by Victor Poole
"I'm very upset," Delmar said. Ajalia murmured agreeably, and nuzzled his neck. Delmar sighed. "I thought you didn't like me," he complained. Ajalia caught up his lower lip in her mouth, and a deep shudder ran through Delmar's whole body. His hands crept up about her ribs, and tightened.
"I do like you," Ajalia said. Delmar kissed her. She put her fingers into the hair at the base of his neck; the horse snuffled in the ground at their feet. A long time passed, and much kissing was had.
"Where'd you get this?" Ajalia asked, plucking at the fabric over Delmar's abdomen.
"Relatives," he muttered into her hair.
"Do you often turn up half-naked in Talbos?" she asked. She ran one hand up his arm; he tightened his grip around her waist.
"Of course I don't," he said stuffily. Ajalia pulled Delmar into the street, and began to walk towards the rim of the city, where a long street enclosed the buildings of Talbos. A rough stone wall had been erected, stacked out of large fragments of black stone, and this wall ran around the city to the edge of the sea. Delmar followed Ajalia reluctantly, his fingers twisted around her hand.
"Where are you going?" he asked. "I am not finished kissing you."
"What did you tell Philas this morning?" Ajalia asked. She put Delmar's hand around her waist; his palm slid down to just over her hip, and lingered there. "After you abandoned me," she added heartlessly.
"I didn't abandon you," Delmar said.
"What did you tell him?" she asked. He shrugged. Ajalia retrieved her hand from Delmar's grip.
"That is not fair," Delmar said.
"No secrets," Ajalia said. He regarded her closely. A sliver of moon had lifted itself into the sky, and was dangling over the rim of the world. They came out into a road that ran along the inside of the cruel black wall.
"It's private?" he suggested.
"I see," she said, "that this arrangement will not last long."
"What arrangement?" Delmar asked swiftly.
"The one where my tongue gets to know your tongue," Ajalia said. A long pause followed this.
"Were you thinking of that?" Delmar asked in a strained voice.
"Well, I was," Ajalia said pointedly. He thought about this.
"Do you really want to know?" he asked. She thought that she could hear him beginning to sweat profusely.
"Oh well," Ajalia said.
"Wait," Delmar said quickly.
"Yes?" she asked. She glanced sideways; Delmar's face was almost purple with the effort to say nothing, or something. She laughed at him, and he shot her an irritated look.
"If you're going to be like that," he said with dignity, "I won't tell you."
"Okay," Ajalia said. She took the horse's reins from Delmar's hands, and drew a little ahead of him.
"I don't know why you care so much," Delmar called to her. She said nothing. "And I don't see why you should stop kissing me," he added. Ajalia watched the top of the black stone wall pass by under the stars. The walls of Slavithe were long and proud and tall, smooth and white. The jointure of the stones left nary a crack to be seen, and the top of the wall was a smooth length of perfect corners that ran endlessly around the city. This wall of Talbos was shorter, by more than two-thirds the height of the white Slavithe wall, and the stones were visibly stacked together into roughly interlocking shapes. The top of the wall was like a row of aggressive and jagged teeth that pierced the sky.
Ajalia felt the crisp breeze blowing up against her cheeks; the wind made a hollow whistling against the stones of the black wall. She pulled one of her long sleeves up a little, exposing a few inches of her wrist. When she turned the underside of her arm into the shadowy moonlight, an involuntary gasp slipped from between her lips.
"What is it?" Delmar asked at once. Ajalia pushed the sleeve back down.
"Nothing," she said.
"Is it your arm?" Delmar asked shrewdly.
"No," Ajalia said. Delmar caught up to her and gave her a sharp smile.
"No secrets," he said, and reached for her arm.
"You first," she snapped, holding her arm against her body. Delmar's face hardened.
"Fine," he spat. "But don't blame me when it ruins your day."
Ajalia nodded. She refrained from laughing at Delmar's extravagant expectation of her disappointment in him, or in Philas. Ajalia thought that she would be disappointed in Philas when she found him living in a hut, and eating rocks. Which, she reflected, would not even be disappointing to her. She did not think she was capable of disappointment anymore; she always suspected the worst of everyone.
