Light in the Darkness

by CJ Brightley

  “Derrim,” I said hesitantly.

  “Now, I know I’m not supposed to tell how you to wear them,” he went on, eagerly, “but those silver-and-yellow outer skirts you have would look fantastic with the crimson-and-gold bodice, and that would leave the only orange for the ellas flowers, which would show off how unusual they are —”

  Wait. Huh? He’s telling me what to wear?

  “Derrim,” I said more insistently.

  “But you don’t want to put them in your hair, like you usually do,” he went on. “Because they’ll show off much better if you put them on your shoulders. I figured out this great way to arrange them —”

  “Derrim!” I shouted.

  He stopped, and blinked. “What?”

  Oh, man. Now I had to say it. I swallowed a lump in my throat.

  “Derrim, I . . . I don’t want another bouquet.”

  He stared at me blankly.

  “I don’t . . . want to keep courting you,” I said slowly.

  He looked hurt, and confused. “What are you talking about?”

  I took a deep breath. I’d made a decision. And it was the right decision. So I had to follow through with it.

  “I’m sure you’re a really great guy, but I think we would be better as friends,” I said woodenly. Then I cringed. That sounded even worse than it had in my head.

  “What?” He looked baffled, then angry. “What are you talking about?”

  I didn’t know how to explain. I fumbled for the right words.

  “I don’t like how I act when I’m around you,” I said. “I don’t like the person you encourage me to be. I don’t think I would be happy living with you. I don’t think I would be happy having children with you. And I don’t think it’s a good idea to continue a relationship I can’t see leading to marriage. So . . .” I raised my hands. “I’m sorry.”

  Derrim’s eyes flashed hurt, then anger. His mouth opened, then shut. He glared at me for a moment, then spun on his heel and stormed out of the room.

  I clutched the edge of the table, feeling weak. I blinked back tears and stared at the tiny flowers painted across the wall. One . . . two . . . three . . . four . . . five . . . many . . .

  It was no good. There weren’t enough numbers in the world to take my mind off of anything. A tear dripped down my cheek and landed on the table. Furiously, I scrubbed my face and wiped it off with my sleeve.

  Then I looked up and saw someone watching me. I realized, to my horror, that he must have been in the room the whole time.

  “How much of that did you hear?” I cried.

  He scratched his head, looking sheepish. “Pretty much . . . all of it?”

  I ducked my head and groaned.

  “Well, courtship’s hard,” he said, shrugging. “Count yourself lucky. At least you don’t have a time limit.”

  I looked up, startled. I looked at him closely. “You’re the heir, aren’t you?”

  He nodded. “Genn.”

  “I’m Raneh.”

  We both bowed.

  “Wow,” I breathed. “I guess that puts things in perspective. You have to get married by the end of the season, don’t you?”

  Genn looked glum. “If I want to inherit the land, yeah.”

  “I take it you do?”

  “Well, I don’t want it to go to some stranger. My family lives here.”

  “Yeah . . .” The laws for landowners were strict, but there were still a few who treated their vassals badly, or who didn’t take care of them as much as they should.

  We stared at each other for a moment.

  “Raneh,” Genn said awkwardly, “would you be interested in me courting you?”

  7

  Like a fool, I just stood there numbly for a moment.

  “Ah — I’m sorry!” Genn cried, waving his hands in front of him. “You just got out of a relationship, and —”

  “Okay,” I said.

  He stopped. His hands sort of twirled uselessly. “What?”

  “Okay,” I said. “I mean . . . I’d be willing to try it. You seem nice.”

  “Oh. Good. Then. Ah.” Genn rubbed the back of his neck, looking more stressed out than ever. “Uh . . . what would you like to plan to do?”

  “I . . . don’t know what events are planned next,” I floundered. “I could check . . .”

  “Yeah. Do that,” he said, nodding quickly.

  “All right. I’ll be right back.” I started to back away, tripped over a table leg, and barely caught my balance against a wall. Embarrassed, I shoved my outer skirts back into place and ran out of the room.

