Brother Horse broke the silence, clearing his throat. “You have had an unusual experience,” he said. “Unusual, I mean, even for a gaan.”
“It seemed unusual to me,” Hezhi admitted. “But I know nothing of these things.”
“You were caught up in the wake of the sacrifice. Traditionally we must make certain that the Horse God returns home without delay when she is slain. We must make sure she does not lose her way. So we sing her a path to follow.”
“It was more like being caught in a stream,” Hezhi said.
The old man nodded. “I have never flown in such a manner. Few gaans ever purposely risk the mountain. It is too dangerous by far.”
“Then perhaps,” Tsem exploded, turning in his saddle and unwittingly yanking his poor mount's head about, as well, “perhaps you should have warned her before giving her the means to do so. Or did you hope that she would do what she did?”
“I did not think? Brother Horse admitted, more to Hezhi than to Tsem. “I did not think. I honestly never believed you would open the lake without my help… without my urging, even. You seemed so reluctant.”
“Whatever else she is,” Tsem said, “she is still a very young woman. Impulsive.”
“Tsem—”
“Princess, I have served you for many years. Until quite recently, it was not enemies I protected you from but yourself. You have the mind of a scholar—I know you are smarter than me—but you have no sense sometimes.”
Hezhi opened her mouth to frame an angry retort, but she let it die unsaid, for Tsem was right, of course. Sometimes she became so lost in thought, she could not see where she was walking. At other times, it seemed as if she acted without any thought at all and had to spend her wakeful hours making up stories about why she did things. Anyway, it was the same old Tsem litany. He didn't really understand.
Instead of replying, she nodded wearily.
“In any event,” Brother Horse said, “with some rest, you should be adequate to the task of helping Perkar.”
HEZHI awoke, cold, though she was well bundled in blankets. The embers of a nearby fire gave out a dull heat, as well, but the air quickly sucked it away. Hezhi could not remember stopping; she must have fallen asleep in the saddle. She still felt tired, but it was a manageable weariness, not the soul-numbing shroud of exhaustion she had worn earlier. Most everyone else seemed to be asleep, as well, scattered here and there about the floor of some sort of cave or rock shelter. Outside the gaping entrance, moonlight drizzled onto the plain when swift-flying clouds allowed; she watched several of the dark forms pass before the Bright Queen, dress briefly in silver, then rush on to their nameless destinations. The air smeiled wet.
“It will rain soon,” a voice raspily whispered. Hezhi turned from the tableau to Ngangata. She could see only bits of his face in the dim glow. It seemed very inhuman, and she suddenly remembered the dreams she once had of a deep, ancient forest, of trees so huge and thick that light never fell, undiffused, to the earth. And though she had never dreamed of Ngangata—only Perkar—in the bits of his face she somehow sensed those trees.
“You can tell?”
“Yes. It is no difficult thing, really.”
“How is Perkar?”
“Breathing a bit more shallowly, I think,” he answered.
“Well,” she chuffed, rubbing her eyes, “would you go wake Brother Horse for me?”
“Do you have the strength for this? I know I urged you earlier, but…”
“I won't let him die, Ngangata. Not if I have a choice in the matter.”
He nodded and rose lithely, with no sound, and padded off on cat's feet.
Nearby, Tsem stirred. “Princess?”
“I'm here.” She rummaged through her things—they were in a pile near the blanket she had been wrapped in—and withdrew her drum.
“Can't that wait?” the half Giant asked.
“Wait forever, you mean? Tsem, try to understand.”
“Tsem always try to understand, Princess. Tsem just not very bright.”
Hezhi could not tell if Tsem was trying to make her smile or rebuke her with his “dumb act,” the one he had used in the palace so often.
“You'll be right beside me.”
“I was right beside you before, when your spirit left your body. You almost fell off the roof and broke your neck.”
“I was foolish. I didn't know what I was doing.”
“And now you do,” he replied sarcastically.
She didn't answer. Ngangata was returning with Brother Horse. The old Mang man knelt and touched Perkar's brow.
“Yes,” he muttered. “We should do this now.”
“How?”
“I will do it. You will lend me the strength I need.”
“I don't understand. You told me you couldn't heal him.”
“I can't—not without you. I don't have the strength. On the other hand, you don't have the knowledge, and I don't have time to teach it to you; that would take months of apprenticeship.”
“What do I do, then?”
“Tap your drum; follow me and watch what I do.”
“What will you do?”
He spread his hands expressively. “We must fight and defeat the Breath Feasting. We will use our spirit helpers. Watch how I call mine forth, and then call yours forth in the same manner.”
“The Horse, you mean—the spirit of the Horse.”
“Yes, of course.”
“Of course,” Hezhi repeated, not at all certain things were as obvious as Brother Horse seemed to think them. “I'm ready.”
“The rest of you be silent and do not touch us,” the old man warned. “Do you understand? Giant, do you understand?”
“If anything ill befalls her, I will break your neck.”
Brother Horse sighed and shook his head slowly at the cave floor. “If, when we get started here, you interfere, you may have no need to break either of our necks. The Breath Feasting may do it for you.”
Tsem glowered but protested no more.
They sat and after a still, silent moment, Brother Horse began scratching the surface of his drum with his nails, faintly, faintly. Soon he began to tap it, and Hezhi joined in, also tapping with the nail of her index finger. The effect was nearly immediate; though almost negligible, the vibration of the taut rawhide tremored up her finger and into her bones and blood, filled it with rhythm. She moved to a pulse not her own, pumped not by her heart but by the skin head, by the scale on her arm. She was only remotely aware when Brother Horse began to chant, a wordless incantation at first, a droned note repeated over and over and an occasional odd rise in pitch. But in time, the meaningless syllables resolved into words, and these she caught as they drifted by.
Wake up, my guest You have slept long In the house of my ribs, The house of my heart Wake up now, See through my eyes, Walk with my feet, Yush, my old friend
As he sang, Brother Horse began to shiver, wavering like flame in high wind. In that uncertainty of form, his face was the face of a wolf and his own at once, and she gathered from his limbs a sense of lean gaunt grayness that was not wholly Human. He chanted on, speaking to the spirit in him, and the air about Hezhi began to dream, to fill with the colors from behind closed eyelids. Tsem, Ngangata, and the others became shadowed, dimmed away as the real and the unreal traded their substance. Brother Horse continued to spread, became two shapes, wolf and man, though they were not entirely separate.
“Now,” the old man told her, though he still chanted when he said it, “sing as I sang. Call up your helper.”
Hezhi closed her eyes, rocking. It no longer seemed as if her finger moved the cadence of the drum; rather, it seemed to move itself. Hezhi's sight turned inward, and there she saw the horse-child, waiting for her call. She appeared as she had in life, iron gray with blazing white stripes, mane whipped by a fierce wind, racing upon a limitless, grassy field.