The First Binding, page 56
“Him?”
Eloine kissed me once on the cheek. “A lady has other commitments.”
I grunted, wondering who in the world she was to meet. “But how?”
She raised a brow.
“From everything last night to…” I gestured at the cart.
“Wit, wiles, a woman’s ways and her charms.”
That gave me just as much by way of an answer as I had before. So, I found myself left with nothing.
“And I won’t see you next until…?”
Eloine stepped away from me, stopping before reaching the carriage doors. “Until the next time we meet, of course.”
Of course.
I feigned a heavy sigh and shrugged. “Well, I suppose I’ll have to find someone else to share my story with in the meantime.”
The driver came to her side and opened the doors for her, offering a hand to assist. Eloine froze at my words.
“You can’t leave a story unfinished once it’s started. It’s not only a shame, but a crime.” I turned away and looked to the moon. “Mayhaps she’ll want to hear the next piece of it. Someone will want for it I hope? I’ve only been keeping it buried for so long, and now, here I am sharing it all only to find you’ve not the ears for the rest of it.” I placed a hand over my heart and squeezed.
Her lips twitched, but she took control of them, pressing them tight. But the smile reached her eyes instead. “Well, we can’t have that. I suppose I’ll have to find a way to make sure I won’t be too long without your company.”
I bowed. “Seems the likely thing if you’d like to hear the rest of the tale.”
“I do.” Eloine took the driver’s hand and stepped up into the carriage. “Wait for me?”
“Yes.”
The doors closed and the driver walked around the carriage, getting back into position all without passing me the slightest glance. I may as well have not been there.
He spurred the horses to action and kept his head so fixed ahead I knew it to be the look of someone loudly ignoring a person.
I squinted as he passed by and resisted the terrible temptation to unleash a binding on him.
Soon as the thought faded, the carriage and Eloine disappeared into the night.
I looked overhead to the moon to find clouds had taken her as well, leaving me full and truly alone on the streets of Karchetta.
FIFTY
WHAT WE MEAN
The inside of the carriage is upholstered in a red so vibrant it makes the storyteller’s cloak look a dull wash of blood in comparison. The cushions offer her a better respite than anything she’s slept on in long memory. Eloine adjusts herself and turns a shade to regard the small panel near her head.
She pulls on the brass knob, sliding the wooden slat aside. A thin grate is revealed, and through it she makes out the back of the driver’s head. “Driver?”
“Yes, Lady Etiana?”
“How is the road to Del Soliel?” It is as easy a topic to get someone to talk about. The roads of the world are always questionable to someone, and there is ever a complaint to voice. It makes the passing journey more bearable than muffled silence within the carriage.
“Ah, they are well enough, lady. No frets, no worries. Not even with the camarani so close by. Why, I can see their campfires and caravan from here. An ill-blotted sight on our pristine hills, but you shouldn’t be able to see them from your windows, lady. Peace.”
Eloine stiffens before turning fully to regard the man. “Where?”
“I’m sorry?”
“Where? The singing folk. Where are their wagons? You can see them now?” Her tone leaves no room for further questions. It is hard as the stones of ocean cliffs and just as sharp.
“Y-yes. Why, they’re not more than a hundred paces from the side of the road. Not so close they violate the laws of the land by bringing themselves into the country proper. Them with uncultured music and songs … and their dancing, lady, so vulgar—”
“Quiet.” Her voice doesn’t raise by a single note. It has all the subtle weight of the world before a storm.
To the man’s credit, he adopts respectful silence on command.
Eloine takes a series of breaths to better still herself before deciding what she needs to do. “Stop the carriage.”
“I’m sorry?”
Eloine closes her eyes and steals a piece of patience from a better part of herself, though her tongue wishes to remind the driver of his recently enacted silence. “Stop the carriage, Driver. Immediately.”
“But … my orders to take you to—”
“Which you will still fulfill … after I see to something. Are the roads dangerous?”
“N-no.”
“Are we in danger?”
“Of course not, Lady Etiana. No one would even look on this carriage the wrong way for fear of losing—”
“Then whatever is the matter? Am I a letter to be delivered, or is my presence a request? One, I wonder if I can refuse? I do believe I can. I wonder who then will be—”
The carriage slows before she can even finish what she is saying.
“Am I permitted to ask the lady what is wrong?”
“You are. I am going for a walk. To the wandering folk, in fact—their encampment. I wish to see them—alone.”
“I don’t think—”
“Then I think it’s better we continue that habit, please. And if you do, I’ll be sure to tell your master what a wonderful driver you have been, and that I’ve felt nothing but pleasure being in your company.”
The man opens his mouth, then closes it. She can see thoughts running through his mind, and they are cut short as he comes to the most appropriate answer. “Ah, yes. May you enjoy their … everything, Lady Etiana.”
“I’m sure I will.” Eloine wastes not another moment in the carriage, stepping out from it and crossing the dirt road onto the grass.
The driver spoke truly. Campfires dot the near distance, bringing to light waxed canvas canopies large enough to shelter a hundred men and women. A ring of wagons, used to carry all the materials to build the structures, surrounds the encampment like a wooden fence. She can make out no people from where she stands.
