Sharum Do Not Bend

302305 AR

Inevera waited nervously in the dama'ting pavilion, her breath fogging in the bitter cold. Qeva was there, as well as three other Brides, seven Betrothed, and four eunuchs, including the powerful Enkido. The eunuchs were dressed in full Sharum blacks, night-veiled with spear and shield. Under their robes was linked armour of dama'ting craft, enough to turn even a demon's bite.

But despite the powerful gathering in a familiar space, Inevera shifted her feet nervously. It was deep in the night, and they were on the surface. Evejan law forbade this, even for Brides of Everam, but Qeva and the others stood chatting among themselves as easily as if they stood in the Dama'ting Underpalace. Inevera knew logically the chances of alagai passing the Sharum in the Maze and breaching the great wall was minimal at best and in truth closer to infinitesimal but still her heart thudded in her chest.

Fear and pain are only wind, she reminded herself, picturing the palm and finding her centre.

Standing by the tent flap, mute Enkido raised a hand and made a quick series of gestures with his fingers.

'Oot!' Qeva said. 'They come.'

Everyone quieted, and the Brides moved to stand in front, Qeva at their lead. She nodded to Enkido as he opened the tent flap.

Half a dozen Sharum approached the pavilion, one of them leading a camel with feet wrapped in thick black cloth. There was black cloth over its body as well, and wrapped around the wheels of the large cart it pulled.

Their blacks were dusty from the Maze, with fresh dents in their armour and ichor splattering their heavy shields. One walked with a slight limp, and another had a blood-soaked cloth tied around one thick arm. The Sharum all had their night veils in place, but Inevera recognized them immediately by their sleeveless uniforms with breastplates of blackened steel emblazoned with the golden sunburst of Dama Baden. Even without his characteristic swagger and white kai'Sharum veil Inevera would have recognized Cashiv, and even more so the man beside him. His ajin'pal.

Soli.

She had not seen her brother in years, but she knew him instantly even behind his veil. His eyes had the twinkle of her brother's easy smile, and she knew his walk, his stance, and his muscular arms as well as she knew her own. She suppressed a gasp, but could not help staring.

Next to her, Melan snorted. 'You have as much chance there, bad throw, as you do in beating me to the veil. Those are push'ting. Man lovers. There are said to be none finer in battle than Dama Baden's Sharum, but they would sooner bed a goat than you.'

Asavi snickered. 'And be better for it.'

'Silence!' Qeva hissed.

Cashiv and the other Sharum came before the dama'ting and bowed deeply. As they did, Soli's eyes passed over Inevera, but though her face was bare, there was no recognition in the dim light.

'Rise, honoured Sharum,' Qeva said. 'The blessing of Everam be upon you.'

Cashiv and the others straightened. 'Everam is great. All honour and glory begins and ends with Him. Our lives belong to Him and his sacred Brides. It is the first night of Waning after winter solstice. We have come to deliver Dama Baden's tithe.'

Qeva nodded. 'Your sacrifice in blood does not go unnoticed by Everam, or his Brides. What gift have you brought?'

Cashiv bowed again. 'Twenty-nine alagai, Dama'ting.'

Qeva raised an eyebrow. 'Twenty-nine? This is not a holy number.'

Cashiv bowed again. 'Of course the dama'ting is correct. Twenty-eight is the traditional tithe; seven sand demons, seven clay, seven flame, and seven wind. One each of the common breeds for every pillar of Heaven.' He paused, his eyes sparkling with amusement. 'But Dama Baden is grateful for the blessings of the dama'ting, and commanded us to lay a special trap. To honour the one Creator, we have also brought a single water demon.'

Several of the nie'dama'ting gasped. The Brides showed no obvious sign, but Inevera could read the shift in their stances as easily as if they were shouting in elation. Water demons were beyond rare in Krasia, and there were spells that could only be made from their bones. The spell to create water alone could be accomplished with a fraction of the hora.

'Everam is pleased with your gift to honour Him,' Qeva said. 'How did you accomplish this?'

'Dama Baden had us wall off a section of the Maze, removing the wards and breaking the sandstone floor that prevents alagai rising. We dug a deep pool, which the dama filled with water from his own stores, and seeded with fish and other life. It took many months, but at last, the bait was taken and a water demon took residence there. It killed one of my men and injured two others as we hauled it out in the nets this night, surviving far longer than we expected in the night air. It eventually died of suffocation, and is otherwise intact.'

The dama'ting exchanged a glance. The cost of this endeavour was not lost to them. The water alone was a Damaji's ransom tainted now and useless. It spoke of Dama Baden's incredible wealth ... and of a favour he sought.

Dama Baden did nothing for free.

