by Victor Poole
"I can do something, I think," Calles said, her eyebrows working as she looked up and down Chad's body, "to complement your household boys. I have seen them in market," Calles told Ajalia, and her mouth turned into a wry smile. "You have excellent taste yourself," she told Ajalia, who smiled.
"I want to shock the city," Ajalia told Calles. "I want them to look at Delmar, and then at Ocher, and Rane, and I want them to look at Card, and at Chad, and then at my servants, and I want them to wish in their hearts that they looked so fine as the smallest servant boy in my house."
"What about your women?" Calles asked, but Ajalia waved her hand.
"The girls I have are not ready for spectacle," Ajalia said. "I am still breaking them in." Calles looked speculatively at Chad.
"Have you got measures, for those men?" Calles asked. Ajalia shook her head.
"I haven't," Ajalia said, "but Ocher at least, and Chad will dress in any way I choose."
"That is an awfully presumptuous thing to say," Chad interrupted. Leed had eaten his food, and put on his new shoes, and he came into the room now, and stood near Ajalia.
"I can take measurements," Leed said. He looked up at Calles, his fringe of brown hair falling into his eyes. "And you'll do anything Ajalia tells you do," Leed told Chad. Chad made a face at the boy.
"Show me you can measure," Calles told the boy, giving him a cord from her pocket. Ajalia went to the door of the chamber, and looked down at the hall. She was waiting for Ocher to come; she had asked, in her writing, for him to see her as soon as he could. She did not know when Delmar had planned to visit Ocher, to discuss the prisoners he had taken. Ajalia felt slightly out of sorts; she had not yet gotten used to Delmar going about and conducting official business. She shook herself, and turned back to watch Leed, who was deftly measuring Chad up and down, and telling Calles the lengths. Calles was nodding with approval, and watching the boy.
"You are competent," Calles told the boy, who thrust his chin out a little, and glared at her, as if she had insulted him. "It will be faster," Calles told Ajalia, "if you lend me Sun, and Ossa again."
"I have a new girl, Minna," Ajalia told Calles. "She seems sweet." Calles's mouth dimpled into a smile, and she gathered up the clothes that Ajalia had laid out.
"You go and bring me a paper," Calles told Leed, "that has the measures for the new Thief Lord, and anyone else she tells you." Calles nodded towards Ajalia, and gave Leed the measuring cord.
"Go and get Ossa, and Sun," Ajalia told Leed. "Tell them to bring Minna, and come downstairs with their sewing things." Leed bundled the measuring cord into his pocket, and ran out of the room, his new leather shoes slapping loudly on the white stone floor.
"He seems like a sharp boy," Calles told Ajalia, her eyes on Leed's retreating back.
"His name is Leed," Ajalia said. Calles went to Chad, and began to pluck meditatively at his clothes. Chad looked at the fabric merchant's wife, and his arms lifted a little into the air, as if he were unsure of what he should do.
"Your boots are lovely," Calles told Chad, and the young man beamed.
"Thank you," Chad said politely. Ajalia told herself that Chad was becoming positively pleasant to have around; she reflected that she had thought seriously of disposing of his services only a few weeks ago. She was glad that he was turning out so well. Once Chad had settled into the rhythm of his work, and gotten used to managing the servant boys who formed Ajalia's cleaning crews, his personality had seemed, all at once, to mellow, and Ajalia suspected that he would soon become almost clever.
"I like your idea," Calles said, her fingers tucking in the sides of Chad's tunic, "of hemming in the sides. This young man told me," she explained, "what you did to the Thief Lord's clothes."
"You told me to explain what you wanted," Chad said, his mouth trembling with something like a smile.
"I'd like stronger lines," Ajalia told Calles, taking Chad's clothes around the waist, and pulling them, to show the woman, "around here, and coming down from the shoulders."
Calles watched Ajalia fold the fabric, and she nodded thoughtfully.
"I saw your Eastern robes," Calles said, "and how they pleated here." She touched Chad's shoulders, and the young man flinched, and blushed. He looked acutely uncomfortable with Ajalia and Calles hovering around him, and pushing and pulling at his clothes.
"If you put a panel here," Ajalia said, tucking Chad's tunic up so that the lower half was folded up against his shoulder, "and had two layers, just here—"
"Oh, yes," Calles said at once, her eyes taking in the thicker body of fabric that was the result. "I see what you mean," she said, and laid out one of Delmar's new tunics. "We can cut this open at the sides," Calles said, indicating with her fingers, "and then build up the shape here, and along the front."
