That night they had a party. The quiet, efficient servants strung lanterns along the standing rigging. The night being balmy, food was brought forth and laid on folding tables on the deck. Musicians gathered around the binnacle, Thianra in their midst, wearing her bard’s robes of blue, her hair shining with coppery highlights in the lantern-light.
About twelve people comprised Rajanas’s company, not counting servants. (And they wouldn’t count the servants.) Most of them were male, and all of them were young. Four young ladies, including that obnoxious Princess Kressanthe, vied with laughter and flirty fans for the notice of one of the young lords. All had dressed in their best finery, floaty panels and velvets, with ribbons and lace and jewels glittering and gleaming in the candlelight. I caught the random, blood-glow flickers of two rubies braided into Rajanas’s long black hair.
The one who was the focus of the most attention was tall and slender, slightly older than the others, and marvelously dressed with moon-sapphires shining in his apricot locks. He was exactly the type to arouse admiration and desire; once even mine, but I rejected the impulse to linger, and I looked only to despise.
They laughed and talked, switching back and forth between two or three languages. I could understand all the words, of course, but I sure didn’t catch many of the references, and the laughter sounded more heartless than humorous. I noticed Hlanan, plainly dressed as always, standing on the perimeter looking pensive.
Taking my cue from him, I stayed up on the masthead, out of sight. Battles and chases I could handle with little thought, but there was a cruel edge to that laughter, especially when Kressanthe led it, that I deeply misliked, especially since what they said rarely made sense. I knew I could think up insults as quickly as any, but that was defense. Little as I wished to find attraction in Prince Copper or his smooth-faced, glittering friends, still less did I wish to serve as target for their wit.
So I stayed only to nab some of the eats, and when the music started, stirring up old emotions and half-buried memories without much sense, I retreated to skulk in my cabin.
Not that I could entirely escape. Over the next watch occasional breezes wafted scraps of music into my cabin—which, I discovered, actually belonged to the yacht’s first mate, who was now housed down below where the toffs stayed. The music played on and on, often blending with the sweet, silvery rise and fall of Thianra’s voice.
I had worked hard to build a stone wall around my heart, but music always seemed to put cracks between the stones, through which useless emotions leaked out. I resented this weapon. I wanted hurtful emotions locked safely away so they couldn’t, well, hurt.
I stayed high up until one by one the instruments and voices fell silent, and all I heard were the occasional calls of the night watch, the creak of rope and wood, and the endless wash-slap of the sea against the hull.
o0o
Next morning, I discovered the yacht swarming with activity. At first I saw none of the toffs, just their servants. Then I spotted Hlanan moving quietly among the soberly dressed men and women laboring to bring up big trunks and bulky receptacles of various sorts. He spotted me at the same time, and his thoughtful expression lightened to a smile.
“Lhind,” he said. “Just the person I need. Would you take this box down to Thianra?” He gestured toward the other hatchway, dropping a small wooden cask into my hands at the same time.
I looked down at it, surprised that my hands had taken it. When I looked up again, he was deep in conversation with several toffs, all looking off at the coast.
The cask was heavy, and it smelled like one of those good woods—rose, cedar, taurein. Twining figures of animals and flowers carved at either end. Heavy. It made a chinking sound as I moved it in my hands, and I wondered if it was loaded with coins. Maybe those gold crowns he’d offered me so easily?
He gave it to me? I stared down at it as I worked through a succession of reactions: amazement at his lack of forethought in handing coins to a thief; scorn for his neglecting to think I wouldn’t lighten the load first; last, a twinge of discomfort when I recollected his words about how even a thief has a sense of dignity.
Then I remembered my easy promise before they first untied me. I could break that promise, but I found that I was reluctant to.
Here I was, divided between two instincts: the first, to take what I could while I could, the second to . . . not.
I didn’t like this dilemma. It was unsettling, like I’d been bound by some invisible rope. But then practicality reasserted itself: they’d have only to check the cask and they’d know I’d messed with the contents long before we came into port. Of course they would count! At least once. I certainly would.
And so, as I had no desire to see how Rajanas carried out his threats, I continued down into the middle deck, where I found Thianra bustling about a tiny cabin strewn with clothing before two heavy chests, and a helpless-looking lady wringing her hands as she glanced about in despair.