  Message board, message board, I thought, racing down the stairs and to the entrance. Where did he put the message board?

  Try as I might, I couldn’t find anything near the entrance. All I saw were artist displays.

  “Hey,” I said desperately to a short man near me. “Where’s the message board?”

  “That way,” he said, pointing towards the kitchen.

  “Thanks,” I said in relief. Strange place to put it, I thought, hurrying past three girls squealing over the embroidery. I ducked under a dangling display of tassels somebody had thoughtlessly left over the doorway, and ducked into the taste room.

  There were still refreshments left, I noted in relief. In fact, it looked like Hurik had barely touched the savory treats. It was only the sweet things he’d been inhaling. Still, I was glad he was gone. He would have teased me mercilessly.

  Message board, message board . . . where’s the message board?! I thought, looking frantically along the walls.

  My eyes fell on an impromptu scattering of papers on one of the tables. I dove for it, relieved. It looked like somebody had started one here because our host had forgotten to hang one. Our host being Genn.

  He realllllly didn’t grow up among landowners, I thought, sighing.

  I sorted through the papers quickly. A dance for married people . . . two parties for young children . . . somebody’s oath ceremony . . . ah. There was one that would work. I tore a tiny corner from one of the scraps of paper and scribbled the information quickly. Then I ran upstairs to find Genn.

  I was almost afraid he’d be gone, but no, he was just standing there, nervously sniffing three perfumes vials at once. He jumped and dropped two as I ran through the door.

  “Here’s one,” I panted, wishing I hadn’t just run up the stairs. There were times when you wanted to look elegant and poised and not breathing heavily, and this was one of them. “It’s just a few days away.”

  “Good. Ah. Good.” Genn scrambled on the floor to try to pick up a perfume vial. It rolled and sloshed its liquid across the room. The overpowering scent of adlies stung at my eyes.

  “Do you need help?” I asked, trying to scrub at my eyelids without looking too obvious.

  “No, no! I’ve got it!” he cried. His elbow whacked another table, and three more vials fell to the ground and smashed.

  I choked at the stench.

  “Okay,” he said glumly. “Maybe I do.”

  “I’ll be in the hallway,” I gasped, backing out of the room. “You need to get your magician to decrease the smell.”

  “Uh huh,” Genn said gloomily, surveying the damage all around him.

  “Ew, what’s that smell?” a yellow-gowned woman cried, following a man out of the dance room. They nearly bumped into me as I backed into the hallway.

  “Told you someone would upset the vials before the night was over!” the man said triumphantly. “You owe me a kiss.”

  “Oh, fine,” she said huffily, and kissed him on the cheek as they headed down the stairs.

  Genn came out of the room, trailing strong odor and looking gloomy.

  “Don’t worry,” I said. “It could have been worse.”

  “Oh, yeah?” he asked, yanking off his soaked outer tunic. He threw it in the room and slammed the door, and the stench dissipated. “I’d like to know how.”

  “Well . . . it was kind of charming.”

  “Charm
ing?” he asked incredulously.

  “Well — at least it was sweet that you were nervous about waiting for me.”

  “Ugh,” he moaned, putting his head in his hands.

  “Here,” I said quickly, wanting to change the subject. I handed him the corner of paper I’d written on. “There’s an event next week. Those are the details.”

  He squinted at it, reading very slowly. His mouth moved as he reached the end.

  “A dance!” he yelped. “A dance? Did you just see me in there?”

  “I’m sure you’re not so clumsy when you’re not so nervous,” I said.

  “You can think that if you want,” he muttered.

  “Come on,” I said. “It’ll be fun.”

  “I’m really, really terrible at dancing,” he murmured, rubbing his forehead. “Believe me, you don’t want me dragging you down.”

  Well, that kind of annoyed me.

  “You have to learn sometime,” I said sternly. “Dances don’t just stop after you’re married, you know.”

  He looked up in horror. “They don’t?”

