The Desert Spear. Peter Brett V.

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СКАЧАТЬ dama’ting carried black robes.

      The dama’ting led him to a private chamber and with her own hands unwrapped his bido, pulling it away. Jardir tried to embrace the feeling of her hands on his bare skin, but she was the only woman who had ever touched him so intimately, and for the first time in years, he could not find peace. His body responded to her touch, and he feared she might kill him for his disrespect.

      But the dama’ting made no mention of his arousal as she wrapped a black loincloth in place of his bido, then dressed him in the loose pantaloons, heavy sandals, and robe of a dal’Sharum.

      After eight years in a bido, Jardir expected any clothing to feel odd, but he was unprepared for the weight of a dal’Sharum’s armored blacks. Plates and strips of fired clay were held tight in sewn pockets throughout the garb. The plates could absorb a great blow, Jardir knew, but they shattered on impact, and needed to be replaced after every hit.

      So distracted was he that he did not notice at first that the veil she tied about his throat was white. When he did, he gasped aloud.

      “Did you think your time among the dama meaningless, son of Hoshkamin?” the dama’ting asked. “You will rejoin your dal’Sharum brothers as their master, a kai’Sharum.”

      “I am but seventeen!” Jardir said.

      The dama’ting nodded. “The youngest kai’Sharum in centuries. Just as you were the youngest to bring down a wind demon, and the youngest to survive alagai’sharak. Who can say what else you may accomplish?”

      “You can,” Jardir said. “The dice told you.”

      The dama’ting shook her head. “I have seen the fate your spirit reaches for, but it is a path fraught with peril, and you may still fail to reach it.” She drew the white veil about his face. Her touch seemed almost a caress. “You have many tests before you. Bring your focus to the now. When you return to the Kaji pavilion today, one of the Sharum will challenge you. You must—”

      Jardir held up a hand, cutting her off. The dama’ting’s eyes flared at his audacity.

      “With respect,” Jardir said, recalling the gruel lines of the Kaji’sharaj, “the world of Sharum, I understand. I will break the challenger publicly before any dare follow his example.”

      The dama’ting regarded him a moment, then shrugged, a smile in her eyes.

      Jardir strode with pride into the Kaji training grounds, followed by Dama Khevat and the dama’ting. The dal’Sharum paused in their training at the sight, and there were murmurs of recognition as they saw Jardir’s face. One of them barked a laugh.

      “Look! The rat returns!” Hasik cried, his s’s still whistling after all these years. The big warrior planted his spear with a thump. “It only took him five years to change out of his bido!” Several other warriors laughed at that.

      Jardir smiled. It was natural for Sharum to test the mettle of a new kai, and it was inevera that it should be Hasik. The powerful warrior was still larger than Jardir, but he felt no fear as he strode forward.

      Hasik stared him down coldly, unafraid. “You may have a white veil loose about your throat, but you are still the son of piss,” he sneered, too low for the others to hear.

      “Ah, Hasik, my ajin’pal!” Jardir called loudly. “Do they still call you Whistler? I would be happy to remove a few more teeth and cure your affliction, if you wish.”

      All around, Sharum laughed. Jardir looked among them and saw many who had served under him when he was Nie Ka.

      Hasik growled and lunged, but Jardir sidestepped, spinning into a kick that knocked the big warrior onto his backside in the dust. He stood patiently as Hasik scowled and scrambled back to his feet unharmed.

      “I will kill you for that,” Hasik promised.

      Jardir smiled, reading Hasik’s every movement like writing in the sand. Hasik charged in, thrusting hard with his spear, but Jardir pivoted, slapping the point to one side, and Hasik stumbled past, overbalanced. He turned and swung the spear like a staff, but Jardir bent backward like a palm tree in the wind, avoiding the blow without moving his feet an inch. Before Hasik could recover, he whipped upright and grabbed the weapon with both hands, kicking up between his hands and breaking through the thick shaft of wood. He followed through on the kick, taking Hasik in the face.

      There was a satisfying crack as Hasik’s jaw shattered, but Jardir did not stop there. He dropped the speartip but held on to the butt, advancing as Hasik struggled back to his feet.

      Hasik punched at him, and Jardir marveled that he had once found those punches too fast to follow. After years among the dama, the fist seemed to move at a crawl. He caught Hasik’s wrist and twisted hard, feeling his shoulder pop from its socket. Hasik screamed as Jardir swung the spear butt, shattering the warrior’s knee. Hasik collapsed, and Jardir kicked him over onto his stomach. He was well within his rights to kill Hasik, and those gathered likely expected him to, but Jardir had not forgotten what Hasik had done to him in the Maze.

      “Now, Hasik,” he said, as all the dal’Sharum of the Kaji tribe looked on, “I will teach you to be a woman.” He held up the spear butt. “And this will be the man.”

      “Watch to ensure he does not fall on his spear in shame,” Jardir told Shanjat as Hasik was hauled off to the dama’ting pavilion, howling in pain and humiliation. “I would not see any permanent harm befall my ajin’pal.”

      “As my kai’Sharum wills,” Shanjat said, “though they will have to remove the spear before he can fall on it.” He smirked as he bowed to Jardir and hurried after the injured warrior. Jardir followed Shanjat with his eyes, marveling at how quickly they fell back into old patterns, despite Shanjat having earned the black years ago, and him just this day.

      Jardir had planned his revenge on Hasik for years, while he danced sharusahk in his tiny cell in Sharik Hora. It wasn’t enough for the man to suffer defeat; Jardir’s revenge had to be an abject lesson to any who would ever seek to challenge him again. If Hasik had not challenged him, he would have sought the man out and initiated the challenge himself.

      By Everam’s infinite justice, every step played out exactly as he had imagined it, but now that his triumph was complete, he found no more satisfaction in it than when he fought Shanjat for his place in the nie’Sharum food line.

      “You seem to have things well in hand,” Dama Khevat said, slapping Jardir on the back. “Go to the Kaji pavilion and take a woman before tonight’s battle.” He laughed. “Take two! The jiwah’Sharum will be eager to bed the youngest kai’Sharum in a thousand years.”

      Jardir forced himself to laugh and nod, though he felt a clench in his stomach. He had never known a woman. Except for a few glimpses of the jiwah’Sharum that one night in the Kaji pavilion, he had never even seen one without her robes. Kai’Sharum or no, he had one last test of manhood in front of him, and unlike the crushing of Hasik or the killing of alagai, this was one none of his training had prepared him for.

      Khevat left him, and Jardir took a deep breath, looking toward the Kaji pavilion.

      They СКАЧАТЬ