“I’ll behave,” I said, as steadily as possible. “As I always do.”
He gazed at me, not smiling any more, and I turned my own gaze away, to Selera. “Farewell,” I said. “May you find everything you seek, in your new home: renown, fortune. Love.” I did not intend to be mean—not this time—but perhaps my distraction and excitement made me sound it; she glared at me—for the last time, I thought—and walked to the nearest carriage.
“And you,” I said to Grasni, and found that I could say nothing more.
“And you,” she said, and smiled, though her eyes were bright with tears. We clung to each other for a moment, until she drew away. She patted her freckled cheeks and her shapeless dress and said, “Renown, fortune and love,” and we laughed together—for the last time, I thought. Just before she climbed into the second carriage she looked up at the castle walls—for him, I realized. Sildio, who had so entranced her that she had come to me, that night when everything had changed between us. The night that had made our friendship more about words not spoken than ones that were.
Teldaru bent close to me, before he got into Selera’s carriage. “Take care, Nola,” he said. “I won’t be long.” He ran his finger along my jaw and quickly, quickly over my lips and then he was gone.
Gone, gone—the word circled in my head as I ran up the gatehouse tower steps. I would have to make certain that the carriages were out of sight before I made any attempt to find Bardrem. You do not need to find him, whispered a voice in my head. Just try to go; try now. And then what? my other, louder mind-voice demanded. What will Teldaru do when he finds me gone? Whom will he hunt down right away? No—I won’t endanger Bardrem that way . . .
I lost sight of the carriages as soon as the horses drew them down the road into the city. I leaned as far over the tower’s edge as I could, craning, waiting. It seemed like an age before I saw them again, out past the other, further gatehouse, already well onto the long, straight eastern road. It seemed like another age before they dwindled. The sun was behind me, and the pure, vivid light made the tiny horses and carriages very distinct and not quite real. I waited until they were just specks—flickers of light off wheel hubs and harnesses. Gone, gone, said my head, and I picked up my skirts and ran.
I hardly saw the guards I passed as I flew down the stairs. One of them called to me to be careful. I burst from the tower into the courtyard and would have kept going except that someone caught me by the arm and pulled me to a reeling stop. I wrenched myself around, opening my mouth to say something shrill, but instead I cried, “Bardrem!” and wrapped my hand around his arm. We stood there gripping each other like dancers who had forgotten their steps.
“I saw you,” he said at last, as I tried unsuccessfully to retrieve all the ideas that had filled me only moments before. “I saw you go up there, and then I watched you. You could have fallen over, you know. I would never have caught you in time.”
I made a sound that was part laugh and part sob. “Did you see the carriages?” I asked, and he nodded. “And who was in them?”
“No,” he said. “Should I know who was in them?”
“No”—thinking, Of course he didn’t see Teldaru—if he had he’d be upset—furious, shocked . . . “They were friends. Going away.” I took a deep breath that steadied me. “Bardrem. I have to leave the city. Come with me.”
“What?” He let go of my arm, though I kept hold of his. “Why?”
“Because,” I said quickly, like an impatient mother avoiding a real explanation, “I have to.”
He was not angry this time—just puzzled. “My turn at the competition is tomorrow—it’s why I’ve been looking for you; I was wondering if you might come to listen . . . I suppose I’ll go with you, as long as I’m back in time.”
“You won’t be.” I dug my fingers into his skin and he winced. “I’m leaving for good.”
He pried my hand away. “You can’t mean this. Nola—be serious, don’t—”
“I am.” I felt more tears; when had I ever cried so much? “This is the most important thing I’ve ever had to do. Please, Bardrem—stay here. Wait for me. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
I hardly breathed. I watched his face, which showed me nothing, not even when he said, “I don’t understand. I haven’t understood anything since you found me.” A long pause; I tried not to reach out and clutch him again. “How do I know,” he finally said, “that you won’t just disappear?”
My breath escaped in a noisy rush. “I won’t. I’ll come back—I promise.”
“I’m not promising anything,” he said. “I’ll just wait for now, if that’s what you want—only Nola, I . . .”
But I was running again, waving at him over my shoulder.
I would have to remove everything I could from my room. If I left anything that had come from my body—a hair, a fingernail—Teldaru would be able to use it to Othersee, just as he had done when he had been hunting Chenn. I found an extra bag in Grasni’s room and took it back to mine. I began shoving dresses, skirts and shifts inside—for although he would not be able to use the cloth itself to find me, there might be stray hairs caught in lace or bodice ribbons. Luckily I did not have too many clothes; I moved swiftly on to the hair combs and clips, the necklaces and earrings and bracelets. (The jewellery I packed simply because I loved it.) Not too many of these, either—thankfully I was not Selera, with her five cases—and I reached for the toy horses. They were too big to take with me. I looked them over carefully, found nothing but matted material and bead eyes; I held them both for one long, still moment and then I placed them back on their shelf. I would have to strip the sheets from the bed; maybe I’d claim they were crawling with ticks and have Dellena burn them. I’d have to sweep and wash the floor too—so much; too much. I was moving toward the door, intending to find a broom, when someone knocked on it.
I halted. Said nothing.
There was another knock, and another pause, and a voice. “Mistress?”
I took the final three steps to the door and opened it.
“There you are,” said King Haldrin. “Thank the Pattern. Come with me, Nola; I need you.”
CHAPTER THIRTY
“What has happened?” I asked the king. Blood was rising to my cheeks, singing in my ears.
“I’ve called a break in the competition. Zemiya still needs to rest; perhaps this was too much for her, though I’ll never tell Derris he was right. And now there’s something important that I must do, and I think you are the only one who can help me with it.”
“But what . . .?”
“Come with me.”
“But my king, I cannot; I—”
“Please.”
He was smiling. The students were gathered around the pool, watching, whispering, their eyes very wide. King Haldrin came here with Teldaru, sometimes, but never alone.
His smile was terribly winning. I could not say no to the king, especially not in front of other people. And if we stood here for too long he might look past me into the room and see the case on my bed and the pile of sheets on the floor.
“Very well.”
He took me to rooms in the keep where I had never been before—his rooms, bright with wall hangings and late afternoon sun. I looked but did not see. I saw only a window that showed the courtyard. I saw the top of the gatehouse tower, but of course I could not tell whether Bardrem were waiting at its foot.
“I am trying to choose a gift for her. I am failing. Look, Nola, and help me.”
A brocade chair and a small, round table, both covered in things. A cloak draped over the chair; a pair of slippers, a pile of necklaces, a book, a tiny statue on the table. I went close, touched, thought, Just pick, quickly. He was entirely motionless, watching my face for clues; I could not be too quick. I considered each item and I did care, a little—a gift for the new queen, and he had come to me.
I chose the statue. It was the likeness of a girl with long, straight hair, her dainty stone hands cupped before her. “It’s very
old,” Haldrin said as he took it from me. “My great-grandmother’s, I think. I’ve been told the girl is her. She used to hold something, but it’s long lost. Why this?”
“Because it’s Sarsenayan stone,” I said, and felt a brief, warm surge of truth. “And she’s lovely. The girl, and Zemiya too.”
“She is.” He was serious, quiet. He told me I would take some food and drink with him, at a larger table by the window. I said no. He insisted. Zemiya was resting; he had some pressing tasks that he wished to put off. The sun was going down. How long had it been? I tried not to look out the window but the sky seemed to tug at me and I had to turn to it. I ate food I did not taste and drank my wine so swiftly that my cheeks flooded with heat again, as they had when I had seen him at my door. He talked to me; I responded. The light outside was bronze.
He pushed his chair back at last. “There are two more dancers to see this evening,” he said, and rose. “The last two, thankfully. I will be glad to listen to poetry tomorrow.”
Be there, I thought as I ran back across the courtyard. Bardrem—be there still, please. I am coming.
I would not worry about the sheets, or about sweeping or washing the floor. I would take my case and go.
When I was nearly at my door, already reaching for the latch, a shadow slipped out of the other, deeper shadows of walls and trees. “Ispa Nola,” said Neluja as Borl growled at her from his place by my door. “Forgive me for disturbing you here.”
I almost laughed that unfortunate, hysterical laugh of mine. Instead I said, in a tight little voice, “I am tired. Come back tomorrow, as early as you wish.”
“It is about Ispu Teldaru.”
“Oh,” I said, helplessly. We went in. She stood just inside the door, which I closed. It was quite dark in my room, but I did not light a lantern. Her eyes gleamed.
“What did you see, the other day?” she said. “When isparra showed you the king?”
“I told you—I told everyone. A volcano of gems, and—”
“What did you truly see?”
I forgot Bardrem. I stood before her, trying to hold my head up before her black eyes. “Why do you think I saw something else?”
The lizard crept out from the sleeve of her dress. It picked its way up her arm and circled her neck and settled in the hollow of her collarbone. Its tail lay over her shoulder, curling a bit at its tip.
“I do not think. I am sure. Your words did not match your eyes.” She paused. “And I saw you. When I was a girl and isparra showed me Teldaru. I saw you, older, different, and you were with him, and you wept tears that were words, and though people gathered close around you they could not read them.”
“What else did you see?” I could barely speak.
“Things that did not seem possible. Zemiya invented something, years ago—a wild, mad vision to mock Teldaru. And then I had a real one—for any word spoken, any thought made real for another, even if it is false, causes change. He will change all the tides, all the currents. And you with him. I am Belakaoan: I seldom say ‘will,’ for isparra’s waters are seldom so clear. But I am certain of this. And I am afraid.”
“Neluja,” I said. “Ispa. I can say nothing to you, though I want to.”
The lizard scampered around her neck again, twice. She put her hand gently over its head and its body sagged against her, clawed feet splayed. “Nonetheless,” she said, “I will speak to you another time.”
“Yes.” I almost regretted that this could not be true.
She closed the door carefully behind her. For a moment I stood still. Then I seized my case and opened my door, closed it, one last time.
It was quite dark now, but the pebbles of the path still glinted a little. “Borl,” I called softly, and I heard him growl again, though I did not see him. I took a few steps, and for the second time that day, fingers wrapped around my arm.
“Having a visit, were you?” Teldaru murmured. His lips stirred the hair at my neck. “And now you’re going for a walk? Lovely. Let us go together, shall we?”
He was dressed as Orlo: dark tunic, dark cloak, both of them plain. It was that night again, at the brothel—his hand on the small of my back, propelling me—except that this time there was no pretence of safety, no promise of care. He draped me in a cloak, too—a rich purple, maybe; it did not look quite black. It was velvet, and hung from my shoulders like a pair of hands, dragging me down toward the earth. Sweat slicked my back and belly.
No, I thought, not again, not this time—but his fist was knotted in the cloth at the base of my spine, and he was scraping my skin, and I walked forward.
No one stopped us in the keep. Why would they have? He was Master Teldaru, smiling, greeting the guards and the serving girls, who blushed. I was Nola, his favoured pupil, just made Mistress. Some of the guards said my name and nodded at me as Teldaru guided me out the door and down the steps.
He pulled my hood up over my hair, when we reached the bottom. “You are no one, now,” he said as he tugged his own hood up. “I am no one.” His teeth gleamed; they were all I saw of him, as he turned his shadowed face away.
The cloak was long and I tripped on its folds and he was forcing me to walk too fast, so I tripped some more. I was angry, and a few stumbled paces later I was furious. The fury was cold; I felt it hardening my limbs and muscles. More steps, through the crowd, toward the gatehouse. There was no one there—no one right at the tower’s base except for a guard I did not recognize. Bardrem must have left hours ago, certain of some new betrayal or carelessness on my part. Despair threaded through the rage but I twisted it, smoothed it over with strength. I glanced back at Teldaru and thought again, Not this time.
We were nearly at the gate. I slowed a bit and felt his hand shift on my back, seeking a tighter hold. I drew in my breath and wrenched myself around and free. I spun and righted myself in one motion and took four long, speeding-up strides toward the open gate. I did not let myself remember the last time I had tried this, years ago, when I had run but never escaped. I remembered nothing and thought about nothing except the space before me—and then a weight fell against my back and bore me to the ground with a force that took away all thought, all breath.
He was laughing. I felt it as he lay on me, pressing me into the dirt, and I heard it when he straightened away from me. I gasped and coughed and scrabbled at earth and pebbles.
“Mistress Foolish Seer,” he said. He was kneeling beside me. I could see his face now, because I was looking up at it. His hood was still pulled over his head.
“What’s happening here?” The guard, peering over Teldaru’s shoulder. “Get up, man. And you too,” he added, gesturing at me.
Teldaru rose, twitching at his hood. “My apologies,” he said in a voice and accent that were not his. “It was a race, something foolish. We’ll be going now.”
I sat up, shaking my head free of the folds of my hood. I’m Mistress Nola, I tried to say, And this is Master Teldaru. “I’m a brothel girl,” I said. “Help me find my way home.”
The guard frowned. He opened his mouth to speak, but Teldaru laughed a ragged, nervous laugh. “More foolishness.” He bent, gripped my arm. “Off we go, Jalys,” he said, and pulled me out beneath the gate.
Enough, I thought, groping for steadiness, for focus. Don’t say anything else to anyone; don’t let him make you a madwoman again. There is another way—just think. . . .
He stopped walking a few steps beyond the gate. He gripped both my arms, just below the shoulder, and leaned in close. Anyone watching might think that he was going to kiss me, but instead he snapped, “Enough, Nola. Enough. You are making me angry.” And he squeezed so hard and suddenly that I cried out. Then he made a strangled, muffled noise, and one of his hands fell away.
Borl’s jaws were fastened around Teldaru’s ankle. I heard the dog’s low, unbroken growl; abruptly I heard the water of the royal fountain, too, also constant, like a song that sometimes changed but never ended.
“Borl!” I cried, as sharply as
I could. “Borl—stop!”—because it was no use; Teldaru was still clutching me, and he was too strong, not surprised enough—and anyway, even if he did let me go, I needed to think now, not run.
Borl did not hear me, or did not listen. He clung, his claws slipping in the spaces between the cobblestones. Teldaru grunted and shook his leg, and I saw him tense, felt it in the bunching of his arm muscles. A moment later he lifted his free leg and kicked. His foot hit Borl’s side with a dull sound—one full sack of grain landing on another—and the dog yelped and staggered away. He shook himself and snarled, his teeth and gums glistening, and he was on Teldaru again, scrabbling and tearing at his cloak, and at the flesh beneath it. Another savage kick, and this time Borl fell onto his back. He rolled over, but Teldaru’s foot caught him in the ribs, over and over. He had let go of me. I seized his arm and pulled back on it with all my strength. He kicked once more, and this time there was a sound like a branch snapping, and Borl sagged onto the stones.
Teldaru stared down at him. He was breathing hard; there was sweat running down the sides of his face (I could see this; the hood had fallen back, though not all the way). He smiled and reached for my hand. He laced his fingers with mine, quite gently, still gazing down at the dog, who was motionless except for the laboured rise and fall of his chest. Borl was whimpering—another noise like the water, though much quieter. Teldaru stroked my palm. I did not move.
He whistled. Those notes—three short and low and one long and high—that used to call Borl to him. Borl jerked back and forth, trying to rise, but he could not. He strained his head toward Teldaru’s leg and his teeth snapped, found nothing but air. Teldaru whistled again, very softly, then chuckled and turned. He picked up my fallen case and led me down the road (he limped a bit, at first, but not for long), and I let him, because I was thinking. Trying to. Because there must be something in the white ringing silence of my head that would show me what came next.
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