* * *
When they arrived at the Palace, Jaxar and his family were conducted inside with a good deal of bowing and strewing of flower petals. Lycian was radiant from the adulation. A pair of guards took Tsorreh around to the side and through a maze of narrow corridors, up stairs and then down, until she’d lost all sense of direction. They encountered no servants or courtiers, not even a scullion, only an occasional guard wearing Cinath’s colors. The guards went on in silence, as if Tsorreh were deaf and mute. They were tall and muscular; even without their weapons, either could have broken her like a twig. If they feared her “Meklavaran sorcery,” they gave no sign.
She, on the other hand, felt a growing sense of unease that increased the deeper she went into the Palace. At first, she attributed it to her own very natural anxiety. Despite her brave intentions to endure whatever waited for her, she did not feel in the least stalwart. She might well break down under physical torment, but she had no warrior’s pride to armor her against weakness. Women were expected to be delicate, were they not? If screams and tears would satisfy Cinath, then screams and tears he would have. If screams would keep her alive—and she must stay alive, she who was the guardian of the te-alvar.
As she thought this, she stumbled on an irregularity in the stone floor. The guard following her gave a sound like a wolf’s growl as he shoved her forward. She scrambled to regain her balance. The te-alvar ignited in her chest, not in reassurance but in warning.
She felt a cold prickling along her spine and the hairs on her arms stood on end.
Qr.
The noxious trace vanished as abruptly and as completely as if someone had dropped a smothering cloak over it. Without thinking, Tsorreh lifted one hand to her breastbone. Warmth flared under her touch, then subsided.
They passed not to the audience chamber where Tsorreh had undergone her first interview, but to a far larger hall. She had not known the palace contained such a vast space. It was bigger and its painted ceiling far higher than anything in Meklavar. She recognized many of the gods portrayed by the statues, art from this conquered province or that. Wine cascaded from multi-tiered fountains. Half the courtiers filling the hall were already drunk, but not the watchful-eyed guards.
Drums and flutes and man-high lyres poured forth music, but she could barely make out the melodies above the cacophony of voices, some raised in song or laughter, many more in excited chatter. Where in all this riot of color and sound was Jaxar? Danar? The guards pressed close around her, preventing any contact with the throng.
At a signal she could not make out, the chatter died, as did the music. The revelers drew back and the foremost guard led the way deeper into the hall. The crowd thinned even further.
Ahead, Tsorreh recognized Cinath, tall and broad-shouldered, attired in elaborate, blindingly white robes and crowned with a garland of amethysts and blue topazes. He spoke with a man much more simply dressed, bald head bowed, no ornaments. The courtier straightened, and Tsorreh saw the scorpion emblazoned on his headband.
For a terrible moment, the world froze. She went deaf and blind to everything but that black shape against the white cloth.
A muted thud broke the silence and then another, a distant two-part rhythm. Was it her own heart? As if in response, warmth blossomed between her breasts, spreading outward. Movement and color returned. She felt her own limbs and heard the murmurs of the courtiers.
Cinath raised one hand, a careless flicker of a gesture, and the Qr priest took a step back. Now Tsorreh saw the priest’s face, the rounded cheeks that spoke of ease and rich food, the mouth with its hint of a smirk; satisfied, confident, and greedy. The priest’s gaze slipped across her but did not linger. He saw her only as a slave, of no importance to his own designs. Cinath, however, glared at her. She dropped her gaze as a slave would, but in that fractional moment, she got a good look at him. When she had seen him before, his eyes did not have that tautness, as if he had not slept well for fear of his slain enemies returning in his dreams.
Thessar, his cheeks flushed with drink, was surrounded by women in richly colored, bejeweled costumes, some of them so diaphanous and clinging they bared as much as they concealed. He threw his head back and laughed at something one of them said.
Tsorreh glanced back at Cinath just as recognition lit his eyes. She hunched over even further, although it impaired her view. She had not seen Jaxar or Danar, and it would be far too risky to search for them now. Lycian was undoubtedly nearby, eager to witness every unpleasant moment.
