"Would you care for some tea? Refreshments?" He moved toward the table, his hand outstretched toward the teapot.
I almost laughed. Raym and I had been good friends almost from the beginning, very easy with each other, certainly never formal, even on our last day together. His behavior now was ludicrous.
But then the sadness of the situation struck me. He was tense, seemed anxious to do exactly the right thing. And although he looked healthy again, his experience with Orath had aged him somehow. He was thinner than he ought to be, and there was a hint of gray at his temples. He'd lost the hollow-eyed appearance of the first few days after Orath's death, but still there was something almost haunted about his look.
I couldn't laugh at him.
"Tea, please. But no, thank you, to the food. I'm eating far too much, trying to share meals with poor Joli. She's filling out a little, but if I'm not careful I'll be getting too fat for my clothes. You go ahead, though." If there were anything left, Tedor would eat it; the boy was a bottomless pit.
Raym poured my tea, added just the right amount of honey, and after fixing a cup for himself sat in one of the chairs at the table. He looked at me for a moment before speaking. "I've been thinking about Joli, too. It was good of you to take her away from that court. Afron would have kept her and been kind to her, of course. But staying there, so close to...to everything she's had to go through for all these years, would have been torture."
"Yes," I said. "Although I'll admit that didn't occur to me until later. On the morning everything happened, I asked her to come with me if I managed to get away, and I didn't want to go back on my invitation. I hadn't really thought of why she ought to come with me."
I frowned, as if an idea had just occurred to me. "Still, Raym, in a way she might have been better off staying. She had a place there. The other servants were kind to her, maybe because of how Orath had treated her, and she knew them. It was a little world she'd never have had to leave. Now..." I raised my hands, one of them holding the teacup, in a gesture of perplexity.
"What'll become of her? If I could fix her mouth, I would, but I don't know if it's even possible. Tedor is good to her. Because he's an only child, he's always been close to the families of his father's servants, so he's a very democratic sort of prince. And the old cook there would take her on in a minute, just because she'll be so happy to see Tedor again. But, Raym--" I set the teacup down. "--she'd be a scullery maid for the rest of her life. And there's more to her than that. I know there is."
"She'd never have picked up chess so fast if there weren't."
"Well, what can we do? Katra told me once about an old man who'd lived in our village, a shoemaker. He had a leather thing he made to put in his mouth so he could talk better, but it hurt him. She gave him salve that helped. She said he might have married, since he made a good living, but he wasn't sociable, and who could blame him? He had some cronies he played cards with, but that was all. Eventually he died.
"It's easier for a man. The one Katra spoke of could have married. But who will want Joli? Who that she would want, I mean? And how can she support herself, if not as a servant? She could learn a trade, I suppose. Do you suppose there's a bit of guile in her?"
"No, of course not. You know that, Vivia."
"Right. I'd have left her with Tada and Fin and Kenath if there were."
We looked at each other.
"I can make a prosthesis for her," he said after a moment. "It will help her speak. It'll fit better than what Katra's old shoemaker probably had. And yes, she could learn a trade. But I think there's more to her than that. Don't you? You don't want to consign her to being a kitchen maid. Do you want her to be a seamstress? Even a shoemaker? Without the opportunity to be something more? If she were our--" He had abandoned his formality, begun to speak with fervor. Now he stopped abruptly and turned away.
"If she were what, Raym?"
"If she were my own child, I was going to say, I would teach her to read and write. Teach her numbers. She could make something of herself, that way. Or be a seamstress, if that's what she chose, but it would be her choice."
I stared at him. "Your own child?" But the word he'd used was our.
He hadn't looked back at me, and he didn't now. He said nothing more.
"Again, you're right," I said. "I'll keep her with me, and I'll teach her as much as I can. It's not far to where you live, so she can go there to be fitted with the--what you just called it. The prosthesis." It was a word I'd not heard before.
He became formal again. "You're returning to Ladygate, then?"
"I suppose so. For a while, anyway. Not long, but long enough to decide what to do next. I'm wealthy now, relatively. I can support myself and Joli."
