Nebula Awards Showcase 2003 Part 22

Gallium answered carefully. "It is my honor to serve you, sir. But perhaps Governor Argali would also like to do her best by Ironbridge, by accompanying her bodyguard back."

Kamoj almost swore. She knew Lyode and Gallium meant well, and she valued their loyalty, but she wished they hadn't interfered. It would only earn them Jax's anger. She and Jax had to work this out.

Although their merger favored Ironbridge, it gave control to neither party. They would share authority, she focused on Argali and he on Ironbridge. It benefited neither province if their governors couldn't get along.

Perhaps she could still mollify Jax. "Please accept my apologies, Governor Ironbridge. I will discuss Lyode's behavior with her on the walk back. We'll straighten this out."

He reached down and grasped her injured foot, bending her leg at the knee so he could inspect her instep. "Can you walk on this?"

"Yes." The position he was holding her leg in was more uncomfortable than the gouge itself.

"Very well." As he let go, his fingers sc.r.a.ped the gash between her toes. Kamoj stiffened as pain shot through her foot. She didn't think he had done it on purpose, but she couldn't be sure.

She slid off the stag, taking care to land on her other foot. As she limped over to Lyode, bi-hooves scuffed behind her. She turned to see the riders thundering away, up the road to Argali.

2.

THE OFFER.

Incoming Wave Jul, the sun, had sunk behind the trees by the time Kamoj and Lyode walked around the last bend of the road, into view of Argali House. Seeing her home, Kamoj's spirits lifted.

Legend claimed the house had once been luminous pearl, all one surface with no seams. According to the temple scholar, who could read bits of the ancient codices, Argali House had been grown in a huge vat of liquid, on a framework of machines callednan.o.bots , which were supposedly so tiny you couldn't see them even with a magnifying gla.s.s. After these machines completed the house, one was to believe they simply swam away and fell apart.

Kamoj smiled. Absurdities filled the old scrolls. During one of her visits to Ironbridge, about ten yearsago, Jax had shown her one in his library. The scroll claimed that Balumil, the world, went around Jul in an "elliptical orbit" and rotated on a tilted axis. This tilt, and their living in the north, was purported to explain why nights were short in summer and long in winter, fifty-five hours of darkness on the longest night of the year, leaving only five hours of sunlight.

She had always thought it strange how her people counted time. One year consisted of four seasons, of course: spring, summer, autumn, winter. They called it the Long Year. A person could be born, reach maturity, wed, and have a baby within one Long Year. For some reason her ancestors considered this a long time: hence the name. Even more inexplicable, they divided the Long Year into twenty equal periods called short-years, five per season. People usually just called those "years." But really, it made no sense.

Why call it a short-year?The scroll claimed this odd designation came about because the time span came close to a "standard" year.

Standard for what?

Still, she found it more credible than too-little-to-see machines. Whatever the history of Argali House, it was wood and stone now, both the main building and the newer wings that rambled over the cleared land. Huge stacks of firewood stood along one side, stores for winter. Seeing them gave her satisfaction, knowing that preparations for the harsh season were well under way.

Bird-shaped lamps hung from the eaves, rocking in the breezes, their gla.s.s tinted in Argali colors-rose, gold, and green. Their radiance created a dam against the purple shadows pooled under the trees. The welcome sight spread its warmth over Kamoj. Here in the road, a fluted post stood like a sentinel. A lantern molded and tinted like a rose hung from a scalloped hook at its top, its glow beckoning them home.

They entered the front courtyard by a gate engraved with vines. Five stone steps ran the length of the house, leading up to a terrace, and five doors were set at even intervals along the front. The center door was larger than the others, stuccoed white and bordered by hieroglyphs in rose, green, and gold, with luminous blue accents.

As they neared the house, Kamoj heard voices. By the time they reached the steps, it resolved into two men arguing.

"That sounds like Ironbridge," Lyode said.

