Thus he thought, and thus he was still thinking when the wall began to shudder beneath the weight of mallets, accompanied by the high, shrill keen of priests chanting.
XII The Breath Feasting
HEZHI heard the roaring of the crowd outside, but she had been hearing such for several days, and in her pensive, withdrawn state she certainly thought nothing of it. Nothing, that is, until Yuu'han and Ngangata dragged Perkar's still body into the yekt. His eyes were closed and a bright string of blood ran from one corner of his mouth. His nostrils, also, bore red stains. He was pallid, and she could not see if he breathed or not.
She stared, unable to think of anything to say.
Tsem, however, easily found his voice. “Is he dead?” the Giant grunted.
Hezhi frowned at Tsem, still trying to understand what she was seeing. Yuu'han had stripped off Perkar's shirt, and beneath it his chest was livid, purple and red, as if he had been stepped on by a Giant twice Tsem's size. No, not stepped on; stomped. But how could he be dead? She had seen Perkar alive after being stabbed in the heart. She had seen the blade appear from the front of his chest, a red needle with Yen behind it, laughing at her, at her stupidity. What could kill Perkar, if not that?
No one answered Tsem, and finally Hezhi, more irritated at that than Tsem's blurted question, finally asked, “What happened to him?”
Yuu'han met her gaze levelly, for just an instant, before looking off into some middle distance the way Mang were wont to do. “He played Slap,” the young man said. “He won't play again, I think.”
“Then he is—”
Perkar interrupted them by coughing. It was actually more of a gurgle than a cough, but he blew a clot of blood from his mouth. His eyes did not open, though his face pinched tight with pain. Yuu'han stared aghast, made a hurried sign with his hand in the air.
“Naka'bush!” he hissed. In Mang it meant an evil ghost.
“No,” Ngangata told Yuu'han. “No, he is alive.”
“He was dead,” Yuu'han grunted, watching Perkar's chest begin to rise and fall, hearing his wheezing, rasping breath.
“No. It is that sword he bears. It heals him.”
“Thegodblade?”
The Alwa-Man nodded. “Tell Brother Horse but no one else.”
Yuu'han looked uncertain, but after considering he nodded and then left the yekt.
“He will heal, then?” Hezhi asked, her voice still dull with shock.
“I believe he will,” Ngangata answered, “considering that he was deadbefore and is now breathing again. That would seem to me to be the biggest step toward recovery.” His alien face remained expressionless, and Hezhi wondered what the strange man was thinking. Were he and Perkar friends or just traveling companions, forced together by circumstance? Did Perkar really have any friends? In the past months, she had begun to regard him as such. There were moments when he made her feel better than anyone else did, happier anyway. And she believed that, unlike Tsem or Ghan or D'en, Perkar could not be taken from her by death. It seemed safe to care for him. Now even that illusion was shattered.
“I hope so,” Hezhi replied, still unable to think of much to say.
Ngangata rubbed his forehead tiredly and selected one of the yekt's large, colorfully felted pillows to slump down upon. He looked very tired. “I have to know what you have heard,” he said after a moment.
Tsem crossed the room bearing a pitcher and bowl.
“Drink something,” he told Ngangata. Hezhi felt blood rise into her face with a wave of shame. She should be doing something. Ngangata took the water from Tsem.
“Fetch me a rag, Tsem,” she said quietly. “A rag and some more water. We should clean him up, at least.” Perkar's breath was still coming erratically, labored, but at least he was breathing. Tsem nodded and went to search for a rag.
Ngangata watched her expectantly.
“I don't know,” she said at last. “I'm not sure what is going on.”
“You've heard about the war?”
She nodded. “Yes, just today. Some men came in earlier. They found me out in the desert—”
“Found you?”
Hezhi helplessly realized that she was only making things more confused. “I was walking over in the cliffs,” she explained. “Two Mang men from the west found me.”
“Found you in the cliffs? What were they doing over there?”
“I don't…” She didn't know. “That's a good question,” she finished. “It isn't on their way, is it?”
“Leave that for a moment,” Ngangata said. “What have you heard about the war?”
“Not much. Just that there is one, Perkar's people and the Mang. There was an argument between those men and Brother Horse. He told them they were not to attack the two of you. I guess he doesn't have much authority over them.”
“It's too bad he didn't have even less,” Ngangata said wryly. “If they had simply attacked Perkar, he would have killed them with his sword; that much is a fact. As it was, they challenged him to a 'game'—you see the outcome.”
“I don't know,” Hezhi said. “You know more about bar—about these people than I do. If there were a real fight, with swords and everything, wouldn't others join in?”
Ngangata nodded. “Probably. It might have even turned into a little war, with Brother Horse's closest kin trying to protect his hospitality. All in all it was probably best this way. His sword will still heal him.”
Tsem returned with a damp cloth and a basin. She reached for it, but he gently held her away and began sponging Perkar's chest himself. Hezhi started to protest, but realized that Tsem probably knew more of what he was about than she did.
“I've seen him with worse wounds and still capable of walking and talking,” she commented. “Worse looking, anyway.”
“As have I,” Ngangata agreed, and Hezhi thought she caught a deep worry in his burring voice. He did not, however, offer anything further.
Tsem wiped Perkar's face, and the young man hacked again, moaning a bit.
“Did he find what he went looking for?” she asked.
“I suppose. I think he learned much. We learned about the war, at any rate.”
“From this goddess of his?”
“And from another god. From Karak, the Raven.”
Hezhi pursed her lips. “Perkar told me of that one. It was he who set you and Brother Horse to watching for us, when we fled the city.”
“Yes. It was also he who tricked Perkar and his friends into betraying our king. He is a strange, willful god.”
Hezhi sighed and shook her head. “I know nothing of these gods. They are all strange to me.” Monsters, she finished inwardly.
“I don't know everything he learned from Karak,” Ngangata went on. He seemed to want to tell her something, but was trying to work to it carefully.
“Weren't you there?”
“I didn't hear the conversation. But afterward, Perkar was eager to return here, to find you. I think Karak told him something about you, something important.”
“Oh?”
Tsem growled low in his throat. “I like this not at all, Princess,” he muttered. “Too much, happening too fast. Too many people wanting you again.”
“I know, Tsem.”
“What do you mean?” Ngangata queried. “What is this?”
“Those Mang who met me in the desert. They acted as if they wanted something from me, too.”
“And they found you in the cliffs, though no trail from the west passes near. That means they were looking for you.”
Hezhi tried to deny that with a little shake of her head. “They might have seen me run into the cliffs.” But they hadn't. She knew that, somehow. “No, you're right, Ngangata. They were looking for me. And Brother Horse put me in this yekt, as soon as we returned, and set his nephews to guard me. He could tell something was wrong.” She did not add that she was worried even about Brother Horse's intentions. No one who could not see into him would understand, would merely think she had become mad with paranoia.