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[J T Patrioy]

What a fascinating tale! So rich in tradition and culture are the Frascini, that I just want to hear more about them. Your writing creates vivid, brilliant images in my minds eye. Just a pleasure to read, and unashamedly I ask for more. 

[RVM45]

Grand Story.

Even though the gout has decided to attack my Left (Typing Hand) and my Left foot.....

At the Same Time!

I still enjoyed the Addition Very Much, even in the midst of my suffering.....

And I'm typing this Right-Handed--Which kinda undermines the idea of Tapping directly into my Right Brain/Creative Subconscious.....

But then again, I'm not fully convinced that there is A Subconscious or that I have any Creativity.

Really looking forward to Melissa's First Martial Art Lesson.....

.....RVM45       

[rick]

... frascinating... !!!

Good piece of work!

[Vrsovice Rebel]

Author's Note:

Here we go again folks, hope y'all enjoy it! Sorry for the repeated delays, but unfortunately the way Summer Session works at my place of employment is a major disruption to my normal writing rhythm, and tends to slow down the process considerably. We'll be back to normal soon, promise!

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Ch. 18

Aah. Constable Jonas thought to himself as he turned into the corridor and headed for his office. Glad to see my mornings are back to their usual selves. His Deputy had worn a supremely irritated expression at the front desk, and now he knew why.

Indeed, his morning had been terrible. Waking up late, he'd not even allowed himself a bath and rushed breakfast before charging out of the house at a trot. He'd bathed the night before, but still felt as if he smelt of coal-oil and wood smoke. His dreams had been disturbed and fragmentary, the clipped-yet-liquid Frascini accent clinging to their edges like psychic garnish. And there was a familiar grey-suited stuffed shirt sitting on the bench in front of his office, his long face a picture of frustrated adult petulance. Just who I's hopin' I'd never have t'see again...

"Damn it, Jonas, who the samhell's running your show? I call for a meeting with Doctor Seyes, get back to Charleotten and am informed that he's already on his way here by train. I get here and discover that not only has he arrived and gone across the river, you went with him! Then after you're both gone for a night, you return and tell everybody Seyes is -staying-?" Viktor Marshallson was almost shaking with rage. "Do you have any idea what this -looks- like? The Governor's already in hot water over these...people...from factions inside his own party, yet! When word of this hits the press, -especially- this business with Seyes, how do you think that'll play back at the Senate House?"

"Do I look like I work for the Governor to you?" Jonas grumped back. Smarmy little city-slick stinkass politician's what -you- are... "Or like I give half a shit for his re-election? I'm the Constable. That means I answer to the people of my Parrish, not t'the Governor an' not t'you. You're s'high up in the Prosecutor's Bureau, -you- bring charges if y'think you can, 'cept we both know y'can't 'cause nobody's done nothin' illegal." Just go away an' let my hangover die with some dignity, why don't'cha...

"Oh no?" Marshallson snarled back. "Oh no? Who let Thomas Jenkins be delivered into the hands of a lynching mob? Had he been tried? Had charges been laid, counsels appointed, arguments heard? You think about -that- for a moment before you start baiting me on -charges- Constable."

"So whaddaya want?" Jonas shot. As if I can't guess... "Maybe y'want me t'let 'em ear th'town apart?"

"I want to know why the screaming blue shit have you not taken whatever force was needed to get Seyes back!?" Calm down, Goddammit, you're shakin' like a leaf an' 'bout t'blow yer stack...

"Because like I said last time it a'int possible!"

"Not possible for two women is understandable, Jonas- 'not possible' for one of the most respected scientists, one of the most prestigious brains at the Govornor's own University...do you not begin to see, Jonas, how utterly STUPID that is?"

"A'int possible is a'int possible." The Constable ground back. "Especially not in the friggin' wintertime. B'sides which, Seyes couldn't be kept back, and I dunno if he'll get -got- back too quick, either. You might just have t'drag that old man back kickin' an' screamin'." Jonas could feel his carefully manicured diction slipping, his native accent sliding even more comfortably into place as he found that he faced an enemy, a known quantity, for the first time in days.

"Do I look like I care?! He is an employee of the District, Constable!"

"Who has th' full knowledge and permission of his University President and all the proper insurance binders! I know, I checked 'em myself!"

"Fuck that doddering jackass Grovesnor!" The grey-suited man's venom was rising. "The -Govornor-, Jonas, is..."

"Fuck the Govornor!" Jonas shot back. "-He's- a District employee too, or did you forget?"

"Jonas, you will -immediately- begin all necessary operations to retrieve that man -and- extradite those animals who murdered Thomas Jenkins and kidnapped his family, or I will bring charges for...for..."

"For -what-, Marshallson? Stoppin' a man from makin' a legal trip into a territory where neither you n'r me's got fuckall authority? Not lettin' my whole Goddamned Parrish burn t' th'ground?"

"Malfeasance! Dereliction of duty! I will think of -something- Jonas! YOU LET THEM WALK AWAY! I bowed to the reality of that situation when I first met you, but I can now see I was gravely mistaken! If not for your neglect of your duty, Seyes would never have come here!"

"How th' screamin' bluetailed fuck was I supposed t'STOP those people, Marshallson? I got me three Depputies an' a few fellas with huntin' rifles against a crowd-a armored-up Blackwalkers carryin' guns th'likes a-which you a'int ever seen! I spent one night at a Walker roadhouse, Mister, an' I got a good look at the kinda hardware they're strappin' around with these days. Fella ran the place had these rifles- automatic loaders, takes ten rounds through th'top, an' the bullet looks like it'd go straight through a an-vil. I've seen 'em shoot, an' I promise you them three could hold 'at bridge against a whole platoon'a reg'lar Army. You got any idea what eighteen'r twenty coulda done?

"Three of those creatures?!"

"Three- one barkeep, his pregnant wife, an' their little live-in girlfriend."

"HOW, Jonas? HOW?! Where could they possibly get the resources...Where would they -get- such things, Jonas!?" His antagonist was shouting now. "They have no industry, they have no mining, they have no..."

"How would you know?!" Jonas shot back. "You ever been into the Interior? No? Me neither. Nor anybody else ever. Even those silly books the Doc carried around were writ by folks who got maybe a hundred, two hunnerd miles inland. For all we know they -buy- the Goddamned things from somebody on t'other side of however big the damned continent is! But it don't hardly matter -where- or -how- they got 'em, s'long as they -got- the damned things! Seyes's tryin' to prevent a war an' riskin' his neck t'do it, an' back here you're itchin' t'START the Goddamned shootin'!"

"Do you not understand, Jonas?!" Came the scathing reply. "The Govornor wants these...these...creatures brought to heel! He's willing to leave them on their own land and not annex any territory, but he wants their noses bloodied for this kidnapping. He wants the perpetrators extradited to stand trial here, to your town."

"Are you outta your Goddamned mind?!" Jonas was quaking with rage and suppressed terror. "Bloody their noses!? There won't be any trial, there'll be a lynchin' followed by a massacre! You ever read up on what happened -last- time somebody thought like you went 'cross that river!? Ever heard'a Shavelin Bridge?!"

"You've got no right to complain of 'lynchings,' Constable! Not after what you allowed! And as for a massacre..." Marshallson's face seemed to narrow, giving him the momentary aspect of a ferret. "I refuse to believe that a crowd of nomadic primitives with no...observable...industry or modern infrastructure is capable of impeding a modern force equipped with tanks and aircraft, if it comes to that. Shavelin Bridge was a long, time ago, and..."

"To Hell with impedin' a force, you screamin' asshole- when it all comes down t'shootin' they'll burn -this- Parrish to the Goddamned ground! They'll kill ever'thing walks, crawls, or swims! These people, this Parrish, are my responsibility, so maybe you'c'n see how stoppin' this shitstorm might be in my interest? B'sides which, how d'you figure on gettin' them to 'extradite' somebody when they a'int got nothin' like a Government t'get t'agree t'such a thing?"

"You -MAKE- them agree you duddering fool! You cross that river and burn a few farms, you kill any opposition you encounter- they're primitive savages, Jonas! Without a State, without even so much as automobiles or electrograms! They still worship stones and mountains and spirits, for fuck's sake!"

"They're savages allright, Marshallson, but if you call 'em Primitives you got somethin' else comin'! Go on then! -You- go 'cross 'at bridge! Yourself! Tell me whatcha find! God damn you, and God damn the horse 'at brung ya!"

