Shadow Gate

7

Standing in the shop of her Ri Amarah hosts, Mai studied the wares for sale: netted bags; varying qualities of linen and cotton cloth, from stands-up-to-hard-use to dainty-for-festivals; needles of varying length and thickness; and two shelves packed with thread and yarn of diverse luster, strength, and color. Behind the counter, Eliar's father presided over cubbyholes and shelves and baskets packed with medicinals.

'Isn't that oil of naya?' she asked Isar, indicating a display of vials containing a pale liquid.

'Oil of naya is famed for its healing properties, verea.' Isar had Eliar's good looks, aged and mellowed, and Eliar's charming manners, but in other ways he reminded Mai of her own father: he liked tidy shelves and tidy rules, because he arranged them. 'This is finest-quality water-white, useful against certain skin conditions and ailments. Crude oil of naya has the property that it burns even when water is thrown on it, so it is hard to extinguish.'

Mai leaned against the counter to steady herself as the memory of living men engulfed in flame flashed in her mind's eye. Fifteen days ago, she had watched from the women's tower of the Ri Amarah compound as Anji and his troops, with the aid of the Olossi militia and the reeves of Argent and Clan Halls, had attacked the army invading the city. They had won a victory against a numerically superior force by dropping oil of naya on the army's encampment. Merciful One! Everything had burned, even flesh.

'Are you well, verea?' Isar asked. 'If you'd prefer to go back to the women's quarters, you might find it more suitable.'

She took in and released a measured breath, just as Priya had taught her, cupped a hand over the curve of her belly. After the battle, Anji had stayed with her for one night, and then he had ridden off with his troops in pursuit of the remnants of the broken army. He had his work. And she had hers. She would do what must be done.

'I am grateful to you for sheltering me, ver,' she said a little

hoarsely. 'Your house has shown me nothing but kindness and generosity. But I find I miss the bustle of the market. It keeps my mind off those things I cannot change.'

Isar seemed about to object when a pair of matrons entered the store and demanded his attention in their quest for an ointment to soothe abrasions and burns that men in their family had received while fighting the fires that had sprung up in the lower city during the attack. Mai sat on a stool reserved for customers, relieved she did not have to answer his objections, and watched the give and take. She never tired of bargaining. She could learn much observing how others conducted themselves. In addition to selling his wares, Isar acted as an apothecary might, refusing to recommend any tisane or ointment until he had led the women through an exhaustive list of symptoms to identify the severity and precise nature of each ailment. A pair of turbaned younger men entered from the back, bearing a tray with tiny cups. They offered this fragrant tea to the customers, but both women refused.

Several young women dressed in good quality silks ventured in, laughing together. As they spread out bolts of fabric, they glanced at Mai, whispering with heads bent together. The Hundred folk favored bold colors and patterns: stylized flowers too bright to be realistic, playful butterflies and bats representing day and night, handsome motifs formed out of ranks of green-on-gold vegetation. Their chattering, the strange patterns, the smell of unfamiliar herbs, and even the color of the dirt made her feel an utter outlander, tossed into a foreign land with no choice but to fight for her own survival.

She could not allow it to overwhelm her. She and Anji, and their company of about two hundred soldiers and additional grooms and slaves, had chosen to make their stand here, to carve out a life in exile.

'Verea, is there anything you need?' asked one of the young men hesitantly. When she smiled at him, he reddened and tugged at the cloth wrapping his head that concealed his hair, as if the action would deflect her gaze.

'No. I thank you.' She rose.

Isar looked up from his customers, marked her exit with a creased brow, and offered a brief and possibly disapproving nod.

If only his daughter were permitted to accompany her, but of course that was impossible.

She pushed through the hanging banners stamped with the signs that signified to customers what was sold within, and emerged onto the porch. Every storefront had such a porch, set a few steps up from the street, on which folk left their street shoes before entering. Her attendants waited outside. Priya sat cross-legged on the porch, watching the passing traffic. Her lips shaped the words of prayers that she chanted to herself whenever she had a quiet moment. Chief Tuvi and four soldiers stood guard. Eliar, her chosen escort and local guide, was leaning against a wooden pillar chatting with O'eki, the mountainous slave, about wool.

As Mai bent to strap on her sandals, Priya rose. O'eki broke off his disquisition on the importance of a long and lustrous fiber to a carpet that would stand up to repeated wear.

