Read Online The Birthgrave by Tanith Lee - Free Book Online Page B

was no doubting this was a man’s gear—the peculiar sheaths with their cargo of spiked knives, the groin-guard under the tunic flap.
    â€œRoll back the shirt a minute,” he said abruptly. “I brought a salve for the cuts Shullatt gave you.”
    â€œNo need,” I said.
    Impatient at this presumed modesty, he came over and roughly pulled the shirt free of shoulder, upper arm, and breast. It was darkening; I could not see his face. But his breath was sucked in hard. He touched the mauve scars with nervous fingers, as if my flesh were too hot, and might burn him.
    â€œYou heal quickly,” he said.
    His fingers brushed the jade.
    â€œWhen you’re ready,” he said, “we’ll go down.”
    â€œWait,” I said. “How many men are with you? If they see me they will know me.”
    â€œMost of these men come from another place. The ravine men that ride with us set no store by you or your spells. It was the women’s doing, that anger, and they’ve had their sacrifice. They’ll think it’s Shullatt that’s gone with me.”
    He turned, and I followed, across the icy water, through the flowers, on to a strange new turning, that wound away into the rock where there had seemed to be no opening.
    Darkness, and water running on stone, then the starlight, heather tufted slopes, the stamp and whicker of ponies, and men waiting.
    Darak turned me to my right. A man brought up a little black horse, which I mounted and could ride properly now without a clinging enclosing skirt. Darak was up and already riding down the hillside. I fell in with the others, feeling as anonymous as they. I pushed the hood of the cloak from my head and let the cool wind thrust back my hair. It did not matter now if they saw me.
    I was adrift. The tide pulled me away. The need to think and decide seemed gone.
    Through the dark movement of bodies, I saw Darak. I kept my eyes fixed on him. I was in his hands now, and whatever degradation, misery, or pleasure awaited me, must come from him. At that time, this seemed enough.
    4
    We rode through the night, moonless, from one black place to another. As the sky paled, the first bird and animal calls began, and invisible sentries passed us on. Low in the hills now, I could make out great sweeps of trees to the west. Beyond the last hills on the horizon there was nothing standing up but sky. Everything beyond was flat. The Plains?
    We made toward the woodland, and it was not far. By daybreak we were in the trees, and in the new camp. A small river splashed through it over gray stones. The air was moist and green, but the smells of smoke and food, animals, leather tents, and man were familiar enough.
    It had interested me that Darak had brought so few men from what I took to be his camp in the ravine. Now I began to realize that this warren, too, was his, and probably others. While he was away in different places, his “captains” kept the inhabitants in order. Odd Darak trusted to their loyalty, but perhaps he had good cause to, or had made provision against any sort of rebellion. There never seemed to be a question of leadership, or any dissent among them.
    The riders around me dispersed, Darak being the first to go. He had got me out of danger, but that done, he abandoned me again. There would be new dangers now but it did not matter much. I dismounted and left the horse to graze, glad to walk off the stiffness of riding. I felt easy and unhampered in the bandit boy’s clothes. My legs were free, despite the chafing boots; the gaudy brown and yellow silk shirt with its slightly tarnished gold thread and tassels, the waist tunic which was no more than a leather flap hind and fore leaving the legs free, all the rest of the accouterments and ornaments seemed bright and fresh after the dark red and black in which men’s various beliefs had shut me. Only the mask now, the shireen, was a closeness and a cloying, but there was no help for