Marshallson seemed to choke on this for a long several moments, stalking back and forth across the front bredth of the room, rubbing his chin like a man who missed his beard and glaring at the Constable as he leaned across the desk all but snarling. Then he stopped. Aw shit...

"You keep using superstitious profanity..." His face seemed long and ferret-like again. "...you were gone for a night, a whole night. There's no telling what you've been...WHO you've been up...to..." The grey-suited prosecutor seemed to stare off into space for a moment. "You..." He looked up with a sudden maddened light in his eyes, grinning. "You...Constable...have been cavorting with one of...those...women, those perverted...you are no longer fit...DEPUTY!!"

"Unfit a'int for you t'determine! That's up t'the voters! An' besides which..."

The door swung open, and the youngest of his Deputies stepped nervously into the room.

"Do you have any idea what your Constable has been doing?!" Marshallson was speaking fast now, his face flushed, his hands shaking. "This...this -person-...has been fraternizing with the enemy! Carrying on with those...those...things and their lewd females!"

" Izzat true, Sir?" Asked the young man, his expression dubious.

"I stayed overnight, Son, an'..."

"Why else would he?" Marshallson cut him off, only to have his face fall in amazement and turn disgusted at the young man's response.

"Wazzit th' redhead, Sir?" The Deputy's face shone in undisguised admiration. "Hot damn! 'Bout time you got...beggin' your pardon, Sir..." He blushed.

Marshallson was reduced to spluttering indignation. "Yo...you're all mad!" He screamed, his composure lost completely. "Jonas, you are disobeying a direct order!"

"From -who-, weasel-face?!" Came the thunderous reply, a parade-ground bellow which felt as if it started somewhere down around the Constable's knees. "Don't see nobody in here gets t'give orders t'me!"

"I am the Deputy Prosecutor General, Jonas!"

"An' your Jurisdiction is at the District level, -not- Parrish! You got n'more authority'n this room'n my old grey cat!"

Marshallson boiled for a moment, then something changed again. Got a look like one'a those backwoods kill-ye-fer-sport kinds...fuck.

"Very well, Jonas." He ground out. "That being the case, I will handle this on the -District- level. -My- way. And we will see about these cowardly running-dog prognostications of yours." A twisted light came into his eyes. "Your perverted friend and his lewd little mates will be dealt with first, for suborning you and corrupting -our- lawful authority. Then -I- will retrieve those women and that water-brained academic, by whatever means are needed. And if they have gone over to the enemy, Jonas, they will be dealt with accordingly."

Straightening up with the slow menace of a rearing snake, the man turned and strode from the room. Jonas waited several seconds until he heard the door crash shut and saw the grey suit striding away towards the electrogram office.

"Charlie...I want you t'take the car an' git down t'where the electrogram line crosses Baxter Creek. You git there, boy, an' you cut that line. Don't care if y'gotta wreck th'car t'do it, but you git that line cut b'fore that fucker gits his message out. He's got t'git all the way 'cross town first, so y'got a chance. That bastard means t'start a Goddamned war on this Parrish, an' I don't feel like dyin' this week."

"You got it, Sir...where you goin'?" The young man's face was grey.

"I'm goin' back 'cross 'at bridge." Jonas said grimly, checking the load on his revolver. "He's gonna get through sometime, an' then he'll be back with company lookin' t'take some kinda re-venge- sounds like th'kind leaves a buncha people dead. Don't figure I oughta let 'im."
 

[Vrsovice Rebel]

The morning sun was so bright it hurt his eyes.

Doctor Seyes stood up slowly, his back crackling like a handful of twigs breaking as he stretched upwards from the little tent half-buried in drifting snow. Beside him, Yemanda yawned, her jaw opening to the full, painful-looking extension of its' arc.

"Sleep well, Shihan Prako'i?" She asked ironically, working the mandible in circles a few times. Must be settling the joints...that skeleton looked awfully hypermobile.

"I slept?" He replied with a wry chuckle. "I thought I lay awake all night waiting to freeze to death."

"Na." She cracked her knuckles, whistled. The two dogs suddenly emerged from under the snow, shaking off their night's covering. The sledge, which had formed one wall of their tucked-in lean-to shelter, was buried as well, and he bent to helping her dig it out. Caught out the night before, they had backed the sledge into a copse of firs by the branching of what Yemanda told him was the road to Stonyhill, wrapping one end of the canvas tarpaulin over the sledge and pinning it beneath the frame like a sheet wrapped around a mattress, then staking two of the other three sides down before piling snow over the edges. The fourth side they had weighted down from the inside when they crawled within to wrap themselves in a single black bearskin, huddling together for warmth through the long cold night. The wind had howled, and the snow piled deep enough that he had feared their suffocation, but sometime in the small hours of the morning Yemanda had crawled to the sledge end of the shelter, the highest point of the little lean-to, and cut a slit with her work-knife. The whistle of the slicing wind had gnawed at his ears and half-sleeping dreams all night, but the fresh air had been enough. "Another night like that without fire...ai yee." She shivered, tipping the sledge back onto its' runners before digging into the packet of dried meat strapped to the luggage-rails at the front.

"Yarka, spy?" She asked, holding out a strip for his inspection. Unthinking, he gnawed at it until it became pliable, the flavours of venison, hot red pepper, salt, and something tasting like black beer mingling into something that shot warmth into his stomach and outwards.

"Why does everyone keep calling me that?" He asked. "I thought you'd decided I was a scholar after all."

"You are." Yemanda replied. "But this means nothing of -spy-, Shihan Prako'i. Just because you spy not for your rulers does not mean you do not spy."

"Rulers?!" He spluttered. "What do you mean 'rulers,' young lady?"

"Do you have a king?"

"Yes, but he has very little power anymore- we -vote-, my dear!"

"So, you are voting for your rulers- do they rule you any the less?" She quirked an eyebrow at him. "They who voted not for these not-rulers...are they bound to them?"

"Eh?"

"Do they do as these men tell them?"

"Of course they do, that is how election works! Both sides vote, but everyone agrees beforehand to abide by the result and by the policies of the winners!"

She flipped him a smug, 'that-answers-that' look and tossed her short black hair. "You see? Rulers."

Seyes rolled his eyes. I suppose in some ways they -are- a little mad... "In any case, what do you mean? About how I might be spying even if it was not for my..."rulers," as you call them?"

"You are spying for yourself, of course. And for these other scholars. Never did I say it was a -bad- thing, Shihan Prako'i.

He chuckled to himself. "Well. On to better things, I suppose- where are we bound today?"

"We..." She said, chewing on a strip of dried meat. "...are hitching up the dogs, packing our things, and heading for Longwood. Tavish House, the Hearth of the Tavishi, is first on the road, so there it is that we'll stop first."

"I've been meaning to ask..." Seyes ground around a mouthful. "...these families- it sounds as if they each have some kind of headquarters, or a central farm. Is that what you're talking about?"

"A little." She replied. "Each chakta...each little settlement, group of farms, hey?- is home to several friendly families. Longwood has Margai, Tavishi, Larkini, see? Each farm is...how would you say it...it is the home, at that chakta, for members of that family, whether they are settling there or they are on the Road. The Hearth...that is our way to say that it is that family's home in that place, hey?"

"So...Tavish House, for instance, is the home of the Tavishes of Longwood? The place where they all congregate?"

"In some way, yes. And of course, there are the Long Halls- these are the places where all peoples of a Clan, from many chaktai, gather together. The Sunriders have a Long Hall not far from here, did you know it?"

"How many set...how many chakta'i of Sunriders would use one Long Hall?"

"Oh, a few dozen...every the one within perhaps a week's ride. And of course the people of friendly Clans use it too, when the owning Clan invites them- the Long Hall of the Sunriders hosts always many Stone Wolves, Silver Lances, the Storm Kings if they are behaving themselves."

"So...a Long Hall is owned and- operated, shall we say- by a given Clan, but other Clans are allowed to use it? How do they...how is it paid for? And do the other Clans have Long Halls in the area as well?"

"Of course not! So many- how to keep them all? No- only the Sunriders have a Long Hall near to here. The nearest other is a Hall of the Silver Lances, perhaps ten day's ride away. And for paying- all the families what are near to it, and use it, send some of their people and riches. Woodworkers, ironsmiths, stonelayers...it is very old and very strong, so it needs only a little work. And it is used only a few times each year, for great feasts, so each family is sending only a little of their...well, their food and drink and such, hey?"

