Dreamsnake

Chapter 7

Snake awoke before Gabriel, at the very end of night. As dawn broke, the faint gray light illuminated the bedroom. Snake lay on her side, propped on her elbow, and watched Gabriel sleep. He was, if that were possible, even more beautiful asleep than awake.

Snake reached out, but stopped before she touched him. Usually she liked to make love in the morning. But she did not want Gabriel to wake up.

Frowning, she lay back and tried to trace her reaction. Last night had not been the most memorable sexual encounter of her life, for Gabriel was, though not exactly clumsy, still awkward with inexperience. Yet, though she had not completely been satisfied, neither had she found sleeping with Gabriel at all unpleasant.

Snake forced her thoughts deeper, and found that they disturbed her. They were all too much like fear. Certainly she did not fear Gabriel: the very idea was ridiculous. But she had never before been with a man who could not control his fertility. He made her uneasy, she could not deny it. Her own control was complete; she had confidence in herself on that matter. And even if by some freakish accident she did become pregnant, she could abort it without the overreaction that had nearly killed Gabriel’s friend Leah. No, her uneasiness had little basis in the reality of what could happen. It was merely the knowledge of Gabriel’s incapability that made her hold back from him, for she had grown up knowing her lovers would be controlled, knowing they had exactly the same confidence in her. She could not give that confidence to Gabriel, even though his difficulties were not his fault.

For the first time she truly understood how lonely he had been for the last three years, how everyone must have reacted to him and how he must have felt about himself. She sighed in sadness for him and reached out to him, stroking his body with her fingertips, waking him gradually, leaving behind all her hesitation and uneasiness.

Carrying her serpent-case, Snake hiked down the cliff to get Swift. Several of her town patients needed looking at again, and she would spend the afternoon giving vaccinations. Gabriel remained in his father’s house, packing and preparing for his trip.

Squirrel and Swift gleamed with brushing. The stable-master, Ras, was nowhere in sight. Snake entered Squirrel’s stall to inspect his newly shod feet. She scratched his ears and told him aloud that he needed exercise or he would founder. Above her, the loose hay in the loft rustled softly, but though Snake waited, she heard nothing more.

“I’ll have to ask the stablemaster to chase you around the field,” she said to her pony, and waited again.

“I’ll ride him for you, mistress,” the child whispered.

“How do I know you can ride?”

“I can ride.”

“Please come down.”

Slowly the child climbed through the hole in the ceiling, hung by her hands, and dropped to Snake’s feet. She stood with her head down.

“What’s your name?”

The little girl muttered something in two syllables. Snake went down on one knee and grasped her shoulders gently. “I’m sorry, I couldn’t hear you.”

She looked up, squinting through the terrible scar. The bruise was fading. “M-Melissa.” After the first hesitation she said the name defensively, as if daring Snake to deny it to her. Snake wondered what she had said the first time. “Melissa,” the child said again, lingering over the sounds.

“My name is Snake, Melissa.” Snake held out her hand and the child shook it watchfully. “Will you ride Squirrel for me?”

“Yes.”

“He might buck a little.”

Melissa grabbed the bars of the stall door’s top half and chinned herself up. “See him over there?”

The horse across the way was a tremendous piebald, well over seventeen hands. Snake had noticed him before; he flattened his ears and bared his teeth whenever anyone passed.

“I ride him,” Melissa said.

“Good lords,” Snake said in honest admiration.

“I’m the only one can,” Melissa said. “Except that other.”

“Who, Ras?”

“No,” Melissa said with contempt. “Not him. The one from the castle. With the yellow hair.”

“Gabriel.”

“I guess. But he doesn’t come down much, so I ride his horse.” Melissa jumped back to the floor. “He’s fun. But your pony is nice.”

In the face of the child’s competence, Snake gave no more cautions. “Thank you, then. I’ll be glad to have someone ride him who knows what they’re doing.”

Melissa climbed to the edge of the manger, about to hide herself in the hayloft again, before Snake could think of a way to interest her enough to talk some more. Then Melissa turned halfway toward her. “Mistress, you tell him I have permission?” All the confidence had crept from her voice.

“Of course I will,” Snake said.

Melissa vanished.

Snake saddled Swift and led her outside, where she encountered the stablemaster.

“Melissa’s going to exercise Squirrel for me,” Snake told him. “I said she could.”

“Who?”

“Melissa.”

“Someone from town?”

“Your stable-hand,” Snake said. “The redheaded child.”

“You mean Ugly?” He laughed.

Snake felt herself flushing scarlet with shock, then anger.

“How dare you taunt a child that way?”

“Taunt her? How? By telling her the truth? No one wants to look at her and it’s better she remembers it. Has she been bothering you?”

Snake mounted her horse and looked down at him. “You use your fists on someone nearer your size from now on.” She pressed her heels to Swift’s sides and the mare sprang forward, leaving the barn and Ras and the castle and the mayor behind.

The day slipped by more rapidly than Snake had expected. Hearing that a healer was in Mountainside, people from all the valley came to her, bringing young children for the protection she offered and older people with chronic ailments, some of whom, like Grum with her arthritis, she could not help. Her good fortune continued, for though she saw a few patients with bad infections, tumors, even a few contagious diseases, no one came who was dying. The people of Mountainside were nearly as healthy as they were beautiful.

