heard a strange chant begin to rise and fall, like the song of coyotes. The Uigenna were preparing for a ceremony.
The tepee entrance lifted and a Uigenna guard stood at the threshold. He gestured to Flick. ‘Come.’
He would be taken to Wraxilan, then. That made sense. Wraxilan, who believed himself to be a king, would not stoop to go to anyhar.
The har took hold of Flick’s arm, which was totally unnecessary, and led him roughly through the camp. In the centre, a large fire had been built and here the drummers were playing. A group of hara enacted a tribal dance around the flames, and some of them were chanting. Eyes shone in the darkness, like the eyes of cougars. Feet stamped and hair and feathers flew.
Flick’s guard held him before the fire, but nohar paid them any attention. Flick looked around for Ulaume but could not see him.
Then Wraxilan stepped from the largest tepee and all fell silent but for the hungry crackle of the flames. The Uigenna leader stared across the fire directly into Flick’s eyes and for a moment Flick understood the point of it all. This was so different to anything he’d experienced since inception. He’d never met hara like this. Their raw, savage power skittered like electricity over his skin. They were reputed to be cruel and were clearly barbaric, yet he could not deny that in their pride they possessed a certain primitive nobility. These were the kind of hara who had changed the world. They did not hide in the wilderness, they overran it.
Wraxilan made a gesture and Flick’s guard inclined his head. ‘Lie down for him,’ he said to Flick.
‘What?’
The guard did not repeat the instruction but knocked Flick from his feet by kicking him in the back of the knees. Instinct took over and Flick immediately tried to rise, to run, but other hara, uttering fearsome cries, ran over and knelt on his limbs.
It is only pelki if you see it that way, Flick thought. He closed his eyes. There was no point in fighting. It would be over sooner if he did not resist.
He could feel Wraxilan’s approach and knew when the Uigenna leader stood over him, because his hot power burned into Flick’s skin.
‘You will be initiated into our ways,’ said Wraxilan. ‘Know this is a privilege and be grateful.’
Flick would not open his eyes. He tried to distance himself, concentrate on his breathing, think of other things. He would not be a victim. He would be remote. He would not acknowledge the pain in his arms and legs where bony knees dug into him.
‘Prepare him,’ said Wraxilan.
The hara who held Flick down got up and virtually tore off his clothes. Flick kept his eyes closed tight. He wouldn’t utter a sound. Hands pulled his legs apart. He thought of the north star, its brilliance and Wraeththu spirits dancing in its light.
He heard Wraxilan’s voice, closer now. ‘Look at me, white ghost.’
He wouldn’t. Wraxilan could do as he wished with his body, but his mind and his eyes were his own.
‘Look at me!’
Flick swallowed with difficulty. He anticipated the blow before it came. He felt his lip split, tasted blood. I have a choice, he thought. I can open my eyes or get beaten up, and the outcome will be the same. He opened his eyes.
Wraxilan knelt between his legs. ‘That is better, white ghost. Be here, not somewhere else.’
I want to spit on him, Flick thought, but knew it would only make matters worse. He would look into Wraxilan’s eyes, and he wouldn’t show contempt. He’d show nothing, which would be more insulting.
The Uigenna’s song had changed to a soft haunting mantra. Wraxilan reached out and lightly touched Flick’s broken lip. ‘You were wrong to make me do that. It is not my wish to hurt you.’ He leaned down and kissed the cut, licked the blood away. Flick could feel the rhythm of the drums in the ground beneath him. ‘The Aghama has made me your lord,’ Wraxilan murmured, close to Flick’s ear. ‘With me, you are sacred and what we do is sacred.’
This was not what Flick had expected. Wraxilan’s breath curled into him like smoke. Flick was powerless to prevent it and could not ignore its influence. In the sharing of breath, hara become one, and it is an act of surrender to each other, when innermost thoughts mingle and collide. Performed in this spirit, it can never be an act of violation. Flick saw