The Salt Road by Jane Johnson Read Free Book Online

Sarid would pay her if it was good, and when the travelling smith came back she would be able to buy the earrings she had set her heart on. It was her first commission; if she did well, others would follow. It was demeaning to work for pay, but much to her disgust she depended on the charity of others now. Her Aunt Dassine and the other women of the Kel Bazgan treated her with no respect, and certainly not the respect someone of her lineage deserved. They even expected her to milk goats with her own hands – to bind them head to head and pull on their teats! It was disgusting. Everyone knew that such a task was designed only for the hands of the iklan . But, despite the lack of deference they accorded her, Mariata was beginning to wish she hadn’t moved so far away from the rest of the tribe.
    She stilled her breathing. It was probably just a goatherd, but there were bandits in the region, who came by night to steal camels or goats, and recently stories had reached them of peasants murdered as they worked in the garden-farms, of brutal attacks on villages; and here she was, alone and a long way from the camp.
    A twig cracked under someone’s foot and a moment later a figure moved into her line of sight: a man, his veil lying loose upon his chest. By this detail she knew he was alone and that he did not expect to meet any other man. By the lazy position of the veil and the carriage of the man’s head, Mariata knew that this was no bandit but Rhossi, the nephew of the chieftain. Only Rhossi was so arrogant as to think himself immune from the spirits.
    The thought of him made her skin prickle. Rhossi had been watching her since her father left her with the Bazgan tribe: she had felt his gaze crawling over her whenever she crossed the encampment, when she danced with the other girls, practising steps for the wedding dances, when she sat beside the fire at night.
    He wasn’t looking at her now; he was looking at the ground, touching something with the toe of his sandal. Perhaps he would pass by. She watched him kneel and touch the dry grass she had crushed underfoot. Then he raised his head, turned towards her and smiled.
    ‘Are you well there in the shadows, Mariata ult Yemma?’
    She saw his eyes fix on her, gleaming. ‘Thanks be to God, I am well, Rhossi ag Bahedi,’ she said, bringing the edge of her headscarf across the lower part of her face. Over the top of it she glared at him, furious at being discovered.
    He grinned. His teeth were sharp, each set slightly apart from the next. The other girls said he was handsome and flashed their eyes at him; but Mariata thought he had a face like a jackal’s, narrow and sly, and a regard that was calculating and without warmth even when his mouth was smiling.
    ‘And is it peace with you, Mariata?’
    ‘It is peace with me. Is it peace with you?’
    ‘With God’s blessing, it is peace, insh’allah .’ He kissed the palms of his hands, brought them down his face and touched his chest, just above the heart, all the while maintaining eye contact. It was politeness and piety personified, but somehow he managed to make the gesture obscene.
    Mariata glared at him. ‘Are you a man, Rhossi ag Bahedi?’
    He bridled. ‘Of course.’
    ‘I was always taught that only little boys and rogues go unveiled. Which are you?’
    Rhossi grinned all the more widely. ‘I veil only in the presence of my betters, Tukalinden.’
    Tukalinden. ‘Little Princess’. It was what some of the people of the tribe – those who honoured her lineage – had taken to calling her, for her mother’s bloodline could be traced directly back to Tin Hinan, through her daughter Tamerwelt , known as The Hare; but in Rhossi’s jackal-mouth the words were heavy with sarcasm.
    Mariata got to her feet. Even grinding millet was preferable to passing time with the high chieftain’s nephew; even milking goats or collecting dung for the fire. She made to pass him, but he caught her by the shoulder. His fingers dug