The Seven-Petaled Shield (28 page)

Lycian’s gaze lit upon Tsorreh, and she paused in mid-sentence, her lips parted. Frowning, she swept up the stairs.

Astreya backed up against the wall while attempting a deep obeisance. Tsorreh, unsure of the proper salutation in such circumstances, inclined her head. “Lady, your pardon.”

Lycian’s perfectly arched brows drew together. “Explain your presence here!”

“I was just going to—” Tsorreh began. Were servants not permitted access to the bathhouse? If that were true, why had Astreya brought her here? Why had Breneya, who had seemed so friendly, suggested it?

Have I stumbled into a nest of household plots and subterfuge?

She glanced at Astreya. Keeping her eyes lowered, the girl stammered, “Gracious lady, Lord Jaxar gave orders that this guest be made comfortable. I beg forgiveness if—”

“We’ll see about that!” Lycian cut her off. “It seems to me a scandalous indulgence to bathe in the middle of the day, when there is work to be done. If
she
has nothing better to do than idle around, splashing about in hot water, she can just as well be of use. She will go with you to the washery. See to it, girl, or you will soon find that slaves are not the only ones who can be whipped!”

Round-eyed, Astreya bowed again. “Lady—”

“Now!” Lycian drew back one hand. “Or have you forgotten where the dirty linens are kept?”

Acting more by instinct than rational thought, Tsorreh stepped between Lycian and the cowering girl. Lycian’s open palm, aimed with surprising force, caught Tsorreh flat on the cheek.

Tsorreh’s head snapped back with the force of the blow. Her face stung where Lycian’s long fingernails raked her skin. She staggered and caught herself against Astreya.

Tsorreh’s temper flared, fueled by pent-up anxiety and frustration, the days of fear and confusion, grief and horror. To have survived the siege and fall of a great city, the deaths of so many loved ones, flight and capture and the hideous mind-touch of the Qr priest in Gatacinne, only to be slapped about by this silly, pampered woman!

She took a step toward Lycian, only dimly aware of the fierce expression on her face and the menace in her posture. One of Lycian’s attendants yelped.

A hand touched Tsorreh’s shoulder. She spun around, a heartbeat away from striking out. Astreya stared at her, eyes white-rimmed and desperate. She took one of Tsorreh’s hands between her own and pulled her back up the steps. The girl’s grasp was surprisingly soft, entreating rather than compelling.

“Gracious lady,” Astreya bowed to Lycian, “she’s confused, she didn’t mean anything. She doesn’t know our laws or customs! Please, if you must punish anyone, it was my fault—”

“Get out of my sight! Immediately!”

“Yes, of course, gracious lady. Thank you, gracious lady.” Astreya whirled Tsorreh around and shoved her bodily up the path. Tsorreh started to speak, but Astreya hurried her away even faster.

By the time they were beyond Lycian’s hearing, Tsorreh had regained a measure of calm. If she had hoped Jaxar’s patronage would protect her within the compound, she now knew that to be an illusion. She did not know what power Lycian might have over non-slaves, but Astreya’s reaction suggested it was considerable. She did not know the customs here, whether Breneya and her daughter had any rights, if they were free to leave if they were mistreated, or what hold Lycian might have over them. Grimly, she thought that she would soon find out.

“I’m sorry to have brought trouble upon you,” she said to Astreya.

“You took the blow meant for me,” Astreya breathed.

“She had no right to strike you.”

“You don’t know what she’s like, what she can do! How
she never forgets.” Astreya glanced back toward the bathhouse entrance. She bit her lower lip, clearly thinking she had already said too much.

“But you are not slaves! Surely you have the freedom to leave, to refuse her orders.”

“Once that was true. My mother has told me how it was when she was a child.” Astreya shook her head. “Now the laws are different. It is said that obedience is ordained by the gods for the greater glory of the Ar-King, may-his-splendor-never-grow-dim, and the Golden Land. If you or I dared, dared to—and Lady Lycian made a complaint against us for disruption of social order, it would become a matter for the public court. She could have us whipped. Or worse,” she added in a whisper.

“I don’t suppose the washery is that bad.” Tsorreh shrugged, resigned. “It’s useful work, after all. Someone has to clean the clothes.”

Astreya gave her another astonished look. “Oh, we don’t do that here! We take them to the best establishment in the cloth-groomers’ district. It’s on the other side of the city.”

