Child of the Sword, Book 1 of The Gods Within (16 page)

Why me?
thought Morgin. But he was
polite. And when the dance ended, he even dallied for a few moments
to avoid being obvious. Then he returned the girl to her mother and
retreated quickly.

But no sooner had the next dance begun than
he was accosted by another mother with another daughter. Again he
danced with the girl, and again he was polite. At least this one
didn’t giggle, and she laughed knowingly when he said something
witty. In fact, she laughed knowingly at everything he said, as if
all his words were the essence of sophisticated banter. As an
experiment he began to mumble, to slur his pronunciation a little.
Eventually he was mumbling incoherent babble, only slightly masked
by the sound of the music, and yet the girl continued to laugh and
nod knowingly.

The next dance saw another mother-daughter
team, and the one after that another. It became so ridiculous that
Morgin no longer even bothered to talk, and each daughter, having
been thoroughly instructed by her mother to display her utmost
charms, filled the vacuum with polite, but uninteresting,
conversation.

Morgin quickly tired of this foolish
charade. Mothers and daughters! He couldn’t even remember the name
of the girl with whom he was dancing at the moment, though he was
almost certain she was an Inetka. At least she, realizing that his
patience for hollow conversation was exhausted, had ceased
prattling.

She suddenly stopped dancing and Morgin
stepped on her foot.

“Ouch,” she said angrily. She stepped back
from him, put her fists on her hips, looked at him with a storm
growing behind her eyes. “Your brother said you’re a gentleman, and
that if you’re quiet, it’s only because you’re a little shy. But I
find you boorish. And you’re also a clumsy oaf.”

“I’m sorry,” Morgin said. “It’s just that
these mothers keep forcing their daughters on me.”

Her eyes darkened even further. Green eyes,
Morgin noticed. Pretty eyes. “So I was forced on you, was I?”

“I didn’t mean it that way.”

She sneered. “Your meaning was quite clear.
And what makes you think that you weren’t forced on me as
well?”

“I . . . Well
I . . .”

“At least I had the courtesy to be civil in
what was a mutually uncomfortable situation.”

With that, she turned her back on him and
walked away, leaving Morgin alone in the middle of the dance floor.
He moved quickly to avoid any mothers with daughters. He steered
straight for JohnEngine, who stood among a cluster of young
men.

“What in netherhell’s going on?” he
demanded.

JohnEngine grinned. “Difficulties, brother.
I wish I had such troubles.”

“Too many ladies for you?” Dannasul
asked.

“Yes,” Morgin said angrily. “No. Too many
mothers pushing too many daughters on me. What’s going on?”

“Shall we tell him?” JohnEngine asked
DaNoel.

“Tell me what?”

DaNoel ignored Morgin. “I don’t know, John.
As usual his head’s up in the clouds and he hasn’t the vaguest
idea.”

“Idea about what?” Morgin demanded.

“You’re right,” JohnEngine said seriously to
DaNoel. “Perhaps he should find out for himself.”

“Damn it!” Morgin said. “Find out what?”

Brandon elbowed his way between JohnEngine
and DaNoel. “Your reputation is spreading, Morgin.”

“What reputation?”

Brandon shrugged. “No one likes the Decouix,
and you humbled him badly.”

“How did they find out about that?”

“It’s all over the city,” Dannasul said.
“You can’t keep a duel like that quiet. Especially when it involves
the Decouix.”

“But there was no duel,” Morgin said.

Brandon shook his head as if Morgin were a
slow-witted child. “The story that’s going about the city is that
Valso was ready to let his Kulls murder us all. You challenged him.
He could not refuse without seeming cowardly, but he demanded that
it be a duel to the death. The two of you fought, and by superior
swordsmanship you overcame him. But you were merciful and granted
him his life on the condition that we be allowed to leave
unharmed.”

“That’s preposterous,” Morgin said.

Brandon agreed. “I know.”

“But Brandon tells the story so poorly,”
JohnEngine complained. “Oh he’s got the facts straight, but in the
streets it’s told with so much more embellishment: a blow by blow
description of two master swordsmen battling their way from one end
of the city to the other. It sounds so much better that way, don’t
you think?”

DaNoel raised his mug of ale. He was already
a bit drunk, swaying slightly as he spoke. “To mighty Morgin. The
greatest swordsman in all the land.”

