The Enhancer Read online

  The women rose, murmuring, "That's the thing to do," and, "What a wonderful idea."

  As they filed out onto the meadow behind the cottage, Varis said, "Bring your flute, Meeral."

  By the time she followed them out to the meadow they had formed a circle. Meeral played the first mournful notes and the women, with long, slow steps, circled in one direction. Suddenly, as the music shifted, they moved with short, sprightly steps in the other direction. They repeated the pattern from sad to joyful, with subtle changes in rhythm and movement and Meeral could feel the melody in her own body. She thought about Shejani and how she loved to dance.

  As she played her flute she watched the swaying, lumpy bodies of the old women dancing with surprising grace. She saw their broad faces. These women who were now sharing her sorrow were the wives of the men who drank beer and taunted her in the tavern.

  When the women looked at Grandma Varis, they smiled and their eyes were filled with love. When they looked at her, their smiles were frozen on their faces, and their eyes saw her as a stranger.

  She finally played the last slow, stately notes. The circle broke and the women walked slowly away.

  Back in the cottage, Meeral looked at all the food spread out on the table that her father, Boktod, had made many years ago.

  "How nice of our friends to bring all this food," Varis said.

  At least they were sure of something to eat for the next few days, Meeral said to herself. Varis earned some money by enhancing a cooper, but she only had the energy to work a few hours a day.

  She took the one and a half onics from her pocket and gave it to Varis. "I'll have to earn more," she said.

  "Did they know about Shejani in the tavern?" Varis asked.

  "Chak told them."

  "Bad news travels fast."

  "He said Shejani left many debts."

  "He told me that, too. He tried to make me think she owed him money, but I don't believe him. I have enough for us for a little while. But you can keep working for Dubot, can't you?"

  "I guess so," Meeral said. She sat down next to her grandmother. "He said something about taking care of me."

  "Taking care . . . ?" The older woman looked surprised.

  Meeral nodded.

  "Marry you?"

  "I think so."

  "He makes a good living." Grandma Varis leaned back in her chair. "Such a handsome man!"

  "How long ago, Grandma? How long ago was he handsome?"

  Varis thought for a moment, then said, "He is pretty old. Would you be happy with him?"

  They talked of marriage and money and Meeral said, "If I earn enough money I can choose whether I want to marry."

  "That's what your mother said fifteen years ago, just before she went to Pactyl."

  "I'm not going to do what mother did!" Meeral said with a fierceness that surprised her.

  The older woman took Meeral's face in her two hands. "No. You aren't." She ran her fingers across her granddaughter's cheekbones. "You have my son's face, wide and with those deep brown eyes. And a good strong body. All you have from your mother is that lovely voice. But you could never be like your mother. It's just as well."

  "But I have to get more work."

  "Chak wants to take you to Pactyl when he comes back from trading in the mountains north of here."

  "Chak? I don't want to go with Chak." Meeral remembered how he gloated over his knowledge of Shejani's death, and that nasty stranger who sat next to him.

  "Perhaps you won't have to leave Cyrtuno," Varis said. "People will forget about Shejani and you'll find work here. But if you go with Chak, it will work out all right."

  Grandma Varis always saw the good in people, Meeral thought.

  Meeral looked at the older woman sitting contentedly in her chair and wished she could believe her. But she remembered that, even after spending her whole life in the village, she was still a stranger.

  CHAPTER 2

  "I did the work. Who's going to pay?"

  "Shejani promised me . . . "

  "I was counting on the money . . . "

  Everyone complained to Meeral. Shejani had promised to hire housemaids and cooks. Neighbors had spent days preparing the large house she planned to use. Others had been promised delivery of special goods from Pactyl -- a steel ax head for one, cotton cloth for another. Shejani's death caused as many problems for Meeral as when she was alive.

  Meeral tried to explain, but they interrupted her.

  "What are we going to do about it?"

  "She was your mother. You should pay."

  Whatever Meeral did made the villagers angry.

  "Try to understand them," Varis said one day when Meeral told her grandmother of some particularly nasty comment. "They counted on Shejani and now she's gone."

