Of Mist, and Grass, and Sand Page 3

  She looked at the parents, and at Arevin; they were all pale, but she had no sympathy for their fear, and cared nothing for shared grief. “Such a small creature,” she said. “Such a small creature, who could only give pleasure and dreams.” She watched them for a moment more, then turned toward the tent again.

  “Wait-” She heard the older husband move up close behind her. He touched her shoulder; she shrugged away his hand. “We will give you anything you want,” he said, “but leave the child alone.”

  She spun on him in fury. “Should I kill Stavin for your stupidity?” He seemed about to try to hold her back. She jammed her shoulder hard into his stomach, and flung herself past the tent flap. Inside, she kicked over the satchel. Abruptly awakened, and angry, Sand crawled out and coiled himself. When the younger husband and the wife tried to enter, Sand hissed and rattled with a violence Snake had never heard him use before. She did not even bother to look behind her. She ducked her head and wiped her tears on her sleeve before Stavin could see them. She knelt beside him.

  “What's the matter?” He could not help but hear the voices outside the tent, and the running.

  “Nothing, Stavin,” Snake said. “Did you know we came across the desert?”

  “No,” he said, with wonder.

  “It was very hot, and none of us had anything to eat. Grass is hunting now. He was very hungry. Will you forgive him and let me begin? I will be here all the time.”

  He seemed so tired; he was disappointed, but he had no strength for arguing. “All right.” His voice rustled like sand slipping through the fingers.

  Snake lifted Mist from her shoulders, and pulled the blanket from Stavin's small body. The tumor pressed up beneath his ribcage, distorting his form, squeezing his vital organs, sucking nourishment from him for its own growth. Holding Mist's head, Snake let her flow across him, touching and tasting him. She had to restrain the cobra to keep her from striking; the excitement had agitated her. When Sand used his rattle, she flinched. Snake spoke to her softly, soothing her; trained and bred-in responses began to return, overcoming the natural instincts. Mist paused when her tongue flicked the skin above the tumor, and Snake released her.

  The cobra reared, and struck, and bit as cobras bite, sinking her fangs their short length once, releasing, instantly biting again for a better purchase, holding on, chewing at her prey. Stavin cried out, but he did not' move against Snake's restraining hands.

  Mist expended the contents of her venom sacs into' the child, and released him. She reared up, peered around, folded her hood, and slid across the mats in a perfectly straight line toward her dark, close compartment.

  “It is all finished, Stavin.”

  “Will I die now?”

  “No,” Snake said. “Not now. Not for many years, I hope.” She took a vial of powder from her belt pouch. “Open your mouth.” He complied, and she sprinkled the powder across his tongue. “That will help the ache.” She spread a pad of cloth across the series of shallow puncture wounds, without wiping off the blood.

  She turned from him.

  “Snake? Are you going away?”

  “I will not leave without saying good-bye. I promise.”

  The child lay back, closed his eyes, and let the drug take him.

  Sand coiled quiescently on the dark matting. Snake; called him. He moved toward her, and suffered himself to be replaced in the satchel. Snake closed it, and lifted it, and it still felt empty. She heard noises outside the tent. Stavin's parents and the people who had come to help them pulled open the tent flap and peered inside, thrusting sticks in even before they looked.

  Snake set down her leather case. “It's done.”

  They entered. Arevin was with them, too; only he, was empty handed. “Snake-” He spoke through grief, pity, confusion, and Snake could not tell what he believed. He looked back. Stavin's mother was just behind him. He took her by the shoulder. “He would have died without her. Whatever has happened now, he would have died.”

  The woman shook his hand away. “He might have lived. It might have gone away. We-” She could not speak for hiding tears.

  Snake felt the people moving, surrounding her. Arevin took one step toward her and stopped, and she could see he wanted her to defend herself. “Can any of you cry?” she said. “Can any of you cry for me and my despair, or for them and their guilt, or for small things and their pain?” She felt tears slip down her cheeks.