'This gift pleases us greatly, Cashiv asu Avram am'Goshin am'Kaji. Your honour, and that of your men, is boundless. The pleasures of Heaven will be yours forever when you pass from this life. Bring forth your wounded.'

The two most heavily wounded men stepped forth, and there was no hesitation as the dama'ting warded the skin about their injuries and drew forth small bits of hora to effect magical healing. The other men had only superficial scrapes and burns the Brides treated with more conventional means.

When it was done, Qeva turned back to the Sharum. 'Bring the gifts into the Rendering Chamber.'

Moving with the assuredness of men who had been this way many times, Cashiv and the others began unloading alagai corpses from the cart and carrying them down through a trapdoor Inevera had never seen before, right in the entrance hall. Large punctures in the chests of the sand and wind demons told of death by stingers arrows the size of spears, launched from wooden scorpions atop the walls. The armour of the clay demons was crushed by heavy stones dropped into demon pits. The smell of rank ichor was nauseating.

The flame demons drowned in shallow pools were unmarked, as was the water demon, a slimy mass of horned tentacles and sharp scales. Its mouth was enormous for its body, with row upon row of wicked teeth.

When it was done, Qeva gestured and Cashiv came to kneel before her. 'Four questions,' Qeva said, 'and a boon.'

Cashiv nodded. 'Thank you, Dama'ting. I humbly accept this gift, though we are yours to command, and act only to bring glory to Everam, not from thought of reward.' His words had the ring of practice, more a chant than speech. Inevera understood that this meeting likely played out every year, a business transaction that had become ritual. The way everyone smoothly gathered into a ring around the scene spoke of it as well.

Qeva knelt across from Cashiv as she reached into her hora pouch. 'Have you the dama's blood?' Cashiv drew forth a polished wooden box. Contained within was a delicate porcelain vial. He passed this to the dama'ting, who emptied its contents onto her dice.

'Lower your veil.' When Cashiv complied, she asked, 'Do you swear now that this is the true blood of Dama Baden, and that you speak with his voice his words and not your own with Everam as your witness?'

Cashiv put his hands on the canvas floor of the pavilion and pressed his forehead between them. 'I do, Dama'ting. I swear before Everam himself, in the name of Kaji and on my honour and hope of Heaven, that this is Dama Baden's blood and I have memorized his questions precisely.'

Qeva nodded, raising her hand and causing the dice to flare with a harmless glow. Cashiv flinched in spite of himself. 'Then ask, Sharum. The dice will know if you lie.'

Cashiv swallowed hard and drew deep breaths, finding his centre in much the same way as a dama'ting. Their sharusahk might be vastly different, but the philosophy at its core was not.

Cashiv met Qeva's eyes, his words slow and careful. 'What will be my greatest loss this year, and how can I profit from it?'

'Well said,' Qeva congratulated. 'That was two questions last year.' Without waiting for a response, she shook the dice in her hands, chanting as they began to glow. She threw, then studied the pattern carefully.

'A sickness will spread through the goat herds this winter,' she said. 'Only two in five will see the spring, and those too weak to have much value. Tell Dama Baden to sell his stock now and buy as many sheep as he can afford.'

Cashiv bowed and asked his second question. 'As my palanquin passed through the city a month ago, a khaffit spat upon me from the crowd. How may I find this one again, to visit justice upon him?'

Inevera knew full well what 'justice' the dama meant. One fool enough to spit on a dama no doubt deserved it, but it said much of Baden's pride that he would waste such a valuable question on revenge.

Qeva showed no emotion at all as she consulted the dice. 'You will find him in the bazaar. His stall three hundred twenty paces east of the statue of the Holy Mother near the Jaddah gate in the Khanjin district. A seller of ...'

Inevera tilted her head, studying the pattern still glowing softly on the dice. Honey melon, she read.

'Honey cakes,' Qeva said after a moment. Inevera stiffened, looking at the dice again, positive of her reading. She glanced at Qeva, and did not know what filled her with more fear, that Dama Baden was going to torture and kill the wrong man, or that her great teacher had made an error.

She hesitated. Should she speak? She quickly dismissed the idea. If she pointed out the mistake in front of the Sharum, it would likely mean her life, as well as that of all the warriors present, Soli included. The dama'ting could not be seen as fallible.

She breathed, finding her centre, and did nothing.

Cashiv bowed again. 'Dama Lakash is attempting to end the exception that the personal Sharum of dama need fight in the Maze only on Waning. How can this be prevented?'

Qeva grunted and threw the dice a third time. 'Dama Lakash's son-in-law and heir Dama Kivan has spoken ill of you in council. Claim insult and kill him, taking his Jiwah Ka, Lakash's eldest daughter Gisa, as your Jiwah Sen in recompense. Marry her that night, and get a daughter on her the third afternoon after the ceremony.'

