by Glenda Larke
Basalt nodded again.
And I trust you about as far as I can throw you, Jasper thought.
“Laisa,” he continued, “tomorrow I will appoint you Highlord of Breccia, as long as you endeavour to make sure Lord Gold doesn’t harm Terelle. And I think I should also warn you I’ll not countenance any attempt by you to control the water matters of this city. They are my affair.”
Cautiously, she murmured her assent and added, “What about Senya? This is your baby.”
“I will talk to Senya about the conditions of this proposed marriage. It will have to be in name only, but I don’t believe she’ll regard that as onerous. If she’s still agreeable after our discussion, I’ll marry her the day after she has given birth to a healthy child—assuming that there’s nothing about the baby or the date of its birth to indicate it’s not mine. I’ll then acknowledge it as mine. If I remember correctly, that will legitimise the child under Scarpen law.”
She considered that briefly, then nodded. “Agreed. And I assure you that, to best of my knowledge, the child is yours.”
Throughout this conversation, Basalt had been struggling up into a sitting position. Jasper now stepped back to give him room. “And as for you, my lord, you’ll extend your mercy to Terelle Grey, acknowledging to your council that she was working in the service of the Quartern and its Cloudmaster, not indulging in evil sorcery. In return, when she comes back to Breccia, I’ll undertake to see that she uses the magic power of her waterpainting only in the service of the Quartern. I’ll make sure she doesn’t diminish religious faith in the Scarpen or threaten anyone’s belief in the Sunlord.”
For the third time Basalt nodded.
Jasper continued. “There is one other suggestion I’d like to make. Given our antipathy, perhaps you would consider removing the seat of your Council of Watergivers, and indeed the seat of the Sunpriest, to another city of your choice. Considering the poverty of Breccia at the moment, this might well benefit you anyway. At the beginning of every cycle, as long as you keep your side of the bargain, I’ll make a substantial donation to the Sun Temple of whichever city you choose, as long as it is not this one, to last throughout your lifetime.
“Now, will those terms be agreeable to you?”
He reached out and helped the Sunpriest to his feet. Once up, Basalt shook him off. “The conditions are acceptable,” he said with little semblance of civility. “Rest assured that I’ll be delighted to establish the main Sun Temple elsewhere. I wouldn’t want to stay in the same city as a ruler of your moral depravity!”
“Then we’re in accord,” Jasper said. “I don’t particularly want a man of your ridiculous unbending moral rectitude in my city. Laisa, would you be so kind as to dry Lord Gold’s clothes?”
While she obliged by extracting the water and returning it to the family jar, he returned his sword to its scabbard and gave orders to the single guard still outside the door, telling him to see Lord Gold out and to offer him a chair back to the temple. “There was a minor accident with the family jar and he is a little shaken,” he finished.
The guard’s lips did not twitch even the slightest. “Yes, my lord.”
As the Sunpriest brushed by them both on his way out, Jasper added, “By the way, armsman, I would hate to hear that an insignificant incident like this has become the subject of gossip.”
“Yes, my lord.”
Jasper closed the door, took a deep breath and turned to Laisa.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Scarpen Quarter
Breccia City
Breccia Hall, Level Two
Jasper was shaky, as if his knees had turned to water. He sat down in a straight-backed chair opposite Laisa.
She said, “That was very smart of you—offering him compensation to move. Sometimes you surprise me, Jasper.”
“Bribery works wonders with criminals,” he snapped. “Now, two things for you, Laisa. First, a warning. I expect your rule of this city to be in its best interest. I’ll not take kindly to any attempt by you to grow rich at the expense of the city’s poor. If I’m unhappy, I guarantee you won’t like the way I remedy the situation.”
She didn’t react, so he moved on. “My second point is more a question. Do you know why Taquar was so set on Senya seducing me? Did he intend me to father her child, and if so, what was his motive?”
“I’m sorry, Jasper, I don’t know. I’m as intrigued as you are, and as mystified. If he ever told Senya the truth, she didn’t confide in me. From something she said once, I think he just spun her a tale about how he wanted more stormlords born as soon as possible, and she was fool enough to believe it.” She shrugged, hands held palm up. “But we both know that’s unlikely to be the real reason.”
He suspected she was telling the truth, and that unsettled him. Taquar had been up to something. It would pay him to find out what, before it was sprung on him as an obnoxious surprise. Picking up the waterpainting he had dropped, he left her for the stormquest room without saying anything more. Once there, he leaned back against the door and took a deep breath. Nothing would ever be more painful than seeing Citrine killed, but betraying the woman he loved came close.
Terelle. You don’t deserve this. He closed his eyes, picturing her face, remembering the feel of her water against his, the sound of her voice, the touch of her hand. And that bastard had threatened her. No, worse, he had persuaded the Council of Waterpriests to condemn her to death. And because he’d made it a religious matter, the Council had the legal power to do it, leaving Jasper with no real choice.
Marriage to Senya. He could hardly think of it without feeling sick. How would it make Terelle feel? To save her life, he was going to betray her! Utterly and damnably. How was it possible to love her so much, and yet do something that would make her so wretched?