"Taxes, you mean?"

"What are taxes?" Yemanda's face was puzzled for a moment before realization crossed it. "Oh! You mean the tribute you Settlers send your rulers?!" At this she burst out laughing as she settled into her seat in the front of the sledge. "Silly man, no! A family simply sends as much food as -they- would use for a certain feasting! If they are sending gold or skins or woodwork, or if they labour in it, it is so that they might display their skills and riches by the making of a beautiful Hall!"

"So...who do they pay?" It was Seyes's turn to be puzzled. And how is this all organised?

"Nobody." The vulpine girl replied. "They are simply helping to make a good feast, and a beautiful space for it. Why not to show off their best cooking, their finest carving, their greatest weaving? They can say 'Look! Look how skilled are we! Look how strong our hunters, how delicious our wine! Marry our women, envy our men!' What, do you Settlers need to be -made- to boast of your skills?" She chuckled for a moment, then quirked at him. "But of course- you crazy people rush through everything like mad bulls, taking never any time for anything- your skills are of course the lesser. Yes- you -must- be made to brag. And your rulers do not give good feasts or make proper religion, so they must take your tribute by force."

I have the uncomfortable feeling that we Humans are the butt of a rather...unflattering...joke among these people. Reflecting upon the rustic luxury of Markush Larkin's tavern, he had to admit there was something to the girl's tweaking. Everything they do seems to be...solid. Properly built, by someone who bothered to take his time and do the thing properly. He dug into the rucksack between his feet as the sledge began to move, extracting Liu's pamphlet and flipping to a dog-eared page with glaring interest.

Much beloved of all arts, and of making show of them, the people ofttimes see fit to send to the gathering-places of their many clans some examplar of their greatest artisanry for the envy of other persons, families, or allied sibaries. In the same way, each family sends to such places their choicest food and drink, for the distribution among all on the occaision of a great feast. This is their only tribute, they having neither money to send in tax nor lords to collect it, and they disdaining the very notion of Tribute as unmanly and unbefitting a free people. Alike, they are fond of slowly building and decorating their family homes, many standing for hundreds of years, with such art and yeomanly artisanry as their families and friends may produce. Wealth is a thing of persons, then families, then clans- the wealth of a clan displayed to the world, the wealth of a family to the clan, the wealth of a person to his family. They consider it a proper show and use of such wealth to secure themselves, their families, and their sibaries: the giving of gifts, the occasion of feasts, the building of temples, and care for the poor and the crippled being thought very correct to display it. A wealthy man who cares not for his poor neighbor, or a wealthy family for their poor kin, or a wealthy clan for a poor family, are held in the highest dishonour. Alike is held a man who disdains to enrich himself and thereby his family and clansmen. Wealth among them consists not only of gold, silver, and the like but also of the many kinds of artisanry and craftwork which they love, of horses and cattle, and all gear of war.

He stuffed the little book back into his rucksack and stared out at the snow-covered forest for a long moment. The previous day they had stopped briefly to examine bright sprays of blood crossing the road and leading into the forest, and his guide had been delighted at the huge red stains in the snow which they discovered in the laurels.

"Three kills were here!" She laughed. "Some great feasting will be waiting for us maybe!" From there, it had been impossible to slow her down or arrest the sprinting progress of their sledge. Urging the dogs on to greater speed, she disdained even a stop for lunch, passing strips of spicy dried meat back to her passanger instead. As they drew nearer, the ebon-haired woman's mood became downright festive, and she dug into the luggage rack on the front of the sledge to produce half a skin of heavy, sour red wine.

"Here, drink! No reason for not starting the feast a little early, na? Three kills, this will be great doings indeed!"

Seyes took a grateful swallow, feeling the warmth of the wine trail down his throat. "Thank you, my dear...when do you think we will arrive?"

"Soon." She replied. "Before sundown I hope! Jiffrei and Shari Tavish will be..." She grimaced wryly. "Jiffrei will grumble, as he always does. Shari will make jokes at him for it, as -she- always does..." She trailed off for a moment, turned around to face him. Her face was curious, and soft, and sad. "What will you do?" She asked gently. "Shuma will probably be there..."

Seyes took another swig of the wine, thinking. "I do not know." He finally replied.

"I do." She said. "You will bleed inside. You will weep again, as few of you strange little people know how. If you have any sense at all, you will get very drunk- drunk enough to dance and fight and speak the truth and sleep without dreams. And then you will wake up again to the aching in your heart and head, and you will sit down across a table with her and a Shihan of her Clan, and find a way for you all to drink the same water and walk the same snows."

"I think you have an excellent plan." Seyes said, feeling the grief rise white-hot in his chest again. "But I do not think any...any solution is possible." He said after a long pause. "I think it may turn out best if I simply do not see her."

"Vafani horseshit. If you do not, she will despise you for a coward when she learns you are here, and she will seek you out to mock you for it. -I- will see to -that-!"

"You are a meddlesome little girl." He said, half envenomed.

"And you are a foolish old man, but you are a -good- foolish old man whose heart has broken enough already! Too much more sorrow and shame, and -you-, foolish Shihan Prako'i, will murder yourself! We all saw it in your eyes- even your friend, the Lo-Beihan Shikari saw it and feared for you! I will not watch a scholar- a brave, wise, silly old man- murder himself and go down to the Forgotten Ones!"

The sudden intensity of her voice was like a blast of heat, thrown off by the indignant flames in her eyes. She was locking eyes with him with the intensity of a stalking cat, as furious as a black furnace and as merciful.

"I..." He choked on his protest, remembering how tempted his hand had been to reach for the revolver, how in the howling darkness of the night before he had wished for a moment to simply drift off into frozen sleep and never waken. "I...I will go to her." He sat back, deflated and defeated. "Though I don't see what good it will do for anybody." He hoped he didn't sound as surly as he felt, a hope which died as Yemanda clouted him hard across the side of the head. "What in the name of...!?"

"For being stupid! You cannot see what good will come, so you decide no good -can- come?! Good can be coming from -anything,- you vafani Firgano!" She slapped him again, on the other side this time, then turned back around into her seat in harrumphing bad humour.

"A...what?" He asked, his attention distracted, as much by desire for almost anything else to talk about as by the words themselves. That's the first time any of them has been anything other than welcoming...perhaps they don't approve of suicide? On some religious or spiritual level? And what did those words mean, I've heard her use them before...

"Vafani Firgano. Crack-skulled barbarian with no control of himself. Your brainpan's cracked and all the good sense run out." She grumped at him. "You keep insisting there's nothing for it, but you do not know." She went on after a pause. "You think that because one thing has happened, nothing else can, and it's all horseshit. Shuma may marry you and have two husbands, if Charlis and her family agree- it has been done. You might heartfall for one of her daughters- they are beautiful and strong and would make a good wife for a silly old man with more brains than he knows what to do with. There may be another woman altogether waiting for you, some proud warrior to teach you some courage. But no- you made up your silly head that it was all over and done and nothing remained for you but to die or kill yourself, quick or slow or by pieces. Fagh!" She tossed her head in annoyance and no small measure of contempt.

Why is this...this...this...this meddling little girl so...meddling? What does -she- care about -me-?

"Shikari! You Settlers make -no- sense!"

[RVM45]

Another fine addition to the canon.

If you don't print up copies of this, and send it around to the Publishers when its done.....

Well anyway, you might get a big enough advance to quit trying to teach Junior Shabnasticators, and devote yourself to writing full-time.

.....RVM45             

Did I say that I liked it? 