"I told Philas," Delmar said, after taking a deep breath, "that you and I had a nice talk, and that you told me you didn't like either one of us." He peered anxiously through the moonlight at her, as if waiting for her to explode at him. Ajalia tried to follow Delmar's logic, but could not.
"I don't understand," she said carefully. "Did you say more than that?"
Delmar shook his head. "No," he said. "He said he wasn't surprised, and I said you were very pretty, and he agreed with me, and then we stopped talking about it. He did want to know if I kissed you," he put in, "but I told him I wouldn't tell. He thought I hadn't," Delmar said with a sly smile.
Ajalia put herself in Delmar's way; she pressed his mouth open with her lips. She put the tip of her tongue into his mouth, and stroked the bottom of his tongue. Delmar pulled her convulsively against his body. Ajalia could feel that he had stopped breathing. She kissed her way gently out of his mouth, and bit the edge of his jaw. A tiny moan made its way out of Delmar's throat.
"I thought you'd be angry," he whispered.
"I'm not angry," Ajalia said into the soft skin of Delmar's neck.
"Well, clearly," Delmar laughed, lifting her off of the ground, and kissing her again. "Where are we going now?" he asked, when he had set her down, and they had started to walk again.
"I'm going home," Ajalia said.
"Where is your home?" Delmar asked. Ajalia bit down on her tongue. A flush of anger rose up in her cheeks. "What's the matter?" Delmar asked.
"I mean, I'm going back to Slavithe," Ajalia said.
"Okay," Delmar said. "Then what?"
"I have bruises everywhere," she said, to change the subject. "And my arms look terrible."
"Can I see?" Delmar asked.
"Not right now," she said.
"Can I see later?" he asked.
"I don't know," she said. The thought of Delmar putting his hands over her wrists again made her feel a little sick.
"I'm sorry I left you," Delmar offered. "I didn't want Philas to come looking for you."
"That's sweet," she said. After a brief silence, Delmar spoke again.
"I guess I could have stayed," he said.
"Yes," she said firmly.
"I'm sorry," he said again. She told him she didn't mind. "But it was awful of me," he insisted. "I didn't think about how it would seem, when you woke up, and I was gone."
"Why do those men follow you?" Ajalia asked.
"They don't," Delmar said quickly. "They just—don't mind helping sometimes."
They came around a sharp curve, and the lower part of the city came into view. The lights in the city and double harbor made myriad twinkling sparks in the night. Ajalia examined Delmar's face. She could not decide if Delmar was remarkably stupid, or very clever.
"So they call you the dead falcon," she prompted. Delmar nodded. "And they hope that you have a grand destiny among their people," she said.
"Yes," Delmar said.
"But you say that they are only willing to help sometimes, and nothing more," Ajalia finished. Delmar puckered his lips.
"It isn't like that," he said.
"Like what?" she asked.
"Like what you made it sound like," he said. "My life isn't like that."
"So what is it like?" Ajalia asked. She watched Delmar walk, and imagined the way his hips might press against her someday in the future. Delmar did not notice the direction of her eyes, or the surfeited
curve of her lips. He gestured earnestly with his hands, and Ajalia watched him adoringly.
"Well, I'm not in line to be Thief Lord, the way some people seem to think I am," he said, "and my grandfather in Talbos disowned my father after his behavior in the Great Plague. I don't have a legitimate claim to either throne, but there are these people out there, in Talbos and Slavithe, and they think I'm some kind of a promised figure who is going to unite the cities, and fix all of their problems. It just isn't true, and I wish it would all go away." He finished in a rush, and his mouth was turned down in an angry pout.
Ajalia concluded that Delmar was, indeed, an idiot. But, she told herself, he was an adorable idiot, and he belonged to her.
"Why is it forbidden?" she asked. Delmar shook his head, as if to clear away flies.
"I don't know," he said peskily. "It just is."
"I bet Leed could tell me," she said demurely. Delmar glanced at her.
"Why don't you give up?" he demanded.
"Well," she said, "sometimes when you want something, and you don't have it, you keep trying for a long, long time." Ajalia was holding the reins in one hand; she let her free hand drift to the side until it brushed against the top of Delmar's thigh. Delmar emitted a short yelp, and leaped away from her. He watched her warily.