She spent all afternoon working in a room on the ground floor of the inn where she had intended to lodge. It was a central spot in town, and the innkeeper made her welcome. In the evening, the last parent led the last weepy child from the room. Wishing Pauli had been here to tell them jokes and stories, Snake leaned back in her chair, stretching and yawning, and let herself relax, arms still raised, her head thrown back, eyes closed. She heard the door open, footsteps, the swish of a long garment, and smelled the warm fragrance of herb tea.

Snake sat up as Lainie, the innkeeper, placed a tray on the table nearby. Lainie was a handsome and pleasant woman of middle age, rather stout. She seated herself, poured two mugs of tea, and handed one to Snake.

“Thanks.” Snake inhaled the steam.

After they sipped their tea for a few minutes, Lainie broke the silence. “I’m glad you came,” she said. “We’ve not had a healer in Mountainside for too long.”

“I know,” Snake said. “We can’t get this far south very often.” She wondered if Lainie knew as well as she did that it was not the distance between Mountainside and the healers’ station that was the problem.

“If a healer were to settle here,” Lainie said, “I know the town would be liberal in its gratitude. I’m sure the mayor will speak to you about this when he’s better. But I’m on the council and I can assure you his proposal would be supported.”

“Thank you, Lainie. I’ll remember that.”

“Then you might stay?”

“Me?” She stared at her tea, surprised. It had not even occurred to her that Lainie meant the invitation to be direct. Mountainside, with its beautiful, healthy people, was a place for a healer to settle after a lifetime of hard work, a place to rest for someone who did not wish to teach. “No, I can’t. I’m leaving in the morning. But when I go home I’ll tell the other healers about your offer.”

“Are you sure you don’t wish to stay?”

“I can’t. I haven’t the seniority to accept such a position.”

“And you must leave tomorrow?”

“Yes. There’s really not much work in Mountainside. You’re all entirely too healthy.” Snake grinned.

Lainie smiled quickly, but her voice remained serious. “If you feel you must go because the place you are staying… because you need a place more convenient to your work,” she said hesitantly, “my inn is always open to you.”

“Thanks. If I were staying longer I’d move. I wouldn’t want to… abuse the mayor’s hospitality. But I really do have to go.“

She glanced at Lainie, who smiled again. They understood each other.

“Will you stay the night?” Lainie asked. “You must be tired, and it’s a long way.”

“Oh, it’s a pleasant ride,” Snake said. “Relaxing.”

Snake rode toward the mayor’s residence through darkened streets, the rhythmic sound of Swift’s hooves a background for her dreams. She dozed as the mare walked on. The clouds were high and thin tonight; the waning moon cast shadows on the stones.

Suddenly Snake heard the rasp of boot heels on pavement. Swift shied violently to the left. Losing her balance, Snake grabbed desperately for the pommel of the saddle and the horse’s mane, trying to pull herself back up. Someone snatched at her shirt and hung on, dragging her down. She let go with one hand and struck at the attacker. Her fist glanced off rough cloth. She hit out again and connected. The man grunted and let her go. She dragged herself onto Swift’s back and kicked the mare’s sides. Swift leaped forward. The assailant was still holding onto the saddle. Snake could hear his boots scraping as he tried to keep up on foot. He was pulling the saddle toward him. Suddenly it righted with a lurch as the man lost his grip.

But a split second later Snake reined the mare in. The serpent case was gone.

Snake wheeled Swift around and galloped her after the fleeing man.

“Stop!” Snake cried. She did not want to run Swift into him, but he was not going to obey. He could duck into an alley too narrow for a horse and rider, and before she could get down and follow he could disappear.

Snake leaned down, grabbed his robe, and launched herself at him. They went down hard in a tangle. He turned as he fell, and Snake hit the cobbled street, slammed against it by his weight. Somehow she kept hold of him as he struggled to escape her and she fought for breath. She wanted to tell him to drop the case, but she could not yet speak. He struck out at her and she felt a sharp pain across her forehead at the hairline. Snake hit back and they rolled and scuffled on the street. Snake heard the case scrape on stone: she lunged and grabbed it and so did the hooded man. As Sand rattled furiously inside, they played tug of war like children.

“Let it go!” Snake yelled. It seemed to be getting darker and she could hardly see. She knew she had not hit her head, she did not feel dizzy. She blinked her eyes and the world wavered around her. “There’s nothing you can use!”

He pulled the case toward him, moaning in desperation. For an instant Snake yielded, then snatched the case back and freed it. She was so astonished when the obvious trick worked that she fell backward, landed on her hip and elbow, and yelped with the not-quite-pain of a bruised funny bone. Before she could get up again the attacker fled down the street.

Snake climbed to her feet, holding her elbow against her side and tightly clutching the handle of the case in her other hand. As fights went, that one had not amounted to much. She wiped her face, blinking, and her vision cleared. She had blood in her eyes from a scalp cut. Taking a step, she flinched; she had bruised her right knee. She limped toward the mare, who snorted skittishly but did not shy away. Snake patted her. She did not feel like chasing horses, or anything else, again tonight. Wanting to let Mist and Sand out to be sure they were all right, but knowing that would strain the mare’s tolerance beyond its limit, Snake tied the case back on the saddle and remounted.

Snake halted the mare in front of the barn when it loomed up abruptly before them in the darkness. She felt high and dizzy. Though she had not lost much blood, and the attacker never hit her hard enough to give her a concussion, the adrenalin from the fight had worn off, leaving her totally drained of energy.

She drew in her breath. “Stablemaster!”