Eliar grinned as he pushed away from the pillar. 'Did my father talk you out of your reckless scheme, Mai?' he asked, as casual with her as if she were his sister.

Chief Tuvi gestured, and the soldiers fell into formation, two in the vanguard and two for the rear guard. 'Mistress? What is your wish?'

She gathered her courage, let out a held breath. 'Surely shopping must be the same in every town, even a foreign one. I am ready to go!'

The market streets in Olossi brimmed with ten times the wonders that even the twice-annual market fair in isolated Kartu Town could ever ever ever boast. Along one narrow street you could browse the stalls and shops of papermakers, with rice-paper lanterns, plain or painted fans, decorative paper for folding, and painted landscapes suitable for screens as well as ordinary white rice paper for windows and doors. An alley snaked between shops selling fabulous creatures carved from bone. She found mirrors backed with bronze lacework, braided cords to ornament jackets, and silk ribbons woven plain or patterned.

'You're dickering,' said Eliar as they strolled down a rank of stalls that sold nothing but beads: wood, ceramic, stone, crystal, polished, unpolished, in so many colors she could not name them all. His

silver bracelets jangled as he gestured toward the bustling shops. 'But you're not buying.'

'This is my first time out. I was fearful of venturing out, after the battle, with everything in disarray. Then your sister told me it was also the year-end festival with ghosts and such. So I thought it would be better to stay indoors. But now that's over-' She laughed. 'You can see it wouldn't be wise to buy when I don't really know how bargaining works here.'

'The same as any other place, I suppose.' Eliar heaved a sigh that ought to have shaken earth and sky together. 'Not that my father and uncles will let me travel to other towns and see.'

'The roads aren't safe. Didn't a man from your house get killed on the road to Horn last year?'

'Yes. But they wouldn't even let me ride out with the militia during the battle. All I was allowed to do was fight the fire in the lower city after the army had already run!'

Mai shuddered, remembering the way buildings and tents and living creatures had burned and burned and burned. 'People died fighting those fires.'

'So they did. I shouldn't make light of it.'

A girl scuttled up to the pair of soldiers standing rear guard. Ducking her head shyly, she held out a wooden platter of sweet rice dumplings. 'My papa asks you take these as a gift, for fighting for the city. The Silver isn't permitted any.'

Eliar's frown deepened.

'That's rude!' muttered Mai.

'Maybe not meant so,' he said. 'Best the soldiers be seen accepting the gift.'

She gestured to Chief Tuvi. He strolled back to inspect the dumplings and the girl, who wasn't more than ten. He indicated she should eat one first, and when she popped one promptly in her mouth, he allowed the soldiers to share the rest.

'Even so, walking through the market is more than your sister can do,' said Mai, mouth watering as she watched the soldiers devour the moist dumplings. She couldn't bring herself to taste them when Eliar was rejected in that way, but if he meant to let the slight pass, she would not mention it again. 'She wasn't allowed to accompany me.'

'She's unmarried. She's not allowed to walk in the market until she becomes an adult.'

'Which I am, although I'm younger than she is? Just because I'm married? That doesn't seem reasonable.'

Like his father, Eliar might smile and charm but there were things he would not joke about. 'That isn't our way, verea.'

'Forgive me. I had no intention to offend. I grew up selling produce in the market in Kartu Town. It seems strange to me that your sister lives so restricted.'

'Let's move on,' he said.

Even Miravia's absence could not ruin the delight of walking through the bright day and enjoying the sight of a city so rich they could build with wood as much as with stone and brick. So many colors and smells! Vendors sold oil by the ladle. At food stalls you could buy noodles, or mounds of colorful spiced and pickled vegetables.

A girl sat on a blanket under the shade of a canvas awning, fruit mounded in neat piles before her, crying her wares in a cheerful voice: 'Sunfruit! Best and sweetest! Ghost melon for the new year! Strings of redthorn.'

Mai wiped away unexpected tears.

Priya cupped Mai's elbow under an arm. 'Mistress, are you well? Perhaps we should return?'

'Just remembering when I used to be that girl, selling fruit in the market in Kartu Town.'

She bought several sunfruit, making only a cursory effort to bargain, and shared out the segments with the others. The moist flesh cooled her mouth, but it tasted a little sour.

The smell of fried fish made her stomach turn, so they walked on, past carpenters raising walls where a hall had just days ago burned, past roofers shifting broken tiles, past folk hauling water and pushing wheelbarrows piled with bricks, past men and women calling out their wares in a singsong that grabbed and held the ear. The rhythm of the marketplace truly was the same anywhere. And today she had no need to feel hurried, to grasp at trinkets in passing, to wonder if the coin she'd been given as a sign of favor by Father Mei might be pried from her hand by Grandmother Mei in a fit of pique. She could wait, see what appealed, how prices compared, and she

could come back whenever she pleased, because she and Anji were wealthy. Anji's troop of Qin soldiers had saved Olossi. Acting as negotiator for their services, she had pinched the Olossi council for so much coin that she couldn't imagine how she'd had the audacity just days ago to manage it.

No, there was no haste to buy.

Not until they came to the street catering to those who knew how to write, with its brushes and inkstones and ink knives. In one shop, a dozen wretchedly preserved scrolls had been tossed into a dusty basket in the corner.

'Look here, Priya,' she said to the slave, drawing her close, hand tucked into her elbow. 'Don't those look like prayer scrolls? Whatever would such a thing be doing in this land, where they've never heard of the Merciful One?'

The shopkeeper hustled over. 'Verea.' He nodded at Priya, not realizing she was only a slave, and then at Mai, gaze shifting between the two to gauge their relationship. 'How may I help you?'

'I'd like to look at these,' Mai said. 'What a curiosity!'

'Please, please.' He was a short, broad-chested man wearing a sleeveless vest and loose trousers that fell to just above the ankle. He cleared a space on a table and carelessly dropped several of the frayed scrolls there.

A youth wearing only a kilt belted low on the hips was seated on the floor in the opposite corner at the rear of the shop, twisting hairs into brushes. His well-muscled chest was mostly hairless, quite smooth. He glanced up as if he had felt the weight of her gaze, and grinned flirtatiously right at her. She looked away, although not because she feared a lad's dazzling smile. The Hundred folk wore much less clothing in public than Mai was accustomed to, displaying a great deal of lovely brown skin. Perhaps it was no wonder Isar did not like his unmarried daughter to walk in the market.

Priya sucked in a sharp breath, a hiss of surprise. She had untied a ribbon and smoothed out the first few turns of a battered scroll, careful lest the ragged tears rip further.

'This is a copy of the Thread of Awakening,' she murmured.

Was that a tear below Priya's eye, or a stray drop of rain? Priya had always a well-modulated voice, in which Mai heard only

affection and wisdom. Tenderly the slave tied the scroll back and peeled open a second.

'Aie!' She sounded as if the sight pained her. 'The Discourse on the Seven-Branched Candle. Ill handled for its pains. I cannot imagine how these holy books journeyed here.'

'Yet here they are,' murmured Mai as the woman mouthed the words silently and rocked side to side to the rhythm of the unspoken phrases.

The months-long overland journey with Anji's company had been hard on Priya, but she had never relaxed her care of Mai, never once spoken of her own fears and aches. Nor had Mai, in the seven years Priya had been her personal slave, ever asked. Anji was the one who had discovered that Priya had been kidnapped years ago from a temple where she served the Merciful One, and marched over high mountains to be sold into slavery far away from her homeland. Her only comment: 1 survived because of the teachings of the Merciful One.'.

'Do these exceptional scrolls interest you, verea? They are rare. Outlander work. It was chance I was able to lay hands on them. You'll find nothing else like them in all of Olossi.'

'Look how dirty and torn they are,' said Mai with a kind smile. 'How sad that those who handled them treated them with such scorn. Here, now, what can you tell me of these prints?' She indicated a set of pictures leaning against the wall. 'How I love butterflies! So colorful they are! But is this a practiced hand? Or apprentice work? Please advise me, ver.'

Distracted, he followed her to the ranks of prints on display. 'It's very good work, although you might find Hoko's work more to your taste, she is a master artisan, the best in town. Here are Hoko's festival prints special for the Year of the Red Goat, which I can offer at a markdown since we scarcely had a festival this year due to the terrible events. See the detail of this wharf scene! The festival banners, the ghost ribbons, the food stalls. Here, the incomparable Eridit, and there a talking line of children from the Lady's temple dance the episode of the reunited lovers from the Tale of Change.'

