. Even now a sheen of moisture squeezed from the pores of his skin, highlighting the scars which criss-crossed his back and curled around his rib-cage -scars that patterned his arms and legs, scars long healed into thick ridges and shiny grooves, scars fresh and pink, scars still thick-scabbed and oozing. The chain shackles hung loosely at his neck and wrists and ankles. They had rubbed coarse calloused circles around his neck and limbs, slave marks that he would carry to his grave.}

^{He sucked in the air, his chest pumping, swelling and subsiding, the ribs beneath the skin fanning open and closing. Around him the smoke swirled, dimming the lamp flames. The heat was a violent shimmering thing, and the rock at the face glowed still, although the fires had burned to thick beds of ash.}

^{For five days now they had been attempting to break up this intrusion of hard green serpentine rock which was obscuring the gold reef. Sixteen men had died in the attempt, suffocated by the steam and smoke, struck down by flying shards of exploding rock or merely overcome by the heat to fall swooning onto the glowing floor and to sizzle while their flesh stuck to the hot rock and came away in stinking slabs from the bone.}

^{From the shaft above him, dangling on a plaited reed rope, one of the water-bladders was lowered to him. Made from the whole skin of an ox, carefully stitched and with the joints waterproofed with pitch the bladder contained forty gallons of liquid, a mixture of sour wine and water.}

^{Timon doused his leather cloak in the filthy warm water of the wooden trough beside him, then one at a time he lifted his feet and dipped them into the trough, soaking his leather leggings and the sandals. The soles of the sandals were reinforced with five thicknesses of leather to withstand the heat of the rock floor. Timon threw the cloak across his shoulders, bound the linen cloth over his mouth and nose, took one last breath from the air pipe and held it. Then he ducked under the dangling water bladder and took the weight on his shoulders. Reaching up, he jerked loose the tail of the knot that held it, and, bowed under the weight of liquid, he staggered up the tunnel.}

^{As he approached the face, the wet soles of his sandals began spluttering and stinking. He could feel the heat through the thick leather. Heat from the rock walls hammered at him, a physical force against which he had to fight his way forward.}

^{There was little time in which to work. Already his abused lungs were pumping painfully, but he dared not draw a breath of this poisonous smoke-laden air. The heat was scalding the exposed skin on his arms and face, his feet were agony as the rock burned away the protective soles.}

^{Against the face of the drive, he eased the bladder from his shoulder. He moaned with the pain as his careless elbow touched the rock, searing away an inch of skin and leaving the pink raw flesh exposed.}

^{He lowered the bladder to the floor, whirled and ran back through swirling fumes and heat down the tunnel with his chains jangling loosely under the cloak. This was the moment when men died, when the hot rock ate through the water bladder too swiftly, before the bearer was out of the danger area.}

^{Behind Timon the bladder popped, forty gallons of liquid drenched the hot rock, the sudden contraction of the strata shattered the surface, the rock burst explosively and a sharp sliver of it hit Timon in the back of the head, a glancing razor touch that sliced down to the bone of his skull. He staggered, knowing that to fall on this burning floor was to die horribly. He kept his feet while with his senses reeling he reached the water trough and plunged his head quickly into the filthy scummy water. Then with dirty water and fresh blood streaming down his back, he clutched the air pipe with both hands and panted into it. He was coughing and retching and his eyes were blinded with the tears of pain.}

^{It took him minutes to recover a little of his strength, and he staggered to the ladder that led to the level above. As he climbed, the next water bladder was being lowered, and he squeezed himself against the side of the narrow shaft to allow it past. He climbed fifty feet in darkness and then crawled over the edge into a dimly lit low-roofed cavern.}

^{The slave-master saw him grovelling on the lip of the shaft.}

^{'Why have you left your station?' And the long lash of the hippo-hide kiboko curled wickedly around Timon's ribs. He writhed at the sting of it.}

^{'My head,' he gasped. 'I'm hurt.' And the slave-master stepped closer to him, stooping to examine the clotted cut in the back of Timon's scalp from which dark blood still welled. He grunted impatiently,}

^{'Rest, then.' And turned to a row of ten squatting slaves. They were all incorrigibles, wearing the same heavy chains as Timon, and their bodies were also scarred and abused. The slave-master selected one of them, prodding him with the sharpened point of the whip.}

^{'You next. Quickly now. The slave stood, and shuffled to the mouth of the shaft, moving stiffly for the damp of the workings was in all their bones. At the edge of the shaft the slave paused and peered fearfully into that dreadful fuming pit.}

^{'Move!' grunted the slave-master and the kiboko whistled and clapped against his flesh. He went down the ladder.}

^{Timon dragged himself to the low bench against the wall. He sat with his elbows on his knees and his face in his hands. His lungs ached with the smoke and the cut in his scalp burned and stung. None of the other slaves looked at him. Each man was sunk in his own private hell, uncaring and silent. Beside Timon a man began to cough, a monotonous hacking sound, and a little bloody saliva wet his lips and glistened in the lamp light. He was dying of the lung sickness of the miners. The dust of powdered rock had filled his lungs, solidifying like concrete and turning his lungs to stone. None of them moved, none of them spoke.}

^{The younger slave-master paced restlessly back and forth before them. He was a swarthy bearded man, part Yuye, a freedman as like as not. He wore a linen tunic with light body armour, enough to turn a dagger's point, and an iron helmet to protect his skull from the rough roof of the tunnel. At his waist were belted a short iron sword and a slave club studded with iron nails. He was tall and hard-looking, with flat sinewy muscle in his arms and legs. A cruel man, selected to work with the incorrigibles because of his brutality. There were always two of them. The other slave-master was an older man with a frosting of grey in his beard and a pale sickly-looking face. But he was big in the shoulder, and dangerous, as cruel as the younger man and more experienced. From above, five bladders of liquid were lowered into the shaft, and five times a thick rush of steam swirled from the dark mouth as they were used to quench the heated rock.}

^{'Enough!' the younger slave-master bellowed down, and the slave crawled up out of the pit and lay on the edge coughing and retching. He was filthy with ash and sweat and mud, and he vomited a little yellow bile into the mud.}

^{'Take him away,' ordered the slave-master and two of them shambled forward and dragged him away to the bench.}

^{The younger slave-master's eyes travelled along the row, and they stiffened into awareness, each trying to will the choice away from himself.}

^{'You.' The sharp point of the whip dug spitefully into Timon's ribs. 'You did not finish your shift.'}

^{There was no right of appeal, protest was folly, Timon had learned long ago. He stood up, and shuffled to the shaft. He steeled himself to the descent, but the delay was too long, and the hippo-hide whip seared its white flash of agony across the tenderness beneath his armpit.}