The Heart of the Mirage Read online

  Two more legionnaires came up, grinning. ‘Hey, what about us, Evander?’ one of them asked the man who was holding me. ‘I could do with a poke and she’s not bad—for a Kardi.’

  ‘Why not?’ the one called Evander replied. ‘Let’s find a place.’

  ‘I noticed some sacks of grain stacked in the alley back there,’ Xasus said. ‘Just the spot.’

  Hardly able to credit I was hearing this conversation on a crowded city street, I twisted in my captor’s arms and said—in Tyranian—‘How dare you! Let me go, this instant or you’ll find yourself feeling Brotherhood justice.’

  Evander did not release me, but the others looked stunned. ‘Who the Vortex are you?’ one of them asked.

  ‘Ah, er, my mistress is Legata Ligea of the Brotherhood, at present residing with the Governor. She’ll have you skinned alive and sold for slave meat if you touch me!’

  Xasus backed off a little. ‘Perhaps we ought to let her go,’ he said to the others. ‘I don’t want any shit with the Brotherhood. And I’ve heard of that particular bitch. You don’t cross her and get away with it. My cousin was a tax inspector in Tyr until he ran foul of her. Now he’s a scribe in Gammed and his name is mud in Tyrans.’

  ‘Since when has a slave told a legionnaire what he can and cannot do?’ Evander growled. ‘Damn it, Xasus, you reckon any Brother is going to give a shit about a slave?’

  ‘You’d better believe it,’ I snapped. ‘She’s very fond of me.’

  Xasus held up both hands in a gesture of defeat. ‘I’m off,’ he said.

  But Evander was not going to give up his prize so easily, and one of the others was prepared to follow his lead. The crowd around had thinned out, giving us space; people were backing off, concerned, wary, not knowing what to do. The oppressive humidity of their hate for the legionnaires hung in the air, but no one actually moved to help me.

  I caught sight of the man I had been following, as he came back to see what had happened. He was broadcasting his concern before him, as strong to my senses as incense is to the nose. With what I hoped was unexpected suddenness, I sagged in Evander’s arms and he lost his grin. While he was off-balance, I whirled and jabbed him in the throat with stiffened fingers. It was a deceptively harmless-looking blow, but in the Brotherhood we called it the Vortex-strike for its ability to send the recipient to Acheron. The jab was hard, crushing his larynx and slamming into the blood vessel behind; the shock stopped his heart as effectively as an arrow in the chest would have done. I didn’t wait to see what happened; I was already running. Behind me I heard an outraged cry of: ‘The frigging helot has killed him. Get her.’

  My guide saw me coming, turned and dodged into an alleyway, also running. I darted after him. The legionnaires, spurred by fury, were not far behind, but my guide knew what he was doing. We hurdled a low wall, dashed across a deserted courtyard and skidded through an archway into another crowded square. Back inside the crowd he dropped to a brisk walk to make our passage less obvious.

  I risked a swift look behind. The legionnaires were shouting to someone in front of us: more legionnaires. My guide changed direction. He grabbed my hand and pulled me through another archway into a narrow lane hemmed in by adobe walls. The alley itself was a dead end, but several wooden doors set into the walls, intricately carved, hinted at an illustrious past for the Kardi homes behind them.

  Without hesitation the Kardi opened a door and pulled me into the courtyard beyond. Once it had been a spacious garden for a wealthy man’s home, now it was an untidy fowl-run surrounded by crumbling tenements. A number of curl-feathered hens scratched diligently in the dirt. There was washing hanging out to dry from almost every sagging balcony bordering the court, but there was no one around. I was pulled across the open space to the unkempt straggle of bushes against the wall on the other side. My guide forced his way into the heart of them, still drawing me with him. I was about to protest that the bushes weren’t thick enough to hide both of us when he slipped sideways and disappeared.

  I turned to follow and found myself squeezing through a narrow cleft in the wall and into a rectangular recess beyond. Its purpose I couldn’t begin to guess at, except to wonder if it had once been some kind of storage space. There was barely room for us both. I was jammed up against my guide, my head squashed down to tuck in tight under his chin, my hips hard against his, my breasts flattened against his chest. The only place he could put his arms was around me. He smelled faintly of spice and sweat—and squashed fruit. His belt pouch, oozing peach juice, was flattened between us.