[Vrsovice Rebel]

Ch. 19

Elmira's morning had been nothing short of exhausting. As she sat down at the broad kitchen table and absently picked the congealed mixture of flour and chicken blood from under a thumbnail, she tried to fight down the rising frustration which threatened to erupt at any moment. Ridiculous language...why can't they just talk like normal people, or even like Shuma and Catrin? And those -animals-! Twenty cows and a -mare- to milk, twenty pigs to slop, probably two and a half hundred birds...hay to check for wet, three kind of flour and -six- grains to check for mold, liquor stills to draw off...don't touch those, Mata Prako- hold him down, Mata Prako- turn the bellows for Jiffrei, Mata Prako... She was grumbling to herself as the whole crew of Frascini came bursting into the kitchen. Jiffrei, nearly eight feet tall, his neatly cropped beard and hair gone to silver-grey streaked with black, his neck traced by an ancient, white, hastily-stitched scar. Shari, drying her hands and telling some story to Tumash and Awrin, twins of perhaps eight years who had been Elmira's tormentors all morning long. Fridei, with flaming hair like Catrin's, acerbic and witty and easily frustrated with a middle-aged Shikara who didn't understand things like beer-making or horse-shoeing. Catrin, her face always a little drawn and sad, trailed by Melissa, who seemed more a part of this insane word with every passing hour. The first glance she'd had at her daughter, as she and Jiffrei and Catrin rested after a half-hour's work in the forge built behind the barn, had been enough to nearly give her a stroke and then turn her green with envy. It had been the last and most startling in a long morning filled with hurried introductions.

She looked down in irritation at the beautifully embroidered but utterly impractical skirt of her new suit of clothes. It reached nearly to the floor, and seemed purpose-built to snag, trip, and subtly obstruct. Her soft-soled leather shoes were comfortable, and lined with fur for warmth, but she envied the Frascini their fitted hard-soled boots. The laced leather vest which held the billowing green shirt against her chest and abdomen was tooled and dyed to match the skirt, but the whole ensemble seemed mildly out of place. Well, at least this long underwear mostly fits... The softly woven woolen underclothes were warm and comfortable, but nothing like the skintight black coverall of her captors...and her daughter.

"Why can't I dress like you?" She had asked Catrin in frustration as the redhead chivvied her into them. "Nobody else is wearing this kind of thing!"

"Nobody else is a prisoner or a bearing mother, Mata Prako." The redhead had replied. "This is the proper dressing for such a one."

They weren't joking about the 'prisoner' situation. She grumped to herself. And these clothes seem like they were -meant- to be in my way...keep me from trying to fight or escape, I supp...

"...ako!" Came the shout. She jerked her head up to see Catrin standing over her with a big wooden platter in hand, piled high with rice and chicken in a thick white sauce. "Are you not hungry?"

Her stomach instantly betrayed her with a snarling rumble, and she reached up for the platter without preamble. Here we go again... Tearing loose the leg, she finally managed to get a bite into her mouth and was relieved to find that, for once, it was not some pepper-infused draught of burning coal-oil which greeted her, but rather an indolent flavour of salt, cream, and celery. She fought it, but in moments was tearing into the chicken with both hands, stripping meat from bones to suck down even the fat as if it were the very staff of life. It took her several moments to notice the laughter from the table.

"A-hey, Valta Mata!" Shari was sayin. "Shikari haven na such good food, hey?"

"Na, Mata Chakti-" Catrin replied for her. "-yen Prako never tasten such before, na spice they haven! Hyi!" The last syllable came out as an exclaimative rush of air. "She yan hers haven never such, yan it is too much for her haven much, hey?"

"Impossible language..." She had muttered under her breath back at the forge, which served only to make Catrin laugh aloud and Jiffrei roll his blue-grey eyes. "Nothing ever...nothing means the same thing twice!"

"Of course it does, except when it doesn't." She had snerked a little. "Mata Prako, listen to me, hey? Listen. When you Shi...Settler's speaking is like a hard, paved road. It goes exactly where you are telling it, always the same size, leading always to the same places. Our speaking is like a river- it is changing, jumping banks, washing away and rebuilding, going where it likes in little ways, joining with other rivers, joined by little streams...but always moving down to the Dread Sea, always to the same place, na?"

The rice was disappearing, spoonful by spoonful, and she felt herself slowing down a little. Looking up, she could see the Frascini watching her with unconcealed interest. Jiffrei looked puzzled, Shari flattered, the children confused, and Fridei smug as always.

"It's really good, itsn't it?" Melissa asked from beside her, shredding a wing.

"Mm! Mhmm!" She found herself mumbling around the mouthful before she could stop.

"At least you are eating properly now!" Came Catrin's enthusiastic quip. "You've hardly touched anything since the feast!"

"It's too bloody hot!" She shot back, her frustration boiling anew. "How any of you can...I shat myself dry that night! The only reason I was able to eat on the way here is because that stew didn't burn my tongue out! This is the first thing I've been able to eat enough of in two days!"

"One cure of that..." Shari said decisively, returning from the stove with a bowl containing -more- rice. "Eat, Mata Prako, eat! Healthy you must to be!"

"Hey, haven she all my morning-work to do!" Fridei put in. "Goen I to work now with Eerzha Larkin!"

"Na." Shari's voice was firm. "Showen ye not proper manners da yen Mata Prako, Fridei- capten she ai, but courtesy must be."

"Sha...Mata!" Came the spirited objection. "Capten she by some Shikari underfooter! Ow!" The redhead recoiled as Melissa swatted her across the back of the head. "Mata!"

"You be nice to my Mommy!" Melissa interjected. "And I'm not a Sheekary underfooter, whatever that means! I'm a Stone Wolf warrior who's captured a Settler prisoner! How many have you caught?"

The table went almost silent for a moment while Fridei spluttered in juvenile indignation, and then blew apart in laughter. Jiffrei's laugh was quiet, but his eyes danced with mirth- Shari was pounding the tabletop with a flat hand, Catrin and the twins whooping and pumping their fists, Shuma raising her beaker of shortbeer with a look like a proud teacher, and Elmira was utterly flummoxed. Then suddenly the red-haired girl was out of her chair, shrieking and throwing herself at Melissa, the two going over backwards in the smaller girl's chair in a tangle of hair-pulling, slapping, screeching mayhem. As Elmira tried to get to her feet and Shuma moved to intervene, the redhead cocked her fist and punched downwards only to drive her hand into the stone floor as Melissa dodged to one side and swung her left hand as hard as she could. It connected with the Frascini girl's head and ear with a satisfying WHOCK, and then Shuma had them both by the hair and the backs of their necks, pulled apart and plopped back in their seats. The whole table was cheering, and when Mikal and Shimon burst through the door splattered with mud and complaining, they were shocked to see that they were -not- the most exciting thing to have happened that morning.

"...swear, Mik, if we have to fix that God-rotted fence because of your bloody bull one more time, I will personally...what? What's all the tummel?"

"Ya Shaqi!" Awrin shouted. "Ya Shaqi, Mikal! Beaten she Fridei! Beaten sound yan sure! Boxen her ear for her!"

"I told you we're not all crazy!" Melissa said to Fridei as her antagonist nursed her aching head and rapidly swelling hand.

"Fridei lucky will be if breaken her hand na." Shuma said, sounding oddly satisfied. "This teachen ye forbearance, fool of a girl."

"Wait a minute!" Elmira said indignantly. "You told Melissa she'd never have to fight until her teeth came in! She told me while we were riding that first day!"

"No." Shuma said primly. "I -told- her that it was the worst kind of bad luck to start a fight with a Shaqi, so almost nobody would- and look! See? Fridei has had her ear boxed and her hand broken. I call that -very- bad luck indeed! And besides, a little kitten-scuffle like this is hardly a proper -fight-, Mata Prako."

"As strong as you people are?! That punch could have hurt her!"

"Yan Fridei learnen a proper lesson, na?" Jiffrei replied in his quiet rumble. "She na maken such again, hey?"

But she could have...and it...shit. Elmira could feel her face and shoulders fall in the face of the Frascini's logic. "But what if she -had- hit her?" She gave a final sally.

"Then -I- would have taught Fridei." Shari put in decisively. "One road or another, haven a proper lesson." She glared at the younger redhead, who was growling under her breath and surreptitiously rubbing her rapidly swelling hand.

Elmira bit back another objection and returned to the rice. It -was- good...and she -was- hungry. The rest of the long meal seemed to be taken up with the twins retelling the incident and needling Fridei for her bad luck and foolishness, and with the elders at the table trying to laughingly tamp the situation down. Then, gradually, people began to dribble away to bedrooms, hay-lofts, and the bath. Sighing gratefully, Elmira followed after Catrin, Shari, Shuma, Fridei and her daughter to strip and bathe. Leaving her beautiful but cumbersome and utterly impractical garb behind on the chair in her bedroom, she was delighted to wrap herself in an oversized towel, make her way to the bathing room, and slip tentatively into the blistering water. She closed her eyes for a long time, feeling and hearing the other women come in and immerse themselves.