Giving me a quick, preoccupied smile, Thianra bent to cram an armload of lace and silk into one of the boxes. “Lhind,” she cried breathlessly. “Would you kindly sit upon the baroness’s trunk so I can do the latch?”
“Hlanan sent me with this.” I held out the cask.
“Just set it on the bunk there.” She waved a hand, standing expectantly next to the trunk.
I climbed on it and crouched down. She shook her head and I hopped off. After much shoving and grunting and finding corners of flounces and frills hanging out the side, we finally got the latch to thunk into place. She straightened up, wiped a strand of hair from her brow, and began moving purposefully toward another chest. I slunk out.
Retreating to the masthead, where no one could see me and load me with their chores, I bestowed a moment’s brief pity on those people with all their chests and boxes and dunnage to be dragged about. The only way that made sense was to have one set of clothes, and when they either wore through or itched one beyond bearing, one snaffled some new.
A strong breeze blew the yacht right down the center of the harbor. The yawing bow rolled and pitched in the deep blue of the sea like a horse galloping for home, sending sprays of saltwater high into the air. The river sparkled a lighter blue under the brilliant sky, marking where brine ended and fresh water began.
Even from our distance, Letarj appeared different from Stormborn Harbor back in Thesreve. It was built along the mouth of a wide river. The shoreline angled inward until we sailed into the river itself. On hills rising to each side the whitewashed and golden-brick buildings of the harbor city gleamed. A very rich city, this. But the thief gangs were tough and numerous and did not look kindly on independents, Thesreve rumor had it.
I sighed as we sailed past all that wasted wealth. And what a variety! I saw everything from beautifully decorated, fast yachts like the one we were on, to big old weather-beaten round-hulled trade three-masters. Twice we were passed by exotic and sinister-looking red-sailed Shinjan galleys moving out to sea. The slaves in the galleys dipped and raised the long oars in a matched rhythm one would have thought impossible to achieve, and the red sails looked like stains of fresh blood against the sky. I remembered some of the stories I’d heard about Shinja, and shivered in the strengthening breeze.
Farther and farther in we sailed, past anchored ships of all kinds, from all over the world. There was a long line of piers, next to which lay big traders or very fancy ships obviously belonging to royalty. Along the wharves lay goods from all over the world: gigantic wine barrels from the inland hills, crates of blood oranges from the islands, their aroma sweet above the brine; bales of wool from the high mountains, cloth, wood, even baskets of almonds, islanders in fringed vests bargaining loudly with dock merchants with their counting beads.
As we sailed slowly along, little rowboats fast splashing out of our way, it became apparent from the various flags that went up and down the foremast rope on the yacht, and at the harbormaster’s on the hill, that we were to get a pier to ourselves.
Then I heard noise below. A shrill, sarcastic voice: “. . . if you think you can manage this without further damage—”
Princess Kressanthe stalked the length of the deck, yelling the while at a string of heavily burdened servants. She was gowned in some kind of shiny silk and so many diamonds hung round her neck, on her wrists, and in her hair, that it hurt the eyes when the jewels caught the strong sunlight and flung it back in shards of liquid light.
She halted in the middle of the deck, and tossed her hair back with an angry gesture, then ran her fingers through the curls flagging in the strong breeze. My scalp itched anew as I watched.
Nobody seemed to be paying attention to her. The princess scanned the deck, her eyes narrowing when she spotted Rajanas and the captain standing aft behind the wheel, talking.
Kressanthe turned her head sharply and shrieked at someone right behind her, “MUST you be so SLOW?”
The men remained at the taffrail, gazing at the shoreline.
The maidservant she snarled at ducked her head and ran back for another load, stumbling among the sailors heaving on sails as the yacht drifted up to the pier.
Thianra appeared, her face anxious and her hair loose. It flew about her in the wind as she rushed straight to Kressanthe and began talking very earnestly.
The ship shuddered and wallowed; the yards braced round, tight as the sailors could get them. The crowd of servants milling about staggered after one violent surge. One skinny maidservant burdened with a bulky receptacle of some kind lost her balance and lurched against the princess, who turned and slapped her ringingly across the face. The servant girl fell back, dropping her burden, which smashed on the deck and spilled its contents: jewels, rings, brooches, and necklaces.
We’re now in port, I thought as I slid down a backstay. Here’s my chance.
Snaking into the group of reaching, grabbing, exclaiming servitors, I went to work: a foot behind another foot here, a shove there, and a yank on a skirt—and the off-balance group fell down in a satisfying tangle of thrashing cloth and flailing limbs.