Eloine draws closer, taking her time to enjoy her freedom from the city, from the driver, and to be in an open field without the eyes of strangers on her. The stars her destination, almost, as she looks up to them and follows their glow more than the firelight ahead.
The low and lilting melody of flutes touches her ears first, then the rhythmic twang of strings. There are sounds that only come from flesh clapping flesh, and something nearing a jingle that is of silver bells.
She reaches the closest of the wagons and slips between the openings to find herself before the white tenting.
Laughter. It fills the air, and a pair of men stumble out from the makeshift home. They are locked elbow to elbow by a band of red fabric, and their steps are those taken by boys who’ve addled their brains. Usually from too much drink, or from introducing their fists to one another. She reasons it’s a combination of both.
They stop as they realize she is there and the laughter dies. They look her over, then their faces twist in unison into the same puzzled mask. Both are young, somewhere just beyond their twentieth year. Lean, muscled, wearing open sleeveless vests and breeches rolled up to showcase their calves. Well-tanned, but not enough to hide the flush of red at their cheeks.
“Under familiar stars, and the ever-moving moon, we are one and of the same family.”
The stones setting both men’s backs rigid now vanish and they relax, stumbling over their tongues to repeat the familial greeting.
She eyes the ribbon binding their arms together and raises a brow.
They catch on to her silent question and break into a torrent of renewed laughter. “Karbanti … uh, the—” Both men speak over one another, leaving little clearly heard.
Eloine raises a hand, staying both their lips. “What was the bet between you two, and did the loss result in you being stuck to one another or…?” She lets the question hang in the air.
Both men frown, and it is almost like a pantomime performance. “Oh, we forgot to take off the band,” says the first. The second laughs and claws at the length of red, his fingers fumbling, giving clearer indication of his inebriation. “Or we forgot how?” the second man adds. “Wait, were we supposed to be stuck together?” The first’s brow furrows and the second’s quickly follows. “I think so? Mamman said it’d help our—” The first man is drowned out as the second speaks over him. “Our brotherly affections.”
Eloine’s mouth opens and she clicks her tongue against the side of her cheek. “Ah. I hope your affections are bolstered then, and do not cross well into the … amorous.”
The brothers purse their lips with an uncanny symmetry. Then they break into grins better served for lechers. “If you so wish, we can foster that love with a third and willing participant?” The first brother barely manages to get each word out. The second looks on as if expecting her to agree.
Eloine reaches out, running the back of a hand against both of their cheeks. She rolls her wrist and takes the earlobe of the second man between her thumb and forefinger. Her smile widens and she yanks once.
The second brother yelps and staggers. His brother tries to counter the movements, but the lash at their arms is their undoing, sending the pair to the ground in a tangle of limbs.
Eloine steps over them and enters the great tent. She tallies a rough count of fifty people by the low-standing candles that are shining their glow through half-moon bulbs of glass nearly swallowing the wax pillars they sit over.
Every shirt or dress worn by the assembly is a cut that shows more skin than any Etaynian would find proper. The colors are pulled from all those found in the night and brightest mornings and across any field afar of flowers. There is no comparison in her mind to the vibrancy and life in their movements while they dance.
A man and woman sit in the middle of the tent, playing a flute and plucking a traveler’s harp. Every step of the crowd brings a chime of bells, the clap of hand drums, and the rhythmic, percussive, silver-struck beat of tambourines.
She is home.
Eloine closes her eyes and breathes, less to take in the air, and all the more to take in the moment of being among singers, dancers, and musicians. The Maghani. The wanderers who always feel better bright and bold under the guise of darkness and moonlight.
She lets out a low hum, more born of instinct than any invitation to join the nightly festivity. Her feet drum themselves against the thick rug of the tent, drawing nothing noticeable but a dull thump her own ears can scarcely pick up.
The music never falters all the while.
A woman breaks from her performance and rushes over to her, taking Eloine’s hands into hers. “Sister,” she says, her chest heaving in what is both excitement and, just as much, from exertion from the dance. “What family are you from? I don’t recognize you.” The young girl cannot be more than sixteen.
Eloine runs a hand through the woman’s hair, a color close to mahogany, but holding better the brown than red of it. “An old one. One far from here, I’m afraid. Tell me, sweet, is the Mamman of your family here, or is she resting?”
“She is here, but she’s not watching the sanzara. She’s been too tired of late to dance and stand in watch. She is in the Circle’s tent, but none of the members are there. Just her. I can bring you?” She says the last words more as a question.
Eloine cups the girl’s chin and gives it a gentle shake. “What is your name?”
“Shira.”
“Thank you, Shira. Yes, please. Take me to her.”
Shira barely waits for Eloine’s words to fall and die against the air. The girl takes her wrist and pulls with all the strength and enthusiasm of a child, hauling her forward.
A man steps before the pair of women. He is what many a young girl might think of when their heads are filled more with cotton and dreams than sharper things. The cut of his jaw is sharp and strong—broad. His eyes hold a light plucked from candles and stars in the warmth of their brown. His hair is dark and short and curly. And the shape of him is a dancer’s body with the lean muscles all out for her to see from the vest and short breeches. The sort of shape that can give many a person all manner of ideas.