"Come on, Little Mother, don't fall asleep!" Catrin teased her. "Soap and scrub! -Then- sleep!"

She levered herself onto the drain-pierced floor, scrubbing and soaping and rinsing several times before re-entering the water. Fridei was gratefully soaking her swollen, empurpled fist, a little awkward with brush and bath-tools confined to her left hand. Catrin, sat between the two girls, casually changed places upon re-entering the tub and placed them side by side. In the long, humid silence while the women and girls soaked their hair, half-floating in the huge stone tub, Elmira was startled to hear Fridei speak up to her daughter.

"Proper buffet ye given me, Valta Shaqi. Proper." The voice was grudgingly respectful. "Thinken I not that Shikari knowen how."

"Your mistake." Melissa sounded...proud. A little cocky, even. She's turning into one of these people right before my eyes...

"Na my only..." The girl said, shaking out her right hand. "Right aien ye, in the morning...Shikari na -all- crazy. Yan...right aien ye, at yen table. A warrior ai ye. Afearen ye ai na."

Melissa sounded almost sheepish. "I didn't have time to be afraid...and besides, you're not my D...not -him-."

"Eh?" The redheaded girl asked.

"Her Shikari patro beaten her, yan her Mata. Belongen that one in a tree, sayen I." Shuma said, her slow voice full of quiet and almost unbelieving anger. "Maybe yen Shaqi haven na fear of any but him."

"Why killen ye na yen Firgano?" Fridei asked in amazement.

"Na Shikari ways, Valta Shatti." Shari spoke up for the first time since the fight. She sounded more sad than angry. "Even for me, taken it long to gain yen courage for."

"Your husband...your first husband...?" They told me on the road, but seeing her now...how?

"Hey. Beaten he me...maken me fear. Maken me fear for life, for my eyes...tellen me once he cutten out my child-bed yan leave me barren, if tellen I. Then one night, drunk yan with fury, taken he yen chalga and near to killen me. Wandering long was I, on yen Spirit Road between living and dying. Haven I visions, visitations...yen Lady Of Spears speaken to me, yen Armored Maid Of Flames, yan even Herself, Mother Of God, yan many the Little Folk. When waken I was, taken I yen same chalga in my hand. Knowen I not even now what sayen they were to me...but woken I with fire yan steel in heart yan hand."

"Na your people's way." Shuma, beside her, gentle and firm. A hand on her shoulder. "Tellen ye I was upon the road. That life is over for you now."

"So see, Fridei? Yen Shaqi maybe haven no fear of such as we." Catrin, sounding proud.

"All Shikari fearen us but these?" The girl said, sounding as if she was measuring something. She shook out her hand again. "Na bad." She flashed Melissa a rueful, sideways grin. "Liken I ye. Na bad."

[Vrsovice Rebel]

As the door to the Matagarnachin closed behind her, Catrin suddenly realised how glad she was to put the noise and rush of the morning behind her. Elmira and Melissa were still in the bath with Fridei, Shuma, Awrin, and Shari. Jiffrei was complaining to himself about the crush of Shikari guests as he sat down to take a nap in his chair by the fire in the big main bedroom, the children finishing lunch. The welcoming warmth of the place closed around here like a blanket.

I always liked the Catosan Matagarnachini...their ways of showing Holiness are very like our Ortosani. She walked a turn around the room, inhaling the scents of the place, of leather and wood, of the sacred aromatics in the brazier. Walking to the altar, she reached for the chips of purple cedar in their basket and dropped them onto the coals, waiting for the sweet-smelling flare before adding a pinch of the mixed herbs from their bowl on the altar's lower shelf and dipping her fingers into the oil and splashing it into the fire. She made the sacred signs on forehead, lips, and heart, bowing low before the Ikons of Holiness.

Lord Father, Giver Of Fire and Font Of Life; Mother Of All Holiness; Child Born Of No Iniquity; Spirit Of All Creation, look down upon your daughter and her trial... The words of the opening prayer rolled through her mind and silently off her lips as she brought the fire into her mind. ...deliver from me this suffering, cause not the bitter cup to linger long upon my lips, and succor in eternal glory and power the soul of Roban Tavish... She knelt, bent to the floor, touching her forehead to the stone, before drawing her knives and laying them before her. Her long rainbow-steel fighting knife, blooded at the first moonfair of her eighteenth year- her Pritha, which had been her grandmother's in her own time, the blade pitted with the blood of Thomas Jenkins, Marki Charnin the Black Spear, and Hildi Martak, Lady Thunderfist- and her greatest treasure, the little working-knife which Jiffrei had given her on her fifth birthday. The blades glinted softly in the flamelight, red-gold dancing on the steel. She felt the forms of prayer fade on her lips and in her heart. Remember what Patra Pawdrac told you...when the form dies, comen the truth... "...burn away the sorrow in my heart, cleanse me in your fire..." She felt the warmth spreading from her belly, bowed again, her hands raised with palms turned towards her face. feeling the words turn from sound to image, from image to emotion, from emotion to wordless sound and formless thought. The flames of candles, lamps, and brazier seemed to meld together in the centers and edges of her vision, the flame-trance heating her soul red-hot, melting her desire down to pure essence, the ache in her heart begging for relief...

She started at the sound of a voice behind her.

"Catrin? What are you doing? Who were you talking to?"

Her hair still wet from the bath, Melissa Jenkins was standing framed in the doorway, looking like some unknown thing of the Spiritworld, trapped in the Place Between yet somehow visible. She repressed the urge to make the Sacred Signs, beckoning the little girl forward. She moves like something...frightened. Settlers don't Believe...is she afraid of that? Or me? Or us? Catrin had spent most of the morning being very visibly confronted with the discomfort of Melissa's mother, and it was worrying her. All of us she knew before...we all spent so much time around the Humans, trading with them...we speak like to them. Now she can hardly understand us when we speak in our own way...I and the others, especially the youngers...Hellfire, I even -think- the way they talk, now.

"I was praying, Little One...talking to God. Are you allright?"

"I think so..." She sat down on the floor.

"Why only think?" My grief can wait. This is a child... Something jarred in her mind, a bolt of soft lightning. ...a child. Like the daughters Rob and I should have had. Something warmed a little inside.

"I'm...well, I'm...lost." Melissa replied. "Everyone's being really nice, but...I mean, I can understand everybody pretty well, but it's hard sometimes. Fridei thinks I'm crazy and tried to hit me, and Jiffrei's all grumpy, and..." She paused for a moment, gathering her thoughts. "How come everybody here talks so different, anyway?" She asked. "You and Shuma and everybody else...you're a -little- different from us, but not like the people here- they have all those different words...?"

"Oh, Little One..." Catrin sighed. "I was talking to God about that just now, I think. And do you know what I think He was telling me?"

"No...wait, what you -think- he was telling you? Does God talk a different way too?"

"Hey, of course. God is...God is so different from we, so much..." She gestured expansively. "...so much -more- than we...He speaks a different language, and Oh! so quietly...you have to be listening very, very carefully. And sometimes you can be wrong, but what I -think- He was telling me was this." She took a deep breath. "Little One, I have lived all of my life close to the Humans, the Settlers, the Shikari. I got accustomed to speaking with them for trade, and...well, I did not -lose- the use of our Frascini words, but I stopped using them nearly so much, hey? I became very...skilled, I suppose, in speaking the Human way. I became -so- good at it that now, I find I even -think- in such a way, when I have been down off the mountain for a time." She sighed. "This is the first time I have been back to Longwood in many moon-turns, Little One. We- Mikal, Taylar, Willam, Feyna, Shimon and I of course- we had been gone for three months on a trading caravan, what we call a Razza. We had traded up and down the river Nerva, selling guns and horses and cattles. We returned laden with gold, and each went to see our families or Shihani to give the gold to the people whose horses or cattles we had sold for them. Then we came back to the Long Hall for two day's feasting to celebrate our rich returning, the ending of the trading season...the night I arrived was the night Rob was killed. We met Old Man Burras on the road, who offered him a rich reward to seek his lost stallions...and into the night he went, saying he would see us soon as a richer man." She sighed, feeling the tear fall from each eye. He laughed and said he would buy Tumash Hurtz's black bull, to start our herd when we married. And then he was gone. "So when you and I met, I and the people with me were much practiced with speaking like the Shikari." I had forgotten. The greif of that night had so overwhelmed her that, she realised, she had not thought of the reason for her visit in the nearly three weeks since.