"What do you think of pleats along the back waist?" Ajalia asked. She turned Chad, who moved like a clumsy clockwork doll, and folded over his tunic where it lay over his lower back.
"I'm not sure," Calles said. "It would look very fine, on a woman."
"Yes," Ajalia agreed. They both stared at Chad, and Chad looked at them, and then at the floor, and then at his hands. "I'd like him to carry some kind of a knife, if only a plain one at his waist," Ajalia commented, and Chad jiggled a little in alarm, and squeaked.
"I don't want a knife," Chad protested.
"No, not you," Ajalia told him, patting his arm.
"Oh," Chad said, and then he looked crestfallen.
"We don't carry weapons openly here, except for the guards," Calles told Ajalia. Ajalia studied Chad's waist, and then turned to the older woman.
"What about in Talbos?" Ajalia asked. Calles could not keep an expression of distaste out of her face at the mention of the other city; Ajalia reflected that she had been spoiled by talking to Delmar and Rane about Talbos, and to Ocher. She reminded herself that the majority of the Slavithe people tacitly pretended that "the other city," as they called Talbos, did not exist.
"Do people carry weapons there?" Ajalia asked. She had only visited the city of Talbos once, near nightfall, and she had not visited the central part of the city.
Calles glanced at Chad, and then looked back to Ajalia. The seamstress's eyes were anxious.
"Yes," Calles said, a little scorn entering her tone. "They do."
"Good," Ajalia said, almost to herself.
"Why is that good?" Calles demanded. Her eyes were a little bright, and Ajalia saw that Calles was attached to the idea of Slavithe as a superior place to live.
"Do you want to hear the truth," Ajalia asked Calles, "or do you want to hear something comfortable?" Calles glanced again at Chad, as though the fabric merchant's wife felt that this talk would corrupt Chad's innocent young mind. Ajalia smiled in her heart, because she thought that Chad did not need any protecting at all. Chad would benefit, she thought, from a great deal more roughing-up than she had hitherto given him.
"I want to know the truth," Calles said. "Why should our own Thief Lord pattern himself after their ways?"
"Because I think it is very likely," Ajalia said, lowering her voice, and looking in a conspiratorial fashion at Chad, "that Delmar will rule in both places."
Chad looked dumbstruck. When Ajalia had first lowered her tone, and begun to speak as though she told secrets, the young man's eyebrows had hopped up eagerly, and his lips had parted a little, but when he had heard what she had to say, he stood very still and quiet. Calles's eyes were sharp, and her mouth was calculating.
"Do you really think so?" Calles asked. Ajalia shrugged.
"Delmar has done more," Ajalia said, "in the last four hours to protect the city of Slavithe from harm than his father had done in his whole life. Who is to say," Ajalia added, "that the king of the other city will not see the advantages of an open alliance?" Calles looked again at Delmar, and then back at Ajalia.
"But an alliance would not make Delmar the ruler there," Calles suggested. She looked as though she wanted to hear more, but felt a little guilt
y for speaking of such things. Ajalia hid a smile; she saw that Chad and Calles were watching her assiduously, and she let the hint of her smile show on her mouth.
"I can't say any more," Ajalia told them. "What I've said is no more than my own thought," she added, and Calles and Chad exchanged looks. Ajalia told herself that there would be rumors rampant in the city by nightfall, and she went to the door of the room, and looked out into the hall. She was watching for Leed, and for the girls she had sent him for, but instead she saw Ocher walking into the temple. He saw her, and changed his direction. Ajalia glanced into the room at Calles and Chad; she saw that they both had looks on their faces, like eager gossips who wait for an inconvenient person to exit the scene, and she smiled again.
"I'll be back in a little while," Ajalia told Calles, and Calles, who was smoothing her hands over the clothes that she held, nodded agreeably. Ajalia went out towards Ocher, and met him in the hall.
Ocher had the two pieces of paper in his hand, that Ajalia had sent with Card, and a strangely hungry look was in the bearded man's eyes.
"Good afternoon," Ajalia said in a friendly voice.