  They did not understand her; they were offended by her crying. They stood back, still afraid of her, but gathering themselves. She no longer needed the pose of calmness she had used to deceive the child. “Ah, you fools.” Her voice sounded brittle. “Stavin-”

  Light from the entrance struck them. “Let me pass.” The people in front of Snake moved aside for their leader. She stopped in front of Snake, ignoring the satchel her foot almost touched “Will Stavin live?” Her voice was quiet, calm, gentle.

  “I cannot be certain,” Snake said, “but I feel that he will.”

  "Leave us." The people understood Snake's words before they did their leader's; they looked around and lowered their weapons, and finally, one by one, they moved out of the tent. Arevin remained. Snake felt the strength that came from danger seeping from her. Her knees collapsed. She bent over the satchel with her face in her hands. The older woman knelt in front of her, before Snake could notice or prevent her. "Thank you," she said. "Thank you. I am so sorry . . . " She put her arms around Snake, and drew her toward her, and Arevin knelt beside them, and he embraced Snake, too. Snake began to tremble again, and they held her while she cried.

  Later she slept, exhausted, alone in the tent with Stavin, holding his hand. They had given her food, and small animals for Sand and Mist, and supplies for her journey, and sufficient water for her to bathe, though that must have strained their resources. About that, Snake no longer cared.

  When she awakened, she felt the tumor, and found that it had begun to dissolve and shrivel, dying, as Mist's changed poison affected it. Snake felt little joy. She smoothed Stavin's pale hair back from his face. “I would not lie to you again, little one,” she said, “but I must leave soon. I cannot stay here.” She wanted another three days' sleep, to, finish fighting off the effects of the bush viper's poison, but she would sleep somewhere else. “Stavin?”

  He half woke, slowly. “It doesn't hurt any more,” he said.

  “I am glad.”

  “Thank you . . .”

  “Good-bye, Stavin. Will you remember later on that f you woke up, and that I did stay to say good-bye?”

  “Good-bye,” he said, drifting off again. “Good-bye, Snake. Goodbye, Grass.” He closed his eyes, and Snake picked up the satchel and left the tent. Dusk y cast long indistinct shadows; the camp was quiet. She found her tiger-striped pony, tethered with food and water. New, full water-skins lay on the ground next to saddle. The tiger pony whickered at her when she approached. She scratched his striped ears, saddled -: him, and strapped the case on his back. Leading him, . she started west, the way she had come.

  “Snake-”

  She took a breath, and turned back to Arevin. He faced the sun, and it turned his skin ruddy and his t robe scarlet. His streaked hair flowed loose to his shoulders, gentling his face. “You will not stay?”

  “I cannot.”

  “I had hoped. . .”

  “If things were different, I might have stayed.”

  “They were frightened. Can't you forgive them?”

  “I can't face their guilt. What they did was my fault. I said he could not hurt them, but they saw his fangs and they didn't know his bite only gave dreams and eased dying. They couldn't know; I didn't understand them until too late.”

  “You said it yourself, you can't know all the customs and all the fears.”

  “I'm crippled,” she said. “Without Grass, if I cannot heal a person, I cannot help at all. I must go home. Perhaps my teachers will forgive me my stupidity, but I am afraid to face them. They seldom give the name I bear, but
they gave it to me, and they'll be disappointed.”

  “Let me come with you.”

  She .wanted to; she hesitated, and cursed herself for that weakness. “They may cast me out, and you would be cast out, too. Stay here, Arevin.”

  “It wouldn't matter.”

  “It would. After a while, we would hate each other. I don't know you, and you don't know me. We need calmness, and quiet, and time to understand each other.”

  He came toward her, and put his arms around her, and they stood together for a moment. When he raised his head, he was crying. “Please come back,” he said. “Whatever happens, please come back.”

  “I will try,” Snake said. “Neat spring, when the winds stop, look for me. And the spring after that, if I do not come, forget me. Wherever I am, if I live, I will forget you.”

  “I will look for you,” Arevin said, and he would promise no more.

  Snake picked up the pony's lead, and started across the desert.

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