by Kate Elliott
“M. Unbutu, how did he do that? What was he doing?”
“If we’re going to try that again, you’d better just call me David. The formal style takes too damned long.”
“We’re going to do that again?” She hesitated, tried out the word “David” on her tongue, and decided just to not call him anything unless she absolutely had to.
“You don’t want to?” He laughed under his breath, and she realized with a shock that he was exhilarated.
And that she was, too. If Valentin could do that, could she? Could she pour light through her and create a world? “Well. Yes. I’d like to see that model of the palace.”
“I’d like to see if we can use it to get through to the real palace, even in nesh form.”
At that moment, Ilyana knew that she was part of the conspiracy. She felt suddenly very…adult. “Yes,” she said fiercely. “Oh gods. We’d better get Valentin back to my mother’s tent.”
Anatoly watched from the shadows as Ilyana and David supported Valentin between them and helped him off toward Karolla Arkhanov’s tent. When the courtyard was empty, he emerged from behind a column and examined the gazebo and the latticework wall. It hummed in the way the great wall that anchored the dome hummed, but although he had seen the way their hands clutched it, he was not so foolhardy as to make such an expedition alone.
In the morning, he woke to exclamations coming from outside. Portia and Diana were already gone. He dressed quickly and ran outside to find the Company gathered along the east wall of the caravansary, facing the gardens. Yesterday a bank of green shrubs had grown here. Today they had all come into bloom at once, white flowers with a scattering of crimson blossoms at their center, forming a shape that Anatoly vaguely recognized as glyph, something Chapalii, he thought, but he found it difficult to remember visual markers of language.
“What kind of flowers are those?” he asked, coming up alongside Hyacinth, who looked flushed.
“Flower night,” said Hyacinth. “That’s how Roki translates the glyph. It’s a summons.”
“A summons?”
Already Yomi was calling out orders. Several of the younger actors were shaking out skirts and gowns, hanging them out in the open air on a line set up by some of the techs.
“To perform.” Hyacinth paused, slapping his fingers on his cheeks, eyes wide. “Tonight!” He laughed. “The bastard made us wait so long to even get here at all, made us wait weeks here, you’d think he’d give us more notice. Not even a tech rehearsal. We don’t even know what kind of space we’ll be performing in.”
“He is zayinu.”
Hyacinth lowered his hands, glanced at Anatoly, and grinned. Anatoly grinned back, realized what he had done, muttered an excuse, and went to find Diana.
“I don’t have time for you right now,” Diana said, catching sight of him before he’d even said a word to her. She was helping shake out costumes. “Yana already took Portia. Maybe Yomi has something for you to do.”
But he was superfluous. The repertory company was like a well-honed jahar, adept at working together. His presence would only throw off their drill. Even David, by virtue of his relationship to Charles, fit in with them. Anatoly did not. And while it was always appropriate for a man to take care of young children, it certainly would be unseemly for him to do so in the company of an unmarried young woman to whom he was not related.
So he went out to the horses and rode the mare he now thought of as his. A summons meant, of course, that the zayinu duke Naroshi commanded the Company to come to him. How would he bring them there? Where was he? Anatoly rode at once to the great slab of ebony stone embedded in the rose wall. Was this the doorway through which they would pass? Through the rose wall he saw the blurred lines of the other world, drowned in rain.
He dismounted and went to lean against the rose wall where its color changed from rose to ebony, an abrupt break, like a seam. Through the wall he could make out…towers, a host of spears thrusting up into the sky. He had seen a gathering of towers from the platform hovering high above the palace, when they had first come here. The foundation of those towers had been lost beneath the confluence of two rivers, and yet in the map in the courtyard of the caravansary, there was a similar nest of towers which rose from a spit of land bounded by rivers: Was it possible that some catastrophic flood had risen and covered them? But that meant, then, that the map in the courtyard might not be accurate.
Only the khaja put their faith in maps. The land changed over time, over the seasons, and over the lifetime of a man. Anatoly knew better than to trust anything he had not seen with his own eyes or heard from the wisest elders, and even then, nothing truly remained constant except the plains themselves.