  I bit my lip to keep from laughing. Father would have made some sort of sarcastic comment at that. Dances were his favorite kind of social event. “Of course not,” I said. “They’re good exercise. How do you think we keep in shape during cold season? You ought to know. Vassals hold dances, too.”

  He rubbed the back of his neck. “I always sort of saw those as optional.”

  Oh, for crying out loud, I thought.

  “That’s it,” I said. “We’re going to the dance room.”

  “But —” he protested.

  “No buts!” I said. “We’re going to get you presentable right now!”

  Whether Genn was presentable after two hours, it would have been hard to say. He was probably slightly better, and certainly too exhausted to try any further. I was getting the impression he was not the most athletic of men.

  “Okay,” I panted, sitting down, rather exhausted myself from dodging his many foot stomps. “I think we’ve got most of the basics —”

  “Except the cross-step and the swing.”

  “— but we can probably do without those. I know which kinds of tunes tend to require them, so we’ll avoid those. We really only have to worry about two dances, so —”

  “Two?” He looked up, pushing sweaty hair out of his eyes. “Why only two?”

  “Because you’re not required to dance with anybody but your escort. And we’re not going to dance three.”

  “Why not?” he asked.

  “Because three means —”

  Three means you’re engaged. I halted, too embarrassed to explain it.

  “I know what it means,” he said softly.

  I swallowed. “I — I just met you today,” I stammered. “I’m not ready to make that sort of commitment. Not yet. I have to get to know you better first. You understand?”

  He hunched his shoulders. He folded his hands in his lap.

  “I . . . I do understand you have a time limit,” I said carefully. “I’m not asking for a lot of time. Just — a little. Some time. Okay?”

  He nodded, rubbing his ear awkwardly.

  Okay, I thought. I stood up. “Then I’ll see you at the dance in three days. Would you like to meet there, or go together?”

  “I don’t have a working carriage,” he murmured. “Leola didn’t fix hers when it broke during cold season.”

  “I’ll pick you up, then,” I said.

  The rest of my family had left already, so I had to walk home.

  When I got home, Yaika was dyeing something in her garden. I could see her all the way down the road, wearing her oldest and most soiled clothing, carefully folding whitish cloth into the barrel she kept in her garden.

  “Oh, hi, Raneh!” she called as I neared the house, waving. “Do you want to see this amazing thing I just discovered?”

  I caught a whiff of the dye on the breeze, and gagged. “What is that?”

  “Leftover stinksap from the batch Lala and I made!” she squealed. “It turns things bright green!”

  “First stinkberries, now stinksap?” I yelped. “What is it with you and smelly plants? If you start gathering stinkburrs next —”

  Yaika started laughing. “Don’t be silly, Raneh!” she cried. “Those make an ugly, muddy yellow. Come on! Come see this amazing green!”

  I caught another whiff of her stinksap on the breeze, and plugged my nose. “No thanks!” I called. “I’m going inside now!”

  Yaika stuck her tongue out at me. “Wimp!” she said cheerfully.

  “In possession of a sense of smell!” I called back.

  I got to the house, still plugging my nose, and found Mother and Grandmother arguing over something in the kitchen.

  Mother whipped her head around when I came in. “Shut the door!” she cried.

  I slammed the front door shut. “Believe me,” I said through my plugged nose, “I smelled it.”

  “We’ve been getting complaints ever since we got back,” Mother groaned. “Apparently the wind picked up immediately after we left, and most of our vassals’ homes were downwind.”

  “Couldn’t Lala have diminished the smell?” Grandmother asked, looking aggrieved. “I can’t cook under these conditions.”

  Mother shook her head. “Not without using up all her magic. And she needed that to enhance the sap’s efficiency.”

  “Does she have any left?” I asked. “She could decrease the smell of Yaika’s dye now.”

  Mother and Grandmother exchanged looks.

  “I’ll go get her,” Mother said, spinning out of the room.

  A moment later, we heard Lala protesting. Then she stormed out of her room and slammed the front door on her way outside. When the door opened again a moment later, only the faintest stench seeped in.