He drank deeply, as did the others. They
laughed noisily, and while DaNoel laughed too, his laugh was
forced, as if he and Morgin had returned to the uneasy posture that
always separated them. DaNoel staggered into Morgin, and under the
guise of catching his balance, hissed in his ear, “You don’t fool
me, whoreson.”

JohnEngine’s eyes suddenly brightened. “Ah,
Rhianne!” he said, looking over Morgin’s shoulder.

Morgin turned to find the young Inetka girl
on whose toes he had earlier stepped.

JohnEngine swooped around him and took her
hand. He kissed it with a flourish. “Rhianne. This is a pleasant
surprise. I hadn’t expected to see you free so easily.”

“Good evening, JohnEngine,” she said
pleasantly. “I tire of dancing, and of oafish dancers who step on
my toes.” Her eyes passed quickly over Morgin.

“Then what besides dancing would you like?”
JohnEngine asked.

“A small goblet of wine and some pleasant
conversation.”

Dannasul fetched the wine while JohnEngine
hovered jealously about her. “I don’t believe I’ve met everyone
here,” she said.

JohnEngine frowned. “You don’t want to know
these ruffians.”

She sipped her wine coyly. “You just want to
keep me for yourself.”

“Ah Rhianne,” he said. “You know me too
well. Nevertheless.” He shrugged and turned to the rest of them.
“Rhianne ye Inetka. You already know my brother DaNoel et Elhiyne,
and my cousin Brandon et Elhiyne.”

They both nodded. JohnEngine put a hand on
Dannasul’s shoulder. “This is Dannasul ye Elhiyne—a distant
cousin—and the one here with his mouth open is my bother AethonLaw
et Elhiyne, who goes by the name of Morgin.”

She looked at Morgin, turned one brow upward
and offered her hand. Morgin took it, bowed, kissed it much like
JohnEngine, but without the flourish, all the while never certain
that he was doing it properly.

“So you’re the great swordsman,” she said.
“It’s a pity you can’t dance as well.”

Morgin shrugged.

JohnEngine frowned. “Do you two know each
other?”

Rhianne smiled an unfriendly smile. “We’re
acquainted.”

Morgin suddenly wished he knew a spell of
invisibility. “I’m the oafish dancer who stepped on her toes.”

DaNoel’s teeth suddenly shined in the middle
of a broad grin. Brandon shook his head pityingly. Dannasul choked
back a laugh. JohnEngine let one out. “Oh brother-of-mine. That’s
precious.”

“AethonLaw,” a woman called. “AethonLaw is
that you?”

Morgin cringed inwardly. He recognized her:
a Penda woman with more than one daughter, one of whom she
literally dragged across the dance floor now.

“AethonLaw. You must meet my other daughter
Anja. Anja. Meet AethonLaw et Elhiyne.”

The girl was all of twelve years old. She
looked at him and wrinkled her nose.

Morgin summoned every ounce of courtesy he
could find. He bowed. “I am honored, milady.”

“Anja’s been wanting to meet you all
evening, AethonLaw. Haven’t you, Anja?”

The little girl wrinkled her nose again.

Dannasul snickered.

“You two run along and dance now,” Anja’s
mother said.

“I don’t want to dance,” Anja said.

JohnEngine spluttered and coughed, spilling
ale and slapping himself on the chest. “Sorry,” he said chuckling.
“Took a little ale down the wrong pipe.”

Morgin wanted to get this over with as soon
as possible. “Would you care to dance?” he asked Anja politely.

“No,” she said petulantly.

JohnEngine turned away, fighting back open
laughter. “Think I’ll get more ale.”

“Now, Anja,” her mother said. “Don’t be
rude. Dance with AethonLaw.”

After a little cajoling Anja finally
condescended to dance with Morgin, though she was none too happy
about it. Morgin took care not to step on her toes, though she
walked all over his. When the music ended she went her way and he
snuck out into the gardens where he hoped to find refuge from
mothers and daughters.

The night air was still and pleasing. He
found a stone bench to one side of the terrace and sat down alone.
Below him lay the city, a dark skyline of buildings with small,
lighted pockets of activity.

“Morgin,” Rhianne said softly. “Are you out
here?”

He stiffened, remained quiet, hoping she’d
pass him by unnoticed. Then he heard the soft rustle of her skirts
behind him. “That was terribly humiliating, wasn’t it?”

