Shaman's Crossing

“I keep your son then.” The look he gave me was a measuring one, more chilling than anything I had ever beheld. I’d endured my father’s stern discipline and Sergeant Duril’s physical challenges and chastisement. This look spoke of colder things. “Take his horse. Take his knife, and his long knife. You leave him here with me. I will teach him.”

I think that if I could have begged quarter of my father then without humiliating both of us in front of the Plainsman, I would have. It was as if I were stripping myself to nakedness as I took my sheath knife from my belt and handed it over to my father. I felt numb all over, and wondered what Dewara could teach me that was so important that my father would leave me weaponless in the hands of his old enemy. My father accepted my knife from me without comment. He had spoken of the Kidona ways of survival and understanding one’s enemy as being the greatest weapon any soldier could have. But the cruelty of the Kidona was legendary, and I knew that Dewara himself still bore the scar of the iron ball that had penetrated his right shoulder. My father had shot him, manacled him with iron, and then held him as prisoner and hostage during the final months of King Troven’s war with the Kidona. It was only due to the cavalry doctor’s effort that Dewara had survived both his wound and the poisoning of his blood that followed it. I wondered if he felt a debt of mercy or of vengeance toward my father.

I unbuckled the worn belt that supported the old cavalry sword. I bundled it around the sword to offer it to my father, but at the last moment Dewara leaned forward to seize it from my hands. It was all I could do to keep myself from snatching it back. My father stared at him, his eyes expressionless, as Dewara drew the blade from the sheath and ran his thumb along the flat of it. He gave a sniff of disdain. “This will do you no good where we go. Leave it here. Maybe, someday, you come back for it.” He took a tight grip on the hilt and thrust the blade into the earth. When he let go of it, it stood there like a grave marker. He dropped the sheath beside it in the dust. A chill went up my spine.

My father did not touch me as he bade me farewell. His paternal gaze reassured me even as he told me, “Make me proud of you, son.” Then he mounted Steelshanks and led Sirlofty away. He rode away along a gentler path than we had come by, out of consideration for the women who followed him in their high-wheeled cart. I was left standing beside the Kidona with no more than the clothes on my back. I wanted to gaze after them, to see if Sergeant Duril abandoned his watch post and followed them, but I dared not. For all the times I had resented the sergeant’s eagle-eyed supervision, that day I longed for a guardian to be looking down on me. Dewara held my gaze, measuring me with his steely gray eyes. After what seemed a long time, for the sound of departing hoofbeats and wheels had faded, he pursed his lips and spoke to me, “You ride good?”

He spoke broken Gernian. I replied in my equally awkward Jindobe, “My father taught me to ride.”

Dewara snorted disdainfully, and again spoke to me in Gernian. “Your father show you, sit on saddle. I teach you, ride ontaldi. Get on.” He pointed at the three creatures. As if they knew we spoke of them, they all lifted their heads and gazed at us. Every single one laid its ears back in displeasure.

“Whichtaldi?” I asked in Jindobe.

“You choose, soldier’s boy. I teach you to talk, too, I think.” This last comment he delivered in the trade language. I wondered if I had gained any ground with him by trying to use the trade language. It was impossible to tell from his implacable face.

I chose the mare, thinking she would be the most tractable of the three beasts. She would not let me approach her until I seized her picket line and forced her to stand. The closer I got to them, the more obvious it became to me that these were not true horses, but some similar beast. The female did not whinny, but squealed in protest, a sound that did not seem horselike at all to me. She bit me twice while I was mounting, once on the arm and once on my leg as I swung onto her. Her dull teeth didn’t break the skin but I knew the bruises would be deep and lasting. She snorted, plunged, and then wheeled in the midst of my mounting her. With difficulty, I managed to get a seat on her. She turned her head to snap at me again and I moved my leg out of reach. As I did so, she wheeled again, and I felt sure she was deliberately trying to unseat me. I gripped her firmly with my legs and made no sound. She plunged twice more but I stayed on her. I tried to ignore her bad manners, for I did not know how Dewara would react to me disciplining one of his mounts.

“Keeksha!” Dewara exclaimed, and she abruptly quieted. I did not relax. Her belly was round and her hide was slick. The only harness she wore was a hackamore. I had ridden bareback before, but not on a creature shaped like her.