Beneath an Opal Moon, page 17
part #4 of Sunset Warrior Cycle Series
“Did Cascaras say anything to you when you last saw him? Anything at all?”
“Why are you so interested in him?”
“He was murdered, Martyne. In Sha’angh’sei.”
“Sha’angh’sei?” Her eyes opened wide. “Why would he go so far south?”
“He was being pursued by this man Hellsturm. He was tortured. We believe by Hellsturm.”
“If Hellsturm is Tudescan there is a sure way of finding out. “
“There is? What?”
Martyne turned away from Chiisai and her hands reached out, stroking the faceted ruby again, a touchstone, a talisman against bad memories. “The Tudescans are a remarkably savage people in many ways, despite the veneer of civilizadon they have cloaked themselves in.” She paused, took a deep breath, let it out as a shudder. “The day my parents died, it was my birthday. I saw them coming down the block because I was sithog in the open window, waiting for them. They were bringing home my presents. They were struck down as they were crossing the street. Two men had obviously been waiting for them. It took such little dme, so little effort, and they were sliced open, Iying there in their own blood, already dead. One moment there; the next, not. I don’t really remember much of what happened after that. I must’ve hid because they were certain to search the house. Then I was out on the streets. How much time had passed I have no idea. I only knew that they would be looking for me and that I had to get to the border.
“I tried not to sleep but, of course, that was impossible after a while. I was in the back of an alley one night when a combination of sounds and movement woke me. I should have run then but something held me, a kind of odd paralysis. Lucky it was, too, because I would have run right into the three warriors; it was a cul-de-sac, you see.” She paused, her slender fingers exploring the ruby’s contours as if reading the past, divining the future. “They were dragging a woman in from the streets. Perhaps she was a prostitute, perhaps not; there’s no way of knowing. They raped her there in front of me, a kind of bloodless ritual without even the semblance of passion. And then, when they were finished with that, they sliced open her chest. There was something more they wanted from her; information, I imagine. They got it in the end.”
Chiisai felt a cold constriction fluttering around her own heart. “What did they do to her?”
Martyne’s eyes were bright with the memory. “You really wish to know all of it?”
Chiisai nodded her assent.
“In Rhein Tudesca torture is a high art. In a society of secrets, you see, it is believed imperative that those in power possess the means to obtain those secrets. You understand?”
Chiisai thought of what Moichi had told her about how Sha’angh’sei society operated, so full of secrecy yet open, too. “No,” she admitted, “I’m afraid I don’t.”
Martyne shrugged. ”Well, no matter. I suppose you’d actually have to go to Rhein Tudesca to understand fully. The Tudescans have perfected a way to expose the living heart and massage it artificially so that the victim’s life-processes are slowed or speeded up from there. They can cause great pain in this fashion without the coming of death. No one can withstand this form of torture, but it is only one of a great many.”
“This was Cascaras’ fate, I’m afraid.”
“Then I shall pray for the peace of his soul.”
Chiisai touched the other. “Please, Martyne. It is important that you try to remember if he said anything to you before he left. “
Martyne sat back, passed a hand across her forehead. “Let me see. It was quite a while ago, the beginning of summer. He was off now where did he say? I can’t really remember. Well, the northwest, anyway “
Yes, Chiisai thought. Kintai is to the northwest of Corruna.
“He was quite excited, I recall. ‘When I return, Martyne,’ he said, ‘I will be so wealthy, so powerful that you will give me your hand in marriage.’ But I paid him little mind. He always had a scheme or two which, he was certain, would make him as wealthy as an emperor. This I told him, for wealthy or no, powerful or no, it made no difference to me. I did not love him, therefore I would not marry him. Of course, this had little effect on him, for, as a man who believed that money could buy anything, he felt I was just leading him on. However, what he said to me was this: ‘You do not understand, Martyne. This time I have truly found it, the key. With it I will have mastery of the whole world. But this, too, you will comprehend when I return from the Land of the Opal Moon.”