No one answered for a moment, then, five meters above her, the loft door rumbled open on its tracks.

“He’s not here, mistress,” Melissa said. “He sleeps up in the castle. Can I help?”

Snake looked up. Melissa remained in the shadows, out of the moonlight.

“I hoped I wouldn’t wake you…”

“Mistress, what happened? You’re bleeding all over!”

“No, it’s stopped. I was in a fight. Would you mind going up the hill with me? You can sit behind me on the way up and ride Swift back down.”

Melissa grabbed both sides of a pulley rope and lowered herself hand-over-hand to the ground. “I’d do anything you asked me to, mistress,” she said softly.

Snake reached down and Melissa took her hand and swung up behind her. All children worked, in the world Snake knew, but the hand that grasped hers, a ten year old’s hand, was as calloused and rough and hard as any adult manual laborer’s.

Snake squeezed her legs against Swift’s sides and the mare started up the trail. Melissa held the cantle of the saddle, an uncomfortable and awkward way of balancing. Snake reached back and drew the child’s hands around her waist. Melissa was as stiff and withdrawn as Gabriel, and Snake wondered if Melissa had waited even longer than he for anyone to touch her with affection.

“What happened?” Melissa asked.

“Somebody tried to rob me.”

“Mistress, that’s awful. Nobody ever robs anybody in Mountainside.”

“Someone tried to rob me. They tried to steal my serpents.”

“It must have been a crazy,” Melissa said.

Recognition shivered up Snake’s spine. “Oh, gods,” she said. She remembered the desert robe her attacker had worn, a garment seldom seen in Mountainside. “It was.”

“What?”

“A crazy. No, not a crazy. A crazy wouldn’t follow me this far. He’s looking for something, but what is it? I haven’t got anything anybody would want. Nobody but a healer can do anything with the serpents.”

“Maybe it was Swift, mistress. She’s a good horse and I’ve never seen such fancy tack.”

“He tore up my camp, before Swift was given to me.”

“A really crazy crazy, then,” Melissa said. “Nobody would rob a healer.”

“I wish people wouldn’t keep telling me that,” Snake said. “If he doesn’t want to rob me, what does he want?”

Melissa tightened her grip around Snake’s waist, and her arm brushed the handle of Snake’s knife.

“Why didn’t you kill him?” she asked. “Or stab him good, anyway.”

Snake touched the smooth bone handle. “I never even thought of it,” she said. ‘’I’ve never used my knife against anyone.“ She wondered, in fact, if she could use it against anyone. Melissa did not reply.

Swift climbed the trail. Pebbles spun from her hooves and clattered down the sheer side of the cliff.

“Did Squirrel behave himself?” Snake finally asked.

“Yes, mistress. And he isn’t lame at all now.”

“That’s good.”

“He’s fun to ride. I never saw a horse striped like him before.”

“I had to do something original before I was accepted as a healer, so I made Squirrel,” she said. “No one ever isolated that gene before.” She realized Melissa would have no idea what she was talking about; she wondered if the fight had affected her more than she thought.

“You made him?”

“I made… a medicine… that would make him be born the color he is. I had to change a living creature without hurting it to prove I was good enough to work on changing the serpents. So we can cure more diseases.“

“I wish I could do something like that.”

“Melissa, you can ride horses I wouldn’t go near.”

Melissa said nothing.

“What’s wrong?”

“I was going to be a jockey.”

She was a small, thin child, and she could certainly ride anything. “Then why—” Snake cut herself off, for she realized why Melissa could not be a jockey in Mountainside.

Finally the child said, “The mayor wants jockeys as pretty as his horses.”

Snake took Melissa’s hand and squeezed it gently. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay here, mistress.”

The lights of the courtyard reached toward them. Swift’s hooves clattered on the stone. Melissa slipped from the mare’s back.

“Melissa?”

“Don’t worry, mistress, I’ll put your horse away. Hey!” she called. “Open the door!”

Snake got down slowly and unfastened the serpent case from the saddle. She was already stiff, and her bad knee ached fiercely.

The residence door opened and a servant in night-clothes peered out. “Who’s there?”

“It’s Mistress Snake,” Melissa said from the darkness. “She’s hurt.”

“I’m all right,” Snake said, but with a shocked exclamation the servant turned away, calling for help, and then came running into the courtyard.

“Why didn’t you bring her inside?” He reached out to support Snake. She gently held him away. Other people came running out and milled around her.

“Come get the horse, you foolish child!”

“Leave her alone!” Snake said sharply. “Thank you, Melissa.”

“You’re welcome, mistress.”

As Snake entered the vaulted hallway, Gabriel came clattering down the huge curved staircase. “Snake, what’s wrong? — Good lords, what happened?”

“I’m all right,” she said again. “I just got in a fight with an incompetent thief.” It was more than that, though. She knew it now.

She thanked the servants and went upstairs to the south tower with Gabriel. He stood uneasily and restlessly by while she checked Mist and Sand, for he had urged her to take care of herself first. The two serpents had not been hurt, so Snake left them in their compartments and went into the bathroom.

She caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror: her face was covered with blood and her hair was matted against her scalp. Her blue eyes stared out at her.

“You look like you’ve almost been murdered.” He turned on the water and brought out washcloths and towels.

“I do, don’t I?”

Gabriel dabbed at the gash across her forehead and up above the hairline. Snake could see its edges in the mirror: it was a shallow, thin cut that must have been made with the edge of a ring, not a knuckle.