"Maxard too." Kamoj paused, her foot on the first step. Now silence came from within the house.

Above them, the door slammed open. Maxard stood framed in its archway, a burly man in old farm clothes. His garb startled Kamoj more than his sudden appearance. By now he should have been decked out in ceremonial dress and mail, ready to greet Ironbridge. Yet he looked as if he hadn't even washed up since coming in from the fields.

He spoke to her in a low voice. "You'd better get in here."

Kamoj hurried up the steps. "What happened?"

He didn't answer, just moved aside to let her enter a small foyer paved with white tiles bordered by Argali rose designs.

Boots clattered in the hall beyond. Then Jax swept into the entrance foyer with five stagmen. He paused in midstride when he saw Kamoj. He stared at her, caught in a look of fury, and surprise too, as if he hadn't expected to reveal the intensity of his reaction to her. Then he went to Maxard, towering over theyounger man.

"We aren't through with this," Jax said.

"The decision is made," Maxard told him.

"Then you are a fool." Jax glanced at Kamoj, his face stiff now with a guarded emotion, one he hid too well for her to identify. In all the years she had known him, he had never shown such a strong response, except in anger. But this was more than rage. Shock? Emotionalpain? Surely not from Jax, the pillar of Ironbridge. Before she had a chance to speak, he strode out of the house with his stagmen, ignoring Lyode, who stood just outside the door.

Kamoj turned to her uncle. "What's going on?"

He shook his head, his motion strained. Lyode came up the stairs, but when she tried to enter, Maxard braced his hand against the door frame, blocking her way. He spoke with uncharacteristic anger. "What blew into your brain, Lyode? Why did you have toshoot at him? Of all days I didn't need Jax Ironbridge angry, this was it."

"He was mistreating Kamoj," Lyode replied.

"So Gallium Sunsmith says." Maxard frowned at Kamoj. "What were you doing running around the woods like a wild animal?"

She would have bristled at the rebuke, except it was too far outside his usual congenial nature to make sense. She always walked in the woods after she finished working in the stables. He often came with her, the two of them discussing projects for Argali or enjoying each other's company.

She spoke quietly. "What is it, Uncle? What's wrong?"

He pushed his hand through his dark hair. "We can meet later in the library. You've several pet.i.tioners waiting for you now."

She studied his face, trying to fathom what troubled him. No hints showed. So she nodded, to him and to Lyode. Then she limped into her house.

For her office, Kamoj had chosen a large room on the ground floor. Its tanglebirch paneling glimmered with blue and green highlights in scale patterns. The comfortable old armchairs were upholstered in gold, with a worn pattern of roses. Stained-gla.s.s lanterns hung on the walls. She didn't sit behind her tanglebirch desk; she had always felt it distanced her from people.

A carafe of water waited on one table, with four finely cut tumblers. Kamoj was pouring herself a drink when the housemaid showed in her first visitors, Lumenjack Donner, a broad-shouldered man with brown eyes, and Photax Prior, a much slimmer man who could juggle light-spheres like no one else in Argali. Both were wearing freshly cleaned homespun clothes and carrying their best hats, with their dark hair uncut but well-brushed for this meeting. They bowed to her.

Kamoj beamed at them, a smile warming her face. She had known both farmers all her life. "My greetings, Goodmen."

Lumenjack's deep voice rumbled. "And to you, Governor.""Tidings, Gov'ner." Photax's hands moved restlessly on his hat as if he wanted to juggle.

She indicated the armchairs. "Have a seat, please. Would either of you like water?"

Both declined as they settled in the chairs. Kamoj sat in one at right angles to theirs, so she could watch their faces and judge their moods. "What can I do for you today?"

Lumenjack spoke up. "Photax be cheating me, ma'am. I come to ask your help."

"It's a twiddling lie, it is," Photax declared.

Kamoj suspected that if they had agreed to seek an arbitrator, the situation was probably salvageable.

