Calling Up the Fire Read online

  ✷

  Calling

  Up The Fire

  Lori Martin

  ✷

  Lori Martin

  Copyright © 2014 by Lori Martin All rights reserved.

  To my family

  ✷

  With gratitude as always to Shelley Nass

  Lori Martin

  The Valtah

  Farmland MenDas

  Mendale

  Plains

  C l i f f s

  C l i ffs NC l i f fs

  The Sea

  Calling Up The Firee

  Feimenna

  (uncharted)

  Woodlands

  Second

  Hill

  Third LindahneHill

  O

  p e n Passage

  Fourth

  First Marlos-AnHill

  Hill e y

  V

  a

  Fifth

  Hill

  C a v e f a n

  Prologue

  O! Not in my days, my son, but in yours O! Not in my days, my daughter, When the Royals return, When the Royals return, In the days of my son and my daughter.

  – country song of Lindahne

  The Five Hills of the land of Lindahne lie under shadow. The temples of the gods are dark and silent. No sacrifice is brought by pious hands to the white gleaming altars; the sacred earth is fallow, waiting. It has been a generation since

  Lindahne was free. The Mendales are their enemies and their masters. Once in the first days of conquest, the Lindahnes had died – of disease, exposure, hardship, and always hunger: for it had been a War of hunger. Now they live, after a fashion. The best their country produces travels westward to Mendale, but enough is left to feed Lindahne bellies, and only their hearts are empty.

  The temple of Nialia, goddess of Fate and the weaver of their fortunes, still stands in vigil on the crest of the First Hill, as it has for all of mortal time. Her temple broods still over the palace below, where once the royals ruled; it is paced now by the boots of Mendale solders. The last king is dead; the queen is imprisoned, until goddess Nialia takes her to her last release. But the Lindahnes do not forget or forsake these things. “It will come again,” they whisper. “It will come again.”

  They whisper, too, of Dalleena-relas, exiled and missing these long years; they whisper of the royal child she might have borne. A child of sin and blasphemy, it is said, but a child of the Lindahne earth. They repeat this often – too often, perhaps; it has a wistful sound of legend.

  Though few know it, the legend is a true one. Two children had been borne, a special gift of the goddess. They were soon sundered, but Nialia set her blue seal upon each of them, as the sign of their joining, to mark their shared burden and fate. The boy-child has become a man in this year, living in security but an unease of the heart. Those who call themselves his parents protect his life by denying him truth.

  The second child has become a woman. She is a Mendale in her raising, a Mendale in her thoughts; the blood of her royal mother flows unacknowledged in her veins. Her dreams are dark. She fears walls, the fall of night, the feeling of time closing in: the grip of the goddess she does not know.

  She is the enemy of her own true people. And their greatest hope.

  Chapter 1

  Scayna heard the whistle of the approaching arrow and had the sense to be still. It hit with a thud into the target wood, just above her right shoulder.

  “What are you doing?” the chilhi shouted furiously. “Are you

  trying to get killed, girl?” Scayna dared to lift her head. She was on the wrong side of the targets, of course, on the shooting side: but practice was supposed to be over. Instead of lifting the warning flag from behind, and then leaning out to recover her arrows, she had simply stepped across the target.

  The frightened girl who had made the shot, young Pirri, was already galloping across the field. “Scayna! Are you all right?”

  “Yes, yes,” she answered impatiently. The chilhi was still roaring at her from the shooting line.

  Scayna had been a member of the Mendale army for two moons. Her father Quienos had urged her to it, now that she was eighteen and unwilling to marry. She knew that the chilhi, second highest officer of her Band, had already marked her out as a troublemaker.

  Her long fingers tugged the arrows from the target. The first three, straight and blue-feathered, had hit well, but the last was far to the side. Pirri, panting, came up beside her. Scayna pulled out Pirri’s arrow and handed it to her.

  “The chilhi wanted me to try again,” Pirri said. “She says I’m just not good enough. How did you do today?”

  “Better,” Scayna said. Her shoulders were aching from the weight of the bow slung across her back. She glanced at the shooting line. “Is it safe to move now?” she shouted.