'It's very fine, but the colors here look a little smudged. Oh, I do like that one, but-'

She smiled brightly and spoke cheerfully, and wielded her 'but's

like a trimming knife until the shopkeeper begged for mercy. 'Your sweet tongue is as sharp as those swords carried by your soldiers, verea,' he said, laughing. 'I accept defeat! What is it you want?'

'It seems a high price for prints for a festival now over, for a year that won't come around again for – well – how can I even count that far? Many rounds of years, surely, before the Red Goat walks again.'

'I can't lower my price, verea. My overhead. Surely you understand. But I could throw in something else. Is there something you have your eye on?'

She made a show of examining other prints, the brushes, the ink-stones. He had an assistant bring tea. As she sipped, savoring the gingery taste, she entertained him with a long digression about needing to bind a new accounts book, as she must of necessity set up a household.

'So you and the outlanders are indeed staying, as it is rumored?'

'Is it spoken of?'

'Surely it is, verea. You must know every person in Olossi talks of little else. How could it be otherwise, since your bold attack saved us from ruin?'

She liked him, for his laugh and his praise of Anji and the soldiers, and because bargaining entertained him as much as it did her. Because he offered tea not just to her and Priya but also to Eliar and Tuvi and the four soldiers as they loitered under the eaves, waiting for her. 'I'll need two accounts books. I am sure you can bind them with good-quality paper, something that will hold up better than those poor scrolls, and provide the necessary scribal tools.'

In the end she purchased the prints and the accounts books, with the entire basket of dusty scrolls thrown in as a courtesy. The books and scribal tools and prints would be delivered, but Priya herself carried away the basket, clutched as tightly as a precious child. Mai could not have been more pleased.

'Mistress, here is juice, just as you like it with lime and mint.'

'Ah! That's very nice, Sheyshi.'

'While you were gone, I washed the cloth just as you said. I folded the bedding. I cooked rice. The young mistress helped me.'

'Very good, Sheyshi. Where is Miravia?'

'She went back through the gate, Mistress. Do you want your hair brushed, Mistress?'

'Yes, Sheyshi.' Mai sank down onto pillows and sighed with pleasure as Sheyshi took out the combs and sticks that held her hair. Released, her hair fell past her hips. As Sheyshi brushed with steady strokes, Mai watched Priya examine the scrolls. The slave said nothing, but tears shone on her weathered skin.

'What have we found?' Mai asked finally.

'A treasure! Six of the scrolls are written in script unknown to me. They might be anything. But the other six are discourses and threads. I have not touched holy books since the day our temple was burned and we were taken away by the raiders.' She wiped tears from her cheek. 'I thank you, Mistress. This treasure brings me great joy.'

Mai sniffled, wiping away her own tears. 'We'll make an altar. You can teach me all the holy prayers.'

'We will not build an altar in the house of the Ri Amarah.'

'No,' said Mai with a frowning laugh. 'I suppose we will not.'

The brush paused halfway down her length of hair.

'Mistress, what altar will you build?' Sheyshi asked. 'Can I pray there? I know the words "the Merciful One is my lamp and my refuge". But that's all I know.'

Priya touched each of the scrolls in turn, as if she could absorb their holy essence through her skin. 'Of course you will pray, Sheyshi. The Merciful One hears the prayers of all people.'

'Even women?' Sheyshi whispered. 'Even slaves?'

'Especially women. Especially slaves.' Priya sat back. She had grown thin. In Kartu she had been more robust, favored with extra food in her capacity as nursemaid to the house's favored daughter, Mai. But the long journey had whittled at her flesh to expose the ridges and hollows of bone.

'You must eat more, Priya,' said Mai, scooting forward to touch one of Priya's hands with her own. 'And rest. I could not bear to lose you.'

'I will recover, little flower. Do not fear for me. You are the one who must be careful to eat plenty, now that you are with child. Look. Here comes Miravia.'

The guesthouse attached to the Ri Amarah compound was

separated from the street by gates, and further separated from the main compound of the family by another set of gates.

Miravia entered, ran over, and kicked off her sandals before she dropped down beside Mai on a neighboring pillow. 'Sheyshi, what a lovely brushing you've done!' The young slave dipped her head shyly, smiling at this praise. 'Priya, you look tired. I will take Mai into the house for supper and afterward I will bring a tray of food for you and Sheyshi myself. That way you can rest.'

'Let me put your hair up, Mistress,' said Sheyshi.

Sheyshi braided Mai's thick black hair into the loose arrangement which she then twisted and bound up on Mai's head with combs and hair sticks, while Mai and Miravia discussed the shopping expedition and the scrolls.

'Don't mention that they are holy scrolls,' said Miravia, with a look of alarm as if she thought invisible spirits might be eavesdropping. 'They might make you get rid of them.'

'Even if we just keep them here in the guest house with our other belongings?'

'It would be better if you did not mention it. Might you teach me the reading of the script, Priya?'

'Certainly,' said Priya. 'Must you ask permission from your elders?'

'I won't, for they would forbid it.'

'Then not in this house. It would not be fair recompense for their hospitality.'

Miravia sighed, and made no reply. She took Mai's hand. 'Come, Mai.'

They slipped on sandals and walked to the inner gate. 'My mother is particularly keen to talk to you. She wants to know what you thought of our markets.'

'I don't think it's right you're not allowed out to shop! Yet you visit the prison!'

'To bring food to indigent prisoners. That they cannot forbid me to do because of our obligation to act for justice and mercy where we can. But only adult women are allowed to go out into the marketplace.'

'And even then, with a veil covering your face!'

'Mai, let it go, I beg you.'

They had reached the gate. Mai embraced her friend as they waited for the mechanism to be drawn back from the other side. 'I'll say nothing more. But I have my own plans. You'll see.'

After supper, Mai accompanied Miravia on her lamp-lighting rounds.

'Do you miss him?' Miravia asked as she stood on tiptoe, pressing a lit taper to a wick. With a hiss, flame brightened.

Mai closed and latched the glass door. 'Yes. But I don't like to think about him. What if he is killed? That would be too painful to bear, wouldn't it?'

'If you cared for someone, it would. Otherwise maybe it would be a relief, wouldn't it?'

Her voice had such a finely grained dark tone that Mai touched her hand, to let her know she was not alone. 'When my uncle Girish died, I think everyone wept only because they were ashamed that they were glad he was gone. But people will feel relief, if a death lightens their burden.'

Miravia wiped her cheek with the back of a hand, but she did not reply. She walked on to the next lamp in the vast rectangular courtyard of the women's side of the Ri Amarah compound. Older children not yet sent to bed played in the open space, shrieking and giggling as they dodged around benches and the twisting forms of pruned trees. A hearth glowed in the kitchens, and beside it a pair of old women prepared pots of steaming herbs. At a raised trough, chatting girls scoured dishes. Most of the married women had gone to the innermost apartments, leaving the supervision of the courtyard to the unmarried women and elderly widows.

'What if another's misfortune brings relief to you?' asked Miravia as she lit a lamp, keeping her face turned away from Mai. 'If something you never wanted is made impossible through no effort of yours, only through trouble afflicting others?'

'What happened?' asked Mai as she latched the tiny glass door. They stood in shadow far from the running children, the clatter and laughter in the kitchen, and the intermittent cries and complaints of younger children being coaxed to bed in the sleeping rooms. 'No one can hear us here. You know I'll keep secret any word you tell to me, Miravia.'

A bench stretched below the lamp, the polished wood gleaming

under the illumination. Miravia sank down, and Mai sat beside her, taking her friend's hands between her own.

'A courier came from Clan Hall to Argent Hall, a reeve bearing letters. One of the Ri Amarah houses in Toskala paid to have a message delivered to us. High Haldia is fallen-' Her voice broke on a caught breath.

'Yes, I heard that, too.'

'I spoke once to you of the young scholar it was arranged I would marry. I should have gone a year ago but the roads weren't safe. To High Haldia. Where their house is.'

'Oh, no,' murmured Mai.

'A few survived the assault, and fled to Toskala with their news. But he's dead. Mai, he's dead. And I'm relieved to know it. I never even met him. It's just I didn't want to marry someone I never met and never knew. But you did.'

'I always knew I would marry someone my father chose for me.'

'He didn't choose your husband.'

'No,' said Mai with a strangled laugh. 'He was very upset when Anji picked me. Father had no choice then. No more than I did. In Kartu, you could not say no to the Qin.'

