Angelica (17 page)

“That's just the opening movement, but it gives you the general feel of it,” Ahio said. “Pretty, isn't it?”

“
I
can't sing like that!” Susannah exclaimed.

Miriam laughed. “Well, of course you can't. No one can. That's Hagar and Uriel.”

“The best voices of their generation, and, if you can believe the reports angels have left behind over the past two centuries, the best voices ever,” Ahio observed. “Even Gaaron can't sing like Uriel, and I'd rather hear Gaaron than anyone I know.”

“But I—I don't even think I can learn the
song,
let alone deliver it right,” Susannah continued. “This is—I don't think seven or eight months is long enough!”

“You'll pick it up a lot faster than you think,” Ahio said. “I'm not worried at all.”

“Well, no, you don't seem like the type who worries about anything!” Susannah declared, which earned a burst of laughter from Miriam and a grin from Ahio. “And you're not the one who's going to be standing up there making a fool of yourself in front of however many hundreds of people show up for this Gloria of yours.”

“Thousands, usually,” Ahio said. “But we'll find the right piece for you. Don't fret about a thing.”

And, indeed, over the next few hours, the next few days, Susannah found it easy to follow Ahio's advice. From the music room they went to the common rooms in search of Nicholas, and he was just like the other two, Susannah thought—careless, happy, and easygoing. The four of them lounged in Nicholas' far-from-clean room and talked the afternoon away, though later Susannah could not exactly pinpoint what their discussions had been about. Gossip about angels, living here or in the other angel holds—stories about trips they'd taken, weather intercessions performed, and small services rendered—shopping trips embarked upon, meals eaten, fashions mocked. None of it carried much weight. All of it seemed to elicit much hilarity. Susannah didn't contribute much to the conversation, but she laughed a great deal, and she felt energized with happiness when they all finally made their way down to the dining area for the evening meal.

Here they were joined by another angel, a soft-spoken dark-haired girl introduced as Zibiah. She was not nearly as flamboyant as Miriam, but just as relaxed and friendly as the others, and Susannah could instantly see how these four had
become friends. At first Susannah felt a little shy, as if she was intruding on a circle of friendship that was already complete, but Zibiah seemed as happy with her company as Miriam and the men did, and so she quickly relaxed.

“How's your little girl today?” Nicholas asked as they toyed with their desserts, having eaten perhaps a little more than they needed to of the main courses. Susannah had eaten more than any of them, suddenly ravenous after her three days of near starvation, but no one had seemed to think that strange.

Zibiah shrugged. “Much the same. She's eating, though, which is good, and she lets me leave the room for a few hours at a time, as long as Chloe or Sela or someone else is with her. And that's
very
good.”

“You have a little girl?” Susannah asked.

The others laughed. Zibiah made a face. “Not mine. I've inherited her. A young Jansai girl we found on the road about a week ago. She's terrified and she won't speak, and for a while she wouldn't eat, either, but she seems to be recovering a little.”

“At first she wouldn't let Zib out of her sight,” Miriam piped up. “Shrieked every time Zibiah would try to leave the room.”

“And she
hates
Esther,” Nicholas said with a grin. “But I figure that's a sign of her intelligence.”

“How do you come to have a Jansai girl here at the hold?” Susannah asked. “They don't let their women roam alone.”

“Found her by a burned campsite,” Nicholas said. He made a big circle with his arms. “The whole place. Just ash and cinder. She'd apparently been out of the camp when the fire started, so she survived. But I guess she saw it, because—well, she's traumatized.”

Susannah felt her heart grow chilled. “A whole campsite—just burned to the ground? All of it?” she said in a small voice.

Nicholas nodded. “Strangest thing I ever saw.”

“Me, too,” Susannah said. “We—my clan and I—came across just such a burned site a few weeks ago. We couldn't imagine what had caused such destruction.”

Now Miriam and all three of the angels were staring at
Susannah with sober alarm on their faces. “You mean—it's happened more than once?” Zibiah said. “But how could—surely something like that was some kind of bizarre accident—”

“Maybe it was the same site,” Ahio suggested. “Where did you come across it?”

“A little north of Luminaux,” Susannah said. “Maybe ten miles.”

