Treasure Traitor by L.J. Popp
Chapter One
The day I met my best friend, he tried to eat me.
I chuckled at the memory, releasing some of the
tension in my sore legs and taut nerves.
You
remember that, Acha?
I asked, glancing up at the dim outline of the black carrion-eater soaring
above me under the pale half moon. The coarse sand rasped against my feet as I
slowed and stopped. What’s it been, five
years?
If he were a person, he probably would have laughed
too. Instead he answered in mental pictures, emotions, and sensations. They
used to confuse me, but now I could translate them easily.
<Sorry, looked like corpse.>
I bent over with my hands on my knees to catch my
breath. This place certainly hasn’t
improved since then. If we’re not careful, I might die for real this time. The
barren desert stretched before us as far as we could see.
A thousand fears whisked through my mind. What if
someone from the castle caught up with us and dragged us back? What if a nasty
nocturnal beast tried to eat us? Pain from running half the night shot up my
side and through every muscle in my body.
I
need to rest, just for a moment. Can you fly to me, Acha? I stretched out my leather-gloved arm.
He didn’t come, but cried a loud warning. “Rena!”
I spun around as two bipedal lizards my own size emerged
over a tall dune. Their eyes flashed and razor sharp teeth gleamed in the faint
light. Snarling, they lowered their heads and charged me.
Not
now! My sweaty palms
struggled to pull the hunting knives from both sides of my belt.
The lead lizard lunged for my neck. I slashed its
face, spun and sliced the second in the chest. They shrieked in rage and
kicked at me with their powerful legs. A talon sliced across my left arm. A
scream tore from my throat.
Acha must have been waiting for an opening. He wasn’t
getting it.
Help! I called silently.
“Rena!” His voice pierced the night air again. The lizards jerked toward the
sound, distracted.
Thanks! I stabbed one in the stomach. It howled and collapsed. Acha flew in the face of the second.
Swinging my other blade
around, I tried to cut its throat. It swiped blindly with its short forearms, knocking the knife from my slippery,
trembling hand. My heart slammed against my rib cage.
I ducked under the monster’s
claws, picked up one
blade, yanked the other from the first lizard, and thrust them
both into the second’s heart. The eyes rolled back in its head. It dropped with a thud, dead.
Fear propelled me over the dunes, carrying me from the
sight and smell of the lizard’s black blood. When I reached the bottom of the
next hill, I fell in the sand, shaking.
My pulse pounded in my ears, and the cut on my arm
ached. Exhaustion, terror, and pain mixed together in gut-wrenching nausea. I
wanted to throw up or burst into tears, but fought the urge.
Survival. That’s all that mattered now.
Acha, you all right? I held out my uninjured arm, and he landed
on the leather gauntlet, puffing out
his black
throat and leg feathers to make himself look bigger and stronger. He jerked his short, curved beak from side to side as
his piercing yellow eyes searched for further danger. Finally, he shuffled up
my arm to perch on my leather padded shoulder. The base of his neck was about
level with the top of my head. Despite his size, he wasn’t heavy.
<Little pain. Small scratch on Strong Beak’s face. Strong Beak not seeing more lizards. Free Wind hurt!>
Free Wind, his picture-name for me. He always imagined
me running over the dunes, my long brown hair flying behind me. His
picture-name, Strong Beak, was a baby bird pecking open its shell and leaping
out. I willed myself to take the names to heart, to be strong and free, even
though I felt more vulnerable than a trapped rodent.
I angled my injured arm toward the starlight. A
narrow gash snaked from wrist to elbow, tiny drops of blood dripping into the
sand. Looking at it made it burn even hotter. Acha let out a soft squawk, able
to feel a portion of the pain in his own left wing.
They just got my skin, but it might get infected. I took off the small bag I’d slung across my back and pulled out a waterskin, wincing as I washed the wound. A torn piece of
my long overshirt didn’t make much of a bandage. The thin, lacy fabric couldn’t
absorb the blood or stop its slow seeping.
We
need ointment and proper wrapping. I’d seen enough people die from animal inflicted injuries that didn’t seem
lethal to know I couldn’t take any chances. And
I’m almost out of water.