“If you mean Anja?” he asked, trying to
sound unconcerned. “It really didn’t bother me.”

“Yes it did,” she said softly. “And you were
very polite about the whole thing, as you are trying to be polite
now.”

He shrugged.

“May I join you?”

“Sure,” he said. “Sit down.”

She did so, and again he heard the soft
rustle of her skirts. Her perfume drifted about him, carried by a
breeze too gentle to be felt. Like Rhianne herself, the scent she
wore was soft, and while he desperately wanted to, he refused to
look her way, all the while knowing himself to be a fool.

“I’m sorry I stepped on your toes,” he
said.

She laughed a little. “You hurt my pride
more that my toes.”

“Well I’m sorry about that too.”

He wanted to say something more, to be witty
and charming like JohnEngine, but he could think of nothing, and he
knew if he tried he’d make a mess of it and sound even more the
fool.

“Morgin,” she said tentatively. “When my
mother introduced me to you, was she anything like Anja’s? And be
honest with me. Don’t be polite again.”

“To tell you the truth,” he said. “I really
don’t know. I don’t even remember being introduced. By that time
I’d stopped paying attention and was just going through the
motions.”

“How many times has that happened this
evening?”

“I don’t know that either,” he said. “I lost
count long ago.”

“You must have had a thoroughly wretched
evening. Surely it can’t all be because you humbled Valso.”

Morgin shrugged. He’d been thinking about
that himself. “There’s more. Of course my brothers and cousins
don’t see it that way, but they’re not adopted either.”

“What does that have to do with it?” she
asked. “Clan law recognizes no difference between adoption and
birth.”

“I think you’re being naive,” he said
politely. He turned to face her, to truly look at her for the first
time that evening. A small, curly lock of hair had fought its way
loose from the elaborate tangle on top of her head, and he realized
he could lose himself in that face. Her curiosity was honest, but
remembering a lifetime of subtly unintended insults and unknowing
slights, he wondered if she could ever understand.

“Don’t you see?” he said. “Clan law is
enforced by men and women who are as fallible as you and I. In
gross matters I am of House Elhiyne, and none dare say otherwise.
But in the fine points, the little things that are ruled by
people’s prejudices, I am still the adopted whoreson, as I shall
always be.”

In the moonlight he could see her brow
wrinkle, and he noticed that even frowning, she was beautiful. “But
what does that have to do with dances and mothers with marriageable
daughters?”

“Well now,” Morgin said, “Every one of those
daughters, including you, and I mean no insult by this, but every
one of them was the daughter of a minor lord. A daughter of one of
the major houses may expect to marry high within the caste of one
of the clans. And while by adoption and law I am of the highest
caste, I am still the whoreson and that makes me just a little more
accessible than my brothers and cousins. Your mother, and the
others, thought that their daughters, who ordinarily could never
expect to marry into one of the great houses, might still have a
chance with me, the whoreson.”

Rhianne nodded slowly. Morgin could see that
she understood. “And the incident with Valso?” she asked.

“That’s what opened up all the possibilities
in those mother’s minds. Since I am the hero of the moment, the
mothers have hopes that their daughters will resist them less when
they propose marriage with me.”

Rhianne smiled. She reached out and took his
hands in hers. “You don’t seem at all bitter about this.”

“Me?” Morgin asked. “Bitter? Why should I be
bitter? My life is much better with the clan than it was before. I
love my brothers and sisters and cousins. And they love me, for the
most part. And there has never been any question that I am deeply
loved by my mother and father. So what do a few slights
matter?”

She looked at him oddly. “I like you,
Morgin. I like you very much.”

She stood, still holding his hands. “Come.
Let us dance again. But this time we’ll dance because we want
to.”

Morgin only danced when forced to by
circumstance, or required courtesy, and at that moment dancing was
the last thing he would have chosen to do. But suddenly, for
Rhianne, he would have done anything. He escorted her out onto the
dance floor, smiling outwardly, terrified inwardly, trying to
remember the lessons that Olivia had forced upon him. For once, he
was grateful for something the old woman had demanded he learn.

The music began. He managed to stay with it,
concentrating intently, moving with utmost care. And then he
realized that Rhianne had asked him something, and he hadn’t heard
a word she’d said.