"So I got to...get to know you all that way first? Now it gets harder?"

"Oh yes. Everything becomes harder, the deeper you go. The forest becomes darker, the beasts more fearsome, the battles more dire. Do you have wild pigs, or screamer-cats, on Shikari lands?"

"I think so, a few...maybe. I've never seen one until now."

Catrin nodded. "Now, a few dozen miles into our land, they are plentiful. And the deeper we go into the mountains, Little One, the more plentiful they and their kind will be. Beyond the mountains, there are greater beasts yet, of kinds which you Shikari have not seen since before the Beginning."

"Really?" She looked up with wide eyes. "Will we go see them?"

"We will, in the Spring. When the snows melt we will go to the Great Pasturelands to hunt them, and to seek for new breedstock, and drive the herds onto the fresh grass."

"Why don't you go now?" Melissa asked, puzzled. "If it's down off the mountain, wouldn't it be warmer?"

"Oh no, Little One." The redhead replied. "There, there are no trees to slow the wind, no mountains to catch the snow, and we are not so close to the sun. But this is all for later- the important thing is, when you are going into a new and perhaps dangerous place for the first time, it is not always bad to have a guide. Not -all- of life is like the Walk, after all."

The little Settler girl looked up at her, thinking. "I don't think I need a guide -all- the time...but can I come to you, or go with you, if I need help?"

"Of course Little One!" Catrin said, reaching down to hug her close. "Think me like a...like a big sister, na? Or maybe a strange aunt?"

"-Are- you strange?" She giggled.

"I am sure I am to you!"

"Not -very-..."

"It is not wrong thing to think me strange, Melissa. I know we are so different from your old life...do little girls carry knives, back where you are from?"

"No!"

"Do women and men play as we do?"

"Of course not!"

"Is our food the same?"

She screwed up her face. "No! But I -like- your food! It's...it's...it feels -alive-."

"That is because Shikari food is so horribly dull." Catrin said with evident distaste. "Shikari know not how to use pepper, or salt, or any sort of spices...at least not properly. But anyroad, I promise you- soon everything will be much less strange. You will learn our speaking, and our cooking, and our working, you will even learn our fighting."

The girl looked pensive, maybe a little afraid, bit her lip. "Will Fridei get in trouble?" She asked. "Like Timash? I don't want her to...I think she's...well, I like her. She gets grumpy easy, but she helped me all morning."

"Na." Catrin replied soothingly. "She will be on the end of a great many jokes for losing a fight she started, and with a Shaqi yet, but there was no dishonour in that, only horrible bad luck . Timash...what he did was for ruling, to show strength and give fear, and this to a person who should have been being shown that she had no cause for fearing. He was tyrannic- there is his dishonour, and alike the dishonour of a grown man to strike a woman so, and alike again that of a strong person striking a weak. Fridei was tyrannic na- just foolish, and she payen for it."

There was a long silence. Catrin turned, still kneeling beside her charge, turned again to face the altar. Lord Of Love, give me what I need to teach her rightly...she is brave, and she learns swiftly, but she is so young, and all our ways so alien to her...

"Catrin?" Came the question, with a flicker like the flames in the brazier. "Can you teach me praying? I don't really know what this God thing is...but if I'm going to learn all that other stuff I think...maybe I ought to learn how to listen? The way you all do, I mean..."

She looked down in quiet amazement.

"...you know? To listen to little things?"

The moment stretched for a moment longer. A cedar chip popped in the flames.

"Of course, Valta Shaqi." She finally replied, standing and offering a hand for Melissa to clasp before leading her two steps up to the altar. "Here, you see? This is the Altar- the Table Of God. See, we have a sacred fire- like at the feast, hey?"

"Fire's important for talking to God?"

"Fire is one of God's gifts. Fire warms, fire purifies, fire is a gateway to the World Beyond. So for all our holinesses, we have a sacred fire."

"It smells good, like the one at the party."

"Here, see?" Catrin reached under the tabletop, drew out the baskets of cedar chips and splints, the herbs and oil. "It is all for making the fire pleasing, for freeing the mind from the things of this world." She handed the Human girl a few of the little split pieces of purple cedar. "Go on- put them in." The girl could barely reach the brazier, but dropped them onto the coals of the shavings and chips of before. "Good. Now this...just a fingerful, not too much..." She showed her charge how to add the dried aromatic herbs, and the smoke rose dense and earthy-smelling. "And now the oil...dip your fingertips, just so...and splash the flames, hey?" The fire rose a little, the room taking on another scent yet. "Now, Little One, comes the difficult part."

"What's that?"

"Now you must learn to take the fire into yourself. Breathe the smoke, feel the warmth, smell the burning...and when the fire is lit in you, into it go all the things which are hurting you or hindering you except for the thing you wish to talk about with God. Burn away all the hurts, the sorrows, the jealousies, the angers...leave behind only the one thing. Then you take that thing to God, for helping and healing."

"Is that what you were doing?"

"Yes." Catrin replied, feeling the now-familiar ache rise in her breast. "I was asking God to use the fire, to clean away and heal the sorrowing for my Rob." She led Melissa back to the open space of floor, kneeling again before the three glittering blades laid on the stone. "Here, Little One- down with me, hey?" She guided the little Settler down, helping her to her knees. "Now draw out your knives and lay them down before you, as I've done." Melissa's movements were unsure and a little clumsy, but she did as asked.

"Why do you do that?" She asked as she straightened. "Fridei said I shouldn't take the big one out except for fighting?"

"Fridei was not thinking you would learn Prayer so quickly, I think. We do this to show God that we are fighters and workers, as He made us to be. And so that we are always reminded that only He lives forever in this world. We are all mortal- we are all borne to die- we are all dying. From the day we are borne, Little One, we are all dying."

"Don't talk sad like that, Catrin..." Plaintive. Oh...they don't know about the Dying Mysteries! The poor creatures!

"It is not sad!" She said gently. "It is a happy thing- this world is only the beginning. Here we grow and become stronger and then we are born again- as we grew in our mother's wombs until we were strong enough to be borne into this world. When we have grown strong enough through our growing here, we will be borne again into the World Beyond."

"And we'll be different? How?"

"We will be reborn as a thing so much stronger, so much more powerful than we are now...can you remember when you were inside of your mother?"

"No..."

"Because you are so much more now than you were then- you are stronger, greater, more powerful. We will be reborn as something -that- much more than we are -now-. To those already borne into the World Beyond, Little One, -we- are as weak and blind and helpless as a child still within her mother."

"So dying doesn't have to be sad?"

"No, Little One, no...only for those whose names we forget, those who were dishonourable- cowards, murderers, rapists, child-corruptors..."

"Like my Daddy?"

"Yes. And no." Catrin's reply was gentle, but firm. "We cannot be knowing if he is -truly- forgotten- forgotten by God and cast away from the Fire Of Heaven. But -we- can forget him."

"I want to." So quick she is to say it... "I want to forget everything he did."

"Then perhaps that is what you should pray for. To forget him, and his evil, and the things he did to you. To be healed of him."

There was another long silence as the little Settler digested this. "Catrin?" She asked. "You said dying isn't a sad thing- but if it's not, why are you sad for your boyfriend?"

It is not sadness, Valta Shaqi, it -hurts-... "Because...because the sea is wide, Little One. It is wide, and deep, and none may cross it in this world. And I miss him." She choked a little. "I miss him like a piece of my soul. We were going to be married, in the Spring...we had known each other all our lives, Rob and I...losing him is like losing a piece of myself. And it hurts because..." She took a deep breath, composing herself. "Because I should have been there. Because now all the things we should have said never can be. Because now I must wait all the long years of my life before I see him again."

"So it's like if someone moved away?"

"A little." Why does it cut a little less when I tell her?

"Catrin...is it allright if I ask this God thing to help you? Can you pray for somebody else?"

Unbidden, she felt wetness start in her eyes again. She fought for a split second, then bawled openly, falling forward onto one hand and pulling the little girl fiercely against her with the other. She clutched Melissa's neck, tucking them together like two blind kittens, choking on her tears as she wept into the little girl's hair. I killed her father...Firgano or na, I killen her father, yan she asken to pray for -me-...she wishen to give her first prayer for me... "Of...of course...yes! Yes, Little One, you can...you an pray for...for anyone, or anything..."