The lamplight made Miravia's face ghostly and vulnerable. 'Where did you find the grace in your heart to accept it? And not fight it?'

'The only place to find happiness is inside. In the house I grew up in, the ones who fought to no purpose, who thrashed and flailed like Mei and Ti, they were the unhappiest ones. Even Uncle Hari didn't know how to be happy even though everyone loved him because he was so funny and charming. But a worm gnawed at him. He was dissatisfied. He never learned how to use his anger to build, only to tear down.'

'How did you learn?'

Mai shrugged, amused at herself and saddened by Miravia's distress. 'Maybe because I am like my father in wanting to control things. So if I can control myself, then no one can touch that part of me. That's my garden, where my spirit rests.'

'My spirit flies in the mountains and fields and forests,' said Miravia with a grimace, 'or it would, if I could ever go there. They'll just arrange another marriage for me.'

Mai felt her trembling. She kissed her lightly on the cheek. 'Maybe you'll be fortunate, as I was.'

'Maybe so,' she said without meaning it. 'But there was talk, before the scholar, of an old rich man who's already buried three wives, and needs a fresh young one. A lecherous goat!'

'Miravia!'

'It's true. You know how they talk around what they don't want said. Hearing nothing ill means there is nothing good. If a man is rich enough, he can buy what he wants. He has a daughter fit for Eliar, an excellent match for our family, but Eliar refused the match the first time it was offered two years ago because the agreement was for him to marry the daughter and I to marry to the old man. Eliar knew I would hate living trapped in Nessumara in a house said to be much stricter than our own. So he refused to make the bargain, knowing how I would hate it.'

'How can a house be stricter than this one, with a men's court and a women's court?'

'Most everyone here is related, so we have more freedom of movement between the two courts than may be obvious to you. In a very strict house, all movement is regulated, and women who have married in especially are confined to the women's court and to a private family chamber where their husband meets with them. It's like a prison.' The last lights in the weaving hall were extinguished, and the counting rooms went dark. 'Even here, it was more informal when Eliar and I were little. But in the last few years we've had marriages, apprentices, and fostered girls brought in to complicate matters. And we absorbed a smaller cousin house from Horn that was driven out.'

'Driven out?'

Miravia walked on to the next lamp, opened and lit it, and gravely regarded the light as it flared. 'In fire and blood. Many in the Hundred still consider us outlanders although my people have lived in this land for a hundred years. We are honest merchants. Sometimes there is resentment, because we look different and don't worship their gods. Because we are wealthy, I suppose. Anyway, our house is now large enough that it will branch soon, sons and cousins splitting off to make their own house. Not like that rich old

man in Nessumara, who clutches all the generations beholden to him in his fist.'

'Maybe he found another wife when he heard you were betrothed to the scholar.'

'Maybe he did.' Miravia rose, shaking out her loose trousers and the calf-length pleated jacket worn over all. 'Poor young scholar. I wonder how he died.'

'In fire and blood,' said Mai, remembering how the tents had burned outside Olossi, remembering the rising and falling whoops of men too weakened by burns for full-throated screams. She let her tears flow, knowing better than to suck them down. There was nothing shameful in sorrow.

'I've made you gloomy, too,' said Miravia, hugging her. 'How dare I! I'm sorry.'

'It would be worse not to think about it. But we lived and won, and they lost and died.'

'Thanks to Captain Anji and his company. And that reeve my friend Jonit cannot stop talking about.'

'Marshal Joss is charming and handsome, I'll have you know, although he is pretty old.'

Miravia laughed. In lamplight, the courtyard glowed. Mai brushed the last glistening tear from her friend's face. She wanted to assure Miravia that all would be well, but who could ever know? It was better to be honest, and remain silent.

Several women emerged from the weaving hall, walking the length of the porch around to the living quarters, where they disappeared inside. Girls carried heavy ceramic pots on trays across the courtyard and went in after them. Miravia tipped back her head and inhaled. 'Ah! Can you smell it? Warmed cordial.'

'It must be time for me to return to the guesthouse.'

'Yes, it is, just when families gather in the evenings to exchange their news of the day.' She snuffed out the taper. 'I'm sorry you always have to go back to the guesthouse alone.'

'Never apologize to me, Miravia. That you are here is what makes my days tolerable.'

'A sad tale, to be sure, if listening to me complain is the best part of your day!'

