The Warrior's Tale (75 page)

I slashed at him, and bit through his beard; felt his hot, soft throat beneath; and I clamped my strong jaws shut. The blood I lusted for pulsed out. The claws fell away. The Archon collapsed; I didn't loosen my death grip, but only shook and shook until the blood ceased to flow and his heart was still.

I let loose, and lifted up my head. I was standing on the Archon's corpse. I saw a small, dark wisp rise from his chest and knew it was what was left of his soul. I slapped it down with my paw like a mouse and crushed it. The Archon was no more.

My scream of victory resounded from the very moon.

Then Archon, palace, ravine and moon vanished and I was no longer a panther, but only Rali, an all-too-mortal woman and soldier.

I was lying on a deck of a ship, bleeding from many wounds. It was
my
ship. And the corpses of my Guardswomen were piled around. Just to one side was Gamelan's body. Next to him was Polillo's. I struggled up and looked out across the rolling seas.

I knew I'd never left that deck - except as a spirit. We'd fought a battle here. And continued the fight in the ethers; where it was finally won. I knelt down on one knee and prayed thanks to Maranonia for gifting her daughters with noble deaths.

I looked at my palm. The lion scar was gone forever.

Then I wept. I wept for Polillo, I wept for Gamelan and Corais and Ismet and all the others. I also wept for me. I still lived and I knew the guilt of being among the living would not be easy to bear.

Twenty-Six

The Cry of the Gull

I

don't remember
much about what happened next. It was a long, hard journey home. I think I hungered. I may have suffered from cold and heat I couldn't say. Somehow I jury-rigged a sail and went on, still to the east, still towards our home. Somehow I must have lashed the tiller. Somehow the winds were kind, and didn't rip the sail from the mast. Somehow the seas held their hands. Perhaps the gods saw an end to their jest, and realized there was no more of me to make sport of.

Finally one day I saw a ship and it was an Orissan ship - a merchantman from Amalric's fleet. This time it was no trick and the captain who greeted me appeared in awe when he learned who I was and what I had done.

Once home, I got a hero's welcome, as you well know. And it was honest and warm and I was filled to overflowing with joy. The people of Orissa mobbed me and carried me through the streets to the Great Amphitheatre where my praises were sung, and honours heaped on me; and afterwards the wine flowed freely in all the homes and taverns in a proper Orissan celebration.

Amalric welcomed me with a hug I thought would crush my ribs. Omyere kissed me and we both cried for being so happy. Porcemus and my brothers were delightfully cold and distant. I treasured the constancy of their dislike almost as much as I valued Amalric's love.

I was even more delighted to learn Jinnah had never enjoyed any of the honours the Archon envisioned in his false Orissa. When he'd returned from Lycanth, he'd been damned by the Magistrates and Evocators for his misdeeds in the siege, and for sending me after the Archon's fleet with such a puny, rag-tag force. He'd been stripped of all rank - condemned even by his family - and banished from the city and all its provinces. When last heard of he'd been kidnapped by slavers and was pulling an oar on a leaky barge that plies the pirate-infested waters offjeypur.

While I was gone a vigil was kept for the whole two years, and many were the prayers and sacrifices for our safe and victorious return. Before I came home a great earthquake shook Orissa, with its centre seemingly the hill on which the Palace of the Evocators stood. Fortunately, damage and loss of life were slight. The Evocators have traced that great quake to the time when I fought the Archon in the ethers as a panther.

As for that holy beast itself, I've never seen her again - except in troubled dreams.

My love life could be full, if I wanted. Many women have sought to share my days and nights. As the Princess Xia predicted, Tries came running to me as soon as I got back. She hadn't married, of course, but swore she'd kept her love alive all that time. She said it was all a silly misunderstanding and sometimes I think I might even agree. But other times - well, let's just say I've chosen to remain unattached and chaste for a time.

You ask what will I do next? What does it matter? The book is done, the tale is told and that should be the end of it.

Oh, very well, Scribe. I'll tell you as best I can.