She heard the clink of metal ornaments—a chain, perhaps—and the tread of leather on stone. The guard in front of her stiffened and bowed. His attention was momentarily diverted from her. She remembered, with sardonic half-humor, how she had imagined snatching up a weapon and attacking Thessar during his victory parade. She knew now that she could not have done it. Taken a knife, maybe, but never used it on a living man. Thessar was a braggart and a bully, but Cinath—and here she dared to lift her gaze, in an instant taking in his face and bearing, the hovering priest, Lycian in her finery at the forefront of the audience—Cinath was a man on the brink of something she dared not name.
“Well, Thessar, here she is.” Cinath’s voice fractured her thought. “Your Meklavaran queen.”
“Not mine, Father. Her dusty little city’s mine, certainly. But her…who would want such a scrawny, dark little thing? I mean, look at her! I’ve seen ham-handsomer slaves every say. Every day!”
Good, she thought. Let him gloat. But he was intoxicated, and that made men unpredictable.
Danar, hold your peace.
They were talking again, Cinath and his son and someone else she could not see, but not the priest. Someone was mouthing words about providing amusement and someone else uttered a petulant complaint, something about the Xian wrestlers and raising a bet.
“By The Guardian of Soldiers!” That was Thessar again, slurring his words. “What can she do against us?”
Footsteps approached, the guards sprang back, and Tsorreh found her jaw in the grip of a man’s large, powerful hand. Thessar wrenched her head back, turning her face from side to side. His fingers dug into her flesh, pressing her cheeks into her teeth. She tasted blood. Tears sprang to her eyes, but she made no effort to hold them back. Let him see how much he was hurting her. Let him think her weak.
“Bah! Look at her. Sc-scared as a rabbit! I told you before, Father, their women don’t fight, don’t rule. They’re good for nothing but popping out sons for us to kill.”
For the first time, real fear sank talons into Tsorreh’s gut. Don’t think of Zevaron, don’t remember him.
The next moment, with her head still clamped at a punishing angle, Thessar ran his free hand over her body. He groped her breasts through the coarse fabric of her slave’s dress, then slid down her belly and between her thighs. She shuddered and almost retched. No man had ever touched her in such a callously brutal manner.
Thessar gave a snort of disgust. He pushed her away, hard enough to send her sprawling. The mosaic floor was hard and cold. A burst of laughter, Lycian’s foremost among them, covered his next words. Someone cried, “Thessar Victorious!” to a round of cheers.
“Celebrate!” Thessar shouted, and people began moving away in his wake.
Tsorreh curled into a ball, drawing in her legs and covering her head with her arms in case one of those elegantly garbed courtiers might think it amusing to step on her. A flurry of light blows landed on her shoulders. Just as she dared to hope she’d escaped the worst, a savage kick slammed into her lower spine. White pain seared her. She glimpsed the edge of Lycian’s gown as the woman glided away.
Moments passed, marked by the galloping pace of her heart.
By the sounds, the chamber was roughly half-empty. A booted foot nudged Tsorreh’s hip, but not hard enough to hurt. It was an attempt to attract her attention, not to inflict pain. She uncurled enough to lift her head. One of the guards gestured for her to get up. She did so, moving carefully because
of the throbbing in her back. She did not think her kidneys had been damaged, but it was not going to be easy to walk.
The guards made no move to help her, as if a touch might contaminate them. They led her limping from the hall and along another confusing series of corridors and then, surprisingly, to a narrow room lined with cots of the barest, most meager sort. A slave dormitory, she thought.
Slowly she lowered herself to the nearest cot. When the door closed, leaving her in darkness, trembling shook her. She thought her muscles might wrench themselves from her bones. Her teeth clattered against each other. She felt sick and numb, all at once.
It’s over, she tried to tell herself. I’m safe.
But it wasn’t over, and she wasn’t safe, insisted another part of her.
She lay there, racked by wave after shuddering wave until the spasm had run its course. At last, lassitude crept over her, a weariness so deep, she could not resist.
