So many had died.
But the days in exile were over, although the taste of dust was still fresh in her mouth. The suck of life is powerful. The babies were strong and sturdy, dark and fat. They were beautiful, and so was this world with its sere hills and secret winds, its changeable sky and restless sea. Even the breath of ancient burning had brought new life to this small corner, where bugs scurried in the cracks and a dusky green vine had grown in through the open window and announced its presence with a pair of perfect white flowers.
Every window is a gateway onto another place. She thought of the doorway woven by the Pale Sun Dog, and she wept a little, remembering the beauty of those glittering threads.
“It’ll be dusk soon,” he said, interrupting himself. “You’ll want to go back to the stones.” He took the sleeping babies from her and let her go.
Dawn and dusk were gateways, a passage between night and day. So was each footstep, which brought you farther from the place you started but closer to the place you hoped to reach.
The youngest of the blood knives was lurking by the village gate, and she fell in beside Secha, looking around with all the furtive nonsensicalness of a child playing at hide-and-seek. She was not much older than Secha’s own son, but she was a sleek and fine young woman who seemed years older, honed to a cutting edge that made young men stare. She was not at all the kind of woman Secha had any wish for a sweet lad like her own dear son to fall into lust with, but otherwise she liked her far better than any of the older blood knives.
“They’re sour and bitter,” said the girl with a smirk, as if she had tasted Secha’s thoughts. “They want to go back to the temples and lick blood off their tongues. But I know you understood the magic of weaving, didn’t you?”
“No. But I could. If someone taught me its secrets.”
They crossed the ditch in silence except for the creak of planks beneath their feet.
“In the house of youth I was best in my cohort at calculating numbers,” the girl confessed without humility. “It was a great honor to my household when the sky counters brought a serpent skirt to the chief of our village. They tied the sash of apprenticeship over my shoulder and sent me out to serve with the army. But now I see something I want more.”
Secha nodded, and the girl looked at her and nodded, and that was all that needed to be said.
A pair of brawny mask warriors walked past, going toward the village, and the young woman tilted her chin and canted her shoulders and twitched a hip so that they flushed dark and pulled on their ears and hurried on, too intimidated to look back after her.
“Why do you do that?” Secha asked.
“Because I can.” Then she started, like a young hare. “Best they not see me with you,” she murmured, and shied off into the camp as swiftly as she could without running and drawing more attention to herself.
The blood knives were preparing to depart the camp in the company of Feather Cloak and a number of mask warriors, so Secha fell in at the end of the procession, unnoticed and undisturbed. Just beyond the encampment a path split off from the main road and curled up over a slope. Within a cradle of shallow hills stood the eleven stones that marked this circle. Ten stood as though newly raised while the eleventh had fallen off to one side where the hillside had caved in under it. The brambles and vines that had covered it had been cleared away in the last few days.
They waited somewhat back from the circle, since no one wanted to get too close. No one knew quite what to expect, even though the dawns and dusks of the last six days had passed uneventfully. The young serpent skirt sidled out of the gathering shadows to join the other sky counters. She did not look once at Secha; her gaze was fixed on the dark stones.
The wind died. Twilight settled. Out here beyond the White Road, they rarely saw the sun, and tonight the entire sky was covered with a mantle of pale cloud. It was chilly. A pair of warriors breathed into their hands. Feather Cloak was tapping her foot, looking irritated and impatient. She had brought Little Beast with her—the rest of the hostages had been left behind in a pen—and her granddaughter stood perfectly still. The contrast was almost amusing. She was waiting. They all were waiting. Each in their own way.
It was entirely quiet. Distant sounds drifted on the wind: a goat’s complaint, chiming laughter, a snatch of song.
A faint melody ringing as out of the heavens tingled through her, seeping into flesh and bone. She gasped.
The crown flowered into a blossom of brilliant light, threads weaving and crossing, caught in the warp of the unseen stars and wefted through the stones. Led by Fox Mask, the mask warriors burst out of the gateway. They were laughing and howling and chattering and singing, burdened with tools and sacks and an iron kettle and a pair of cows and four horses and a herd of terrified sheep and one interested dog that everyone seemed to ignore although the animal was busily keeping the sheep in a tight group.
The blood knives cried out a brief poem, a song of praise, because there were six prisoners as well, bound and under close guard, one woman in long robes and five men, all struggling against the ropes that restrained them.
window is a gateway onto another place. She thought of the doorway woven by the Pale Sun Dog, and she wept a little, remembering the beauty of those glittering threads.
“It’ll be dusk soon,” he said, interrupting himself. “You’ll want to go back to the stones.” He took the sleeping babies from her and let her go.
Dawn and dusk were gateways, a passage between night and day. So was each footstep, which brought you farther from the place you started but closer to the place you hoped to reach.
The youngest of the blood knives was lurking by the village gate, and she fell in beside Secha, looking around with all the furtive nonsensicalness of a child playing at hide-and-seek. She was not much older than Secha’s own son, but she was a sleek and fine young woman who seemed years older, honed to a cutting edge that made young men stare. She was not at all the kind of woman Secha had any wish for a sweet lad like her own dear son to fall into lust with, but otherwise she liked her far better than any of the older blood knives.
“They’re sour and bitter,” said the girl with a smirk, as if she had tasted Secha’s thoughts. “They want to go back to the temples and lick blood off their tongues. But I know you understood the magic of weaving, didn’t you?”
“No. But I could. If someone taught me its secrets.”
They crossed the ditch in silence except for the creak of planks beneath their feet.
“In the house of youth I was best in my cohort at calculating numbers,” the girl confessed without humility. “It was a great honor to my household when the sky counters brought a serpent skirt to the chief of our village. They tied the sash of apprenticeship over my shoulder and sent me out to serve with the army. But now I see something I want more.”
Secha nodded, and the girl looked at her and nodded, and that was all that needed to be said.