by Sharon Green
"Well, what do you know," I commented, leaving it to Traixe to hear the very soft observation. "It's finally taken off its cloak. I wonder if it's chilly now."
If Traixe heard me he didn't respond immediately, but the observation was true. The Flower stood in nothing but flowing trousers, long-sleeved tunic, swordbelt and boots. Red swordbelt and red boots. I was about to say something about people's appetites having to have been ruined after seeing something like that, but Traixe spoke first.
"I think the duke could use someone on his side right now," he said, taking my arm. "Are you remembering what you'll be doing with Lord Kylin?"
"I'm remembering what I'd like to do with Lord Kylin," I answered, unhooking my arm from his gentle grip without looking at him. "If at any time that doesn't suit you, just let me know and I'll be glad to leave. Unless and until that happens, just remember the role played by the general strategist once the battle is in full swing. You've appointed me to the position of field commander, and that's what I intend being."
With that I simply walked away from him, and I didn't have to look back to know how he was reacting to what I'd said. Traixe had never been one to stand with arms folded, watching while others fought, but that's what he'd be doing now, or he and my father could do their fighting without me. I didn't like any part of what was happening, and I couldn't help thinking that if I had any sense at all I'd walk out of there and leave them all to play their little games together.
Making my way across the floor proved not difficult at all, even though half the people there seemed to want to ask me my opinion of what was going on, or give me the details of theirs. Each in turn would start to approach me with a smile, suddenly notice the expression I wore and the way my left hand rested on my hilt, and then they would step back into their former places in the crowd. Since by then they knew exactly how I felt about the entire situation and no longer had the need to ask, I was able to get where I was going quickly and directly. My father looked up when he saw me approaching, which made the … man with him turn around and immediately fix me with a light-eyed stare.
"Ah, Lady Sofaltis, how delightful to see you again," he said with what was almost a giggle, bowing grandly in my direction. "The moments since our last meeting have seemed like ages."
"That's odd," I said, stopping about three feet in front of him. "To me they seemed exactly like moments."
And then I fell silent and just stood waiting. If he was all that taken with me, he could carry the conversational burden, at least for a while. And possibly during that time he would learn not to make inane comments. He stood there looking down at me, expecting me to add to what I'd said, but after some more of those moments he'd mentioned he finally realized there weren't going to be any additions. At that point he stopped looking expectant and cleared his throat.
"Yes, indeed, just like moments." he offered, working to get his smile back in place. "How delightfully clever of you to phrase it exactly that way. The gentlemen of your acquaintance must find you a most stimulating partner for conversation."
"Oh, my, yes," I agreed, flashing him the most suggestive grin I could come up with. "If there's one thing the gentlemen of my acquaintance have always said about me, it's that I'm a stimulating partner. I'm so glad you agree."
"Uh, yes, most certainly I agree," he mumbled, actually backing a step as though I'd advanced on him. His expression had turned peculiar as well, and suddenly I knew I'd stumbled on exactly the right line of pursuit. Our Lord Flower disliked references to intimate relations, and that meant he'd named the subject we'd be talking about most.
"I think it's time we began the Feasting," my father said to no one in particular while signaling to a servant with a gong who stood at the wall behind the main board. "Kindly follow me to our places at table."
"Allow me to escort you, my lady," the Flower said, coming out of whatever had been bothering him fast enough to step forward with his arm out. The servant was stroking the gong and my father was already moving toward the board, and the conversation in the room was beginning to fall off as people started heading for their own boards. With Traixe still behind me I should have been trapped into taking the Flower's arm, but sometimes ignorance or innocence can get you out of a trap faster than intelligence and experience.
"Oh, that's all right, I know the way," I answered with a small laugh, as though he were being silly and amusing, ignoring the arm being held out to me. "It's only a few steps, so why would I need an escort?"
I turned alone and moved after my father, leaving the Flower with his arm out and a confused look in his eyes. It was then up to Traixe whether or not he wanted to take the arm, but a quick glance back showed he didn't. As I moved along the board to its center, I decided that that was too bad; at the very least it would have given my father's guests an additional topic of conversation.
My father took his place in the Great Chair at the center of the board, and I almost walked past him before it came to me that the chair to his immediate right was mine. The last time I'd been there my brother Endrin had had the place, with Rymar to his right. The chair to my father's left was always kept empty, a tribute to my mother, and to the left of that was where I'd usually sat with Traixe beside me. If my sisters had been older they were the ones who would have been to my left, but they had been too young to be brought to Feastings. They were still too young, which made the number of our family members at that board distressingly few.
"Allow me, my lady," the Flower said, helping me with the chair as I began to seat myself. He certainly was fast at overcoming surprise, not to mention persistent, and his smile suggested he was being generous with something that was really his. As my father's oldest child the place to his right was mine, but only until I married. After that my husband would be my father's heir, and the place would be taken by him. The Flower's smile said that it would be silly to take a stand on betrothal rights - which he could have done - when the matter would be settled permanently in so short a time, and simply lowered himself into the chair beside me without a murmur. I decided it was a good thing my father hadn't adopted the use of glass tableware like certain of those of high position in the north, and sat back to try recapturing the hold I'd had on my temper.
