Beneath Ceaseless Skies #230 Read online

  Having undone the break, the Raker laughed, unsteady. “And now we are even.” He waited then for my answer; but I did not have words yet.

  He staggered up at last, one hand against the rock, and helped me up. I leaned against him, too exhausted to move or speak. We stumbled through the opening and into a small cavern. In the dim light trickling from outside, we saw thin clusters of honey crystal hanging from the ceiling, dripping slowly onto their bottom formations. I exhaled, and that was enough for the structures I’d laid here to become activated. Candlebulb lights filled the cavern, and with it the shimmer and iridescence of unbroken honey crystal clusters, illuminating for us a path deeper into the rock.

  I showed him the way, wordlessly, and he led me to where an ancient arch was carved with thorn and tumbleweed and the scorpions and sandbirds of my house. The next room was where we would stay. It was no cave but a small chamber, adorned with ancient mosaics of lapis and turquoise and painted in deep vermillion. An ancient Niyazi carpet was spread on the floor, exquisite in its faded madder and stylized Birds, those ancient harptails in their blue plumage.

  The Raker helped me lie down on the carpet. My head was in his lap, his hands framing me with a feeling I had long forgotten, a feeling that maybe had never existed.

  “I trust you,” he said. He meant this place, this room. My age and my fragility and all the secrets I held. I could not speak, and so I closed my eyes and I gave him my trust, and I slept.

  The First Ones came before that first Birdcoming. I see them moving in the mist, people grand and plain and maybe not people at all, dreamway and siltway and my people the nameway, dancing their dances each to each as they create the foundation of the land, this shining grid. Later their descendants, the Guardians, would watch the first Birdcoming and catch the twelve great stars; they would carry them to their homes and embed them in the grid, anchoring the land in this power. And between the anchors of the twelve stars and the lines of light which is the grid, the ancient guardians had planted their deepnames, so we could live, so we could thrive. Except, the First Ones now sang, except that of the twelve triumphant stars, some had gone out.

  I opened my eyes. I lay still in the stronghold of his arms, the carpet rough under my naked calves. My ancient magics here had woken with my presence. We were surrounded by constructs, invisible beings that laid down low tables covered in embroideries and laden with vessels of sweetmeats and fruit, moist balls of sesame seed, and carafes of honey water and sherbet. I did not think he had touched them.

  “Good waking to you,” he said. I stirred, pain returning into every bone and muscle of my body, the pain of my flight and before it, his fire, and now of lying so still. I groaned.

  “Do you want me to try healing...?”

  I waved a hand and summoned my deepnames to ease some of the pain. This would need more than his newly acquired knowledge. It would need more than magic—days and nights and months of rest without youths or secrets or assassins. I groaned again. “No. But thank you.”

  I felt the reverberation of his shrug travel down his torso, and at the same time a growl of his stomach. I propped myself up to sit, so we could share the bounty my invisible servants had laid out for us. We sat side by side, not touching, to share a feast of flatbreads and figs, of honey and pungent goat cheeses. I was ravenous after so much effort and magic, and he seemed even more so, but at last the worst of the hunger subsided. My thoughts acquired again a semblance of clarity.

  I spoke. “I apologize for injuring you.”

  He waved it off. “I am well. Eating helped.” He popped a ball of spiced millet into his mouth and washed that down with honeyed water. “I learned much from you and in such a short time.”

  I smiled. “After I stopped trying to teach you.”

  “You taught me about the First Ones. About the grid.”

  Yes, I wanted to say. But now I am worried by my vision, and I want—

  He continued, “It is a vision of Strong Building. Just as builders lay down a naming grid of a house, the First Ones laid down the land’s very foundation, upon which the whole land could be built.”

  Yes. And should that foundation be damaged...

  I sighed. “I wanted to share that vision with you as I have not shared it, since the dawn of time.”

