Alessan said, ‘You see, the newest problem is that although we could still travel as musicians, after this morning’s performance we’d be notorious wherever we went. Had I thought about it in time I’d have botched the music a little, or told Devin to be a little less impressive.’
‘No you wouldn’t have,’ Devin said quietly. ‘Whatever other things you would have done, ruining the music isn’t one of them.’
Alessan’s mouth quirked as he acknowledged the hit. Rovigo smiled.
‘Perhaps so,’ the Prince murmured. ‘It was special, wasn’t it?’ There was a brief silence. Rovigo got up and put one more log on the fire.
Alessan said, ‘It all makes sense. There are certain places and certain activities that would be awkward for us as performers. Especially well-known performers. As merchants, we would have a new access to such places.’
‘Certain islands, perhaps?’ Rovigo asked quietly, from by the fire.
‘Perhaps,’ Alessan agreed. ‘If it comes to that. Though there it may be a matter of five of one hand, five of the other: artists are welcome at Brandin’s court on Chiara. This gives us another option, though, and I like having options to work with. It has been necessary once or twice for a character I’ve assumed to disappear, or die.’ His voice was quiet, matter-of-fact. He took a sip of his wine.
After a moment he turned back to Rovigo. Who was now stroking his chin in a fine imitation of a shrewdly avaricious businessman.
‘Well,’ the merchant said in a greedy, wheedling voice, ‘you appear to have made a most … intriguing proposal, gentlemen. I do have to ask one or two preliminary questions. I’ve known Alessan for some time, but this particular issue has never come up before, you understand.’ His eyes narrowed with exaggerated cunning. ‘What, if anything, do you know about business?’
Alessan gave a sudden burst of laughter, then quickly grew serious again. ‘Have you any money to hand?’ he asked.
‘I’ve my ship just in,’ Rovigo replied. ‘Cash from two days’ transactions and easy credit based on profits over the next few weeks. Why?’
‘I would suggest buying a reasonable but not indiscreet amount of grain in the next forty-eight hours. Twenty-four hours, actually, if you can.’
Rovigo looked thoughtful. ‘I could do that,’ he said. ‘And my means are sufficiently limited that no purchase I made would be large enough to be indiscreet. I have a contact, too—the steward at the Nievolene farms by the Ferraut border.’
‘Not from Nievole,’ Alessan said quickly.
Another silence. Rovigo nodded his head slowly. ‘I see,’ he said, startling Devin again with his quickness. ‘You think we can expect some confiscations after the Festival?’
‘You can,’ Alessan said. ‘Among all the other even less pleasant things. Have you another source for buying up grain?’
‘I might.’ Rovigo looked from Alessan to Devin and back again. ‘Four partners, then,’ he said crisply. ‘The three of you and Baerd. Is that right?’
Alessan nodded. ‘Almost right, but make it five partners. There is one other person who should be brought in to divide our share, if that is all right with you?’
‘Why should it not be?’ Rovigo shrugged. ‘That doesn’t touch my share at all. Will I meet this person?’
‘I hope so, sooner or later,’ said Alessan. ‘I expect you will be happy with each other.’
‘Fine,’ Rovigo said crisply. ‘The usual terms for a contraina association are two-thirds to the one investing the funds, and one-third to the ones who do the travelling and put in the time. Based on what you have just told me I will accept that you are likely to be able to offer information which will be of real value to our venture. I propose a half interest each way on all affairs we jointly conduct. Is that acceptable?’
He was looking at Devin. With as much composure as he could manage, Devin replied, ‘It is quite acceptable.’
‘It is more than fair,’ Alessan agreed. His expression was troubled again; he looked as if he would go on.
‘It is done, then,’ said Rovigo quickly. ‘No more to be said, Alessan. We will go into town tomorrow to have the contraina formally drawn up and sealed. Which way do you plan to go after the Festival?’
‘Ferraut, I think,’ said Alessan slowly. ‘We can discuss what comes after, but I have something to do there, and an idea for some trade with Senzio we might want to consider.’
‘Ferraut?’ said Rovigo, ignoring the latter remarks. A smile slowly widened across his face. ‘Ferraut! That is splendid. Absolutely splendid! You can save us some money already. I’ll give you a cart and all of you can take Ingonida her new bed!’
On the way upstairs Alais couldn’t remember when she had last been so happy. Not that she was prone to moodiness like Selvena, but life at home tended to be very quiet, especially when her father was away.
And now so many things seemed to be happening at once.
Rovigo was home after a longer trip than usual down the coast. AIix and Alais were never at ease when he ventured south of the mountains into Quileia, no matter how many times he reassured them of his caution. And on top of that, this trip had come unsettlingly late in the season of autumn winds. But he was home now, and palm to palm with his return had come the Festival of Vines. It was her second one, and Alais had loved every moment of the day and night, absorbing with her wide, alert eyes all she saw. Drinking it in.
In the crowded square in front of the Sandreni Palace that morning she had stood extremely still, listening to a clear voice soar from the inner courtyard out among the unnatural silence of the people gathered. A voice that lamented Adaon’s death among the cedars of Tregea so bitterly, so sweetly, that Alais had been afraid she would cry. She had closed her eyes.
It had been a source of astonished pride for her when Rovigo had casually mentioned to her and her mother having had a drink the day before with one of the singers who were doing the Duke’s mourning rites. He had even invited the young man, he said, to come meet his four ungainly offspring. The teasing bothered Alais not at all. She would have felt that something was wrong by now had Rovigo spoken about them in any other way. Neither she nor her sisters nursed any anxieties about their father’s affection. They had only to look at his eyes.
On the road home late at night, already badly unsettled by the thundering clatter of the Barbadian soldiers they had made way for at the city walls, she had been truly frightened when a voice called out to them from the darkness near their gate.
Then, when her father had replied, and she came gradually to understand who this was, Alais had thought her heart would stop from sheer excitement. She could feel the tell-tale colour rising in her cheeks.
When it became clear that the musicians were coming inside, it had taken a supreme act of self-control for her to regain the mien and composure proper to her parents’ oldest, most trusted child.
In the house it became easier because the instant the two male guests stepped through the doorway Selvena had gone into her predictable mating frenzy. A course of behaviour so embarrassingly transparent to her older sister that it drove Alais straight back into her own habitual, detached watchfulness. Selvena had been crying herself to sleep for much of the year because it looked more and more as if she would still be unmarried when her eighteenth naming day came in the spring.
Devin, the singer, was smaller and younger-looking than she’d expected. But he was neat and lithe, with an easy smile and quick, intelligent eyes under sandy-brown hair that curled halfway over his ears. She’d expected him to be arrogant or pretentious, despite what her father had said, but she saw nothing of that at all.
The other man, Alessan, looked about fifteen years older, perhaps more. His black, tangled hair was prematurely greying—silvering, actually—at the temples. He had a lean, expressive face with very clear grey eyes and a wide mouth. He intimidated her a little, even though he was joking easily with her father right from the start, in exactly the manner she knew Rovigo most enjoyed.
Which made her even more curious about the woman. Alais thought Catriana was terribly beautiful. With her commanding height and the startlingly blue eyes under the blaze of her hair—like a second fire in the room—she made Alais feel small and pale and bland. In a curious way that combined with Selvena’s outrageous flirtation to relax rather than unsettle her: this sort of activity, competition, exercise, was simply not something with which she was going to get involved. Watching closely, she saw Catriana register Selvena’s soft flouncing at Devin’s feet and she intercepted the sardonic glance the red-haired singer directed at her fellow musician.
Alais decided to go into the kitchen. Her mother and Menka might need help. Alix gave her a quick, thoughtful glance when she came in, but did not comment.
