The Lion Hunter (The Lion Hunters #4)

The Lion Hunter (The Lion Hunters #4) Page 23

“Your crystals are in the way,” Telemakos said. “They catch the light and glitter—”

The room was utterly bewitching in its beauty.

“I cannot see,” said the astronomer. “I can see the light catching the crystals, but not the soft lights against the dome above. The crystals can be fixed against the ceiling so they are out of the way. We’ll do that tomorrow.” Dawit gave a great push to the side of the globe, using both hands, and the stars wheeled at a dizzying pace.

Malika gasped. Athena shouted, “Again! Again!” She pulled herself up to stand behind Telemakos with her arms locked around his neck, watching the show from over his shoulder. Telemakos sat with Shadi pressing against one side of him and Inas against the other, while Athena leaned over his back, cheek to cheek with him. Never in his life had Telemakos felt so loved, and so at ease, with others more or less his own age. He had not missed it; he had never known life could be like this. And now he was ready to learn to hunt.

Telemakos thought, not for the first time, I am glad to be here.

He did not flinch when Tharan bound fast his eyes in the training ring the next morning. The neat desert horse he was to ride was whickering near his shoulder, and Telemakos, drawn by its warm smell of sun and dung, reached up blind to fondle its bony head and rub its coarse-silk cheek against his own. When Tharan helped him up and Telemakos sat astride the narrow back, gripping the saddle cloth behind him, he wondered briefly, What am I to these people? I am not a hostage. I am not a servant. Abreha can’t expect me to repay him for any of his gifts. Why are they teaching me such mastery?

He wondered only briefly. He did not care. He had never expected anyone to give him a warrior’s training, and he was too grateful to question it.

Daily after that, at daybreak, Telemakos joined the palace guard in their target practice. The cadets were all at least a year older than he, so even if he had been whole as the rest of them, he would not have been expected to achieve their standards. But Telemakos was never treated with any kind of indulgence. The vizier Tharan directed them in this as well, and he was a hard taskmaster. But he approached the challenge of uncovering the most effective technique for a one-armed warrior as though it was the most fascinating puzzle he had ever been set. Telemakos, slowly acquiring some skill, did not mind the work. He thought of hunting with his father in years to come and was driven with hope.

One morning when Telemakos came through the library on his way back to the Globe Room after his daily practice, he found the custodian carefully copying a list of royal transactions of olive oil. Supervising this work, of all men, was the merchant Gedar, Grandfather’s neighbor from the villa across the street to the house of Nebir.

“Peace to you, Telemakos Meder,” Gedar greeted him, smiling. “Are you surprised to find me here?”

Telemakos knelt, swiftly and sincerely, and bowed his head. My poise is coming back, he thought; I must thank Tharan for his attention.

Telemakos apologized to Gedar. “Of course I know you traffic with the Himyar court.”

“Indeed, I was sent as a messenger again,” Gedar said. “I am in San’a on business, but your family have given me letters to deliver you.”

“Oh, thank you, sir!”

“Come, sit by me.”

Telemakos obeyed eagerly—too eagerly, for Gedar’s expression changed. He warned, “You’ll be disappointed. They are badly sea-damaged; our crossing was nearly unendurable.” He handed over to Telemakos a wallet of woven raffia, warped and stained with salt. Telemakos bent over the packet and knew, even before he opened it, that the letters within would be unreadable. The pages fell to shreds when he tried to pull them out.

He wiped the pulp from his fingertips against the outside of the folder, feeling suddenly desolate. He longed for another letter from Goewin.

“What filthy bad luck,” Harith the librarian said sympathetically.

“It was base neglect on my part, not luck,” Gedar said. “I am sorry, Telemakos. I should have kept them with my invoices. They would have survived in my document case.” He reached for the hide-bound box resting on the floor beside him. “You see.” He laid open the lid. Paper and parchment scrolls lay packed in dry ranks like rows of bone. Telemakos smelled dust and faint decay.

It was like a blow to the skull. For a long moment he had to sit very still, holding his head against his knees, sick with what that breath brought to his memory: the bright green plumage of the murdered sunbird, the nail through its back.

Telemakos raised his head.

“I’m sorry,” Gedar said again.

His whole house smelled like that, Telemakos remembered.

God help me, I do not dream when Athena is there by me, I can ride a horse and carry a spear blindfolded, Afar is on the other side of the Red Sea and Hara is dead. And yet still the smell of dust makes me faint?

“It can’t be helped,” Telemakos replied quietly.

Gedar, as the najashi’s guest, was invited along to view the parkland beyond the blossoming almond groves north of the city, the very first time the lion Menelik was taken out to hunt with the gazelle hounds. The hunting party was small, only seven men and four dogs. Gedar stuck by Telemakos, though clear of the lion, of which Telemakos had charge. The olive merchant’s endless questions of polite interest quickly wore Telemakos’s patience thin. The thought of setting the lion loose was making him increasingly nervous, even without Gedar distracting him; he knew that neither he nor Menelik was ready for this.

