GriffinSinger

1. Seer, Sand, and Secrets-6

Mudbrick dwellings, most of them four and five storeys high, encircled an open plaza-like area. As the only female visitor who was not a servant, Irenya was given the honour of sleeping in the centre of a room on the fourth floor of a new lodge, surrounded by the women of the chieftain’s family and a gaggle of children. The room reeked of sweat and an odour both sweet and pungent. The women plied her with sweetmeats, drink, and endless chatter. Irenya caught sight of a face she’d seen only a few days ago, a girl no more than fifteen summers with eyes of hazel-green, startling against her dusky skin. She wore a necklace of beads, not blood-red but bright yellow.

The chieftain’s wife, Lumi, quickly restored order to the room and appointed Irenya two companions: Ulei, Lumi’s green-eyed daughter, and Rani, another girl of the same age. Both young faces beamed genuine delight at the appointment. Ulei skipped forward. Irenya raised both hands, palm out, to meet Ulei’s offer of friendship. She warmed to the girl’s musical giggle and her happy confidence.

Ulei and Rani, followed by most of the women, led Irenya out of the lodge, across the open town centre baking in the heat, and then to the river. Viewed from below, the falls began as one curtain. Halfway down, it separated into several lacy arcs splashing into shallow stone basins and spilling into deep pools where the silt settled. The girls guided her to a smaller pool formed by run-off and screened by a profusion of flowering bushes. Heedless of her protests, they undressed her in seconds, then drenched her from head to foot, rubbing her all over with foliage from the bushes. Irenya gasped at the sudden cold and cringed at the unaccustomed intimacy. The girls flung off their robes and pulled her into the water, splashing and laughing.

They helped her out and the women rubbed her dry with spare folds of their clothing. Irenya flinched as one wizened lady tested the weight of Irenya’s breast and lisped through toothless gums. Others crooned. Irenya heard the sound for ‘infant’ and several women held imaginary babes to their breasts. The crone pinched a n****e as though testing the breast for milk.

Irenya shaped her mouth to make the right sounds. ‘My baby … far away …’

The girls held up a length of pale-yellow cloth and began winding, folding, pleating, until Irenya’s body was out of sight once more. She sighed inwardly with relief. But the girls were not done; they oiled her damp hair with something sweet and pungent. Irenya coughed at the smell. She grabbed the nearest fabric, which happened to be the clothing of a vociferous young relative of Ulei’s, and rubbed furiously at her reeking hair. Far from upsetting them, they laughed hysterically. Her hair turned into shiny curls. The women converged, playing with Irenya’s locks, then trying it on their own straight, wiry hair, clearly disappointed. Irenya opened her mouth to ask the girls where the seer lived, but they were already hastening her to somewhere else as they both had duties to attend.

Around the perimeter of the open common, fires had been lit and the evening meal was underway. Smoke and the delicious aroma of cooking filled the air. In the middle of the common, Ulei pirouetted suddenly. She stretched her arms above her head and began to rotate her wrists in a slow, sinuous movement. Her bare feet beat a simple tattoo on the packed earth. Her hips lifted and dipped, insinuating as silk on skin. She began to sing—strange, quivering notes. The girl turned slowly in the drifting smoke, hips and hands curling, a wild secret in the curve of her mouth. As she turned a second time, faster, it seemed to Irenya the girl’s face stretched into a grimace of shock, and blood sprayed like a string of red beads from a slit throat. On the third turn, the smile was back and only a string of yellow baubles arced out from Ulei’s neck. Irenya blinked. Her eyes stung and she rubbed the smoke from them.

The food was delicious and filled the balmy night with the smell of crisp, roasted meats. At each fire, people sweated to outdo the others, offering great platters of meat with bowls of dipping sauces. After sampling a spicy sauce or two, Irenya declined them and stuck to the meat and the inevitable flatbread. Leachim explained the reason for so many cooking fires and the rivalry between groups.