When everyone in the hall was finally seated, Traixe rose from his place in my old chair and asked Evon's blessing for all those attending the Feasting, as well as a special blessing for those the Feasting honored. That, of course, meant dear Lord Kylin and me, and officially began the three days of celebration traditional before the wedding ceremony. I could feel the Flower's eyes on me and sensed his deep satisfaction, two reactions I still found impossible to understand. When he said "my lady" I kept getting the feeling he meant "my lady", and that brought me the sensation of corners closing in. I had to find out what his specific interest was, and then do my damnedest to kill it.
Traixe's invocation was as short and to the point as ever, and then the balance of the food began coming. Fried and stewed meats and fish, chicken of every possible description, breaded boar and edged venison, vegetables and breads and cheeses and greens. Four different kinds of soup with sixteen varieties of trimmings and dunkings, and with it all the wine and brew flowed like an unending waterfall. No one alive could have found fault with the Feast offering, and that seemed to lighten my father's mood to the point where he began talking to Traixe over the empty chair between them. That, unfortunately, left only a single someone for me to talk to, a circumstance which the someone was quick to take advantage of.
"I must admit this is most likely the finest Feasting I have ever attended," my lord Flower allowed graciously, holding his cup out so that it might be refilled from the wine pitcher of a hovering servant. "May I inquire, my lady, as to which of these dishes is your favorite?"
"I think I would have to say the boar," I told him, holding my own cup out to a servant with brew. "I've always found a great attraction in roasting boors - ah - boars."
He was sipping at his wine when I said
that, and if he'd been swallowing at it instead he probably would have choked. As it was he was reduced to coughing for a moment, and when he raised his head I was surprised to see that what had started the fit was laughter.
"Clearly I'll need to be more cautious in future," he said, lowering his head again to give one last cough into his hand. "The dangers of so excellent a wine, a mis-swallow in over-eagerness … I do hope you'll forgive me."
The gaze that came back to me was sober again, just as though the laughter had never been, and that gave me another puzzle to worry at. If he thought what I'd said was funny why would he pretend instead that he'd swallowed wrong? It didn't make any more sense than the rest of it, and I decided it was time to ask a few questions of my own.
"Whyever would you care about my forgiveness?" I came back, for the first time looking straight at him. "You can't possibly believe I'm here of my own free will, so what difference does it make how I feel?"
"My dear lady Sofaltis, in a matter of days you will be my wife," he returned, the protest absolutely prim and proper, but with the shadow of something else behind it. "How could I not be concerned with your feelings? I look forward to the time with an eagerness I would have you share, and find myself distressed that I seem unable to accomplish that objective. Am I so loathsome to you, that you cannot even accept my concern?"
Yes, I wanted to say, absolutely and inarguably yes, but with those light, innocent, vulnerable eyes on me I just couldn't do it. He might have been a Flower, but apparently even Flowers had feelings.
"You still haven't really said why you would feel concern," I compromised, ignoring the subject I didn't care to get into. "All nonsense about marriage aside, you don't know me and don't need to know me, something that would please any other member of your … persuasion. Why this sudden and unexpected push for the attention of the fly caught in the middle of the web?"
"I, myself, find my reactions somewhat surprising," he said, somehow making me think he was trying to look surprised. "Despite my father's many and varied attempts at interesting me in the fair sex, I've never before discovered a woman worthy of my sincere interest. Now, however, that seems to have changed, and I am smitten with the woman who will be my wife. Happily, happily smitten."
He beamed at me then, to show just how happily, I suppose, and I felt the need to check on the quality of the brew my cup had been refilled with. Even he didn't know what he found so attractive about me, which meant I had almost no chance of countering that attraction. But I had to counter it, or my future would be as black as my leathers.
"And so, my lady, I shall not allow you to speak of yourself as 'a fly caught in the middle of a web,'" he went on, and I looked at him again to see the ridiculously stern expression he was now bending on me. "You are the woman who has been pledged to me in marriage, and I mean to dedicate myself to your happiness."
"Do you really," I said, suddenly annoyed that a Flower would even consider "not allowing" a Blade to do something. "I feel a great admiration for those who are dedicated, and I'm wondering how you intend to proceed with your intentions. What if I don't want to be happy?"
"Then I shall certainly take great delight in making you unhappy," he said soberly, then raised a hand to titter behind it. "Meaning, of course, that if being unhappy will make you happy, then I shall see to the matter that way. As I told you, I am completely dedicated."
"Completely dedicated," I echoed in a mutter, staring balefully at his scatterbrained amusement. "There was a free worker in a night house I used to frequent who told me that once, but it turned out he was misphrasing. What he should have said was that he was completely inadequate to the task at hand."
I expected the Flower to continue assuring me how capable he was, but instead his smile went vacant even as his expression brightened, and suddenly he found a renewed appetite for what was on the platter in front of him. At first I couldn't understand so odd a reaction, and then I remembered it wasn't the first time he'd reacted that way. I was desperate enough to try anything to discourage him, and that sort of anything wasn't difficult at all.
