Troubled Waters (14 page)

“Ilene! Whatever you’re cooking smells wonderful!”

Ilene tucked the gold flower behind her ear and preened a little—or, no, she just looked so good because she had taken a little trouble with her hair and her clothing, and there was a smile of pure happiness on her face. “It’s Barlow’s favorite meal,” she said. “He’ll be here in a moment. Come inside, straight through the kitchen.”

For a moment, Zoe couldn’t remember who Barlow was. Instead of asking, she stepped through the door and looked around the kitchen. It was narrow and low-ceilinged, but spotlessly clean and laid out with Ilene’s usual affinity for shelves and containers. “This looks like an excellent place to cook,” she said.

“Let me show you the whole place,” Ilene said.

All in all, the living quarters above the shop weren’t much bigger than the cottage Zoe had shared with her father—and, true to Melvin’s prediction, a little too warm. The main room opening off of the kitchen was clearly where the family did most of its living. The furniture was neatly arranged, but there was too much for the small space—a dining table and chairs, a cluster of more comfortable chairs set by the windows, mats and pillows on the floor. More of those useful shelves lined every wall, stocked with an unending variety of household objects. A few closed doors probably guarded closets and at least one bedroom, Zoe thought, but she guessed that all of them were cramped.

Still, the colors were muted and pleasing, the ambiance was tranquil, and the place had a prosperous, contented feel that instantly made it seem welcoming.

Ilene put the flowers in a vase and set it in the middle of the table, while Melvin pulled his big body up from one of the chairs at the window. “I hope he gets here soon,” he remarked. “I’m hungry.”

As if the words had conjured their guest, there was a rattle on the back steps as someone stepped into the
kierten
. Ilene’s smile grew even brighter.

“Barlow,” she said happily, before calling, “we’re all in here!”

Moments later Barlow stepped into the room, and that was when Zoe remembered who he was. He had the same lumbering bulk as Melvin, though he was not quite as tall, and the same brushy brown hair, though none of his had turned to gray. His eyes were more like Ilene’s, dark and curious, taking in the room, the company, the situation, in one quick scan. He had, Zoe would guess, his father’s shape and his mother’s soul.

“Dinner smells great,” he said.

“Zoe, this is our son, Barlow,” Ilene said, taking him by the arm and leading him over. “Barlow, Zoe has been helping us out in the shop and working very hard.”

Barlow nodded to Zoe, assessing her with a little more attention. She couldn’t tell from his expression if he’d expected her to be here or not. “Learning how to make shoes, are you?” he asked.

She decided she simply would not allow herself to be ill at ease. She would not think about why Ilene had invited her here, why Ilene had asked if she wanted children, why she had encouraged Zoe to wear her prettiest top and the trousers with the smoothest, most flattering fit. She smiled faintly. “Not so far,” she said. “I have my hands full just keeping track of the sales and the money.”

“That’s a big part of any merchant’s job,” he agreed. “Doesn’t matter what you’re selling. If you price it wrong, or don’t watch your inventory, you won’t stay in business very long.”

“Barlow’s a trader,” Ilene explained. “He buys and sells goods all over Welce! He’s been from the southern ports to the northern mountains and everywhere in between.”

“Where have you found the most interesting merchandise?” Zoe asked.

Before he could answer, Melvin interrupted, humorously plaintive. “Could we talk about it while we eat?” he said. “I’m too hungry to wait.”

“Of course! Barlow, you help me get out the food. Zoe, will you pour water? There’s a pitcher on the table.”

After five minutes of bustle, they were all seated, Zoe and Barlow facing each other over the plates and glasses and steaming platters. Barlow—whom Zoe supposed was used to being the focal point of any conversation with his parents—immediately resumed the discussion where it had been interrupted.

“Well, every place has interesting merchandise, if you know where to look,” he said. “At the southern coastal towns, you can find all the spices and gems and imported silks you’d expect, but anyone else can find them, too. You need to look for merchants who carry the unexpected treasures.” He took a large bite, chewed quickly, and swallowed. “But that’s only half of it. You have to know the markets that will buy the unexpected treasures as well.”