<Free Wind not take more along? Concern.> Acha
eyed the gold and silver jewelry filling the bag, everything of value my
parents had ever given me. On top lay only a few scraps of food. <Gold
shiny, but Free Wind’s throat dry, belly empty. Now hurt.>
A small sip from the waterskin barely took the edge
off my burning thirst. I had to slip
straight out my window. I would have been caught if I foraged for supplies. The
gold will buy me food and medicine if we reach the city.
<Eat roadkill like Strong Beak,> he suggested
playfully, trying to help me feel better. He preened my hair, pulling out pieces of my braid,
and pressed his long beak to my cheek.
Normally I would have smiled at his joke and “bird
kiss,” even though his breath smelled like rotting flesh, but the battle had
left my nerves frayed. How can you be
worried about food when we were
almost eaten alive just now?
Acha stopped “kissing” me.
<Deep remorse for not noticing lizards.>
I scratched the top of his mostly-bald head, my eyes
watering from the pain of moving my arm again. You saved my life, Acha. Sorry for snapping. I was the foolish one,
distracting you with silly memories. I won’t let it happen again. We’d better get
out of here before someone catches us,
or I die of blood poisoning. I wasn’t sure which would be worse.
I stood, taking a deep breath to calm myself as I squinted
into the night and checked my position by the stars. Before and behind, as far
as the darkness let me gaze, I saw nothing but a sea of sand with islands of
dark gray rock, towering cactus clumps, and serenading insects.
Just like the day I met Acha, alone
with no one who understood us.
A chill night gust whipped my long braid behind me. I
shivered, but it wasn’t from the cold. Where
should we go? How do we get there?
The closest town was still twelve kaktans away. Just
because Acha hadn’t seen any more lizards didn’t mean there weren’t others
nearby.
Not for the first time in my
life, I wished for the old technology before the Ban. Shimmering machines that
glided faster than the fastest bird, beyond the sky,
through the darkness between the stars and Hierarchy worlds. A hundred years
ago I could have hired a pilot to free me from this wretched desert planet with its man-eating beasts and
traitorous parents.
There’s
no point wishing for what can never be again. Now there was only one way off this world, and no one
would grant it without my father’s permission. I’d
be dumber than a sand slug to go back and ask. No stables
nearby, either.
I needed a better view. Acha, will you fly?
He hesitated, reluctant to
leave my side.
We need to find help, someone who doesn’t
know who I am.
<Understanding.> He leapt from my shoulder into the air.
He had lied about not feeling much pain from the fight. Our minds were so close
I could feel it in my own bones, my own tendons, an echo of his aching. His
wings hung
lopsided, the right lower than the left, compliments of the old wound inflicted
by Mother. The shortness of breath that had plagued
him recently didn’t help, either.
Not
so high, I told him. I want to catch you if you fall.
Seeing through Acha’s eyes,
even though I did it often, sent a thrill of excitement through me that
momentarily displaced my pain and worry. The night was as day to him, the constellations and
moon like the late afternoon sun. I marveled as the barren wilderness became ten times sharper. Colors not visible to a
normal person, infrared and
ultraviolet, and air drafts like wisps of smoke sprang into my perception. Acha
circled the drafts to rise higher despite my warning. He could never help
himself, and how could I blame him? Everyone wants wings.
A whole world of fragrances
blossomed before me. Distant desert flowers, a
twinge of salt on the rocks, the acrid terror of a rodent being crushed by a slithering,
legless lizard. Acha couldn’t
tell the size of the predator. My throat tightened in fear.
Then Acha caught
the musty scent of pack bushyans just north of us. Even worse.
Did someone follow us from the castle,
Acha? I won’t let them hurt you!
He turned toward the animals so that three purple,
lumbering forms popped into view. Huge sacks of goods hung from their humps,
and beside them walked an old man and a middle-aged woman.
<Strong Beak not
recognizing people,> Acha assured me.
I sighed in relief. Me
either. They’re moving too slowly to be
chasing anyone. They’re probably just out
at night to avoid the day’s heat. Animals don’t usually attack a group.
<Travel together?>
Acha suggested.
