"It wasn't just for you, but you are welcome."
Later, returning to the village, he noticed a low, familiar chanting issuing from a clump of scrubby pines. He nearly passed on, but after reflecting for a moment, he sat down on a convenient rock and waited, watched the crimson slice of the sun flatten against the black rocks in the west.
After a while, the chanting stopped, and Ngangata emerged from the trees, bowstave in hand. He nodded at Perkar when he saw him. The two men regarded each other, Ngangata standing, Perkar seated on the stone.
"It should be time to eat," Ngangata said after some time had elapsed.
He nodded. Wondering what it was, precisely, he wanted to say. He frowned in concentration.
"Come on," Ngangata said, his voice soft, like the evening air.
Perkar shook his head. "No, I… Brother Horse was right, you know. You had no sane reason for coming to help me."
Ngangata's mouth quirked up. He glanced off at the horizon, at the faded sun, and it seemed a long time before his black gaze, once so frightening, came back to meet Perkar's eyes.
"Perkar," he sighed at last. "You think too much. Too much. Now let's go eat; my bow and I are starving."
Perkar stood a bit unsteadily. His vision was a trifle blurred, as if some dust had blown into his eyes. He brushed off his kilt, took a few, slow steps to join Ngangata. "Thank you," he said.
Ngangata looked down at his own feet, nodded. "Come on. Food." And when he smiled, Perkar felt his own face respond, smiling back.
"Princess?"
Hezhi woke to the familiar voice, wondered if she had overslept again, if Ghan would be angry, what Qey was preparing for breakfast. Reality intruded quickly, the red desert, unfamiliar voices buzzing in the background. But Tsem, Tsem was familiar. And awake.
"Tsem!" Hezhi fell forward across his chest, buried her face in his monstrous shoulder. "Please live, Tsem."
The half Giant chuckled wanly. "That is what I hope to do, Princess, believe me." He glanced blearily around at the cedar posts, the soot-darkened walls of the little house they were in.
"I don't know where we are," Tsem admitted.
"Let me get you some water," she offered, "and I'll tell you." She patted him on the shoulder and went outside, down the hill to the spring Duk had shown her. So much she had to tell Tsem, and so much of it was unexplainable. So much unknown. Where were Ghan and Qey now? Being tortured for their part in her escape? Dead already? She might never know. Fetching the water back, she took a moment to regret her refusal of power. Whatever else she would have done, she would have saved Ghan and Qey. But if the fire in her had burned that far, she would have been lost, and many, many people would have died.
Tsem accepted the water thirstily and listened with wide eyes as she explained where they were, what had occurred while he slept.
"What will we do?" he asked, when she had finished.
"I don't know," she replied. "But I hope you will stay with me. I can't bear to lose you, too."
"Of course, Princess. I am your servant."
"No," she refuted. "I am no princess and you are no servant, not out here. If you stay with me here, it must be because you choose to."
Tsem nodded and sat up, gazing silently out the bright rectangle of the door.
"I should like to step outside," he said at last.
"I don't know…"
"Please."
She was scant help in aiding Tsem to his feet, but in reality he seemed to need only her moral support. Out in the sun, he leaned against the clay-plastered wall of the hut, gazed around at the distant horizon.
"I would like to find my mother's people," he said at last. "Someday. She used to tell me about them…"
"We can do that," Hezhi said.
"Not necessarily right away," Tsem put in. "But someday."
"Someday," she agreed, and grinned. She laid her hand on his shoulder, and together they contemplated the distance.
EPILOGUE
Autumn
A month passed, and the sky grew clearer, the winds colder. Some days brought clouds of geese and ducks, winging from the north in search of a warmer sun. Others brought the cold fingers of winter the birds were fleeing. The Mang worked hard in that month, chinking up houses, trekking to the wetlands nearer the River to gather nuts and berries, ranging in the uplands for meat and pine nuts.
Tsem recovered slowly, but after the first week the Mang healer attending him announced that he would certainly live— though he hinted that the debts he had incurred with certain gods would have to be repaid. Perkar, eager to do his part, organized a hunting expedition with Ngangata and a few younger Mang men. It was decided that a few women would accompany them, as well, and Hezhi, unskilled as she was, begged to be included.
Two days brought them to a lightly forested canyon, and there they made a strong camp, set up tents, dug firepits, built skinning frames for the hides they hoped the men would bring in. Hezhi set about learning the things Mang women did: gathering nuts, digging roots, tanning hides. The work was hard, and many times, early on, kindled nostalgia for the palace, where she was waited on by servants. The women she worked with were cordial but a little impatient with her. They seemed to expect her to already know how to do things. Hezhi was a quick learner, however, and before many days had passed the women began including her in their storytelling sessions, laughing now and then at her highly imperfect Mang, but never with any malice. The men returned every few days, always with game, and the women murmured much about the skill of Ngangata and his bow. Perkar was less esteemed, but he also killed much game, often entering the camp, flushed with his success, "like a little boy, just learning to hunt," the women would exclaim.
Half a month passed at the camp, and Hezhi began to feel a certain contentment, the days settling on her shoulders like a warm coat, her fingers learning their tasks as her tongue became comfortable with the language of the Horse People. One of the young warriors began flirting with her, and she became the object of good-natured gossip, though she kept a good distance from the young man. The lesson she had learned with Yen—Ghe?— was not one she would unlearn quickly. It was one of three pains still throbbing in her. The palace and her family were already fading. They were, as the saying went, more of her skin than her heart. But she missed Qey and Ghan, feared for them. She wondered often what the letter Ghan had left her contained—it had gone with Zeq' and his boat when he had fled.
Toward evening of the twentieth day in camp, Hezhi was scraping clean an antelope skin when the packhorses began to pace nervously in their corral. Many of the women stopped in their tasks, gazing down the canyon to see who or what might be approaching. They soon made out two riders, and one of the older women, astute in such matters, recognized Brother Horse and Yuu'han, his grandnephew.
That evening they held a celebration. Fortuitously, the hunters returned that same day, and so a deer was dressed and roasted. Brother Horse brought with him beer, candy, copper bells for the men and their horses, cloth and knives for the women. To Hezhi he gave one of the knives, a small, sharp blade.
"They tell me you learn quickly," he said. "Every Mang woman needs a good skinning knife."
"Thank you," she said, meaning it. The knife borrowed from Duk had always been that, and she was astonished at how happy she was to have her own.
"Well," Brother Horse went on, when she had accepted her present. "I have something else for you, as well." He drew forth a small bundle from his pack. "A friend of yours sent this along."
"A friend of mine?"
"Yes. Yuu'han and I rode down to Nhol, to buy sugar and knives."
"Nhol?" She took the package, fumbled it open with eager fingers. Saltwater started in her eyes when she saw what was enclosed. There was a book—The Mang Wastes—and a ten-score roll of blank paper. The latter was accompanied by pen and powdered ink. There was a note, as well.