Infall Ch. 04

Chapter Four

Saba sailed and landed, Indya's body rocking forward and then back.

"Indya!" Kythe thundered, dismounting and striding toward her, his long legs and large body, Indya seeing him and waving madly.

He was with another man who was also on a horse, but the other man had turned away and was looking in the other direction. "Kythe!" she cried, grinning, turning Saba, trotting back. "You're here. Did you see Saba, how strong he is?"

Saba was her horse, and he was the warmest reddish brown with black hair on his lower legs and a white streak on his face and a black mane and tail. She'd seen him right away, deciding at once when Kythe had different horses brought to the camp, a trader selling them.

She and Kythe had come out of the tent to look at the horses. Standing not far from them without talking to them and looking awkward had been a man named Joel who had frozen, mumbling something, when Indya had been introduced. Joel was the man who would make the final and actual exchange of coins for her horse.

Kythe sometimes wouldn't do things others did, just regular things like touch coins, as if to do so would reveal to everyone that he was just a person. He had rules, and he'd explained to her that he hadn't made those rules, but he had to follow them. Well, most of them.

The trader had stared at her like the others did in the camp until Kythe had glanced at him, and then the man simply hadn't looked at her while Kythe was watching.

"Choose your horse, Indya," Kythe had said.

"That one," Indya had said right away, pointing at the horse already with a saddle, at the end, taller than the others, his alert ears. "He's like he is Bishar, Kythe," she'd said. Bishar was Kythe's stallion, whom she loved because he was the first horse she'd ever met, and because she'd met Kythe then, too. Not only was this horse tall and strong like Bashir, but his coloring was the same.

"That horse came with the trader. He's areshu, Indya."

"The trader is being a reshu?" she said, squinting at Kythe, at which the trader had turned around sharply and looked at her, looking away when Kythe glanced at him.

"The horse is a reshu, Indya. He's not a stallion."

She cocked her head, looking. "It's a strange mare, Kythe," she said.

His mouth twitched. "He's not a stallion or a mare, alea. He's had his..." Kythe said, looking at her face, seeming to hesitate, and then he shook his head. "It doesn't matter. He's a male horse, yes. But he's the trader's horse."

"Oh," Indya had said, her eyes on the tall horse with the reddish-brown body like Kythe's eyes, and the black legs, strong and tall, the muscles moving in his shoulders and his rump. She dragged her eyes away from his beauty, ignoring what she felt, not quite meeting Kythe's eyes for a moment because he would see her longing, and then she did, smiling. "I understand."

Kythe had then looked at the horse with the proud neck and the big nose and silky nostrils and he'd smiled. "He's a fine horse," he said, turning back to her. "You like him?"

Indya's heart had leapt, but then she had come close to Kythe, facing away from the trader, leaning in, Kythe leaning in to hear her. Indya had spoken quietly. "I don't think that's good. This trader maybe he loves him, Kythe, like you is love Bishar, it is his horse. I don't take one he love from him. I like one of the small females. The white one is pretty."

Kythe had straightened. "Trader," Kythe had said, the man he addressed straightening, his eyes darting to Joel like Joel would save him.

"Rí," the trader said, approaching, sort of, seeming unsure of the appropriate distance.

Joel had also turned and stepped forward, not quite seeming to know what to do.

"How long have you had your horse?" Kythe said.

The trader had glanced at the tall, magnificent horse with the black mane and tail, Indya also looking at him, her eyes drawn to him. "Not long, Rí," the trader said, looking at Kythe and again at the horse as if he was trying to figure out if the horse had done something wrong. "I got him in a lot. He's two years old."

"Is he a good horse?" Kythe said.

"He's a horse, Rí," the trader had said, shrugging a little. "A reshu for travel. He has a soft mouth, but he has no line, a modress. He's not worthy."

Not worthy. Indya felt a stab for her horse, to be dismissed, unvalued and he was so strong and beautiful. "What is amodress?" Indya said to Kythe, frowning at the trader.

"He isn't of a bloodline like Bashir. His parents are one horse or another," Kythe answered.

"Bashir is royalty? You doing that with the horses, too, as well as your selfs?" Indya said, laughing a little. "So, some horses is just so special like you? But not my horse."

"Yes, Indya," Kythe said. "The animals are bred for excellence. You understand this. You know about this. You've told me about genetics."

"Nature is for a better making of excellence than any of us, Kythe," Indya said, giving another laugh. "He will be Saba, the most wonderful horse, and I don't care who is his parents." The trader didn't understand that Saba was worth a thousand small mares with lines in their blood.