Well… Hanging back, I continued to examine them through Acha’s
eyes. The middle-aged traveler wore the red color of a
married woman and a round,
wide-brimmed grass hat that hid her eyes, probably
to protect them from the
sand and wind. Her
plump husband dressed in the billowy pants and tight-fitting, ornate vest of a
treasure trader.
The memory of Mother’s voice,
loathsome as it was, warned, Merchants,
almost as low as serfs, not to be trusted. Even worse, treasure traders. They wandered from planet to planet “collecting”
rare items and selling them at outrageous prices. Not exactly upstanding citizens.
Acha swooped down and
perched on my shoulder, chastising me with a sharp “cha!” and nipping my ear. He often grew impatient with my notions of caste.
<Sharp-toothed lizards
attacking Free Wind and Strong Beak again!> he predicted. <Free Wind need
medicine, water!>
I batted his beak away. All right already! It’s not like birds don’t have a system of
hierarchy. We’ll go with them, but my clothes show I’m kakra. I have to act my
status or they’ll get suspicious. I sent him the mental image of me feigning friendliness in all my expensive clothes
and the treasure traders looking wary.
I hurried in their
direction, feeling light-headed from my injury and thirst, but knowing I had to
downplay my discomfort. If I looked vulnerable, they would take advantage of
us. As soon as we drew near enough to see the dim impression of each other’s faces, I slowed to a saunter and held my head
high.
“The stars’ blessing on you,
wayfarers.” I struggled to keep my voice calm, greeting them in the Kakra
language and using the
high speech of superior to inferior.
The old man put a hand on
the lead bushyan’s purple hump to stop the animals. The
first lazy creature used the break to run its toothless sucker mouth over the ground, spitting
out the sand and eating whatever tiny creatures it
found. The second
uncurled its long proboscis and stabbed the sharp end into a
needle-free part of a nearby
cactus, slurping greedily. The third just
dug its four plate-sized feet into the sand and stared stupidly at us through
thick, dusty eyelashes.
Halting the animals took only a moment, but for me the
process was agonizingly slow as my arm continued to throb. Was it getting
worse? I thanked the gods that I was bonded to Acha and not some dumb, drooling
bushyan.
Once the old man was satisfied that his merchandise
wasn’t wandering off, he raised his oil lamp, squinting at me through the dark. His
gaze swept over the fine fabric of my blue lace pants, long, loose overshirt
embroidered with gold thread, and leather, silver-studded sandals. He nearly
dropped his lamp, kneeling on the sand and touching his face to the ground. He
spoke in the same language, though awkwardly, using the low speech of inferior
to superior.
“Forgive me, Kakra! Couldn’t see your golden eyes in
the dark.”
Thank
the gods he still can’t.
“Rise, and be not troubled,” I said. “Whence do you
go?”
He obeyed, trembling. “City Trabin, Your…um…Grace.”
Great. Father owns that place. Then again, he owns most towns
in this area. “That is also my destination. Have you any water or medicine?”
His fearful face wrinkled
with concern as he handed me the waterskin hanging from his belt. “No medicine,
only bandages for emergencies. We had some wine. It could have stopped
infection and helped a bit with pain, but another kakra took it. Tariff tax,
you know.”
“Tariff tax.” This really isn’t my night. I had to restrain myself
from taking huge gulps of water, sipping slowly, stately. “The bandages will
suffice.”
He glanced at my injured
arm, and his eyes widened. “Stars above, it looks awful!”
Hurts even worse. “A scratch is all.”
“Allow
me to examine it.”
The
gravelly voice startled me at first, seemingly disembodied and speaking my language perfectly, the way a kakra
would address another kakra. Then I realized it came from the merchant’s wife. Her lips and eyes were hidden under her wide-brimmed hat.
She reached out to take my arm.
I jerked back
instinctively from a commoner’s touch, but she must have gotten the closer look
she wanted. She sucked in a sharp breath. “A scratch? It appears the lizards got you.”
“I’ll
get the bandages.” Her husband turned and started digging through his saddle
bags.
I
waved my right hand dismissively. “Really, it is nothing. I am accustomed to
bites and such.”
The woman cocked her head to
one side. “Then you are a monara?”
Imaginary flies buzzed
through my stomach as my anxiety rose like a fever. Whoever this woman was, she
wasn’t an ordinary commoner. Best to tell the truth, or at least part of it.
