Travesty was a symbol of Shaftal Zanja did not doubt, but it would not help Karis if she told her so. Karis did not understand symbols, not even the symbolism of her own obsessions.
“What’s wrong with the floor?” Leeba asked.
“It doesn’t feel right.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know. I just don’t like to sit on it. I’m sitting in a chair, see?”
Leeba sat on the floor, declared that she didn’t like how it felt either, and then proceeded to move from spot to spot, testing each one in turn and telling Zanja what she learned: the floor was too crooked, too rough, too creaky, too cold, and the spaces between boards were too wide.
“You can help me fill the gaps with rope,” Karis suggested. “Not today or tomorrow, but the day after that.”
Zanja said, “Perhaps a carpet would help. An old one, with a complicated pattern. On that I could sit and be happy.”
Karis had finally tossed back the blankets and gotten out of bed. “Emil would say something insightful to you now, wouldn’t he?”
“He’d say, ‘You’ve been seeking that pattern an awfully long time, my sister.’ ”
“Fire bloods—who can possibly understand them?”
Karis snatched Leeba up from the floor and swung her to the ceiling. Leeba shrieked. The seat of her breeches had proven an efficient dust mop, and furry clots of it flew into the air with her. Karis swung her down to the floor and then up again. “Leeba bird, Leeba bird, will you fly away?”
“Come in,” Zanja called, for Emil was just stepping up to their door.
“But nobody knocked,” Leeba said, not too breathless from shrieking to protest this breach of custom.
“It’s Emil, though.” Karis put her daughter down as the door opened, and Leeba ran to Emil and wrapped herself around his leg. He obligingly walked around the room with her hanging on his leg like a squirrel on a tree trunk until she lost her grip and fell to the floor with a thud.
“This floor is too hard,” she declared.
“Is that the problem with the floor?” Zanja set the ink brush aside and hung her finished flag with the others on a laundry line by the fireplace. After a day’s work on that fireplace, a chimney doctor had managed to make it stop smoking, but now it burned coal at a tremendous rate without warming the room particularly.
Emil had been about to say something to Karis, but Zanja’s glyphs had caught his attention, and he studied them instead. Writing with glyphs was as much an art as reading them was, and Zanja supposed that in the writing she had revealed as much about herself as she had about the people she was grieving: a Paladin who not only had given her three new glyph signs, but also had drawn the illustrations on the new cards she put in her deck; a librarian who had been so unobtrusive that she walked right into him one day; a clerk with extraordinary handwriting, who had devoted much effort to teaching her how to properly trim a pen.
Emil glanced at her. “I wish we had not lost so many glyphs. I’d love to see what you would do with them.”
“I’d waste my entire life with them,” she said.
“No, no—it’s called being a scholar. How many times must I tell you?”
A year ago, Zanja had transliterated some of the poetry of the great glyphic poet Coles, and Emil had been teasingly calling her a scholar ever since. Coles had used all thousand glyphs in his great book of poems, and since they did have a copy of the book, the glyphs themselves had not actually been lost. But the meanings were lost, for neither the study of glyphology nor any glyphic lexicons had survived the first years of the war. Zanja had started her transliteration of the poetry in an effort to discover some of the lost meanings by understanding the context in which Coles was using them, but after a few months of effort had abandoned the task, not because it was grueling but because it was fruitless.
Emil turned to Karis. “You’ve slept, finally.”
“You’ve shaved,
“What’s wrong with the floor?” Leeba asked.
“It doesn’t feel right.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know. I just don’t like to sit on it. I’m sitting in a chair, see?”
Leeba sat on the floor, declared that she didn’t like how it felt either, and then proceeded to move from spot to spot, testing each one in turn and telling Zanja what she learned: the floor was too crooked, too rough, too creaky, too cold, and the spaces between boards were too wide.
“You can help me fill the gaps with rope,” Karis suggested. “Not today or tomorrow, but the day after that.”
Zanja said, “Perhaps a carpet would help. An old one, with a complicated pattern. On that I could sit and be happy.”
Karis had finally tossed back the blankets and gotten out of bed. “Emil would say something insightful to you now, wouldn’t he?”
“He’d say, ‘You’ve been seeking that pattern an awfully long time, my sister.’ ”
“Fire bloods—who can possibly understand them?”
Karis snatched Leeba up from the floor and swung her to the ceiling. Leeba shrieked. The seat of her breeches had proven an efficient dust mop, and furry clots of it flew into the air with her. Karis swung her down to the floor and then up again. “Leeba bird, Leeba bird, will you fly away?”
“Come in,” Zanja called, for Emil was just stepping up to their door.
“But nobody knocked,” Leeba said, not too breathless from shrieking to protest this breach of custom.
“It’s Emil, though.” Karis put her daughter down as the door opened, and Leeba ran to Emil and wrapped herself around his leg. He obligingly walked around the room with her hanging on his leg like a squirrel on a tree trunk until she lost her grip and fell to the floor with a thud.
“This floor is too hard,” she declared.
“Is that the problem with the floor?” Zanja set the ink brush aside and hung her finished flag with the others on a laundry line by the fireplace. After a day’s work on that fireplace, a chimney doctor had managed to make it stop smoking, but now it burned coal at a tremendous rate without warming the room particularly.
Emil had been about to say something to Karis, but Zanja’s glyphs had caught his attention, and he studied them instead. Writing with glyphs was as much an art as reading them was, and Zanja supposed that in the writing she had revealed as much about herself as she had about the people she was grieving: a Paladin who not only had given her three new glyph signs, but also had drawn the illustrations on the new cards she put in her deck; a librarian who had been so unobtrusive that she walked right into him one day; a clerk with extraordinary handwriting, who had devoted much effort to teaching her how to properly trim a pen.
Emil glanced at her. “I wish we had not lost so many glyphs. I’d love to see what you would do with them.”
“I’d waste my entire life with them,” she said.
“No, no—it’s called being a scholar. How many times must I tell you?”
A year ago, Zanja had transliterated some of the poetry of the great glyphic poet Coles, and Emil had been teasingly calling her a scholar ever since. Coles had used all thousand glyphs in his great book of poems, and since they did have a copy of the book, the glyphs themselves had not actually been lost. But the meanings were lost, for neither the study of glyphology nor any glyphic lexicons had survived the first years of the war. Zanja had started her transliteration of the poetry in an effort to discover some of the lost meanings by understanding the context in which Coles was using them, but after a few months of effort had abandoned the task, not because it was grueling but because it was fruitless.
Emil turned to Karis. “You’ve slept, finally.”
“You’ve shaved,
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