"For the modress," Kythe said to the trader, "I will pay you what I would have paid for one of the mares."

"Yes, Rí," the trader had said, looking baffled, glancing at her.

While the trader had gone and unloaded his gear from her horse, putting it on one of the small mares, she had thrown her arms around Kythe's neck, Kythe laughing. "Thank you, Kythe. I love him with all of me," she'd said.

* * *

As soon as Kythe was there, Indya saw the two men and one woman who had stayed with her in the wooden house leave in a carriage. All they had ever done was watch. They hadn't spoken to her. She didn't even know their names.

Kythe was waiting for her, big and his feet planted and his handsome face. She liked his face. When she arrived, he reached, pulling her down off of Saba and against himself, on her feet, his face like a thundercloud in the sky

"Yes, I saw what you did," Kythe said. "You shouldn't jump the horse, even over something so small. You're just learning to ride."

"I'm so happy to see you," she said, breathing fast, still smiling, her arms coming around his neck. "I missing you so much and I thinking of you all the time."

He looked down at her and his face relaxed and Kythe grinned, shaking his head and leaning down to kiss her. When he pulled away, his face was stern again. "I missed you as well, alea, but you should be more careful."

She saw Etien come out of the house, waving to them, Indya drawing out of Kythe's arms and waving back. "Goodbye, friend Etien! I will see you soon again," she called.

"Goodbye, Indya," he called back, his voice faint, getting on his horse.

"To learn, I must do it," she said to Kythe, going to Saba and giving him treats she kept from her pocket, a bit of apple, his eyes greedy, and petting him, laying herself on the horse's long face when Saba leaned into her. "I love you, you are so wonderful," Indya told him, kissing her horse on his nose, his ear flicking. "You are being my handsome and wise and strong Saba."

"He gets your affections," Kythe complained, gesturing. "Saba is not a pet."

Kythe turned away to get his horse and Indya crossed her eyes and stuck out her tongue at his back, hearing a laugh, turning and seeing the other man dismounting. She blinked, her eyes going wide and then going to Kythe and back.

"You're right. She already has a good seat," the man said.

Kythe, who hadn't told her, sent the other man a narrow glance. "Don't tell her I said that, brother," Kythe said, getting his horse. "You'll only encourage her."

She walked to face the other man, putting her hands behind her back. "Hello. You are Kythe's antadamo," she said, giving the name for an identical twin in her language. "I don't know this. It's very nice to meet you. I am Indya."

Kythe's brother stepped forward and offered his hand. She put hers in it and he brought it to his forehead, leaning down briefly, dropping her hand and smiling. She hadn't had anyone greet her like that before, and he was as handsome as Kythe, of course, and she couldn't help smiling back.

His hair was different, Indya's eyes taking him in. It was shaved short on the sides and then long on top, pulled back and braided, one thick braid that came over his shoulder and lay on his chest, dark brown hair, and his eyes were clever like Kythe's and were that same warm color.

"I don't think I would mistake you in the headdress and pants, and your eyes that are a blue like midnight on the water. You're even more beautiful than theishlino."

"What is ishlino?" she said.

"When people talk to one another about other people," Kythe said, coming to stand beside her.

She nodded. "Gossip," she said in her language. "On Atlantis, we say a person is for being chewing another person's food in his mouth," Indya told his brother, making her hand talk.

Kythe's brother grinned. It was strange to see Kythe in him.

"Indya, this is my brother," Kythe said.

She turned to Kythe, her smile fading a little. "Yes, I can see that. Why you don't tell me you have a brother who is being...what is your word?"

"Twin," Kythe supplied, his eyes on her face. "He was in the south. He's only just returned."

Which didn't really answer her question. "Yes, twin, thank you. He is this rí? I can calling him Rí, if you would like," she offered to Kythe, smiling. "I don't mind."

"Thank you, Indya," Kythe said, shooting her a look. "I appreciate you doing so for my brother."

Her smile left her face. "You're with sarcastic again," she accused Kythe. "You wanting me to call you Rí and saying you're so wonderful for to being born like the rest of us and keep looking for things on the ground when your shadow coming to my feet."

Kythe's brother burst out laughing. "She is everything you said, brother," he said, hitching. "I am Zen, Indya. I'm happy to meet you."