Damn you, Jasper Bloodstone. Damn you, damn you, damn you.
He didn’t know if she’d ever forgive him, but he did know he would never forgive himself.
That evening, Jasper sent a message to Senya saying he would like to dine with her alone. She duly arrived in his private dining room, unsmiling and wary.
“I have asked the servants to leave the serving dishes on the table so that we have some privacy.” He pulled out a chair for her, and she seated herself without greeting him. She looked tired and ungainly, and not particularly triumphant at her victory. He wondered if she was regretting her decision to seduce him now that she was dealing with the reality of a pregnancy. That she had intended to fall pregnant he had no doubt.
She waited for him to serve her, but he didn’t oblige. He put food onto his own plate and poured himself some water, wishing it was wine. “When is the baby due?” he asked.
“As if you don’t know,” she sneered.
He didn’t. For a start, he was a little vague about the exact length of a pregnancy. More to the point, he was vague about the actual date of the seduction; so much had happened since then. A war. So many deaths. Finding Mica and losing him all over again. Finding Ryka and Kaneth—and losing them all over again too. Finding Terelle. Being made Cloudmaster. Learning how to stormshift with Terelle. Losing Terelle, all over again. He felt like getting up and walking away, not stopping until he was back in the Gibber…
Instead, he said evenly, “No, I don’t know.”
“Any time now.”
“I would apologise, if I didn’t know that you and Taquar planned this together, and that he showed you how best to make it hard for me to say no at a time when I was vulnerable and friendless.”
She pouted. A year earlier it might have appeared attractive; now it just appeared childishly silly. “You did say you would marry me.”
“Yes, I did. I apologise for changing my mind. Frankly, though, I don’t understand why you want to marry me. After all that has happened to Breccia, no one cares about propriety any more. And you are the last cloudmaster’s granddaughter, young, attractive, a rainlord. There must be many young men in other cities who would love to marry you. If you
don’t want to be bothered with this child, I’ll see to it that she is properly cared for.”
She spooned food onto her plate while he was speaking, as if she was not paying attention. He blinked at the amount she took.
He pushed on as she started to eat. “I guess what I’m trying to say is, why in all the Sweepings do you want to marry a man who doesn’t love you and doesn’t want you?”
“You wanted me once,” she said with a sly smile and licked some gravy off her lower lip.
“Believe me, that’s never going to happen again. If you want to be bedded, you’ll have to go elsewhere and I won’t acknowledge any more children you may have. They certainly won’t be mine.”
“In the Gibber and on the lower levels here, maybe it doesn’t matter if unmarried women have children, but if you think it makes no difference to uplevellers, you have sand for brains. If you don’t marry me, I’ll never be accepted back into Breccian society.”
“There isn’t much left of Breccian society,” he pointed out.
“There will be once Mama is in control. And I’ll see to it that there is, too. But I must be married to the father of this brat, and you know it. Oh, people will forgive us—you and me—because of the war and everything, as long as in the end you do the right thing. But if you don’t, your daughter will be a bastard, and respectable families will cut her dead in the streets if she as much as smiles in their direction.”
His heart missed a beat as he thought of his unborn daughter. Sunblast it, the little bitch is probably right. I might be able to do it to Senya, but I can’t do it to a child. Any child.
She chatted on, sampling the dishes as she talked, oblivious to his sudden disinterest in his food. “I don’t want to bed you, so that part doesn’t matter. And I’m never going to have another child.” She shuddered. “To puke up my breakfast and to look like a pregnant goat all over again? Never!” She waved a fork at him. “I want to be the stormlord’s wife, just like you promised back when we were in Scarcleft. Only now it’s not just the stormlord’s wife, it’s the Cloudmaster’s wife. That makes me the most important woman in the Quartern.”
He frowned and pushed his plate away. Did she really think being someone’s wife made her more important than, say, Lord Ouina ruling a whole city, or the woman physician he’d recently met down on Level Twenty-nine, treating the ills of the sick and injured without asking for any payment?
“I suppose it could be an important job, if you wanted to make it so,” he said with as much neutrality as he could muster. “What were you intending to do? Perhaps you could establish more schools for lowleveller girls. That would be more than just a worthy cause. Or—”
She flicked away any idea he might have had with a wave of her hand. “The Cloudmaster’s wife doesn’t work. Her job is to…”—she hunted for the right word—“set the tone for upleveller society.”
“Tone?”
“Yes. Fashion and society. People need someone to look up to. To emulate. It’s what makes society work properly. There has to be a—a—hierarchy. A ranking. Proper standards.”
He stared, wondering if she was mocking him, but all he could see in her eyes was guileless anticipation. “Who told you that?”
“Lor—Lord Taquar,” she replied, faltering a little under his stare.
“Senya, does it ever occur to you that you were manipulated by Taquar into doing what he wanted rather than what was in your own best interest?”
“He loves me. And do you think I’m so stupid that I don’t know what is good for me?”
He almost said he was certain of it, then thought better of it. There was nothing behind that gaze of hers except self-interest. Once, he’d thought it was just her immaturity that made her that way. Now he wasn’t so sure.