“Maybe you should lie down.”

“Scalp wounds always bleed like that,” Snake said. “It isn’t as bad as it looks.” She glanced down at herself and laughed sadly. “New shirts are never very comfortable but this is a hard way to age one.” The shoulder and elbow were ripped out, and the right knee of her pants, from her fall to the cobblestones; and dirt was ground into the fabric. Through the holes she could see bruises forming.

“I’ll get you another,” Gabriel said. “I can’t believe this happened. There’s hardly any robbery in Mountainside. And everybody knows you’re a healer. Who would attack a healer?”

Snake took the cloth from him and finished washing the cut. Gabriel had cleaned it too gently; Snake did not much want it to heal over dirt and bits of gravel.

“I wasn’t attacked by anyone from Mountainside,” she said.

Gabriel sponged the knee of her pants to loosen the material where dry blood glued it to her skin. Snake told him about the crazy.

“At least it wasn’t one of our people,” Gabriel said. “And a stranger will be easier to find.”

“Maybe so.” But the crazy had escaped the search of the desert people; a town had many more hiding places.

She stood up. Her knee was getting sorer. She limped to the big tub and turned on the water, very hot. Gabriel helped her out of the rest of her clothes and sat nearby while she soaked the aches away. He fidgeted, angry at what had happened.

“Where were you when the crazy attacked you? I’m going to send the town guards out to search.”

“Oh, Gabriel, leave it for tonight. It’s been at least an hour — he’ll be long gone. All you’ll do is make people get up out of their warm beds to run around town and get other people up out of their warm beds.”

“I want to do something.”

“I know. But there’s nothing to be done for now.” She lay back and closed her eyes.

“Gabriel,” she said suddenly after several minutes of silence, “what happened to Melissa?”

She glanced over at him; he frowned.

“Who?”

“Melissa. The little stable-hand with burn scars. She’s ten or eleven and she has red hair.”

“I don’t know — I don’t think I’ve seen her.”

“She rides your horse for you.”

“Rides my horse! A ten-year-old child? That’s ridiculous.”

“She told me she rides him. She didn’t sound like she was lying.”

“Maybe she sits on my horse’s back when Ras leads him out to pasture. I’m not even sure he’d stand for that, though. Ras can’t ride him — how could a child?“

“Well, never mind,” Snake said. Perhaps Melissa had simply wanted to impress her; she would not be surprised if the child lived in fantasies. But Snake found she could not dismiss Melissa’s claim so lightly. “That doesn’t matter,” she said to Gabriel. “I just wondered how she got burned.”

“I don’t know.”

Exhausted, feeling that if she stayed in the bath any longer she would fall asleep, Snake pushed herself out of the tub. Gabriel wrapped a big towel around her and helped her dry her back and her legs, for she was still very sore.

“There was a fire down at the stable,” he said abruptly. “Four or five years ago. But I thought no one was hurt. Ras even got most of the horses out.”

“Melissa hid from me,” Snake said. “Could she have been hiding for four years?”

Gabriel remained silent for a moment. “If she’s scarred…”He shrugged uneasily. “I don’t like to think of it this way, but I’ve been hiding from almost everyone for three years. I guess it’s possible.”

He helped her back to the bedroom and stopped just inside the doorway, suddenly awkward. Snake realized all at once that she had been as good as teasing him again, without intending to. She wished she could offer him a place in her bed tonight; she would have liked the companionship. But she was not inexhaustible. Right now she had no energy for sex or even for sympathy, and she did not want to tease him even more by expecting him to lie chaste all night beside her.

“Good night, Gabriel,” she said. “I wish we had last night to live over again.”

He controlled disappointment well, disappointment and the embarrassment of realizing he was disappointed, though he knew she was hurt and tired. They merely kissed good night. Snake felt a sudden surge of desire. All that kept her from asking him to stay was the knowledge of how she would feel in the morning after tonight’s physical and emotional stress. More exertion of body and mind, even pleasurable passion, would only make things worse.“

“Damn,” Snake said as Gabriel stepped back. “That crazy keeps adding to what he owes.”

A sound roused Snake from deep, exhausted sleep. She thought Larril had come about the mayor, but no one spoke. Light from the hallway illuminated the room for an instant, then the door closed, leaving darkness again. Snake lay very still. She could hear her heart pounding as she readied herself for defense, remembering what Melissa had said about her knife. In a camp it was always nearby, though she no more expected to be attacked while traveling than while sleeping in the mayor’s castle. But tonight her belt and knife lay somewhere on the floor where she had dropped them, or perhaps even in the bathroom. She did not remember. Her head ached and her knee hurt.

What am I thinking of? she wondered. I don’t even know how to fight with a knife.

“Mistress Snake?” The voice was so soft she could barely hear it.

Turning, Snake sat bolt upright, fully awake, her fist relaxing even as reflex had clenched it.

“What — Melissa?”

“Yes, mistress.”

“Thank gods you spoke — I almost hit you.”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t really mean to wake you up. I just… I wanted to be sure…”

“Is anything wrong?”

“No, but I didn’t know if you were all right. I always see lights up here and I thought nobody went to bed till way late. I thought maybe I could ask somebody. Only… I couldn’t. I better go.”

“No, wait.” Snake’s eyes were better accustomed to the darkness and she could see Melissa’s form, the ghost of faint light on the sun-bleached streaks in her red hair; and she could smell the pleasant odor of hay and clean horses.

