They spent the entire day at the Kazakh camp while women tailored boots for each of them, well and closely stitched, handsome and comfortable! The chief’s mother was no longer hostile or even suspicious, only displeased that they wouldn’t stay long enough for the boots to be properly decorated.
The next morning they left. Now Achikh had a remount again, and the others each a horse. The seventh horse was an additional pack horse which carried gifts, including a maikhan—a sizeable leather tent for traveling—and large bags of fermented mare’s milk, the now familiar airag, which the Kazakhs called kumyz. Each of the travelers had also received a heavy, short-handled axe about sixty centimeters long. Baver wondered what use these would be on the steppe, unless—Perhaps they were weapons.
As they rode, Baver asked Nils how he had known what he had about the Kazakh warriors. Nils explained that when asked if she knew where the warriors were, the truth rose to her near-consciousness where he perceived it, with pictures and related concepts, although her spoken answer was a lie.
This time Baver believed what he was told.
On the sixth day, while they rested at noon, eight horsemen caught up with them, fierce-looking Kazakhs closing at a gallop, trailing a dust cloud. They were armed of course, with some thirty remounts trailing.
Baver stood watching with serious concern and a hand in his holster pocket as they pulled up in a big cloud of dust. While the dust settled, the leader sat his saddle perhaps four meters away, looking quietly at Nils as if evaluating what he saw. “It is you again,” he said at last in groping Anglic. “I thinked that, but hard to believe.”
“And you. I am glad to see you again, Shakir.”
Nils said it slowly, that the Kazakh might more easily understand. The man looked surprised for just a moment, then swung down from his saddle. “You learned my name from my mother,” he said.
Nils grinned and nodded.
“You know what I am called. What are you called?”
“I am Nils, Hammar’s son.”
“Nils.” Shakir repeated the name as if to himself. “After you killed the lion, we called your name ‘Golden Giant.’ ” He paused, pursing his lips. “You are different now. Look different.” Shakir tapped one of his own eyebrows. “Eyes,” he added. “My mother said you took out eyes, held them in hand.” He peered into them intently, and found no life there. “What became? They not like that before.”
“I was in an Orc prison. An Orc pierced them with his knife tip.” He tapped a glass eye with a finger, without flinching. “These were given me in their place. By friends,” he added, then indicated Baver. “Some of his people.”
It was clear that Shakir wanted to say something to that, but couldn’t find Anglic words for it. He turned to Achikh, and in Turkic said, “My mother told me you speak our language. Will you interpret for me? My Anglic is too limited.”
Achikh nodded. “I do not always speak your tongue correctly, but maybe well enough.”
“Tell the big one, Nils, that I never loved the Orcs. They offered us fighting and looting, and all we wanted to eat, if we joined them. After we joined them, we saw much we thought ill of, but it was not possible to leave then. And there remained the prospect of battles and pillage.”
Achikh passed the message on.
“Also tell him that, as for debts, I believe we are even, he and I, since we met in the forest that second time.”
When Achikh had repeated this in Anglic, the Kazakh asked, “How old are you, Northman?”
“I am in my twenty-third summer now,” Nils said, and signed with his fingers.
“Twenty-three summers! If you say so, I can only believe you. But your soul is old, Northman, old, and purified by fire.”
Then he bowed deeply to Nils Järnhann.
The Kazakhs squatted, and ate their noon meal with the travelers. As they ate, Shakir spoke to Nils from time to time, sometimes in Turkic through Achikh, and sometimes in halting Anglic. Gesturing at Baver and speaking in Turkic again, he asked: “Of what people is he who wears trousers that come to his throat? Those who can give eyes to the blind are surely wizards.”
When Achikh had translated, Baver blushed.
“He is a star man,” Nils answered. “His ancestors were ancients who flew to the stars to live, very long ago.”
The Kazakh frowned. “Flew to the stars to live?”
Nils nodded. “They were mighty makers in those days. They made boats that fly endlessly high. They flew out and found a star that is much like the world we live in. They made their home there, and now they have come back to visit. They are peaceful. They do not like to fight, though the Orcs learned that when they must fight, they are dangerous.”
The Kazakhs looked carefully at Baver, then Shakir turned back to Nils. “That is a very strange story. It is hard to believe.”
Nils nodded. “It is uncanny. But I have been on the sky ship they came on. I have seen the world many tusen below me. At a glance I have seen from one sea to the next, and all the lands between. And many others of my people have seen the star folk come and go in the small sky boats they use to fly from the ground to their high-soaring ship.”
The Kazakhs sat digesting that for a long minute. When Shakir spoke again, he changed the subject. “And the boy,” he said, “is he your slave?”
“We Northmen no longer have slaves. He is a poet’s apprentice.” (Here Nils had to explain for Achikh, before the Buriat could interpret.)
“Ah! A poet! Tell the boy I apologize!” Shakir said. “Boy! Will you speak poetry to me?”
