The Waters Rising

though only a little. Things had become stranger than usual during the past few days. Had the chipmunk actually spoken? In the woods, she was sure it had. Later she thought she’d imagined it. Had Abasio given her a vision? She thought so, but she could have imagined that, too. She had been almost sure she had imagined it, but then, how to explain that Abasio imagined the same thing? Or could it be his imagining, which he had somehow put into her head? Some imaginings did persist. For example, sometimes when she looked into water, she imagined she could swim into its depths without needing air. Sometimes when she looked at herself in a mirror, she imagined she saw someone else, someone older, larger, and very powerful! Those imaginings were more than a little frightening. She had never mentioned them to Bear or Precious Wind. They would tell her to stop imagining any such thing. But she rather enjoyed the thought of Dame Cullen being attacked by an army of rats. She had no right to suppose that Xulai didn’t want to play with other children, for she did want to! At least, she had wanted to—some years ago.

There had been a time when she had watched them from behind a window shutter, little groups of them moving about, full of self-importance, almost always with a studied confidence that Xulai believed they must have learned somewhere, from someone. In their movements, their voices, each of them seemed to know exactly what was appropriate, what came next, a calm assurance that had baffled Xulai. In time, she had come to understand that they were pretending! Each of them was being someone else! This one was father, that one mother, this one the guest invited to tea. Or, again, that one was a nameless assassin, this one a Wold warrior, the third one a Wold friend who arrived in time to save his companion’s life. As soon as Xulai figured it out, their confidence was understandable. They were not being themselves at all; they were not subject to agonies of self-betrayal, to having forbidden thoughts, feelings, and dreams, persistent anxiety and fear of failure. They were being other people, people who weren’t real, and whatever poise they might have lacked in their own lives could be pretended in another life with great virtuosity. How wonderful to be someone other than oneself! Someone who couldn’t be hurt, or killed, or lost in some terrible spasm of obliteration that she knew existed, that she had always known existed though she could not remember being told. No one had told her. She just knew.

Once she knew what they were doing, she had tried to join them, but only a few times, for she could not fit in. She lacked the words to describe what she played at. What did she know of fathers, heroes, or assassins, of warriors and friends? Then, too, it did not help her that all the children seemed slightly afraid of her, or of what she was said to be. In the mythology of Norland, only the Wasting God carried souls, but the souls he carried were only the leftover, twisted, rotten ones. All truly virtuous souls were snatched into the pastures of paradise as they drew their last breaths. There they were replanted to bloom endlessly as flowers under perfumed skies. Though Xulai was obviously not twisted, ancient, and evil, as was the Wasting God, she was still tainted by association.

But none of that mattered now. Precious Wind and the Great Bear of Zol had told her a thousand times that death changes and upsets things. If the princess’s death had not prepared Xulai for change, certainly the funeral would have done so, and if that hadn’t done it, Abasio’s continued presence would have, all by itself. Yesterday he had put his hand on her shoulder, leaned close to her ear, and told her firmly that he was staying with her. Wherever she was going, he was going also, he said. He had also said he didn’t know why, in particular, but sometimes he decided to do things without knowing why, just for the nicanotch of it.

“Nicanotch?”

“The whatever. In lieu of a swear word. Obscenity. Scatological comment. Nicanotch.”

“I may be a very long time,” she said. “Won’t you be homesick?” Xulai was already homesick, and it was on her mind.

“Will I be homesick?” he had repeated in a thoughtful voice. Well, would he? “Home was a farm I had been eager to leave from the time I was old enough to walk. Home was a city so filthy, so violent, and so torture ridden that I sometimes shudder when I remember it. Home was a few good friends or, rather, good fellows who could be depended upon if one were under attack, though—for the most part—if they had shared one thoughtful new idea among them, it would have surprised me greatly. Home was a long journey into new lands to the south while people died all around me, cut down like a harvest of grain. Home was one woman, one woman I loved, love, gone now, leaving only her speaking, thinking spirit behind. Home held another woman I had been with but never met, but who, I was assured, would raise my son to heroic stature by sheer force of will. Home was that son, not yet born when I left, a son I unintentionally fathered though I was unconscious before, during, and for some time after the act. Home was a war in which too many good men and creatures died, irreplaceable men, irreplaceable creatures, irreplaceable love.”

She felt shattered, unaccustomed to being given so much, so truly, though she had understood it completely! His words made her feel as though she was not a child at all! “So, I guess you’re not homesick.”

“I’ve never really found a home,” he said quite honestly. “So, you’re right. I don’t suppose I’ll be homesick.”

“Well then, you need to come with me