her anger on the ustuzou, pushing her foot into the thing’s face, twisting hard. It groaned with pain and called out loudly.
Kerrick cocked his head, listening intently before he spoke. “Eistaa, please wait — there is something.”
She stepped back and spun about to face him, still angry. He spoke quickly before she turned her wrath on him as well.
“You heard it, it called out the same thing-many times. And I know, that is, I think I know what it was saying.”
He fell silent, chewing at his lip as he searched through memories long buried, words forgotten, silenced.
“Marag, that is what it said. Marag.”
“That conveys no meaning.”
“It does, I know it does. It is like, it has the same intent as ustuzou.”
Now Vainte was puzzled. “But the creature is ustuzou.”
“That is not what I mean. To this one, the Yilane are ustuzou.”
“The meaning is not completely clear, and I do not like the inference, but I grasp what you are attempting to say. Proceed with the questioning. If you think this ustuzou is yileibe and cannot speak well we will find you another one. Begin.”
But Kerrick could not. The captive was silent now. When Kerrick leaned close to encourage it the ustuzou spat into his face. Vainte was not pleased.
“Clean yourself,” she ordered, then signaled to a fargi. “Bring another one of the ustuzou here.”
Kerrick barely noticed what was happening. Marag. The word turned over and over in his head and stirred up memories, unpleasant memories. Cries in the jungle, something frightening in the sea. Murgu. That was more than one marag. Murgu, marag, murgu, marag…
He stiffened and realized that Vainte was calling to him angrily.
“Are you suddenly yilenin too, as unable to speak as a fargi fresh from the sea?”
“I am sorry, the thoughts, the sounds the ustuzou made, my thoughts…”
“They mean nothing to me. Speak with this other one.”
Kerrick looked down into wide, frightened blue eyes, a tangle of blond hair about its head. There was no hair on the thing’s face and its body under its wrappings was swollen and different. The frightened creature wailed as Vainte grabbed up one of the stone-tipped wooden spears that had been taken from the ustuzou and prodded the captive’s side with it.
“Look at me,” Vainte said. “That is correct. I now show you what your fate will be if you remain silent like this other one and do not make your speaking.”
The bearded captive cried out hoarsely as Vainte turned and stabbed the spear into its flesh, again and again, until it was silent. The other prisoner moaned in agony and rolled about as much as it could in its tight binding. Vainte threw the blood-drenched spear aside.
“Loosen its limbs and make it speak,” she ordered as she turned away.
It was not easy. The captive wailed, then coughed heavily until its eyes streamed with tears, mucus dribbled down its lips. Kerrick leaned close and waited until it grew quieter before he spoke the only words that he knew.
“Marag. Murgu.”
The answer came quickly, too fast for him to understand, though he recognized murgu-and something else. Sammad. Yes, sammad, the sammad had been killed. That was what the words meant. All in the sammad slain by the murgu. That was what she was saying.
She. Unbidden the word was on his lips. Female. She was linga, the other dead one, hannas. Male and female. He was hannas too.
Understanding grew, but only slowly, a word, an expression at a time. Some words he could not understand at all; the vocabulary of an eight-year-old, all that he had ever known, was not that of a grown woman.
“You make noises at each other. Is there understanding?”
Kerrick blinked at Vainte, leapt to his feet, and stood gaping for a long moment before the meaning of her question penetrated the flood of Marbak words that filled his head.
“Yes, of course, Eistaa, there is understanding. It moves slowly — but it moves.”
“Then you are doing well.” The shadows were long, the sun below the horizon, and Vainte had a cloak wrapped about her. “Tie it again so it cannot escape. In the morning you will continue. When you have perfected your understanding there are questions you will put to the ustuzou. Questions that will need answers. If the creature refuses — just remind it of the other’s fate. I am sure that that argument will be a strong one.”
Kerrick went for a cloak for himself, then returned to sit on the sand beside the dark form of the woman. His head was filled with a clash of words, sounds, and names.
The woman spoke some words — and he realized that he could understand them even though her movements were unseen!
“I grow cold.”
“You can speak in the dark — and I can understand.”
“Cold.”
Of course. Marbak was not like Yilane. It did not depend upon what the body was doing. It was the sounds, just the sounds. He marveled at this discovery while he unrolled some of the blood-soaked skins from the dead man, then spread them over the woman.
“We can speak — even in the night,” he said, wiping his sticky hands on the sand. When she answered her voice was low, still fearful, but curious as well.
“I am Ine of the sammad of Ohso. Who are you?”
“Kerrick.”
“You are captive too, bound to that marag. And you can speak with them?”
“Yes, of course. What were you doing here?”
“Getting food, of course, that is a strange question to ask. We should never have come this far south, but many starved to death last winter. There was nothing else we could do.” She looked at his outline against the sky and felt a great curiosity. “When did they capture you, Kerrick?”
“When?” It was a difficult question to answer. “It must have been many summers ago. I was very small…”
“They’re all dead,” she said with sudden memory, then began to sob. “These murgu killed them all, all except a few captured.”
She sobbed even louder and there was sudden pain in Kerrick’s neck. He seized his collar with both hands as he was dragged away. The noise was disturbing Inlenu* in her sleep and she rolled away from it, pulling Kerrick after her. After that he did not try to talk again.
In the morning he was slow to waken. His head felt heavy, his skin warm. He must have been in the sun too much the day before. He found the water containers and was drinking thirstily when Stallan approached him.
“The Eistaa has informed me that you talk with the other ustuzou,” she said. There was a wealth of rich loathing behind the concept of bestial communication that she used.
“I am Kerrick who sits close to the Eistaa. Your manner of talk is an insult.”
“I am Stallan who kills the ustuzou for the Eistaa. There is no insult in calling you what you are.”
The hunter was filled with the fullness of the killing today. Her manner was normally as rough as her voice, yet not this venomous. But Kerrick was not feeling well enough to argue with the brutal creature. Not today. Ignoring her movements of superiority and contempt he turned his back on her, forcing her to follow him as he went to the spot where the bound woman lay.
“Speak to it,” Stallan ordered.
The woman shivered at the sounds of Stallan’s voice, turned frightened eyes on Kerrick.
“I am thirsty.”
“I’ll get some water.”
“It writhed and made noises,” Stallan said. “Your noises were just as bad. What was the meaning?”