Hans, who”d darkened and scowled at being thought a slave, lost most of his scowl now, and standing, recited in his tonal dialect, almost singing the words, his young baritone rich and firm:
When the poet’s apprentice had finished, all the Kazakhs clapped their hands politely. Hans blushed. Then Shakir spoke again, soberly. “Tell him that while I do not understand the words, I know his poem is excellent from the very sound of it. What is his name?”
“He is Senig Hans, Gunnar’s Son,” Nils said, and followed that with clan and tribal affiliations. Baver caught the change of cognomen from “Skinny” to “Sinewy,” and realized how apt it was. Despite all the running and walking, the tiresome diet and frequent sword drill, Hans had gained considerable weight since they’d left the ting. But none of it was fat; he was whipcord-lean.
Shakir nodded acknowledgement. “Tell him I am Shakir, Son of Rashid, of the Súbhi Band of the Kazakhs.” He gave orders to two of his men then, and they led a string of four horses to where the travelers’ horses were picketed.
“Tell Nils these horses are my gift to him,” he said to Achikh. “In case our debts were not quite even.” He cocked an eye at the Buriat. “Tell him the Kazakhs are not a stingy people like the Kalmuls.”
Achikh’s face tightened with anger, and he got to his feet, hand on his sword hilt. Nils rose with him, and laid a hand on Achikh’s shoulder, his gaze on Achikh’s eyes. “Good friends,” he said, slowly for Shakir’s sake, “please do not fight.” He looked then at the Kazakh, who had also gotten to his feet. “Achikh is my good friend, who has traveled far with me. He shared his horses’ milk with us, before a great storm killed most of them. We have become like andat, sworn brothers.”
He turned back to Achikh. “You told of watching me in the arena, in the City of Kazi. But you did not mention that I broke my sword in killing the lion. Do you remember it?”
Achikh nodded glowering.
“And then I dueled the Orc officer, and killed him. Do you remember where I got the sword to do that?’
“Someone threw one to you from the stands.”
“The one who did that was Shakir. Though I was a stranger, he would not see me toyed with by an Orc, mutilated and slowly killed before the crowd.”
Achikh relaxed somewhat. “He intended to insult me,” he answered slowly, “thinking me a Kalmul because we speak the same tongue, or very nearly, and because I’ve learned his own. I am not a Kalmul, I am a Buriat, but I took the thought for the act.” He shrugged big shoulders. “Nonetheless—”
Then Shakir spoke, facing Achikh:
“Tell Nils that if Achikh is like a sworn brother to him, then I withdraw my offense against Achikh, if Achikh is willing.”
Achikh translated.
“I hope you are willing,” Nils said to the Buriat.
It was hard for him, but Achikh nodded. “What he did for you was a very good thing,” he said. “Very brave. And it defied Kazi. Few would have dared it. Besides, the Kalmuls are a difficult people. I cannot blame him for disliking them.”
He turned and thrust out a hand toward Shakir. For a brief moment Baver feared the Kazakh would refuse it. Then Shakir reached, and met it with his own. For a moment their handshake threatened to turn into a grip-down contest. Finally Achikh grinned. Shakir laughed. Then both men laughed together, embracing and slapping each other on the back. Baver stared astonished.
Shakir turned to Hans. “And you, poet: Your work will be famous beyond your people. I know it.” While Achikh forwarded this added praise in Anglic, Shakir unfastened his belt and removed from it a curved knife in a sheath of intricately carved horn. “This I give you in admiration.”
He held it out. The poet’s apprentice stared, hesitant, then took it and drew the blade. It was slender, razor-sharp, engraved in some hair-thin script.
“It reads,” said Shakir, “ ‘long life to the holder. May his honor always shine.’ ”
He turned to Nils again. “As Achikh is not a Kalmul, I have advice for you. Do not follow the road over the pass between the great lakes. The Kalmul have been lying in wait there this summer for travelers. They kill them out of hand and take their possessions. It would be wiser, though longer and much more strenuous, to swing north and cross the mountains above Belukha. That way you are likely to get through alive.”
Ten minutes later the Kazakhs were on their horses again, riding back westward. Watching them go, it seemed to Baver that he knew of no one among his own people, or any people, as courtly as Shakir, a sweat-stained barbarian. It also occurred to him that Shakir and his men had ridden hard for several days to catch up with them, apparently just so he could see Nils again and gift him with horses.
And what had he said? Your soul is old, Northman, old, and purified by fire. Something like that. A strange thing to say, but . . . It seemed to Baver that it defined something he’d sensed himself and had failed to put his finger on. Though Nils could seem quite boyish, there was a sense about him of being old, old and wise.
For the first time now, the ethnologist looked at something he’d long accepted but had refused to really examine: That this giant, this boy-man Nils Järnhann who had no eyes, could see. What kind of man was he?
As they rode on, Nils and Achikh talked it over and decided to follow Shakir’s advice. Years before, Achikh himself had crossed the great Altai range via the Pass Between the Lakes without incident or threat. It was by far the lowest and best crossing. But now and then some Kalmul clan would set up camp there for a season or a year, or longer. There they’d graze their sheep and cattle, and reap the occasional band of travelers; he’d heard that from the Kalmuls he’d served with in Kazi’s army.
