Southern Fire

'I don't think I've heard a quarter of that story,' said Kheda with open curiosity.

'That's more than complex.' Risala's eyes were shadowed. 'The heart of the tragedy was Kaeska was barren. She couldn't accept it, wouldn't trade for a nameless baby to raise as her own or provide Shek Kul with a chosen bed mate to beget one with her blessing.'

'Didn't she have sisters?' Kheda frowned. 'Most women would look to their family for a baby of common blood.'

'She was obsessed with raising a child of her own bearing.' Risala drew a shapeless squiggle in the dust with one long forefinger. 'Which led her, finally, to seek help from some enchanter from the north. Her brother Danak Mir, who inherited from Danak Natin, he'd been killed and his hold over the windward domains fell away.' She drew a spread of tiny islands in the dust before brushing them away.

'That hold was what made it so important for Shek Kul to protect Kaeska's position as first wife, even though she couldn't give the domain a child?' Kheda guessed.

'Danak Mir would have twisted any loss of her status into an excuse for attack.' Risala grimaced, turning to sit with her back to the stone wall once again. 'None of his allies would have dared ignore his summons. But with him and all his alliances dead with him, Shek Kul set about getting an heir with Mahli Shek. She'd been born Mahli Kaasik and that alliance, with the Kaasik domain, was enough to set other warlords wondering if there might not be an alternative to yielding to Danak might again.'

'How did he die, this Danak Mir?' Kheda was curious.

'Someone got close enough to cut his throat.' Risala shrugged. 'No one's sure if it was a hired assassin or some much-abused islander.'

'What happened then?' Kheda found he welcomed this distraction.

If I'm to ally myself with Shek Kul, it's as well to know such things. And it means I don't have to think about what I'm going to tell Janne.

'Melciar Kir was the first to move. He knew the other windward domains wouldn't stand for him annexing Danak territory directly so he proclaimed his second son Danak Nyl. The boy's mother had been born Erazi Danak, so the people of the Danak domain were only too happy to accept him, especially with every soothsayer seeing omens in his favour.'

'And to save themselves from being ground beneath armies fighting for domination over their islands.' Kheda could see only too easily how this had played out. 'I take it there was no love lost between Kaeska and Erazi?'

'Erazi Melciar was determined to see her son flourish and knew conciliation was their best course. Any hint that he had ambitions to be another Danak Mir would have seen his blood shed on the same sand.' Risala sighed. 'Kaeska knew she had no one to protect her status any more. Once Mahli's baby was born, she'd be reduced to fourth wife, not even left as second or third, and soon Laio and Gar would be with child. She was so desperate she resorted to magic. Discovered, that was the death of her.'

'I thought Shek Kul's children were very young, for a man of his years,' Kheda commented.

Risala shrugged, non-committal. 'He wasn't blind to the advantages of his situation. He could garner sympathy from other domains for his lack of an heir, the way his hands were tied. Lesser wives in several local domains were happy to let him give the lie to Kaeska's hints that he might be to blame for her barrenness, by bringing new Shek blood into their families. And while there were no children, he didn't have that vulnerability, the danger that they might be poisoned or abducted to force his hand over something.'

Kheda stared out over the sea. 'This time last year, if I'd heard Kaeska's story, I'd have said she must have been insane.'

But here I am, having made a pact with a wizard and waiting to explain myself to my wife.

'How did she die?'

'Shek Kul condemned her to be pressed to death. On the seashore. Everyone brought rocks to weigh her down, until she couldn't breathe,' said Risala sombrely. 'Then her body was burned, along with all her possessions, and the ashes left for the sea to take.'

Kheda shivered. 'But she was using magic against her domain. At least we're just seeking to use it against those who wield it themselves, without shame or restraint.'

Risala wasn't listening, her thoughts still in the Shek domain. 'Kaeska wasn't all bad. I don't think anyone can understand the hunger for a child that seizes some women. Anyway, the wizard, he was using her for his own purposes, so it was said. '

'After dealing with Dev, I can well believe that.' Kheda reached for the leather water bottle between them and took a long drink before wordlessly passing it to Risala. She drank deeply. It was hot and what little shade the tower and the wall cast at this time of day was falling on the inner side of the island.

'You're well informed,' observed Kheda after a few moments' silence.

'I was raised in the Shek compound.' Risala's face cleared a little.

Kheda raised an eyebrow. 'Slave or free? Your mother, I mean.'

'Free, one of the seamstresses.' Risala smiled fondly. 'She was no one special, except in my eyes.'

'Your father?' Kheda thought of the anonymous little children running around the Daish residences. Some were born to servants who dutifully approached one of his wives for permission to wed. Other girls simply shrugged and kept their own counsel when questioned about a swelling belly, unable to tell which of their swains was the father or unwilling to tie themselves to him in return for a claim on whatever he might offer the child.

I don't think I ever gave such brats a thought, beyond relying on Rekha to see them usefully trained and settled. Shek Kul evidently has a talent for using every resource within his reach.

'A gate guard.' Risala smiled fondly. 'Shek Kul granted him the tithes of a hill village a few years back. He and my mother live there now.'

'Reward for their faithful service or payment for your talents?' Kheda was intrigued.

I may as well keep on asking questions until she refuses to answer.

'A little of both.' There was a glint in Risala's eye as she ran the plaited cord of the water skin through her fingers. 'And, of course, there were the rumours.'

'Saying what?' prompted Kheda.

'When Kaeska did something to really exasperate Shek Kul, he would beget a child on one of her slaves. There was generally one happy to oblige him in making his point,' said Risala pertly.

'Because bearing the warlord's child saw them freed.' Kheda nodded his understanding. 'And Shek Kul deprived Kaeska of her valuable slaves at the same time.'

We of Daish may not have the Shek wealth but I'd say the peace in our household is more than a fair trade.

'My mother was Kaeska's seamstress,' Risala continued. 'When I was born, rumour whispered Shek Kul had begotten me.' She shrugged. 'The rumours came back with the tide when he picked me out for schooling and prenticing to a poet.'

'Do you think Shek Kul would approve of you telling me all this?' asked Khcda.

'He'll only know if you tell him I told you,' Risala replied with that same mischievous glint in her eye. 'Not that it matters who begot me. My father is the man who raised me.'

'He who tends the crop reaps the harvest.' Kheda quoted the old proverb. 'Whether or not he sowed the seed.'

Risala grinned. 'Anyway, Shek Kul picks out any child with a fair share of wits so he can use us as his eyes and ears.'

'Who looks twice at the slip of a girl carrying the poet's bags, when all they want to hear is Haytar's famous variations on The Mirror Bird's Quest,' Kheda smiled to show he meant no offence. 'You must have some tales to tell of your travels.'

'Not for anyone but Shek Kul.' Risala glanced over her shoulder to the rolling grass-crowned dunes that hid the far side of the isle. That was where the skiff had been stowed, mast unstepped, tucked between the battered vats used in the pearl harvest. 'I must let that case dry out properly. The leather's sodden and mould's a plague on the paper in the wet season. On the other hand, I don't want to risk the sun fading the pictures.'