And he thought bitterly of Diana.
The humming pitch of the stone changed. He ran to stop his mare from bolting. A shudder shook through the ground, running up through his boots, up through his whole body, like the charge of the air in a lightning storm out on the flat plain.
The gate opened, just opened, dissipating into the rose wall, leaving a gap the width of eight horses riding abreast through to the other side. Hot, humid air spilled out, spattering him with warm rain and the sheer weight of heat and dampness. In the world beyond it rained in dense sheets, pounding rain, like the thunder of hooves of an army charging into battle.
He got on the mare and rode for the opening. He did not get there in time.
A great vehicle appeared, a barge, filling the opening. The mare shied and reared. As he fought to hold her, the barge moved through, floating above the grass, and the opening sealed shut behind it. Water poured off its sides, sprinkling the grass, and then it was dry, gleaming, a boat flat on both the bottom and the top, with a silver railing wreathed in white and red flowers. It was empty. It sailed off over the grass, leaving a wave of wind in its wake. Anatoly could do nothing but follow its trail back to the caravansary.
By the time he got there, the company was fitted up and mostly onboard. Most of the actors were chattering with excitement, voices loud, faces flushed. He left the mare waiting and ran to find Diana.
She sat on the prow, a calm eddy in the midst of the wild stream of movement around her, her skirts arrayed around her and her expression distant, contemplating not the far line of wall but something else, something unseeable, unknowable. Then she caught sight of him.
“Thank goodness, Anatoly, I was wondering where you were.” Gods, it hurt, the leap of hope in his heart any time she gave the slightest smile to him. He walked over to her, careful not to let the hope show on his face. “Portia is staying with the other children, and I wanted you to know where she was in case she needs anything. They don’t want anyone except the Company to come this time, because it’s the first time. They’re being extremely careful about protocol.”
“I thought I might come with you.”
“You can’t.”
She sat above him on the boat, not looking particularly sorry about it. She was so beautiful, in her khaja gown given life by her presence in it. “What play are you doing?” he asked dutifully.
She pulled a face. “The Tempest. You know, the one about the magician Prospero and the island he rules through his magic, and how his enemies are shipwrecked on that island and he rights old wrongs done to him. Charles Soerensen told Owen and Ginny to play it for our first performance. I suppose…” she canted her voice lower and leaned down toward him. He had not truly grown used to the immodest clothing khaja wore: Her gown was cut so low that he could see the swell of her breasts. “…it’s meant to be subversive.”
Caught by a sudden overwhelming impulse, he stood on tiptoe, steadied himself with one hand on the side of the barge and with the other hand stilled her chin, and kissed her on the lips.
“Anatoly! You’ll ruin my makeup.” But she laughed. “If only you were playing Ferdinand instead of Vasil. He’s too old for the part, but he’s so damned pretty. He would have done better as Ariel—that’s the spirit who is servant to Prospero—but he ju
st couldn’t do it.”
“Why do you wish I was playing Ferdinand?” Anatoly asked suspiciously.
She gave him her most brilliant smile, and moved slightly to make room for Vasil Veselov, who appeared at just that moment to strike a pose, standing, at the railing. “Because I’m playing Miranda, Prosper’s daughter, you idiot, and she and Ferdinand fall in love with one another.”
“Sakhalin,” said Vasil, acknowledging him, and went back to his pose, adjusting his sleeves to drape over the railing.
“Veselov, surely you will bring back a report to me,” said Anatoly, “of what you see.”
Vasil glanced at him. “I’m not in the army anymore.”
Anatoly grunted under his breath and then, to his surprise, Diana got to her knees and leaned down toward him, ducking under the railing. He lifted his arms and caught her and swung her down from the deck into his arms. She was giggling.
“I’m not going to sit next to him,” she whispered, leading Anatoly away to the back of the barge. “He hogs every scene he’s in, and especially entrances.” Pulling him against her, she pressed her lips against an ear. “Don’t talk about reports and scouting,” she breathed, so close against him that he almost forgot to listen to her words, “not to Vasil. He isn’t part of it.”
