Quiet Knives

QUIET KNIVES

Adventures in the Liaden
Universe
®

Number Nine

Sharon Lee and Steve Miller

Pinbeam Books

http://www.pinbeambooks.com

This is a work of fiction. All the characters
and events portrayed in this novel are fiction or are used
fictitiously.

QUIET KNIVES

Copyright
©
2003, 2005, 2011
by
Sharon Lee
and
Steve Miller
. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be
reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic
or mechanical, without permission in writing from the author.
Please remember that distributing an author's work without
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First published in 2003 by SRM,
Publisher.

Veil of The Dancer originally appeared in
Absolute Magnitude #19, Summer/Fall 2002

ISBN:

Kindle: 978-1-935224-72-3

Epub: 978-1-935224-73-0

PDF: 978-1-935224-74-7

Published May 2011 by

Pinbeam Books

PO Box 707

Waterville ME 04903

email [email protected]

Cover Copyright
©
2003 by Steve
Miller

QUIET KNIVES

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Dedicated to:

Lou and Beth

Veil of the
Dancer

IN THE CITY OF Iravati on the world of
Skardu, there lived a scholar who had three daughters, and they
were the light and comfort of his elder years.

Greatly did the scholar rejoice in his two
elder daughters--golden-haired Humaria; Shereen with her tresses of
flame--both of these born of the wives his father had picked out
for him when he was still a young man. Surely, they were beautiful
and possessed of every womanly grace, the elder daughters of
Scholar Reyman Bhar. Surely, he valued them, as a pious father
should.

The third--ah, the third daughter. Small and
dark and wise as a mouse was the daughter of his third, and last,
wife. The girl was clever, and it had amused him to teach her to
read, and to do sums, and to speak the various tongues of the
unpious. Surely, these were not the natural studies of a daughter,
even the daughter of so renowned a scholar as Reyman Bhar.

It began as duty; for a
father must demonstrate to his daughters that, however much they
are beloved, they are deficient in that acuity of thought by which
the gods mark out males as the natural leaders of household, and
world. But little Inas, bold mouse, did not fail to learn her
letters, as her sisters had. Problems mathematic she relished as
much as flame-haired Shereen did candied
sventi
leaves. Walks along the river
way brought forth the proper names of birds and their kin; in the
long neglected glade of Istat, with its ancient sundial and
moon-marks she proved herself astute in the motions of the
planets.

Higher languages rose as readily to her lips
as the dialect of women; she read not only for knowledge, but for
joy, treasuring especially the myths of her mother's now empty
homeland.

Seeing the joy of learning in her, the
teaching became experiment more than duty, as the scholar sought to
discover the limits of his little one's mind.

On the eve of her fourteenth birthday, he
had not yet found them.

* * *

WELL THOUGH THE SCHOLAR
loved his daughters, yet it is a father's duty to see them
profitably married. The man he had decided upon for his golden
Humaria was one Safarez, eldest son of Merchant Gabir Majidi. It
was a balanced match, as both the scholar and the merchant agreed.
The Majidi son was a pious man of sober, studious nature, who bore
his thirty years with dignity. Over the course of several
interviews with the father and the son, Scholar Bhar had become
certain that Safarez would value nineteen year old Humaria, gay and
heedless as a
flitterbee
; more, that he would
protect her and discipline her and be not behind in those duties
which are a husband's joy and especial burden.

So, the price was set, and met; the priests
consulted regarding the proper day and hour; the marriage garden
rented; and, finally, Humaria informed of the upcoming blessed
alteration in her circumstances.

Naturally enough, she wept, for she was a
good girl and valued her father as she ought. Naturally enough,
Shereen ran to cuddle her and murmur sweet, soothing nonsense into
her pretty ears. The scholar left them to it, and sought his study,
where he found his youngest, dark Inas, bent over a book in the
lamplight.

She turned when he entered, and knelt, as
befit both a daughter and a student, and bowed 'til her forehead
touched the carpet. Scholar Bhar paused, admiring the graceful arc
of her slim body within the silken pool of her robes. His mouse was
growing, he thought. Soon, he would be about choosing a husband for
her.

But not yet. Now, it was Humaria, and, at
the change of season he would situate Shereen, who would surely
pine for her sister's companionship. He had a likely match in mind,
there, and the husband's property not so far distant from the
Majidi. Then, next year, perhaps--or, more comfortably, the year
after that--he would look about for a suitable husband for his
precious, precocious mouse.

"Arise, daughter," he said now, and marked
how she did so, swaying to her feet in a single, boneless move, the
robes rustling, then falling silent, sheathing her poised and
silent slenderness.

"So," he said, and met her dark eyes through
the veil. "A momentous change approaches your life, my child. Your
sister Humaria is to wed."

Inas bowed, dainty hands folded demurely
before her.

"What?" he chided gently. "Do you not share
your sister's joy?"

There was a small pause, not unusual; his
mouse weighed her words like a miser weighed his gold.

"Certainly, if my sister is joyous, then it
would be unworthy of me to weep," she said in her soft, soothing
voice. "If it is permitted that I know--who has come forward as her
husband?"

