Awakeners by Sheri S Tepper

She hurried toward the wine merchants’ stalls, as though by speeding this part of their necessary preparation she could speed their departure. She was heartily sick of Northshore; tired of the babble and bellow of its people, the muddy taste of its food, and the stink of its workers, glad as she had never been glad before of her dark skin, which prevented the Tears of Viranel from invading her body, dead or alive. Tears wouldn’t work on black folk. Something about the light not getting through. It didn’t matter why they wouldn’t work. The fact was enough to be thankful for.

“Thanks be to the Jabr dur Noor,” she murmured to herself in the ritual prayer of the Noors. “Thanks be that I am black.” Thus assured of the attention of the All-Seeing, she lifted a merchant’s purse as he pressed through the market throng, slipping it into her trouser leg. At the wine merchant’s she bargained well. Between what she bought out of the merchant’s purse and what she slipped into her wide pockets without paying for, the price would be acceptable, even to Porabji. There was fresh puncon for sale, but Medoor did not bother running to the old man with word of it. When they returned to camp, she simply emptied her capacious trouser legs, placing russet fruit after russet fruit onto the meal wagon tailgate, grinning as she did so until Porabji, who had begun by scowling at her, had to grin in return.

“You’ll be caught one of these days, girl,” he said, shaking his head. “You’ll be caught and brought up before the Tower charged with theft.”

“What’ll they do, let the fliers eat me?” She grinned. Criminals were dosed with Tears and given to the fliers for food, at least white ones were, or so it was rumored.

Porabji shook his head. “They’ll burn you, girl. That’s what they do to us Noors. If the fliers can’t eat someone, they’ll bum him and scatter his ashes on the River.”

Medoor sobered somewhat, if only for a time. She had witnessed a burning once. It was not an end that appealed to her. She promised herself for the hundredth time to be more careful. Still, stealing was the one thing she did really well, and it was hard to give up one’s only talent. She went toward the campfire in a mood of mixed self-congratulation and caution. One more night among the stinking heathen of this town, then three towns more, then home, to the tents of … well. Home. That was enough.

When the Moor had been fed, Medoor was free to amuse herself until roll call. There was never any question where she would go or what she would do with her free time. She had had only one passion since she had first seen the River. Boats. Boats spoke to Medoor. Their planks oozed with mysterious travel, far destinations. Their crews had been all-the-way-around. They had seen everything, been everywhere. Sometimes the owners would let her come aboard. More than once she’d gone aboard at some lecher’s invitation and had to show her knife and whip to get off again, but no owner was going to bring the curse of the Melancholies down ‘on himself. He might hint a little, or make an outright proposition, but he wouldn’t try rape. At least, Medoor thought with some satisfaction, none had yet. It had been the danger her mother had most feared for a Moor daughter, here among the heathen. Medoor had had to promise utmost prudence before she had obtained permission to join the Melancholies.

For some days now, there had been one particular boat at the Chantry docks that interested Medoor, and it was certain the troubled man who was owner of the Gift of Potipur wouldn’t bother her. Though he seemed to like to talk to her, he hadn’t once looked at her with that particular expression men sometimes got. It was almost as though he didn’t know she was a woman at all, and this was part of the fascination. Most boatmen were garrulous sorts, full of tales and exaggerations, but the crew of the Gift was of a different kind. Quiet. Almost secretive. Not fearful, she thought, but with a kind of separation about them, as though they knew something the rest of the world didn’t. Thrasne himself had a habit of standing on the deck, staring southward over the River at one particular spot, as though there should be something there he could see.