This kind of thing is an art, and I’d gotten mighty good at it.
Kressanthe was on the bottom. She lay there without moving, shrieking for her maids. I eeled out from the pile, snagging take as I went. A package got thrust into my nose and someone’s elbow caught me hard in the stomach, but still I managed to nip three rings and two bracelets. My big prize was going to be the long string of faceted diamonds, right from Kressanthe’s perfect neck, but I was distracted by sharp fleering light at the edge of my vision. I took a look, and gasped when I saw more diamonds, much bigger, better diamonds, half-spilled from an embroidered cloth bag. The light didn’t just reflect and refract, it seemed to gather in them, radiating pinpoints of ferocious sun.
I bent, whisked them up, and retreated to my cabin where I stashed them hastily in my knickers.
Then, gloating inwardly, I reflected that the best thing was that Rajanas, in ignoring the princess, could not possibly have spotted me making the pinch.
The instant my clothes were straight I strolled innocently out to watch the servants picking up scattered belongings and disentangling Kressanthe from the mess.
Her rising voice caused Rajanas to cross the deck. He bent to give the princess a hand up. As he pulled her to her feet, he glanced about, giving me a narrow-eyed glance. I edged discreetly back, and gazed off at the shoreline as if nothing was amiss. But I peeked sideways to keep an eye on things.
The sails were brailed up by now, the ship tied fore and aft. The crew extended a gangplank to the dock, which dropped with a bang, to be instantly tied down by dock workers.
Kressanthe snatched her hand away from Rajanas’s arm, and marched toward the gangplank with her nose high in the air. I didn’t hear her parting shot toward him, but it must have been a good one, as his brows rose in mild surprise, and Thianra turned away, her hand covering her face to hide laughter. My heart warmed toward Kressanthe—too late.
Kressanthe was the first to sweep down to the dock. Hlanan appeared at Thianra’s side, both of their faces wearing twin expressions of concern. Rajanas, smiling faintly, moved to talk to them. I would have kept my distance, but Hlanan looked about, spotted me, and gestured for me to join them.
I took my time, catching the end of Hlanan’s murmured words; he was talking in one of those languages I’d heard once or twice on in the southeastern reaches of the empire. “. . . I wish it hadn’t happened because it will only sound the worse by the time the story reaches Court.”
Rajanas shrugged. “If you believe for a moment she’ll tell a story on herself, then by all means worry.”
“It will not be the truth that her father hears, but the emotions propelling her words will be genuine,” Thianra responded softly.
“You’re right.” Rajanas brought his chin down in a definitive jerk. “No time for our errands in Letarj. We’ll make straight for Imbradi.” He turned away, beckoned to one of his stewards, and began giving orders.
Below us on the dock, Kressanthe had dispatched harbor runners to fetch vehicles for hire. As I watched, three pair-drawn coaches rolled up and the harassed maidservants began loading trunks and cases into one coach. The servants then climbed into the smallest one, and from the largest—into which Kressanthe had stepped the moment they rolled up—a few coins spun, glinting, from the doorway to land at the runners’ feet. Then the same imperious hand that had flung the silvers waved with another imperious gesture and the coaches rolled from the dockside with a great cracking of whips and pounding of hooves.
Hlanan said, “We must disembark now.” His brown eyes were distant, his expression pensive.
Wondering what he was afraid of, I said, “Still want that book?” I was poised to run, but twelve golders?
“Book?” he repeated, brow furrowing, then he nodded quickly. “Oh yes, Lhind, I do indeed. I thought you knew that. Tell me, shall you mind a somewhat hasty journey? Rajanas wishes to travel fast.”
“Well of course I’m used to kingly comfort,” I said promptly.
A rich laugh behind me told me that Thianra had heard. “You stay to help Ilyan,” she said to Hlanan, in Chelan. “I shall take Lhind with me to yon inn, and enjoy a bite and sip on firm ground.”
Hlanan gave her a relieved smile, and I wondered what was going on that was not being said. Hoping to get a hint from Thianra, I followed her to the inn she pointed out.
Once again she was dressed in a fitted minstrel-blue jacket and riding trousers. Her tiranthe hung in its embroidered cover (much finer than her own clothes), and below that, a simple knapsack.
