Wind Follower. Carole McDonnell
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the Wind had sent me one to lie in my bosom, or if—as Father had been saying—grief for Krika had made me whimsical. Even Little Mother, who always gave and forgave me everything, had begun to say I was impetuous. The sun had already rolled away into the far horizon and the vendors were busily packing up their wares. Some had already closed the curtains of their tents. Because the Doreni horse dealer was still present, I decided to open my heart to him.
“Older Brother,” I said, greeting him. “This was a day the Creator made.”
“It brought many blessings,” he answered. “And that horse is one of them. You got a good bargain, there.”
“Tell me, Older Brother, if you know ... what kind of girl is Monua’s daughter?”
He glared back at me, his eyes suddenly angry under his clan-cap. “You mean Satha?”
“Is that her name? Satha?”
You who have forgotten the old language cannot understand the joy with which I received her name. You hear our names, you hear the names of people in my narrative and those names mean nothing to you. But before the Angleni destroyed our language, blowing it away as one blew away chaff in the wind, names meant something. “Satha” was a Theseni word which meant “Queen” or, more accurately, “Queenie.” It sounded like the Doreni word, “Sithye” which meant “dawn,” a name close in meaning to mine.
“Satha,” I repeated. “It is a lovely name.”
“Aren’t there enough women in your father’s compound—captive slave girls, servants—you can misuse?” He pointed at the jade bracelet on my right hand that signaled that I was my father’s primary heir and the future chieftain of the Pagatsu clan. “Shame on you, Loic tyu Taer.” His eyes were like unsheathed daggers, his tone sharp like knives.
In those days every Doreni clan was at odds with every other, and his angry eyes made me wonder if some grudge lay between my clan and his own. I was glad the bracelet gave warning that those who killed a first-born would bring vendettas and clan wars upon their head. “I don’t recognize your clan cap, Older Brother,” I said. “Is there some fire between your clan and the Pagatsu?”
“It isn’t your clan that bothers me.”
“Then what fire is there between us?”
“Like a true Doreni, I am a brother to all people. But your rude intentions towards Satha nauseate me. Can you not call any of your slave women to your bed? For all I know, you and your father probably share the same woman despite the taboo. That’s the way you rich people are, flaunting the laws. Although you have a herd of women from which you can choose, you want to take a poor man’s one little ewe.” I watched nervously as his agitated fingers groped about the horseshoes and horseshoe nails on his stand. The knife he suddenly lifted before my eyes glinted in the moonlight.
It was true the Doreni sought to be brothers to all men. Before the Angleni came and colored our perceptions of each other, marriages and love affairs between the different tribes were frequent, but weddings between rich and poor were less common. Although a rich tribe could bring wealth, status, and protection to a poorer tribe, what could a poor tribe give? It was also true that in the Golden House many servant girls and some of my female cousins had shown their desire to couch with me. Although, from what my Little Mother told me, they were more desirous of replacing my father’s hated third wife than they were of lying in my hairless bosom.
I pushed the knife away, feeling strangely pleased that my tribesman had defended Satha so vehemently. “Satha tya Monua has nothing to fear from me.”
His eyes searched mine, the threat still in them. “Are you being honest?”
“Very honest, Older Brother.”
He bent towards me and managed a conciliatory smile. “Well ... as long as you mean the girl no harm. She’s a good girl, that one. Proper. I wanted to marry her myself. But she has no dowry. And, as you can see—” he gestured towards the back of his tent “—I’m a poor man. She’s industrious, don’t misunderstand me. But when one considers a wife—even if the girl has noble ancestors—one might as well get more than a few quixas to take her off her parents’ hands.”
“Poor men can’t marry poor women,” I cited a proverb my Little Mother had told me. I didn’t add the end of the proverb however: “Rich men, therefore, have a greater selection.”
“Good luck with the girl,” he added as he pulled the slatted curtains of his shop together. “And remember me if you wish to buy another horse. Don’t tell your father about ... this little incident between us. I wouldn’t want him thinking I tried to murder his son.”
“I assure you, Father has met many who wanted to murder me.”
He nodded knowingly, “It is always that way with rich men’s sons.”
I tied the stallion—whom I now called Sunset—to Cactus and to father’s horse. How like brothers they looked with their similar sunset coloring, and how like brothers they behaved, nudging each other with their noses. They whinnied as if resuming an old conversation.
I walked to the next vendor. “A lovely day the Creator made, is it not?”
The Ibeni merchant stopped packing away his wares and turned to me. “It brought many blessings.”
“The greatest of which was that I met Satha tya Monua and jobara, indeed, she is a beauty.”
A lascivious smirk came to his lips. Yes, that one was typical of his tribe—suspicious, lustful, and jealous; hexes, fetishes, and carved idols guarded his shop. He wore the typical Ibeni patchwork leather vest—embroidered spells and chants decorated it but I didn’t recognize its clan markings. A Doreni woman in an Ibeni veil appeared behind him but he jealously hurried her away. She fled immediately and I found myself wondering why a Doreni woman—for our women are bold and shrewd—would marry an Ibeni man.
“Yes, Little Doreni,” he said after the woman had scurried behind the slatted curtains. “Monua’s daughter is a beauty. Even with the veil, one can tell. But she’s not one to lay in the fields with a boy, if that’s what you’re after.” He lowered his voice. “Or with a man either. Believe me, Little Doreni, I’ve tried. Waihai! Who would know? I offered her one thousand quixas for the romp—a lot considering an Ibeni woman could give me far more for far less—but I couldn’t convince her. The Uncaused Causer of all things knows her family needs the money.”
It is difficult to turn the mind of an Ibeni away from lustful imaginations, but I tried, whistling at his generosity. “A lot of money, that.”
“Enough to feed even your household for a month, little rich Doreni.” He bent towards me, fingering the porcelain frog fetish dangling from his neck. “I would have married her and made her my ninth wife if she had agreed to play with me.” His hands carved a female figure in the air. “That torn-up oversized gyuilta she wears over her kaba can’t hide everything, if you know what I mean.”
“I think I do.” Nine wives. But that was also typical of the richer Ibeni. Their eyes liked whatever they saw, and what they liked they had to have.
“So you want her?”
“I think I do.”
He sucked at his teeth. “Good luck! You’re Pagatsu, right? That’s what those clan markings on your clan cap say?” He too glanced at the jade firstborn bracelet. “You’re a chieftain’s son?” Knowing the Ibeni love of status and power, I didn’t immediately answer. “Come now, little rich Doreni. I know a few things about clan markings and I heard Monua earlier.”
“True, I am Pagatsu.”
“Taer’s son?”
I nodded.
“You’re from a noble clan. Unfortunately, that won’t win her over. Now, if you were from the Therpa Doreni, let’s say. Or the Trabu Theseni like Queen Butterfly, then ... perhaps you’d feel no qualms about taking her. After