Companionably, they strolled across the courtyard on one of the

gravel paths, brushing against the waxy leaves and soft petals of night-blooming paradom. Fumes from the hearth fires and the lingering smells of clove-spiced meats and sharp khaif roiled out as they passed the kitchens.

'Miravia? Is that Mai, with you?' The mother of Eliar and Miravia crunched toward them down an intersecting path. 'Come with me, Mai, if you will. Miravia, please fetch warmed cordial and a pot of khaif and bring it to Grandfather's rooms.'

Miravia gave her mother a startled look, but she released Mai's hand and hurried off.

Puzzled, Mai asked, 'Isn't Grandfather dead?'

'So he is, but his rooms will go to Eliar when he marries.'

'That's a notable honor.'

'Eliar is Grandfather's eldest living male grandchild, although naturally my husband and his brothers hope for more sons. However, since Eliar has not yet married, the rooms remain unoccupied and therefore available.'

Available for what? Her worst fears intruded. Barely able to speak, she choked out words. 'Is there somewhat amiss?'

'Not at all. Your husband is back.'

'Anji?' The drowsy languor of falling night vanished as quickly as droplets of water steam off a hot brick.

'This way. Your hirelings have already been informed that you won't be returning to the guesthouse tonight.'

On the porch, Mai slipped off her sandals and found cloth slippers that fit well enough. Public rooms faced the courtyard. Beyond them lay a warren of inner chambers separated by papered walls, sliding screened doors, and corridors. Some rooms lay dark and quiet, or alive with the excited whispering of children who everyone pretends are asleep. Others rooms were lit. As Mai followed Miravia's mother, turning left and right and right again, she heard voices chatting in the companionable way of families catching up on their day.

They fetched up at a dead end, facing a pair of sliding doors. A narrow corridor extended to either side, ending in gates. The gate on the left had its top half slid open; beyond, lamps glimmered in the courtyard where she and Miravia had just walked. The gate to the right was latched shut, but evidently it opened into the men's court. Miravia's mother slid open one of the doors, and they

mounted six steps into a narrow chamber lit by a single oil lamp. Polished wood planks gleamed, smooth and dark. The whitewashed walls bore no decoration save for a ceiling strip minutely carved with vines.

'This way'

This narrow room opened into another. Nearby, male voices rose in argument. In an alcove, a set of peepholes looked out over a bright chamber where men were talking and, by the sudden outbreak of laughter, not arguing but conversing in the intense manner Mai had always associated with arguments. She stepped inside the alcove and raised up on her toes, hoping to see, but Miravia's mother pulled her back and led her on. They passed a second alcove fitted with a bench and a series of openings like arrow slits in a fortification, and at the end of this series of small rooms found themselves in the vestibule to a square chamber fitted with mats, a wide sleeping pallet, a low desk, and a lit lamp hanging from a tripod. The chamber had a musty smell, and the merest twinge of sweet mold festering.

The woman sniffed audibly. 'Eh, that mildew will have to be found and cleaned, wherever it's hiding. I'll be back in a moment. Remove your slippers before you go in.'

She left, her footfalls ringing away. Mai fidgeted. She wanted to go back to the peepholes, to see if she could see Anji, but she dared not insult her hosts by eavesdropping on a conversation she had no right to overhear. The vestibule contained an empty table and a stand with hooks opposite, suitable for hanging articles of clothing.

Muted sounds drifted: more male laughter, and a burst of speech as several men spoke at once. Laughter again, after which a voice spun its tale uninterrupted. Was that Anji speaking? She pressed a palm to her chest, breath tight and heart pounding.

The soft slap of feet startled her, and she patted the creases and folds and twists of her hair, wondering if she looked worn or weary, but it was only Miravia's mother, bearing a tray with a pot of steaming khaif, a pot of warmed cordial, a pitcher of water, four small cups, a washing bowl, and a tiny bowl containing mint leaves. She set this tray on the vestibule table, laid out squares of folded cloth, and pressed Mai's hand between her own in a gesture meant to comfort.

'There, now.'

She left.

Mai chewed on mint as the doors slid shut, and the quiet settled like dust, undisturbed but for the hearty festivities in the men's hall and, once or twice, a childish shout from farther afield. After a while, she crept back to the alcove, but even standing on tiptoe she could not see through the lowest slit. In the dim light she prowled the rooms until she found a pair of bricks, likely warmed in cool weather to place within the bed, and stacked them beneath the lowest peephole. She balanced carefully atop this, hands splayed against the wall to steady herself.