"What are you getting at?" he asked.
"And if you really want something, you find a way to get it," she finished.
"Do you mean sex?" he asked her.
"Why is it forbidden to marry?" Ajalia asked.
"I did not bring up sex," Delmar said prudishly.
"Does your mind stop at kissing?" Ajalia asked.
"Yes," Delmar said earnestly. "Why?" he repeated. Ajalia smirked. "What?" Delmar exclaimed.
"Do you like kissing me?" Ajalia asked.
"Yes," he said promptly. They had walked halfway down the stretch of the long road that ended near the harbor. The moon had risen high in the sky, and clusters of effervescent stars had appeared in a great rash over the mountains.
"And you have every intention of kissing me at every available opportunity, but nothing more?" she asked. Delmar's face puckered in thought.
"I hadn't thought about it," he admitted, "but yes."
"And what was your plan when I returned East to my master?" Ajalia prompted. Delmar did not say anything for a long time.
"I could come with you," he suggested.
"And be a slave?" she asked. Her words produced a pregnant silence.
"Well, no," Delmar said cautiously. "But I could come and live there," he added cheerfully.
Ajalia had no words in the face of such blind and forceful optimism; she said nothing more. A feeling of dead weight had settled in her stomach; she began to feel the labors of the long day as a compelling screech of combined discomfort, rather than a background murmur of pain.
"Why are you so different outside the walls of Slavithe?" she asked Delmar.
"I'm not different at all," he said. "I'm the same everywhere."
"The first time I met you," she said, "I thought you were mentally deficient." They walked in silence for a long time. Ajalia saw the distant lights at the city gate. She hoped that Philas and Leed would be there; she wanted to set out right away on the road to Slavithe.
"Why do you follow me everywhere?" she asked Delmar. He shrugged.
"I like you," he said. Ajalia watched his face closely.
"What is the dead falcon?" she asked. "You were going to tell me before."
Delmar heaved an aggrieved sigh.
"I knew you were going to ask me that," he said. "The city of Slavithe was founded by Jerome, but it wasn't really. It was really founded by his brother, Bakroth." When Delmar didn't say any more, Ajalia prodded him in the ribs. Delmar heaved another sigh.
"Bakroth was renowned as a great magician. Everyone said that he could make the earth rise up into the air, and cut stone with the graze of his hand."
"Could he?" Ajalia asked. She was thinking of the golden bird that had drifted up with Delmar's magic, and of the golden light that had come out of his mouth. Her wrists throbbed when she thought of the twisting gold light.
"Of course not," Delmar said peevishly. "Magic doesn't really work. But everyone said that Bakroth had magic. I think," he added conversationally, "that Bakroth was a brilliant manager. He would organize workers, you see, and get things done much faster than anyone else could. And he had the idea of taking the stone up into the places where the springs are, where Slavithe is now, and building the city out of stone atop the springs. He had a lot of good ideas like that."
"Okay," Ajalia said, "so where does Jerome fit in all this?"
"He was jealous," Delmar said. "No one talks about this, by the way," he added. "If you ask people in Slavithe, they won't tell you things, and they might kick you out and not let you back in."
"Is that what happened to you?" Ajalia asked. "Is that why you won't be the Thief Lord? Because you asked about it, or talked about it?" Or read about it, she did not say.
"I don't want to talk about that," Delmar said, brushing away her question.
"Does that mean that I'm right?" Ajalia persisted. Delmar's face clammed up. His expression told her she was right.
"No," he said snootily. "It wasn't that. It was a lot of other things."
"Like how you're useless, and how no one likes you?" Ajalia asked. She was watching his eyes to see how he reacted to this. To her surprise, he nodded cheerfully.
"Actually, yes," he said, sounding relieved, "that is why I'm not going to be the Thief Lord. You're very perceptive," he told Ajalia. She did not know how to respond to this kind of talk. She wanted to tell Delmar that she had been testing him, to find out how strange his family was, but he was failing all of her tests with an enormous lack of awareness that continually shocked her. She could not see how Delmar was able to look past the blatant and sweeping favoritism in his family.
"Why do your parents hate you?" she asked suddenly.
