The Seven-Petaled Shield (30 page)

The man’s words and the kindness in his voice brought Tsorreh an absurd rush of joy. Until that moment, she had not known how deeply she missed seeing a face like her own—with her bones and skin and wavy dark hair—and hearing the music of her own language.

The man’s eyes softened as he took in her response. “You are new in Aidon? Taken as a slave?”

The day seemed suddenly too bright.

The Meklavaran said, under his breath, “This place is not safe.” His eyes narrowed as he looked out over the market. His body tensed, jaw clenching. Tsorreh tried to make out what had alarmed him, but she was too short to see easily through the crowd. In comparison, he was a head taller.

“What—” she began, still in Meklavaran, and then a space opened between the strolling pedestrians.

A pair of helmeted men, city patrol, strode through the crowd. A brief glimpse revealed their intent, set expressions and the arrogant set of their shoulders. From the way they walked and held themselves, they were on an urgent mission. The more poorly dressed people scurried out of the patrolmen’s path and the street urchins disappeared. Even the more wealthy made way.

Tsorreh masked her shiver of fear. She reminded herself that, to such men, she would look like any other slave woman. In a public place like this, they might direct a few crude remarks in her direction, but nothing worse. She wished that Astreya had returned. Perhaps the best strategy was to take no notice of the patrolmen and do nothing to bring herself to their attention.

The Meklavaran had vanished, melted into the market crowd as if he had never existed. How would she ever find him again? She didn’t even know his name. There were so many answers she needed from him.

The gaze of the foremost patrolman lit on her face. His eyes widened and his expression shifted. He pointed at her.

“You there! Halt!”

All Tsorreh’s resolve to remain calm vanished. Her heart hammered so fast and loud, she could not think. Wildly, she searched for an avenue of escape. She knew, before she could take a single step, how futile that would be. The moment of flight had already passed. Any street urchin could have evaded the patrol more readily than she. If she tried, she would be captured, if she were not killed in the attempt. Neither anonymity nor flight could avail her now. Her only hope was to offer no resistance, to pretend innocence.

The next instant, the two patrolmen were upon her. One grabbed her and spun her around, expertly jerking her arms behind her back. “Got her!”

“The Lady Lycian reported you’d escaped custody,” said the other, who appeared to be in command.

Lycian!

“There has b-been a m-mistake.” Tsorreh tried not to stammer, and failed. “I w-was not running away.”

The patrolman gave her arms a vicious twist. “That’s what they all say. You will soon learn not to lie to those in authority over you.”

“What—?”

“No questions!” The patrolman shoved Tsorreh forward so hard that she stumbled. Fire shot through her shoulder joints.

“Everyone out of the way!” the older patrolman ordered. The crowd, which had drawn nearer out of curiosity, pulled back again.

“What’s this? What’s going on here?” Danar’s voice rose above the sounds of the market crowd. Through eyes watering with pain, Tsorreh saw him pushing through the milling pedestrians toward her. Two tall, muscular men followed him closely. They wore sashes in Jaxar’s house colors.

Danar glared at the nearest patrolman. “What do you think you’re doing? Is this how you were trained to greet dignitaries? Do you not recognize this noble lady or know she is in Lord Jaxar’s care?”

The man holding Tsorreh’s arms snorted insolently, but
his fellow paused. His expression wavered from annoyance to hesitation.

“Who is asking?” The patrolman’s gaze shifted from Danar’s youthful features to his tunic of silk, the gold clasps at his shoulders, the chain of ruby-studded links around his neck, and the cloak of purple wool. Danar’s escort had taken up positions to either side of him. From their postures and grim expressions, their eyes narrowed and their hands ready on the hilts of their swords, they stood ready to defend him against the city patrol or anyone else.

With an aggrieved sigh, as if anyone who needed to ask was beneath his attention, Danar gave his name, followed by a long stream of titles, few of which Tsorreh recognized. Her panic melted into near-exhilaration at being rescued by a boy the age of her son.

“I see you are woefully ill-informed on current events at court.” With a sneer, Danar addressed the senior patrolmen. “I shall report this lapse and your superiors will be duly disciplined. This lady is in my father’s charge and
I
am escorting her about the city. I suggest that if you value your jobs, not to mention your skins, you unhand her immediately. Well, what are you waiting for? Is something amiss? Anything I ought to report to my uncle?”