Ah! She peered into a high beamed hall. Mostly she saw the aura of light spilling from lit lamps, tangling with the darkness that pooled in the rafters. The mingled scents of burning oil and spiced cordial made her wrinkle her nose. The fierce conversation had died down. She saw a few turbaned heads, one crossing the hall and others lower, as if seated, swaying a little. Did that black hair belong to Anji? She pushed as high as she could, craning her neck-

''What are you doing?'

She shrieked, lost her balance, toppled back to be caught in strong arms.

'Anji!'

He was whole and unmarked, clean and smiling, perfectly handsome and entirely here, right here. She embraced him, pressing her face against his warm neck. He smelled of horses – he always did – and sweat and dust, the best scent imaginable. She knew she was crying, so she held on until she could draw up calmness and let it suffuse her. He talked in a voice as mellow as if their lives had not been turned entirely upside down, as if they had not been tossed into exile and then thrown into battle against an implacable enemy whose strength ought to have battered them into surrender but had not, because he was cleverer than they were. He was indomitable.

'My informants tell me that you are eating well, sleeping well, and have been out into the market despite their concern that I might find this behavior inappropriate in my wife. Which I do not. Our own endeavors have gone smoothly so far. The remnants of the invading army are fleeing north, but we're keeping on them, killing

as many as we can although unfortunately some will escape and take news of our victory to their commanders. We can't know how long it will take the retreating soldiers to reach their base, or how their commanders will react. All these matters must be discussed and considered. I left Tohon and Chief Deze and most of the men on the hunt, with orders to drop back if our force gets too strung out. Reeve Joss has been named marshal at Argent Hall, which is excellent news. Meanwhile the Olossi council wishes to meet with me tomorrow on military matters. Isar has his sources, so I get advance notice of their complaints and fears and demands. It seems they want me to coordinate the entire regional militia, since the militia they have now is worthless.'

She found her voice, still a little frail. She hadn't used to be so easily overset, but she remembered how the women in her father's house got irritable and weepy in early pregnancy. 'Our soldiers need wives.'

'Isn't it too early to be thinking of that?'

She could not hold him tightly enough. 'If we wish to settle here and be accepted, the men must marry local wives. And the women they marry should have connections with local clans.'

'Why would they not have such connections?'

'Many women will come who are destitute or without family, because their suspicion of outlanders will be overcome by their desperation. Such women will be grateful, and will work hard, but if there are too many kinless women, without clan support, then the rest of Olo'osson will not feel connected to us.' He seemed perfectly able to understand her despite that she was speaking into his neck. She could not bear to release him, as if he would vanish if she let go. But even so, she had been thinking about these things for days and days, having little else to do. 'We don't want to be seen as outlanders for generation after generation. We want to be seen as Hundred folk.'

'Mmmm,' he agreed, kissing her hair.

'Anyway, it will take months, perhaps years, to find fitting wives for all the men. Once children are born, then a transformation begins, the children become woven into the land, so it is less easy if the locals decide we have served our useful purpose.'

'What do you mean?'

'To start agitating for us to leave, to feel we are not a part of the land, that they can't eat with us, to fear us or want to drive us out…' She pushed back, so by looking into her face he could see how serious the matter was.

Unlike every male in her family, he nodded to show he had heard her, that he considered her opinion worthwhile. 'I do not think peace will come quickly, but you are of course correct in your assessment of the situation. You are in charge of the strongbox in any case. Do what you need to do, and I will do what I need to do.'

'I want a house, a compound, of our own. A place Miravia can come visit me. An altar to the Merciful One where Priya and I can pray. I want-'

'Mai,' he said softly. 'Can this wait?'

There is a moment in every one of the thrilling story-songs she had grown up with and loved when the bandit prince clasps the young maid close against him, and devours her with his brooding gaze because he, never caught by those who pursue him, has fallen captive to her innocent charm. How foolish and naive are those who believe in such tales, none of which are true. That's what everyone always told her.

'Anji,' she murmured, leaning forward to kiss him. 'I missed you so badly.'

He swept her up in his arms, carried her past the vestibule, and brought her to bed.