  “Thank you,” he said. Mulling. Choosing what he would say next. I saw the effort of it move in his face, as if he had figured out a secret. We sat so close, and yet not touching, not quite facing each other either. So many secrets hanging unspoken between us. What would he ask about? The First Ones? The grid? Ranra?

  Oh, I wanted him to ask. I wanted him to question me, and equally I wanted him to let it go. Whichever of my secrets it was that he had guessed, I wanted him to pass it by, pretend that he had learned nothing.

  He turned his head towards me. Held my gaze, and I swallowed. I knew what he would ask then, if he asked, and he drew it out, every exquisite moment of that pain. When he spoke, his words dropped knifelike into my silence. “You never shared this vision. Not even with him?”

  “No.” I hid it, for like the desert wind I hide things, to reveal at a whim, or never. I’d never trusted him enough. He had no need of my sharing, because he had seen it, and more.

  He waited for the turmoil in my eyes to subside. Then he pierced me again. “Ladder.”

  I wrapped my arms against my knees and drew them to my chest. Suddenly it was cold, and too much to be naked. Too much to face that gaze. I had not wanted him to guess that name, to have seen so deeply, to know that much about me.

  The Raker said, “The assassin he sent was too easy of a slaying. He does not want your death.”

  I rested my head on my knees, not looking at him. I drew on my power. I needed a gentleness my all-too-powerful configuration did not possess, and so I drew on my star, on the far-off slim outer tendrils of it, and covered myself in a shimmering garment of its magic.

  “Forgive me,” he said. “I will say no more.”

  I turned my head away from him. Spoke. “He often sends those who failed his tests, unfit to serve at his command. Still, three times in those years and lifetimes of mine, three times those assassins had succeeded.” And yet twice more I had been slain by his assassins sent by other rulers, but I did not mention that.

  “He wishes to consume you, then.”

  “Perhaps. I have no wish to be consumed. Or subsumed. Which is why I divest and give my memories to my star.”

  He nodded, mulling on this. “Perhaps he wants your fear. But you do not like that. You do not like to be frightened.”

  “No.” I sighed. “Whatever the outcome of his actions may be, he enjoys it.”

  The Raker picked up a carafe of sherbet and poured, a long, languid motion. It would be hard for me to imagine him serving anyone, but he offered the cup to me now, his gaze down. I received it as it has been offered, with an acknowledging nod he might or might not have recognized from the movement of air. I emptied the cup, my fingers gripping the etching in its brass—a bird. There is always a bird.

  The Raker said, his gaze still down. “Perhaps he misses you.”

  Of all the Bird-forsaken things to say—

  I slammed the empty cup against my thigh, alarmed at my vehemence, too hurt to care. “Misses me? My no should have been enough. Once. Over the centuries my no, spoken over and over in every inflection and every living language of the desert, my no should have been enough!”

  “Forgive me.” He extricated the cup from my hands, gently, and put it away. “Should I stop asking?”

  I clenched my fists on my knees, the orange robe of power buzzing around me. “No need.” I should have told him to stop. The pain was no longer exquisite. It was ugly, that pain. And yet some part of me craved it, craved to unburden the weight of my secrets on the Raker, to push at him with that bitterness. “Ask on.”

  He tucked his hands under his arms, as if to prevent himself from moving, from doing anything. He bit his lower lip. But in the end,
he could not restrain himself. The question fell from his lips. “Is this why you do not submit?”

  I propelled myself to my feet with my power in a way that I couldn’t manage with my exhausted body. Towering over him. I submitted to you. Just hours ago. But of course, I had not. I did what he wanted because it pleased me, pleased us both, but I had not submitted. Perhaps he wanted my submission, wanted from me something greater than I would give, even though I had given him more than I had to any other lover in millenia. And that had scalded. Worse than I wanted. Worse than I would admit.

  My words, when they fell, were no less scalding than his. “And is your hurt why you do not submit?”

  He jumped up, too. We were facing each other now, fists clenched, our powers rearing, the impossibility of what we’ve both drawn upon pushing out the air. I am the most powerful named strong of my land, and he my equal, and this—this was too much for the land to hold for long. It would be much easier to unleash violence now than to safely release it. Nevertheless, over the centuries my people had attributed wisdom to me, and it wouldn’t do to renege on that now.

