'I'll go and get our food, master,' Io said happily. 'That's one of the things I ought to do for you.'
'It won't be ready yet!' I called after her, but she paid no attention. I had picked up this scroll and started to follow her when someone tapped my shoulder.
It was one of the bowmen. I said, 'She'll do no harm; she's only a child.'
He shrugged to show he was not concerned about Io. 'My name is Oior,' he said. 'I am of the People of Scoloti. You are Latro. I heard the man and woman speak of you.'
I nodded.
'I do not know this land.'
'Nor I, either.'
He looked surprised at that but went on resolutely. 'It has many gods. In my land we sacrifice to red fire and air the unseen, to black earth, pale water, sun and moon, and to the sword of iron. That is all. I do not know these gods. Now I am troubled, and my trouble will be the trouble of all who are here.' He looked around to see whether anyone was watching us. 'I do not have much money, but you will have all I have.' He held out his hand, filled with bronze coins.
'I don't want your money,' I told him.
'Take. That is how friends are made in this land.'
To please him, I took a single coin.
'Good,' he said. 'But this is no good place to talk, and soon there will be food. When we have eaten and drunk, go high up.' He pointed to the ridge, between the sentries who stood black against the sky to the north and south. 'Wait for Oior there.'
Now I am waiting, and I have written this as I wait. The sun has set, and the last light will soon leave the western sky. The moon is rising, and if the bowman does not come before I grow sleepy, I will go to a fire to sleep.
CHAPTER X-Under a Waning Moon
I write beside the fire. When I look about, it seems that no one is awake but the black man and me. He walks up and down the beach, his face turned to the sea as if waiting for some sail.
Yet I know many are awake. Now and then one sits up, sees the rest, and lies down again. The wind sighs in the trees and among the rocks; but there are other sighs, not born of the wind.
I asked Hypereides whether we would bury the dead man in the morning. He said we would not, that there is hope we will reach the city soon. If we do, the dead man can lie with his family, if he has one.
But I should return to the place where I stopped writing only a short time ago. Io carried food and wine to me, though I had eaten already, and we shared it with our backs against one of the highest rocks of the ridge, watching the moon rise over the sea and enjoying the spectacle provided by the fires of driftwood and the ships drawn up on the beach.
Hypereides was generous with food, and because no one had remembered I had eaten already, Io had received full portions for both of us. While I pretended to dine a second time, she piled what she did not want of her own meal onto my trencher, so there was a great deal there still when I drained the cup, wiped my fingers with bread, and laid it at my feet.
'I would like something of that.'
I looked around to see who spoke. What I had thought only a stone resting by chance upon a larger stone was in fact the head of a woman. As soon as she saw I had seen her, she rose and came toward us. She was naked and graceful, beyond her first youth (as well as I could judge in the moonlight), though not her beauty. The black hair that fell to her waist seemed longer, thicker, and more tangled than any woman's hair should be.
As she came nearer to us, I decided she was a celebrant of some cult; for though she wore no gown, she had tied the shed skin of a snake above her hips like a cincture, with the head and tail hanging down.
'Here,' I said. I picked up my trencher again and held it out to her. 'You may have it all.'
She smiled and shook her head.
'Master!' Io gasped.
She was staring at me, and I asked her what was wrong.
'There's nobody there!'
The woman whispered, 'She's your slave. Won't you give her to me? Touch her and she's mine. Touch me, and I am hers.' She scarcely moved her lips when she spoke; and she looked away, toward the moon, when she said, 'I am hers.'
'Master, is there somebody here? Somebody I can't see?'
I told Io, 'A woman with dark hair, belted with a snake skin.'
'Like the flute-playing man?'
I did not remember such a man and could only shake my head.
'Come to the fire,' she pleaded. She tried to pull me away.
The woman whispered, 'I won't hurt you. I've come to teach you, and to give you a warning.'
'And the child?'
'The child is yours. She could be mine. What harm in that?'
I told Io, 'Go away. Run to the fire. Stay there till I come.'
She flew as a rabbit flies the hooves of warhorses, leaping and skipping among the rocks.
'You are selfish,' the woman said. 'You eat, while I go hungry.'
'You may eat as I did.'
'But quick of wit, an excellent thing. Alas, that I cannot chew such food.' She smiled, and I saw that her teeth were small and pointed, shining in the moonlight.
'I didn't know there were such women as you. Are all the people of this coast like you?'
'We have spoken before,' she said.;
'Then I've forgotten it.'
She studied my eyes and sank fluidly to the ground to sit beside me. 'If you have forgotten me, you must have seen many things.'
'Is that what you came to teach me?'
'Ah,' she said. 'It is my face you do not remember.'
I nodded.
'And the rest is somewhat differently arranged. Yes, you are right. That is one of the things I have come to teach you.'
I looked at her, seeing how fair her body was and how white. 'I'd gladly learn.'
Her hand caressed my thigh, but though her fingers moved with life, they felt as cold as stones. 'Someday, perhaps. Do you desire me?'
'Very much.'
'Later, then, as I told you. When you have recovered from that wound. But now I much teach you, as I said I would.' She pointed to the moon. 'Do you see the goddess?'
'Yes,' I said. 'But what a fool I am. A moment ago, I thought her only a crescent lamp in the sky.'
'There is a shadow across her face now,' the woman told me. 'In seven days, the shadow will cover it wholly. Then she will become our dark goddess, and if she conies to you, you will see her so.'
'I don't understand.'
'I tell you these things because I know she once showed herself to you as a bright goddess when the moon was nearly full. What she has once done, she will do again, so these things are good for you to know. For a very small price, I will tell you more-things that will be of the greatest value to you.'
I did not ask what the price was, because I knew; and I saw that she knew I knew. I said, 'Could you take her? Even when she's sitting around the fire with the rest?'
'I could take her though she sat in the fire.'
'I won't pay that price.'
'Learn wisdom,' she said. 'Knowledge is more than gold.'