"What does this mean?" Ocher demanded, thrusting out the papers in Ajalia's general direction. "I had hoped," Ocher said in a rush, "that you would not be serious when you told me you would get me a wife. You can't find me a wife," he said, "and in any case, I'm too old, and no woman would take me."
"I see that Card found you," Ajalia said.
"He's gone back to the quarries," Ocher said dismissively. "What does this mean?" he demanded. Ajalia turned a little, so that she had a clear view of the stairs at the end of the temple. Calles and Chad were out of sight in the other room. Ajalia looked at the stairs, and she thought of what she wanted to say first.
"I have a question," she told Ocher, "about the boy named Bain."
Ocher's eyes darkened, and his beard grew stiff.
"What do you want to know?" he asked in a guarded voice. "I came to see about my wife," he told Ajalia sourly. Ajalia heard that Ocher felt acutely uncomfortable; he looked as though he thought she was playing an elaborate prank on him.
"I am not teasing you," Ajalia told the man. "I have several girls who at present are knocking about my house and being in the way. They are poor, and their prospects are very bad."
"Why?" Ocher demanded. "And what makes you think I would want such a girl?" Ajalia eyed Ocher; he was on edge, she saw, and would snap easily.
"I got two new girls today," Ajalia told him. "They were the girls who carried the rug for Tree, and they have nowhere else to go." Ajalia did not know if this was true or not, but she thought that the phrase sounded well enough, and she did not want to frighten Ocher with too many fussy details.
"So?" Ocher demanded, his face turned suspiciously to Ajalia.
"They are too young," Ajalia told him. Ocher glared at Ajalia.
"Are you backing out of our deal?" Ocher asked harshly.
"I am telling you that I am serious," Ajalia said. "I am prepared to house and groom any one of these girls for several years. It will not take years, I think," she added, "because you are an attractive prospect, and the lucky child will be motivated to learn." Ocher's eyes vibrated a little, and he blinked.
"What do you mean by groom?" Ocher asked. He was beginning to sound interested, in spite of his nervousness, and his lips were pressed firmly together. Ajalia looked at Ocher, and she thought about his colors, which she had examined when she'd taken Beryl's soul out of his body.
"You are not a bad man," Ajalia said. Ocher's lips twisted, and he breathed in to speak, but Ajalia cut him off. "You have sense," she told him, "and you are powerful. You are the kind of man," she said, "that a sensible female dreams of marrying."
"Are you a sensible woman?" Ocher asked quickly. He was looking narrowly at Ajalia, and his eyes were cunning. Ajalia did not smile at him.
"I am a taken woman," Ajalia told him. "I am off the market, as it were." Ocher's nose and mouth made a little pushing-out motion, as though he had suspected she would say this, but could not stop himself from trying. "You would not like me at all," Ajalia told him, for what felt to her like the fourth time. "I am not at all as nice as I look," she added.
"I don't think you know anything about how you are," Ocher said.
"I know very well what I am," Ajalia told Ocher, "and Delmar has gone through a great deal to keep me. I do not think you have any real interest in me. You want my power," she said, before Ocher could interrupt, and Ocher's whole expression drew together. "I have power," Ajalia said again, "and you are a man who appreciates power."
Ocher watched her, and Ajalia saw that he was thinking over what she said. She saw that her words were beginning to filter into his mind; she could say more now, she thought.
"I would like you to be settled," Ajalia told him, "and I would like for you to be content."
"Then I want—" Ocher began.
"It's not going to happen," Ajalia told Ocher, looking straight into his eyes. "If Delmar was dead, it would not happen. If I had never met Delmar," she said, "it would not happen. You are a very nice man," she told Ocher, "and you are a tempting package to any woman, but not to me. My loyalties are to my master in the East, and now to Delmar here. You have no place in my heart. I am interested in your development as an ally, and I want you to be contented, because you are my friend."
Ocher's lips had drawn into a tight line through this speech; he glared at Ajalia, and she could see that he was thinking of what she would say or do if he tried to kiss her.
"Let us meet your young ladies," Ajalia told Ocher, "and then we can talk." Ocher make a jerking motion with his hand, but he swallowed down whatever protest had risen to his lips.
"Where are they?" he asked, and Ajalia gestured to the stairs.
OSSA
"Three of them will be down at any moment," she told Ocher. "If they do not suit you, I have two more."
