An earthly crown

CHAPTER TEN

"Most honored uncle," said Jiroannes Arthebathes into the clear chill of the night. He waited, after those three words, for the pen of his personal secretary, Syrannus, to complete the required list of titles and honorifics with which a nephew was obliged to address a noble and powerful uncle in the Great King's court.

After some minutes, during which the careful scritching of his pen blended with the low popping of the fire, Syrannus paused and lifted his eyes. At his right hand burned a lantern, casting light over the parchment laid on a board across his knees. The thin veins of his lined hands showed constricted and blue in the muted illumination. The lettering those elderly hands had produced was sinuously beautiful.

Jiroannes cast it a cursory glance, expecting nothing less. "Now some opening pleasantries, a synopsis of the journey since Eberge, with perhaps an anecdote or two but leave off at the difficult part."

As Syrannus began to write again, Jiroannes lifted one hand. His concubine padded forward and gave him a cup of bitter, hot tea before kneeling in silence behind his chair. When Syrannus at length finished, the younger man read the words and nodded. "Very well. Now." He sighed, twisting the ends of his mustache between thumb and forefinger. "How can I introduce this subject without offending him? 'I was shocked-' No. What impossible barbarians these jaran are. I suppose all their women go about unveiled and in men's clothing."

"Surely not, eminence," interposed Syrannus. "Do not forget that Her Most Benevolent Highness, the Princess Eriania, is allowed by Her Most Gracious Brother privileges which all other women would never desire. Perhaps these females also have an exalted position of some kind. Their boldness is indeed shameful and certainly humiliating for them, but they are discreet."

"Discreet? Not a word I would have chosen. If you mean they don't display themselves like the whores one sees at ports-that may be true, but this woman, Nadine Orzhekov, shows such a complete lack of true womanly modesty, of that humility which is proper in a female, that she disgusts me far more than any prostitute. Samae. More tea." The concubine rose and took the cup away. "But perhaps we misinterpret Bakhtiian's motives. Perhaps he meant these two women to be an offering to me. Certainly the Orzhekov woman is not at all to my taste, but the other one-I have seen her gaze on me once or twice. Should I take that as an invitation? It would be a pleasant diversion from Samae, and she is certainly attractive-"

"Your eminence," hissed Syrannus, warning.

A figure appeared at the edge of the tent. At Syrannus's nod it moved forward into the light and resolved into a dark-haired young woman. "Your eminence," she said, but the tone mocked him.

Jiroannes eyed her with vast dislike. He had quickly ceased trying to spare her womanly virtue by not looking at her directly, since he was sure she had none. "To what do I owe the honor of this late visit?" he asked, neither rising nor honoring her with a title.

Nadine Orzhekov gave the barest of smiles, and he had the satisfaction of knowing that the slight was not lost on her. "As commander of your escort, I feel it my duty to warn you-no, to inform you about some jaran customs that may seem strange to you."

"Indeed. Has some special occasion brought on this generosity?"

"Indeed," echoed Nadine. "I understand, your eminence, that you come from a society very different from ours. I even know a little about it, having read of Vidiya at the university in Jeds. Because of that knowledge, I have endured your rudeness to me, but if you persist in expecting the women of the jaran to act as Vidiyan women do, and in scorning them because they do not, I can assure you that Bakhtiian will have nothing to do with you or your mission. You had better learn to be polite, since I doubt you'll ever learn proper deference. Otherwise you will be sent home a failure." She paused. Behind her, hidden by darkness, a musician played a melancholy tune on a high-pitched pipe.

Jiroannes, lips tight, said nothing. Syrannus looked shocked.

"I will venture a more personal observation," added Nadine, noting her speechless audience with what Jiroannes knew was malicious satisfaction, "because I'm not the only one to have noticed it. If I were you, I would not watch Terese Soerensen as if I were measuring her to see if she would fit in my bed."

It was too much to bear, such insolence. "Certainly I may look at whom I please!"

"In fact," she went on, ignoring his words as if they were a child's outburst, "you would be well served to moderate the way you look at jaran women in general. It isn't becoming in a man to stare." Then, having said it, she had the effrontery to grin.

"Are you quite finished?" he demanded.

She shrugged. "We have tribute to collect, so we must return to the main camp roundabout. We'll be some days before we arrive there." She hesitated as the concubine came back to the edge of the circle of light furnished by Syrannus's lantern. Her dark eyes met Samae's almond-shaped ones for the barest instant, and then Samae placed the cup into Jiroannes's waiting hand and retreated to kneel behind his chair.

Nadine's mouth had pulled tight, and Jiroannes was gratified to see that she felt compelled for whatever reason to suppress her anger. He hoped the act caused her pain. "I thought," she said, her anger betrayed by the hoarseness of her voice, "that a message was sent that you only bring men."

Jiroannes dismissed Samae's presence with an airy wave of his free hand. "She is dressed as a boy. Surely that will suffice."

"Only a fool would take her for a boy."

Now he stood. "And for what reason am I expected to answer to you?" A mere woman! "In any case, she is nothing. Only a slave, if you know what that is."

Her voice dropped, softening with an emotion he did not recognize. "I know what a slave is. Send her back to your lands, eminence. I will provide an escort for her.''

"No." It came out petulant, but he was furious by now. "I will not."

For a moment she stared, most brazenly and contemptuously, at him. Then she turned on her heel and left, without a word or a sign or the merest polite valediction. His hands shook. He touched the tea to his lips, coughed, and threw it down so that the hot liquid spattered the rug.

"Fresh-brewed tea, girl! I do not expect this swill!" The concubine started up and, retrieving the cup, hurried away. "Syrannus. I am too tired to compose. Write what you see fit. I cannot possibly explain this to my uncle. He would never believe me. Samae!" She appeared out of the small tent pitched next to his. "Attend me." He stormed over to his tent, paused, watching her. She inclined her head, acquiescing, and lifted the veil that draped down over her shoulder up and across her face, concealing all but her coal-black eyes.

Satisfied, he went into the tent. She followed him, but at the tent flap she hesitated and looked back, out into the darkness of the jaran camp, her eyes glittering in the lantern light, her expression hidden by the veil. Syrannus had begun to write, the precise flow of his hand right to left, left to right, across the white page, filling it in with his supple calligraphy. The flap sighed down behind her as she went in. Syrannus wrote on, blowing on his hands now and again to warm them. Out in the darkness, by a far campfire, a man sang, a wistful melody that wound itself round the chill air and somehow seemed to soften it.