I hadn't told him how I'd become wealthy, and he didn't ask. It seemed that our conversation was over. Raym stood up. "I must ask you to leave me alone now, if you will, please, Vivia. We'll make arrangements for Joli when we arrive."
"Very well." I stood up too, getting ready to creep sadly out of the cabin. But I found I couldn't. "What's the matter, Raym? We used to be friends. But now you don't even want to talk with me. To look at me."
He turned with such a fierce glare that I gasped.
At that moment, the ship gave a small lurch, and so did I. Suddenly I was in Raym's arms and he was in mine. He was kissing me, on my face, on my neck, finally on my mouth, and I was kissing him back. Every atom of my body sang.
And then he tore away from me and stepped backward. He looked as though he'd been hit on the head with a hammer, and I suppose I did too. "My God, Vivia. I'm so sorry. Please forgive me, my--my--"
His what I was not to learn. He backed up to the door, bumped into it, turned and opened it and walked quickly away.
Suddenly I was on the shore of that lake again, the day he'd come running out of the trees and we'd stared at each other in abrupt recognition. What we'd known that day was what we'd known, again, a few moments ago. Nothing had changed--and everything had changed.
I stood thunderstruck and listened to his footsteps recede.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
The rest of that voyage was pure hell. I managed to sleep for a few hours each night, and for those few hours my dreams were marvelous and terrible and intense. I dreaded them all day and, once in them, dreaded waking.
I stayed in our cabin, afraid that if I left it I would meet Raym. Or maybe that I wouldn't. I could scarcely eat. Joli noticed and, after a couple of days, asked as well as she could what was wrong. I horrified us both by beginning to cry, loudly and wetly, like a child. She knelt beside me and patted me, trying mutely to console me. Eventually I stopped, emptied of tears.
Tedor came daily to play chess with Joli. While they played I sat and stared out the porthole at the endless sea. They glanced at me out of the corners of their eyes. He, of course, knew something was wrong. I supposed they'd both guessed what it was. How Raym was behaving I couldn't imagine, but I suspected Tedor would have noticed something amiss with him, too. Smart boy that he was, he'd have put it all together.
Long ago Katra had told me that there would come a day when I'd curse my guile, would wish to be rid of it. I simply hadn't believed her. "Why would I want to do something so stupid?" I'd said. "Yes, when I first knew I had guile, it scared me. I didn't know what it was. I thought it was something bad. But I know better now. It's part of me, maybe the best part, even."
"It's good that you value it," she'd replied. "Still, unless I'm very wrong about you, someday you'll wish you didn't have it."
Now at last I understood what she'd meant. If not for my guile, there would be no barrier between Raym and me.
In order to preserve my guilish power, I had to remain celibate forever. Even before I'd met Katra, my father had told me that if witches "went in for that sort of thing" they would stop being witches.
He'd been wrong, at least in the case of some witches. Raym told me on that memorable day two years ago that his gift didn't require celibacy. Harken, too,
had suggested that not every powerful witch was a virgin. Even Riga had retained her guile, although sadly depleted.
Raym would never willingly jeopardize my gift, so he and I could never be lovers. Worse, it was now obvious that we could never be friends again either, except perhaps by mail. And I didn't want to be friends by mail.
At last, thankfully, the voyage was over. I pulled myself together and packed, aided by Joli. When the steward came to take our trunk, he handed me a sealed letter. I opened it with trembling fingers.
There was no greeting. He hadn't even wanted to write my name. Just Prince Tedor has offered to bring Joli to me, both well-guarded, and to wait for her at Lord Khori's court until the prosthesis is made. You and he may arrange the date and he will inform me. T. R.
No, we could not be friends, even by mail.
* * * *
By the time I disembarked, Raym was gone. Tedor sent a message by runner to his father, and I hired a coach to carry Joli, Tedor, and me south and west to Horok's stronghold. Halfway there we were met by a company of Horok's guardsmen with orders to accompany us. From the captain of these guards I learned that until a few weeks ago, there had been no report to the High King's court of the Maalian raids on Monsara's east coast.