“Nothing at all, young lord! Everything is in perfect order!” The older of the two patrolmen sputtered as his comrade released Tsorreh.

Tsorreh lifted her chin, assuming as regal a posture as she could. The muscles of her shoulders burned and she longed to rub them, but she was determined not to display weakness in front of such men.

“It is unpleasant to be the object of so much common attention,” Danar said to the patrolmen. “Disperse this rabble and then take yourselves off to your next duties, so that we may proceed without hindrance about our own business.”

The patrolmen shouted for the crowd to break up, then hurried off as quickly as they could with any degree of dignity. With their departure, the shoppers and vendors
lost interest. Danar’s guards maintained their watchful stance.

“Thank all the gods you’re safe!” Danar said. “Astreya told Father what Lycian did! Or rather, she told Breneya. Father was furious at Lycian. I haven’t heard them fight like that—well,
she
screams, but he just listens and then does what he wants. He sent me to find you. When you weren’t at the washery, I didn’t know where to look!”

“We were on our way back,” Tsorreh explained.

“Where’s Astreya? Isn’t she with you? She didn’t leave you here to find your own way home?”

“No, no. She just stepped away for a moment. To see a…” Tsorreh hesitated, unsure how much to reveal. How easy it was to slip into a conspiracy of the powerless, to lie by omission. “A friend, I think.”

Somewhat to her surprise, Danar nodded. “Yes, the oil merchant’s son. We’ll lose her as soon as the boy’s father settles him with a share in the business. Father says it won’t be long now.”

For an invalid and a crippled recluse, Jaxar appeared to know a great deal about the goings-on in the city. Certainly, he was no fool about what went on in his own household.

“Father said not to hurry home, to keep you away from the house for awhile. I wonder if you’d like to see a bit of Aidon.” From Danar’s tone, the outing was clearly not a burden, but an adventure. He had shed the arrogant self-importance with which he had confronted the patrolmen. “What would you like to explore first?”

“I
HARDLY know,” Tsorreh replied, still dazed at the rapid reversal of events. First she had been sent on a menial errand, which turned out to be a scheme by Lycian to have her arrested. Now she found herself in the company of a young man eager to indulge her wishes.

“I’ve been in your city only a short time,” she pointed out, “and most of that I’ve been confined indoors, either at the Palace or in your father’s laboratory. Won’t Astreya worry if she returns, and I am not here? I did promise not to wander off.”

Danar appeared not to have heard her last comment. He was already turning away from her, gesturing to one of the ragged children who had followed in his wake.

Glancing nervously at the two guards, the child approached. Dust obliterated the original color of his rough-cropped hair. He looked to be about eight, slender and wiry, but the bright, calculating look in his eyes made Tsorreh suspect he was older.

Danar held out a coin that glinted copper in the sun. “Here, boy. Do you see that shop, with the two-handled jar above the door? I will give you this coin to tell the oil seller there that there is no hurry on his order. I will have another such coin when you return with his answer.”

Beaming, the boy snatched the coin in one dirt-encrusted hand. He darted back into the crowd, weaving in and out of the shoppers like a liquid shadow. The boy was so clearly a creature of the city, of alleys and stolen apples, of cleverness and desperation, Tsorreh wanted to laugh and weep.

A few minutes later, the boy returned.

“He says he is most, um, most overjoyed.” With an exultant glance at Danar’s bodyguards, the boy thrust out his hand for the rest of his payment.

“I doubt he really said that, but you have earned your fee.” Watching the boy disappear once more, Danar said, “I believe he may have a future as a speedy but not necessarily accurate messenger.”

The incident lightened Tsorreh’s mood. “You choose our destination. Take me to one of your favorite places.”

“Let’s go up to Victory Hill,” Danar said, motioning for his escort to follow. “It’s got the best view of the city. That will give you a general idea of where things are.”

*   *   *

The slopes of Victory Hill were almost as steep as cliffs. A road wound along the sides, switching back frequently. Its natural defenses made it an ideal location for both lookout and fortress. A handful of archers could easily hold the heights. At the highest point, to the southwest of the relatively flat top, a windswept field surrounded the crumbling remains of a watchtower. Leaving the two guards at the base of the tower, Danar and Tsorreh clambered up to the top of the heaped stones.

Aidon was more vast than Tsorreh had imagined, a patchwork of regularly laid-out avenues lined with greenery, marked by open spaces and markets. It flowed like a carpet of white and green and red-brick roofs between the encircling hills. Jaxar’s compound, as she had seen from her first day, was situated near the top of one of three eastern hills.

The hills, Danar explained, were the oldest part of the city. Each had originally possessed its own fortifications, villages
that at times warred against each other. The first Ar-King had united them as a single city. He had also, Tsorreh recalled from her study of Gelonian history, codified the various legal systems. For this, he was now known as Ir-Pilant, a divine avatar of The Giver of Justice.

As Danar talked, Tsorreh studied the wide Serpan River that formed the western border of the city. The water shifted from green to a blue so deep it was almost black, but along the shore, churned silt turned it brown. Here and there, fortified bridges, marvels of Gelonian engineering, spanned the river. As Tsorreh watched, a pair of long-necked white birds swept across the surface, dipping now and again to brush the waves. She had read about such birds. The sight of them, with their wings outstretched as they drifted on the air currents, moved her unexpectedly.

In the early years of the city, a second river, flat and shallow, had flowed into the Serpan. The old river had long since dried up or been diverted. Now the royal palace, municipal buildings, temples, and courts occupied the dried watercourse. The most fashionable noble families had relocated their compounds there from the inconvenience of the hilltops. Danar explained that Jaxar remained in the ancestral family dwelling. Unlike other nobles, he did not leave the city during the summer, although his estates on the slopes of the northwest mountains were rich and pleasant.

Beyond the Serpan, Tsorreh could just make out a ribbon of road and fields, the dust-blurred shapes of men and beasts, tents and wagons. In response to her questions, Danar confirmed that the fields were for army encampment. Once the site had been temporary, but now, with one campaign following another, no crops had been grown there for years. He hesitated, as if in realization that the soldiers who had conquered her homeland might have mustered and trained on those very fields.

In the awkward moment, Tsorreh found her voice thick with unexpected emotion, “Who does Cinath make war upon now?”

“He’s always sending expeditions to Azkhantia, for one
thing, for all the good it does. Those riders have powerful gods, and they’re marvelously fierce archers. If they ever decided to invade Gelon, we’d be hard-pressed. It’s just as well that they keep to the steppe. And there’s Isarre. Isarre, the Eternal Enemy. I don’t know where my uncle will turn next. Through the Var Pass to Denariya? The Sand Lands? Or west to the Mearas? Only the gods know. He wants it all.”

Tsorreh looked at the young man with curiosity. Danar did not sound enthusiastic about his uncle’s military ambitions. “You don’t approve?”

Danar leaned on a bit of stone wall and looked away, but not before she caught the shift in his expression. He seemed suddenly much older than his years. The wind tugged at his red-gold hair. “It’s not seemly for me to have any opinion at all,” he said tightly. “My uncle is the Ar-King, the Voice of the Gods, the Glory of the Golden Land. How can anything he commands be otherwise than right?”

Some impulse drove Tsorreh to say, “If you did have doubts, would it be prudent to speak of them to an enemy, even one as defeated and powerless as I am? And yet, even if I did repeat what you say, who would believe me?”

He flashed a grin, and she decided she liked him very much. She wondered if he and Zevaron might have become friends if they had met in times of peace.

“My father says trust must be earned.” Danar’s voice was softer now, more thoughtful. By chance, the wind died down so that she heard him clearly, not just his words, but all the harmonics below them.

A smile touched the corners of her mouth. “Your father is a wise man.”

“My father is a man who, only a generation ago, would have been drowned as an infant!” he said, his voice laced with sudden fervor. “He’s seven years older than my uncle, but because of an accident at his birth, he cannot rule. Yet he never lives a day without being suspected of coveting the Golden Throne!”

“
Does he?
” she shot back, masking her horrified reaction
to Danar’s casual reference to infanticide. “Does he covet it?”