Sword Singer-Sword Dancer 2 (34 page)

She sighed, stroking back pale hair. "And so I ask myself: What sort of parent

would I be? What sort of mother would I be if I risked myself in the circle?"

"But you have a choice," I told her. "You don't have to be a sword-dancer...

once you start having babies, there'll be other things to do. The children will

keep you busy."

Del's mouth hooked down. "And there it is, Tiger... a man does what he wants, even after siring children, A woman must be a mother."

I frowned, puzzled. "Isn't it what you'd want?"

Del looked straight at me. "Not every woman wants children."

"But it seems a natural thing--"

"Does it?" Her tone was inflexible. "Is that why your mother left you in the desert?"

Something pinched deep in my belly. I felt a little sick.

Del's fingers tightened. "Maybe she had no choice. Maybe she was ill. Maybe you

were ill, and she thought you'd already died. Maybe--"

"Maybe not," I said dully. "Maybe it's like you said: she simply didn't want me."

Del stopped walking abruptly and raised my hand to her lips. "I want you,"

she

said.

Twenty-nine

It was the stud who warned us, although we weren't paying much attention, being

rather engrossed in something other than listening to horses. And then, suddenly, they were here, and we were no longer alone.

Adara's hand was on my shoulder, pulling me away even as Massou slipped between

Del and I. "So long--" she said. "So long--"

"Now, wait just a--"

Cipriana grasped my right arm. "You don't know how it is. You don't know how it

is."

I heard Del say something to Massou in a questioning tone, although the words themselves were lost beneath Adara and Cipriana. Massou didn't answer. He just

hung on to both her wrists.

"What in hoolies--?" I tried to twist free of them, found I couldn't. Found they

weren't about to let me.

"So long--" Adara whispered.

"Me first," her daughter said.

"Power," Adara hissed. "Power in flesh, power in steel--"

"Get off--" But they weren't about to--

"Tiger!" It was Del, sounding uncommonly afraid. "Oh, Tiger--loki--"

No. It couldn't be possible. Loki? Adara and Cipriana? Especially Massou; it was

impossible.

But it wasn't. And I knew it; it all came together.

"Hoolies--"

I tried ripping away, shouting at Del to do the same. I couldn't see much, being

engulfed by two determined loki masquerading as women, and poor light to boot.

All I knew was they were both incredibly strong, both incredibly forceful, and

if I wasn't careful they'd have me spread-eagled on the ground before I could say my name.

"Del--?" I wrenched my head around, trying to see her. Saw Massou pushing her back, pushing her back, until she smacked against the wall so hard her head rapped rock. I heard the scrape of her sword hilt. And then I saw Massou, who was no longer Massou.

"Tiger--Tiger--"

Hoolies, I've never heard her sound so frightened. I tried again to wrench free,

but Adara and Cipriana were too much for me. I felt hands digging into belly, into abdomen; lower, between my thighs.

Adara: "--power in flesh--"

Cipriana: "--power in steel--"

Hoolies, they were undoing the tie-string of my trews!

Del began to scream.

I thought: If I can get my sword free--But knew I couldn't. I was flat on my back on my sheath; the sword was lost to me.

Cipriana bent down, tongued my cheek, traced out the scars. Something rattled against my teeth: the necklet of lumpy stones.

And then I recognized it. Reddish, irregular stones strung on a thin leather thong. She had shown it to me once before, no doubt flaunting it in challenge,

and I hadn't recognized it. Now I did. Now I knew it was the necklet Del had made for her mother years before, thrown into the circle of stones as an offering to the loki in hopes it would be enough.

Obviously, it hadn't.

They weren't women. Not exactly. More. Demons in women's bodies, using a woman's

wiles and a demon's strength. One was more than enough. Two would be my death.

Or whatever was left over when they were done with me.

Del still screamed. Massou, who wasn't Massou, had forced her to the ground.

I

writhed, twisted, rolled; saw only snatches, because the women were too strong.

Del, like me, was on her back, spitting and kicking and clawing and screaming,

but clearly losing the battle. Massou, who wasn't Massou, was dragging her legs

apart.

