Teri McLaren
"I will bargain with you, Yob. A song for our release and safe conduct. And maybe do you have a flask-"
"Og!" warned Cheyne.
"Maybe later. But I will do some magic for you right now."
Og curled his lip at Cheyne and began to hum softly, a low-pitched, almost tuneless sound that immediately got under Cheyne's skin and made it itch. Claria seemed to be squirming also. Then Og jumped free, flipped twice in the air from a standing position, held up his hands, and smiled hugely.
Yob jerked back as though stung, his yellow eyes wide with amazement. Before the others could react, he began to laugh in great rolling guffaws, shaking the teeth and bone necklaces that hung across his chest, making a weird sort of music himself.
"Good one, Og. Loved that one. Ha!" He wound down to a spitting chuckle. "Do some more."
Og whistled a little and began to pirouette and leap, his blistered feet completely forgotten, turning back-flips and somersaults, pretending to slip and fall, then catching himself awkwardly at the last moment. He found the skull Cheyne had flicked into the underbrush, found another one and a couple of shin bones very near it, and began to juggle them. The ores dropped to the ground laughing and put down their spears.
"What's he doing now?" asked Claria, her shoulders aching from holding her arms behind her back.
"I don't know yet," replied Cheyne, laughing as heartily as the ores. "But he has them spellbound. He's as good with them as you were in the fight back in the city. And I meant to say it earlier: thanks for the help. Where did you learn those old juma moves?
"What do you know about the juma?" Claria shot back at him.
"Well, just what I learned at the university," said Cheyne, trying to figure out what he had said wrong.
"Then you would have learned that there are no
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more juma now," she said stonily. After a long silence, Cheyne tried a different subject.
"Tell me about Maceo."
"Maceo! Why do you want to know?" hissed Claria, suddenly angry again.
"Is he your lover? Check the ropes again," said Cheyne, leaning around her to follow Og's act.
"He was my fiance, if you must know. But not anymore. Since he's about to be invested as king, he has accepted a proposal of marriage from Riolla. He told me just before you came into the shop, may her complexion glow divinely… from the drinking of poison. And I'm already over it, thank you very much."
Claria felt around her hands for the cast-off bindings. She turned her head sharply into Cheyne's nose when she did not find them. "Ow. You mean he really can do magic? Why do you care about Maceo, anyway?" she whispered, her face jammed uncomfortably into his stubbled cheek.
Cheyne smiled, enjoying her spicy perfume and the softness of her skin. "I care because I like to know who my enemies are. My friends, too. Listen."
When his audience was thoroughly mesmerized, Og launched into a song. Or it could have been a song at one time, Cheyne decided, disappointed. Og seemed to do well enough when he wasn't trying to make musical sense, but his voice, like any fine instrument left to the merciless desert wind and weather, or submerged in raqa, had deteriorated and become tuneless. With every verse, and the song had twenty-two, Og fell further and further from pitch. By the end, there was little difference between his voice and the croaking of the tree frogs in the pool behind them. Cheyne ground his teeth; Claria had placed her head between her knees in an attempt to cover her ears.
The ores applauded rabidly; some were crying.
Og bowed deeply and touched his nose to the ground. "Now for the finale-" He glanced covertly at Cheyne, who nodded. "I will break the bonds of my