‘The Sildahni were once separate tribes, often fighting, sometimes living in relative peace and intermarrying.’ He waved a hand toward the desert. ‘This area was green, good for hunting. The sands have slowly encroached, making survival harder. Over time, the tribes banded together, or annihilated each other, disparate groups thrust together by circumstance.’

Irenya looked around for Elaaron. He was lounging on rugs piled with cushions, licking his fingers and listening to the chieftain, Kidu. Irenya judged from the rhythmic rise and fall of the Sildahni’s voice that he was reciting a poem. She hoped Elaaron would remember to ask him where Fis lived and wished that she had spent more time at Ilkyrie learning the language.

After the feasting, the fires were rekindled. The Sildahnis took up their drums and flutes. The music gathered momentum and people began dancing to the complex syncopated rhythms. They stamped their feet and circled each other.

Leachim continued his discourse. ‘According to Sildahni beliefs, a sign from the desert will be delivered to them, and this sign, whatever it is, will restore their importance in Dar Orien. Kidu is ambitious enough to believe the sign will come through his family. I hope he is right,’ he raised his voice over the insistent drums, ‘because Kidu is not one to tolerate being overlooked. He believes there should be a Sildahni princedom. He wants a Sildahni voice on the councils.’

Irenya pressed her mouth into a line and sniffed before observing, ‘So they flatter Elaaron in the hope that he will use his position to convince the Ishterim to part with some land. And let me guess, Kidu hopes to become a ruling prince.’

‘Heartling, you are far too young to be cynical.’

She shouted over the increasing noise. ‘I’d say, by the smirk on your face, that I’m probably—’ the drums ceased abruptly, leaving her final words, ‘—not being cynical enough,’ hanging in the sudden quiet.

In the open space, circled by fires and lit by flaming lamps, stood Ulei, still as a painted statue. She was clothed in bright orange from shoulders to ankles, the fullness of the fabric pleated into a beaded belt pulled tight around her waist. The fabric, thin as gauze, revealed her perfect breasts. She raised her arms above her heavy black hair, wrists entwined like two snakes, fingers pointing to the sky. The other dancers melted away and an expectant hush settled around the fires.

The girl began to turn her wrists, the same sinuous movement Irenya had seen earlier. An older woman stepped forward, closed her eyes, and drew breath to sing. Slowly, Ulei lowered her arms, wrists turning, fingers stroking the night air.

Irenya felt her skin prickle.

The song slid, quivering, from guttural to piercing, through quarter and halftones. Ulei’s hips undulated to a rhythm as insistent and clear as if drums had beaten it out.

Leachim leaned closer and whispered in Irenya’s ear. ‘If I know anything about Sildahni custom, you are about to witness an event that will raise the level of your cynicism to the stars.’

Irenya barely heard him, so mesmerised was she by the rhythmic swing of Ulei’s beaded hem. The singer clapped her hands, a soft slap of curved fingers over a cupped palm, and the Sildahnis cried encouragement in guttural voices. Ulei’s hips and arms wove a silken pattern and her fingers drew curls in the air, stroking invisible desires. Her swaying skirt stirred the drifting tendrils of smoke and her feet moved effortlessly across the packed earth, bringing her step by step to the place where her father sat with Elaaron.

The dance increased tempo and the singer’s hand-clap changed to a resounding slap. Others took up the rhythm. The swing of Ulei’s hips became more insistent. A few metres from Elaaron, she whirled around and around. The singing ceased but the clapping grew faster, and with it the figure in bright orange. Her full skirt swung horizontally with the momentum, revealing naked thighs and a prominent pubis as closely shaved as Elaaron’s chin. The girl dropped to the dirt and the crowd cheered.

‘Now what, Leachim?’

But words were not required. Elaaron rose from his cushion and grasped a handful of beaded hem. He picked up the girl and resumed his seat, Ulei draped across his lap. The Sildahnis began a rhythmic chant, insinuating and unmistakable.

Irenya looked at Leachim. ‘Well?’