“Like what?” Zoe asked. “What did you buy and sell that was so unusual?”

“In a northern port I once found a man selling hunting birds from Soeche-Tas. Smaller than a hawk and faster. He took me out to a field and showed me how they would dive on their prey—absolutely soundless. The most chilling thing I ever saw, and the most beautiful.” He paused to take another mouthful of food. “But I was able to buy the birds for an excellent price because none of the other land traders could figure out where to sell them.”

“Tell her where you found your buyers,” Ilene said.

“The Dochenzas,” Barlow said with satisfaction. “Kayle Dochenza is a hunter himself, and I thought surely an
elay
man would feel an affinity for a creature of the air. It was a gamble, of course it was, but it paid off. He paid me double my cost for every one of those birds.”

“That was smart,” Zoe said, sincerely impressed.

“Oh, Barlow has hundreds of stories like that,” Ilene said.

“Have you ever been to the southern ports?” Barlow asked. When the rest of them all answered in the negative, he said, “It’s nothing like Chialto here, I’ll tell you that,” and launched into a long description of its wharves and markets.

He seemed taken with the freighters that carried merchandise from far-off countries, for he spent an inordinate amount of time noting the size and hull capacity of all the vessels with which he did any business. “Have you ever thought about sailing to one of those other ports and buying merchandise directly from the dealers?” Zoe asked.

He laughed and shook his head. “
Torz
man through and through,” he said. “I don’t like to get too far from land.”

“Where will you be going when you leave the city?” Melvin asked him.

“And how long will you be gone?” Ilene added.

Barlow swallowed another bite. “I have a few short trips I need to make in the next couple of ninedays. First I want to go southwest to pick up some wool that a sheep rancher promised me. I can swap it to a trader who will be in the city toward the end of Quinnahunti, bringing painted glass he hauled in from Berringey. I’m taking the glass up to the northwest provinces. Lalindar territory.”

“How do you keep it all straight?” Ilene demanded with a laugh.

Zoe smiled at her. “You have two hundred customers you can call by name,” she said. “How do you keep
them
all straight?”

“That’s different. I know them.”

But Barlow was nodding. “That’s how I feel about the goods I trade for. I might have twenty pelts in one trunk and six different bolts of fabric in the other. But I bought each one, a piece at a time—I could tell you where the flaws are, I could tell you what the weight is. It’s as if they have faces or souls. They’re individuals to me.”

That’s actually a poetic way to put it,
Zoe admitted to herself. Certainly it would never have occurred to her to think in such terms. She thought Barlow might seem like a very interesting man if she knew him for any length of time.

“Who are you going to see in the northwest?” Melvin asked. “Thought all the Lalindars were here in the city. All the ones with any money, anyway.”

“Some of them,” Barlow agreed. “The big estate is still empty, but there are a half dozen other Lalindars with smaller houses near the river property.” He laughed and glanced around. “Well, I say they’re
smaller
, but they could fit this whole space in their
kiertens
alone.”

Zoe felt a small frown pucker her forehead. The big Lalindar house was empty? Christara’s lovely, elegant mansion overlooking the Marisi River? Zoe remembered that the polished wood floor in the
kierten
had been buffed to such a high glow that it looked as wet as the sparkling river. She and her cousins had skated across it in stockinged feet, skidding into the walls and tumbling over each other like clumsy puppies. The seer had told her the Lalindar family was still in disarray since Christara’s death, but it was hard to believe that neither her aunt Sarone nor her uncle Broy had claimed the house, even if they had not yet settled who should be prime.

“And when do you leave for that trip?” Ilene asked again.

“Before Quinnahunti is out, I hope. I’ll leave the day after tomorrow to pick up my wool.”

“I wish you would stay with us whenever you were in the city,” Ilene said.

He grinned, and once again Zoe felt a certain liking for him. His voice was teasing as he answered, “I like having my own place. A man can’t behave the way he likes when he’s under his mother’s watchful eye.”

Melvin snorted and then laughed out loud. Ilene batted him playfully on the arm and looked over at Zoe. “Can you believe it? He’s nearly thirty and he still hasn’t picked a wife or provided me with grandchildren.”