  "They don't want to hear anything I say," Meeral answered.

  "I guess it's because they miss her. She gave this village a sense of importance. For all her proud ways they loved her for coming to their little village. She fascinated them with the way she spent money on luxurious living."

  Meeral looked anxiously at Varis. "It's so bad in the tavern - - the way they keep after me about Shejani -- Dubot says he may stop having me come. We can't live on the money I earn at the dairy."

  Meeral's agony reflected in Varis' eyes. "What about the work you do at the school? The Ezant teachers say such nice things about you."

  "I love helping them teach, but they can't pay me until I'm twenty-one. It's a rule in the Ezant church."

  Finally Varis said what both were thinking. "Perhaps you should go to Pactyl."

  "Oh, Grandma Varis," Meeral wailed, "Chak is such a mean-spirited man -- the things he says about Mother, and the way he gloats over her death. Isn't there anyone else that I can go with?"

  Varis shook her head. "I've asked around -- no one is going for months -- not until after the harvest. But Chak isn't really a bad person. His wife comes from a good family. I knew her parents."

  "Was that when Dubot was such a handsome man?" Meeral asked with a wry smile.

  "I guess it was pretty long ago, but you know Jarph and her daughter Rolim."

  Meeral nodded. Chak's wife Jarph lived in Cyrtuno during the winter months while their little girl went to the Ezant school. Chak had a winter job somewhere in the Tuno Mountains. "I think he wants you to enhance the pull of the horses. You're more skilled than either Jarph or the little girl. I don't see what could go wrong for that nine-day trip."

  So it was decided that Meeral should go to Pactyl. Now that they had it settled, she ignored the taunts and accusations. Those annoying mannerisms of her mother's now became a part of Meeral. She ignored the villagers, floating past them with her head high. She felt isolated except for Grandma Varis.

  One good thing came from those weeks of criticism from the villagers. Sharp remarks no longer bothered her. She looked forward to leaving Cyrtuno -- except she wished she did not have to go with Chak.

  She packed her things into a small trunk, including wool clothes to wear in the cold night air of the Tuno Mountains and linen skirts and blouses for the heat of Pactyl. She even packed the wine-colored dress with pearl buttons down the front. Her mother had brought the material from Pactyl. How disgusted Shejani had been when she saw the finished dress!

  "I buy you the best silk that no one in Cyrtuno can afford, and you have it made into a country-style dress. Couldn't you have told the seamstress to make it in the same style as my dresses?"

  Shejani always wanted Meeral to dress in her style, never in Meeral's style. Well, Meeral would see how they liked her style in Pactyl, that is, if Chak ever came.

  Finally, one afternoon they saw him plodding up their dirt road.

  "Are you coming?" he shouted as he climbed the hill to the cottage.

  Meeral nodded.

  "Well, come on then. I want to get to Hituno before the markets open tomorrow."

  "We weren't even sure you'd be here, Chak," Varis said. "Meeral needs to collect her t
hings and you promised to buy my raspberry preserves."

  "The wagon's quite full," Chak said, frowning. "I don't know if I have room."

  Chak carried all his produce in one large wagon pulled by two horses. Every year he and Varis bickered over the amount he would pay her. Today he knew how much Varis needed the money now that Shejani would no longer provide for her.

  The old woman did not act as if their bargaining was any different than before. She said, "The raspberries are particularly good this year. If you don't want them, I'll sell them in town."

  "Well, maybe if I don't have to pay too much . . . " Chak said.

  They argued back and forth. By the time Meeral placed her flute in a corner of the trunk and put a large wool shawl over everything, Chak paid Varis six and a half onics.

  Chak looked at the trunk. "I can't carry this unless you help me."

  Meeral said, "Of course." She enhanced his lift of the trunk. He used less energy than Meeral used as she carried the preserves in the straw-lined basket Grandma Varis had prepared.

  "You'll enhance the second wagon," Chak said as they reached two wagons, each with a sturdy workhorse in front. "We have more goods this year, so I traded for another wagon. You'll ride with Glitob."

