Read Online Being a Green Mother by Piers Anthony - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Piers Anthony
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policemen charged up to the graveyard.
Orb began to sing, accompanying herself on the harp. Her magic flung out, touching the moving men.
The men stopped, listening. They stood about her, doing nothing else. The Gypsies, beyond the range of her full magic, continued working.
Orb sang song after song, keeping the policemen mesmerized. In due course the corpse was out, and the pyre built. The fire started, and then blazed high, and the stench of burning meat wafted out.
The ghost appeared. “That’s more like it!” he exclaimed. Then, as his body crumbled into ash, he faded out.
Orb stopped singing and playing. She rejoined the Gypsies as their wagon pulled out. The police still stood, bemused, looking at the open gravesite and the pile of embers.
They went to the nearby river, and the women stripped and plunged in, desperate to get clean again. Then they set about washing their clothes.
Finally, shivering, naked, they wrapped themselves in blankets from the wagon. “You did it!” one exclaimed. “If that was not the Llano, it was akin!”
“It was not the Llano,” Orb said. But she was quite pleased with herself.
Hungary was the land of Gypsy music. World renowned composers and musicians were here, and Gypsy orchestras toured the country. Historically, the top composers of Europe had drawn upon Gypsy music, popularizing it as their own. Schubert, Brahms—the beauty of their music owed its share to melodies the Gypsies had possessed before them. The Hungarian pianist Liszt had transcribed Gypsy music as the Hungarian Rhapsodies.
Here the Gypsies were known as Tziganes. They had been here before the Magyar conquest, and the Magyars sought to profit by mingling Tzigane blood with their own. When the Tziganes resisted, laws were passed requiring Tziganes to become Christians and to marry only Magyars. This drove many Tziganes out of the country, into Russia and Poland and Germany and France, in one of their great historical diasporas. Many did pretend to accept Christianity, decorating their wagons liberally with crosses, but at heart theybelieved in no religion but their own. They were required to settle in houses and desert their own language; this caused another exodus, for no true Gypsy could be anchored in one place long. They were accused of cannibalism and severely persecuted for it, their denials being taken as confirmation of the charge.
Still they survived, and their facility with metal and wood greatly benefited the sedentary culture around them, and their music shaped that culture. It seemed that every blacksmith was a Gypsy, and every musician a Gypsy, too. The greatest of contemporary Tzigane musicians was Csihari, a violinist who was said to be able to charm the souls of the living and the dead.
So it was to this Gypsy Orb went. But no Gypsy of the region would tell where to find him. She was an outsider they termed “Ungar,” or “stranger,” not to be trusted. She realized with flattered bemusement that they took her for a Gypsy; her command of the language and customs had enabled her almost to pass as one of them, despite her honey hair. Perhaps they took her for a crossbreed, as Gypsies frequently married outside their culture. Yet it seemed that they held foreign Gypsies in greater contempt than they did the mundanes.
She came to a village where the Tziganes were especially surly—an extremely unusual state for this normally happy people. “What is the matter?” she asked.
“Csinka defiled the water!” she was informed gruffly.
“What?” Orb asked, startled by the similarity of that name to that of her friend Tinka.
“She walked over the underground pipe that brings our water,” the woman explained indignantly, taking Orb’s exclamation as outrage. “Now we have to forage at great range for our needs. It’s a terrible inconvenience.”
Orb sought out Csinka. The woman was almost suicidal in her chagrin. “I lost my way—I had a big package to carry and I didn’t see
Orb began to sing, accompanying herself on the harp. Her magic flung out, touching the moving men.
The men stopped, listening. They stood about her, doing nothing else. The Gypsies, beyond the range of her full magic, continued working.
Orb sang song after song, keeping the policemen mesmerized. In due course the corpse was out, and the pyre built. The fire started, and then blazed high, and the stench of burning meat wafted out.
The ghost appeared. “That’s more like it!” he exclaimed. Then, as his body crumbled into ash, he faded out.
Orb stopped singing and playing. She rejoined the Gypsies as their wagon pulled out. The police still stood, bemused, looking at the open gravesite and the pile of embers.
They went to the nearby river, and the women stripped and plunged in, desperate to get clean again. Then they set about washing their clothes.
Finally, shivering, naked, they wrapped themselves in blankets from the wagon. “You did it!” one exclaimed. “If that was not the Llano, it was akin!”
“It was not the Llano,” Orb said. But she was quite pleased with herself.
Hungary was the land of Gypsy music. World renowned composers and musicians were here, and Gypsy orchestras toured the country. Historically, the top composers of Europe had drawn upon Gypsy music, popularizing it as their own. Schubert, Brahms—the beauty of their music owed its share to melodies the Gypsies had possessed before them. The Hungarian pianist Liszt had transcribed Gypsy music as the Hungarian Rhapsodies.
Here the Gypsies were known as Tziganes. They had been here before the Magyar conquest, and the Magyars sought to profit by mingling Tzigane blood with their own. When the Tziganes resisted, laws were passed requiring Tziganes to become Christians and to marry only Magyars. This drove many Tziganes out of the country, into Russia and Poland and Germany and France, in one of their great historical diasporas. Many did pretend to accept Christianity, decorating their wagons liberally with crosses, but at heart theybelieved in no religion but their own. They were required to settle in houses and desert their own language; this caused another exodus, for no true Gypsy could be anchored in one place long. They were accused of cannibalism and severely persecuted for it, their denials being taken as confirmation of the charge.
Still they survived, and their facility with metal and wood greatly benefited the sedentary culture around them, and their music shaped that culture. It seemed that every blacksmith was a Gypsy, and every musician a Gypsy, too. The greatest of contemporary Tzigane musicians was Csihari, a violinist who was said to be able to charm the souls of the living and the dead.
So it was to this Gypsy Orb went. But no Gypsy of the region would tell where to find him. She was an outsider they termed “Ungar,” or “stranger,” not to be trusted. She realized with flattered bemusement that they took her for a Gypsy; her command of the language and customs had enabled her almost to pass as one of them, despite her honey hair. Perhaps they took her for a crossbreed, as Gypsies frequently married outside their culture. Yet it seemed that they held foreign Gypsies in greater contempt than they did the mundanes.
She came to a village where the Tziganes were especially surly—an extremely unusual state for this normally happy people. “What is the matter?” she asked.
“Csinka defiled the water!” she was informed gruffly.
“What?” Orb asked, startled by the similarity of that name to that of her friend Tinka.
“She walked over the underground pipe that brings our water,” the woman explained indignantly, taking Orb’s exclamation as outrage. “Now we have to forage at great range for our needs. It’s a terrible inconvenience.”
Orb sought out Csinka. The woman was almost suicidal in her chagrin. “I lost my way—I had a big package to carry and I didn’t see
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