She ought not to sleep, here in the stronghold of her enemies. Here where she had no defenses, no protection, where at any moment someone—a guard, a courtier, Lycian, Thessar—Cinath himself!—might come through the door. Her body seemed to think otherwise as a soothing, gold-edged warmth pulsed gently between her breasts. Just as she lost consciousness, a thought came to her.
It is not over. It is only beginning.
Chapter Twenty-three
AS the mild Gelonian winter faded, a flurry of rainstorms passed over the city. The sky turned to patterns of white and gray, with only fleeting patches of blue. Between squalls, a light, persistent drizzle misted the air. It became impossible to stay really dry, and the older servants complained of pain in their joints.
Tsorreh felt cold all the time. The damp penetrated her bones. She never mentioned it, for she knew she was not ill, merely uncomfortable. Jaxar, for all his reticence on the subject of his physical ailments, was clearly suffering. He left the compound infrequently and then he was forced to use a litter. Even Lycian, who normally preferred to display herself on her elaborately caparisoned onager, called for a curtained sedan chair.
Danar cheerfully summoned his bodyguards to accompany Tsorreh wherever she wished to go, which was usually to fetch more medicines or to consult Marvenion on the adjustment of dosages. Jaxar suffered only one minor attack, which was quickly resolved.
Finally the storms ended and the days lengthened. The air turned sweet and mild. Flowers burst forth in every garden, every planter along the boulevards, and in pots atop every balcony. Bright new streamers replaced old, rainfaded decorations. The streets filled with people, abroad for no purpose but their own enjoyment.
Jaxar spent more time outside, often taking his midday meal in the garden courtyard. Danar could not stand to be indoors for long, so Tsorreh found ways to incorporate his language lessons as part of forays into the city.
Despite the increasingly fine weather, the washed-clean brightness of the buildings, the heady smell of the flowers, and the air of general jollity, she often felt a shadowy sense of threat. In Jaxar’s compound, particularly in the quiet solitude of the laboratory, her sense of unease lessened, but it never completely vanished.
Although by now Tsorreh was familiar with the city, its districts and avenues, she felt even more anxious than when she had arrived the year before. She could not shake the feeling that somewhere, just beyond the limit of her physical senses, something had changed. Something was gathering. She tried to rationalize her feeling, for it made no sense. Surely, the threat to her, as a royal captive from Meklavar, was no greater. Thessar had returned, triumphant. She had placated him and thought it unlikely the Ar-King would bother himself with her again. Rumors of resistance to Gelonian rule in Meklavar were just that, talk of complaints and festering resentment, not widespread violence.
After the quietness of the winter, the whole city embarked on a round of spring festivities. Since the Gelon worshiped so many gods, a festival to one or another occurred almost every day. Only the Scorpion god received no public adulation, although it seemed to Tsorreh the priests of Qr were more numerous than before. They looked intent, almost grim, as they hurried about their business or stood in twos or threes at intersections and marketplaces, peering at everyone who passed.
Jaxar attended official ceremonies whenever his presence was required at the palace, along with Danar and a clearly delighted Lycian. Jaxar rarely showed any interest in public celebrations, although he had no objection to other members of his household enjoying themselves. Tsorreh went with Danar, at his urging, to the temple of The One Who Brings Forth Flowers, and again to The Bounteous Giver of Wine, but shrank from the spectacle of public drunkenness. The chants and dances would be interesting, were it not for that faint, pervasive sense of peril.
Jaxar also received guests at home. During the winter, and before that, when he had been so ill, guests were few. With the increasingly clement weather, there were more frequent social and political visits. Tsorreh was rarely invited. Lycian had cornered her in a hallway early in the season and let her know in no uncertain terms that she was not to draw attention to herself.
Lycian clearly wished to be the center of attention, admired by all. Tsorreh had great difficulty imagining how Lycian, with her fine clothing, extravagant jewels, and golden hair, could possibly see a penniless hostage as a rival. Yet on more than one occasion, she had overheard a snatch of servants’ conversation to the effect that Lycian still suspected Tsorreh of being Jaxar’s mistress. Tsorreh was as horrified as if she had been accused of sleeping with her own father, but she saw no way of denying the charge without raising the issue for renewed scrutiny of either herself or her protector. Lycian had no idea what her husband and Tsorreh did in the laboratory or why they would spend days at a time there, and nights, too—not understanding the opportunity offered them when the sky was clear and the far-seeing lenses opened the heavens’ new and glorious vistas.