Cashiv's face wrinkled at the thought. 'This brings me to the dama's final question, Dama'ting: "I remain vigorous with men, but have lost my ability to lie with and seed my wives. How can this be restored?"'

Qeva snorted and put her dice away. There was a tinkling clatter of small corked bottles as she rifled through the pouch at her waist, finally selecting one. 'Apply this personally to the dama's spear before he does the deed, and tell him to be quick about it.' She tossed the bottle to Cashiv. 'If that doesn't work, stick a finger in his arse.'

Cashiv and the other Sharum laughed at that.

'And the boon?' Qeva asked.

'My master has lost nine poison tasters in the year,' Cashiv said. 'He suspects one or more of his many sons.'

'Yet he wastes a question on a spitting khaffit,' Qeva noted.

Cashiv bowed low. 'My master's sons add to his power, and he would not wish to kill one, nor does he think it would deter the others if he did. He asks instead for a chalice, ornate as befits his stature, magicked to turn poison to water.'

'A precious gift,' Qeva said. 'Difficult to make.'

Cashiv smiled. 'My master prays it will be less so, with the bones of a water demon.'

Qeva nodded, rising to her feet. 'You may go. Tell your master his chalice will be ready on the first Waning after spring equinox. We will teach him a precise way to hold it, so that only he may activate its power.'

'The Dama'ting is generous beyond measure.' Cashiv touched his forehead to the ground and got to his feet. As he and the others turned to go, Soli looked back. For an instant, he met Inevera's eyes.

And winked.

The days that followed were a horror, as Inevera and the other nie'dama'ting who had earned the Chamber of Shadows rendered the demon's flesh with acid and fire, leaving the hora untouched. The bones were then polished with sacred oils as the nie'dama'ting chanted endless prayers to Everam until they were black and hard as obsidian.

The putrid acid slurry was neutralized with a base, the resulting liquid poison to the touch, but thick with magic the dama'ting could tap. It was drained into large vats connected to pipes that sent the stuff through the palace walls like a circulatory system, powering the wardlights, climate control, and countless other spells warded throughout the palace.

The work left the other girls pale and retching, their hands burned and eyes watering, but Inevera barely noticed. Her mind was far away from such inconsequential wind. She breathed through her mouth as she chanted, letting her hands work the monotonous task on their own as her thoughts danced with the image of Soli. She had worried greatly about him over the years, her heart clenching every day Sharum wounded were brought to the pavilion. It would have been enough to see him and know he was alive, but the wink had changed everything. He knew her fate and loved her still. He would tell Manvah that she was well and calm their mother's heart.

The chamber rang with the sound of Inevera's cymbals as she gyrated and spun, the grip of her bare feet sure on the polished stone floor. She was thirteen, but already she had a woman's body, lithe yet well curved. She snapped her hips at Khavel and saw him rock back with every thrust.

The younger girls watched in fascination. Inevera taught the beginner classes in pillow dancing now, though the bido wrap she wore meant she herself had yet to experience the dance in full.

Sacred law held that Everam's Betrothed remain virgins until they took the veil, as signified by the bido. That first night, the Damaji'ting would break her hymen to consummate the marriage to Everam, and Inevera would become a full Bride.

The second night, she would be free to love any man or object as she pleased, for what were they, compared with Everam's embrace? Playthings.

Inevera met the eunuch's gaze as she writhed before him. Firmly under her spell, his eyes were glazed, head swaying in time with her movements. He was hers.

Khavel was a perfect physical specimen the dama'ting settled for nothing less in a pleasure eunuch with a handsome face, proud jaw, and muscular body glistening with oil. Trained from an early age in massage and all the other ways a man might give a woman pleasure, he would without question be a skilled lover. It was whispered that almost every dama'ting made use of him, and that he was on a constant diet of virility drugs, with a strict ritual exercise and sleep regimen. Practically every new dama'ting in the last decade had summoned him to her chambers on her second night, with none regretting.

But while Inevera could see the eunuch's beauty, he stirred no desire in her, no more than a perfect statue of a man might. Other girls might be eager to practise the pillow dance fully, but Inevera didn't spend years honing her skills to waste them on half a man. She would sooner bed a khaffit.

When her demonstration ended, she lined up the younger girls, helping them place their feet and practise the twist and snap of the hips that was the core of the pillow dance.

After the lesson, Inevera went to the baths, breathing steam deeply as the hot water soaked into her muscles. Melan and Asavi were there, pointedly ignoring her, but in the many months since Inevera's defeat of the older girl, most of the other nie'dama'ting had changed their attitude towards her.

