Quibble, 70. Dyay

Quibble learns of a way to get home, but it's fraught with peril. Asreh challenges the Aht-nah to combat.

70. Dyay @Quibble

Asreh wanted the full story of how Lurah spilled her own blood, but the sah said it was too long, so instead Asreh interrogated me about my plan. The jah adjourned her council without making a clear decision. Now she sat and talked with just Nuah. After his behavior in council, that would be a difficult conversation. I didn’t need to be in the middle of it. I wandered towards the Aht-sah – more warriors had joined Hnefn’s contingent – at a fire a little deeper in the canyon.

Lurah and Hnefn were there, speaking close in their own im off to one side. All the other sah but one sat around the fire. Struck by the loner’s incongruity, I sat down in front of him. “Qihbel,” I said, giving im.

“Sen-aht-yahn, Sen-aht-sah-yahn, Sen-sah-aht-ri-yahn,” the man replied.

Yahn was gruff. Though not yet an old man, he looked careworn. As a rule, Aht-sah were clean-shaven, but Yahn had a long, grizzly beard. I could not see his lahn-jep. His face bore a few scars, including a long, ugly one over his right eye. Though I’d seen sah with such scars, trophies of battle, I still wasn’t used to the sight. Dazed and Adroit had scars, of course, but from working, not fighting.

Yahn had not given me im, so he was free to say more. I waited. After a while, he sighed and said, “What do you want?” Still he didn’t give im.

“Company.”

“For aught I know, you are my enemy,” Yahn said. Unlike other Far, he didn’t look at me as he spoke. The evasiveness of his gaze reminded me of a Dazed. Glancing at the talkers in im at the fire, he added, “And for aught they know, I am theirs.”

“Then why not join them in im and let them get to know you?”

“They know me,” Yahn muttered, scratching his beard.

“Why are you here, Sen-sah-aht-ri-yahn?” I said, feeling it was time to push forward a pawn. “Tell me plainly, and I will tell you plainly why I am here.”

“You first,” he suggested.

“I am trying to get home. It is a long way from here. I have to cross Qahn-dah.”

“Your Djer-stone will not take you?”

“Only amber glasses travel like that. My yinman blue glass is for other things.”

“Djer magic,” Yahn said with clear contempt.

“It is not magic. It only seems magical to you. Really, it is a technology.”

“Dyay,” the sah-ri insisted.

“Do the Far not have metallurgy?” I asked. “But now tell me why you are here. It is plain what your feelings are. If you agree with the nah, why come to the jah’s aid?”

Yahn loosed a loud, bitter laugh.

“Agree with the nah?! Who said that? I am a sah-ri of the Aht, not a nahli-sah out to fill his belly and his purse. Perhaps the jahli-ri Nuah is Djer, perhaps not. At the least, I recognize the man who was Nuah. Is he a traitor to the Far? I cannot guess. But I know whence Nahli-aht-sah-luht’s orders come, and I know what Luht did today was wrong. The nah cannot defy the law. So here I am where I must be.”

The talker with im at the fire had fallen silent at Yahn’s outburst. All the Aht-sah were now regarding Yahn with some annoyance but also, I thought, respect for what he had said. Billowing my cloak, I turned slightly and gave them im. They stared at Yahn a moment longer, then returned their attention to the talker, who picked up his tale.

I faced Yahn again. “It costs nothing to give im,” I pointed out.

“Qahn-dah is indeed large,” he said, softer, “and full of Far. Qehb, Sqoh, Uhta. If you cause them this much trouble, you will die long before you reach home.”

“I do not doubt it, sah-ri, but I have to go anyway. There is somewhere I must be, and there is no night-door to take me there.”

Now Yahn looked at me. “The door of night is set amid the stars,” he said.

I stared at him. “What?”

“In the city of glass uhn-qah called Ahnk-nuh-qah-say.”

The place of the frozen bones.