Reyman Bhar nodded, well-pleased to find
proper womanly feeling, as well as a scholar's thirst for
knowledge.

"You are allowed to know that Safarez,
eldest son of Majidi the Merchant, has claimed the right to husband
Humaria."

Inas the subtle stood silent, then bowed
once more, as if an afterthought, which was not, the scholar
thought, like her. He moved to his desk, giving her time to
consider, for, surely, even his clever mouse was female, if not yet
full woman, and might perhaps know a moment's envy for a sister's
good fortune.

"They are very grand, the Majidi," she said
softly. "Humaria will be pleased."

"Eventually, she will be so," he allowed,
seating himself and pulling a notetaker forward. "Today, she weeps
for the home she will lose. Tomorrow, she will sing for the home
she is to gain."

"Yes," said Inas, and the scholar smiled
into his beard.

"Your sisters will require your assistance
with the wedding preparations," he said, opening the notetaker and
beginning a list. "I will be going to Lahore-Gadani tomorrow, to
purchase what is needful. Tell me what I shall bring you."

Mouse silence.

"I? I am not to be wed, Father."

"True. However, it has not escaped one's
attention that tomorrow is the anniversary of your natal day. It
amuses me to bring you a gift from the city, in celebration. What
shall you have?"

"Why, only yourself, returned to us timely
and in good health," Inas said, which was proper, and womanly, and
dutiful.

The scholar smiled more widely into his
beard, and said nothing else.

* * *

HUMARIA WEPT WELL INTO the night, rocking
inside the circle of Shereen's arms. At last, her sobs quieted
somewhat, and Shereen looked to Inas, who sat on a pillow across
the room, as she had all evening, playing Humaria's favorite songs,
softly, upon the lap-harp.

Obedient to the message in her sister's
eyes, Inas put the harp aside, arose and moved silently to the
cooking alcove. Deftly, she put the kettle on the heat-ring, rinsed
the pot with warm water and measured peace tea into an infuser.

The kettle boiled. While
the tea steeped, she placed Humaria's own blue cup on a tray, with
a few sweet biscuits and some leaves of candied
sventi
. At the last, she added a pink
candle, sacred to Amineh, the little god of women, and breathed a
prayer for heart's ease. Then, she lifted the tray and carried it
to her sister's couch.

Humaria lay against Shereen's breast, veils
and hair disordered. Inas knelt by the end table, placed the tray,
and poured tea.

"Here, sweet love," Shereen cooed, easing
Humaria away from her shoulder. "Our dear sister Inas offers tea in
your own pretty cup. Drink, and be at peace."

Shivering, Humaria accepted the cup. She
bent her face and breathed of the sweet, narcotic steam, then
sipped, eyes closed.

Shereen sat up, and put her
head scarf to rights, though she left the
ubaie
--the facial veils--unhooked and
dangling along her right jaw.

"Our young Inas is fortunate, is she not,
sister?" Humaria murmured, her soft voice blurry with the combined
effects of weeping and the tea.

"How so?" asked Shereen, watching her
closely, in case she should suddenly droop into sleep.

"Why," said Humaria, sipping tea. "Because
she will remain here in our home with our father, and need never
marry. Indeed, I would wonder if a husband could be found for a
woman who reads as well as a man. "

Shereen blinked, and bent
her head, fussing with the fall of the
hijab
across her breast. Inas watched
her, abruptly chilly, though the night was warm and no breeze came
though the windows that stood open onto the garden.

"Certainly," Shereen said, after too long a
pause. "Certainly, our father might wish to keep his youngest with
him as long as may be, since he shows no disposition to take
another wife, and she knows the ways of his books and his
studies."

"And certainly," Humaria said, her eyes open
now, and staring at Inas, where she knelt, feeling much like a
mouse, and not so bold, so bold at all.

"Certainly, on that blessed day when the
gods call our father to sit with them as a saint in Heaven, my
husband will inherit all his worldly stuffs, including this, our
clever sister Inas, to dispose of as he will."

At her father's direction, Inas had read
many things, including the Holy Books and domestic law. She knew,
with a scholar's detachment, that women were the lesser vessel and
men the god-chosen administrators of the universe the gods had
created, toyed with and tired of.

She knew that, in point of law, women were
disbarred from holding property. Indeed, in point of law, women
were themselves property, much the same as an ox or other working
cattle, subject to a man's masterful oversight. A man might dispose
of subject women, as he might dispose of an extra brood cow, or of
an old and toothless dog.

She knew these things.

And, yet, until this moment, she had not
considered the impact of these facts upon her own life and
self.

What, indeed, she thought, would Safarez the
merchant's son do with one Inas, youngest daughter of his wife's
father? Inas, who read as well as a man--a sinful blot so dire that
she could not but be grateful that the Holy Books also stated that
the souls of women were small, withered things, of no interest to
the gods.

Humaria finished the last of her tea, and
sat cradling the blue cup in her plump, pretty hands, her eyes
misty.

"There now, sweet, rest," Shereen murmured,
capturing the cup and passing it to Inas. She put arm around
Humaria's shoulders, urging her to lie down on the couch.