Soldiers Live

16 Wastelands: Night’s Children

Narayan Singh released his grip on his rumel, the consecrated killing scarf of a Strangler. His hands had become two aching, arthritic claws. Tears filled his eyes. He was glad the darkness hid them from the girl. “I never took an animal before,” he whispered, drawing away from the cooling carcass of the dog.

The Daughter of Night did not respond. She had to concentrate hard to use her crude talents to misdirect the bats and owls searching for them. The hunt had been on for weeks. Scores of converts had been taken. The rest had scattered in time-honored fashion. They would come together again after the hunters lost interest. And the hunters did lose interest in them before long. But this time the Witch of Taglios seemed determined to collar the Daughter of Night and the living saint of the Deceivers.

The girl relaxed, sighed. “I think they’ve moved off to the south.” Her whisper contained no note of triumph.

“This should be the last dog.” Narayan felt no sense of accomplishment, either. He reached out, touched the girl lightly. She didn’t shake him off. “They’ve never used dogs before.” He was tired. Tired of running, tired of pain.

“What’s happened, Narayan? What’s changed? Why won’t my mother answer me? I did everything right. But I still can’t feel her out there.”

Maybe she was not there anymore, the heretical side of Narayan thought. “Maybe she can’t. She has enemies among the gods as well as among men. One of those may be...”

The girl’s hand covered his mouth. He held his breath. Some owls had hearing acute enough to catch his wheezing—should they catch the girl off guard.

The hand withdrew. “It’s turned away. How do we reach her, Narayan?”

“I wish I knew, child. I wish I knew. I’m worn out. I need someone to tell me what to do. When you were little I thought you’d be queen of the world by now. That we would’ve passed through the Year of the Skulls and Kina’s triumph and I would be enjoying the rewards of my persistent faith.”

“Don’t you start, too.”

“Start?”

“Wavering. Doubting. I need you to be my rock, Narayan. Always, when everything else turns to filth in my hands, there’s been the granite of Papa Narayan.” For once she seemed not to be manipulating him. They huddled, prisoners of despair. The night, once Kina’s own, now belonged to the Protector and her minions. Yet they were compelled to travel under cloak of darkness. By day they were too easily recognized, she with her pale, pale skin and he with his physical impairments. The reward for their capture was great and the country folk were always poor.

Their flight had led them southward, toward the uninhabited wastelands clinging to the northern foothills of the Dandha Presh. Peopled lands were far too dangerous right now. Every hand was against them there. Yet there was no promise the wastelands would be any friendlier. Out there it might be easier for the hunters to track them.

Narayan mused, “Perhaps we should go into exile until the Protector forgets us.” She would. Her passions were furiously intense but never lasted.

The girl did not reply. She stared at the stars, possibly looking for a sign. Narayan’s proposition was impossible and they both knew it. They had been touched by the Goddess. They must do her work. They must fulfill their destinies, however unhappy the road. They must bring on the Year of the Skulls, however much suffering they must endure themselves. Paradise lay beyond the pale of affliction.

“Narayan. Look. The sky in the south.”

The old Deceiver raised his eyes. He saw what she meant immediately. One small patch of sky, due south, very low, rippled and shimmered. When that stopped for half a minute an alien constellation shone through.

“The Noose,” Singh whispered. “It isn’t possible.”

“What?”

“The constellation is called the Noose. We shouldn’t be able to see it.” Not from this world. Narayan knew of it only because he had been a prisoner of the Black Company at a time when the constellation had been the subject of intense discussion. It had some connection with the glittering plain. Beneath which Kina lay imprisoned. “Maybe that’s our sign.” He was ready to grasp any straw. He dragged his weary frame upright, tucked his crutch under his arm. “South it is, then. Where we can travel by day because there’ll be no one to spot us.”

The girl said, “I don’t want to travel anymore, Narayan.” But she got up, too. Travel was what they did, day after month after year, because only by remaining in motion could they evade the evils that would prevent them from fulfilling their holy destinies.

An owl called from somewhere far away. Narayan ignored it. He was, for the thousandth time, reflecting on the change of fortune that had befallen them so swiftly, after life had gone so well for several years. His whole life had been that way, one wild swing after another. If he could cling to the tatters of his faith, if he could persevere, soon enough fortune would smile on him again. He was the living saint. His tests and trials had to be measured accordingly.

But he was so tired. And he hurt so much.

He tried not to wonder why there was no sense whatsoever of Kina’s presence in the world anymore. He tried to concentrate his whole will upon covering the next painful hundred yards. With that victory in hand he could concentrate on conquering the hundred yards that followed.