"Yes, I've found there are both benefits and drawbacks for women who use night houses," I commented, as though unaware of his new preoccupation with food. "One of the benefits, of course, is the constant variety, but strangely enough that's also one of the drawbacks. You look for the workers who really have learned to do it right, but in order to find them you have to go through a large number of gropers. Then, after you've made the effort and have learned who your favorites are, the word somehow gets around to the other female Blades and you walk in to find all your favorites already claimed for the night. Sometimes it's downright discouraging."
"You must have had quite a lot of adventures as a Blade," he responded, still paying an inordinate amount of attention to eating. "Fighting in battle is quite horrendous, I'm sure, and I can't imagine how you keep from being frightened. If it were I, I would be quite beside myself."
"Anyone who isn't frightened in battle isn't safe to fight beside," I said, silently congratulating him for managing to get three "quites" into his little speech. It was one more than the messenger who had led me into the trap had gotten, but it wasn't enough to distract me from my original topic - as he seemed to have been trying to do.
"The fool who isn't afraid has no real interest in staying alive," I said after pausing to swallow at my brew. "Fighters with sense let their fears protect them, but once the battle is over you have to cope with relief reactions. Sometimes that means nothing more than uncontrollable shaking, but once you've been a Blade for a while it most often comes out as outrageous silliness. I remember one time when battle's end left my Fist not far from a stream, and even though it had already begun turning really cold, four of us stripped and jumped into the water. We might have been laughing on our way in, but once we hit the icy-coldness there wasn't anything to be heard but howls. Then Foist blundered into me, and immediately decided he knew how to warm up even in that liquid ice. He pulled me close and began running his hands over me, trying to make it possible, you see, but he was so cold that even touching me didn't - "
I broke off my story and just sat there with brows raised high, pretending to be surprised when Lord Flower hastily excused himself, surged to his feet, then hurried away from the board. Once he was gone I sat back in my chair with a satisfied inner smile, wondering just how far I'd be able to take that tactic. I didn't know if it would be enough to send him running even from a ceremony he was "eagerly looking forward to," but a little more experimentation ought to give me the answer.
"Sofaltis, what have you done?" my father asked suddenly, just as though he didn't approve. Traixe had left his place to hurry after our guest in distress, which meant I'd have to question him later. Whatever he found out was bound to be a help for our side.
"I'm terribly sorry, Father," I answered, looking at him with sorrowful sincerity. "I seem to have distressed Lord Kylin with something I said. Wouldn't it be awful if he decided he didn't want to marry me after all?"
My father's expression went through rapid change as I drained my cup of the brew it held, but he had it under control again as I got to my feet and bowed my request to be excused. He had seemed to be anxious to question me, but knew as well as I that that wasn't the place for it. In a way I was glad not to need to stay through an explanation; the hall had grown very close despite the opening of the window doors leading to the battlements, and I needed a short stroll in the cool night air I could see beyond the lamplight. By the time I got back Lord Flower might be ready for another treatment, which meant I was actually looking forward to seeing him again. I nodded pleasantly to the circulating guests, and just kept going until I was through the doors.
* * *
Traixe hurried out after the young man who had left the hall right before him, but he didn't manage to catch up until they had put two long corridors between themselves and the feasters. When Lord Kylin opened his mouth to speak Traixe quickly gestured him to silence,
then led the way to a door not far from where they'd been. Inside was the small chamber Traixe used when he needed to speak to one of his Fighters in his capacity as a priest of Evon, and once a lamp was lit and the door closed behind him, the older Fighter turned to the younger.
"All right, now we can speak as we please," he said to Lord Kylin, studying the younger man's agitation. "I hope you're not going to tell me she's actually managed to find something to make you change your mind."
"That sounded like a really excellent plan to keep her occupied when we decided on it," Kylin answered, running a big hand through his streaky blond-brown hair. "I particularly liked it because it meant I would have the chance to get to know her, but I'm afraid she's picked up on something that's going to give me trouble."
Kylin's expression of discomforted near-embarrassment was familiar enough to Traixe to keep him silent but encouraging while he gestured to one of the comfortable chairs the chamber held. Kylin barely hesitated before going over to drop into it, then waited for Traixe to do the same before gesturing vaguely.
"You have to stop to remember how many weeks I've been practicing and living this part," the younger man said in an effort to explain what was bothering him. "If I'd taken time out for relief on the way and someone found out about it the lapse could have ruined everything, so I didn't take time out. I haven't often gone that long without a woman before, but there were other things to distract me and I knew it wouldn't be forever. Then I got here and met Sofaltis instead of the pale, frightened little thing I'd been expecting, and suddenly everything changed. For an entire hour before the Feasting, my mind refused to think about anything but what our wedding night would be like."
Traixe nodded sympathetically, understanding what the other man meant. The girl wasn't an eye-stopping beauty, but when she walked into a room she tended to draw attention. To keep from thinking about bedding her would be difficult for any normal man; for the man who had come to take her to wife, it would have to be three times worse.