  “Much better,” Mother sighed, breathing deeply.

  “I hope you realize I won’t have any left tomorrow,” Lala said huffily. “I was going to use it to enhance my new dress.”

  “Maybe if you hadn’t used it to decrease your sense of smell this morning . . .” Mother said unsympathetically.

  “Ha!” Lala cried. “I’d like you see you stir stinksap with your sense of smell intact!”

  “Fortunately,” Mother said dryly, “I don’t have to. That’s the responsibility of a house magician. Which you knew when you begged for the position.”

  “Huh!” Lala cried. She spun on her heel and stormed back to her room.

  Catching my chance to escape, I snuck towards the stairs.

  “Oh, no, you don’t!” Grandmother called from the kitchen. “What’s up with you and that young man, Raneh? I noticed you spending lots of time with our host.” She wiggled her eyebrows suggestively. “In fact, when I last checked before we left, the two of you were dancing together. Hmmmmmm?”

  “I . . . I . . .” Drat. There was no escaping her nosy inquisitiveness. “We’re just going to a dance together in a few days,” I muttered. “I had to teach him a few basic steps.”

  “Yes!” Grandmother crowed. “He seems a nice boy!”

  “So near our land, too,” Mother said, looking pleased.

  “What kind of signature do you think those two would make?” Grandmother asked eagerly. “I’m thinking tonna berry husks from ours, plus some of those lovely white ellases Leola had in hers, and —”

  “Hey — hey — hey!” I cried. “Stop that! We haven’t even talked about it yet!”

  “Talked about what?” Grandmother asked slyly.

  “Getting engaged! He only asked if he could court me!”

  Grandmother grinned widely. She elbowed Mother, who looked back at her and nodded, smiling.

  Argh! I raced up the stairs to go hide in my room before they could embarrass me with further questions.

  “Do you know how many children he wants yet?” Grandmother called after me.

  8

  Genn had not, as it happened, improved in our practice together. I yelped
as he stepped on my foot again.

  “Genn,” I whispered in an undertone, grating my teeth, “do try to be a bit more careful, would you?”

  “Sorry, sorry,” he whispered, looking flustered. Stomp!

  I gritted my teeth and tried to bear it. Apparently when Genn got nervous, he forgot everything he’d ever learned about coordination. Just finish the dance, I told myself. Finish the dance . . .

  I looked over Genn’s shoulder and saw a woman in a fluffy white dress glaring at him, her lips puckered in distaste. She’s about to ding his status! I realized, a little panicked. If Genn lost a lot of status tonight, there was no way I’d be able to convince him to get on a dance floor again. And I was not going to spend the rest of my life as a semi-hermit, avoiding any event that included dancing.

  So I pasted a bucolic smile on my face and plonked my head on Genn’s shoulder, trying to look deeply in love. Fortunately, she fell for it, and moved on. I breathed a sigh of relief.

  “Um,” Genn said, looking down at his shoulder.

  Ack! I yanked my head back. “Sorry! I just — had to make it look like — um — I didn’t mind you stepping on me —”

  ”You did that for appearances?” he said, looking leery.

  I gulped. He looked the way I’d felt when Derrim kissed me. “Maybe . . .” I muttered.

  He looked away. Now I wanted to change the subject desperately.

  “So how did you become the heir?” I asked hopefully.

  “Huh?” He looked distracted. “Oh. Um. I often visited the house. Leola rarely left it, so I sort of became her unofficial go-between. She trusted me with status to go buy stuff at the markets, or to decide what was being planted where which season. In the end, I guess she decided I was practically an heir already, since she was treating me that way. So she decided to make it official.” He looked gloomy.

  “Didn’t you want to?” I asked. I couldn’t think of a reason somebody would do all that without wanting to.

  Genn looked uncomfortable. “I was just doing what needed doing. You know?”

  “It must have at least crossed your mind at some point.”

  Genn shook his head vigorously. “No! I had no idea! She just sprang it on me one day!”