“It was sweet of you to come all this way to ask about me.” She drew Melissa closer, leaned down, and kissed her forehead. The thick curly bangs could not completely hide the irregularity of scar tissue beneath them.

Melissa stiffened and pulled away. “How can you stand to touch me?”

“Melissa, dear—” Snake reached out and turned up the light before Melissa could stop her. The child turned away. Snake took her by the shoulder and gently brought her around until they were facing each other. Melissa would not look at her.

“I like you. I always touch the people I like. Other people would like you, too, if you gave them a chance.”

“That’s not what Ras says. He says nobody in Mountainside wants to look at uglies.”

“Well, I say Ras is a hateful person, and I say he has other reasons for making you afraid of everyone. He takes credit for what you do, doesn’t he? He pretends he’s the one who gentles the horses and rides them.”

Melissa shrugged, her head down so the scar was less visible.

“And the fire,” Snake said. “What really happened? Gabriel said Ras saved the horses, but you’re the one who got hurt.”

“Everybody knows a little eight-year-old kid couldn’t get horses out of a fire,” Melissa said.

“Oh, Melissa…”

“I don’t care!”

“Don’t you?”

“I get a place to live. I get to eat. I get to stay with the horses, they don’t mind…”

“Melissa, gods! Why do you stay here? People need more than food and somewhere to sleep!”

“I can’t leave. I’m not fourteen.”

“Did he tell you you’re bound to him? Bonding isn’t allowed in Mountainside.”

“I’m not a bondservant,” Melissa said irritably. “I’m twelve. How old did you think I was?”

“I thought you were about twelve,” Snake said, not wanting to admit how much younger she had really thought Melissa was. “What difference does that make?”

“Could you go where you wanted when you were twelve?”

“Yes, of course I could. I was lucky enough to be in a place I didn’t want to leave, but I could have gone.”

Melissa blinked. “Oh,” she said. “Well… here it’s different. If you leave, your guardian comes after you. I did it once and that’s what happened.”

“But why?”

“Because I can’t hide,” Melissa said angrily. “You think people wouldn’t mind, but they told Ras where I was so he’d take me back—”

Snake reached out and touched her hand. Melissa fell silent.

“I’m sorry,” Snake said. “That isn’t what I meant. I meant what gives anyone the right to make you stay where you don’t want to? Why did you have to hide? Couldn’t you just take your pay and go where you wanted?”

Melissa laughed sharply. “My pay! Kids don’t get paid. Ras is my guardian. I have to do what he says. I have to stay with him. That’s law.”

“It’s a terrible law. I know he hurts you — the law wouldn’t make you stay with someone like him. Let me talk to the mayor, maybe he can fix it so you can do what you want.”

“Mistress, no!” Melissa flung herself down at the side of the bed, kneeling, clutching the sheets. “Who else would take me? Nobody! They’d leave me with him, but they would’ve made me say bad things about him. And then he’ll just, he’ll just be meaner. Please don’t change anything!”

Snake drew her from her knees and put her arms around her, but Melissa huddled in on herself, pulling back from Snake’s embrace, then, suddenly, flinching forward with a sharp gasp as Snake, releasing her, slid her hand across the child’s shoulder blade.

“Melissa, what is it?”

“Nothing!”

Snake loosened Melissa’s shirttail and looked at her back. She had been beaten with a piece of leather, or a switch: something that would hurt but not draw blood, not prevent Melissa from working.

“How—” She stopped. “Oh, damn. Ras was angry at me, wasn’t he? I reprimanded him and just got you into trouble, didn’t I?”

“Mistress Snake, when he wants to hit, he hits. He doesn’t plan it. It’s the same whether it’s me or the horses.” She stepped back, glancing at the door.

“Don’t go. Stay here tonight. Tomorrow we can think of something to do.”

“No, please, mistress, it’s all right. Never mind. I’ve been here all my life. I know how to get along. Don’t do anything. Please. I’ve got to go.”

“Wait—”

But Melissa slipped out of the room. The door closed behind her. By the time Snake climbed out of bed and stumbled after her, she was halfway to the stairs. Snake supported herself against the doorjamb, leaning out into the hall. “We have to talk about this!” she called, but Melissa ran silently down the stairs and vanished.

Snake limped back to her luxurious bed, got under her warm blankets, and turned down the lamp, thinking of Melissa out in the dark, chilly night. Awakening slowly, Snake lay very still, wishing she could sleep through the day and have it over. She was so seldom sick that she had difficulty making herself take it easy when she was ill. Considering the stern lectures she had given Gabriel’s father, she would make quite a fool of herself if she did not follow her own advice now. Snake sighed. She could work hard all day; she could make long journeys on foot or on horseback, and she would be all right. But anger and adrenalin and the violence of a fight combined against her.

Gathering herself, she moved slowly. She caught her breath and froze. The ache in her right knee, where the arthritis was worst, turned sharp. Her knee was swollen and stiff and she ached in all her joints. She was used to the aches. But today, for the first time, the worst twinges had spread to her right shoulder. She lay back. If she forced herself to travel today, she would be laid up even longer soon, somewhere out on the desert. She could make herself ignore pain when that was necessary, but it took a great deal of energy and had to be paid for afterwards. Right now her body had no energy to spare.

