Black Jade

Bajorak shook his head. 'You do not know him.'

'I know what my grandfather, Sajagax, said of Garthax's father: that Artukan was a great chieftain who would never scrape before Morjin. Does a lion sire a snake?'

'Garthax,' Bajorak said, 'is not his father's son.'

'Have you tried helping him to be?'

It was one of Atara's graces, I thought that she tried ever to remake men's natures for the good.

'Help him?' Bajorak said. 'You do not understand. Ganhax quarreled with Artukan over the question of. nether we should treat with Morjin. And two days later Artukan died while drinking his beer. .of poison!'

'Poison!' Atara cried out. 'That cannot be!'

'No, no one wanted to believe it — certainly not I,' Bajorak told her. 'But it is said that upon taking the first sip of his beer, Artukan cried out that his throat was on fire. One of his wives offered him water, but Artukan said that this burned his lips. Everything. . burned him. No one could touch him. It is said that he put out his own eyes so that he would not have to bear the torment of light. His skin turned blue and then black, like dried meat. He screamed, like a kradak burnt at the stake. It took him a whole day to die.'

Master Juwain's faced paled, and then he said to Bajorak, 'If what you tell is true, then surely the poison was kirax.'

Surely it was, I thought as my heart pushed my flaming blood through my veins. And surely thus I would have died, too, if only the assassin sent by Morjin had managed to bury his arrow even a tenth of an inch into my flesh.

'I do not know this poison, kirax,' Bajorak said to Master Juwain.

And Master Juwain told him, 'It is used only by the Red Priests of the Kallimun. And by Morjin.'

Bajorak s gaze flashed from Master Juwain to Kashak and Pirraj, and he made a warding sign with his finger as he cried out. 'Treachery! Abomination! If Garthax really was in league with the Red Priests, if he is then. .'

'Then his eyelids should be cut off, and he should be staked out in the sun for the ants and the yellowjackets to eat!'

These terrible words came from Atara. and I felt my heart nearly break against my chest bones to hear her pronounce the age-old punishment that the Sarin meted out to poisoners. 'He should be unmanned,' she added, 'and his parts given to the vultures!'

It was one of Atara's griefs, I knew, that when her hopes for men failed, she could fall icy cold and full of judgment, like a killer angel.

'If true,' Bajorak said, nodding his head, 'what you say should be done. But we know not that it is true. Only that, from what we've learned of Garthax, it could be.'

'Then until it is proved,' Atara said, 'he is still your chieftain. And so you must persuade him with words to break this covenant with Morjin, rather than with arrows and flaying knives.'

'Words,' Bajorak spat out. He looked from Atara to Kane and then at me. 'Valashu Elahad, all of you, rode with Sajagax to Tria to unite the free peoples against Morjin, with words. And what befell? Alonia is in flames, and in the Morning Mountains, the Elahad's own Valari make war with each other. And on the Wendrush! The Zayak ride openly into our country! It is said that the Marituk have allied with the Dragon, the Janjii, too! And so the Tukulak and the Usark, and other tribes, soon will. They think to choose the winning side before it is too late. They have no sense of themselves! Whatever side the Sarni choose will be victorious. And that is why we Tarun, and the other Danladi clans, must choose another chieftain, before it is too late. And we shall make our votes with these!'

So saying, he reached into his quiver and drew out a long, feathered shaft. With one smooth, quick motion, he nocked it to his bowstring, drew it back to his ear and loosed it toward the Red Knights and the Zayak warriors. His great horn bow unbent with a crack like thunder. The arrow whined through the air and buried itself in the grass a few hundred yards away. Not even Sajagax, I thought, could shoot an arrow a mile.

Bajorak's eyes gleamed, but he sighed. 'Atara Manslayer is right,' he said. 'Until Garthax's treachery is proven, he is still our chieftain. And so his cursed covenant will be honored.'

Much of what he had told me we had learned while in winter camp with Karimah and the Manslayers, for the Wendrush is Ea's crossroads, and news flows as freely as the great sagosk herds over its windswept plains. I had not, however, known about the Marituk's alliance with Morjin. They were a great tribe, and so this was evil tidings — but no surprise. In Tria, I had nearly claimed the Lightstone for myself; I had spoken a lie and slain a man, and as with a stone cast into a black water, these evil deeds had rippled outward to touch many peoples and many lands.

'And so,' Bajorak continued, looking from the Red Knights back at me, 'we shall not attack our enemy. They know this. It is why they ride so impudently.'

'But what if they attack us?' Maram wanted to know. It was a question that he could not stop asking Bajorak — and himself.

'They won't,' Bajorak told him. 'They haven't the numbers … yet.'

'Yet?' Maram called out. 'Ah, I don't like the sound of that, not at all. What do you mean, yet?'

'I believe,' Bajorak said, 'that these are not the only companies of Red Knights or Zayak that Garthax has allowed into our country.'

At this Maram craned his neck about, scanning the horizon. And all the while he muttered, 'Oh, too bad, too bad!'

Bajorak ignored him and looked straight at me. He said, 'Until Karimah came to me asking us to escort you, I could not imagine what these companies were seeking in our lands.'

I said nothing as I watched the Red Knights, who seemed to be waiting for us to remount so that they might renew the chase.

'But I do not understand,' he went on, 'why they are seeking you.'

'Surely that is simple,' I told him. 'We are Morjin's enemies. Surely he would pay much gold to anyone who brings him our heads.'

I rested my hand on the hilt of my sword; I looked into Bajorak's eyes to see if he desired this gold badly enough to betray us. But I saw there only a blazing hatred of Morjin and a fierce pride.

Then Bajorak looked away from me toward our enemy. 'Perhaps they do want to kill you. But perhaps they are seeking the same thing as you.'

His perceptiveness vexed me, and I told him, 'We have not said that we are seeking anything.'

He smiled as best he could and said, 'No, you say little, with your lips, Valashu Elahad. But your eyes sing like the minstrels. I have never seen a man who desires as you do.'

'Perhaps,' I told him, 'we desire nothing more than to cross your lands.'

He pointed at the snowy peaks in the west, 'To go into the wild mountains where no one dwells?'

'Perhaps we wish to dwell there.'

He held out his hand toward Estrella and Daj. 'It is strange that you take children with you on such a journey.'

'Is it strange to want to find a place where they might come of age in peace?'

Bajorak's face softened as he said, 'No, that is not strange — if any such place exists. But if it did exist, surely you would not seek it in the Sarni's lands so close to Sakai.'

'We go where we must,' I told him. 'Will you help us?'

'We would help you better if you helped us.'

'We ride together,' I said. 'If our enemy attacks you, we will fight them.'

'That is good. But I would be even better if you trusted us.'

'We've trusted you with our lives.'

'Yes, but not with that which impels you to risk your lives.'

'As Kane has told you, that would be an unnecessary burden.'

'You say. But the greater burden is not knowing where we are going or why. It puts my men at risk. And I do not spend their lives as readily as I do gold.'