Read Online The Embers of Heaven by Alma Alexander - Free Book Online
Authors: Alma Alexander
Tags: Historical, Fantasy
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windows securely covered by wooden shutters. Others, those that had actual people going in and out of them, were divided between two types. One consisted of a string of busy offices where men ducked in with bulging bags and armfuls of paperwork, re-emerging with sour faces and tight lips that betokened either their having sucked on a particularly sour lemon or having just paid large sums of money to people they considered undeserving for ‘services’ they resented being obliged to buy. The other, which she could smell all the way across the wharf, had quite different purposes and the people coming out of these wore expressions that, if not ecstatic at their lot in life, were at the very least tolerably content with it for the duration of the panacea doled out by rice wine or sorghum ale.
Amais saw no apparent lodgings and what she could overhear from the conversations going on all around her the language that was spoken here was different from the one she thought she knew, the one she had thought would be spoken by all of Syai—a different dialect, a different accent, it sounded harsh and foreign and she found herself close to tears of pure frustration and helplessness even while her mind was collecting these sounds and smells and images, sorting them, cataloguing them, filing them smartly away for future reference, for future stories. There were lots of stories here. Amais could feel them all around her, rubbing against her ankles like friendly cats, ducking into alleys just out of her line of sight and inviting her to follow.
But those were for later. Those were for when she was fed and housed. And Vien…
“ Nixi mei ma ?” The voice was soft, almost too soft to be heard over the hubbub of the harbor. Both Amais and Vien turned their heads, sure they had heard something but not certain of what. Their eyes met those of the man who had spoken, wiry and barely tall enough to be eye-level with Vien. He bowed to them, having got their attention, presenting them with a brief glimpse of a beaded round cap that fitted snugly around his head, and then straightened again, smiling.
Amais scratched around in her brain for the meaning of the words he had just uttered and came up, incongruously perhaps, with ‘Have you eaten?’
“No,” she said helplessly, slanting the words in what she thought might be comprehensible to the local speaker, staring at the man. “Thank you,” she added, after a moment, and bowed back in the manner that he had done. It seemed to be called for, just basic politeness.
His eyes glittered as he offered a small smile. When he spoke again, it was slowly, enunciating his words, and Amais found she had little trouble understanding him.
“I apologize,” the man said, “for intruding, but I think that you are strangers in the city. Might you be looking for a place to stay tonight?”
Vien still looked a little confused. Amais glanced at her quickly, and ‘translated’. Vien blinked several times, quickly.
“But who is he?” she asked Amais, in the high court language of old Syai that she had been taught by her mother.
The man obviously understood, because he bowed again, this time directly to Vien. “Beautiful lady,” he said, in heavily accented but compatible dialect, “my sister runs an inn not ten minutes from here by pedicab. It is safe, cheap, might I interest you in lodging there with her tonight?”
Amais found her heart thumping painfully, her eyes darting from the smiling tout to her apparently frozen mother. Aylun, in her mother’s arms, was obviously being clutched at ferociously, but had caught the mood of the moment and didn’t do more than let out a small soft whimper.
“We have to sleep somewhere, Mother,” Amais said, in the language of Elaas, something she knew that the man would not understand. His expression didn’t change as she spoke but she saw his glance sharpen as he tried to interpret her words.
“But
Amais saw no apparent lodgings and what she could overhear from the conversations going on all around her the language that was spoken here was different from the one she thought she knew, the one she had thought would be spoken by all of Syai—a different dialect, a different accent, it sounded harsh and foreign and she found herself close to tears of pure frustration and helplessness even while her mind was collecting these sounds and smells and images, sorting them, cataloguing them, filing them smartly away for future reference, for future stories. There were lots of stories here. Amais could feel them all around her, rubbing against her ankles like friendly cats, ducking into alleys just out of her line of sight and inviting her to follow.
But those were for later. Those were for when she was fed and housed. And Vien…
“ Nixi mei ma ?” The voice was soft, almost too soft to be heard over the hubbub of the harbor. Both Amais and Vien turned their heads, sure they had heard something but not certain of what. Their eyes met those of the man who had spoken, wiry and barely tall enough to be eye-level with Vien. He bowed to them, having got their attention, presenting them with a brief glimpse of a beaded round cap that fitted snugly around his head, and then straightened again, smiling.
Amais scratched around in her brain for the meaning of the words he had just uttered and came up, incongruously perhaps, with ‘Have you eaten?’
“No,” she said helplessly, slanting the words in what she thought might be comprehensible to the local speaker, staring at the man. “Thank you,” she added, after a moment, and bowed back in the manner that he had done. It seemed to be called for, just basic politeness.
His eyes glittered as he offered a small smile. When he spoke again, it was slowly, enunciating his words, and Amais found she had little trouble understanding him.
“I apologize,” the man said, “for intruding, but I think that you are strangers in the city. Might you be looking for a place to stay tonight?”
Vien still looked a little confused. Amais glanced at her quickly, and ‘translated’. Vien blinked several times, quickly.
“But who is he?” she asked Amais, in the high court language of old Syai that she had been taught by her mother.
The man obviously understood, because he bowed again, this time directly to Vien. “Beautiful lady,” he said, in heavily accented but compatible dialect, “my sister runs an inn not ten minutes from here by pedicab. It is safe, cheap, might I interest you in lodging there with her tonight?”
Amais found her heart thumping painfully, her eyes darting from the smiling tout to her apparently frozen mother. Aylun, in her mother’s arms, was obviously being clutched at ferociously, but had caught the mood of the moment and didn’t do more than let out a small soft whimper.
“We have to sleep somewhere, Mother,” Amais said, in the language of Elaas, something she knew that the man would not understand. His expression didn’t change as she spoke but she saw his glance sharpen as he tried to interpret her words.
“But
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