"What seems to be the problem?"

Lumenjack crossed his arms, accenting his husky build. " Photax is plowing my land and taking my crops."

"It's my land!" Photax gave Kamoj his most sincere look. "He traded it to me last year when I juggled for his daughter at the festival."

Lumenjack made an incredulous noise. "I wouldn't give you myland for throwing pretty gigags in the air."

He turned to Kamoj. "I said he could have the crops, just last year, from a strip of my land that borders his."

"You said the land!"

"I meant the crops!"

Photax shot Kamoj a beseeching look. "He be going back on his bargain, Gov'nor."

Kamoj rubbed her chin. "Photax, do you really think such a parcel of land is a fair trade for a juggling show?"

"That's not the point. He made a deal and now he's reneging." Photax glowered at Lumenjack. "You're as crazy as that madman Lionstar." To Kamoj, he added, "Begging your pardon, ma'am. Lionstar rode through my fields yesterday and tore up my bi-grains."

Kamoj didn't like the implications. Lionstar seemed to be stirring from his borrowed palace more often lately. "Did he recompense you for the damage?"

"Nary a bridal bell. He doesn't even stop." Photax gave a theatrical shudder. "He was riding like a man possessed. He's a cursed one, he is."

She doubted it involved any curses. Lionstar's destructive behavior was problem enough by itself. "I will send a messenger to the palace. If he wrecked your crops, he owes you for them."

Photax looked mollified. "I'd be right obliged if you would do that, Gov'ner."

"That's why you're so set on Lumenjack's land, isn't it? Because you're going to be short this year."

"I can't feed a family by juggling b.a.l.l.s," Photax said.

"So if you get your recompense," Lumenjack said, "will you quit trying to steal my land?"

"Steal?"Photax bristled at him. "I don't steal. Yougave it to me!""Why would I do something so stupid?" Lumenjack demanded. "What, I'm going to feed my family rocks?"

Photax shifted in his chair, his mobile face showing less confidence now. "I heard you say it. So did my wife and other people."

Lumenjack made an exasperated noise. "If I said the land, instead of last year's crops on the land, it was a mistake."

"You gave your word," Photax repeated.

Kamoj sighed. Technically, if Lumenjack had given his word, he did owe Photax the land. But the mistake was so obvious, she couldn't imagine Photax holding him to it if he hadn't already been in trouble due to Lionstar's rampage. "How about this? Photax, I will see to your compensation for the crop damage. For the disputed land, why don't you and Lumenjack split the yield this year and then call the debt done, with Lumenjack keeping his land. That way, neither of you suffers unduly from the mix-up."

"I don't like giving him half my crops for nothing," Lumenjack grumbled. After a pause, he added, "But I will agree."

Photax moved his hands as if he were feeling the weight of light-spheres. "All right." He stopped his ghost juggling and frowned at Kamoj. "Do you think Lionstar will make good?"

"I can't say." She doubted it, but she didn't want to sound negative. "If he doesn't, Argali House can help you from our yield this year."

"It be right decent of you, Gov'ner."

"I wish I could do more." Her province needed so much. Not for the first time, she wondered if she should hasten her merger with Jax, to ensure Ironbridge support. After what had happened today, though, she dreaded facing his temper.

She talked more with Photax and Lumenjack, catching up on news of their families. They took their leave on better terms than when they had entered, though now they were arguing about whose son could throw a bowball farther.

She next met with the representatives of several committees she had set up: the storage group, which worked to ensure Argali had stocks of grain for the coming winter, when the village would live off crops grown during autumn; the midwives, who discussed childbirth techniques, with the hope that sharing knowledge would decrease Argali's heartbreaking infant mortality rate; and the festival group that planned the harvest celebrations.

The housemaid finally announced her last visitor, Lystral, orLiquid Crystal , an older woman who was well-liked in the village. Instead of arriving with her usual good nature, today Lystral stalked into the room. She wasted no time on amenities. "Well, so, Governor, have you done anything about that maniac?"