One glass of tasty brown cider and a big cheese pie stuffed with wine-braised onions and tomatoes went down to warm the inner Lhind, but during that time I gained nothing from her aside from a respect for her story-telling ability. She talked a great deal, mostly about traveling.
Once or twice I sensed she was watching me for signs of familiarity with the places she mentioned, but she asked no direct questions, and she answered the ones I asked her with friendly ease and humor. I also saw those browny-gray eyes flick toward the door each time someone came or went, and I noticed her hands, when resting, in reach of where I guessed her weapons to be hidden, but her smiling face never changed.
The inn we visited was as colorful and varied as her stories: not just for gentry, though several fine-dressed people passed us by, nor just for harbor folk. People from several lands sat at the rough-hewn tables around us, even four Shinjans, noticeable for their pale skin and eyes, and though they didn’t actually have red hair, as most Shinjans are rumored to have, they wore red somewhere about them. The aromatic air was thick with the clatter of many tongues.
We were on our second glass, paid for with great cheer by Thianra, when Hlanan entered quietly and came to our table. “All the guests have departed.” He spoke in Chelan.
“Then we may do the same,” Thianra said. “Ready, Lhind?”
I looked from one to the other. “If we’re definitely still on for those twelve golders.”
“We’ll be planning that as soon as we reach our next destination,” Hlanan said, palm raised in the universal sign for I vow this is truth. Which I know is scarcely worth the air around it, but he hadn’t lied to me yet. That I’d caught, anyway.
Thianra and Hlanan led the way outside again. The yacht bobbed at its pier. Despite its furled sails, its long, low lines made it look as if it were still skimming over the water.
I paused in the yard and thought about how splendid the yacht felt moving under full sail, once I’d discovered the mast heads, and I wondered how one of these might be pinched. Maybe you could snaffle the boat, but how about the crew, dolt? Grinning to myself, I walked on.
Hlanan and Thianra stood before a high-slung carriage with four restive horses pawing the cobbled street before it. The carriage was newly painted an imposing black, and I recognized the device on the side as the same that I’d seen stitched on Rajanas’s tunic. Next to it an open chariot waited, with a matched team being held tightly in check by one of the stewards. Two high-bred horses, their reins held by other servants, danced and tossed their manes nearby. In back a big cargo coach, piled high with luggage, was also ready to roll.
Thianra and Hlanan stopped near the chariot, clearly involved in some kind of disagreement.
Thianra shook her head, and I barely heard her voice, using some language I remembered from long ago, but didn’t have a name for: “. . . entertain Kressanthe, and I have. I told you, I heard rumors of new Kitharee folk patterns up in Barsk, and I need to hear them myself—”
Hlanan’s voice was too low to make out as his back was to me, but I heard Thianra’s answer, “Hlanan, you know where my true interest lies. But just this once.”
“Thank you,” he said. I heard that much.
And they both glanced at me.
Did they think I didn’t understand them? I waved. They smiled, Hlanan friendly, Thianra more troubled.
Meanwhile, six men whose bearing and purposeful movement indicated they were warriors, despite the plain tunics like the rest of the servitors, mounted inside and atop the carriage. Rajanas appeared from the other side, waved languidly, and the carriage-driver cracked a whip. The horses started out.
The easy days of sailing plus a good meal had made me unwary. When a steely hand grabbed my shoulder, I jumped, then wrenched away and glared up at Rajanas. He tipped his chin toward the luggage coach.
The driver of this vehicle was a big, beefy-looking man with a rocky, scarred face and a purple nose. He had small, squinty eyes with an expression like a brick-pile falling on somebody’s head, but his bristly brows indicated curiosity. If I was to ride with him, maybe a suitable story would win his sympathy—
“Arbren,” Rajanas drawled, “this repellent scrap is a thief, hired for some obscure reason by the Scribe. I want those trunks to arrive in Imbradi intact. You are to see that he has no opportunity to inspect their contents.”
Arbren’s glance congealed into a glare that would have scared a weaker soul right off the coach. I contemplated cutting and running, but then Rajanas tossed me up onto the seat beside the driver.
“Haw!” Arbren gave a knowing guffaw that lost none of its sneeriness despite a complete absence of teeth.
Rajanas mounted the chariot, and Thianra climbed in beside him. Hlanan swung into the saddle of one of the horses, a steward mounted the other, and our cavalcade set out at a gallop.