Excitement tingled along the edges of Tsorreh’s mind. An image tantalized her—eluding the fragile custody of this young girl, bolting down a crowded street, hiding herself in a warren of alleys…

“Why so far?” she asked to cover her reaction. “Don’t you have a laundry for a household this size?”

“What do you think we are? Only poor people wash their own garments. Besides, the smell is terrible! You wouldn’t want to live anywhere near, if you could help it.” Astreya frowned. “It’s not the usual day for laundry, so Issios won’t be pleased.”

“Issios?”

“Steward here. He likes everything in its place, you know.”

“Oh yes, I’ve met him.”

“Don’t mistake me. He’s strict, but he’s fair. It’s just that he never smiles. Never. Not even at the Festival of The Bounteous Giver of Wine!”

“I’m sorry, I don’t know what that is.”

Astreya rolled her eyes, looking very much like an adolescent, but said nothing. They’d reached the house. A side entrance, one of many, led to a separate wing where the steward and other household managers had their quarters and offices.

The steward frowned when Astreya explained to him what she and Tsorreh were to do. He shook his head. “I cannot authorize
her
,” meaning Tsorreh, “to leave this compound, not when she has been given into the custody of my Lord Jaxar.”

And certainly not on the word of a mere servant girl
, his tone indicated as well.

Astreya’s voice shook as she answered Issios, but she stood her ground. “Shall I send for Lady Lycian, then, so that she can repeat her words to you? Whose orders must I obey—yours or
hers
?”

For a moment, Issios looked as if he might strike Astreya. Then his angry expression vanished into a mask of tight control. “It is not your fault that you have been placed in such a position. I see that you are a dutiful child and have no wish to make mischief. A household runs best when there is one set of clear orders and a hierarchy that everyone understands.”

He suppressed a sigh, pressing his thin lips together. “If Lady Lycian has commanded you both to perform such an unusual duty, it is not for any of us to question her right to do so. I warn you that any deviation from the most proper behavior will place you beyond my protection. You will not be able to say in truth that I authorized this errand, only that I did not forbid it.”

He regarded Tsorreh, his eyes dark and hooded with warning.
Lycian will not vouch for you if you get into trouble. You will be on your own.

Tsorreh thought Lycian would take great delight in disavowing all responsibility, should anything befall.

Under the direction of Issios, a bevy of servants soon assembled piles of sheets, towels, ordinary robes of cotton
and fine-spun wool, and linen underclothing for both men and women. Regarding the sheer quantity, Tsorreh decided that either the household was much larger or more amply supplied than she had first guessed.

Tsorreh wondered how two women could manage such a bulky load, but with the aid of shoulder yokes and capacious wicker baskets, they were able to carry it all. The baskets were heavy, although not unbearably so. As she settled the curved wooden yoke across her shoulders, Tsorreh remembered carrying load after load of library books into safety in the temple cavern. At least, if she dropped this burden, she would not damage it.

She saw very little of the outside streets once they had left the compound itself. All her concentration went to keeping the panniers steady. She kept her eyes on Astreya’s legs, moving in slow, patient steps before her.

The edge of the yoke, which had felt smooth at first, pressed into her flesh. The muscles of her shoulders went from aching discomfort to agony. After a short distance, the rope sandals rubbed blisters on her feet.

I can do this
, Tsorreh repeated silently to herself.

They went around and down, following the natural contours of the hill. The streets curved so that after a short period of time, Tsorreh lost sense of direction. Eventually, they reached the bottom of the hill and wound through one district after another. They passed along rows of shops and progressively poorer-looking dwellings. Astreya explained that, as well as washing finished clothing, the cloth-groomers treated newly woven cloth, rendering it soft and pleasing to the skin. The smells of the substances used to treat the cloth, however, were apparently so vile that the groomers were, by law, relegated to areas far away from any respectable residences.

Tsorreh could not tell how long they had been walking. She tried counting steps. She counted backward and forward. She counted in Gelone, in Denariyan, and in trade-dialect Azkhantian. The distraction helped take her mind off her physical discomfort.

Once down from the hill, they passed all sorts of people, many on foot, others riding donkeys or onagers. Occasionally, a chariot rattled past. Now and again, a runner would dart by, well-shod and swift. The first time this happened, Tsorreh jumped in alarm before she realized that no one took any particular notice of the runner. His even pace suggested that he was a courier rather than a fugitive.