"Catrin, no, don't cry...Catrin? Catrin, you're scaring me! Catrin!"

"I don't...you...I killed your -father-, Little Shaqi...and you want to...to give your first prayer, your very first...the first thing you...I don't deserve that, Little One...Rob...'

"Catrin!" The little Settler writhed in her arms, weeping herself now. "Catrin, you -saved- me! If this God thing can help you if I ask, I want to ask! I don't want you to be sad anymore- I'm not! You and Shuma and everybody...you saved me! I don't have to get hit or...or touched...or anything anymore! I'm learning how to take care of horses and chickens and a house! I'm -clean- Catrin, and it feels so -good-...don't..."

Catrin would never know how long they hugged against each other, or after that how long they lay on the stone floor as a little of the hurt ran out of her like poisoned blood and pus from a wound gone proud. The crying turned to wordless, formless speech, and then to comforting silence. A tiny sound whispered in the back of her mind, like the breath of a mouse or the kiss of wind from half a world away. It was a long time before her thoughts could even form words again. Thank you. Quiet thanksgiving in her soul. You sent me this little one to answer a prayer I'd not even prayed yet...thank you.

[RVM45]

Another good chapter.

No, another Great Chapter.

I had hoped to witness the Professor reunited with Shuma by now.....

But if you had, then we would have missed this Grand part of the Whole.

You are very adept at taking your time, prolonging the suspense and letting your story build.

I hope you'll have the next Chapter soon.....

But you can't hurry Perfection.....Or even run-of-the-mill Greatness, even if it ain't quite perfect.

And this story is somewhere between "Great" and "Perfect".....

Since nothing on this Earth is truly 100% Perfect--

At least, so I've been led to believe.

.....RVM45             

[kaijafon]

thank you for the very interesting and unique story!  I hope it will be continued. 

[kaijafon]

still hoping........

[Vrsovice Rebel]

  Author's Note:

  My apologies again for the lengthy delay. Unfortunately, I find that writing comes easily to me during the working year, when the schedule in the dorm and school produces a very productive rhythm. During the summer, not nearly so much. However, school starts on Monday, and once the Junior Shabnasticators are properly settled, so will I be. This was originally supposed to be a much longer chapter, and while certain additional passages beyond this are finished, much of what follows this submission is, to my eyes, yet unpresentable. Making matters worse, a computer error has resulted in the total loss, and nessesary reconstruction from notes, of a substantial portion of the next chapter.

  Anyhow, I hope you all enjoy the latest chapter, and hope likewise that you can wait a few more days for me to resume my previous output.



>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Ch. 20

Melissa was rapidly coming to the conclusion that dinnertime was the best time of day to be Frascini.

They ate late- after the three-hour rest at midday, the eating and bathing and napping, it had been back to work for several more hours, long after the sun had sunk below mountains turned the colour of molten copper. The remaining hours of daylight she had spent with Catrin, learning her way around the barns, brew-shed, and workshops of the Tavish farm at Longwood. She laughed when the redhead pointed out the patched hole in the side of Jiffrei's winch-shed, relating again the story of the runaway flywheel, complete with expansive gestures and sound-effects and an imitation of Jiffrei's profane near-apoplexy which reduced her to hiccups. They had ridden out with Mikal and Shimon to see the huge expanses of pasture which held enclosed the hundred immense cattle and thirty-five horses which the Longwood Tavishi held, the rabbit warrens and grouse-rows at the edge of the pig-filled wolf-tracked forest, and the fields of winter wheat which would be ploughed for potatoes in the Spring.

"Where do you get everything else?" She had asked, curious at the lack of other vegetables and grains, despite having seen them in huge abundance. "All the other stuff? The vegetables? Do you grow them someplace else?"

"Hey." Had been the reply. "Remember ye how I told ye of the Great Pasturelands over the mountains? In the Spring, we will drive the herds across to these places, and we will there be getting all of this. We will make a great camp, and near it we will plough and plant. The soil in these mountains is not so good, Valta Shaqi, so while the cattles and horses are giving birth and grazing their children on the fresh green grass, we will plant these things and hunt the Great Ones. Then, when the autumn comes and harvesting is done, we will load huge great wagons with the food of summer and return to our mountains for wintertime." She snapped her teeth with a somewhat dismissive aire. "Of course, we are not needing so much of these foods as you Shikari do- we eat much more the meat."

"Does everyone go?"

"No, no- perhaps half, or two in three. Someone must be staying here, to guard the Hearth and see to such workings!" Mikal had put in. "Jiffrei and Shari never leave their mountain, of course, and some others will stay. But with fewer people and the herds gone, there is much the less of work for them to do."

Coming upon a broken section of fence which reduced Mikal to further gouts of profanity, Catrin had taken her a short way into the woods to look for three saplings.

"A handspan thick, Little One, maybe a little less- those are the ones we need."

"What for? To fix the fence?"

"Hey- look here." The redhead pointed to a straight little tree about as thick as Melissa's calf, covered in thickly grooved bark and equipped with wicked-looking thorns. "This is perfect- we call it stonewood. Very hard it is, and good in the wet. Now, watch me..." She had taken a small, hammer-backed axe from a sheath on her belt and begun to chop at the tree waist-high off the ground. The pale yellow wood came out in splintery chips the size of a hand under blows delivered with a loose-jointed whipping motion, and in a few moments the sapling groaned and toppled to the packed, hard snow. It was barely on the ground before Catrin was moving down the length of it, striking off branches with practiced ease before lopping off the top, leaving a limbed trunk perhaps twelve feet long. Then, leaning against a huge walnut bole, she had taken a little stone from a pocket on the axe-sheath, and begun stroking the blade.

"Why are you sharpening it already?"

"Stonewood is very, very hard- it will dull an axe even in so little work as this. And we need two more to fix the fence, hey? Sharp tools make easy works!"

"You sure do carry an awful lot of stuff..." Melissa had remarked, eying the redhead's crowded belt with dubious eye. Beside her saber, pistol, and long knife, the copper-haired woman had the hammer-backed hatchet, a pouch of nails, her work-knife, and a coil of thin rope.

"Aye yes- you are never knowing what you might need, na? But I thought we might be needing these to fix the fence, so I made sure at least -I- had them, in case Mikal or Shimon were forgetting. Now come- it is -your- turn to cut down a tree."

Hatchet held in uncertain hands, she had made what she was sure had been a horrible botch of the job. The yellow wood was indeed as hard as cold rock, and her cuts were weaker, the chips tinier, by far. But in the end and after much grunting on her part, the tree toppled. Then it was her task to chop off the limbs and top where Catrin showed her, before they had sat down on an exposed thrust of rock to sharpen the axe and chew a strip apiece of spicy dried meat.

"That's -really- hard!" She'd puffed. "Do you do this all the time?"

"Every day!" Had been the cheerful reply. "It is making us strong and fierce and free, hey? We Frascini can do -anything-."

"I can't!" She had laughed a little, still blowing like a locomotive.

"You just -did-! Now, one more!"

And so, under Catrin's watchful eye, she had felled, limbed, and lopped a third sapling. Once they were gathered together, her teacher had taken the slim rope from her belt and tied the thinner ends of the trees together and hauled them out to the fence, where Shimon and Mikal had been waiting, a wineskin hanging from the stout upright post on one end of the damaged section. They leaned on an intact section, almost lounging on their feet with the relaxed look of cats lying against a wall.

"Ha, Catrin! What taken ye so long?" Shimon's already starting to talk like the rest of them again...

"Hey, given ye'en Shaqi all the work? Lazyhands!" Mikal needled his Pritha with a wink, taking a swallow from the skin as he did before passing it over.

"Given she me no choice! The little imp -likes- our work! Cutten she two of the three!" Catrin took a long swallow, then handed the wine to her young charge. "Eh?"

Tentatively, Melissa had taken the half-empty bag and upended it, taking a small...then growing...sip of the heavy purple-tasting contents. It feels so warm... Handing it back with thanks, she had leaned against one of the upright fenceposts as the three Frascini adults measured the saplings by eye and then trimmed the ends to flat chisel-like points, which were then jammed into the holes piercing the uprights and nailed into place.