Meanwhile, best they travel as hard as their horses allowed. The other Altai crossings were said to be much higher, and impossible once the snow came, which would be early there.
That day they rode long before they found water again. At last, in thickening twilight, they came to a sizeable stream, twelve meters across and crotch-deep despite the season. Its banks were low but steep. After drinking, it took only a little time to hobble the horses and make camp. Then, while stars thickened in the sky and three fat marmots roasted, the travelers went back to the water, where naked they bathed and washed their clothes. To bathe in running water, or wash clothes in it, was taboo among Achikh’s people, the Buriat told them. But he’d been long away, where customs were different, and they were not yet among his people.
Baver straightened, and standing thigh-deep, looked upward at the sky, feeling an unaccustomed relaxation and sense of contentment. “Nils,” he said curiously, “how do you see, with no eyes?” And surprised himself by asking, for he hadn’t been thinking about it when the words popped out.
“I see in the spirit,” the Northman said.
The answer meant little to Baver, but having asked, he decided to get it clarified. “Did you see in the spirit when you had eyes?”
“No. Then I saw mainly as others see.”
“Mainly?”
“I also saw other people’s pictures—what they saw—through their minds. When I gave attention to it. This I still do.”
“Well—When you give attention to what other people see, or think, can you see in the spirit at the same time? Or can you only do one at a time?”
“I can do both at once, but I had to learn. It took practice. It also took practice, a little, to see in the spirit from the body’s viewpoint. At first my viewpoint would wander a little, and my body would stumble sometimes, or run into things.”
As he wrung the river water from his jumpsuit for the third and final time, Baver tried to imagine what it must have been like at first, but gave up quickly. Splashing to the bank, he climbed it and spread the jumpsuit on a large shrub, next to his underclothes. And shivered; he was wet, and the air cool. Though the day had been hot, they were in the last moon of summer; his watch said September 5. The lengthening nights were no longer as warm as they had been. The shallow water felt warmer than the air now, and he waded back into it, squatting chest-deep near Nils, who was sitting cross-legged, soaking, and looking at the sky.
‘What are you thinking about?” Baver asked.
“I am wondering which star Ilse is on now,” Nils said. “Which star you came from.” He turned to look at Baver. “Can you show me?”
The star man shook his head. “I’m afraid not. It’s in the constellation Lupus. We can’t see it from here; we’d need to be farther south.” Baver remembered the girls in Nils’s tent that evening at the ting, whom presumably the Northman had later copulated with. “Do you miss Ilse sometimes?”
Nils’s answers, usually prompt, were slow this evening, coming after intervals of silence. “Sometimes,” he said. “And the baby, Alfhild. It will be her nameday soon.”
Baver wasn’t a father, but he thought he knew how Nils might feel. Nils went on: “Ilse is the only person I know who is as I am. It was good for both of us that we found each other.”
Baver recalled hearing a kanto of The Järnhann Saga that dealt with Ilse. She sounded quite heroic in it. And the Northmen referred to her as “den döjtsa häxen,” the German witch; supposedly then she had powers like Nils’s. More meaningful to him were comments he’d heard about Ilse from Nikko and Celia, aboard ship, though privately he’d rejected them at the time; they’d been impressed. Physically, on the other hand, the rangy, raw-boned Ilse had looked to him less exciting than either of the two girls in Nils’s tent at the ting. She might be called handsome, but not pretty.
“Does it bother you that Ilse went to New Home with the Phaeacia?” he asked.
Again the answer lagged, but without any sense of pondering or hesitation. Rather, it was as if mentally the Northman was operating in slow motion this evening.
“No,” he said. “It does not bother me. Each person has things they must do. Hers included going to your world. As mine includes going east this summer.”
Baver looked at another question, and wondered if it would trouble Nils unduly. But if Nils could perceive the thoughts of others around him, perhaps he’d already perceived it.
As if in response, the Northman said, “It’s possible that I’ll be killed or die before they come back. Dying is the other side of living. But if one rejects his weird, he grows little. You could be in your own world now, but you chose to come here, and stay here a time, to do things and see things you would not have seen otherwise. Someday, dead or alive, you will know the reason. Someday, perhaps sooner, I will know more fully why I travel east now.”
Nils stood up then, water streaming from his naked body. “I’m going to stand by the fire and dry before I crawl into my sleeping robes.”
Baver followed him. Someday, dead or alive, you will know why! Examining Nils’s words, the chill Baver felt as he padded toward the fire had nothing to do with the evening air. Yet it wasn’t a matter of fear; Baver didn’t know what it was.
Achikh had seen them coming and laid more brushwood on the fire. Baver stood beside Nils with his back to it, hot behind, cold in front. The strange Northman had never seemed quite human to him until tonight, he realized. But now, having talked of personal things, he did. He still seemed very different than other men, but definitely human nonetheless.
*Nikko Kumalo’s translation runs: