There was a thing that he could still remember well. It tasted good, went down easily, filled the belly, and did not fight with him. It was…it was called food . The things with the hooves and horns and the bitter, smelly sandal leather for meat beneath their lice-ridden tangles of dung-fouled hair…these were not food. Food tasted better when it was put on a fire and cooked. This meat became a greasy tooth-defying substance, a jaw-wearying affair. It was like talking with the old men of an outnumbered tribe—and swallowing it was worse. But Padma Sar behaved as if the feast of goat meat which he put out before his guest was the same meal as he might prepare for the gods, and made many sounds at the meal that seemed to suggest that he at least, enjoyed it. He grinned and kept up a constant patter to entertain his guest, and passed over a bowl of curds, the taste of which he described as “incomparable.” And yet Kronos could think of something the taste compared to.
Vomit. Starving however, he ate and ate, even cleaning out the bowl with a handful of bread. Padma Sar beamed and beckoned to his wife to fetch more.
His host’s wife was a small woman with tiny teeth of immaculate whiteness and a deeply bronzed face, half-concealed by the proudest, coarsest fall of deep brown hair, and her eyes were sharper than any camel trader’s. His host was perhaps almost as tall as himself, but was stocky with a round face and round belly, which he occasionally stroked.
“So…you have heard of the man they call Methos? From the land whence you came…”
“Akkad.”
The man’s eyes narrowed to slits. “Even in Akkad they hear of Methos?”
“I have. I have business with him.”
Padma Sar seemed to think this a very good joke—his laugh shook the walls of his clay-daubed hut. His wife hissed at him and then darted behind a curtain, where the sounds of a young child’s whimper could be heard. The man leaned forward, his face serious. “I tell you something about Methos—he has nothing you want. Other men may have herds of goats or cattle…slaves to work mines…loyalty, honor…”
“Perhaps I have a use for the man himself,” Kronos answered. “I take it your opinion of him is not good.”
The man rested himself back, and then stroked his stomach, thoughtfully, his eyes closed. “I have better things to do than to develop opinions about men like Methos. He…seems as old as the mountain, and the men who travel with him are warriors—no weak men. But perhaps…you are a warrior yourself?” One eye opened, surveying him. Kronos could see no reason to lie.
“This is a thing I have been. I have led armies.”
“Akkad, you have said. I believe this is so. You fought for the last king, and now you are looking for Methos. You look for some one else to fight for. Perhaps there are reasons why you are here instead of in your homeland?”
At this question, Kronos saw no overwhelming reason to tell the truth, but chose to reply, “There are reasons for a great number of things.”
Padma Sar considered this another fine joke. “He knows when to speak and when not to! Ha ha! I think I have guessed very right! It is a good thing, is it not? To know when to say nothing? What you were before matters little to me…to anyone. If you wish to fight alongside Methos, it matters still less!”
“How so?”
“Because I’m fairly certain that he’ll kill you!” The stroking of his stomach evolved into a firm pat, and he broke into a fit of giggles. At length, he found his breath. “Of course, I’ll still show you where he is encamped. But you do realize that you must go to him on your own. I have no desire to make introductions!”
“I fail to see why you find this amusing, but I am prepared to meet the man.”
His eyes seemed to burn with a cold fire that made Padma Sar look away. “You have reason to believe he will not kill you. You are a brave man. But brave and wise are different things.”
“As you are speaking bravely, now?” Kronos asked, heatedly.
“And perhaps not wisely,” Padma Sar admitted. “You are…interesting. I rarely speak to one who has come from so far, and seeking such a strange thing—to meet a legend. But as you are my guest, you are right, very right. It ill befits me to say anything against your wishes. I only meant to recommend caution.” The man’s yellow teeth glistened in a wide grin, the grin, Kronos thought, of a man who was afraid.
“It is for your skills as a guide, and not your counsel, that you will be compensated…but I will consider your words.”
But in truth, he had no intention of considering words where it was too late for them. Everything he had known he’d left behind him in order to make this journey, including his life. Only Methos and the slim promise of learning from others like himself lay ahead.
“Consider them! But it grows dark. Best we sleep…it’s a hard journey we’ll be on tomorrow.”
“There are more questions…”
Padma Sar raised his hand in a quieting gesture. “All of which can be asked on the journey.” It was clear that nothing more was to be said for the evening, and so Kronos rose to his feet to stretch himself and arrange the things he had bundled in the corner. He would be making his bed on a bearskin on the floor—a far cry from the cushions on which he was wont to sit in better days. Taking note of the look on his guest’s face, Padma Sar questioned him.
“You are not accustomed to such accommodations?”
Kronos grinned, wryly. “This last year, I have made myself accustomed to far worse.”
“This life you have known…before. You had been treated well. It shows in your manner.” It was a searching comment, asking a question by way of not asking it.
“My manner is that of a man who has dealt with friends…as well as enemies, as my own man.”
Padma Sar nodded as if pleased with the response. “You are of the sort of man of whom I can admit, I feel safer with you inside my house, than outside my door. Sleep well.”
“You, as well.”
“Oh…I am a man who sleeps none too soundly.” And with that, the man slipped behind the curtain to join his wife and child. Kronos stared at the curtain awhile, considering those last words. It was a warning, perhaps that he should not consider doing anything untoward during the night—but whatever would he imagine Kronos to do? Murdering them as they slept would certainly be a shabby reward for their hospitality, and would certainly bring him no closer to Methos.
But perhaps it was only a casual warning. The man had a family and was right to be cautious. And as Kronos had easily learned, there were few men who would be willing to take in a stranger, and he knew that his own face was a tablet whose imprint was all-too-clear—people read for themselves what he was. This man, Padma Sar, however, had nearly gone out of his way to be hospitable.
He was uncertain as to how much he should trust a man like that. He thought about the journey, and slept badly.
****
The sky barely seemed painted with the red streaks of the new day’s sun when his eyes opened, finished with all hope of further sleep. His hosts were awake and speaking together in their own language, different from the trader’s jargon that they had conversed in the night before. His ears strained at the soft sounds as if trying to tease any sense out of the odd music, but barely a word here or there could be recognized, and a word here or there was certainly not enough to render meaning. Quietly, he raised himself up to a sitting position, to see what he could of their faces, and saw there meaning enough. They were arguing about something.
As if oblivious to the seriousness in their postures, he stretched and yawned. They silenced themselves at once, and appeared to look almost apologetically in his direction, or perhaps guiltily. He smiled at them, blankly, wondering if they realized that it was certainly none of his concern if they had some argument between them, and that the abruptness with which they ceased to speak looked more fraught with guilt than if they had continued to speak. It occurred to him, and not for the first time, that when he and Padma Sar set forth, he should keep an eye on his purse.
Two things the world produced in staggering abundance, and those two were thieves and fools. Although he could not always detect the former, he saw no cause to be among the ranks of the latter.
He bid them greeting, and attempted to show no disappointment when it appeared the morning repast would be curds and bread made into a gruel, and some bitter, brown fluid on which some disconcerting oil floated. He rather hoped that among Methos’ people, they knew how to eat . Once fed, the two men readied themselves for the journey. Kronos could not help but notice the long copper knife that Padma Sar strapped to his leg, but it was, of course, a perfectly ordinary thing for a man to wish to be armed. Padma Sar himself could have easily taken note of the sword he carried, and might have had cause to regard the weapon with suspicion.
Upon leaving, the wife of Padma Sar let loose with a flurry of that musical, incomprehensible language, again, to which Padma Sar responded with a sharp clap of his hands, a sound which resonated against the wind and echoed against the hills. The effect on the woman was instant—she turned pale and retired behind the skin that served as the door to their dwelling.
“The woman—she worries about me when I travel,” Padma Sar said, with a false-looking smile.
“So I gather,” Kronos responded.
“Our child is yet young.”
The words were meaningless to Kronos. He turned them about in his mind—but to little avail. What did the age of the child have to do with the woman’s concern about her man? Looking the man up and down, and considering the capability of the woman in question, he imagined the fellow to have very little impact on the child’s welfare. To his own credit, he had little himself to do with the way in which the children his wives swore were his were raised, and prided himself on the fact—he was rewarded by their neutrality to his very existence right up to the point of his supposed death. It was a far cry from the hatred he’d borne for the man who raised him. To be polite, he nodded, briefly, and said,
“I’ve had children myself.”
The face of Padma Sar became rapt with surprise and confusion. “Had? Why, a man your age—are they not still young? Surely, you must have left them still at their mother’s knee?”
“Of course,” he replied. He looked the man full in the face. The oldest perhaps a mere fifty-odd years—that would be young enough, wouldn’t it? “I’m still a stranger to your tongue,” he added.
“I see. So you must have found it difficult…leaving them?”
Silence was the only reply to that.
Posted on Nov 11, 2001, 6:24 PM from IP address 172.138.103.8