  He shoved Meeral's trunk into the back of the wagon, ambled to the first wagon and pulled himself up on the driver's seat next to Jarph. Jarph glanced at Chak as he gathered up the reins, then she gave Meeral a weak wave of recognition. He said something to his wife. Meeral guessed that he told her to start enhancing the pull of the horse because Jarph stared straight ahead, her whole body tense in concentration. Meeral had been born with enhancing skills several level higher than Jarph. To Meeral, enhancing was fascinating. She was always working on improving her technique. She could do things no other enhancer could do, such as enhancing the temperature of beer. Enhancing the pull of one horse would be much easier for her than for Jarph.

  Meeral turned and gripped the side of the wagon to pull herself up. When her eyes met those of the driver she gave a small gasp of distaste. It was the man who sat next to Chak in the tavern, the one who had looked her over so brazenly.

  Before she could sit down he snapped the reins. The horse started with a sudden jerk throwing Meeral off balance. As she fell against the man she could feel his hands on her, and could smell his unwashed body. Meeral finally regained her balance and eased herself down on the small space he had left for her on the seat.

  "Start enhancing," he commanded.

  She often heard those orders when she rode in wagons, whether it was her mother's carriage or that of a neighbor bringing in the hay. Out of habit she began to concentrate on increasing the pull of the horse on the harness attached to the wagon shafts. Suddenly she stopped. She was so crowded on the bench that her hip squeezed against the hip of the driver on one side. If she moved even a little away from him she would fall out of the wagon.

  "Enhance the horse's pull!" He was a wiry man, handsome in a dark, bearded manner.

  Meeral folded her hands on her lap and looked down at his hip pressing against hers. She glanced at the ample room on the other side of him.

  He pointed at the other wagon and waved his arm. "Hurry up! Look how far ahead they are. Chak won't like it!"

  The horse pulled the wagon slowly and painfully along the road without help from Meeral. She just looked at her hands.

  "You'll learn to do what I say!" He raised an arm. For a moment she thought he was going to strike her. Remembering the fire in the stove in her cottage nearby, she duplicated the flame to a spot right near his cheek. If she had been in real danger she would have enhanced a flame within his body. She smelled the burning hair the same moment he put his hand on his beard. He rubbed the smoldering hair vigorously.

  She heard his laugh, but there was no laughter in his face.

  "Can't you take a joke?" he said as he moved over, giving her plenty of room on the seat.

  She had no trouble catching up to the first wagon. This would be a slow trip if Jarph could not enhance the first wagon more than she was doing. Soon Glitob began chatting with Meeral. She was a good listener and, in her quiet way, encouraged him to talk. He told her that he lived far south of Pactyl near the border of the country of Drarie where women did not know how to enhance. He helped the Draries get goods from Lurdoa at a cheaper price. He said that the girls near the border between Lurdoa and Drarie were beautiful. "You remind me of them," Glitob said, leaning close to her. "I like being with you."

  She gave him the same kind of look that she had given him before she singed his beard, and he pulled away from her.

  While he talked the wagon wound around the mountains and the sun played hide and seek behind the peaks. Suddenly conscious that her fingers were stroking the curve of the small pendant that hung inside her blouse, Meeral wondered, was her mother right? Would that bit of jewelry give her the courage she needed so desperately this evening?

  Even the three-quarter moon did not give enough light for them to travel far after dark. By the time Chak finally pulled his wagon off the road Meeral could barely make out traces of old campfires. She could hear water tumbling over rocks nearby. Chak passed out bread and cheese for their supper. The women got some sweet cider and the men shared a jug of something stronger. Meeral started to talk to Jarph about helping her enhance the first wagon but Chak told everyone to go to bed. He went to the second wagon and, with Glitob's help, put up a small lean-to next to it. He said he would wake them in a few hours so they would get to Hituno before the market opened.

  "Meeral, you sleep in the front of the wagon. I put in some straw and a blanket," Chak said. "Glitob has his tent over there."

  She heard the creak of Chak's wagon and saw his head in the moonlight before he disappeared into the first wagon. Then Glitob crawled into his tent with the sound of scraping and grunting.

  Meeral stood alone in the dark. How could she sleep so close to that man? For a moment she thought of going out to the road and walking home. She stood perfectly still, her whole body tense, and even in the cool of the mountain night she was perspiring.

  "IÕm afraid," she whispered to herself. What would Varis tell her to do? Meeral knew. Varis would get along with anyone, even if she disapproved of the arrangement. What really frightened Meeral was that she needed to have seen a flame nearby to use her enhancing to protect herself. Did Glitob realize that, to singe his beard, she had drawn the flame from her cottage? He seemed ignorant of how women enhance, but suppose he knew that she was now too far away from the flame to protect herself.

  Suddenly she felt overwhelmed with anger at her mother. Why hadn't Shejani taught her skills that would have made it possible for her to stay in Cyrtuno instead of making her a misfit in the village? You got me into this, Shejani. What do you expect me to do now?

  She ran a perspiring hand over her forehead. The dust of the road had frosted her face. Not only was she standing in the dark, frightened and angry, she was dirty and she was expected to sleep within a stone's throw of this horrible man. She couldn't even wash her face.

  "Never go to bed dirty," her mother had told her. "There is never any excuse for not washing yourself before you go to bed."

  Well, Mother, she said, tonight there is.

  Then she again heard the rushing of the stream that she had noticed when they first stopped. It was very close. Moving slowly, she worked her way to the sound of the water. When she got closer she went down on her hands and knees, running her hand down the rough surface of a rock until her fingers touched the water. She rubbed her hands together in the water, scooped some up and splashed her face. The cold made her shiver. She reached around in the water until she found a large stone. Slowly she felt her way back to the tent with the stone in her hand. It was not possible for an enhancer to enhance her own muscles, as she had enhanced Chak's when he carried her trunk, but the stone made her feel more secure.

  She slept with her hand on it, waking up for a noise she could not interpret. It
brought no danger so she returned to fitful sleep. Chak had them on the road before the sun was visible. She had survived one night.

  Chak complained that they were so late getting to the market that they did not sell many goods, yet there was more room in the wagon. When he thought no one was watching, he felt the weight of his money pouch and grunted in satisfaction. He was particularly pleased to find the quills from a dead porcupine for sale. He knew of someone in Pactyl who would pay good money for quills.

  He kept Meeral busy enhancing Glitob's work of lifting produce, fetching water, and taking care of the horses. She wanted to talk with Jarph about helping her enhance the wagons but didn't want to do it in front of Chak.

  Once during the day, Meeral found Rolim standing solemnly beside her. She was short for her ten years, but chubbier and placid than when Meeral had seen her in the Ezant school playground.

  "Tell your mother I want to talk with her privately," Meeral said.

  The girl's eyes darted from one place to another, looking to see if Chak was watching. She said, "Mama wants to talk to you alone," and she ran back to her wagon.

  Trading some of his goods with another family of traders, Chak provided Meeral and the others with a fine dinner -- mutton, potatoes, carrots and baked apple for dessert. Later Meeral asked for a bucket of water which she took into the wagon and pulled the curtain closed. Using the flames of the nearby campfire, Meeral enhanced the water for a lovely, warm bath. That night she slept better, secure in knowing she could defend herself against anything by duplicating a flame from the fires that that other traders left burning all night.

  The next morning they left Hituno on a road that wound down steep hills. For the first hour, Meeral did no enhancing, letting the slope of the hill carry the wagon. But the horse began to strain, trying to adjust its step to the sway of the wagon that pushed it from the rear. She looked at Glitob, expecting him to apply the brakes but he was pointing out where porcupines had stripped the bark off trees. He talked about catching porcupines and didn't even pull up on the reins when the horse stumbled.

  Meeral visualized the wheels of the wagon turning on the axle and slowly began enhancing the friction until the wagon ran smoothly behind the horse. Ahead of her the first wagon was swaying dangerously. She released the friction on the wheels of her wagon for just a second then applied it to both wagons. When the road flattened out, she enhanced the pull on both wagons. Jarph could not enhance when Meeral took over. I hope Jarph doesn't mind that I enhanced her wagon without asking her, she thought to herself. Jarph shouldn't object having a chance to relax.