She still could not remember where she had left her belt, nor, now that she thought about it, why she had been looking for it during the night — Snake sat up abruptly, remembering Melissa, and almost cried out. But guilt was as strong as the protests of her body. She had to do something. Yet confronting Ras would not help her young friend. Snake had seen that already. She did not know what she could do. For the moment she did not even know if she could get herself into the bathroom.

That much, at least, she managed. And her belt pouch was there as well, neatly hung on a hook with her belt and knife. As far as she recalled she had left all her things where they fell. She was slightly embarrassed, for she was not ordinarily quite so untidy.

Her forehead was bruised and the long shallow cut thickly scabbed: nothing to be done about that. Snake got her aspirin from the belt pouch, took a heavy dose, and limped back to bed. Waiting for sleep she wondered how much more frequent the arthritis attacks would get as she grew older. They were inevitable, but it was not inevitable that she would have such a comfortable place in which to recover.

The sun was high and scarlet beyond thin gray clouds when she woke again. Her ears rang faintly from the aspirin. She bent her right knee tentatively and felt relief when she found it more limber and less sore. The hesitant knock that had awakened her came again.

“Come in.”

Gabriel opened the door and leaned inside.

“Snake, are you all right?”

“Yes, come on in.”

Gabriel entered as she sat up.

“I’m sorry if I woke you but I looked in a couple of times and you never even moved.”

Snake pulled aside the bedclothes and showed him her knee. Much of the swelling had gone down, but it was clearly not normal, and the bruises had turned black and purple.

“Good lords,” Gabriel said.

“It’ll be better by morning,” Snake said. She moved over so he could sit beside her. “Could be worse, I guess.”

“I sprained my knee once and it looked like a melon for a week. Tomorrow, you say? Healers must heal fast.”

“I didn’t sprain it last night, I only bruised it. The swelling’s mostly arthritis.”

“Arthritis! I thought you never get sick.”

“I never catch contagious diseases. Healers always get arthritis, unless we get something worse.” She shrugged. “It’s because of the immunities I told you about. Sometimes they go a little wrong and attack the same body that formed them.” She saw no reason to describe the really serious diseases healers were prone to. Gabriel offered to get her some breakfast and she found to her surprise that she was hungry.

Snake spent the day taking hot baths and lying in bed, asleep from so much aspirin. That was the effect it had on her, at least. Every so often Gabriel came in and sat with her for a while, or Larril brought a tray, or Brian reported on how the mayor was getting along. Gabriel’s father had not needed Snake’s care since the night he had tried to get up; Brian was a much better nurse than she.

She was anxious to leave, anxious to cross the valley and the next ridge of mountains, anxious to get started on her trip to the city. Its potentialities fascinated her. And she was anxious to leave the mayor’s castle. She was as comfortable as she had ever been, even back home in the healers’ station. Yet the residence was an unpleasant place in which to live: familiarity with it brought a clearer perception of the emotional strains between the people. There was too much building and not enough family; too much power and no protection against it. The mayor kept his strengths to himself, without passing them on, and Ras’s strength was misused. As much as Snake wanted to leave, she did not know how she could without doing something for Melissa. Melissa…

The mayor had a library, and Larril had brought Snake some of its books. She tried to read. Ordinarily she would have absorbed several in a day, reading much too fast, she knew, for proper appreciation. But this time she was bored and restless and distracted and disturbed.

Midafternoon. Snake got up and limped to a chair by the window where she could look out over the valley. Gabriel was not even here to talk to, for he had gone to Mountainside to give out the description of the crazy. She hoped someone would find the madman, and she hoped he could be helped. A long trip lay ahead of her and she did not relish the thought of having to worry about her pursuer the whole time. This season of the year she would find no caravans heading toward the city; she would travel alone or not at all.

Grum’s invitation to stay the winter at her village was even more attractive now. But the idea of spending half a year crippled in her profession, without knowing whether she would ever be able to redeem herself, was unendurable. She would go to the city, or she would return to the healers’ station and receive her teachers’ judgment.

Grum. Perhaps Melissa could go to her, if Snake could free the child from Mountainside. Grum was neither beautiful nor obsessed with physical beauty; Melissa’s scars would not repel her.

But it would take days to send a message to Grum and receive an answer, for her village lay far to the north. Snake had to admit to herself, too, that she did not know Grum well enough to ask her to take on a responsibility like this one. Snake sighed and combed her fingers through her hair, wishing the problem would submerge in her subconscious and reemerge solved, like a dream. She stared around the room as if something in it would tell her what to do.

The table by the window held a basket of fruit, a plate of cookies, cheese, and a tray of small meat pies. The mayor’s staff was too generous in its treatment of invalids; during the long day Snake had not even had the diversion of waiting for and looking forward to meals. She had urged Gabriel, and Larril and Brian and the other servants who had come to make the bed, polish the windows, brush away the crumbs (she still had no idea how many people worked to manage the residence and to serve Gabriel and his father; every time she learned another name a new face would appear) to help themselves to the treats, but most of the serving dishes were still almost full.

On impulse, Snake emptied the basket of all but the most succulent pieces of fruit, then refilled it with cookies and cheese and meat pies wrapped in napkins. She started to write a note, changed her mind, and drew a coiled serpent on a bit of paper. She folded the slip in among the bundles and tucked a napkin over everything, then rang the call-bell.

A young boy appeared — still another servant she had not encountered before — and she asked him to take the basket to the stable and put it in the loft above Squirrel’s stall. The boy was only thirteen or fourteen, lanky with rapid growth, so she made him promise not to raid the basket. In turn she promised him all he wanted of what remained on the table. He did not look underfed, but Snake had never known a child undergoing a growth-spurt who was not always a little bit hungry.

