The Count of Castle Rock

Chapter XXXVIII- Village on the Water

For Leesa Talbert, a young woman from the big city, living among the free dancers is like spending a season in another world. The catkin village causes more of a culture shock than her family's move from Levian to Solomon. Then, it had been a matter of growing used to a slower life in a lazy town of muted colors. The difference between Solomon and Fleeth Village isn't just about colors, but about sounds and smells.

Fleeth Village is a place of exotic spices gathered from the Felah Forest and wilderness so far north the maps of Quinlain have no name for them. Music is everywhere from the river docks to the tall ancient trees where the free dancers make their home. Even the catkin here are different. They look and sound like their southern cousins, but the way they move is more fluid, more catlike, more alive. Feliruu to the south are Quin or Gramshandolin or Hang Du. The free dancers are free of the trappings of human culture.

Each day she spends among them, Leesa feels herself becoming more and more free as well.

The village has no locked doors, though privacy is fiercely respected. The feeling of community permeates every aspect of the free dancer culture and Leesa has been swept away from the moment she arrived. She admired the flowing nature of their colorful garb. They admired the way her hair naturally reached for the heavens like the tall trees. She admired the way their music seemed to beat to the rhythm of their feline movements. They admired the way she took to their language, learning pronunciation and inflection as if born to them. She loved the patterns of their fur and how each design spoke of tribe and ancestry. They fawned over her brown skin and its golden highlights brought out by the noonday sun.

Six days after their arrival in Fleeth Village, the expedition prepares to continue their search for Count Methuen and Leesa laments saying farewell to her newfound friends.

A circle of catkin women drum an undulating rhythm, surging then dropping in a fast paced song that carries up and down the river without a name. Leesa dances with a group of young free dancers, learning the traditional first forms that make up their morning folk dances. She spins and leaps, twirls and dives. She rolls behind a young felirru girl who hurt her foot in a fishing accident. Both come up slower than the other dancers, panting as they hurry to keep up with the rest of the group. An instructor swats them both on the rears to the amusement of the drummers.

Instead of feeling ashamed, Leesa feels appreciative. As the troupe goes through the motions again, she tries harder to emulate the lead girls. Twisting, spinning, leaping, diving. This time, when she comes out of the roll, there is no swatting of her rump. Leesa concentrates, committing the motions to memory. These weren't merely the building blocks to all of the dances taught to their youths, but the key to their fighting style. She remembers how the free dancers fell upon the expedition, superimposing images from that attack over the young men and women dancing around her. For them, dancing in celebration and dancing in bloody contests is one and the same.

The drumming abruptly stops, to be filled with clapping and shouts of praise. The lame feliruu girl limps over and gathers Leesa in a big hug.

"You did well, Red One," she says, her accent making the words sound like a language of their own.

"Thank you. You did well too." Leesa loves the soft feel of the girl's short orange fur against her skin. She takes a deep breath, inhaling the fragrant smell of river wildflowers and the girl's scent. "I will miss you," she says in feliruu.

The girl laughs and presses her forehead against Leesa's, a form of platonic kiss.

"I will miss you," she corrects in her native tongue before switching to the common trade tongue. "I will miss you too. Outsiders never come here hoping to learn our ways. They want our fish and our flowers, but never want to just be among us." She gestures towards the drummers, carefully covering their instruments. "You've shown us a different side of your people."