  ‘Huh,’ he said, amused, and continued in Kardi, ‘It wasn’t nearly so small when I was a kid hiding from my sister here.’

  ‘You live here?’

  ‘The whole building was my father’s house once. Now I have a single room above. Can’t say I’ve been in this cubbyhole for a few years, though.’ He was almost laughing. ‘Sorry about this—I’m afraid we’re stuck here for a while. I think the legionnaires may have seen us disappear into the lane; they will have every house searched. We will have to wait until they are finished.’

  He had barely stopped speaking when we heard voices shouting and the startled squawking of the hens in the courtyard.

  ‘Pull the place apart if you have to,’ someone said in Tyranian. ‘If there’s as much as a mouse hiding in the building I want to know about it! Bring everyone you find down here.’ I didn’t know the voice; it did not belong to any of the legionnaires who had assaulted me. However, it was clear one of those men was present because the next words, spoken in lower tones were, ‘You, legionnaire—you stay here. I want you around to identify that murdering thrall if they turn her up.’

  The Kardi bent to whisper in my ear, ‘Not a sound.’

  I nodded and resigned myself to waiting. The noise continued: voices raised in protest, the sound of breaking wood, running footsteps on stairs, children crying, hysterical hens clucking their distress.

  It was uncomfortable squashed as we were. My back was pressed against rough adobe, my arms were pinioned by his. I twisted my head slightly to look out through the entrance crevice. The bushes grew thickly to block out much of the light, but I could just see movement on the other side. The same voice, now alarmingly close, was saying, ‘Check these bushes, legionnaire.’

  Tension stiffened us both, and the movement, as slight as it was, jammed us still tighter against one another. A rustle in the leaves was an explosion to my ears; someone was using their sword to poke into the branches. Sweat, mixed with dust, trickled down my neck, and my slave collar seemed unbearably tight. I felt no fear; I was hardly in any danger from Tyranians. No one except the Brotherhood itself would dare to question the killing of a rankman legionnaire by a Brotherhood Legata. If I were caught, all I had to do was explain who I was and what had happened. It wasn’t fear that built the tension in me; it was excitement, the provocation of the chase, the stimulation of pitting myself against another…

  The tension was pleasurable. I moved my head slightly to relieve the crick in my neck and found my face almost on a level with the Kardi’s, my mouth brushing his chin. His smell was pleasant, his hard muscularity tempting. No hint of his emotions now reached me; he had obscured himself, just as Brand did. I was intrigued.

  He stirred against me in turn. At first, I thought it was merely discomfort at our cramped position. Then I felt the real reason for his unease pressing into my hips. I jerked my head sideways so that I could focus on his face. He was looking at a point somewhere above my head. The light was dim, but I thought I could see a flush colouring his cheeks. Indignation swelled inside me: how dare he!

  Before I could do anything to indicate my displeasure, I felt him quivering. It took me a moment to identify the cause. Laughter. I had no way of expressing my anger; I couldn’t move, and I certainly couldn’t risk saying anything for fear of being heard. I stayed rigidly still while the cause of his amusement remained abundantly clear to us both. Then, reluctantly, my lips twitched. The situation w
as funny. Despite his laughter, he was embarrassed—but there wasn’t anything either of us could do about it. I sucked in my cheeks and tried to suppress the chuckles threatening to erupt.

  His head dipped and his lips brushed mine gently, tentatively. I wanted my anger to return, but it stayed obstinately away. His mouth closed over mine, tender, then demanding as his tongue probed and I responded.

  The sounds of the search outside continued. Irate officers snarled their irritation, legionnaires vented their frustration in muttered asides to one another. Neither of us moved to break the kiss. Neither of us wanted it to end. I could no longer distinguish the tension of desire from the tension caused by fear of discovery. When the noises finally faded and disappeared, I was hardly aware they were gone. Wave after wave of desire rippled, touching mind and body. Pleasurable tightness travelled across the surface of my skin, an unfamiliar sensation matching the more recognisable pressure building in my loins. Tensiondesire invaded every inch of me, subordinating mind to physical senses. Tissues swelled and warmed and throbbed. I’d never experienced anything so pervasive and thought I would disintegrate if there was no release. Alarm slipped into the cracks between passionate hunger and an overwhelming yearning for this man’s body. Goddess, I thought, I’ve been drugged. Again. But I didn’t want to listen to the warning. In that moment, I wanted nothing but to satisfy an allencompassing lust.