  I willed my fists to uncurl. “No.” I exhaled. “It is not the reason.”

  After a silence, he unclenched his fists as well. The stronghold of his deepnames lost some of its sharpness. “No,” he echoed. “Not for me, either.”

  I said, “I simply do not like it.”

  He barked a laugh. “Me neither.”

  “I have allowed you...”

  “Yes.” He folded his stronghold. Stood there, facing me, his bare chest heaving with the exertion of his unspent power. He wore his sleeping pants still. Of course. He misinterpreted my frown now, for he said, “But you did not like it.”

  Suddenly I raised my hand, as if to warn him. “Bide.” When I had drawn on my power to strike him, I had sensed something, and now I sensed it again. We were not alone.

  “Bide,” I repeated, inhaling. Something familiar, but not wet spidersilk—a whiff of plums. I grunted my annoyance, then called, “Urwaru!”

  She stepped in from the shadows, her long saffron gown trailing behind her. She averted her eyes from the Raker’s half-naked form and from my shining garment of magic.

  “My teacher,” she said.

  “Why are you here?” I asked with a frown.

  She bowed. Mumbled, “Marvushi...”

  “Yes?”

  “He guarded your chambers in the palace, and I thought you should not be unguarded outside of it, now that Nihitu...” She bowed again. “Forgive me. It took me a while to follow you here.”

  I was surprised, but perhaps I shouldn’t have been, for it wasn’t the first time my prized students competed against each other. And Urwaru was excellent, as powerful as Marvushi and subtle, and serious in her arts where Marvushi would all too often adopt a jocular manner.

  Still, I felt impatience at her intrusion and annoyance of her error in reference to Marvushi’s grammatical forms. I would want to discuss this with her, later. For now I simply said, “Fine. You can stand guard outside, in the cave of the honey crystal.”

  The Raker waited until the door closed behind her, then turned again to me. Not speaking. Same stance. As if the interruption had not happened.

  I said, “You thought I did not like it.”

  He shrugged.

  Oh, youth. Could he be insecure under his armor, or was it something subtler yet? “It is the second time you make this statement.”

  He turned his face away. Then back. His gaze locked on mine. “You matter to me. This matters. I have never allowed myself—”

  He dug his fingers into his arm so hard I thought he would scream, but as before, he kept quiet. Very quiet. I heard his unspoken thoughts ring through the air like diamond bells. You matter now, and so you can hurt me. I will not allow myself to be hurt.

  “It is as if you have already refused me.” His gaze, still locked on mine, both challenged and repelled, as if he did not believe for a moment that anything else could be possible.

  I stood there, choosing with every breath what I would now allow to pass. What I most wanted to do. Even though I had slept, I was still fatigued, and I half-suspected that the Raker had simply assumed I possessed the stamina of youth, for all he had tried to be careful—but the rush of our powers had revived me. I felt fully myself now, my spirit stretching my skin, my blood aflame with the exhilaration of that danger. He did not know yet how to be safe. He would choose to be, for me, if he knew how. That I believed.

  The power that clothed me dimmed to a gentle buzz, just enough to sustain me. I thought I would fold it away, but my star still clung, as if wanting to witness. I let that go till later.

  I smiled at the Raker. “To your question—I loved every moment of it. I allowed you because it pleased me.”

  In two steps he almost closed the distance between us. He was shorter, and his upturned face now shone in unrestrained, gleeful need. He had not touched me, but his heat scorched me.

  “Yes?” he hissed, encompassing me, encompassing everything.

  I locked my hands behind my back and bowed, so we were level. My smile, if anything, grew wilder.

  “Now,” I said, “Now we will begin to negotiate.”