“Diana,” he murmured.
She broke away from him. “You will remember that, won’t you?”
“I am not a fool, Diana! But Veselov was in Bakhtiian’s army once. Surely he still feels loyalty to his people—”
“Vasil feels loyalty to no one but himself. Don’t be naive. Himself and perhaps, just perhaps, the memory of what he once shared with Bakhtiian. Oh, stop getting that stubborn look on your face. I don’t care whether you believe it or not, or if it offends your prim sense of virtue, it is true. I get so tired of your oppressive moral code. Give it up, Anatoly. Haven’t you learned anything?”
“I will thank you not to insult my—”
“Oh, you’re impossible to talk to.” She turned and walked over to the barge, leaving him.
As usual, Hyacinth had listened in. He was crouched about twelve paces away worrying at his shoes—if one could call those lavender cloth wrappings on his feet shoes. His clothes were absolutely obscene. He stood up, revealing bare chest and wings made of a glittering fabric like gems spun into silk.
“May I give you a piece of advice?” Hyacinth asked.
“No!” growled Anatoly, and stalked off.
He unsaddled the mare, brushed her down, and let her go back to the herd. She was reluctant to leave him at first; she liked him—which was more than he could say for anyone else—but finally she kicked out her heels and ran off. Anatoly watched the barge go from a distance, garlanded railings and the splash of colors that was the Company in their costumes, the bleaker black figures of the techs in the center with their boxes and props.
Leaving the caravansary almost empty. He heard the children’s laughter as they ran after the barge, waving and calling and halting finally to watch it shrink as it sailed away over the grass. Soon it would pass beyond into the other world, a world he might never be permitted to visit.
But, gods, he was determined to get there somehow. He wandered into the courtyard. Dust motes drifted down in shafts of light, playing over the surface of the mosaic map in the center of the gazebo. Anatoly stopped in front of the latticework. Perhaps he could go there with the boy. With Valentin’s knowledge of that way of traveling, and with Anatoly’s knowledge of intelligence and scouting, they could pierce the wall, they could discover the secrets of the palace.
He heard a footfall and turned, caught a glimpse of a skirt, then nothing. It was silent in the caravansary, empty of life. Everyone, even David, even the khepelli steward, had gone, leaving only Karolla and her khaja servant and the children. And him. The afternoon light mellowed, ripening toward evening.
At last he sighed and went back to Diana’s chamber, pushing aside the curtain to go in. Stopped dead in his tracks.
Color flared in the dim room. Lying next to his saddle rested a bouquet of freshly picked flowers. Flower night. His heart racing, he bent down to pick them up. Their smell was heady and intoxicating. He stood there for a long time, until shadows filled the room. Finally he stirred, putting on his other, fresher shirt, wiping the dust off his boots, running his finger through his hair. Then, clutching the flowers in his right hand, he went in search of Ilyana Arkhanov.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
The Surface World
KAROLLA SAT THE CHILDREN under the awning after they had eaten dinner and set each of them a task: Valentin to polishing the worn leather of a bridle, Anton to embroidery on a square of cloth, and Evdokia and Portia to try their hand at spinning. Nipper tied off the ends of a fringe rug, and Karolla took the baby from Ilyana and settled down to nurse her.
“Go on,” she said in that tone that Ilyana knew meant she wanted no arguments. “Go out. You have little enough time to be on your own.”
Ilyana hesitated, but she wanted to get away from them. She walked away down the road that led to the ruined caravansary. The wind curled in her hair, and she hummed to herself, happy to be alone. Three moons chased each other across the sky, and the barest curve of ring rimmed the western horizon, the great planet hunkering down to its nightly rest. It was warm. She smelled the exuberant scent of night-blooming flowers, their perfume coating the air.