Those raids had begun months earlier. My father and brother knew of them before I left for Maal. "King Horok must have got some messages from the East," I said to the captain, "or he'd have known something was wrong."
"He did. Just no messages about that."
"Were the messengers bought off?"
"Apparently not," he said. "Not all were hired messengers, not all were acquainted with each other, and they certainly weren't in sympathy with Maalian pirates. There was no reason for that news not to be reported, and yet it wasn't. Those we questioned about it later swore they'd never heard of the raids. I interrogated two of them myself, and I believed them both. Very strange." He gave me a significant look, the kind of look someone usually gives me when he means witchcraft but doesn't want to say it.
When word of the raids had finally reached the king, he'd sent troops to defend the northern and interior cities that were said to be threatened. But at almost the same time, news arrived that the invading forces had withdrawn. The Maalian piracy was apparently over, at least as far as Monsara was concerned.
The guard captain had no explanation for this Maalian withdrawal, but I guessed that the new government under Afron and her allies had somehow brought it about. The Queen's Council had suggested sending envoys to Horok. Perhaps talks between the two countries were already underway. I'd noticed that our ship had flown the Maalian flag all the way into port, so it seemed tensions had eased already.
So Orath's death, and Maltuk's, seemed to have opened the way for peace between our country and Maal. The thought made me feel a little better, and at that point I needed to feel just as much better as I could. I was curious about why the raids in the East had gone unreported, but not curious enough to give the question much thought, now that the raids had stopped.
The closer we came to Horok's town and court, the closer we came to Ladygate, the darker grew my mood. When we finally could see the familiar pinkish stone turrets above the trees, I wanted to cry. The only thing that kept me from it was Joli's anxiety. Sitting beside me in the coach, her hands clasped tightly together, she exuded a strange emotion, a mix of mostly dread and a thin ray of hope. I couldn't let my own sense of hopelessness snuff out that small light.
* * * *
We said goodbye to Tedor at the head of the lane. He assured us he would take Joli to Raym as soon as his father could be reconciled to his leaving again. This, he suggested, might be accomplished more easily if I were to write to Horok, in essence backing up Tedor's story of the events at Maltuk's court and incidentally praising the virtues of Afron, to whom the young prince had betrothed himself without his father's knowledge or consent. I promised him I'd write a glowing report. I wouldn't have to exaggerate to do it.
Meanwhile, although persons without guile were traditionally barred from entering the main building of Ladygate, I would keep Joli with me on the strength of my victory over Orath. I could of course send her with Tedor to the protection of the old cook, but for a couple of reasons I found this unacceptable. While I was sure that Tedor would visit her frequently if only to play chess, she'd be a stranger at Heart Hall. Besides, I'd earned the right to make demands, and since I intended to leave Ladygate before too long--despite having no idea where I'd go--this was the only demand I could think of at the moment.
The guard captain escorted Joli and me, with two men to carry our trunk, to the entrance of the building. There we were met by Kaski, one of Harken's favorites. She looked at me with what seemed to be surprise and examined Joli, very briefly, with a frown.
"What's this?"
"This is our traveling trunk." I deliberately misunderstood her. "It's what one takes on journeys, or at least brings home from journeys, such as the one Harken sent me on three months ago."
"And...this?" She nodded toward Joli without looking at her again.
"This is my companion. She will stay with me in my quarters." I smiled politely. "She and I will carry the trunk there, so you don't need to help. Please tell Harken I've returned and wish to make my report."
Joli grabbed the handle at one end of the trunk, I grabbed the other, and we left Kaski attempting to formulate an answer. We'd begun to unpack when Kaski reappeared, opening my door without knocking.
"Mother Harken too has been traveling," she announced, "and has returned only recently. She is weary. She will see you tomorrow."
"She will see me now. You will take me to her. Joli, stay here and lock the door. I'll let you know it's me when I'm back."
