Yusen peered down at them, his gaze narrow with worry. ‘You okay?’
‘Yeah.’ Sour straightened up. ‘Okay.’ He sent Murk a significant look, signed, ‘Her.’ ‘Was just surprised by somethin’, is all.’
Murk said nothing, but he was quite alarmed. Her! So it must be true, this antipathy between Ardata and the Queen of Dreams. ‘Did you get it?’ he asked, trying to keep his voice casual.
While Oroth-en watched, Sour straightened his torn hauberk. ‘Yeah. I got it … Barely.’
‘Okay then.’ Murk gestured, inviting Yusen to keep going. The captain flicked his gaze between the two mages then nodded his cooperation. He continued on.
The warriors, both male and female, crowded round Oroth-en. None looked happy. One young fellow spoke, and thanks to Sour’s efforts Murk could now understand their language: ‘Why have you brought these Isturé demons?’ this one challenged. ‘They will murder us!’
‘I do not believe these are of the Isturé,’ Oroth-en answered, calmly enough.
‘They are like,’ another observed. ‘They carry iron.’
‘True. They are foreigners. Most foreigners carry such things. That is their way.’
‘If they are not of the Isturé, then we should kill them and take their iron,’ one of the female warriors declared.
‘Their numbers are too many,’ Oroth-en explained.
‘Numbers? How many are there?’ another demanded.
‘Many hands.’
This quietened the warriors for a time. Then the female warrior who had spoken before, hefty and scarred, eyed Yusen and scowled bitterly. ‘I see. So … what are their demands?’
Sour’s brows shot up and he looked to Murk, who raised his gaze to the open sky. Why does it always have to be me? He stepped forward, his hands open. ‘Do you understand me?’
All gathered went quiet once more. Oroth-en turned to regard him, and even his gaze was now suspicious. ‘Why did you not reveal this before?’ he asked, quite coldly.
‘Because only now can I do so.’ He gestured to Sour. ‘My partner and I are what we call mages. You understand mages? Yes?’
Oroth-en edged backwards, eyed him and Sour anew. ‘You are shaduwam?’
Shaduwam? Ah — shaman. ‘Yes … of a kind. You have your own shaduwam, yes?’
The warriors exchanged uneasy glances, but none said anything.
So. Something here. Something they won’t reveal. Fine. None of my business. He addressed Oroth-en. ‘We are lost and hungry here in this jungle. We ask your aid. Aid in returning home. And food — whatever you can spare.’
Oroth-en turned to his warriors. ‘You see? They come as guests asking our help. Are we so heartless as to turn them away?’
The large female warrior scowled her displeasure. Her hair was a great mass of locks about her head and shoulders, and her cured leather shirt, her armour, strained to contain her chest. She planted the butt of her spear and tossed her heavy mane. ‘So might the snake beg entry to the hut.’
‘Then keep an eye upon them, Ursa.’
‘I shall!’ and she fixed her critical gaze on Murk.
It seemed to him that Oroth-en hid a quirk of a smile as he half turned away. ‘Very good. Come, guests, sit and eat with us,’ and he gestured to the largest of the huts, the main house, perhaps.
The meal was the oddest one Murk had ever had, or failed to have, as he actually ate almost none of it. They sat in a great circle on a raised floor of woven mats over slim wooden poles. He and Sour translated for Yusen, as Sour wasn’t about to attempt to raise his Warren again. Food was carried in and served round on broad leaves that went from hand to hand. One ate with the right hand and received the leaf with the left. Children tottered about in between, begging titbits from everyone, but only peering fascinated at the strangers.
He wondered how to get any of this food to their companions now squatting in the jungle, waiting. From the lean figures of these natives he could guess that there was hardly enough to go round as it was. How could they possibly take on fifty additional mouths? They’d probably have to completely despoil the surrounding acres to manage it. And then there’d be nothing left.
Yet he was reluctant even to name what came across his lap as ‘food’, let alone try it. Some leaves arrived heaped with what looked like inoffensive mashed plant matter, pulped roots perhaps, yet smelled vile, or crawled with ants. He thought the ants nothing more than an unavoidable nuisance until a leaf arrived with a great steaming heap of them cooked in some sort of a sticky sauce. Much worse was to come. Leaves covered in beetles and fat white grubs, still writhing, that the locals popped down like candies. Then more of the vegetable mush which they gathered up in their fingers like porridge. Murk didn’t know what was more disgusting: the idea of eating these dishes, or the sight of Sour eagerly sampling each and every one that came by.
Eventually, he could stand it no longer and he sent a dark scowl of disgust Sour’s way. ‘Gods, man,’ he hissed, ‘do you really have to?’
The skinny fellow cocked one walleye, half a black beetle pinched in his fingers, chewing. ‘Wha’?’
He leaned closer, lowering his voice. ‘Eat, man. This … stuff.’
Sour popped in the last of the huge beetle. ‘Stuff?’ he said around his mouthful. ‘It’s food. This is what they eat!’
Murk flinched away, wincing his distaste. ‘Yeah … but how can you?’
‘Food’s food, friend.’ He tapped a dirty finger to his temple. ‘It’s all in the mind.’
From where he sat down the circle Yusen raised a hand in the sign for manners, then turned to Oroth-en who sat next to him. ‘Thank you for the meal,’ he said, loudly. ‘It is greatly appreciated.’
Oroth-en translated for everyone and they all smiled and nodded, then proceeded to push more of the heaped leaves on them. Sour sat up and spoke to Oroth-en: ‘May I go to thank those cooking?’
The elder appeared quite bemused by the request but waved his agreement. ‘Of course.’
Sour ambled off. Watching him go, Murk frowned his confusion. What in the name of all the gods is he doing?
Movement on his other side distracted him and he turned. He almost jumped to see that now sitting next to him was the considerable bulk of the woman warrior, Ursa. Gone was the thick leather shirt, the skirting and the weapons. The woman now wore a simple cloth wrap tied at her immense breast. She glowered down at him.
He decided that he ought to take Yusen’s warning to heart and so nodded a polite greeting. ‘Yes?’
‘You are not eating,’ she accused him.
Smiling and giggling, women round him held out the leaves of insects and pulped plant matter.
He struggled for a time, desperate to find a reason, only to finish, lamely, ‘I am not hungry.’
‘You will need your strength for the trial ahead, little man.’
Murk felt his brows climb. ‘Oh? Why?’
‘Why? Have you not guessed?’ The women nearby hid smiles behind their hands. He eyed them all. A terrifying possibility began to form in his mind.
‘You are the first foreigner sorcerer male I have met,’ the woman continued, undeterred. ‘I have heard all sorts of rumours about your kind. That your members are so tiny you can only bugger boys. That those sorcerers to the west have sworn off all mating whatsoever. And that the shaduwam to the south slice them off entirely!’ She made a cutting motion with her fingers across Murk’s lap. He flinched away, almost slapping his hands down to cover his crotch. The women, young and old, giggled anew.