Nicholas shook his head. “We were in southern Bethel, too, but closer to the Corinnis. Couldn't be the same camp.”

“But then—” Zibiah began, but Miriam cut her off.

“Did you tell Gaaron?” the mortal girl asked.

Susannah shook her head. “It didn't occur to me.”

The others were nodding. “Gaaron will want to know,” Nicholas said, and Ahio added, “We'll tell him when he gets back.”

Susannah flicked a look at Miriam, for surely this was confirmation of her earlier assertion that all the angels thought Gaaron could solve any problem. But Miriam was nodding, too. Clearly, no matter how she aimed to rebel against her brother, she also turned to him for support and succor any time the need arose.

He must be a good man,
Susannah thought, but even so she felt a dreariness coiled around the perimeter of her heart when she thought of trying to love such a man. She missed Dathan with his laughing ways, his happy manner, his easy charm. That was the only kind of man she could love, honor this Gaaron though she eventually may.

She nodded at the others and picked up her fork. “I'll tell him as soon as I see him again,” she said, and finished off her plate of pie.

T
hat evening, true to her word, Miriam brought a small cavalcade of women to spend the night in Susannah's room. In addition to Miriam and Zibiah, there was another angel named Chloe and a mortal girl named Sela. And a small Jansai girl who did not appear to have a name at all.

Miriam, Chloe, and Sela were the first to arrive. Sela was quieter and Chloe livelier than the others; that was about the only difference Susannah could see, since they were all young and pretty and full of laughter. All of them came bearing rolls of bedding so big they could scarcely see over the tops, and they filled the room with a new range of giggles.

“I brought wine from the kitchen. I don't think Esther saw me,” Chloe announced, and the others squealed.

“I was in Velora today and I stopped at a cosmetics booth,” Sela said in a soft voice. “So I picked up rouge and kohl and perfume—and this stuff—she said it would add streaks of color to my hair, but I don't know, it smells pretty awful—”

“Oh, I love that stuff!” Miriam cried. “My hair's so fair it doesn't do much for me, but it's great. We'll put some in tonight.”

They unrolled their sleeping gear all around the room, talking without ceasing. Chloe slipped into the water room adjoining the bedroom. (Such a luxury, Susannah always thought, and such a waste—a place of continuously flowing water reserved for the use of one person!)

“I'd like lighter streaks around my face—do you think we could try that?” Chloe called from the mirror in the other room. “I don't want to end up looking like a skunk, though.”

“What about you, Susannah?” Miriam asked. “Would you like blond shadings in your hair?”

They all clustered around her, stroking the long, silky length of her black hair and admiring its sheen and softness. “Oh, no, you can't streak Susannah's hair,” Sela said in her gentle voice. “It's too beautiful.”

“We could cut it,” Chloe suggested, but the others cried out against that.

“Braid it, maybe,” Miriam decided. “With ribbons and pearls. That would be pretty.”

“How do you plan to wear it at your wedding?” Sela wanted to know.

“What are you going to wear for your wedding?” Miriam asked.

“When
is
the wedding?” Chloe demanded.

Susannah laughed and raised both hands to fend them off. “I don't know! I don't know! I've scarcely even seen Gaaron since we got to the Eyrie, and it's not like I exactly knew him before—”

“Plus she's in love with another man,” Miriam supplied. “But she doesn't like to talk about it.”

That news made Chloe and Sela croon out little
aahs
and crowd closer, as if to hear the tale or as if some of that doomed romantic glory might rub off on them. “Really—it's just that—actually, I
don't
want to talk about it,” Susannah said, a little desperately.

“That's all right. We can plan your wedding anyway,” Miriam said matter-of-factly. “We'll figure out what you need.”

Before they'd made any headway on this promising activity, the chime sounded again. Zibiah entered, bedroll in her arms. She was followed by a small, wiry girl dressed
from head to foot in dark, flowing robes. Her head was covered with a veil that draped over her face so that only her eyes were visible. But these were narrow, sharp, and suspicious, darting quickly around the room as if to seek out dangers. They instantly fixed on Susannah as the source of potential trouble, since she was clearly familiar with the other three in the room.