Kaski knocked before I could get to Harken's door. It was locked in any case, but I heard the latch go up and stepped ahead of Kaski. "Harken, I knew you'd want to hear this from me immediately. Tedor is returned to his father, none the worse for wear. You'll want to know the details, I'm sure."
I strode into the room as if I owned it. Harken stood at the door and glared, first at me, then at Kaski before she waved the other woman away. I walked deliberately toward a chair and heard the door slam behind me. Seating myself without being asked, I folded my hands in my lap.
Harken quickly shuffled back to her own chair and fell into it. She was looking far from well. Despite the fact that she was still not slim, her skin was too large for her bulk. Her face was grayish, and the skin around her eyes was puffy. Wherever her travels had taken her, they'd not brought her much pleasure.
"Well?" she said. "The details? Since you've come here against my orders, I suppose you may as well say what you have to say." She was trying to establish her dominance.
I gave her a cool stare and held it until she looked away.
"Details," she muttered. Finally, since I said nothing, she thought of a question. "Is Tedor well?"
"Quite well," I said.
"Have you proof?"
Knowing Harken, I'd prepared for this. "A note from him, and another signed by Horok's captain who escorted us." I produced the documents. "You may send to Lord Horok, if you will, for his confirmation. The boy is home by now."
She pretended to examine the papers before putting them aside. "The Lady Orath. How did you manage with her?"
"Orath is dead."
Harken didn't seem surprised that I'd had Orath to deal with, nor that the Maalian witch was no more. "Dead. Well." She was silent, until her curiosity got the better of her. She'd heard of the death somehow, I was sure, but not how it had happened. "An accident, I presume?"
"Not at all. Maltuk killed her. Deliberately."
She raised her eyebrows. "Oh? Maltuk? That must have taken some doing."
Suddenly I didn't want to go over it again. It was done and it hadn't been pleasant, and Harken's curiosity made me tired. I was sorry I'd insisted on seeing her. "Some doing, yes." I stood up. "I'll leave you now; I've heard you had an arduous jo
urney." I turned to leave.
It was a measure of her exhaustion that she allowed this without her permission.
But as my hand was on the door she snapped, "Vivia."
"Yes?"
"It's come to my attention that you brought a guileless girl, a deformed girl, into Ladygate. Explain yourself, please."
"Joli is my ward." I invented that term on the spot. "She was one of Orath's servants, badly treated. I brought her away to have her birth defect repaired. She'll be with me for a few days, in my room. Don't worry, it won't be long. And, by the way, I'll be leaving too, shortly after that." I spun around again and went out. I half expected her to stop me with guile, or to try.
But she did not.
Back in my room, I told Joli very explicitly what I thought of Harken. She gazed at me in consternation. Apparently she'd never heard the kind of language I used. Her fellow servants at the Red Prince's court must have thought worse about Orath, but of course their fear of her would've kept them from saying so out loud.
"Let's go for a walk," I said. "We've been sitting for too long. In that coach, on that ship, in that other coach. Me on those horses. We'll end up like Harken--broad bottoms, legs like sticks." I took her to Heart Stream and showed her the bridge. After that we went up into the hills where we could look across at Heart Hall in the distance. "That's where Tedor lives," I said, "And where Afron will live too, someday, at least part of the time, if everything goes according to plan."
I was feeling better by the time we went back to Ladygate. Anger at Harken had temporarily dispersed my melancholy, and the walk helped. At dinnertime I went to the refectory and filled a tray with two hearty meals. Kaski and some of her chums eyed me indignantly, but no one tried to stop me as I took the food back to our room.
Quite early the next morning there was a light tap at the door. In answer to my Who is it? I heard a small voice. "It's me, Vivia. Charras. I've come to say welcome back. And goodbye. Let me in, please."
I opened the door and she scooted inside, carrying a large satchel, which she promptly dropped with a relieved sigh. "Welcome back," she said, as promised. "I'm glad to see you again, Vivia, but I hope you don't decide to stay, either."
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