They quickly put a meal together. Back in the front room Alais helped at the sideboard and then listened and watched from her favourite chair next to the fire. Later she had genuine cause to bless Selvena’s shamelessness. None of the rest of them would have dreamt of asking their guests to sing.
This time she could see the singers so she kept her eyes open. Devin sang directly to her once near the end and Alais, her colour furiously rising, forced herself not to look away. For the rest of that last song about Eanna naming the stars she found her mind straying into channels unusual for her—the sort of thing Selvena speculated about at night all the time, in detail. Alais hoped they would all attribute her colour to the warmth of the fire.
She did wonder about one thing though, having been an observer of people for most of her life. There was something between Devin and Catriana, but it certainly wasn’t love, or even tenderness as she understood either of those things. They would look at each other from time to time, usually when the other was unaware, and the glances would be more challenging than anything else. She reminded herself again that the world of these people was farther removed from her own than she could even imagine.
The younger ones said their good-nights. Selvena doing so with a highly suspicious lack of protest, and touching, shockingly, fingertip to palm with both men in farewell. Alais caught a glance from her father, and a moment later she rose when her mother did.
It was impulse, nothing more, that led her to invite Catriana to come up with her. Immediately the words were spoken, she realized how they must sound to the other woman—someone so independent and obviously at ease in the company of men. Alais flinched inwardly at her own provincial clumsiness, and braced herself for a rebuff. Catriana’s smile, though, was all graciousness as she stood.
‘It will remind me of home,’ she said.
Thinking about that as the two of them went up the stairs past the lamps in their brackets and the wall-hangings her grandfather had brought back south from a voyage to Khardhun years and years ago, Alais tried to fathom what would lead a girl her own age to venture out among the rough and tumble of long roads and uncertain lodging. Of late nights and men who would surely assume that if she was among them she had to be available. Alais tried, but she honestly couldn’t grasp it. Despite that, or perhaps because of it, something generous in her spirit opened out towards the other woman.
‘Thank you for the music,’ she said shyly.
‘Small return for your kindness,’ Catriana said lightly.
‘Not as small as you think,’ Alais said. ‘Our room is over here. I’m glad this reminds you of home … I hope it is a good memory.’ That was probing a little, but not rudely, she hoped. She wanted to talk to this woman, to be friends, to learn what she could about a life so remote from her own.
They stepped into the large bedroom. Menka had the fire going already and the two bedspreads turned back. The deep-piled quilts were new this autumn, more contraband brought back by Rovigo from Quileia where winters were so much harsher than here.
Catriana laughed a little under her breath, her eyebrows arching as she surveyed the chamber. ‘Sharing a room does. This is rather more than I knew in a fisherman’s cottage.’ Alais flushed, fearful of having offended, but before she could speak Catriana turned to her, eyes still very wide, and said casually, ‘Tell me, will we need to tie your sister down? She seems to be in heat and I’m worried about the two men surviving the night.’
Alais went from feeling spoiled and insensitive to red-faced shock in one second. Then she saw the quick smile on the other woman’s face and she laughed aloud in a release of anxiety and guilt.
‘She’s just terrible, isn’t she? She’s vowed to kill herself in some dreadfully dramatic way if she isn’t married by the Festival next year.’
Catriana shook her head. ‘I knew some girls like her at home. I’ve met a few on the road, too. I’ve never been able to understand it.’
‘Nor I,’ said Alais a little too quickly. Catriana glanced at her. Alais ventured a hesitant smile. ‘I guess that’s a thing we have in common?’
‘One thing,’ the other woman said indifferently, turning away. She strolled over to one of the woven pieces on the wall. ‘This is nice enough,’ she said, fingering it. ‘Where did your father find it?’
‘I made it,’ Alais said shortly. She felt patronized suddenly, and it irritated her.
It must have shown in her voice, for Catriana looked quickly back over her shoulder. The two women exchanged a look in silence. Catriana sighed. ‘I’m hard to make friends with,’ she said at length. ‘I doubt it’s worth your effort.’