Menelik startled at everything, at insects, at nodding leaves, at birdcalls. It became such a struggle to contain him that Telemakos had to give up the two short lances strapped over his back. It was his first time bearing weapons any distance, and he was not yet comfortable or familiar enough with their weight to carry them and keep fast Menelik’s lead.

“I should take him home,” Telemakos said apologetically. Abreha held the lion while Telemakos, burning with humiliation at having to admit to weakness before half a dozen courtiers, turned his spears over to Gedar.

“The lion is not your responsibility,” said Abreha. “He is mine. Have no fear, we will not run him today. It will do him no harm to see the salukis in action. Will you take him again?”

“Do you trust me?” Telemakos asked miserably.

“What a question, Morningstar. Would I tempt you to prove yourself if I did not?”

“You might do it as a test of my judgment.”

“You are a prudent judge,” said Abreha. “Yes, I trust you.”

Telemakos eyed Abreha’s dogs with disloyal envy. White Nech and ruddy gold Werkama strutted unleashed at the najashi’s side, reliable in their obedience. They held their long ears raised and alert, their feathered tails high. Every so often Nech trotted close to Menelik and nosed at him in concerned interest. I would sell my soul to call one of these dogs my own, Telemakos thought for the hundredth time.

Within the thorn boundary of the royal parkland, the hounds galloped away. They doubled back almost immediately, tongues out in wide, glorious smiles, and settled into a trot ahead of Abreha and his men.

“Watch,” the najashi said to Gedar. “Werkama has one.”

The najashi clapped his hands suddenly, and all four dogs were gone. Telemakos missed seeing them go. Menelik had lunged forward at the command, and Telemakos scolded him and dragged him back. He thought the lead was going to sever his fingers.

“Not yet!”

He seized the lion by the ear and sat on him.

“If you don’t behave, I will never run with you again,” Telemakos told him fiercely. “You are going to outweigh me in about one month. If you want to come hunting, you will have to go with someone heavier, or hold!”

Menelik growled, but with frustration and not at Telemakos. The other men moved forward in the direction of the dogs, scanning the rise ahead for the antelope they had started after.

“There,” said one, and pointed. Werkama and Nech reappeared out of the nearest hollow and flew slantwise over the next rise, followed by their companions. The dogs’ sleek, long bodies were stretched nearly linear; their feathered tails moved in unison as rudders. The reedbuck ahead of them was a yellow streak, but Telemakos saw how easily they would cut it off together, two from either side. The racing creatures disappeared like wind over the crest of the hill.

“On horseback a man may follow the chase,” the najashi commented for Gedar’s benefit, “but we’ll have no chance afoot. They’ll be waiting for us with their catch when we arrive.”

They set out toward the jagged al-Surat Mountains that rimmed the plateau. Abreha himself set them on the slight trail the hounds and reedbuck had left, but he let Menelik and Telemakos lead them. The lion was almost pathetically eager to please now, as if he knew he were somehow inferior to his canine companions. Telemakos caught the scent of fresh blood before Menelik did, but no one was likely to notice that.

The dogs were lying proudly alert alongside their prize when Abreha’s party found them half an hour later. The lion grew so excited that it took Telemakos and Abreha together to wrestle him into compliance.

“My najashi—” Telemakos gasped. “My najashi, this is foolhardy. Let me take him home.”

“Will you manage him on your own?”

“Away from this kill, yes.”

Abreha conceded. “Now he knows how it is done. “We’ll take him with us again soon, and unleash him. I am not discouraged yet.”

Menelik was still whining and trembling when he and Telemakos reached the kennels. Telemakos leaned against the rails and watched the animal keepers feed him, but the lion would not allow himself to be rubbed and brushed as the dogs did, so after a time the keepers left him alone in his pen to recover himself. But Telemakos could not leave him. He slipped through the slats of the lion’s pen and chirped softly to his friend.

Menelik crawled close to Telemakos and reached to touch his leg with one padded paw, softly as a falling leaf and with his claws perfectly sheathed, begging for comfort as desperately as Athena did. He pushed the top of his heavy head against Telemakos’s chin, demanding kisses.

“Oh, you are such a baby,” Telemakos whispered, and lay down beside the young lion, burrowing beneath the straw. It was warm, and smelled faintly of stale honey, like Menelik’s fur. I’ll stay here till he sleeps, Telemakos thought. He, too, was tired to the bone, but too wary of the lion’s mood to allow himself to fall asleep there. He lay still, resting his body, listening with interest to the sounds of the kennel. Already he could tell five of the dogs by their voices.

That is Werkama. Abreha must be back.

Telemakos listened as the kennelmen took care of the hunting dogs. He heard someone make a report to Abreha on the condition of the lion, and Abreha thanked his servants and dismissed them.

Which is the dog that won’t stop crying? Telemakos wondered. That’s not one of the hunters. That is a half-grown pup complaining for milk—

“Hush, hush, my bold, brave girl,” said Abreha’s voice. “Gedar will take care of you—”