Snare

‘That they’re good with a bow when they have to be?’

‘You’re teasing, aren’t you?’ Arkazo was grinning at him.

‘Yes, of course I am,’ Warkannan said. ‘If you mean, do they sleep with men they fancy when they want to, yes. But here’s another true saying – make a comnee man jealous, and you’ll have a knife fight on your hands. Kindly don’t go propositioning girls who belong to someone else. We don’t need any more trouble on this trip than we have already.’

Warkannan was about to say more when he heard someone approaching through the raspy grass – Soutan. He was wearing clean clothes, pale khaki in the same loose cut that the Kazraks were wearing, and carrying his other things wet.

‘There is just something about a bath,’ Soutan announced. ‘Here’s your soap back, gentlemen, and I thank you.’

On the morrow they reached the Great River, where, late in the afternoon, they ran across an unusually large comnee of some thirty families. Their chief, Lanador, greeted them as hospitably as always, but he warned them that the comnee would be riding west on the morrow.

‘You’re welcome to ride with us, of course, if your road takes you that way.’

‘Well, thank you,’ Warkannan said. ‘But we’re heading south. I’m looking for someone, you see. Zayn the Kazrak. Someone told us he rides with Apanador’s comnee.’

Lanador blinked twice; then his face went expressionless.

‘Ah. Well, come have a bowl of keese with me.’

Lanador took them in to his enormous tent, where blue-and-green tent bags hung on the orange and red walls. The chief sat them down on leather cushions, then poured keese into the ritual skull-cup. Warkannan took a sip and passed it to Arkazo, who ran a finger over rough bone and nearly dropped it. Tareev grabbed it from him just in time.

‘Drink from it,’ Warkannan whispered in Kazraki. ‘Skull or not.’ Arkazo took it back, forced out a smile, and drank. Much to Warkannan’s relief, the chief raised one broad hand and pretended to cough, covering a laugh rather than taking insult. Lanador was just handing round the ordinary bowls when an old man lifted the tent flap and came in to join them. He was gaunt, with prominent cheekbones and long bony fingers; his grey hair hung down to his shoulders in greasy strands. The saurskin cloak and the true-hawk feather in his ear marked him for a witchman. He refused a bowl of keese and squatted down next to Warkannan.

‘Why are you looking for Zayn?’

‘He’s a friend of mine. I want to see if he’ll come home with me instead of living in exile.’

The old man’s eyes caught him. Warkannan could neither move nor speak until the spirit rider looked away, his mouth twisted in something like disgust.

‘Do you know where Zayn is?’ Warkannan said.

‘No.’ The spirit rider got up and left the tent.

Lanador rose, muttered a few excuses, and followed him outside. Soutan leaned over and grabbed Warkannan’s arm.

‘You idiot!’ Soutan spoke in Kazraki. ‘You never should have lied to him. Witchfolk can practically smell lies.’

‘What was I supposed to say?’ Warkannan shook his hand off. ‘That I’m going to kill Zayn when I find him?’

‘Imph, well. You have a point –’ Soutan broke off.

Lanador was lifting the tent flap. He came in, smiled vaguely at his guests, and sat down. As the afternoon wore on, he was as gravely courteous as if the incident had never happened. A few at a time, the other men in the comnee came in to take their place in the circle and drink. Warkannan noticed one of them studying him. A handsome, almost girlishly pretty young man, he carried the long knife in his belt that marked him for a warrior, and on his face were the green and yellow marks of old bruises.

That evening, to honour their guests the comnee cooked a communal feast over several different fires. Everyone ate standing up, carrying bowls of food with them while they drifted from friend to friend to talk. Warkannan noticed a pair of comnee girls, both in their teens, staring at Tareev and Arkazo and giggling behind raised hands. As the feast wore on, the two girls began to follow the two young Kazraks, always at a discreet distance, always giggling. Warkannan eventually pointed them out to Soutan.

‘Where are their mothers, I wonder?’ Warkannan said.

‘Trying to ignore the whole thing, most likely,’ Soutan said. ‘Do you know what they’re giggling about?’

‘No.’

‘Neither do I.’ Soutan shrugged. ‘Doubtless nothing in particular. We should be asking questions about this Zayn, not worrying about other people’s morals.’

‘True enough.’

But when Warkannan mingled with the comnee, everyone he asked claimed never to have heard of Zayn – not that he believed them. Since the comnees despised lying, their lack of practice showed. Warkannan let the matter drop and talked only of the weather and the ChaMeech. Some of the men in the comnee had sighted ChaMeech a few days past, but only three females.

‘Three females without any males?’ Soutan said. ‘That’s really peculiar.’

Their informant, a beefy young comnee man, nodded his agreement. ‘We left them alone,’ he went on. ‘They weren’t likely to give anyone any trouble.’

‘They wouldn’t, no, not females,’ Soutan said. ‘And travelling this time of year? Odd. Very odd.’

The comnee man drifted away, and Warkannan glanced around – no one within earshot. There was also no sign of either Arkazo or Tareev.

‘We need to talk about things,’ Warkannan whispered in Kazraki. ‘I’ll just collect our young colts.’

‘They can find our camp on their own,’ Soutan said. ‘I have no doubt that those girls are satisfying their curiosity.’

‘Their what?’

‘I finally heard what the little sluts were giggling about. Both of our boys have big noses. The girls were wondering if other –er – features are commensurately large. You know, the old folk superstition about organ size.’

‘Shaitan!’ Warkannan felt himself blushing. ‘Of all the immodest –! Their mothers should beat them within an inch of their lives.’

‘I quite agree. The mothers wouldn’t. Shall we go? The boys will come staggering back at dawn, most likely.’

Warkannan led the way downriver to their little camp, which he’d set up out of earshot of the comnee. While Soutan lounged on the grass, Warkannan built and lit a tiny fire of dried horse dung around a few pieces of oak charcoal, then sat down near it for the light.

‘There’s one good thing,’ Warkannan said. ‘If Zayn’s still with this comnee, he’s not off in the east, stumbling over Jezro Khan.’

‘If he really is the spy from the Chosen. We can’t be sure.’

Warkannan was about to answer when he heard footsteps crackle in the grass. He was expecting Arkazo, but the comnee man with the bruised face stepped into the pool of firelight.

‘Come walk with me,’ he said to Warkannan. ‘I can’t risk being seen here.’

Warkannan followed him through the dark night to the fern trees along the river. The comnee man leaned close to whisper.

‘My name is Palindor. Why do you want to find Zayn? The Spirit Rider says you’re lying when you say he’s your friend, so don’t tell me that again.’

When Warkannan hesitated, Palindor laughed, a cold mutter under his breath.

‘I hate him, and I think you do, too.’

The venom in his voice rang so true that Warkannan decided to trust him.

‘Yes, I do. The woman he dishonoured was my sister. I’m going to kill him when I find him.’