The Quartered Sea (40 page)

"The xaan doesn't have to be fair," her twin reminded her. "She's the xaan. You ought to get all that hair shaved off and get yourself a house tattoo, Benedikt." He tapped his own chest in the thickest part of the design. "You couldn't have one like this, of course, but the needle master would know what you're entitled to."

"Maybe he's afraid it'll hurt," Yexli snorted. The skin above her elbow was still red and puffy around the interlocking blue-and-black design that circled her arm above the elbow. "It doesn't."

"Your pardon." The house master managed to make the interuption sound neutral, but in no way did her tone defer to the cousin's superior rank. "The peerless one wishes to see Benedikt now."

Intega sighed and peeled herself from Benedikt's hip.

"Here, fix your feathers," Javez muttered, reaching out and doing it for him. "Can't go to the xaan with your feathers all cocked up."

Yexli looked rebellious, although at what Benedikt wasn't certain, and moved out of his way.

"Adjust your sawrap," Serasti sniffed as she spun on one heel and led him back toward the house.

When the sound of their sandals against the gravel paths had faded sufficiently, Intega dropped down onto the bench and scrubbed both hands in the pond. "He was damp."

"That's what you get for plastering yourself all over him," her brother sniffed. "I don't know why he keeps all that hair. He's like an animal."

"So he's damp and hairy—tell me again why we were being nice to him?" Yexli asked, kicking the gravel up into ridges.

"We were being nice to him, infant, because he's in the xaan's favor." Javez sat beside his twin and flicked water up at the younger girl. "She obviously plans to use him to benefit the House and, if he succeeds, that'll give him influence with her. Influence he'll be able to use for his friends."

Sarasti stopped so quickly just outside Xaan Mijandra's private terrace that Benedikt almost stepped on the edge of her robe. Leaning toward him, she shot him an irritated glare when she realized that his ear was a considerable distance above her mouth.

Trying not to smile, Benedikt bent over.

"The xaan is not alone," the house master told him, grabbing a braid and pulling him so close her breath lapped against the side of his face. "Be respectful, and do not embarrass the House." She released him with a final tug for emphasis and pushed past him onto the terrace.

"I have brought Benedikt, peerless one."

"Thank you, Serasti."

The house master turned, flashed Benedikt a silent warning, and left him standing alone on the edge of the multicolored tiles. Remembering her admonishment to be respectful, he dropped to one knee.

"Get up, Benedikt, and come closer."

Studying the xaan's companions from under his lashes, he did as he was told. Seating arrangements suggested that the two women were of equal, or very nearly equal, rank as the Kohunlich-xaan. Although they both wore an uncountable number of tiny braids Benedikt suspected the woman to Xaan Mijandra's left wore some kind of a wig. Her hair couldn't possibly have grown that long in the few years she'd been out of the children's compound.

She tossed her head, as though somehow aware of his scrutiny. "My mother always makes
her
house master kneel."

"Your mother never leaves her house, Omliaz," Xaan Mijandra reminded her, amazing Benedikt with the patience she showed such a petulant comment. "Both my house masters are alone for a portion of the year. I need to show I trust them."

"What does that have to do with kneeling?" the younger woman demanded.

"By not insisting she kneel, it means I respect what she does for me. Besides, she's a cousin."

"My mother makes the whole family kneel." Omliaz looked down into her glass and frowned. "This is empty. My mother's karjen would never allow a guest's glass to be empty," she added as a karjen Benedikt didn't recognize hurried forward to fill it.

"Your mother never has guests," the woman to Xaan Mijandra's right slurred. Benedikt suspected she, at least, was not drinking fruit juice. "No one goes near her since that thing with the Shanshich-xaan."

"When that happens," Xaan Mijandra interjected, "and given your mother's health it will happen soon, you must begin with a clean slate and not bring your mother's mistakes into
your
rule of the house."

"My mother made no mistakes."

"Really? Your Aunt Leyza believes differently and seems willing to work with the other great houses."

From the expression on Omliaz's face, Benedikt assumed that Aunt Leyza was another claimant for the soon-to-be available position of Calakroul-xaan.

"I'm willing to work with the other great houses," she muttered.

"Good." Xaan Mijandra fed Shecquai a small piece of melon, then looked up at Benedikt. "Sing for us now, Benedikt."

Glad he hadn't been forgotten about—there being few things less comfortable than hovering on the edge of a conversation unable to join in and equally unable to leave—he bowed. "What song would the peerless one like to hear?"

She turned to the older woman. "Rayalmi?"