“I’m not a settled kind of man,” he said. “I’d need a wife who likes to wander as much as I do, and so far I haven’t found her.”

“Probably won’t find her among the
torz
women,” Zoe said with a smile.

“Or the
hunti
,” Ilene added. “I don’t know where he got his wandering blood, unless it was from Melvin’s
coru
grandmother.”

Zoe had never felt like her own
coru
heritage had been stamped more visibly on her face. This, clearly, was why she had been invited to dinner—so Ilene’s restless son could look her over and see if he found her attractive. Zoe was surprised to think that Ilene approved of her enough to present her to Barlow as an option, but maybe Ilene liked the alternatives even less. Who knew how Barlow spent his time on the road or in his bachelor’s lodgings in the city? Who knew what kind of unworthy women caught his attention? At least Ilene knew Zoe was honest and clean—and steadier than the average woman of blood and water.

Zoe was clasping her hands together tightly in her lap in the hope that the mild pain would prevent her from bursting into semihysterical laughter. All things considered, Barlow might be a husband preferable to the king; no doubt Ilene would believe Zoe sacrificed nothing by making such a swap. At any rate, Barlow would not expect Zoe to share him with four other wives.
That
was definitely a point in his favor. She was sure she would find other advantages if she tried.
Don’t laugh. Don’t laugh.

“A
coru
woman might do,” Zoe said, her voice only slightly strained. “But
elay
and
sweela
are lively girls as well. Don’t despair of finding someone who suits you.”

“Zoe has traveled a little,” Ilene said, gesturing in her direction.

“Really? Where have you been?” Barlow asked.

“I lived for some time in the southwest provinces,” Zoe said, “but I have done very little traveling except to make the journey here. My life has not been nearly as interesting as yours.”

That easily was she able to persuade Barlow to begin telling more of his own stories; he was a man who seemed to prefer talking to listening. That, again, might be one of his attractions. He would not require much of a wife except that she appear rapt by his conversation. Zoe didn’t suppose that would be difficult at all.

Before long they had finished the meal and Ilene wasn’t letting anyone help her clear the plates. “Is it time for some of those chocolates Zoe brought?” Melvin asked hopefully. The women laughed.

“
That’s
what you should be trading for,” Ilene called to her son from the kitchen. “Chocolate. That’ll make you a rich man.”

Barlow laughed with the rest of them but said, “I’m going to be a rich man no matter what I buy and sell. You just wait. You’ll see.”

T
he rest of the evening ran along much the same lines, Barlow basking in the attention of his parents, Zoe keeping a smile on her face and her true thoughts in shadow. But she was anxious to bring those thoughts out of hiding and examine them one by one. Therefore, when Ilene made the offhand comment that perhaps Barlow should walk her home, Zoe courteously refused and quickly took her leave before Ilene could insist.

Fairly quickly she realized that it might have been a good idea to accept an escort. Although it had been fully dark for at least an hour, the streets were still almost as crowded as during the day. But these nighttime pedestrians tended to be younger, a little rougher, than the daytime visitors—less likely to be workers hurrying to and from jobs and more likely to be teenagers looking for trouble or pickpockets looking for an easy target. Zoe pulled her festive wool scarf a little more tightly around her shoulders;
that
was the one thing she could ill afford to lose. But she supposed she didn’t look rich enough to rob or seductive enough to assault. A few people bumped into her in passing, mumbled excuses, and moved on. Otherwise, no one troubled her.

She wound her hands in the ends of the shawl and contemplated Barlow and the notion that he might consider her for a wife. Over the years, she had given very little thought to marriage. It had just seemed so remote and unlikely. While living in the village, she had had her share of adolescent infatuations with some of the more popular boys. She had been wildly excited when one of Doman’s nephews had spent a summer with his uncle; during secret trysts he had introduced her to some of the more pleasurable aspects of kissing. She had also nursed a secret affection for one of the peddlers who stopped at their village every quintile, a handsome yellow-haired man with a flashing smile and, no doubt, a litter of illegitimate children stretched across the western territories.