He smiles, and it is wide, bright, and utterly practiced for one reason alone.
She doesn’t return the expression, and both she and Shira try to step around him.
He moves ahead of them again. “I haven’t seen you before.”
Eloine inclines her head. “No, you haven’t. And, for both our conveniences, I expect you won’t see me again. If you’ll excuse me.” She tries once more and the man is before her as if he’s set solely to the task of barring her way. She curses but keeps the words from leaving her lips. “I’m on my way to speak with the Mamman of the family.” Her smile is thin and as cutting as wire lined with glass.
He stiffens and the earlier expression slips from his face, but not for too long. It is back across him just as quick. “I would be happy to take you to her myself. Tell me, do you wrestle?” He gestures to a length of red cord folded in his other hand.
Eloine reaches out, placing a hand on one of his arms. She squeezes the muscle there once before trailing her fingers down it until she reaches the edge of his palm—just above where the length of string sits. “I do.” Eloine grips his wrist tight, slips her foot between his legs, and her heel claps against the meat of his calf. She wrenches, pulls, and twists. The man’s expression slips before the rest of him and he is on the ground. She pins him there under her foot and leans forward. “Proficiently.”
Shira lets out a torrent of giggles she stifles behind her hands, though not so quickly that the laughter doesn’t reach the ears of those nearest by and set them off as well.
“Ah, well, I suppose there are worse places to be than under a woman like you.” The man finds his smile again and she wishes he’d lost it in the fall.
Eloine says nothing and walks over him, extending a hand for Shira to take. The young girl does and leads her out of the main tent. They walk through tall-standing grass, taking the time to brush the stalks aside as she is led toward a smaller lodging.
It stands out among the simpler designs—a color between sapphires and the darker blues of night. Gold thread embroidery runs along the outside in long, large loops that take the eyes and almost ask you to continue following to complete the pattern. The circular tent is held in place with a band of flexible wood on the outside she knows is set to squeeze against more poles within. An odd design in the world, at least among folk not her own.
“How long have you lived with this family, Shira?”
The girl’s face tightens, but she doesn’t look at Eloine as she ponders the question. “My mum and me came here when I was little. But I wasn’t alone. Our old family came too—all of us. We were a small band. It was long ago. Years.”
Eloine smiles, wondering what someone still young would consider little.
They reach the tent and Shira holds up a hand, motioning for Eloine to remain in place. “You’re family, but a stranger still to the Mamman; I need to check if she’ll see you.” The girl straightens, setting her hands on her hips and giving Eloine a look that makes it clear she is not to be challenged on the point.
Eloine fights to hide her amusement. “Of course, little one. Go ask her. I’ll wait.”
Shira slips into the tent. Hushed voices are traded and then go silent. She reappears and pulls the tent’s flap aside, gesturing for Eloine to enter. “She’ll see you.” Shira shifts in place and looks to her feet.
“What’s wrong?”
The girl’s mouth twitches. “I can’t stay, though.” She fixes Eloine with a look full of a child’s pleading and curiosity. “Can I?”
Eloine places a hand on the girl’s shoulder and gives her a gentle squeeze. “Maybe next time. For now, this is a private matter.” Another pat that turns to a light push sends the girl a step forward. “Go on, there’s dancing to be done tonight, music to be made, and songs to be sung.”
The words have their intended effect and all the enthusiasm returns to the girl. She races off like she had never cared about listening in on Eloine’s meeting.
Eloine doesn’t wait to watch the young girl go, though for a moment, a weight settles in her, and the yearning for the same freedom the child enjoys. She enters the tent.
A thick rug of wool, dyed to a sapphire ringed with cream, covers the floor. There is a bed better suited for a large child sitting in the corner. A small box of stone sits in the middle of the tent, its frame lined with carvings in a language she does not recognize. Sand occupies its center, and a kettle rests at the core of that, letting out its steam.
“Marvelous things that come out of the Mutri, hm?” The speaker is a woman in her fifties, though her hair holds more to black than what’s turned to silver and white. The sun-kissed tone of her skin carries fewer lines than one would imagine, and those that do crease her face are along the edges of her mouth and eyes. She wears a simple dress of a brown nearly gold, and she is utterly without jewelry at her wrists or ankles.
An oddity for their kind.
She reminds Eloine of someone’s loving grandmother.
“It’s been a good many years since I’ve seen you,” says the band’s Mamman.
Eloine recognizes the voice finally and the change that time has done to the old woman’s face. She says no words and nearly throws herself against the woman’s chest, embracing her. “You, Mamman of another family? When I last saw you—”
The woman doesn’t grin, but whatever could have passed for a warm smile shows in the warmth of her eyes. “As I said, many years. Things change—are bound to change. This you know. But, I give thanks your wanderings and ours have brought us to cross paths again, my sweet…” She trails off. “And what name are you calling yourself nowadays?” The tone is that of someone close to chiding a child.
Eloine nearly shies away from the woman’s look. “A few here. But Eloine is the one I’m most fond of, Mamman Asha.”
