19
I RAISED my eyes and looked at him, knowing then that stronger magic than fate had enslaved me and brought me through so much hardship to this man and this moment in time.
Was it this book?
“As you wish, Excellency,” and I turned the pages and began to read.
The Song of the Frogs
It was a long time ago. A time when mists clung thick to form and voice. A time when all peoples, all races, all creatures lived in happiness and sharing.
It was this same world we live in now, but different.
The peace did not and could not last because it was perfect, and all know that perfection is a dream but never a reality. One race turned against another, then they united to turn against a third, and when all save a few were exterminated, those few crept among other peoples and whispered words of discord and hate.
War spread with the cruel relentlessness of a malignancy.
Because war thrived, peoples learned to live among it. Cultures, societies and religions adapted. Sometimes war raged year after year, while other years were spent in peace – or what passed for it. Some races were decimated, others, more fortunate, more adaptable, more war-like, flourished.
But among all races there was one people known as the Soulenai, and they found it difficult to adapt to this new word and world of war.
Oh, gods. I risked a glance at Boaz, but the name seemed not to perturb him.
The Soulenai were masters of magic, Necromancers of renown and skill, but they were peace loving, and the thought of waging war made them nauseous.
They believed at first that if they took no sides, if they extended goodwill to all, then none would have reason to wage war on them.
But their lands were invaded, their children slaughtered.
So they thought to move far away, journey to a land where there was no war.
And so they did. They found a peaceful if largely dry land, covered with ten thousand pebbles, but a land where they could flourish again with work and effort. Yet within a decade war had found them, and decimated the land where the Soulenai settled. Dry land became utter desert, field turned to rock, furrow to chasm. Even if steel did not pierce their bodies, many among the Soulenai laid down and died because of their great sadness.
Those left alive wept, wondering if they were cursed.
As they wept, a great river rose from their tears, running through the pebbles and the cracks in the rock and following the course of the chasms, dividing the desert, and giving life along its banks.
The Soulenai sat on the banks of the river and ceased their weeping, but their hearts still sorrowed. No matter where they went, what they did, war would follow, and eventually all would die. What use the beauty of the river when none would be left to enjoy it?
But as they grieved anew, their sorrow dryeyed now, a song rose about them. It was an ugly song, and the Soulenai thought it suited the harshness of the desert and rock about them.
One thought to ask, “Who sings?”
“We do!” And ten thousand frogs lifted their heads from the banks of the river and saluted the Soulenai.
“What strange creatures are these?” the Soulenai asked, for none had seen frogs before.
The frogs introduced themselves, and then made great glad cry.
“Soulenai Saviours! For millennia we were locked inside a myriad of pebbles, trapped, as if by sorcery. But then came a wet such as we had never dared dream, and it was your tears. The river formed, and we sprang into life. Thus for you we offer our song.”
The Soulenai smiled, glad that they had helped at least one race. “We thank you, Friends Frog. You sing a beautiful song.”
The frogs laughed. “You think it ugly, but we do not care. Soulenai Saviours, our song is a gift, and we would tell you how to use it.”
“A gift?”
“We will give you a land where you may live in peace forevermore, Soulenai Saviours.”
“Oh! What is this land?”
“We know it only as the Place Beyond.”
I stopped, pretending to pause to wet my throat with wine. This was dangerous. I risked another glance at Boaz. He sat with his eyes closed, his breathing gentle, and I could not tell his thoughts. Magus waiting to trap, or man yearning for the comfort of his lost mother and unknown father?
“Please, go on,” he said, and opened his eyes. They were bright with tears.
I returned to the tale.
The Soulenai were cautious. The frogs sang of hope, but the Soulenai had seen hope dashed before.
“See!” cried the frogs, and opened their throats in song.
The Soulenai saw. They saw a land where the mists still lingered. They saw a land of sea and stars, plunging cliffs and sweeping plains. A land where they would not be disturbed. They saw a land of such peace that it was magic in itself. It was a land where eternity laughed. A land where the unborn frolicked with the dead and yet no-one knew the difference between them.
“We think we like this land, this Place Beyond,” said the Soulenai. “But how do we reach it?”
“Follow our song,” cried the frogs. “Listen, understand, let our song rock and soothe you, let it touch you, touch you, touch you. Let it hold you, touch you, love you.”
And so they did.
The Soulenai followed the path of the frogs’ song, for they were of such magic they could understand the song, and they went into the Place Beyond, and none have heard of them since.
But I think that if you let the Song of the Frogs rock you and soothe you, if you let it hold you and love you, then you too may be able to reach this Place Beyond, for it is surely a wondrous land.
“I think that is where my father took my mother,” Boaz said into the silence. “I think that he understood the Song of the Frogs. I think that is why my mother died of grief. She had lost not only her lover, but the Place Beyond.”
“Perhaps that is where they are now, Excellency,” I said softly.
“Perhaps, Tirzah, perhaps.” He sighed. “I wish I could understand the Song of the Frogs. I think I would like to visit this land called the Place Beyond.”
Even now I still thought of entrapment, but I also thought of something that needed to be asked.
“Excellency?”
“Yes?”
“Excellency, what was your mother’s name?”
Boaz stirred in his chair, and took the book from my hands, replacing it in the box.
“My mother’s name was Tirzah.” His eyes were still on the box.
Such emotion overwhelmed me I found it hard to speak. “Excellency, why give me your mother’s name?”
“For the frogs you carved me that day, Tirzah.”
And yet he had dashed them to the ground. Killed them. Would I ever understand this man?
“Tirzah?”
“Yes, Excellency?”
“It would please me if, in my bed, you would call me Boaz.”
And so I did.
He did not take me into the Place Beyond, but he transported me nevertheless. Yaqob and I had never had the time nor the privacy to do our love justice. Boaz and I had ample of both. And Boaz also brought laughter, which Yaqob had never thought to do. He teased me with his hands, his mouth, his body, until – driven to wantonness – I pleaded with him to make an end to it and mount me.
“An end to it?” he said. “When we have the night before us?”
But he did as I asked, and with the sweetness and tenderness he’d given me in that kiss, until I pleaded with him never to make an end to it. By that time, even he was too breathless for laughter.
An end to it there had to be, and it brought me as much release as he – which surprised me, for I had not realised that a woman could gain as much satisfaction from a bedding as a man.
He did not leave me, but lay sprawled heavy across my body, gently kissing, stroking, whispering…
…hold me, touch me, soothe me, love me…
…until we both drifted into sleep.
We slept, then we woke and Boaz, still heavy atop me, resumed where he’d left off, and it was faster, harder and more frenetic than our first loving, but it was as good, and this time my cries made no coherent words.
We slept again, and when I woke, it was to find the Magus had returned.