"Hello, Zen," she said, turning to smile at him and then her smile faded. "I meant to say Rí. I said that instead, you forget the other one," she said, glancing at Kythe and back at his brother. "Please," she added. "Thank you. All right."

His brother's shoulders began to shake and he snorted more laughter and Kythe shook his head and leaned down, picking her up and putting her over his shoulder.

"What do you do! I am not for a potato bag," she cried.

"Sack, Indya," Kythe said, spanking her butt.

"You don't abuse me, Kythe," she scolded, looking up, frowning, Kythe's brother holding his stomach now.

Kythe laughed, depositing her on her feet at Saba's side, leaning down and kissed her, lifting her onto the horse. She leaned for the reins, all of them going back to the camp.

She'd wrapped her hair that morning in a long scarf Kythe had given her, saying it would help, but not much, but being over his shoulder had unraveled the end and a gust of wind did the rest, Indya catching for it too late, the cloth sailing behind her while Saba was trotting. Indya turned her head, her black hair falling all around her thighs, messy, moving around her.

"My headdress," she cried. "You wait." She stopped Saba and dropped his reins, dismounting and running to retrieve the cloth, which wanted to keep going.

She finally caught it and ran back to Saba, the cloth in her hand. She mounted, Saba dancing a little because he was so strong, turning her head. The two men were staring at her. Her eyes shifted between them.

"Fata, brother," Zen said.

"I told you this," Kythe said.

"What for we are waiting?" she said to them, gesturing. "Did you both forget the way?"

* * *

Indya went into her tent, glad to be home, the men following her in, a person coming in and bringing food and drink and leaving without saying anything. Riding made her hungry.

"Come and sit, nina," Zen said, gesturing to her.

"Thank you, Rí," she said.

"Call me Zen," he said, rising and setting down his bag and opening it, untying fasteners and drawing the strings open. His hands were like Kythe's. He brought out a cylinder.

"The far-see, Zen," she exclaimed. "You making it."

"We made more than one, Indya."

"May I see it?"

"Of course," he said, handing it to her, his hands careful.

"I'll be back," she said, and left the tent, walking out of the camp toward the field, men looking up, staring at her like they did. In a moment, she had Kythe on one side and Zen on the other and the men looked at the ground.

She gave a soft laugh, Kythe glancing at her. "I wonder they don't be looking at the ground twice," she said, giving another soft laugh.

When she got to the field, she brought it to her eye and twisted it, bringing it into focus. "Yes, this is much better. I told them they are trying for different..." she said, turning to Kythe. "How do you say, for bigness that going not high," she said, gesturing on a horizontal plane.

"Length," Kythe said.

"Yes. Length. It changing where glass meet. I don't know they understand. They did well."

"It took them sixteen hours to figure how it was done," Zen said. "Our father called all of the engineers. Once they did understand, they were very excited. It's a remarkable mechanism."

She shrugged. "I'm not for so smart to making the idea, Zen. I learning it like all my people. Yours learning soon. You making the glass now. The glass is...you can see it."

"Transparent," Zen supplied.

"Yes, thank you. Transparent. Once you making it the magnifiers, you see it, your people. It's just for to be time." She turned and walked back to her tent, both men accompanying her. She looked to her left and then to her right. "I feeling like I being a mirror," she said, and laughed.

They went in and sat again. Zen was looking at her. She met Zen's eyes, across from her, the deepest brown like his brother, upturned and clever. She went still when he held hers, feeling a sinking sensation in her belly and looking away. She shivered.

Kythe's eyes were on Zen's face and they narrowed. "You fater. You did," Kythe said to his brother, his face darkening. "I told you not to."

Zen's eyes shifted to Kythe and he sighed and then gestured at her. Kythe turned to look at her for a long moment. Kythe turned back to his brother and sighed, throwing up his hand. He gestured to her.

"You have to ask?" Zen said.

Both men returned to their meal.

Indya leaned into Kythe. "What happen?" she said, but Zen spoke.

"My brother tells me about your people who live in a ship in the great nothing beyond the sky and I don't believe it," Zen said to her. "I don't say you are lying, nina. I thought maybe you were mad or a noita, and now that I meet you, I don't think so. I don't know what to think. Kythe says you have something to show me that will make me believe your wild story."

Her hand went to her arm. "It doesn't matter, Zen. I'm being here now. I'm not for being a noita. I'm crazy, yes," she said, looking at Kythe now. "You telling everyone I'm a crazy person, don't worrying for me."

"What did you do to her, brother?" Zen said, looking at her face.