“My mother is a monara. She
subdues animals to hunt for the king and plow his fields, to protect him and
his castle against Kingdom Seekers and other invaders. I do not possess that
particular talent, hence the scratch.”
“If you’re not a monara,
then why is that cursed carrion-eater on your shoulder?” She didn’t bother to
hide her disgust.
“Acha, my monarant?” I
laughed. “I bought him from
a performer and named him after his bird call. He also speaks. Show her, Acha!” I silently translated for him.
“Pretty lady, pretty lady! Acha!” <Stupid, squawking bird in cage. Embarrassment.>
Smoothing back the sparse
feathers around his ear holes, I let him know I appreciated him playing along.
My head started to throb along with my arm. Why was the treasure trader taking
so long to find the bandages?
“Then, are you a halfer?” the woman asked. “Your skin is like
the tan soil of
the desert.” She brushed a hand over her own arm, which had the
richer, darker
shade of rain-quenched earth.
I almost snapped at her to mind her own business, but her
husband finally
closed the saddlebags, a small roll of cloth in hand. Relief
washed over me.
“Hey now, don’t upset the kakra!” he said. “It’s not uncommon
for them to be
a little paler; you know that. She’s not white like a halfer.”
Once again I was glad neither of them could see my eyes. He
handed over the
bandages, careful not to touch me, and I began dressing my
wound. By now it oozed
puss. I gritted my teeth so I wouldn’t cry out in pain.
“Forgive me, my lord,” she replied quickly. “I just thought
it strange, a lone
kakra girl out at night like this, without an escort, hurt.
Perhaps we should take her
home.”
No! I almost cried aloud in
protest, but Acha silently reminded me not to panic.
I counted my heart beats
in an attempt to slow them.
“Thank you, but my home is some distance from here, in
Country Fraz,” I lied.
“I am on an important errand for my parents. If you
could accompany me to City
Trabin where I can rest and obtain medicine, that
will do.”
The woman glanced at me from under her wide hat. “I’ve never
known kakra
to send one of their own to perform an ‘errand.’ Isn’t that what
servants are for?”
I simply shot her the smile I’d memorized from other women in
the castle. The
one that said, “mind your own business, or I’ll rip out your
heart with my
supernatural powers.” Only in my case, it was a bluff.
The woman took her husband aside, whispering to him in a low
voice. My
throat went dry. Has she seen
through me? They can’t leave me here! I’ll die!
At last I distinctly heard the man say, “Now that’s a much better idea.” He
turned
back to me, his eyes concerned and a gentle smile touching his lips. “Seeing
as
you’re hurt, Kakra, I don’t think it would be good to take you to a common inn.
You’d have to share a single room and table with many below your…um…station.
Since we live in City Trabin, won’t you—”
“Grace us with your presence?” his wife offered. “We would be
honored to give
you what meager food and protection we may, even if you were
not kakra. Won’t
you stay with us until your arm has healed?”
Though the pressure from the
bandages had stopped the bleeding, the ache had not lessened, and I was eager
to jump on their suggestion. I forced myself to stop and think. Their
generosity made sense. If they didn’t extend any hospitality, they probably
reasoned that I had the power or at least the connections to make their lives
miserable. On the flip side, they might anticipate a reward. Then there was the
possibility that they were simply nice people.
<Free Wind’s providers
searching crowded places,> Acha pointed out.
Good thinking. My parents wouldn’t expect me in a commoner’s
dwelling, though we shouldn’t overstay our welcome. Peasant tongues are prone
to wag, and the castle has big ears.
I nodded. “Thank you, though
my errand is very time sensitive. I can lodge with you only until sunrise.”
The woman lowered her gaze. “Then come. Let us not waste the night.”
As we walked, exhaustion weighed me down. I was partly
annoyed, partly
thankful when the woman continued to ask me questions. At least
talking kept my
mind off the pain.
“What is your name, Child?”
Excuse me? Sure, I wore the blue of an
unmarried woman, but ‘child’ wasn’t
something a peasant called a kakra. I pushed
my weariness aside and straightened to
my full height, a good
head taller than even her husband.
