I made good time. I spotted no life beyond a hawk, a pair of grouse, and a hare springing away across a stony clearing. Even such villages and farmsteads as I glimpsed in the distance looked abandoned. The world might as well have been driven into hiding by the Wild Hunt.
Of that dreadful passage no breath stirred that I could discern.
It is easy to think while walking.
The history of the world begins in ice, and it will end in ice. Here in the north, we live under the shadow of the ice, its ice sheets and massive glaciers, and no human can walk there without being killed or driven out. Daniel Hassi Barahal wrote that the Han people who rule in distant Cathay in the far east do not fear the ice, and the people who live near the belt of the world, known as the equator, rarely feel the ice's breath because of the ever- present heat. But he also wrote that of these lands, he could only report what he had been told or read since he had not
traveled there himself to vouch for its truth: Who is to say that our teachers know of what they speak or speak of what they know?
This is what I thought I knew: Two thousand years ago, the Romans and Phoenicians had battled to a standstill, and in the end the Romans kept their land empire and the Phoenicians kept their ports and traded across the seas without impediment. Over time, as the empire of the Romans weakened, the Celtic chiefs broke away one by one and restored their ancient principalities and lordships, at times warring or feuding with their neighbors and at others allying against some more hated prince. But although the various Celtic peoples cast out their Roman overlords, they retained many things Roman: roads, bridges, aqueducts, a calendar, laws, literacy, and the city ways and city speech of Romans.
When, about four hundred years ago, the Persians swept across the north of Africa and conquered the trading city of Qart Hadast, many Kena'ani merchant families were forced to flee to other ports and cities. Across Europa, Celtic princes were eager to welcome them in exchange for a tax on their profits.
About one hundred years after the Persian conquests, the salt plague broke out south of the Saharan Desert, when ghouls crawled up from the depths of the salt mines and in their invading hordes tore apart the empire of Mali. The great diaspora, breaking in waves over a hundred or more years, flooded into the north, bringing West African refugees with their gold, their horses, and their magic. Refugees born to noble houses in the south married their wealth and honor into the princely lineages of the north. Others, feared and respected but never loved because of their sorcery, discovered brethren among the Celtic drua, and their secret societies flourished close to the ice; out of this partnership grew the powerful mage Houses.
But the refugees did not only flee north. A fleet from the crumbling Mali Empire sailed across the Atlantic Ocean, guided
by Phoenician navigators. They reached the distant western continent, which was later named Amerike in honor of the Celtic explorer Rhisiart ap Meurig, and there they met, in South Amerike, previously unknown human nations and, in the north, the venturesome trolls. Their interest piqued by the new arrivals, trolls sailed east in their own exploratory ships and made landfall on the coast of Iberia, and thus began commerce across the stormy and unpredictable Atlantic Ocean.
Like-minded trolls and humans founded the city of Expedition on the Sea of Antilles, an inland sea separating the northern nesting grounds of the trolls and the southern continent with its human chiefdoms and kingdoms. But the inhabitants of Expedition proved to be a busy people with radical notions and an insatiable desire for new technologies that the mage Houses in Europa deplored and the princely houses might take or leave, depending on how it benefited them. In such tumultuous times, the old order will grow rigid and brittle as it strives to maintain the old ways.
Twenty-five years ago, a young Iberian captain who called himself Camjiata rose from obscurity during one of the periodic wars between Iberia and Rome and decided that Europa would be better off if he ruled all of it. Some princes aided him; some, allied with Rome, fought him. In the end, the mage Houses combined with the Second Alliance to overthrow him. But even they feared to kill him outright, so they imprisoned him on an island and left him to rot. Yet peace did not come. The common people became increasingly restless, muttering radical words like rights and demanding radical steps like an elected assembly, but what power did ordinary people have? No more than did the daughter of an impoverished family, however far back we could trace our illustrious Kena'ani lineage. Which was to say, no power at all. Not even the power to know who you truly are.
For who was I? Striding along, I felt no different in my physical form even though the djeli had told me I 'wore' a spirit mantle. My hair, my hands, my strong legs, my height-none of this had changed. I still recalled the journals I had reread so many times I had passages memorized. I knew every wall and corner of the house where I had grown up and was acquainted with many a hidden alley in Adurnam. I had friends and rivals, if not so many as Bee. I sewed my own clothing, because we were too poor to hire it done. I loved yam pudding. These things made me Catherine.
But there were things about Catherine I no longer knew.
Sometimes you think so hard it's as if you are talking out loud. Or perhaps I was talking out loud to myself, for I was sure I heard my name.
'Catherine! Please! Wait!'
I drew my sword as I turned. A cloaked figure hurried toward me along the path with a bulky pack bumping against her shoulders. When I looked beyond my pursuer, I saw no sign of any others approaching in her wake nor could 1 find on the horizon the landmark stone of the crossroads where Duvai had left me. I had walked a long way. Afternoon settled its wings over my shoulders.
'Catherine!' She swept back her hood to reveal herself as Kayleigh, her hair and ears covered by a wool scarf. 'I beg you, Catherine. Take me with you!' Panting, she came to a halt before me. 'Andevai told me… the mansa means to take me to his bed to breed… children. Please.' She wiped her brow as if to wipe away her sorrows and fears. 'Don't make me go to him. Let me escape with you.'
22
I lowered the sword but did not sheath it. 'How are you come here?'
'I followed Duvai. Last night I heard him mention to Fa which way he meant to take you. Please allow me to accompany you.'
'I don't-'
'I have provisions, two blankets, a spade, and a length of canvas and rope.'
'I have no home and no money,' I said, but I already knew how this conversation would end. I could not send her back to suffer what I had myself fled. 'I don't even know how I am going to manage.'
'You know a place to go, away from here. I know no place except the village and the estate. I'm a hard worker. I will not burden you, if you will just allow me to walk with you and show me how to go about finding work and a bed wherever it is you mean to go. Even if it means crossing the water, like the stories say you merchant people do on your ships. And two are better than one, aren't they?' She smiled hopefully.
I sheathed my sword and began walking. 'Do you know anything about my people?'
She was as tall as I was, and her stride matched mine. 'Yours are the tribe who wore purple, isn't that right? You fought a war
with the Romans. You have queens instead of princes. A girl cannot be married until she spends a night in the temple sleeping with whatever man comes calling-'
'That's not true!'
'I've bitten you,' she said contritely. 'I did not know.'
'No, I understand you did not know. You have nothing you need apologize for. It's one of the lies the Romans told.'
'What are your stories, then?'
What stories belonged to a person whose entire upbringing was a lie?
'There are tears in your eyes,' said Kayleigh. 'Is it a sad tale, how you came to be married to my brother? It can't be because he's been unkind to you, for he'd never mistreat a woman. Why did your people make such a contract with the mage Houses? Have they mage bloodlines also, hidden away?'