“Is that a satisfactory bargain?” she asked.

The boy grinned. His teeth were large and white and very slightly crooked; he would be a handsome young man. Snake reflected that in Mountainside even adolescents had clear complexions.

“Yes, mistress,” he said.

“Good. Be sure the stablemaster doesn’t see you. He can hunt up his own meals as far as I’m concerned.”

“Yes, mistress!” The boy grinned again, took the basket, and left the room. From his voice, Snake decided Melissa was not the only defenseless child to feel Ras’s temper. But that was no help to Melissa. The servant boy was in no better position to speak against Ras than Melissa was.

She wanted to talk to the child, but the day passed and Melissa did not appear. Snake was afraid to send any more definite message than the one in the basket; she did not want Melissa beaten again because of a stranger’s meddling.

It was already dark when Gabriel returned to the castle and came to Snake’s room. He was preoccupied, but he had not forgotten his promise to replace Snake’s ruined shirt.

“Nothing,” he said. “No one in desert robes. No one acting strangely.”

Snake tried on the shirt, which fit surprisingly well. The one she had bought had been brown, a rough homespun weave. This one was of a much softer fabric, silky thin strong white material block-printed with intricate blue designs. Snake shrugged and held out her arms, brushing her fingertips over the rich color. “He buys new clothes — he’s a different person. A room at an inn, and nobody sees him. He probably isn’t any more unusual than any other stranger passing through.“

“Most of the strangers came through weeks ago,” Gabriel said, then sighed. “But you’re right. Even now he wouldn’t be remarked on.”

Snake gazed out the window. She could see a few lights, those of valley farms, widely scattered.

“How’s your knee?”

“It’s all right now.” The swelling was gone and the ache had subsided to what was normal during changeable weather. One thing she had liked about the black desert, despite the heat, was the constancy of its weather. There she had never awakened in the morning feeling like some infirm centenarian.

“That’s good,” Gabriel said, with a hopeful, questioning, tentative note in his voice.

“Healers do heal fast,” Snake said. “When we have good reason to.” She thrust aside her worries, grinned, and was rewarded with Gabriel’s radiant smile.

This time the sound of the door opening did not frighten Snake. She awakened easily and pushed herself up on her elbow.

“Melissa?” She turned the lamp up just enough for them to see each other, for she did not want to disturb Gabriel.

“I got the basket,” Melissa said. “The things were good. Squirrel likes cheese but Swift doesn’t.”

Snake laughed. “I’m glad you came up here. I wanted to talk.”

“Yeah.” Melissa let her breath out slowly. “Where would I go? If I could.”

“I don’t know if you can believe this, after all Ras has said. You could be a jockey, if that’s what you want, almost anyplace but Mountainside. You might have to work a little harder at first, but people would value you for who you are and what you can do.” The words sounded hollow even to Snake: You fool, she thought, you’re telling a frightened child to go out in the world and succeed all alone. She searched for something better to say.

Lying beside her, one hand flung over her hip, Gabriel shifted and muttered. Snake glanced over her shoulder and put her hand on his. “It’s all right, Gabriel,” she said. “Go back to sleep.” He sighed and the instant of wakefulness passed.

Snake turned back to Melissa. For a moment the child stared at her, ghostly pale in the dim light. Suddenly she spun away and fled.

Snake jumped out of bed and followed her. Sobbing, Melissa fumbled at the door and got it open just as Snake reached her. The child plunged into the hallway, but Snake caught up to her and stopped her.

“Melissa, what’s wrong?”

Melissa hunched away, crying uncontrollably. Snake knelt and hugged her, drawing her slowly around, stroking her hair.

“It’s all right, it’s all right,” Snake murmured, just to have something to say.

“I didn’t know, I didn’t understand…” Melissa jerked away from her. “I thought you were stronger — I thought you could do what you want, but you’re just like me.”

Snake would not let go of Melissa’s hand. She led her into one of the other guest rooms and turned up the light. Here the floor was not heated, and the stone seemed to pull the warmth out through the soles of Snake’s bare feet. She dragged a blanket off the neat bed and wrapped it around her shoulders as she took Melissa to the window seat. They sat down, Melissa reluctantly.

“Now. Tell me what’s wrong.”

With her head down, Melissa hugged her knees to her chest. “You have to do what they want, too.”

“I don’t have to do what anybody wants.”

Melissa looked up. From her right eye, the tears slid straight down her cheek. From the left, the ridges of scar tissue led tear-tracks sideways. She put her head down again. Snake moved nearer and put an arm around her shoulders.

“Just relax. There’s no hurry.”

“They… they do things…”

Snake frowned, totally confounded. “What things? Who’s ‘they’?”

“Him.”

“Who? Not Gabriel!”

Melissa nodded quickly without meeting her gaze.

Snake could not imagine Gabriel hurting anyone deliberately. “What happened? If he hurt you, I’m sure it was an accident.”

Melissa stared at her. “He didn’t do anything to me.” Her voice was contemptuous.

“Melissa, dear, I haven’t understood a word you’ve said. If Gabriel didn’t do anything to you, why were you so upset when you saw him? He’s really very nice.” Perhaps Melissa had heard about Leah and was afraid for Snake.

“He makes you get in his bed.”

“That’s my bed.”