For a moment Chiisai stood perfectly still. She felt as if she had lost all breath and the rhythmic thudding of her heart was lilce a series of concussions against her rib cage. “Mar ” She cleared her throat. “Martyne, did I hear you aright? Did Cascaras say he was journeying to the Land of the Opal Moon?”
“Yes. I did not recall it before. Why? Surely, it’s merely a figure of speech?”
“Merely a figure ” Chiisai stared at her. “You do not know?”
“Know what? Cascaras often talked in such flowery language. It was a kind of verbal code he made up for himself to protect his destinations from those who might overhear.”
“Not this time.” She put down her empty cup and rose. “You have been of enormous help. More than you realize. At last I know the cause of all of this.”
Martyne was staring at Chiisai curiously, for this last she had said to herself.
“I’m glad I could help but “
“Never mind. Perhaps I’ll be able to explain it to you one day. Goodbye, Martyne.” And on light feet she left the mercado.
Behind her, a shadow detached itself from a darkened corner and slipped out after her into the night.
The room was painted a very dark blue, deeper even than the evening sky. The hue was enhanced by the domed ceiling crisscrossed by narrow arching gilt beams. Around the walls, too, the blue plaster panels were surrounded by gilt edging. Paintings of ships were hung at intervals.
The room was dominated by an enormous down bed, very high, with a brass headboard and a coverlet of exquisite manufacture, of various shades of green. Great leaded-glass windows opened out onto a lush garden in back.
In all, it was an unusual chamber bespeaking iconoclastic tastes. Yet by far the most remarkable feature was the painting. It hung as huge as a harvest moon directly over the bed in a heavy ornate gilt frame. It was so arresting, so chilling that one was compelled to wonder how she could sleep at night beneath its visage.
- It depicted a Daluzan farmer, muscles bulging, skin sweatslick, in an open field painted in-such perspective that it appeered to go on forever, flat and changeless. One great arm was around his wife’s waist; she cowered into the protection of his massive chest and shoulder as she desperately held on to a small child. In his other hand, the farmer held a great wooden-handled scythe which he had obviously been using to harvest his field. Now, however, it was raised into the darkening night sky, for swooping down upon him and his terrified family was an enormous creature, half man, half bat. The wide wings seemed to beat at the heavy air. Long curving talons extended from animal hands and human feet, darting at the farmer’s throat.
Just as the Senhora Seguillas y Oriwara’s extended fingers were slashing at Moichi’s neck. Yet, oddly, he was able to take all the room in as they struggled across the floor.
Moichi knew the basic blocks, but this could only be termed a holding action for he had no offensive training in koppo. Too, if she was an adept, it would not take her long to circumvent his knowledge of the basics.
His flesh stung and his bones began to ache. He blocked another vicious strike aimed at his collarbone. Were it to land, he would be immediately disabled.
He rolled her over, using the force of her own momentum to bring them both around fully, and, as he rode on top for just an instant, used his superior weight to drive his elbow and forearm into her stomach. Still she came on with a nose strike that would surely render him unconscious if it struck. In utter desperation, he jammed his elbow home again, crouched and used the full bulk of his shoulder, driving downward, thinking of her as a male opponent.
“Oh!” The breath whooshed out of her and she began to double up. She tried to gasp but he held her down and no air was coming in. She gagged, about to choke on her own vomit, and he let her up, pinioning her arms behind her in a grip like iron. She rocked against his shoulder, gaining her wind. Astonishingly rapidly, he felt the strength returning to her arms. He tightened his grip on her wrists.
“Now, senhora,” he said. “Like it or no, you will listen to what I have to tell you.”
He stared coldly down at her. Her eyes flew open, the pain fast diminishing, and, as he watched the tiny brown flecks in the jade, he began to realise how extraordinarily beautiful she was.
With an effort, he began to speak. “Cascaras is dead, senhora. Tortured and then butchered in a Sha’angh’sei taverns.” “What is that to me?” she said savagely. “I know no one by that name. ” She twisted violently, attempting to free herself from his savage grip.
“Perhaps not,” he said calmly. “But I think you do know of him. For he was a friend of your daughter’s. When I met her, senhora, Auteya was in Sha’angh’sei, about to be sold at auction in the Sharida.”
A swift intake of breath and, for the first time, he saw true emotion swimming within the jade seas of her eyes. Fear.
“Yes, the Sharida, senhora, where a hideous death awaits all who are sold. This would certainly have been her fate had not I and a friend intervened. Later, she told me she was being pursued by a man, the same man who, I believe, murdered Cascaras. It was but ill fortune which took them both to the same city, for they had planned it otherwise.” He watched her face closely and it seemed to him that it was constantly changing now, but perhaps it was only the dim light combining with his own fancy. “Auleya was terrified of this man, senhora, and I made the mistake of leaving her for a time. He came and took her, the man, and in the process slew my friend. And I tell you now, senhora, I mean to find Auteya and bring her back just as I mean to destroy this man, Hellsturm.”
Her arms pinioned behind her caused her firm breasts to thrust out at him as if awaiting his caress. In their battle, the tied top of her blouse had come undone and now he could see all of the tops down almost to the nipples. These were most apparent as they pushed against the thin material. He tore his gaze away and said, “Now I want you to answer my questions. “
She stared up at his face and under her acute gaze he felt himself suffused with a peculiar feeling.
“Let go of me,” she whispered. “Please.” Her eyes closed for an instant, then opened. She was very close to him. He shifted his grip on her wrists to aid circulation and this brought her torso forward so that the hardened tips of her breasts grazed his chest.
“Release me,” she murmured against the hollow of his neck. “Release me and I’ll tell you all you wish to know.” She moaned as if in pain. “All I know.” Then, as if she were reading his mind, “I will not use the koppo.”
Slowly, his hands came away from her wrists. But he did not take his eyes from hers for it was there that he would know if she meant to betray him.
She flexed her fingers, bringing them upward. She stared into his eyes. Her fingers came against him. This time softly, with no malice.
“What do you wish to know?” Voice like the sigh of the wind at night.
Her arms reaching, her fingers climbing his chest, past his shoulders until they went behind his head, twined in his hair. She pulled his head down to hers.
“I shall tell you,” she whispered, “everything.”
But her lips opened under his, her tongue licking at his teeth. Her torso pressed against him and then she moved in some subtle way he was unable to fathom and her legs were apart, scissoring about his hips. He felt the frantic pressure of her as his arms surrounded her, pressing at the base of her spine.
A rustling; and then a soft moaning, echoing on and on and on.
There was time now before she met Moichi at the top of Calle C6rdel and, striding along Corruna’s night-dark streets, she began to look for an open taverna, hoping that it was not too late. She needed some time alone, to think.
She had taken the first corner on her side of the street as soon as she had left the mercado, even though her mind had been filled by what Martyne had unknowingly told her.
It was a matter of routine. Bujun training. It was, in fact, part instinct, which was perhaps one of the reasons why it was so monstrously effective.
Turning the corner was the first basic, used whenever one was in a foreign city, and she had automatically begun to listen to the sound of her own footsteps, then sorting, one by one, through the other sounds of the night around her: trees rustling in the wind, the cicadas’ whine, and explosion of distant laughter, echoing, a door slamming and, further away, a dog barking angrily. Then she picked up the footfalls.
And she had known she was being followed almost as soon as she had made the turn.
She did not vary her pace but continued to walk down the street as if nothing was amiss. She required two things now from her surroundings. Another corner and a deep doorway, although a dark alley would do, too, in a pinch.
Corner came up and she went around it to the left, her eyes alert for the deep shadows. Time became critical now because there was little of it. She had to have disappeared before
Found it. Slipped in on the left.
Waited, listening intently.
She remained quite still as she heard the sound of the footfalls approaching. She tensed her muscles, ready to She frowned. Something wrong in the sound.
“Chiisai?”
Gods! she thought. It’s Martyne.