‘No effort,’ said Alais quietly. ‘Besides,’ she ventured, ‘I may need your help tying Selvena down later.’
Surprised, Catriana chuckled. ‘She’ll be all right,’ she said, sitting on one of the beds. ‘Neither of them will touch her while they are guests in your father’s house. Even if she slithers into their room wearing nothing but a single red glove.’
Shocked for the second time, but finding the sensation oddly enjoyable, Alais giggled and sat down on her own bed, dangling her legs over the side. Catriana’s feet, she noticed ruefully, easily reached the carpet.
‘She just might do that,’ she whispered, grinning at the image. ‘I think she even has a red glove hidden somewhere!’
Catriana shook her head. ‘Then it’s roping her down like a heifer or trusting the men, I guess. But as I say, they won’t do anything.’
‘You know them very well, I suppose,’ Alais hazarded. She still wasn’t sure whether any given remark would earn her a rebuff or elicit a smile. This was not, she was discovering, an easy woman to deal with.
‘Alessan, I know better,’ Catriana said. ‘But Devin’s been on the road a long time and I have no doubt he knows the rules.’ She glanced away briefly as she said that last, her own colour a little high.
Still wary of another rejection Alais said cautiously, ‘I have no idea about that, actually. Are there rules? Do any of them … do you have problems when you travel?’
Catriana shrugged. ‘The kind of problems your sister’s longing to find? Not from the musicians. There’s an unwritten code, or else the companies would only get a certain kind of woman to tour and that would hurt the music. And the music really does matter to most of the troupes. The ones that last, anyway. Men can be quite badly hurt for bothering a girl too much. Certainly they’ll never find work if it happens too often.’
‘I see,’ said Alais, trying to imagine it.
“You are expected to pair off with someone though,’ Catriana added. ‘As if it’s the least you can do. Remove yourself as a temptation. So you find a man you like, or some of the girls find a woman, of course. There’s a fair bit of that, too.’
‘Oh,’ said Alais, clasping her hands in her lap.
; Catriana, who was really much too clever by half, flashed a glance of mingled amusement and malice. ‘Don’t worry,’ she said sweetly, looking pointedly at where Alais’s hands had settled like a barrier. ‘That glove doesn’t fit me.’
Abruptly Alais put her hands to either side of her, blushing furiously.
‘I wasn’t particularly worried,’ she said, trying to sound casual. Then, goaded by the other’s mocking expression, she shot back: ‘What glove does fit you, then?’
The other woman’s amusement quickly disappeared. There was a small silence. Then: ‘You do have some spirit in you, after all,’ Catriana said judiciously. ‘I wasn’t sure.’
‘That,’ said Alais, moved to a rare anger, ‘is patronizing. How would you be sure of anything about me? And why would I let you see it?’
Again there was a silence, and again Catriana surprised her. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘Truly. I’m really not very good at this. I warned you.’ She looked away. ‘As it happens, you hit a nerve and I tend to lash out when that occurs.’
Alais’s anger, as quick to recede as it was slow to kindle, was gone even as the other woman spoke. This was, she reminded herself sternly, a guest in her house.
She had no immediate chance to reply though, or to try to mend the rift, because just then Menka bustled importantly into the room with a basin of water heated over the kitchen fire, followed by the youngest of Rovigo’s apprentices with a second basin and towels draped over both his shoulders. The boy’s eyes were desperately cast downwards in a room containing two women as he carried the basin and the towels carefully over to the table by the window.
The garrulous fuss Menka inevitably stirred up wherever she went broke the mood entirely—both the good and the bad parts of it, Alais thought. After the two servants left, the women washed up in silence. Alais, stealing a glance at the other’s long-limbed body, felt even more inadequate in her own small, white softness and the sheltered life she’d lived. She climbed into bed, feeling as if she’d like to begin the whole conversation over again.
Tigana Page 16