Read Online Stone Spring by Stephen Baxter - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Stephen Baxter
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bread.’
Chona dropped his pack by the door and propped his walking staff up against a wall. He kept his blade hidden at his left side, however. Magho was a harmless sort, but you never knew, and he didn’t much like the look of the boy sitting against the wall. He stepped cautiously through the house’s clutter of clothes and bits of food and clay pots, making for Magho on his mats. Niches had been cut into the dried mud of the bricks in the wall, and small artefacts stood here, like sculptures of human heads, with bulging eyes and flaring nostrils and protruding tongues done in bright ochre paint. Chona knew from his previous visits that these were in fact real heads, the flensed skulls of honoured ancestors coated in mud and painted. Chona never liked to meet the eyes of these ancients, who he imagined might know the deals he was trying to strike all too well.
Magho cracked open one of his loaves, digging big earthy fingers into the thick crust, and tore off a piece to hand to Chona.
The trader bit into it. This ‘bread’, another word Chona had learned here, did fill your stomach, but it was like eating dry wood, and he knew that the coarse gritty stuff wore your teeth down if you ate too much of it.
Chewing, he sat on the mat Magho had indicated, crossing his legs. But something pale pushed out of the dirt before his mat. It was a skull embedded in the ground, its jaws gaping, dust sifting in its eye sockets.
The boy saw him flinch, and laughed. He was perhaps sixteen. He was wearing a robe not unlike his mother’s, not of hide but of woven vegetable fibre, dyed a bright green. ‘Nothing to be afraid of, trader man. It’s just another grandfather, wearing his way out of the ground. We bury our dead in the ground under our houses where the worms can cleanse their bones. So you’re sitting on a big old heap of corpses. No wonder it stinks of rot in here - that’s what you’re thinking, aren’t you?’
‘Shut up, Novu,’ his father said. Chona was startled at the change in his voice. Where he had treated the women with indifference, there was real hatred in his tone towards the boy.
But Novu kept talking. ‘The last trader we had in here was just the same. He threw up in the piss-pot—’
Magho leaned over and punched the boy in the side of the head. Novu went sprawling. ‘I told you to shut up! And if you did what I told you, you wouldn’t be in this plight now, would you?’ Magho took a deep breath, his massive chest expanding. Then he sat up and turned to Chona, his smile returning. ‘Don’t worry about that. I caught him above the hairline. The bruise won’t show.’
Chona watched the boy rise, cautiously, rubbing his head. He wondered why the father thought Chona would care. And why, if the boy angered his father so much, he was keeping him here in the house during this meeting. ‘He doesn’t bother me, Magho. He’s just a child.’
‘A child? A child-man, and that’s all he’ll ever be, I fear. The gods know he’s a difficult one. Here, try some of this tea.’ He handed Chona a clay bowl of hot, steaming green liquid. ‘We’ve business to do.’ He glanced over at Chona’s pack. ‘I take it you have what I want.’
Chona allowed himself to smile. ‘I wouldn’t be here otherwise, my friend.’ He leaned over and unfolded his pack. In with the bits of sky-fallen iron and shaped flint and fragments of reindeer bone carved into elusive fish and lumbering bears, he had tucked small parcels wrapped in the softest doe skin. He made a show of unwrapping them slowly. Magho all but drooled.
Small, precious items, bartered across the Continent, were Chona’s stock in trade. Not for him the heavy work of trading meat or grain, or sacks of unworked flint. What he liked to carry were treasures valuable far beyond their size and weight - and the further from their source you took them the more valuable they became. The fragments of obsidian he unwrapped now, taken from sites in a
Chona dropped his pack by the door and propped his walking staff up against a wall. He kept his blade hidden at his left side, however. Magho was a harmless sort, but you never knew, and he didn’t much like the look of the boy sitting against the wall. He stepped cautiously through the house’s clutter of clothes and bits of food and clay pots, making for Magho on his mats. Niches had been cut into the dried mud of the bricks in the wall, and small artefacts stood here, like sculptures of human heads, with bulging eyes and flaring nostrils and protruding tongues done in bright ochre paint. Chona knew from his previous visits that these were in fact real heads, the flensed skulls of honoured ancestors coated in mud and painted. Chona never liked to meet the eyes of these ancients, who he imagined might know the deals he was trying to strike all too well.
Magho cracked open one of his loaves, digging big earthy fingers into the thick crust, and tore off a piece to hand to Chona.
The trader bit into it. This ‘bread’, another word Chona had learned here, did fill your stomach, but it was like eating dry wood, and he knew that the coarse gritty stuff wore your teeth down if you ate too much of it.
Chewing, he sat on the mat Magho had indicated, crossing his legs. But something pale pushed out of the dirt before his mat. It was a skull embedded in the ground, its jaws gaping, dust sifting in its eye sockets.
The boy saw him flinch, and laughed. He was perhaps sixteen. He was wearing a robe not unlike his mother’s, not of hide but of woven vegetable fibre, dyed a bright green. ‘Nothing to be afraid of, trader man. It’s just another grandfather, wearing his way out of the ground. We bury our dead in the ground under our houses where the worms can cleanse their bones. So you’re sitting on a big old heap of corpses. No wonder it stinks of rot in here - that’s what you’re thinking, aren’t you?’
‘Shut up, Novu,’ his father said. Chona was startled at the change in his voice. Where he had treated the women with indifference, there was real hatred in his tone towards the boy.
But Novu kept talking. ‘The last trader we had in here was just the same. He threw up in the piss-pot—’
Magho leaned over and punched the boy in the side of the head. Novu went sprawling. ‘I told you to shut up! And if you did what I told you, you wouldn’t be in this plight now, would you?’ Magho took a deep breath, his massive chest expanding. Then he sat up and turned to Chona, his smile returning. ‘Don’t worry about that. I caught him above the hairline. The bruise won’t show.’
Chona watched the boy rise, cautiously, rubbing his head. He wondered why the father thought Chona would care. And why, if the boy angered his father so much, he was keeping him here in the house during this meeting. ‘He doesn’t bother me, Magho. He’s just a child.’
‘A child? A child-man, and that’s all he’ll ever be, I fear. The gods know he’s a difficult one. Here, try some of this tea.’ He handed Chona a clay bowl of hot, steaming green liquid. ‘We’ve business to do.’ He glanced over at Chona’s pack. ‘I take it you have what I want.’
Chona allowed himself to smile. ‘I wouldn’t be here otherwise, my friend.’ He leaned over and unfolded his pack. In with the bits of sky-fallen iron and shaped flint and fragments of reindeer bone carved into elusive fish and lumbering bears, he had tucked small parcels wrapped in the softest doe skin. He made a show of unwrapping them slowly. Magho all but drooled.
Small, precious items, bartered across the Continent, were Chona’s stock in trade. Not for him the heavy work of trading meat or grain, or sacks of unworked flint. What he liked to carry were treasures valuable far beyond their size and weight - and the further from their source you took them the more valuable they became. The fragments of obsidian he unwrapped now, taken from sites in a
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