  “Shh,” Pirri whispered. “Don’t be so disrespectful.”

  The chilhi’s answer cut across the field with the wind. “Scayna, see me after supper!” She turned in an angry swirl of cloak. As she walked away she called behind, “Pirri, come with me!”

  “Oh,” Pirri fluttered. “I’ll – I’ll see you later.” She rushed off after the chilhi, bleating nervously.

  The light was fading from the practice field. To Scayna’s left the training camp sprawled out, clustered here and there with tents and rickety buildings, a few horses, and the ever-present camp dogs. As the early winter dusk came on, the women of the Archery Bands sought shelter. New evening fires were kindled against the chill.

  On her right, horses were being returned to the stables from the riding grounds. The women worked hard and so did their mounts: the new recruits had to learn precise riding skills, which could save their lives in battle. They had to learn to balance the bow, to shoot straight from the saddle, while wheeling and turning the horses with their thighs. The older women, veterans of the War, had it easier. They were permitted to spend their afternoons in the camps of the foot soldiers, where many of them had husbands.

  In the year of Scayna’s birth, the Mendale army had conquered the country of Lindahne. Since that time the “Oversettle” – their occupation government – had ruled over the Five Hills and their inhabitants. But the Lindahnes had never been reconciled to this. They still despised every show of Mendale power, still begrudged every Lindahne cow or hen, fish or leatherwork, that made its way to Mendale. In the face of this entrenched resistance, the Mendale Assembly and its ruling Trio found it prudent to maintain a tight control. This required a large army.

  Although many units were kept here in Mendale, new Bands were often sent to Lindahne to reinforce Oversettle authority. Scayna hoped her own Band, training now on the plains outside of Dallin-town, would remain at home. She had no wish to see Lindahne.

  She shook herself out of her brooding. Glancing at the darkling sky, she lifted her bow and set off quickly across the field. Sunset was a bad time for her. She never liked to see night come on.

  Later that evening she presented herself outside the chilhi’s tent. The guard nodded and lifted the flap for her. “She’s been waiting,” he said.

  Chilhi Bhanay sat at her lopsided desk, writing. Her ranking, who was the commander of the Twelfth Archery Band, was commonly known to be lazy; most of her work fell to Bhanay. Scrolls were piled up around her. The cot-bed, folded neatly in two on its hinges, was pushed into a corner. Bedclothes leaked out of its sides.

  “Sit down,” the chilhi ordered.

  The plush chair beside the cot, complete with footstool, looked like a favorite. Scayna chose the hard straight chair beside it and swung it over to the desk. “You wished to see me, chilhi?”

  “Wait,” the older woman answered, still writing. Her grey hair stuck out behind her ears. �
��I’ll deal with you when I’m ready.”

  A well-made fire gave off heat and little smoke. Scayna’s eyes were drawn to the flames. A crackling thrust, a miniature eruption of yellow and blazing red, shot up from a newly opened log. Scayna’s breath took the heat into her lungs. Gradually her movements slowed, then stilled.

  “Now, girl. What I want to know is, do you intend to fit into this army or not?”

  Scayna turned her head back. Her eyes were reluctant; the lids hung low over her pupils.

  “Well? Your feel for the horses is good – in fact, you’re better with them than you are with people. Your archery skills need some improvement but they’ll do. It’s you I’m concerned about. I don’t see any of the eagerness or the ambition that an archer should have in you. Can you tell me why not?”

  “I’m sorry,” Scayna said. A warning of pain began in the back of her neck. I shouldn’t have looked at the fire, she thought.

  “Your father’s in the army, isn’t he?”

  “Yes, chilhi. He’s a trainer in the second camp over, in the Third Band.”

  “How long has he been there?”

  “Just a few months. He and my mother were in the Pottery Guild most of their lives, but my father was a soldier during the War. My mother’s in the camp, too. She’s one of the cooks now.”

