glacial lakes, and about as warm. “If I should happen to hear anything, perhaps you can tell me why I would pass it on to you? Why I should even tell you if they were here? My clients value discretion.”
“So do mine,” I said, grinning. “Come on, Clariel. It’s the high-end clientele like them who bring in the rest. How many of your customers pay for their seats hoping they’re still warm from a god’s backside, or on the off chance they might spot the Perindan Emperor having a pie and peas with his fifty closest sycophants?”
“There is a difference between people knowing who one’s clients are, and passing on private conversation. My clientele will turn up anyway, Babylon. We serve the best food in Scalentine.”
“Not all of it,” I said.
“Really.”
I may not play chess as well as the Chief, but there are games I’m good at, when I have the pieces.
I leaned forward. “You hear anything, and you tell me, and I’ll get you Flower’s recipe for spiced goulash. If the information’s useful, I’ll get him to come show you how he does it.”
She stared at me.
I stared back.
Finally she blew a delicate puff of air through slightly pursed lips. “Very well.”
I was smiling as I left, but as I walked towards home, my good mood faded. I still had nothing, and if that girl was in some bastard’s hands...
I turned the ring on my finger round and round, crossed the river and headed south.
TIRESANA
S URROUNDED BY THE sort of luxury even my master hadn’t enjoyed, I rode by barge to the capital, Akran, and to the Temple of All the Gods.
For five days I lay on a silk-covered couch being fed fruit by beautiful servants and watching land I’d jounced over on a sandmule drift past gently. I felt as though I were in a guilty dream, suspended, waiting for someone to realise it had all been a mistake.
For five days the Avatar Hap-Canae appeared daily and spoke with me, talking about the marvels that awaited me, and asking me questions that no doubt exposed the echoing depths of my ignorance about, well, pretty much everything. Even about Babaska, she I was about to serve. I knew that she took human lovers, though it didn’t always end well, and that she sometimes turned up in battle to fight beside a favoured soldier or a company. That was about it. I’d had a lot more education in scrubbing than in religion; what little I knew was mostly from fireside tales.
I was an eager listener, partly because I really was interested, and mad to learn, but mainly because I was half in love from the moment I first saw him. After a few days in his company, drenched in his charisma, the focus of utter and undivided attention from a divine being, I was as hopelessly, helplessly, awe-strickenly in love as any sixteen-year-old girl in the history of all the planes. Even now the scent of myrrh will bring it back to me; that drugged and burning madness.
It was the day before we were due to arrive. He lay on a green silk draped couch, the perfect background for his tawny robes; a plate of honey-cakes stood on the little table between us. His robes left one shoulder bare. I watched the smooth play of muscle beneath his glowing skin, and tried not to tremble. I was lying feet away from an Avatar, being treated like a priestess, and I was crazy with desire.
“Have you attended a Sowing?” he said, picking up a cake.
“Twice, so far.” I blushed, I swear, all the way to my waist. The Sowing happened at Spring Festival, one of the most important in the year.
Hap-Canae smiled. “Only twice! Well, at least you know what will be expected of you.” He bit into his cake.
I hadn’t thought of it, but as a High Priestess of Babaska, of course, I would be expected to perform the Sowing. I wondered what it would be like to do it with a man in front of a whole crowd of people. Would everyone guess I’d never done it before? What if I got it wrong?
The thought was probably written all over my face.
He ran a
“So do mine,” I said, grinning. “Come on, Clariel. It’s the high-end clientele like them who bring in the rest. How many of your customers pay for their seats hoping they’re still warm from a god’s backside, or on the off chance they might spot the Perindan Emperor having a pie and peas with his fifty closest sycophants?”
“There is a difference between people knowing who one’s clients are, and passing on private conversation. My clientele will turn up anyway, Babylon. We serve the best food in Scalentine.”
“Not all of it,” I said.
“Really.”
I may not play chess as well as the Chief, but there are games I’m good at, when I have the pieces.
I leaned forward. “You hear anything, and you tell me, and I’ll get you Flower’s recipe for spiced goulash. If the information’s useful, I’ll get him to come show you how he does it.”
She stared at me.
I stared back.
Finally she blew a delicate puff of air through slightly pursed lips. “Very well.”
I was smiling as I left, but as I walked towards home, my good mood faded. I still had nothing, and if that girl was in some bastard’s hands...
I turned the ring on my finger round and round, crossed the river and headed south.
TIRESANA
S URROUNDED BY THE sort of luxury even my master hadn’t enjoyed, I rode by barge to the capital, Akran, and to the Temple of All the Gods.
For five days I lay on a silk-covered couch being fed fruit by beautiful servants and watching land I’d jounced over on a sandmule drift past gently. I felt as though I were in a guilty dream, suspended, waiting for someone to realise it had all been a mistake.
For five days the Avatar Hap-Canae appeared daily and spoke with me, talking about the marvels that awaited me, and asking me questions that no doubt exposed the echoing depths of my ignorance about, well, pretty much everything. Even about Babaska, she I was about to serve. I knew that she took human lovers, though it didn’t always end well, and that she sometimes turned up in battle to fight beside a favoured soldier or a company. That was about it. I’d had a lot more education in scrubbing than in religion; what little I knew was mostly from fireside tales.
I was an eager listener, partly because I really was interested, and mad to learn, but mainly because I was half in love from the moment I first saw him. After a few days in his company, drenched in his charisma, the focus of utter and undivided attention from a divine being, I was as hopelessly, helplessly, awe-strickenly in love as any sixteen-year-old girl in the history of all the planes. Even now the scent of myrrh will bring it back to me; that drugged and burning madness.
It was the day before we were due to arrive. He lay on a green silk draped couch, the perfect background for his tawny robes; a plate of honey-cakes stood on the little table between us. His robes left one shoulder bare. I watched the smooth play of muscle beneath his glowing skin, and tried not to tremble. I was lying feet away from an Avatar, being treated like a priestess, and I was crazy with desire.
“Have you attended a Sowing?” he said, picking up a cake.
“Twice, so far.” I blushed, I swear, all the way to my waist. The Sowing happened at Spring Festival, one of the most important in the year.
Hap-Canae smiled. “Only twice! Well, at least you know what will be expected of you.” He bit into his cake.
I hadn’t thought of it, but as a High Priestess of Babaska, of course, I would be expected to perform the Sowing. I wondered what it would be like to do it with a man in front of a whole crowd of people. Would everyone guess I’d never done it before? What if I got it wrong?
The thought was probably written all over my face.
He ran a
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