'Bathe you, sister?' Jasira asked, holding a soaked cloth lathered with scented soap. She was two years older than Inevera, and had just passed the test of admission to the Chamber of Shadows. Inevera waved her off. Such offers were becoming common, as her power grew and Melan's waned. As Kenevah predicted, the other girls feared her, whispering among themselves that she would one day be Damaji'ting. Inevera could make willing servants of most of the nie'dama'ting, even so far as taking them as pillow friends and having her pleasure of them. But Inevera had no interest in such things. The girls did not shun her as they once had, but neither were they her friends.

More than anything, Inevera wished she could speak to her mother. Or her brother. The only people she could ever really trust.

As they were dressing, Inevera looked to Melan. 'Going to the chamber, sister? We could walk together.' Melan glared at her, and Inevera allowed herself a slight smirk.

'Smile now, bad throw,' Melan whispered. 'Today I finish my dice, and tomorrow I will take the veil.' She gave a predatory smile, but Inevera only smiled pleasantly in return.

'I will still be dama'ting before you,' she promised.

The girls sat in a semicircle before Qeva in the entrance hall to the Chamber of Shadows seven Betrothed aspiring to one day take the white veil.

There was always a lesson before carving began, the dama'ting's robes blood red in the dim wardlight the only light allowed in the chamber.

Throughout the lesson, Melan fidgeted, shifting her weight and pursing her lips, rolling the velvet bag with her dice with one hand, eager to get back to carving.

It was always thus. Inevera and Melan had entered the Chamber of Shadows together, but even though Melan had years of work on Inevera and sneered about it publicly, she seemed to take seriously Inevera's threat to finish her dice first. When Qeva ended the lesson each day, Melan practically ran to a carving chamber, always last to emerge when the dama'ting called an end to the day's work. Inevera imagined she could hear the frantic scraping of her tools even through the thick stone walls.

If Melan took the veil before Inevera, it could be dangerous ... perhaps deadly. All the Betrothed had heard Inevera's vow to finish first, and any power she had gained among the other girls with her defeat of Melan would vanish if her threat proved hollow. More, Melan would gain the near-limitless privilege of dama'ting, and her opportunities to have Inevera killed would increase manifold. There were others among the Brides of Everam who would surely support her.

The girls were finally dismissed, and padded down the cold stone passage to the long tunnel filled with small carving chambers. There were no wardlights in the tunnel, but Melan and the other girls lifted their unfinished dice, casting a red glow to see by. Only wardlight was permitted in the carving chambers, but even that was not given freely. It had to be earned by the girls' own hands. Without light, they would not be able to see their tools, their hands, or even the dice themselves.

The circlets of wardsight they left behind, forbidden in the carving cells. Inevera had heard it whispered in the Vault that a girl once tried to sneak her circlet into the cells that she might carve in Everam's light. Her eyes had been cut out before she was cast from the Dama'ting Palace.

Inevera walked unhurriedly as the other girls slipped into carving chambers. Qeva shut the doors behind them, leaving only the faint glow of wardlight leaking from under the door frames. One by one, the lights winked out until it was only by this faint glow that Inevera came to her own chamber. Qeva shut the door behind her, and she slipped off her robe, using it to stuff the bottom of the door, leaving her in perfect darkness.

Inevera, too, could call light from her dice, but chose not to in the Chamber of Shadows. The Evejah'ting warned that even wardlight could weaken the dice, leaching their power unnecessarily. The Damajah had carved in utter darkness, and Inevera saw no reason to do differently. Everam will guide your hands, if you are worthy, the holy book said.

Kneeling in the darkness, she said a prayer to her namesake as she took out her dice and warding tools, laying them out in a neat, evenly spaced row. She had finished the four-sided die, and the six, now working on the eight. Her work was slow and meticulous shaping, smoothing, etching, all in rhythm with her breath.

Time passed. She did not know how long. Her trance was broken by a ringing sound that echoed through the silence of the chamber.

Melan had completed her dice.

Inevera quickly gathered her hora back into their pouch and put away her tools. There would be no more work tonight. She drew deep breaths and emerged from her chamber.

The other girls had already gathered, Melan in their centre, her face elated in the wardlight. She held up her dice and basked in the sounds of adoration and envy. When she caught sight of Inevera, her smile was one of cold triumph.

Inevera smiled in return, bowing politely.

They gathered in the lesson room, Melan kneeling with the nie'dama'ting surrounding her in a semicircle. Before long, dama'ting began to file into the room as well, nearly every Bride in the tribe forming an outer ring. Kenevah was the last to arrive, moving to the centre and kneeling to face her granddaughter. Her face was unreadable as she produced an ancient, faded deck of cards. The sound of her shuffling echoed in the silent chamber.