A week ago, Amalric invited me to his villa. We had a lovely time, sipping wine and gossiping while Omyere entertained us on her lyre. The garden was its old, comfortable ramble of overgrown paths slipping by sweet-smelling flowers and fruiting trees. My brother and I strolled through it, taking the wine with us, and found a comfortable seat next to the fountain near my mother's simple stone shrine.

Amalric asked me the same question you just posed - what was I going to do next?

I laughed. 'I thought you just wanted me for my company, Brother dear,' I said. 'But now I see you've joined the throng hounding me. No one ever gives a soldier peace when she returns home. She must get busy right away, carve out a life for herself. Te-Date forbid, she might become an idler.' I raised my goblet. 'Right now, all I want is more of this. With a little sun and song as well. What's wrong with that?'

Amalric took my hint and refilled the goblet. Then he said: 'They're re-forming the Maranon Guard, you know.' I sighed. 'So that's it! Listen - the Magistrates have already been
i

.1

beseeching me to command the new guard. And I've rejected them as politely as possible.'

Amalric blessed me with that boyish grin of his. 'So they've told me,' he said. 'And they asked me to apply a little pressure to get you to change your mind.'

I shook my head. 'Tell them you pleaded mightily,' I said, 'but I failed to see reason. And the answer is still no.'

'What has changed, Rali?' he asked. 'Once, the Maranon Guard was your whole life. Being a soldier was your girlhood dream come true.'

I drank more wine. Then: 'I grew weary of taking young women out to die,' I said. 'I've ghosts enough for company as it is. I don't need more.'

'Then you're through with soldiering?' he asked. 'I'm not certain,' I said. 'But as long as Orissa is safe, I doubt I'll take up arms again.' 'So what is that you want?' he pressed.

Unaccountably, tears rose in my eyes. 'Just to be left alone,' I said, struggling not to weep.

Amalric came to me, and put his arms around me. 'They won't do that, Sister dear,' he said. 'It's your misfortune to be a hero who lived.'

I drove off the self-pity and wiped my eyes. 'It's also my misfortune,' I said, 'that soldiering is all I know.'

'That's not true,' my brother murmured. 'There's more to you than sword and shield. I've known that since I was a hero-worshipping boy pestering his sister to be always in her company.'

I looked at the mossy stone that was my mother's shrine. Searching for guidance, I suppose. But none came. There was no sudden shimmering of an image coming to life. No scent of a sandalwood ghost, or whispered warnings, or advice.

A
gentle
wind blew up, carrying the smell of the river. And with it came the memory of a hard ship's deck, crackling sails, leaping seas, the smell of salt, the feel of cold spray needling the flesh, and the horizon - teasing like a gossamer-veiled dancing girl - always retreating before your eyes.

'I have an expedition leaving in a month,' Amalric said.

And I thought: Yes!

'There's tales of rich trading opportunities,' he said, 'far to the south where no one has ever been before.'

And I thought: Yes
...
yes!

'I won't lie to you that it won't be dangerous,' my brother said. 'There'll be cold and hunger and only a small chance of success. But mere will be adventure, Rali. New lands. New people. New hopes. These things I
can
promise.'

And I thought: Please, yes.

'The expedition has need of an Evocator,' he said.

My heart dipped. 'But they'd never allow it,' I said. 'No woman has been an expedition Evocator in all the history of Orissa.'

Amalric said: 'Then it's time we started. After all, you're Rali Emilie Antero. And you can be anything you like. What do you say. Sister dear? Will you sail?'

And I said: 'Yes!'

So, there you have it, Scribe. The tale of a warrior some are fools enough to praise as a hero. You've got most of the journal bundled up now, and soon it'll be ready for the bookstalls.

I wonder what others will think when they read it? Sometimes I imagine a little girl turning the pages, curled up in her bed at night; reading by fire beads under the covers so her nurse won't catch her. I wonder what that little girl will think. Will she want to defy tradition and trade her dolls for a sword? If she does, is that what I desire? To be honest, I'm not certain. What would be best of all, I believe, is that she'd be her own woman; refuse to be anything but equal to any man in whatever life she chooses.

And perhaps, Scribe, when next that child hears a gull cry, she will think of me.