"I'm in the way a lot," Delmar said promptly, without rancor. "I'm not very good at anything. And I'm not very attractive," he added, putting his hand out to snatch at a lighted beetle that was flying past.
Ajalia stared at Delmar. Delmar was oblivious. His chin had hardened into a firm line since he had come out of Slavithe; his eyes were bright, and animated, and his whole face was a knot of concentrated good-humor. Delmar looked extraordinarily handsome. His hair fell over his head in thick waves, his shoulders were broad and free as he walked, and the peculiar swing of his hips made Ajalia's mouth tickle.
"So what happened to Bakroth?" Ajalia asked.
"Jerome killed him," Delmar said. "Well, not for a long time. Bakroth built Slavithe, and for a while it seemed like everything was going to be okay. Jerome was in charge of the quarries, and he had a lot of power over the harbor, and he built a lot of the ships. Bakroth had been a ship-builder, when he was a slave," Delmar added. "He showed Jerome how to build ships. Jerome had only been a field slave."
"Jerome was a slave?" Ajalia asked.
Delmar laughed.
"Everyone from Slavithe was a slave," he explained. "That's why they called it Slavithe. Bakroth was a slave from the East. Not your East," he said quickly, "this was too long ago for your East. There was a kingdom up north from your East." Delmar must have noticed the look on Ajalia's face, because he backed up to explain. "There are maps, and records in the books," he told her.
"The books you have hidden in the wall?" Ajalia asked.
"Shh!" Delmar hissed. He looked around at the deserted road. Ajalia laughed at him, but he gave a very stern look. "My father would burn them," he said, "if he could find them."
"Why?" Ajalia asked.
"No one is supposed to know," he said.
"Why?" she asked again.
"Stop asking stupid questions!" Delmar exclaimed. "This is how things work. And you aren't supposed to ask so many questions."
"You told me that Jerome wrote the book that I have," Ajalia sa
id suddenly. "Did he?"
Delmar was silent.
"Did Bakroth write it?" Ajalia asked. Delmar glanced at her quickly. A ruddy glow gathered in his cheeks.
"Where is the book?" Delmar asked casually. Ajalia laughed at him. He blushed harder.
They came around a stretch of the wall, and the gate to Talbos came into view. Philas was there with his horse. Ajalia could see nothing of the boy Leed.
"We can't talk about this in front of Philas," Delmar whispered. Philas was too far away to hear; he had not seen them yet.
"Why do you think Philas would care?" Ajalia asked him.
Delmar wrapped one arm around Ajalia's waist, and pulled her close to him. He pressed his lips against her mouth briefly.
"Please don't be angry," he said softly, "if I am different at home." He breathed in the smell of her hair. Ajalia kissed Delmar's neck. She took the reins of the horse from his hand, and went ahead towards Philas.
Philas looked up when he heard the hooves of the horse come near. He waited for Ajalia to come up against the gate, and threw the saddle over the back of the brown gelding.
"I found a good house," Philas told her. "Too many windows. Cheap."
"How cheap?" she asked. Philas gave her a crooked grin.
"Don't have to tell you that," he said, "now that I have the money."
"Idiot," Ajalia said, but she smiled.
"Drunkard," Philas said serenely.
"Not anymore," Ajalia shot at him. Delmar wandered up behind them.
"Where's that kid?" Delmar asked.
Philas knotted the girth into the loop on the saddle, and pulled it tight. The brown gelding sighed.
"Has he eaten?" Ajalia asked Delmar.
"What? Who?" Delmar asked.
"The horse," Philas grunted, adjusting the saddle on his own Slavithe horse.
"I don't know," Delmar said. "Don't they do that in the stable when you leave the horse there?"
Philas grimaced at Ajalia. She ignored his look.
"Where's Leed?" she asked. "I sent him to find you."
"He found me," Philas said. "He'll be here in a minute."
The gate of Talbos was thinner than the Slavithe gate, and narrower. Two slim doors of shoddy wood had been cast up into the opening; they would hold little force, but formed a barrier between the mountains and the city. There was only one guard, and he looked extremely bored. He was a fat old man in his fifties, his hair prematurely white, and his face carved into a deep scowl.