  He broke away and I heard wonder in his voice as he asked, ‘Blessed cabochon—a Magor? Who would have thought it?’

  The words meant nothing; I felt only annoyance that he had stopped kissing me when I was still almost incoherent with need. But he gave me no time to say anything. ‘They’ve gone,’ he said and eased himself out of our prison. Wordlessly, I followed, trying to dredge up the vestiges of my equanimity, hearing the whisper of warning in my mind, yet unwilling to listen. No sooner had I extricated myself from the bushes than he had grabbed my hand again and was pulling me up wooden steps to the balcony above. I did not protest—I did not want to protest. My whole body was throbbing.

  I noticed nothing about the room we entered. I had already forgotten the legionnaires, I had forgotten who this man was, all I knew was I wanted him as I had never wanted anyone before in my life, that I had to have him or die with wanting.

  Later, I had no recollection of how I came to be naked, but I was and so was he and he had entered me and my world would never be the same again. The tension, which I had already thought unbearable, grew still greater until I wanted to scream and scream and go on screaming. But just as I opened my mouth, he touched his left hand to mine and the world splintered around me, slivered into light and colour and sound and beauty and love and velvet touch and I wanted to die with the joy of it.

  I floated in magic, in music, in perfume, in tangy peach sweetness, in soft silk, in golden light, in an overload of sensation. Reluctant to descend to reality, reluctant to question, reluctant to have answers. Sure I had been drugged. Not knowing how that was possible. Not caring. Horrified I had so lost all control over my actions. Appalled that I didn’t care.

  In the end, it was he who spoke first. He was lying beside me, his glistening naked body brown and muscular and perfect to my still-besotted eyes. He propped himself up on one arm and allowed his glance to roam over the curves of my nakedness. Then he touched a finger to the brown of my nipple and said, ‘You are the most beautiful woman I have ever seen.’

  I was accustomed to being considered too tall, too muscular, too swarthy; not even Favonius had ever said I was beautiful. Yet I believed this man. I saw the truth in his eyes even before he allowed me to feel it in my mind. I took up his left hand and touched the swelling there, the swelling that matched mine in shape and size. ‘What did you do?’ I asked in wonderment.

  ‘Have you never loved one of your own kind before?’

  My own kind! Shock shivered through me. I wasn’t one of these people! I shook my head, trying to deny the truth. ‘Who—who am I?’

  ‘You do not know?’

  ‘There was never anyone to tell me. I was brought up in Tyrans. What I told Parvana wasn’t quite the truth; I was taken to Tyr as a very young child.’ I shielded my emotions from him; I knew he had the same abilities I had. If I’d wanted, he could have read me as easily as a scroll. The talents I once called intuition were no such thing; I knew that now. They were all part of being born different, of having a swelling in the middle of the palm…

  ‘You have a lot to learn,’ he said.

  ‘The first lesson was…unbelievable.’

  He laughed. ‘We shall take you to the Mirage.’ He touched my slave collar. ‘Soon you’ll be free.’

  I studied his face. He was handsome, with eyes like mine: brown and tilted at the corners. A wide mouth that constantly quirked up with amusement, and white even teeth. A nose that was just a shade crooked at the tip. Curly hair that escaped the thong at his nape to fall forward over his ears. I liked his looks. Very much. And I liked the laughter I felt in him.

  And I was an agent of the Brotherhood. Snap out of it, Ligea.

  I said, ‘The Tyranians have something belonging to the Mirager.’

  ‘So we heard.’ He took a deep breath as though he were faced with a truth too much to bear. With sudden intuition, I knew he had so far delayed mention of it because he was afraid to hear my answer. ‘His—his Magor sword?’

  ‘I suppose so. It looks like a sword with a hollow, translucent blade.’

  ‘It’s here, in Madrinya?’