The ruins threw intriguing shadows over the ground. She wandered through them, tracing a ridge here, a ledge there, finding a single white blossom framed by a ring of stone worn down until it lay even with the earth. She bent to explore it with her fingers, the rugged stone, the loamy dirt, the supple petals of the flower, gray-white as if they had been formed from the palest of ash.
And she heard her name, soft, on the breeze. “Yana. Ilyana.”
She did not recognize the voice at first. She stood up and saw him, walking toward her through the quiet ruins. In his right hand he held a bouquet of flowers.
Flowers.
“I’m returning these to you,” Anatoly said, and held them out to her.
She froze.
“It is a great honor for a man to be a young woman’s first chosen,” he went on, his voice as soft and caressing as the breeze, “and a great responsibility.” He sounded as if he had said these words before. But what girl wouldn’t want a man like Anatoly Sakhalin as her first lover?
She lifted her eyes finally from the flowers, white with a center of red, and he dropped his gaze away from her at once. A moment later he looked at her.
She had an instant of blistering revelation, that washed over her like heat. He desired her. He desired her. She simply could not move.
He smiled, slightly, the merest uplifting of his lips, as if he understood something she did not. He took a step toward her, a second, and lifted a hand, brushed it along her shoulders and settled it around her, comforting, except that now his whole side touched her and he was warm and solid and she was utterly terrified. It had been safe to become infatuated with him when he was on the other side of a room. This wasn’t safe.
“Look there,” he murmured. “A fourth moon is rising.”
When she looked up, he kissed her. It was the briefest touch, gentle, not insistent. Her heart pounded in her chest. She wanted to kiss him again. She wanted him.
And why not?
Even though she knew who must have put the flowers by his saddle, why not? Everyone else was gone. What better night than this night? The actors had said the summons translated as “flower night” also. She summoned up every bit of courage she had and tilted her chin up and kissed him. And he responded.
Ilyana had such a vivid flash of her father, intertwined with that awful khaja man dressed up in jaran clothing, kissing him, caressing him, that she started back, shaking.
“Yana?” Anatoly did not reach for her. He just stood there, quiet, steady. The moons illuminated his face, a handsome face for a man as old as he was. She suddenly wondered
if her father had ever tried to seduce him. Flinched to even think of it, knowing that her father surely wouldn’t be that stupid. Anatoly Sakhalin came out of the old traditions, schooled by the strictest taskmaster of all: Mother Sakhalin. He scarcely spoke to Hyacinth and Yevgeni, except to be scathingly polite. Like Karolla, he held to the old ways even in the new land. The old ways, like flower night.
Except that now all she could think of was her father. She could not get him out of her mind, him and that man, him, the way his body moved. She gulped down air. Her cheeks burned. She had to say something, anything.
“I’m sorry.” Her breathing came in ragged bursts. “I didn’t—I mean, if I did, it would be you, but—” She broke off.
He glanced down at the bouquet and up again at her. His expression changed to the stiff arrogance of a Sakhalin prince; he looked mightily annoyed. “You didn’t put these flowers there.” Then he swore.
Mortified, she fled.
But no matter where she fled, it didn’t matter. In the end she had to go back to her mother’s tent.
She stopped under the awning. The younger children were asleep, and Valentin lay on a pillow with the baby snuffling on his chest. Nipper was gone. Karolla looked up at her blandly.
“I want to talk to you alone,” said Ilyana in a low voice.
Valentin shut his eyes and pretended to be asleep, making little snoring sounds.
“You put those flowers by his saddle!” Tears came, hot, to her eyes. “How could you?”
“It is past time—”
“I don’t care if you think it’s past time. It’s my time. It’s my choice.”
“You don’t want to lie with Anatoly Sakhalin?”
“Not tonight! I wanted to go with the actors. I wanted to go with David!”
“David ben Unbutu?” Karolla considered this, frowning. “He’s not jaran, but if you won’t have Anatoly Sakhalin, I suppose he’ll do well enough. He is one of Soerensen’s trusted captains, and I suppose if he was good enough to be Nadine Orzhekov’s lover, then he is good enough for you, Yana.”