The Daylight War

Inevera closed her eyes and took a breath. It’s only wind. ‘That Everam blessed you with a son so great, he needed no brothers?’ There was no hint of sarcasm in her tone, though she had heard these words a thousand times since meeting Kajivah on her wedding day, barely a week past.

‘Precisely!’ Kajivah bleated. ‘A mother knows these things. I always knew my son was destined for greatness.’

You have no idea, Inevera thought. Indeed, how could she? Kajivah and her daughters were illiterate and uneducated, with little to distinguish them. Dim-witted women who had loved the one male in their family too much and one another not enough. Until recently, they had subsisted on the unskilled work she and her daughters did cleaning the homes of affluent families and the charity of local dama.

Now, Kajivah would never work again, and live always in opulence. That fact alone was almost more than she could contemplate. True greatness was beyond her, like the sky was beyond the fish.

Kajivah continued to prattle on as she surveyed her new surroundings. She was harmless enough, and respectful of Inevera’s white veil, but she was forever underfoot, and doted on her son overmuch when Inevera wanted him hard.

She wished she could marry the woman off. She’d had Ahmann betroth his insipid sisters to his lieutenants before they’d even said their vows. They were comely enough, and the marriages would cement the loyalty of his men. The girls had cried with joy when he informed them, not even asking which of them would be betrothed to whom.

But Kajivah was too old to bear new children, and none of the men Inevera had suggested was good enough for Ahmann to agree to give them his sacred mother. And so she was consigned to their household and Inevera’s sufferance.

She’ll be good enough at watching the children, Inevera supposed, until they turn five and begin to outwit her.

‘Mother! Look at this!’ Ahmann cried. Inevera turned to see her husband, reaching tentatively to touch the water tinkling from the fountain in their receiving room. Before his fingers touched the water, he snatched his hand back as if he had been about to profane something holy. Having spent the last ten years sleeping in a tiny stone cell, it must seem an impossible luxury.

Inevera remembered her first visit to the Dama’ting Palace, and smiled as Kajivah ran to her son and the two of them began to unknowingly use a porcelain chamber pot as a water pitcher, drinking right from its rim. The girls heard their laughter and came running with a great many shrieks and whoops, all of them tasting of the fountain.

Inevera shook her head, finding peace easily. Kajivah was harmless, and her care was a small price to bring such happiness to Ahmann.

Three years passed, and each summer, Inevera presented Ahmann with a child. Two sons, Jayan and Asome, to be his firstborn heirs, then a daughter, Amanvah, to be hers. She acquired two sister-wives, Everalia and Thalaja, after interviewing every unmarried dal’ting in the tribe and casting the bones over the best of the lot. They were essentially servants, but fit to breed Ahmann sons to increase his status and holdings. Soon both were with child.

Ahmann had proven an excellent kai’Sharum. Given a beginning command of fifteen men, the dama had scoffed when he chose many of his former classmates in sharaj over older, more seasoned veterans. But Ahmann’s men knew him from when he had been Nie Ka, and were used to obedience. His unit had tighter discipline than any other among the Kaji, and they fought more fiercely, taking so many alagai that the other kai’Sharum had begun whipping their men to try to stir them to equal frenzy. Soon Ahmann was commanding fifty men, the largest unit in the tribe, and the least of his warriors held a kill count to impress any drillmaster.

Now the other kai’Sharum eyed Ahmann warily. ‘Kai Haival dreams of skewering me like a lamb,’ he told her one day as she bathed him. ‘I can see it in his eyes, though he does not have the courage to challenge me.’

‘I will need his blood,’ Inevera said.

Ahmann looked at her. ‘Why?’

He had always been bold, and that trait grew stronger as the years went by. He continued to obey, but as if Inevera were an advisor, like Shanjat, rather than the voice of Everam. He had begun to question.

‘To read his fate,’ she said. ‘To ensure it does not include killing you.’ And to keep searching, she added silently, in case there are more like you.

‘I just told you he did not have the courage,’ Ahmann said, turning away and leaning back against her. He closed his eyes, serene as she massaged his sore muscles in the steam. Stubborn.

‘Cowards kill as often as heroes,’ Inevera said. ‘Only they do not strike from where they can be seen. A knife in the back; a lie in other men’s ears; venom in your food.’

‘Even then, he would have to get past my fifty, and then me.’ Ahmann had no need to boast of his own unmatched vigilance and strength. It was true the chance of another man harming him was remote.

But where there was one man driven towards jealous fantasy, there would be others. If protecting the Deliverer meant casting for every man, woman, and child in the Desert Spear, she would do it.

‘And if he lashes instead at your wives?’ she asked. ‘Or your children? The histories are full of such tales. Can you protect all of us, all the time? What harm is there in knowing how deep his hate?’

Ahmann sighed. ‘He does not hate me now. He is simply jealous. But he will begin to hate when I must break his nose tomorrow, that I might bring you the bloody glove. You speak of unity, of our people coming together, but how will that ever be reality if your mistrust of even our own tribesmen is so strong?’

Inevera stiffened, but she bent in the wind and calmed before Ahmann could notice. ‘Perhaps you are right, husband.’ She dried him and led him from the bath. After a night’s battle and a hot soak, even Ahmann’s hard muscles were relaxed, and she danced for him before mounting him and putting him down.

Later, as he snored contentedly, Inevera slipped from his embrace and padded away to one of her personal chambers. Ahmann’s words continued to haunt her. They were foolish. Naïve.

And yet they were the very sorts of wisdom Kaji gave in the Evejah. The Damajah had trusted no one, but the Shar’Dama Ka always reached for the best within people, inspiring them to acts of incredible loyalty.

Perhaps he really is the Deliverer.

She knelt on a velvet pillow, spreading a casting cloth on the floor before her and taking out her dice. She kept a vial of Ahmann’s blood on her always, and sprinkled a few drops of the precious fluid on them as she shook.

‘How can Ahmann unify our fractured people?’ she whispered, and threw.

– The Deliverer must have brides to give him sons and daughters in every tribe.—

Inevera started. Often the dice were so cryptic their advice was meaningless, or gave only the barest shred of knowledge. Other times they were a slap in the face. Not only was marrying outside the tribe certain to get Ahmann – and her – ostracized, the symbol for ‘bride’ was the same as the one for ‘dama’ting’. Did Everam wish her to share her husband with other dama’ting? It was too much to countenance. Everalia and Thalaja might breed with Ahmann, but they had none of Inevera’s wit or skills at pillow dancing, no beauty to match her, or skill with magic or healing. Another Kaji dama’ting would be challenge enough as Jiwah Sen, but one of another tribe? Eleven of them?