Benedikt found himself being scrutinized by a pair of small dark eyes nearly hidden in folds of fat. "Do you know this? '
I came down from the mountains for battle/down to the still hot air of the plain/My blade it ran red with the blood of the dead./I'll not see my home in the mountains again
.' "

"Oh, that's cheerful," Omliaz muttered into her glass.

The heavy-set woman had a good voice, the slurring less evident when she sang than when she spoke. Benedikt knew the song. One of the guards had sung it to him while they were on the road. Breathing deeply, he set himself into a light recall trance and began.

When he finished, it was so quiet in the courtyard that the sounds from the aviary on the roof seemed to be coming from just beyond the terrace. Rayalmi wiped damp eyes on the wide sleeve of her robe and motioned for a karjen to refill her glass. Omliaz stared at him openmouthed until she realized he'd noticed, then she brought her teeth together with a snap.

"Well, what do you think of my shipwrecked sailor?" Xaan Mijandra asked.

"He's too tall and too hairy…"

I'm getting really tired of hearing that
, Benedikt decided.

"… and I don't think he looks anything like a warrior of Tulpayotee." Omliaz threw herself back into her cushions and bit into a piece of fried spice bread. Voice, movement, and expression all adding an emphatic,
so there
.

"My brother is in Atixlan, and I want the Tulparax to meet the true Benedikt in case something goes wrong before the change and he's presented with the lie."

"A reasonable precaution," Rayalmi admitted, gesturing for another drink. "But it won't be easy for the Kohunlich-xaan to gain the ear of the Tulparax—even this close to the change."

"My nephew has just been made an attendant of the bedchamber. He's fond of me—the change being so close there was no reason for him not to be. I'll invite him over for the evening and see what I can do. I assume you'll want to be with Benedikt all the time?"

Xaan Mijandra smiled. "It seems a reasonable precaution."

"Doesn't it." Amused about something—the lack of trust between the great houses if Benedikt had to hazard a guess—Rayalmi shifted her bulk and gazed curiously up at him. "Do you play any instruments, Bene… dikt." She stumbled a little over the unfamiliar name.

"Yes…" He suddenly realized he had no idea of how to address her and shot a panicked plea toward Xaan Mijandra. Somehow, given the convoluted Petayn social structure, he doubted a simple karjet would do.

"Yes,
peerless one"
she told him. "This is the Palenque-xaan."

He bowed his thanks. "Yes, peerless one." The words seemed wrong applied to another, but he covered his unease and continued. "I play pipes and the
quintara
."

"These were lost when your ship sank?"

"Yes, peerless one."

"I don't know that second thing—the quitata, was it?—but we've certainly pipes about. My senior attendant plays for me. Very pleasant to have around." She emptied her glass and held it out to the side for a refill, confident that a karjen would appear when needed. "You might consider sending for an instrument maker and getting this boy re-outfitted, Mijandra. If he plays half as well as he sings…" Glass refilled, the end of the thought got lost in its depths.

"Why does he have eight braids?" Omliaz asked suddenly.

"Because that's what he's worth to me," Xaan Mijandra said levelly. "Rewards are as important a motivation as punishments."

The younger woman tossed her head again and, closer now, Benedikt realized that the braided hair was all her own.

Moving with exaggerated care, Xaan Rayalmi set her empty glass on a small table and yawned. "Sing me something cheerful, Ben… edikt. Give me a tune to hum as I haul myself back across the square."

Xaan Mijandra nodded her permission, and Benedikt sang "The Coloas Chorus," hiding as he did a moment's regret he hadn't been rescued by House Palenque. He couldn't help think that Xaan Rayalmi would know what to do with a bard.

Called to the xaan's bedchamber for the first time since arriving in Atixlan, Benedikt paused to smooth his hair before he reached the string of silver bells. Still tightly braided and feathered, it didn't really need smoothing, but he needed that extra moment to compose himself. He couldn't stop thinking of what Javez had said that afternoon.

"Since you're too big to need her protection, I'd say she's got you marked for herself."

For herself. His mouth was dry, and he'd had to wear one of his new blue-on-blue robes over the nonexistent camouflage of his sawrap.

She probably just wants you to sing
, he told himself sternly.
The same thing you did for her on the road
.

He found the thought of the xaan… and him… together… equally arousing and terrifying. Would she ask, he wondered, or assume? The tul would assume. Why am I thinking of him now?

Shecquai lifted his head off the bed and growled as Benedikt came into the room. He seemed fuzzier, looking less like a starved rat than usual.

"He's just had his bath," the xaan announced, following Benedikt's line of sight and smiling fondly down at the tiny dog. Returning her attention to the attendant on his knees, rubbing oil into her feet, she lifted his chin on two fingers, caught his eyes with hers, and asked, "Are you done?"