“Renagada, daughter of Kristos.” I
lied about my father’s name. They’d
probably heard of him. “I’m sixteen by the
universal calendar.” Another lie,
but
barely. After all, tomorrow would be my birthday.
“Renagada.” She peered at me curiously from under her
wide-brimmed hat.
“Free Spirit, Free Wind? Spirit and wind are the same word in our Old Tongue, as I
recall. Quite an
unusual name, is it not?”
Surprised, I nodded. Only Acha called me Free Wind.
Educated. Why’s she married to this bumbling merchant?
She asked me a few more
questions, then fell silent. I tried to keep alert and pay attention to my
surroundings, but fear, fatigue, and my aching arm distracted me.
My memory meandered back again to the day five years
ago when I first met Acha, the day that started all of this. Separated from my
parents’ hunting party, lying in the sand, thinking I would die of thirst.
Acha, believing I was already dead, his sharp beak piercing my arm. Me jerking
awake, suddenly bombarded with foreign thoughts and emotions, the opening of my
mind like stepping outside a dark cave into blinding sunlight. I felt as if someone
had taken a sword and sliced my brain in two. It was maddeningly painful. And
excruciatingly wonderful.
The oath he’d given me then still rang in my mind.
<Bound. Like mother bird defending chicks.>
From that moment everything had changed, for both of
us. Well, some things hadn’t. I grasped the necklace Vasaran had given me. The small white half-stone on a thin leather cord pressed
against my skin, hidden beneath my overshirt. It reminded me of the promise I’d made him just before I
left.
I haven’t betrayed you, Vasaran, I swore silently. I will return when Acha is safe.
Stay sharp, I warned Acha as the tall, flat roofs and candle-lit windows
of City Trabin finally flickered into view. The solid bricks of desert granite glittered in the haze of twilight. Just because we’re out of the desert doesn’t
mean the danger has passed. Keep a look out for golden-eyed kakra. A good many
have probably heard about “that crazy bird girl.”
My gaze scanned the grain
growing in scraggly clumps
near the
waterhole, the fruit trees flanking the houses, and spiny plants with tough
leaves and deep roots that kept the thin soil from running away in the wind.
Many plants had an odd yellow hue, the town’s namesake. “Trabin” meant “yellow”
in Las, the local language.
Tiny
tributaries snaked to the water pool, and wells lay every few paces like pock
marks on a giant’s face.
“Hold it right there.” Two
guards with long pikes stopped us before the city gates.
My heart banged against my
chest. Oh, Acha, what if they recognize
me and report us to Father?
I kept my face turned,
pretending to look at something in the distance as they rifled through the
merchants’ clothes and searched the pack bushyans. They approached me next, but
as soon as they saw my gold eye, they backed away.
“Forgive us, Kakra, go
ahead.”
I exhaled as we stepped
through.
“Wait!”
My foot froze in mid-stride.
“If you need a physician for your arm, you’ll find one
near the north gate.”
In any other situation I
would have thanked them, but now I didn’t even glance back. Too close.
The winding, narrow streets smelled of raw, open
sewage, rotting vegetables and unwashed bodies. Children ran through the
shadows in torn rags as they went about their early morning chores: fetching
water, gathering wood for breakfast fires, chasing poultry. I wrinkled my nose
and walked faster, yet the core of my heart burned with jealousy. They ran free,
while I had been trapped behind the stone walls of a castle my whole life.
Someday their landlord might sell them in the chains of slavery to pay their
debts, but I wore the chains of a female kakra, chains that could never be
broken or redeemed with money. I pitied the serfs, and I envyed them.
“The sun will wake shortly,”
the woman said, beckoning me down a side alley. “Not
much time to rest. At least come inside, and we’ll tend your arm a little
better.”
She opened the door for me
to a two-room, gray granite hut. From his perch on my
shoulder Acha peered through the doorway, mesmerized by
the burnished copper coins on the low
stone table.
<Pretty, shiny!>
I laughed softly at his bird fascinations, finally
able to relax, and stepped inside. It was dark. Too quiet.
Wait
a—
Something hard slammed into the back of my head. Hot pain shot down my spine, and I staggered forward,
colliding with the dirt floor. Acha’s “kek,
kek” warning
call came an instant too late, just as the room went black.