  * * *

  The oldest geometry

  After a while we relocated deeper into the rock-carved rooms, where I revealed to him my treasures—emerald and pearl and endless changes of clothing in embroidery and brocade. And I gifted him cloth, the plain golden weave of the silkworm that lives in the sun, for palace tailors to make whatever he wished to replace his hopeless sleeping pants. I asked him to lounge with me on a low, carved settee, while my invisible servants brought us fresh carafes and cups.

  He did not sit yet. Instead he went down on one knee to pour a cup for me, again with such beautiful precision that I had to wonder. It was a skill of an assassin, for Ladder’s students learn these arts in preparation for deeper mysteries that require even greater attention and precision. And these skills help them too to masquerade as retainers or servants, should the need arise—but certainly the Raker had assumed no such role.

  “Where did you learn this skill?”

  The Raker looked up at me, a small smile turning on his lips. “I learned it from a man called Ludin, a retainer in my parents’ home, after—”

  He looked away, unwilling to elaborate on that after. “I was so alone. So angry.”

  “How long ago was that?” I asked, careful. “If I can ask.”

  “I was barely fourteen. Thirteen. I do not remember.”

  He breathed with a steady and conscious effort now, exhaling his hurt. I leaned over to pour a cup for him, much more clumsily than he had, but no less sincere.

  He turned the cup between the fingers, candlebulbs floating closer to illuminate the deep amber color of the drink it held. He took a sip then, rolled it around on his tongue to savor the deep, tangy sweetness. “Ludin—he gave me service, just endlessly, endlessly. In the smallest of things. He poured my cups and he held doors for me and he opened my books where I needed, and lit the candlebulbs, even though they were much weaker than mine. And all of this he did without asking, because he enjoyed it. I yelled at him a lot.” He spoke as if these memories brought him solace. “Nobody else talked to me.”

  “He sounds like a good person,” I offered.

  “I found out later that he was a Second School assassin. Trained and then hired by my father to accompany him in Katra. I have not seen him in years.”

  “I am sorry.”

  “I always wanted to visit Ladder’s court one day. Perhaps after I left here.”

  “No!” I said, the pain of it sudden and stark. Then, “Forgive me. I will not tell you what to do.”

  “It was before I learned how he hurt you.” He reached over and placed the palm of his hand on my chest. “And yet I am tempted. I want to know more about Bird. And how he enjoyed her pain. And how he still hurts from losing you, all those long centuries later.”

 
; “I do not care how he hurts.” I swallowed, bitter, but I did not move his hand away.

  “No. He should never pursue you in this fashion, never seek to harm you—and yet he does, and that, too, interests me.” He saw my face, and the corners of his mouth tilted down. “Forgive me.”

  “You say that, and yet you keep talking of it.” I drew in a ragged breath, and he took his hand away from me without being asked, then clasped his hands behind his back, like I often do. It was not a gesture I’d seen from him before, and almost immediately he unclasped his hands and put them on his knees. “I do not like this.”

  “What? You do not like to restrain yourself?”

  He laughed. Then, “I will stop talking about this now. Except to say—I will never do this to you. I will hold your no, no matter how much I suffer.”

  It was my turn to laugh. Oh, youth. It has been but a short while since the last, and yet you suffer? “It is not a ‘no’.”

  He became serious again, the hands on his knees deceptively still. “I want to open your skin.”

  I closed my eyes, just breathing. That I had experienced, a very long time ago. The last time truly together. It was then when I began to say no. Perhaps I needed to say it again now, to the Raker. I thought of how I had already divested, and how if he was an assassin after all, then those memories between the divestment and now would go straight to Ladder, for him to feast on against my will. But perhaps, in this moment, I could choose from something other than fear. I could choose not to be safe.

  He waited for me, breathing with me, doing nothing, until I was ready to speak. “Not with knives.”

  He laughed, as if in wonder. “Not with knives! I haven’t said anything about knives. No. With power.”

  I contemplated this in turn. How it could go. Where it could lead us. Where it could lead me, in the trust I had already given. Finally I made my decision, and let my body relax into a kind of warmth. “Yes.”