Susannah, seeing her, grew very still. So tiny and young she was to have witnessed such a catastrophic event, to have survived the death of what was probably her whole family. And then to be uprooted and replanted here, among angels and strangers. Well enough Susannah knew what that relocation felt like. She had a lot in common with this little waif.

Susannah took a few cautious steps closer to the Jansai girl, then dropped to her knees so that their faces were at the same level. Zibiah stood beside the girl, her hand on one frail shoulder, and spoke in a low voice. “That's Susannah. She just came here to live with us. She's an Edori. Have you seen Edori before?”

The girl nodded.

“Susannah's our friend, and she'll be very nice to you, just like Chloe and Sela and Miriam. She'll sing to you if you want—” Zibiah threw a quick questioning look at Susannah as she said this, and Susannah nodded. “And she'll stay with you sometimes when I can't. You'll like her, I think.”

“Do you have a name?” Susannah asked quietly.

The little girl shook her head.

“She's never told us anything about herself. She hasn't talked at all,” Zibiah said.

Susannah moved a little closer, sliding across the stone floor on her knees. “Can I call you
mikala?
It means ‘young girl' in the Edori tongue,” Susannah said.

The narrow eyes wrinkled up a little, as if behind the veil the face was showing a small smile. The girl nodded.

“I think she knows the word,” Miriam said.

Susannah nodded. “She might. The Jansai know a lot of the Edori language. They travel as much as we do and go to the same places—sometimes we share words for those places. Isn't that right, mikala?”

Again, the wrinkled eyes. Again, the small movement of the head. Susannah smiled at her and edged closer. “You know what?” Susannah whispered into the girl's ear, leaning closer and pretending no one else could hear. “Jansai love luxury much more than the Edori do. Now this bed right behind me—it's too soft for my bones. I'm used to sleeping on the hard ground. But you—I bet you never came across a bed that was too soft for you. I bet you could sleep on five feather mattresses piled one on top of the other. I'm going to scoop you up and dump you on that bed, and I want to see you bounce.”

And Susannah leapt to her feet and pounced on the little girl, who gave a muffled shriek that didn't sound at all frightened. Susannah whuffled into her hair and twirled her around in one big circle before dropping her from shoulder height onto the bed and then jumping on top of the mattress right alongside her.

“Bounce!” Susannah cried. “Up and down you go!” And the two of them bounced on the too-soft bed. And the little girl laughed out loud.

“That's a sound I haven't heard before,” Miriam commented just a second before Chloe gave a little yelp and bounded across the room to land on the bed with the others. Moments later, all of them were on the bed, rolling around like maniacs and laughing like giddy children. Susannah positioned herself near the edge to make sure the Jansai girl didn't accidentally get pushed off, but everyone remained safely on, wonderfully happy.

“Ah, I knew this bed would be good for something,” Susannah said breathlessly as she slid off the end and came to a seat on the floor, her back against the frame. The women behind her giggled. “And I didn't mean good for
that
,” Susannah said over her shoulder.

“Well, it will be once you're married,” Zibiah said.

“Or even before,” Chloe added.

“Let's keep in mind that little mikala ears are listening,” Susannah warned in a light singsong voice.

The bed behind her jiggled and swayed as various bodies righted themselves. “Your wedding,” Miriam said. “We need to start planning that.”

“Yes, let's take a look at your clothes,” Chloe said.

Susannah came to her feet and looked somewhat doubtfully at the tall armoire across the room. She had her traveling clothes, of course, and Esther had made sure to supply a few rather nondescript dresses that seemed a little more acceptable in the angel hold, but Susannah didn't have anything that would pass for finery. “Probably not a very good place to start.”

But they insisted on going through her wardrobe anyway, laying out her skirts and her dresses and exclaiming over the fine sewing on the handmade Edori clothes but making no other comment about their attractiveness. However, they all seemed to genuinely love the embroidered shirt that she had made last winter and that she had not had the heart to sell in Luminaux.

“You could pair this with a—let me think—a blue silk skirt and wear it on your wedding day,” Miriam said. She laid it on the bed where the Jansai girl still sat and stood back to view it through half-closed eyes.

“I love it, too, but on her wedding day?” Zibiah said doubtfully. “Is it really fine enough?”

