Skeen's Leap by Jo Clayton Page A

Our hope has been that our sister has not so lost herself in her degradation that she has told her master secrets of the Min. I will name the Speakers of the Synarc. Think of what you desire from us, say you will act for us.” She waved her free hand at the arch on Skeen’s immediate left. “Flet. P’takluvit.”
    Speaker for those who wear wings and hunt from the sky. Uh huh.
    A little woman, smaller even than Telka, fine-boned and fragile, with little flesh between those delicate bones and the shimmergilt skin stretched over them—what Skeen could see of it. Flet wore a loose robe made from cloth like canvas whose angular folds concealed everything about her but long nervous hands, a stretch of arm, and her taut and haughty face. Wide dark pupils, the iris a shining gold rim. Her eyes were fixed on Skeen with the shallow intentness of a predator on its prey. When Telka named her, the golden woman bowed her head, then went back to staring.
    â€œNerric P’shishulavit.”
    Speaker for warriors/hunters.
    A dark lithe man; hair, short and curly like the wool of a black sheep, covered his head, chest, arms, grew down over the back of his hands. He wore his fleece like a shirt. On his lower half he wore tight-fitting leather breeches that creaked when he moved. Bare feet, square and powerful—Skeen could see the bottom of one; it had thick gray pads like a big cat’s. He reminded her a lot of the Cat-man Rijen, but wasn’t him. She suppressed a smile, Nerric didn’t manifest much humor. None of them did, so full of themselves and their importance. He’d be horrified at what she was thinking; she was amused by how vividly she remembered that naked man strutting away from her. Nerric shifted restlessly on his cushion making it obvious he was there under duress. The gaze he turned briefly but repeatedly on Skeen made the bird woman’s almost friendly by contrast.
    â€œStrazhha V’duluvit.”
    Speaker for herds and herders. Uh huh. Who herds you.
    A large, not-quite-fat woman with eyes round as copper pennies and about the color of new-minted copper, a blunt wide nose and a mouth of the width called generous by flatterers, her thin lips a pale pale pink. Horn knobs, pointed, slightly curved, about as long as the first joint of Skeen’s forefinger, poking out through coarse hair that matched the color of her eyes. She wore a robe like Flet’s but wore it carelessly, the hood pushed back, hands resting bare on bare broad knees, large hands to match the rest of her, shapely and well-cared-for. She watched Skeen with a detached amusement that was little kinder than the more overtly hostile gazes, made Skeen feel as if she was back on the line at the fish house. She’d spent some of the most miserable days of her teen years in a youth labor pool, swept off the streets with hundreds of others by a labor pressgang. Under that woman’s measuring gaze she felt like a sub-standard fish fillet.
    â€œZ’la. Chovluvit and V’klav.”
    Speaker for men, uh huh. Warchief, oh yes, no need to translate that one.
    Massive muscles. So massive he looked fat. He wore a sleeveless leather jerkin, laced loosely across a chest that might have been carved from pale teak. His arms were bigger around than her thighs, his legs threatened to burst out of homespun trousers dyed a dark russet. He had a stiff mane of sunbleached coarse blond hair considerably longer than Skeen’s. He watched her from mild, coolly curious yellow eyes. She’d never met anyone who exuded so much raw male power, such calm acceptance of himself, though she’d met quite a few men (Tibo that baster was one, damn his pointy ears) who didn’t come close to matching his physical presence but were as comfortable as Z’la in their maleness, their knowledge of who and what they were, who weren’t threatened by anyone, male or female, no matter how powerful. He saw her watching him,