Tast’annin nodded. “Reive.”
“Reive? Just that? No other name, no number?”
“Reive, that’s all she said. Very young and thin, with very black hair. I think she wore—”
“No, that’s all right, I can find her. Reive.” The caracal nudged her knee and Shiyung took its head between her palms and squeezed it absently, until it whined. “Me-suh! Come here, I need you to locate someone for me—”
The snaky-haired server creaked back into the room, its linen covering flapping across its copper torso. Shiyung explained, “A hermaphrodite named Reive, detained by the Reception Committee this evening. By my sister Âziz.”
“What crime, mistress?” Me-suh’s voice came out in a low croak.
“I have no idea. Sedition, probably. Or—well, I don’t know. There was a disturbance at that dream inquisition in the Four Hundredth Room. Run her name through the main file.”
The server nodded and creaked back out again. Shiyung tapped her foot on the floor and hummed to herself. After a few minutes Me-suh returned.
“She is on Cherubim, mistress. In the Howarth Reception Area.”
Shiyung clapped and plucked at Tast’annin’s sleeve excitedly. “Did you hear that? Howarth. That’s right below here, it will only take a few minutes—”
Howarth was where political prisoners were received.
She stood and went to the armoire, flung aside coats and robes and lumen-accented tunics until she found matching trousers and blouse of a deep burgundy shade. She dressed quickly, then pulled her dark hair back so that it fell in a shining line past her shoulders. Finally she tugged a dark hood around her face. Watching her the rasa’s eyes closed for a moment. When they opened again she stood by the door, waiting.
“All right, Margalis, we’ll go visit your little friend.”
He slipped beside her and the door hissed shut behind them. For a moment Shiyung looked at him with shining eyes.
“I stayed home this evening to work—everyone else is always sleeping this late. It’s nice to have company for a change.”
He stared at her without answering, and then followed her down the hall.
Centuries earlier, the tenth Orsinate dynasty had designed the Howarth Reception Area as quarters for political prisoners, men and women of considerable rank who surrendered or were captured during the unsettled months after the Third Shining.
None of the hostages ever returned to the Balkhash steppes or the jeweled shores of the Archipelago. A few of them eventually married into the Orsinate. Others became tutors, and a few even escaped to the lower levels. But most spent their lives and died in the Reception Area so that now, despite the quite-comfortable accommodations and the attentions of the Reception Committee, it was rumored to be haunted. Several guards claimed to have heard the click of mah-jongg tiles interspersed with soft laughter and the sound of something being poured onto the floor. Reive had only been there a few hours, but already she had seen the blue-tinged silhouette of a young man cross her room and pass through the wall, enter and cross again, as though pacing the outlines of a chamber that had long since been walled off from this one.
The Reception Committee treated her well, since she was a guest of Âziz Orsina. The margravine disdained vulgar privations—they weakened her guests, most of whom were destined for the private torture of timoring. And for successful timoring, one must have some reserve of strength to call upon. So the Reception Committee brought Reive yoghurt and brandied loquats, and a tiny roasted quail, and watched politely while she ate on her bed.
“You can go. We won’t kill ourself,” the gynander sniffed.
The two guards shrugged and smiled, opening their mouths to show where their tongues had been removed, then tugging amiably at the long yellow sashes that hung from their waists.
“Fine,” said Reive, and turning back to her quail ignored them.
A minute later the steel door opened and a tall hooded figure strode in, followed by another figure in a black silk robe.
“Thank you, but we’ll see to her now,” the first announced. At sight of the rasa, the guards nearly fell down in astonishment. When they heard Shiyung’s voice they bowed, grunting and pounding the floor with their palms, then fled. The figure in the silk robe closed the door after them, staring out through the metal grate into the hallway. Reive gazed up silently, her mouth full. She choked when she recognized Shiyung Orsina and the rasa Imperator.
“Aghh—” The remains of her quail fell onto the mattress. The margravine shook her head and put a finger to her lips. Then, smiling conspiratorially, she carefully removed the empty plates from the bed and sat beside Reive.
“We’re your friends, Reive,” said Shiyung. She turned to the rasa and beamed, but Tast’annin only stared at Reive with cold blue eyes. Shiyung shrugged and continued, “I understand there was some—confusion—at a dream inquisition this evening. But you can tell us what really happened.”
Reive swallowed, stammering, “We can?” She tried not to wince as the margravine put her arm around her and shook her gently. She smelled of nucleic starter and amber. Reive thought she looked less beautiful than she did on the ’files.
“You can,” the Aviator intoned.
Reive’s voice quivered as she gazed at the rasa. “You—we saw you this morning. The Investiture—and your dream—”
Tast’annin stared down at the morphodite. The Reception Committee had removed the smudged makeup from her face. With her blank, sharp features and her long legs swinging from the edge of the bed, she looked like an effeminate young boy. He had never understood the vogue for hermaphrodites, found them slightly repellant in fact, with their soft round faces and vapid eyes. But this one seemed more alert than most—flippant even, despite her obvious fear. He spoke to her gently enough.
“I am—I was—Margalis Tast’annin. A NASNA Aviator First Class, now Aviator Imperator to the Orsinate.”
Nodding, Reive turned to the margravine. “And you’re Shiyung.”
The margravine smiled, tossing her hair back so that Reive could see her earrings, solid gold and so heavy that her lobes had distended a full inch from wearing them. The letter O and the Eye of Horus: the Orsinate’s insignia. “That’s right.”
The young one, Reive thought. She wondered if those earrings hurt. The crazy one.
Shiyung looked at her expectantly, “We’d like to help you, Reive. Is there anything we can do to help you?” She put her finger to the gynander’s chin and tilted Reive’s face toward her.
“Is there more to eat?”
Surprised, Shiyung drew back. Tast’annin made a small noise that might be laughter. “Those quail aren’t very big,” Reive said defensively.
“Ye-es,” said Shiyung. She frowned. “But—well, I was thinking more along the lines of, Could we perhaps make you more comfortable? Somewhere else?” Her voice rose suggestively.
“The margravine would like to rescue you,” explained the rasa. “If you remain here her sister is likely to have you executed in the morning.”
“Oh!” Reive sat up very straight. “We didn’t know. We thought—” She gestured at the neatly appointed room with its comfortable chairs and oil paintings and elegant china. “We thought she had forgiven us.”
Shiyung narrowed her eyes. “You haven’t been among us for very long, have you, Reive?”
“N-no.” She flushed and toyed with her hair.
“But you’re a pantomancer, surely you are aware of the significance of a dream of the Green Country?”
The gynander nodded slowly.
“We’ve known that dream,” she said. She glanced at the rasa staring at her sideways, like the cormorant in Zalophus’s tank, his eyes glittering feverishly. She turned to Shiyung. “We have scryed it twice now.”