But he's a boy, I said inwardly, even though he was not. There was no boy left,

only a thing flowing out of mouth and nose and ears. Something much bigger than

a boy. Bigger even than me.

There was nothing left to fight. Del's enemy had changed, but was using a man's

tactics. The ones a conqueror always uses to subdue a proud woman.

Hoolies, not again--

I tried spitting: Cipriana laughed. I tried biting: Adara smiled. I tried kicking and clawing, too, but nothing had any effect.

Del was sobbing now.

Adara's hand was where it shouldn't be. Cipriana licked my face, thrusting her

tongue into my mouth. I felt the pinching in my belly and the acrid tang of bile

climbing into the back of my throat.

Hoolies, not like this--

No. Not like this. Because something was happening.

A sound. A thin thread of a sound. Not a sword, not a knife, but a needle, thrust into an ear. I felt nothing, but something was there. Something inside my

head, piercing into my brain.

Vision flickered. I smelled something foul. Tasted it, too, though I had swallowed nothing. My hearing wavered, then intensified, even as the shrill sound did.

And then I knew what it was.

Gods bless the Canteada.

Hands fell away from me. Bodies retreated, driven back by the song, and so did

the demons, trapped in human, alien flesh.

I sat up. Adara, Cipriana and Massou stood stock still, hands clapped over their

ears. Their faces were formed of pain.

"Del." I crawled to her, put a hand on her, felt her flesh contract. She lay face down in the dirt. "Del--"

And then, awkwardly, she was up. Up and scrambling away, scraping on buttocks and hands, thrusting herself away. She scrabbled across the dirt until she backed herself up against the stone wall, and there she sat, all jammed up against the stone as if she wanted to crawl inside it.

"Del," I said. "Bascha--" But I broke it off because clearly she wasn't listening.

Hoolies, but it is a frightening thing to look into the face of madness.

Oh, bascha, not you.

Behind me, the loki stood trapped while the Canteada sang.

Oh, bascha, look at me, not at them.

She had driven fingers into the stone. She keeps her nails filed short, but one

by one I saw them break, snapping against the rock.

I knew better than to touch her.

Behind me, the loki whimpered.

"Delilah." I said it quietly, with as much command as I could muster.

She looked at me. Blankly, but at me, which was a distinct improvement.

"Delilah," I said again.

Lips moved. Bitten, bloodied lips, already swelling. Shaping something I couldn't hear.

Very gently, a third time: "Delilah."

She stared back at me. She saw me. Sense came back into eyes, looseness to her

limbs, purpose to her movements.

Del was Del again, but now she was angry.

Dirt coated her face. I saw spittle on her chin, and blood. Hair straggled into

her eyes, stuck itself in sweat and tears and blood. She shook so hard she could

barely stand, yet she did, and managed to draw the sword.

Given time, even in her condition, she would have killed the bodies, the shells

that housed the loki. But she was not given time because the Canteada took it.

They took it, remade it, gave it back, in a song of surpassing strength.

It completely swallowed the thread of Del's wailing chant, the warchant, the deathsong, the sound that promised an ending. Swallowed it, chewed it, spat it

out upon the ground. Seeing it, Del broke off, beginning to tremble again.

I wanted to touch her but didn't, knowing she wasn't ready. Knowing the woman before me was not the Del I knew, but Delilah, the girl Ajani had nearly destroyed on the threshold of her life. She had crossed that threshold eventually, but it was warped, planed of hatred and vengeance. She might have died--women did--but didn't, being Del, who gave no man a victory he hadn't fairly earned. Ajani hadn't earned it. He'd only stolen it briefly, and then she

had won it back.

Del stared at Massou, Cipriana, Adara. At the loki in human form, who had somehow replaced human mind with loki guile, human desires with loki needs.

At

the woman, the girl, the boy, who had, somewhere on the journey, lost the battle

to three loki I had unknowingly freed.

Doors and cracks and chimneys glowed, painted with firelight. Beyond the loki,

in the darkness, I saw shadows moving. Small, pale shadows, singing the binding

song.