She smiled across the table at him. “I don’t think we need do this sort of thing very often, do we? Because I find you as boring as the booming of a night-parrot. Oh, and one other thing—I don’t ever want to see Terelle Grey anywhere near Breccia Hall again. If ever she comes back to Breccia. And if you break your promises, I’ll make sure Lord Gold takes it out on her.”
“And I will make sure you regret it.” He stood up, driving his dagger into the wood of the polished table top in front of her. She leaped up with a squeal, her eyes round with shock. “But you’re right. This is a pointless activity. I suggest you leave.”
She threw down her napkin and ran from the room. He sat down again, head in his hands, hoping she had not seen the panic he was sure had flashed across his face when he thought of Terelle never returning, or if she did, of being subjected to Senya’s malice and Basalt’s twisted idea of justice. He schooled his expression into a mask of placid calm, then climbed to his feet and went to look for Laisa.
She was in her apartments. Once her maid, Ara, had left them alone, he said, “I’ve just come from my attempt to have dinner with Senya,” then stopped, not knowing quite how to continue.
Laisa had been sewing, but she now laid her work aside. Not embroidery, he noted with a modicum of surprise, but mending a tear in a dress. Laisa was nothing if not practical. A cargo of new fabrics had recently arrived to replace all the sheets and chair covers and similar furnishings ruined or stolen during the occupation of the city, so he guessed the seamstresses were overworked attending to that.
And you are thinking of everything except what you should be talking about.
“And…?” she asked, waving him into the chair opposite.
When he still didn’t say anything, she sighed. “It’s taken you a long while to wake up.”
“I haven’t seen her for months,” he said sourly. “Before, I thought—I thought she was just immature. But it’s not just that, is it?”
She shook her head but said nothing.
Damn your eyes, Laisa. “Why did you insist on my marriage to her as part of your bargain?”
“Because if I didn’t, I’d have had to bear the brunt of her revenge. Her water-powers are fortunately small because she has steadfastly refused to work at them—for which I’m now suitably grateful—but make no mistake about it, Jasper, she is a rainlord, and she could be dangerous. I would not leave your Terelle alone in the same room as her, if I was you.”
“What’s wrong with her?” he asked bluntly.
She sighed. “I have no idea. I used to think it was because Nealrith spoiled her rotten. Now I know it’s more than that. Is it possible for someone to be born without a conscience? Without the slightest interest in anyone else’s well-being?” She shrugged. “If so, then Senya is that person.” She stabbed at the fire with the poker. “I may be a bitch, but I’m a rational, thinking bitch. At times, I even have a conscience. She doesn’t.”
“And this is the woman you’d have me marry?”
“You’re the only person who has the power to dominate her. And you’re the only person who can give her what she needs to be happy—and when Senya is happy, she doesn’t cause trouble. Give her money for luxuries, position to lord it over others, all with no responsibilities, and she won’t bother you.”
“Apart from the fact that there are precious few necessities around, let alone luxuries—” he began.
She cut in. “Jasper, if you don’t want your daughter to be treated like a snuggery whore behind your back and ridiculed as the Cloudmaster’s by-blow, you will marry Senya. What’s the problem anyway? Terelle is a snuggery lass. She won’t put any store by a marriage ceremony. But take my advice, if she returns, keep her privately, well away from your wife.”
Scrambling to his feet to stare down on her, he wanted to let loose his rage, yet knew there was enough truth in her words for him to be wary of the penalty for not heeding them. That, he decided, was the trouble with Laisa. She was often wise, she often gave astute advice, and it lulled you into believing she was on your side. He didn’t know who was worse: Senya with no conscience at all and no understanding of her lack, or Laisa who knew exactly what was morally right, but was quite prepared to ignore it an
y time it interfered with her plans.
He left the room, aware he was missing something. There was a lurking danger he hadn’t identified, and those two women lay at its heart like scorpions hiding in his clothing.
The trouble was he had no idea when they would sting, or why.
Ten days later, Jasper’s daughter was born.
Outside the birthing room, he took her in his arms for the first time. He folded the swaddling cloth away from her face and arms, marvelling at her tiny perfection. She mewled, clasping and unclasping her minute fists as if she wanted to grasp the world. The stir of love he felt was immediate and as potent as amber on an empty stomach. He had no trouble believing she was his daughter. Her skin was more golden than his natural brown, but her hair was black, her eyes dark. She was perfect and vulnerable and his heart was irretrievably hers.
When the midwife took the baby back, he felt her absence as a loss. He attuned himself to her water so he could track her presence and watched as she was borne away.
“Satisfied?” Laisa asked.
He nodded, not caring that he had no real way of knowing she was his. “Tell Senya to send for me as soon as she’s ready for the wedding ceremony.”
“Aren’t you going in to see her? It is customary for the father to acknowledge the woman’s role in all this.”
“I have nothing to say to Senya, and I’m quite sure she’d be happier not seeing me. And please, Laisa—don’t ask Lord Gold to return to wed us.” The Sunpriest had already left to set up the main Sun Temple in Pediment.
The midwife returned from Senya’s bedroom just then, still bearing the baby. “She won’t put the babe to the breast,” she said with a puzzled air. “She said to give her to you, m’lord.”