"I hurt her arm when she showed me this mechanism," Kythe said to Zen, Indya dropping her hand. "I held it too tightly and bruised it. It frightened her badly."

Something passed between them. Her eyes shifted from one to the other. "I don't mean that," she said, although she did, her hand going to her arm before she dropped it again. "I meaning maybe it's something that is not easy to learning, it's so different."

"Will you show me, Indya?" Zen said.

"Yes. Show him the piece-of-ear," Kythe said.

"I saying it's not a piece of ear," Indya said to Kythe, leaning in, glancing at Zen. "I telling you it's not an ear and now he thinking that."

"It's not a piece of an ear," Kythe said to his brother. "It just feels and looks like one and that's what I thought when she handed it to me, that it was a piece of her ear. It's pink like flesh. But it doesn't rot."

"The name means it's being small, a small piece, a small piece that is to put for your ear, Kythe," Indya said, frowning lightly. "A small earpiece."

Kythe reached out and touched his knuckles to the back of her cheek. "I love your mind, alea," Kythe said. "I'm just warning him."

She got up, going to her things and getting it. She brought it to Zen and held it out.

Zen took it and set it down and looked down at it on the table and his eyes slid to his brother, who was eating a grape slowly, looking back at him with a bland expression. Zen looked wary and his eyes shifted to it and he reached out and took it, looking at it in his hand.

"Before you put it in your ear," Indya said, "I will speak to you in my language." She began to speak.

Zen listened, shaking his head, glancing at Kythe and then back. The earpiece got closer to his ear.

"I'm speaking the same language I was before you had the earpiece near your ear," Indya said when it was close enough. "Set to two speakers, the earpiece learns any language that it comes in contact with in about three hours, and you would understand a person speaking that language."

Zen had frozen. His eyes went to Kythe.

"Stay calm, brother," Kythe said. "It's not magic. She's not a noita."

"How can you know?" Zen said, putting the earpiece down on the table carefully, staring at her, his nose flaring.

Indya made herself smaller, looking at Kythe. "He's angry. I'm not being a noita. You telling him, Kythe."

"Look how beautiful she is," Zen said to Kythe. "Look at her eyes. She could have wenins you. Some of your men believe it."

"What is that?" Indya said to Kythe. "Wenins?"

"When a noita does magic that makes a man believe something that isn't true," Kythe answered.

Indya gestured to the earpiece, Zen eyeing her, his face expressionless, but he picked it up and put it near his ear again, not too close, like it would zap his brain.

"I swear that I don't do magic," Indya said. "The earpiece is a mechanism, a complicated tool. My people have these tools because we studied what's not magic. We studied the rules of the world. Magic is just in stories. If you believe in magic, then anything is possible, and you have no place to rest your trust. And if you can't trust your own judgment, on what can you rely? The judgment of another? How is that person more reasonable than you? People believing such tales of fear have caused pain and violence in our history, making people do terrible things to one another, causing injustice because people decided not to trust their own minds. People can trick one another, but I can't make you see what isn't so, or make Kythe believe what isn't true. Nobody can do that."

Zen was staring at her. "If it's not magic, what is it? How is this done?" Zen said, listening to the earpiece from as far away as possible.

"You are by a river," Indya said. "You have a stick in your hand. You put the stick into the water, and it seems to bend, like now there are two sticks. You pull it out. It's one stick. You know about this?"

"Yes," Zen said. "What does that have to do with anything?"

"Do you believe it's magic?"

His eyes swept her. "No."

"I could get water and a stick now. I know that this would happen again. Do you?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

He eyed her like she was crazy. "Because it always has before," he said.

"And do you believe there's a reason for it to do that?"

"I hadn't thought about it much," Zen said, his voice saying he hadn't developed any interest recently, either. "I don't know why it does that."

"I do, because my people know the rules of the world around us."

His eyes were searching her face. "Rules? Who makes these rules?"

"Nobody. They are. If I tied a rock to the end of a string and swung it fast over my head, the rock would want to pull away from me in a circle, and if I released the string, the rock would fly. That force that pulls the rock outward isn't magic. I don't do that. You don't do that. Neither one of us can change it just by wanting to or saying words at it. That force is a part of the rules of the world. They don't change ever. A rock will always want to fly away if you swing it on a string, without fail. Once we know that, we can study this force, learn when it goes, how far, and find a way to describe it in words and numbers. When we do that, we can make mechanisms that use that force. That's not magic. The force just is."