  ‘Back at the Governor’s residence. The Legata brought it from Sandmurram. The legionnaires said it was heavy, but the shleth carrying it didn’t seem to notice the weight.’

  He closed his eyes, gripped by emotions he found hard to control. ‘Ah. You don’t know it, beautiful one, but you’ve just saved my life.’ He gave a sigh and collapsed back into the pallet as though he had just shaken off a horror that had ridden him longer than he cared to acknowledge. ‘Another few weeks and the story of the return of the Magor to their rightful place in Madrinya would have had another hero.’ He was laughing at himself, but I didn’t understand the ramifications of what he was saying. ‘This Legata, tell me about her.’

  ‘Ligea Gayed of Tyr. She’s a Legata Compeer of the Brotherhood. We are quartered in the Governor’s residence.’

  ‘The sword—can you get it? It won’t be heavy to you.’

  I nodded, but I was bewildered. Why was he so trusting? He’d only just met me! ‘Can I really go to the Mirage?’ That was far more than I had dared hope.

  ‘Yes, naturally. Do you think we would leave someone of the Magor to them?’

  I had to play this carefully. Better, I thought, to forgo meeting the Mirager until we were fully prepared…Besides, I needed to know more of what was going on.

  I said, ‘If I go back I won’t be able to get out again until tomorrow morning—’ I gasped and sat up. ‘Oh—the time! I shall be missed! And I have to pick up my ewer yet, too.’

  He grinned at me as I began to throw on my clothes, but he, too, started to dress. ‘I’ll take you back through the alleys. You don’t want to run into those legionnaires again. Did you really kill one of them?’

  I knew I had, and didn’t mind him knowing it; he would hardly be suspicious of someone who’d killed a legionnaire. However, I did not want him to think of me as a deliberate killer, so I shrugged carelessly and said, ‘I hardly think so. I just hit him. Oh, Vortex, there are so many things I want to ask you!’

  ‘And I you. Never mind. Tomorrow morning: are you sure it will be possible for you to bring the sword out of the house? If there’s any danger, we can send someone in after it instead—’

  I froze. The shade in Sandmurram…Goddessdamn, had that thing been sent by the Mirager? I pictured it again. And thought: It could have been this man’s twin…except that this man was all too alive. I took a calming breath and said, ‘No, there’s no problem. I’ll meet you at the well. Will you really take me to meet the Mirager?’r />
  ‘Tomorrow. I promise. If you have anything precious among your things, bring it with you. You won’t be going back to the Governor’s residence again. Sweet damn, I can hardly bear to let you out of my sight. Are you sure you’ll be all right?’

  I nodded, but I was distracted. I was staring at the floor, my mind chasing an illusive memory. The tiles beneath my feet were of brown and white agate, quite unlike the usual cheap flooring of the few Kardi homes I had entered on my way to Madrinya. I glanced up at the walls: the adobe had been panelled. The wood was cracked and splintered, the tiles chipped and dirty, but once this had been a room of simple beauty—a nobleman’s house, perhaps, or some wealthy Kardi merchant. And somewhere, faint in the edges of my memory, I was feeling the cool smoothness of polished agate stone beneath my bare feet as I ran, laughing, with other children…

  I finished dressing and looked back at him. ‘There is one other thing I’d like to know now.’

  ‘Anything.’

  ‘What’s your name?’

  He started to laugh. ‘Temellin,’ he said, chuckling. ‘Friends call me Temel. Lovers call me Tem.’

  CHAPTER TEN

  Brand was waiting for me at the door. He took the ewer and prepared to wash my feet, but I refused the service with sudden distaste and bathed them myself. Afterwards, as I undid my slave collar in front of the mirror in the main room of my apartments, I remembered Evander’s arms around me and the legionnaires discussing my rape as if I hadn’t been there…Slave woman. Chattel. Less than human. Less even than a valued animal. My eyes met Brand’s in the mirror and then fell to his collar.

  I didn’t think I had shown him anything on my face, but he gave the slightest of cynical smiles and said, ‘So I guess something happened to show you what it is really like to be a slave.’

  I put my collar down on the desk. ‘Yes.’

  ‘I knew you would realise one day. In fact, it’s taken a little longer than I once thought it would.’