"I want to see all of them," Ocher said stubbornly. He was looking askance at Ajalia, and she could see that he was thinking over what she had said. "I'm too old for them," he added, a little mutinously.
"They are not young enough for me to protect them from life," Ajalia told him. "My boys are young. These young ladies, as far as I am concerned, are fair game." She thought of Sharo, and of that young woman's boasting and pleased expression. She felt the tinge of a wish that Sharo would prove to be Ocher's favorite. The girl had already resigned herself, Ajalia thought with a smile, to married life.
Leed and Minna came down the stairs first; they were followed by Ossa and Sun. Ocher's eyes were turned at once on Minna; Ajalia knew that Ocher had seen Minna before. Recognition and mild interest were in the bearded man's eyes. Ajalia knew that Ocher was old enough to be the father of any of her girls, but he was not by any stretch of the imagination an old man, and his face was still young and fresh. He was, Ajalia thought, a strangely innocent person. She was sure that he had never had any children, and she suspected, when she had heard that Beryl was not allowed to be intimate, that he really had lived with his wife in name only. He was not exactly a hoary old partner, she reflected, and she watched his eyes as he moved his gaze to Ossa, and then to Sun.
Leed and Minna came up to Ajalia, and the two girls followed them. Sun and Ossa each had bags in their hands. Sun looked at Ajalia, and then at Ocher.
"Are we going to live with Calles again?" Sun asked boldly. Sun was dressed in one of the Slavithe gowns that Calles had given Ajalia; the girl's dark yellow hair had been twisted a little, so that it lay away from her temples, and her expression was like that of a pushing puppy. Her chin was thrust forward, and her eyes were too aggressive. Ajalia saw Ocher's gaze pass over Sun's cornflower blue eyes, and her thin lips, and he looked over at Ossa. Ajalia saw that Sun held no interest for Ocher.
"Go upstairs and change," Ajalia told Sun. Sun frowned, and glanced at Ossa, who was wearing the garb of a Slavithe man. "You're staying with Calles, for a little," Ajalia told the girl. "
You have no need for finery there."
Sun, looking a little crushed, glanced at Ocher, and then went back towards the stairs. Ocher met Ajalia's eyes briefly, and shook his head a fraction.
"Not her," Ocher said. Ajalia nodded, and folded her arms.
Ocher was still holding the two pieces of paper; Ajalia saw his fingers tighten over them protectively as he watched Ossa's face. Ossa, when she heard what Ocher had said, looked at Ajalia, and then glanced back at the retreating form of Sun. Ajalia saw Ossa's lips compress a little, and the thickset girl looked speculatively up at Ocher's face. Ajalia had talked to Ossa and Sun before, about marriage, and Ajalia thought that the girl was thinking now of what she had said.
"What's your name?" Ocher asked, his eyes guarded. Ossa looked at Ocher, and her expression was just as withdrawn as the bearded man's.
"Ossa," the girl said slowly. Ocher looked quickly at Ajalia, and then back at Ossa.
"How old are you?" he asked. Leed was standing next to Ajalia now, his arms folded like hers, and his face tipped up to Ocher. Leed looked as though he was watching Ocher narrowly, and readying himself to jump to Ajalia's defense, if he felt that the older man tried to pull any funny business.
"I'm seventeen," Ossa said clearly. Her eyes were quite shielded; the corners of Ocher's mouth tugged a little upwards. Ajalia thought that she could see Ocher judging Ossa, and finding her to run deep. Ocher looked as though he wanted to speak to Ossa, but then he glanced at Minna, who seemed to hold no interest for him, and then he looked over at Ajalia.
"Is this all of them?" he asked. Ajalia knew he had heard her, when she had told him there were two others, but she let him be brusque; she figured he was trying to make himself feel more in control of the situation. She could see a ruddy flush at the very base of his neck, and she was sure that he was very hot, and that his mouth was dry. Within Ocher's large body, and under his thick beard, Ajalia thought that she could see the echo of a boy of nineteen, looking shyly out at Ossa. Ajalia had seen older men married to younger ones, and save for one instance, the partnerships had been uneven, and unfair. She had no intention of tying one of her servant girls into a marriage of misery, but she had seen into Ocher's heart, and she had found a kind of pure young man hiding there, who had never found someone to love. Ocher, Ajalia thought, would be a just husband, and a decent man, if he was married to a woman he respected. Beryl, she was sure, had never been such a one.