After that, it had been back to the house to help Shari and Shuma finish preparing supper- something had been roasting all day in the massive stone oven, which Shari strictly forbade her to touch, but there had still been wine and milk to draw, cheese to cut, butter to be scooped and set out in dishes, and bowls of ground hot red pepper to be placed between each pair of chairs or settles. The fire needed stoking and wood bringing in, the stove which heated the huge bathtub filled and set roaring for the evening baths to come, and Catrin had begun to teach her the sharpening of knives as she whetted the slim little eating-blades to glowing razors.

"Out! Out! Given ye me the room!" Shari began, shooing all from the room but Taylar, whom she called in from the barn with an oddly gentle voice. Sitting down around the table, she looked up to see a new dogskin stretched in its' frame at the highest level of the wall. Gustav...he- you- saved Catrin. Thank you. It seemed oddly the right thing to do, as she looked up into the empty eyes of the shaggy pelt. Jiffrei was sitting leaned back in his big chair, a glass of powerful-smelling spiced liquor in his massive fist, with the air of a lounging wolf. He looks almost friendly...

"Jiffrei?" She asked. "Does everybody always move around? Catrin says we might go to see the Larkini in a few days, or the Iestri at Stonyhill?"

"Na everyone. Na me." He rumbled. "This ai my place, me yan my woman, yan here stayen we."

"But most people, yes." Shuma said gently. "It is our way, Valta Shaqi- in such a way as this we are never tired, never but glad to see each the other, and no farm lacken for strong arms, na workshop for eager hands. Yan everyone learnen many the ways of living, of working, even of Matagarna."

"Haven I na the mind for music." Jiffrei put in. "But Catrin, yan Mikal, yan Shuma, yan Shimon...they haven ai, hey. Learnen they many a good song, a-walking the Road."

"Singen we tonight!" Came a bellow from the kitchen door as Taylar stepped through, something immense in his hands. The enormous beast had been roasted whole, and sat in its' wooden platter set-about with apples and onions, stuffed with rice mixed with diced sausages and chunks of bread, and the heavy scent of it was spiked with wine, garlic, cloves and tangy citrus rind. The room erupted into cheering as he seemed to almost dance his way to the table amidst a rythmn of pounding fists and stomping feet.

"What, another party?" She heard her mother ask Shuma. "Are you people always celebrating -something-?"

"Often." Came the queenly woman's reply. "This is just a good supper to remember Gustav, Taylar's dog, and his saving of Catrin's life."

"How is it you have -time- for all these parties?!" Why does Mommy always sound so annoyed with them?

"You saw it today, Mata Prako- we are awake early and work late, with time for a long good nap at mid-day. Also, being wintertime, the working is less. In summer, when we are over the mountains, there is a very great deal more work."

"I -like- this, Mama." Melissa put in. "I think I'd like working the way they do- they always have enough people so it's not too hard to get a lot done."

"But this huge farm, all this food...?"

"Little Mother." Shuma said firmly. "You saw today how it is. It is a lot of work, yes- but that work can be divided among many, hey? And it is not so much work to make enough food for everyone, when everyone is helping. If a family is eating through a hundred pigs in a year, perhaps- Little Mother, pigs eat everything and oh!- so many little ones! You simply hunt them in the forest and keep a dozen sows on the farm to breed porkers who eat rubbish, na?"

"And Mama, Catrin was telling me before- in the summer they go through the mountains to someplace a long way away, and that's where they grow most of their food and hunt a lot of meat and stuff."

"Oh yes- the Longwood Tavishi will be planting three or four times as much of crops in the Great Pasturelands as here, and they will hunt every day as well, and when the wagons are loaded the oxen and horses will struggle to pull them over the mountains all filled up with food. Between the two places, there is always enough."

"Hey, yan this way there always time for feasting ai!" Fridei shot from across the table, gesturing with her bandaged and splinted hand.

"So what -is- that huge thing?" Elmira said, pointing to the dish and its' cargo as Taylar set them down opposite the fire. "A whole pig?" Taylar had drawn his long fighting knife and was using it to carve the roast, a big wooden spoon serving to scoop stuffing and vegetables onto each plate in turn as they were passed down the table to him. Just as he finished and scooped out something solid the size of Melissa's two fists together, Catrin answered her mother.

"Na, this is Gustav! Tonight we are celebrating him, remember?"

And then the whole place seemed to go a little mad for a moment. Unaware of the collision between Elmira and Melissa Jenkins's minds and the reality of Catrin's new information, Taylar held up the solid object, seeming half to weep and half rejoice, crying "Behold the heart of a Warrior! Behold strength, behold honour, behold cour..." He got no further, even his powerful singer's voice cut off by Elmira's shocked screech.

"That's THE DOG!? You expect us to eat DOG?! Never in my life, are you all completely..." Melissa felt herself turning as red as a Sunrider's shirt, and in a sudden fit of embarrassed fury she was on her feet and helping Catrin and Shuma brusquely escort her mother towards the bathroom, Elmira still spluttering in disgusted indignation. "Dammit all, where are you taking me!? DOG?! You're disgusting! That's ridiculous, it's unhealthy, it's unsanitary!" Without ceremony, as Catrin held the door open for her, Shuma hustled the squawking, swearing woman through the door, picked her up under the armpits, and unceremoniously tossed her into the steaming bathtub, cutting off her protests with a colossal splash.

"YOU explain it to her!" The regal Hearthlady fumed as she led Melissa back towards the main room, jerking her head at Catrin and the gasping Human woman, kicking forward onto her toes even more than usually. "If I try, disgracen myself like Timash Vanellen. Noisy frightened little barbarian!" She straightened her laced leather vest and disrupted hair, then took Melissa by the hand. "Come along now, Valta Shaqi, we have a feasting to attend to."

"Why did you throw her in the bath?" Melissa asked anxiously as they made their way back to the table. "I thought we were just going to explain, or get her to calm down...?"

"She is a foolish womanchild who does not know good food when she sees it, or honour, or any then thing else. She has spent all this day filling any ear she sees with complaints and sighing. Perhaps Catrin should bathe her and shovel her into bed like a girl of three! Fagh!" Shuma shook her long sable braid with a contemptuous toss of her head and took a split second to regain herself, stopping to turn Melissa so they could look each other in the eyes in the little hallway. "She is a good woman, Little Shaqi. But she must learn to learn, and she -must- learn to stop making scenes and crying like this. Simply because nobody will be doing as Timash did does not mean she cannot suffer for such a stupidity like this. If I know Jiffrei, he will have her turning his bellows and mucking his stalls every day for a week now, even after we have gone to the Margai or Iestri with Catrin...with your consenting, of course- she -is- your prisoner, after all."

The sounds of a second ducking- curses, splashing, a screech- came from behind the closed bathroom door.

"I..." She paused, feeling something like cool fear rise in her belly. "Shuma...do I -really- have to...is my Mommy -really- my prisoner? I mean, everybody keeps -saying- she is, but..."

"Hey, Little One, hey. If you decide she should come with us, she will- whether she wish it or no. If you decide she should be punished or forgiven, it will be as you say."

"Hey, Valta Shaqi. Ye her capten, na?" Shari appeared from nowhere, a glass in her hand and a wry smile on her face. Melissa noticed for the first time a bowing nod pass between the two women, Shuma moving gracefully- almost imperceptibly- aside for her senior. "Will na ye comen back to my table?"

My prisoner? My choice? Allright then... "Just a minute, Shari..." Melissa said, setting her face in a picture of indignant determination. She turned on her heel, stomping back to the bathroom door to find Catrin levering her mother, gasping and defeated, out of the water. Elmira was soaked, her hair plastered back, her clothing saturated and clinging.

"Catrin." Melissa said in what she imagined was her most imperious voice. "Take my prisoner upstairs and make her change her clothes. Then bring her back down when she's..." What's that word...aha! ..."Presentable. Then see if she can eat like a civilised person." She slammed the door with the redhead's shocked, gaping, fanged smile imprinted forever on her eyes and, taking Shuma's hand in hers, walked out to rejoin the feasting.

[Vrsovice Rebel]

Edited for length

[cowardly lion]

Edited for length??  Well, damn, I hope you *lengthened* with your edit . . . . . .

 

cl

[Vrsovice Rebel]

Actually, I had "chopped" the post when/where I didn't need to, and consolidated the two postings into one (delete free).