Armed men moved through the streets in twos and fours. Pairs of them stood at the major intersections. Tsorreh’s heart raced the first time they came near. The sun gleamed on their helmets and blurred her vision. They were vivid reminders of the soldiers who had marched through the gates of Meklavar and Gatacinne. One of them called out a slang phrase that she did not understand.

“Watch your tongue,” Astreya snapped back, “for it’s more use to any woman than what wags at your other end.” Laughing, the men turned away.

Tsorreh wavered on her feet. Her panniers swung dangerously. For a long moment, it was all she could do to regain control and keep the yoke steady across her shoulders. She was sweating and breathing hard, not entirely from the physical effort.

Astreya, who had gone ahead, paused. “What’s wrong?”

“I’m sorry,” Tsorreh stammered. “I’m not used to—I was surprised by the way those men spoke, that’s all.”

“They thought you were a slave. That’s why they talked to you in such a disrespectful fashion.”

Tsorreh bit her lip. Better that than an escaped prisoner, one Cinath would be as glad to have done with.

“It’s not your fault,” Astreya went on as they walked side by side. “It’s the dress.”

“It doesn’t matter what Gelonian soldiers think of me.”

“Soldiers? Oh no, those were just ordinary city patrol! Riff-raff with no decent manners! No properly trained soldier would speak to a woman in that way, even if she were a slave.” Astreya sounded very much like her mother.

“I don’t understand. They were armed and in uniform.”

“I suppose that all men with swords must look alike to
anyone who hasn’t lived in Gelon. See those men at the corner? They’re military; you can tell by the cut of their tunics and see, their breastplates and the medallions on their scabbards. Some of the noble houses have their own armed escorts, and you can identify them by the sashes with their lord’s colors. City patrol don’t wear armor, just helmets.”

Astreya lowered her voice “The ones you really need to watch out for are the Elite Guards, the Ar-King’s private enforcers. Just pray to whatever gods you have in Meklavar that you never see one of that sort.”

A
FTER detouring to avoid the center of the city, Tsorreh and Astreya reached one of Aidon’s many plazas. Although pleasing in shape and clearly designed as a public space, the plaza had seen better days. The paving stones were worn and cracked with the passage of years. Despite her weariness, Tsorreh lifted her head. Booths ran halfway across the plaza in widely spaced rows, while buildings of weathered wood and stone formed a perimeter. Many of these were shops, their entrances sheltered from sun and rain by overhanging eaves. At each corner, a cluster of shrines stood amidst offerings of wilting flowers, ribbons, and fruit.

In front of the shops and at the ends of rows of booths, old men sat gossiping or dozing in the shade, their heads lowered. A woman in baggy, faded pants and tunic, clearly too poor to afford a booth of her own, crouched behind baskets of peaches, nut candies, and fist-sized green melons. Another man, his face a toothless grin, offered crude beeswax idols and pots of honey for sale. A pair of teenagers laughed and flirted as they sold skewers of some kind of meat from a cart.

Women flocked around a fountain of eroded pink stone that had been carved with sea creatures and human figures,
now faded and indistinct. One by one, they dipped their jugs and carried them away on top of their heads or braced against their hips. Boys watered onagers and donkeys. Between the fountain and the wall of shops, half-grown children played with pebbles, and street performers plucked stringed instruments, rhythm drums, and finger cymbals. The place had the slightly dangerous atmosphere of a festival. Tsorreh would have liked to stop and stare at the rich variety of costume, listen to the unfamiliar dialects, perhaps sample the strange food. Astreya hurried her on, saying they still had far to go.

As they passed through the crowd at the far end, Tsorreh caught a phrase in Meklavaran, or thought she did. By the time she turned to look, however, the voice had stopped. She searched the milling crowd, but none of the faces or clothing looked familiar. From the plaza, they made their way past crumbling apartment rows.

When Tsorreh stumbled with fatigue, they set their panniers down beside a street shrine that Astreya explained was to honor The Source of Fertility. Tsorreh arched her back, feeling the joints of her spine crackle. The buildings here stood two or three stories tall and might have been comfortable enough once, judging by the ample windows. Overcrowding, disuse, and, most likely, the passage of years, had taken their toll. Greasy stains ran from the cracked roofs and window ledges. Emaciated dogs picked through the piles of refuse that were heaped along the sides of the buildings. Several figures squatted in the shadowed doorways, tipping their heads back to drink from a common wineskin.