“Chiisai! “
She began to sweat because she knew what was wrong now. The sounds of the footfalls had changed. There were two to look out for and she was remembering what had been done to Kossori.
Could see a figure now. Martyne. A silhouette turning chiaroscuro as she passed a lantern. Then a return to darkness. And it had to be now, before she passed once more into light. It was a chance and Chiisai briefly debated whether to let her pass by. But this, too, was dangerous, especially if Martyne was on the other side.
Darted out, one hand reaching for Martyne’s arm, the other cupped over her opening mouth. Back into the doorway.
“What are you doing here?” she whispered fiercely.
“Chit ” The hand came over her mouth again.
“Whisper!”
“I came to warn you,” Martyne said softly, breathlessly. “Someone is following you.”
“I know.”
“Oh.” And then, “Oh, I’m sorry. Now I’ve ruined it.”
Chiisai gazed out along the street. “Perhaps not.” She strained to hear the footfalls. The heavier ones. And now she heard them, knew it was too late to get the other woman safely away from here. Well, she would just have to push her back into the shadows and hope no one saw her.
“Don’t worry,” Martyne whispered. “I’m armed.” She reached silently down to her waist, withdrew something.
Chiisai stared at it. It was fully half a meter in length, longer than any knife she had ever seen before. Its blade was of an unusual construction, triangular. Chiisai had seen one like it in a village in the countryside of Ama-no-mori. It was a hunter’s knife, it was explained to her, the blade giving it exceptional force when it pierced the animal’s flesh: One must reach a vital organ quickly and without destroying the flesh, for one hunts only for food. This knife of Martyne’s, she knew, was a potent weapon, perfect for close combat.
“It’s a miss’ra,” Martyne whispered. “A Tudescan military weapon.”
Chiisai saw by the way she held the miss’ra that she knew how to use it. And abruptly she was happy to have this strange woman at her side for she could pick out at least five distinct sets of footsteps. Closing now.
She drew her daikatana, the Bujun longsword. It was named, as was the custom with all weapons, at the moment it had first tasted blood. Chiisai’s was known as Kishsu-shi, the Deathrider.
She could see the glint of metal now as they passed through the penumbra of the lantern and then returned to darkness. She turned to Martyne, whispered, “If we should get separated somehow, meet me at the top of Calle Cordel at midnight. No one must follow you there. Do you understand?”
Martyne nodded. “You can count on me.”
Chiisai fervently hoped so.
With a chill battle cry, Chiisai leapt into the street, the daikatana held high above her in a two-handed grip, already beginning its lethal downward sweep as soon as she had planted her feet firmly on the cobbles.
They were massive, their shadows, looming, larger by far even than Moichi. But she was a Bujun, a warrior from birth.
Kishsu-shi split the night air, humming, then slammed into the collarbone of one of the men on the left, opening him up to his navel. The corpse danced drunkenly, spewing blood and organs into the street. The man had not even had time to cry out.
Their swords were straight, perhaps heavier than her own, double-bladed. But they had not been forged by the Bujun, the supreme masters in such things. Her blade wove a deadly web of silver in the air as pink and gold sparks flew at the points where the weapons intersected, clashing deafeningly one against the other.
Her opponents, she saw now, were sturdy Tudescans, immensely powerful and disciplined. These two before her worked in perfect unison, timing their blows and movements as if both sword arms belonged to one body.
Chiisai was aware, after only a few moments, that Martyne had neither been Iying nor exaggerating about the savagery of the Tudescans. These were animals in the guise of men, murderous fanatics, appallingly dangerous.
She began to feel fatigue for it was as if she battled an ungiving brick wall. Yes, she supposed she was quicker in her reflexes, but these warriors had only to move their huge weapons fractionally in order to block her thrusts. This, of course, was what they were counting on. Once she slowed down, even slightly, they would move in for the kill.
There was a strategy open to her. She could feign more fatigue than she actually felt, thus forcing them to commit themselves prematurely. But this, she felt certain, would fool but one of them. Still