“It doesn’t matter whose bed! Ras can’t find where I sleep, but sometimes…”

“Ras?”

“Me and him. You and the other.”

“Wait,” Snake said. “Ras makes you get in his bed? When you don’t want to?” That was a stupid question, she thought, but she could not think of a better one.

“Want to!” Melissa said with disgust.

With the calmness of disbelief, Snake said carefully, “Does he make you do anything else?”

“He said it would stop hurting, but it never did…” She hid her face against her knees.

What Melissa had been trying to say came clear to Snake in a rush of pity and disgust. Snake hugged Melissa, patting her and stroking her hair until gradually, as if afraid someone would notice and make her stop, Melissa slipped her arms around Snake and cried against her shoulder.

“You don’t have to tell me any more,” Snake said. “I didn’t understand, but now I do. Oh, Melissa, it’s not supposed to be like that. Didn’t anybody ever tell you?”

“He said I was lucky,” Melissa whispered. “He said I should be grateful he would touch me.” She shuddered violently.

Snake rocked her back and forth. “He was lucky,” she said. “He’s been lucky no one knew.”

The door opened and Gabriel looked in. “Snake — ? Oh, there you are.” He came toward her, the light glinting off his golden body. Startled, Melissa glanced toward him. Gabriel froze, shock and horror spreading over his face. Melissa ducked her head again and held Snake tighter, shaking with the effort of controlling her sobs.

“What — ?”

“Go back to bed,” Snake said, even more harshly than she had meant to but less harshly than she felt toward him right now.

“What’s going on?” he asked plaintively. Frowning, he looked at Melissa.

“Go away! I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

He started to protest, saw Snake’s expression change, cut off his words, and left the room. Snake and Melissa sat together in silence for a long time. Melissa’s breathing slowly grew quieter and more regular.

“You see how people look at me?”

“Yes, dear. I see.” After Gabriel’s reaction Snake hardly felt she could paint any more rosy pictures of people’s tolerance. Yet now Snake hoped even more that Melissa would decide to leave this place. Anything would be better. Anything.

Snake’s anger rose in a slow, dangerous, inexorable way. A scarred and hurt and frightened child had as much right to a gentle sexual initiation as any beautiful, confident one, perhaps a greater right. But Melissa had only been scarred and hurt and frightened more. And humiliated. Snake held her and rocked her. Melissa clung contentedly to her like a much younger child. “Melissa…”

“Yes, mistress.”

“Ras is an evil man. He’s hurt you in ways no one who wasn’t evil would ever hurt anyone. I promise you he’ll never hurt you again.”

“What does it matter if it’s him or somebody else?”

“Remember how surprised you were that someone tried to rob me?”

“But that was a crazy. Ras isn’t a crazy.”

“There are more crazies like that than people like Ras.”

“That other one is like Ras. You had to be with him.”

“No, I didn’t. I invited him to stay with me. There are things people can do for each other—”

Melissa glanced up. Snake could not tell if her expression was curiosity or concern, her face was so stiff with the terrible scars of burning. For the first time Snake could see that the scars extended beneath the collar of the child’s shirt. Snake felt the blood drain from her face.

“Mistress, what’s wrong?”

“Tell me something, dear. How badly were you burned? Where are the scars?”

Melissa’s right eye narrowed; that was all she could make of a frown. “My face.” She drew back and touched her collarbone, just to the left of her throat. “Here.” Her hand moved down her chest to the bottom of her rib cage, then to her side. “To here.”

“No farther down?”

“No. My arm was stiff for a long time.” She rotated her left shoulder: it was not as limber as it should have been. “I was lucky. If it was worse and I couldn’t ride, then I wouldn’t be worth keeping alive to anybody.”

Snake released her breath slowly with great relief. She had seen people burned so badly they had no sex left at all, neither external organs nor capacity for pleasurable sensation. Snake thanked all the gods of all the people of the world for what Melissa had told her. Ras had hurt her, but the pain was because she was a child and he was a large and brutal adult, not because the fire had destroyed all other feeling except pain.

“People can do things for each other that give them both pleasure,” Snake said. “That’s why Gabriel and I were together. I wanted him to touch me and he wanted me to touch him. But when someone touches another person without caring how they feel — against their wishes!” She stopped, for she could not understand anyone twisted enough to turn sexuality into assault. “Ras is an evil man,” she said again.

“The other one didn’t hurt you?”

“No. We were having fun.”

“All right,” Melissa said reluctantly.

“I can show you.”

“No! Please don’t.”

“Don’t worry,” Snake said. “Don’t worry. From now on nobody will do anything to you that you don’t want.”

“Mistress Snake, you can’t stop him. I can’t stop him. You have to go away, and I have to stay here.”

Anything would be better than staying here, Snake had thought. Anything. Even exile. Like the dream she had been searching for, the answers slipped up into Snake’s mind, and she laughed and cried at herself for not seeing them sooner.

“Would you come with me, if you could?”

“Come with you?”

“Yes.”

“Mistress Snake — !”

“Healers adopt their children, did you know that? I didn’t realize it before, but I’ve been looking for someone for a long time.”

“But you could have anybody.”

“I want you, if you’ll have me as your parent.”

Melissa huddled against her. “They’ll never let me go,” she whispered. “I’m scared.”

Snake, stroked Melissa’s hair and stared out the window at the darkness and the scattered lights of wealthy, beautiful Mountainside. Some time later, just on the edge of sleep, Melissa whispered, “I’m scared.”