  “I see.” Chilhi Bhanay looked her unsatisfactory recruit over. The girl was small, almost slight, but her arms and shoulders were well muscled from the constant archery practice. Above the black cinched tunic of the army, her face was colorless. Her thin mouth was pale and her cheeks seemed to have no blood in them. Only her eyes, dark and vibrant, sliding their look away from someone else’s gaze, held any proof of life. Her head was swathed in an ugly tarra-cloth.

  “When you were a civilian, did you train for the Pottery Guild, too?”

  “Yes, chilhi.”

  “Brothers and sisters?”

  “No. I have no – I have –” she stuttered. She passed a hand across her temples, which were now throbbing. Not now, not again. I can’t do this in front of the chilhi.

  “Why did your family leave the Guild for the army?”

  “We – had been traveling too much.” She forced more power into her voice. “We’ve been moving up and down Mendale for as long as I can remember. My mother is a good potter, but most of the Pottery Guilds won’t have my father now. He couldn’t keep a place any more.”

  “Drink?”

  “Sometimes. And temper.” She added, “He likes to have his own way.”

  The chilhi drummed her fingers on the scrolls before her. “You didn’t really choose an army career yourself, then, did you?”

  Too late, Scayna saw where her candidness was leading. Her mind had been too concentrated on holding off the pressing dark. But if the chilhi dismissed her, where would she go? To work in the Guilds meant being indoors, crowded in with people. Perhaps later, when she was well again (as she thought of it) she would be able to stand it, but for now the army suited her better. She would have had to do a short mandatory tour in any case, all the young people did, but she had signed up for a longer term. At least in the army, she could work mostly out-of-doors.

  “I want to be here, chilhi,” she said. “I’m sorry if you’re not pleased with me. I’ll try to do better.”

  “Are you well, girl? Your complexion is sickly.”

  “Oh, yes. I’m fine.”

  Chilhi Bhanay wavered. She had intended to be sterner, to show her anger, and if possible rid herself of this strange girl through a quick dismissal. There was something arrogant in her; she held herself as if she were the chilhi’s equal, or as if she were nobleborn instead of a common archer. Even the way she speaks, Bhanay thought. Well, she’s docile enough for the moment, what can I say? “All right,” she said finally. “You can go. I expect to see a big improvement.”

  “Yes, chilhi.” The pain had spread across the top of her skull. It was getting stronger.

  “Scayna?”

  If I can just find a little place to be by myself, she thought. I can hold it back, I can –

  “Scayna!”

  The sharpness of the voice stopped her at the tent-flap. “Yes?”

  The chilhi’s irritation finally hit into a target. “Why do you wear that thing?” she demanded. “It’s very unsuitable for someone in army clothes, and it’s not even clean.”

  Scayna put her hands up to her head, as if to protect herself from a blow. “Chilhi?”

  “Take it off. I don’t like it. Go ahead, do as I say.”

  “But chilhi, I never – I never –”

  “Is this the kind of improvement I can expect? Are you challenging me?”

  Scayna forced her fingers to stop trembling. Her hands unwound the back of the tarra-cloth clumsily and slowly. Burning humiliation licked at her.

  The tarra-cloth slid to her neck and became entangled in her cloak. She yanked off both in desperation.

  A cascade of heavy black hair fell in a glittering cloud. The glow of the fire seemed to reach out gladly to the shimmer of the strands, lighting now here, now there, as her hair billowed and settled on to her suddenly exposed neck and shoulders. Sparks shone among the black waves, like shooting stars across a deep midnight sky.

  Scayna stared down at the earth floor. Her hair covered her in a blanket of shame. The demon-aches of her head made her eyes water.

  The chilhi was without words. After a long moment she spoke, in a new tone. “Child, I’ve never seen anyone with – your hair is – It glitters! How can it sparkle like that? As if you had tiny jewels hidden in it. Is that natural, do you have something in it, some oil or –”

  “No, chilhi,” she whispered.

  “Has it always been like that? Really? Does anyone else, your mother perhaps, have hair like yours?”

  Scayna shook her head slightly. New sparkles were lit in her hair.

  “Why do you hide it?”

  She looked up, astonished.

  “Well, I grant you it’s unusual, unique –” Bhanay was flustered. “But child, you don’t have to wrap your head in that thing. Your hair is beautiful.”

  Scayna made a sound of disbelief.

  “Come here.” The chilhi waved her hand. “Yes, yes, come here.” Her fingers reached out in eagerness. Scayna, stubborn, stopped just before the desk. The chilhi leaned forward, catching the ends of the longest locks, and rubbed them together as if, crushed, they could give off a scent. “It doesn’t feel any different from normal hair. What could cause such – now what’s that, on your shoulder?”

  With her head pulled down, Scayna’s robe had slipped, exposing her right shoulder. She jerked back.

  “Scayna!”

  “It’s nothing, chilhi, nothing –”

  “Let me see.”

  The pain rumbled and crackled, a storm brewing behind her eyes. The liquid in them became real tears. In hatred, Scayna pulled at her sleeve and showed her skin to the chilhi.

  A blue mark, etched like a seal.

  “Is it a scar?” the chilhi asked at last. “A strange color.”

  “It’s a birthmark,” she hissed. “May I go now?”

  The older woman shifted in her chair, uneasy. Her eyes flickered. “Yes, you can go. But Scayna?”

  “Yes?”

  “I forbid you to wear that tarra wrap any more. You’re an archer now, you should look dignified.”

  She was betrayed. She stood motionless.

  “Just pin your hair up like the other women. By the howling wind, girl, why do you insist on hiding it?”

  “There’s something wrong with me!” she burst out, the words ripping from deep in her chest. “I – I –”

  She stumbled backward and slashed through the tent flap. The last sight the astonished chilhi had was of her hair, flying behind her on a current of light.

  The pain drove her past her own tent and the beckoning fire glowing within. She turned towards the trees, searching for a shelter beyond even the moonlight’s rea
ch, an animal desperate for a burrow.

  A dark to hide her dark. Sometimes it took her without warning; this time, however, she could calculate it almost to the moment. Soon, now.

  Her freed hair slapped at the skin of her neck. She whimpered as her sight began to fail. She careened into a tree and grabbed at its trunk. High piercing sounds, sounds that she knew no one else would hear, battered at her. She went down on her knees in the hollow at the tree’s base. Snow melted through her leggings to freeze her flesh. She pulled her cloak around her, yanking it free of twigs and upturned rocks; it carried another layer of snow to her. Her control was gone. The darkness mastered her.

  Towards the end the vision grew softer. A green and towering Hill

  – taller than anything she had ever seen – rose in brilliant life. First a sweet rich smell of earth, and a strange pink flower, springing up across the crest, blooming, blossoming, unfolding its color to the spring air. Then a shadow behind her: a woman’s figure cast long on the ground before her. She could not turn. The shadow lifted its arms, elongated on the grass, and a warm breath soothed and whispered along her back. Her young skin was engulfed by air and soft comforting fluid. She floated, naked. The shadow arms cradled her. “Ennnn,” the hum vibrated, distorted by water. “Ennn... illll... nnnnn...”

  Scayna came back to herself. The moon, higher now, had found her hollow. She shook off the snow but made no attempt to rise. No, not yet. The hill again, she thought. And a voice – ?

  She couldn’t remember the name it had called.

  Just past daybreak, Scayna’s two surprised tent mates awoke to find her standing before the mirror. She was hacking with a knife at what remained of her hair, which was chopped down to ragged ends and plastered to her skull. In the corner, the fire gave off the acrid smell of her discarded, burning locks.

  Paither Lista, riding up bareback, halted the mare with an expert pressure of his knee. He didn’t want to bring her too close to the holding pen, where the animals suspected of sickness were clustered. Though the day was cold, he wore no outer cloak; his sinewy muscular arms were bare to the elbow. A chill wind blew his hair, gold-yellow with darker streaks, down over his forehead; he brushed it back impatiently. His eyes, normally a dark intelligent grey, were lightened by the bright sun to pale smoke. If seen only from his right side, he could be considered handsome.