Page 34 of Humans Don't Have Horns
“No one denies he has done great things for our people,” Minera says, gesturing with her hands in a reassuring manner. “But he has gone vain from the adoration.” Her voice is accusing again. “So vain that he thought he could make his own law. That he presumed to disobey the law of the Goddess.”
“You mean he disobeyed you,” Emek says wryly. The astonishment on everyone’s faces is evident. Minera is appalled, as if Emek had stabbed her in the heart.
But Emek doesn’t waver. “I have served the Goddess under your guidance for the past fifty years. It is not Daton who has gone vain.”
I feel as if I accidentally ran into a gladiator fight. For the amusement of the king. I glance at Daton. He watches the exchange, his face reticent. He doesn’t even glance in my direction.
“Are you turning against me?” Minera cries. The insult and hurt in her voice are loud. “Me? The mother of the people? After all I have sacrificed?” She hits her chest expressively. Daton told me of Minera’s sacrifice: her seven sons were all killed by Aldonians who tried to force her bow to Sun.
“You sacrificed everything so our people would continue to worship the Goddess.” Emek’s voice remains undaunted. “But it is time we choose our leaders not by their sacrifice in the past, but bytheir promise of a future. A future in which our children will not need to make the same sacrifices. In all of our history, we were never so few, so hunted. And now the demichads come to hunt us too. And you want us to stone the Emancipator of all people? And for what? For not wanting to follow the ways of the heretics. The ways in which they treat their females.”
“He handicapped our greatest warrior,” a man from the audience calls in anger. And I wonder if he’s refering to the Mongan warrior who tracked us down, Niro.
Another man jeers, “So great he handicapped him in less than five minutes.” And the people around him snicker. I frown at the way they mock something like that.
Emek shushes them with her hands and says solemnly, “He hurt one of our greatest warriors, and he was exiled for it.” But then her voice goes bitter, and she turns to Minera. “But it was not enough for you, was it?”
“Will you let her talk to me this way?” Minera turns to the crowd. “She is only protecting her brother-in-law. Not fighting for justice for you all.”
Was I treated and fed by Baghiva’s sister? The realization dawns on me.
“Enough,” Daton snaps and stands up. Everyone goes silent. He doesn’t look at me as he speaks. He hasn’t even really acknowledged my presence. “Stone me. Or don’t. I don’t give a fuck,” he says as he steps casually to the center of the tent. His gait is casual, and it only makes him more dominant. No one in the crowd dares to breathe. Minera goes apprehensive, and it’s as if she’s lost two feet of her height just by his nearness.
“The demichads are awakening in greater numbers than ever,” Daton says, his tone scornful. “And all you do is fight with one another while the only person able to stop them is standing here being ignored.” he points at me, his eyes on me all of a sudden. My heart skips a beat as his eyes burn me with their intensity. I gasp, hating him for still having this effect on me. He walked away from me. He could be the king of the asses for all I care. I’m so busy pullingmyself out of his lure that it takes me a minute to realize everyone in the crowd looks perplexed. Their eyes dart between Daton and me.
“You believe the Princess of Aldon can defeat the demichads?” a man asks Daton in bafflement.
Daton looks at me, his face full of emotion I can’t read. “I saw it with my own eyes,” he says quietly. “The demichad preyed on everything on site. The men and the horses. It only spared her and the woman she protected. And she can summon nature by her will. She has done so with direwolves and with vultures,” he tells them.
I swallow hard. What will he say when he realizes I can do none of that now?
“I will not have it!” Minera yells. She looks like she’s going to have a heart attack. “We will not follow a heretic. We will sacrifice to the Goddess, and she will protect us.”
But then, of all people, Niro, the man whose leg Daton broke, comes forward. He is almost tall as Daton, and I can see how his proximity to him is enough for guilt to wash over Daton’s face. Niro’s leg has been amputated. Mongans have no healing, no remedies. In Renya, his leg would have been saved, but they had to amputate it here to save his life. He stands on his other leg and leans on a crutch. “Daton will lead us against the demichads. The heretic will help him,” Niro says definitively.
Daton starts, “I didn’t—”
But no one hears the rest of it as Minera starts yelling again. “Lead?? Lead? He is exiled! He is to be stoned to death! Not leading!”
But Niro speaks again, his voice rising in anger. “He made me”—he hits his chest in emphasis—“a cripple. By law, I get to decide on his redemption. And his redemption is not to be stoned. It is saving us from the demichads.” Then he takes a step back and says in a sardonic voice, “And if a demichad bites off his ass in the course of it, even better.”
The crowd cracks up, laughing. It was funny but not that funny. I assume the laughter plays a big part in the need to release the tension.
Minera starts protesting again, but another woman speaks now.Her hair is all white, and she is hunched and missing her teeth. The reverence for her is evident as they all go quiet. There are not many Mongans who get to such an age. She must be nearly three hundred to look so old. “She who is not followed cannot call herself a leader. The congregation has spoken. You are not the oracle any longer. Emek is the new oracle.”
Mirth pervades the crowd at the old woman’s announcement, and Emek is nearly trampled as people approach to greet her. I stand and watch them as my mind struggles to comprehend what happened in merely several minutes.
Daton quickly grabs my hand and drags me away from the tent. He keeps pulling me until we are out of the central circle, away from everyone. It is night already, and the air of the swamps is less suffocating. But the stench of rotten eggs is the same.
“That was a foolish thing to do,” he growls at me. His hand doesn’t let go of mine. And he is so close to me despite how much space is around us. His scent penetrates the stench of the swamps. And I want nothing more than to nuzzle his neck, that soft spot where his scent is the thickest. Damn him. I need to get over him.
“Seriously?” I snap, pulling my hand away. The anger from needing him stirs in me. “A simple thanks would be just fine.”
“You were very close to getting yourself hanged in the entrance,” he hisses and nods in the direction of the hanging corpses, and I shiver. What I just saw in the central tent doesn’t coincide with those bodies. The children were running around, the men and women arguing and laughing.
“Well, it was very stupid of you to get captured by them,” I tell him.
“They didn’t capture me,” he snorts. “I came to warn them about the demichads.” So he willingly got himself into a death trial. What was he thinking?