Jaxar would sometimes shut himself and his guests in the outer room of his chambers. No one except Danar and, on occasion, Issios, would be admitted. These special visitors were often, though not always, men of rank and importance. At first, Tsorreh thought that Jaxar chose the impressive formal chamber to subtly remind them of his status as the Ar-King’s brother. She noticed, however, that he emerged from these meetings somber and weary. Often he would rest afterward, rather than return to the work he loved. The other advantage of this location was that, because the only access to the rest of the house was through the little entry hall, it could be easily protected from eavesdroppers with a single guard placed outside the door. No one, not even Lycian, dared disturb Jaxar and his guests.
One afternoon, Tsorreh finished the notations from the previous night’s astronomical observations, cleared a portion of one of the work tables for a desk, and took out the book she had been attempting to translate. The ink had faded so badly that, in many places, the writing was impossible to make out. She had tried to decipher its contents on her very first day. Since then, in her spare time, she had begun to transcribe those sections she could understand, a few phrases in Gelone and in archaic Isarran, and figures she thought were numbers, perhaps a form of Denariyan notation. Taking out several volumes written in various Denariyan scripts, she searched for similar symbols, anything that might give her a clue. The scholarly work reminded her of home and brought a small measure of comfort. Her results also diverted Jaxar from whatever was distressing him, probably the Ar-King’s renewed territorial ambitions in Azkhantia.
A tap at the laboratory door interrupted her. She straightened up, feeling the stiffness in her neck and shoulders after having bent over the table for so long. It was one of the boy servants, the same one she had frightened half out of his wits when Jaxar had been so ill. He still looked as if the slightest frown would send him bolting for safety. She gave him an encouraging smile and waited for him to speak.
The boy stammered that she was to come to Lord Jaxar in his own chambers. “At once,” he added. Tsorreh thanked him, carefully cl
osed the books in order to protect the fragile pages from dust, and hurried out of the laboratory.
As she strode down the corridor leading to Jaxar’s suite, she heard the frenzied yapping of the lap-terrier and saw Lycian about to descend the main staircase. Lycian was wearing spring green today, cascades of silk dyed in subtly different shades and sewn with tiny bangles to give the effect of sunlight dancing through lacy branches.
For an instant their eyes met, and then Lycian whirled away, chin lifted, and swept down the stairs, with three or four of her attendants scurrying behind her. The dog gave a last yip and scampered after its mistress. In that moment, Tsorreh caught a flash of triumph in the other woman’s face.
Tsorreh paused in the entry hall and tried to settle her nerves. She thought she had seen the worst of Lycian’s temperament: jealousy, pettiness, and vanity. Never before had she observed this gloating satisfaction and ill will that ran deeper than mere spite. Lycian was more than a pretty figurehead. Driven by such emotions, she could be capable of great malice.
Tsorreh could break her promise to not escape. She could lose herself in the city. By now, she was no longer friendless, although she knew better than to put her faith in Marvenion’s courage. No, for the moment it was better to trust Jaxar’s integrity and his control over his household. He had never given her cause to do otherwise. With a deep breath, she knocked on the far door and stepped inside.
“There you are, child. Come here. We must talk.”
Jaxar rested on one of the divans, his crippled foot elevated on a cushion-laden stool. A folding table of ebony inlaid with mother-of-pearl and silver wire held the remains of elegant refreshments, bits of delicate honey-pastries and fruits carved like flowers, a decanter half-full of pale golden wine, and three goblets.
Following Jaxar’s gesture, Tsorreh seated herself on the nearest chair. The dress that she had once thought so fine, compared to the rough-woven slave’s garment, seemed coarse when set against the silk brocade of the pillows, the exquisite carving of the wood, and the opulence of the mosaic murals.
The Seven-Petaled Shield Page 30