They came from everywhere, the Canteada. Out of and down the walls, carrying candles, creeping forward to form a circle. Even behind Del and me, coming forward, moving us inward, to be clustered within the circle.

The loki made sounds of distress.

It was cold. In darkness blushed with candleflame, I saw my breath plume forth.

But the shiver that racked my body came from within, not without.

The loki in human form were more than merely human. I saw madness in their faces, and desperation, and despair. Bound by the song, all they could do was suffer. As much, maybe, as the human hosts had suffered.

The circle closed. There was flame and song and faces, uncanny, inhuman faces.

Feathery crests stood up from brow to neck, rippling, tinged with firelight, speaking a language all its own. I'd seen only the songmaster. Now I saw the others. Now I heard them sing.

I am not a man much touched by music, being deaf to its intricacies. I've said

it before: it's noise, no matter the intent. But this time, this time, it was far more than noise. Far more than song. The sound I heard was power.

Legs gave out; I sat. Even as others sat; as Del collapsed beside me, loose-limbed, rubbery, dropping the sword beside her, awkward in the sudden loss

of muscular control. The loki also; I saw them, one by one, turned into lumps of

flesh like clay, waiting to be formed. Waiting to be shaped.

I opened my mouth to speak. To say something to Del; to ask her what it meant,

what they would do, what they wanted of us. She was Northern; surely she knew.

But I asked nothing because I couldn't. Because the song had become my world.

Flame melted, ran together, made the circle whole. I saw light, only light, and

then even that was too much to bear. There was only one thing to do, and I did

it. I ran away from it.

Trouble was, it came with me. Just like the song.

*Birthsong?* someone asked.

Birthsong. Birthsong? Blankly, I stared into the light.

A pause. *Birthname?*

Birthname. The meaning was different. Shaped to make sense to me.

I frowned. Thought about it. Realized I had no answer.

A mother or father names a child. I'd known neither one. Which meant I had no birthname.

Barely, I shook my head.

The song changed a little. *Birthname* it insisted.

The songmaster? I wondered. Again, I shook my head.

The song grew insistent. It was unbearable. I felt pressure inside my skull.

And then, suddenly, a cessation of discomfort. I felt a trace of surprise that

had nothing to do with me.

*Callname?* it asked gently.

That one I could answer. "Sandtiger," I said.

The song lingered in my head. Searched for truth or falsehood. Found the answer,

then told me to withdraw.

Withdraw. I frowned. Stared into flame. Then knew I was meant to walk through it.

I stood up. Drew in a breath. Walked slowly out of the circle.

I sagged against the canyon wall, conscious only of exhaustion in mind and body.

No longer did I doubt what Del had said about the magic in their music. It had

gone into my soul, and now I understood it.

I turned. Beyond the light sat Del, staring, as I had, into the ring of flame.

The light was stark on her face, and harsh, limning lines of exhaustion and tension. I saw blood and bruises and dirt, and an endurance almost destroyed.

Del was close to breaking.

I wanted to go to her. I wanted to go back into the circle and touch her and lead her out through the flame, through the song, through the circle of Canteada. But I knew better. This time, I knew better than to ignore the existence of power.

Now it was Del's turn.

*Birthname?* the songmaster asked.

She stared into the flame.

More gently, it was repeated.

"Del," the sword-dancer answered.

*Birthname,* he insisted.

"Delilah," the woman whispered.

I waited until she was free of the circle, blinded by light and tears, and then

I took her hand, led her forth, brought her to stand with me. Saying nothing, asking nothing, merely being there. Hoping it was enough.

The song swelled. I heard dissonance in it, and harshness. An underlying demand.

The songmaster was inflexible as he asked birthnames of the others.

One by one, he asked them. Adara. Cipriana. Massou.

One by one, they lied.

The song intensified. I saw dozens of throats swelling forth, threatening to burst. I heard the high melodic wailing, the deep thrumming hum, the mid-range

staccato whirring. I heard the power in the song, and knew the loki could never