“It looks like a piece of Edori craft work, and Gaaron is marrying an Edori woman,” Miriam said.

“I truly would not want to embarrass him by wearing something unsuitable,” Susannah said. “But perhaps there would be another occasion—some dinner when we announce our betrothal—do you have such events?”

Miriam snapped her fingers. “The wedding breakfast,” she said. “Held the morning after the ceremony. All the important guests will still be here, but it's not as formal as the wedding itself. It will be perfect to wear then.”

The others agreed, which pleased Susannah. She liked the idea of wearing some token of her past life as she made the transition into her new one. “And where will I find this blue silk skirt?” she asked.

“Oh, Velora,” the women answered in a chorus of voices.

“The little city at the foot of the mountain? But how can I get there?” Susannah asked. “I didn't think there was a way down the mountain.”

“No, someone has to fly you down, but I can do that
anytime you like,” Chloe said. “Or Zib or Nicky or Ahio. Just ask us.”

“Let's go tomorrow!” someone cried, and within minutes they were planning a shopping expedition for the following day. No one seemed to be worried about any duties they might be shirking here at the hold, and there was certainly nothing keeping Susannah at the Eyrie, so she was happy to be plotting future amusements.

The whole evening went like that, elliptical conversations punctuated by bursts of laughter followed by more discussion on some completely unrelated topic. They took turns sitting on a stool in the middle of the room and having Sela make up their faces. Only Chloe and Miriam were brave enough to try the hair-coloring product, and they walked around the room for the rest of the evening with silver knots in their hair and the pungent smell of chemicals drifting up around their faces. Between them, they drank three bottles of wine, even Susannah sampling some, although she didn't usually like it. But this was much sweeter than the bitter, raw wine they usually had in camp; it tasted more like dessert than alcohol, though its effects were much the same.

They discussed the men of the hold, angel and mortal, and who was attractive and who was not. They performed the same exercise for the residents of Monteverde and Windy Point, and tossed off the names of half a dozen young Manadavvi men and their varying critiques of their faces, their manners, and their potential. Zibiah curled up around the Jansai girl, stroking the little one's head, and spoke wistfully of wanting a child of her own someday. Chloe said flatly that she didn't want the responsibility. Miriam laughed.

“Well, if you have an angel child at an angel hold, you have no responsibility at all. Everyone's so delighted at the birth that you're practically pushed aside so that the elder women can raise the baby right.”

Susannah had joined Zibiah and the mikala on the bed and was leaning her head against the wall to calm her dizziness. “Is that true?” she said sleepily. “That angel babies are so prized?”

There was a general chorus of agreement. “So much so,”
Chloe said, “that sometimes mortal children born to angels are not exactly welcomed.”

Miriam jumped to her feet and took three quick bows. “As witness, me,” she said.

Susannah focused on her. “Who didn't welcome you? Your parents? The others in the hold?”

Miriam sat down again and began pulling the silver rollers from her hair. Chloe said, “It's not ready yet,” but Miriam kept removing them, one after the other.

“My mother was happy with me—she'd always wanted a girl, and so far she'd had only one child, and that one a boy,” Miriam said. “And, of course, Gaaron was just nine years old—he didn't care one way or the other if I was born at all. But my father—oh, he hated me. My mother always swore that he never tried to leave me out in the cold unattended, or failed to feed me, but I always had the sense that he wished he'd gotten rid of me when I was young enough to dispose of easily. When I was a little girl, he would come up with tasks for me to do—impossible things—and then punish me when I couldn't get them done right. And he would scream at me. So loud everyone in the hold could hear.”

Susannah sat up, disturbed and uneasy. Among the Edori, children were considered a rich bounty, and the whole clan shared the responsibility of caring for them. Unfit mothers and neglectful fathers would simply find their children appropriated, absorbed into some other family, some other tent. Abuse was not tolerated. “Is this true?” she asked, looking at Zibiah.

Zibiah nodded slowly. Her hand was still stroking the Jansai's head, though the little girl appeared to have fallen asleep. “Oh, yes. My family lived just down the hall. You could hear the yelling, sometimes for hours. My mother would take me to the very back room, and crawl under the covers with me and make a little tent, and she'd read to me, but she couldn't drown out the sound of his voice.”