‘It’s the mage’s,’ he said. His face was white under the heavy pigment.
‘It must have crawled into my bag. It couldn’t have done it when we were on the
way to the mage’s rooms. It must have got in when I opened the bag to skin off
the tattoo.’
He howled. ‘The mage has got his revenge!’
‘You don’t know that,’ she said, but she was certain that it was as Smhee had
said. She removed her small belt-bag and carefully poured out the jewels. But
that was all it contained.
‘It’s beginning to hurt,’ Smhee said. ‘I can make it back to the city. Benna
did, and he was bitten many times. But I know these spiders. I will die as
surely as he did, though I will take longer.
There is no antidote.’
He sat down, and for a while he rocked back and forth, eyes closed, moaning.
Then he said, ‘Masha, there is no sense in my going on with you. But, since I
have made it possible for you to be as wealthy as a queen, I beg you to do one
favour for me. If it is not too much to ask.’
‘What is that?’ she said.
‘Take the jar containing the tattooed skin to Sharranpip. And there tell our
story to the highest priest of Weda Krizhtawn. He will pray for me to her, and a
great tombstone will be erected for me in the courtyard of the peacocks, and
pilgrims will come from all over Sharranpip and the islands around and will pray
for me. But if you don’t want…’
Masha knelt and kissed him on the mouth. He felt cold.
She stood up and said, ‘I promise you that I will do that. That, as you said, is
the least I can do.’
He smiled, though it cost him to do it.