Standing by her armchair, Kamoj blinked. "Maniac?"

"Lionstar!" Lystral's scowl deepened the lines around her eyes. "That misbegotten demon-sp.a.w.n of a maddened spirit raised from the dead to bedevil the good folk of this land."

Kamoj held back her smile. Granted, Lionstar was a problem, but she suspected it had more to do with human misdeeds than misbegotten spirits. "What happened?""He and a pack of his stagmen stopped at my daughter's house in the country, where my grandchildren were playing. He jumped down at the well, helped himself to water, and broke the chain on the bucket.

He's a demonic one, I tell you. No normal man could break that chain-and Lionstar didn't even notice!

He scared the little ones so much, they almost jumped from here to the Thermali Coast. Then he just got on his greengla.s.s and rode off. Never even pulled down his cowl. Not that any of uswant to see his pud-ugly face." She put her fists on her hips. "At least his stagman had the decency to apologize before they went tearing after him."

"I'm sorry he frightened your family, Lystral. I'm sending an emissary to the palace. I will include a protest about his behavior and a statement of the recompense he owes you for fixing the well."

"I be thanking you, ma'am." Lystral shook her head. "I wish he would leave Argali alone."

Kamoj also wished so. However, he had a right to the palace as long as he paid the rent. She just hoped Argali could weather his tenancy.

The centuries had warped the library door-arch beyond simple repair. Kamoj leaned her weight into the door to shove it closed. Inside the library, shelves filled with codices and books covered the walls. The lamp by Maxard's favorite armchair shed light over a table. A codex lay there, a parchment scroll made from the soft inner bark of a sungla.s.s tree and painted with gesso, a smooth plaster. Glyphs covered it, delicate symbols inked in Argali colors. Kamoj could decipher almost none of the symbols. Now that she had taken primary responsibility for Argali, Maxard had more time for his scholarship.

He was learning to read.

Behind her the door sc.r.a.ped open, and she turned to see her uncle. With no preamble, he said, "Come see this."

Puzzled, she went with him to an arched door in the far wall. The storeroom beyond had once held carpentry tools, but those were long gone, sold by her grandparents to buy grain. Maxard fished a skeleton key out of his pocket and opened the moongloss door. Unexpectedly, oil lamps lit the room beyond. Kamoj stared past him-and gasped.

Urns, boxes, chests, huge pots, finely wrought buckets: they crammed the storeroom full to overflowing.

Gems filled baskets, heaped like fruits, spilling onto the floor, diamonds that split the light into rainbows, opals as brilliant as greengla.s.s scales, rose-rubies the size of fists, sapphires, topazes, amethysts, star-eyes, jade, turquoise. She walked forward, and her foot kicked an emerald the size of a polestork egg. It rolled across the floor and hit a bar of metal.

Metal. Bars lay in tumbled piles: gold, silver, copper, bronze. Sheets of rolled platinum sat on cornucopias filled with fruits, flowers, and grains. Glazed pots brimmed with vegetables and spice racks hung from the wall. Bracelets, anklets, and necklaces lay everywhere, wrought from gold and studded with jewels. A chain of diamonds lay on top a silver bowl heaped with eider plums. Just as valuable, dried foodstuffs filled cloth bags and woven baskets. Nor had she ever seen so many bolts of rich cloth: glimsilks, brocades, rose-petal satins, gauzy scarves shot through with metallic threads, scale-velvets, plush and sparkling.

And light strings! At first Kamoj thought she mistook the clump on a pile of crystal goblets. But it was real. She picked up the bundle of threads. They sparkled in the lamplight, perfect, no damage at all. This one bundle could repair broken Current threads throughout the village, and it was only one of several in the room.Turning to Maxard, she spread out her arms, the threads clutched in one fist. "This is-it's-is thisours?

He spoke in a cold voice. "Yes. It's ours."