Leaving Exeget and Madyalar sputtering and glaring and his other fellows openmouthed, Gar’Dena lumbered down from the dais with surprising quickness, motioning Paulo and me brusquely to the door. I could no more resist his direction than a feather could withstand a hurricane. When we passed through the bronze doors, I felt slightly dizzy, and my eyes played tricks on me, for I seemed to exist in two different rooms at once.
One was plainly furnished with a thick carpet of dull blue on the floor and padded benches of fine wood set against bare, cream-colored walls. The other room could not have been more different. A vast, opulent space, its walls were hung in red damask and gold velvet. From a ceiling painted with forest scenes and dancing maidens hung great swathes of filmy red and yellow fabric that shimmered like water, and spread on the green-tiled floor were purple patterned carpets so thick they could serve for a king’s bed. Through the slowly shifting veils, I glimpsed lamps of ornately worked brass and silver standing on large tables with black marble tops and gold lions for their legs. Statuary, silver wind chimes, ornaments of glass and silver, and baskets of flowers stood or hung in every nook and niche. Two fountains bubbled in the corners where plantings of greenery, even small trees, flourished in the soft light. Exotic birds twittered from the branches, and everywhere was music: pipes and flutes and viols, softly playing every manner of melody that varied depending on where you looked.
A large hand nudged me one step further. The plain room vanished. Gar’Dena, Paulo and I had come fully into that other place. But the ebullient decoration of the vast chamber was not the whole of wonder. Gar’Dena clapped his hands three times, and three young women instantly appeared in the room with us. One was slim and short, with long, dark hair, her hand raised in mid-stroke with a silver-backed hairbrush. The second girl was blond and tall. Surprise and annoyance crossed her handsome face as she stood in the elegant room, her upraised hands and apron dusted with flour. The third and youngest, bright and fresh-faced and surely no more than twelve or thirteen, was seated on one of the swooping fabric draperies as if it were a child’s swing. A book lay in her left hand, while the fingers of her right hand ran over the lines on the page. Her eyes were unfocused, aimed vaguely into the center of the room while she performed this activity, and the longer I watched, the more convinced I became that she was blind and yet was “reading” the book in some strange and marvelous way.
“Aiessa, Arielle, Aimee, we have guests,” bellowed Gar’Dena. “Look lively now. We need rooms, baths, supper.”
All three girls were clad in flowing, high-waisted gowns of white, the sleeves banded in blue or rose embroidery. Their elegant simplicity presented quite a contrast with Gar’Dena himself, who was resplendent in green satin breeches and a red silk doublet in addition to his hundredweight of jewels.
“Papa, you must give us more notice,” said the tall blond girl, whose flour-dusted apron was dark blue. “My bread is in mid-kneading, and there’s no wine to be had in the house. You sent our dinner to Co’Meste to redeem your wager, and the guest rooms have not been swept in a moon’s turning, since you frightened the sweeping girls. Not that you are unwelcome.” She directed the last at me with a charming smile.
“You’ll think of something, Arielle,” said the big man. “You always do. Get your lazy sisters to help. I will speak to our guests for a few moments, and then they’ll be ready for refreshment and beds.” He bent down from his great height and planted a kiss on the blond curls of the youngest girl. “Who is kissing you, clever Aimee?”
She reached up and tweaked his outsized nose. “I’ll never mistake you for anyone, Papa,” she said, with a giggle far sweeter than the wind chimes tinkling in the softly moving air. “Unless perhaps a rinoceroos should come to Avonar.”
“Someday when our troubles are past, I will bring you a rinoceroos, sweet Aimee. Then shall we see if you mistake him for your papa.”
The impossibly strange mode of travel, the alien surroundings, the warmth and charming repartee… everything was at odds with the noisy rancor of the council chamber. I closed my eyes to clear the confusion, but visions of flashing knives and too much blood filled my head. My knees turned to water, and strength and surety flowed out of me in a tidal rush.
Gar’Dena’s dark-haired daughter dropped her brush and grabbed my arm and my back, supporting me gently. “Would you like to sit down? Papa can be so thoughtless.”
“Yes,” I said. No need for foolish bravado any longer. “Yes, please.”
“Papa, attention to your guests,” said the girl sharply. “I’ll see if I can find them something to drink, at least, so Arielle can finish her bread-baking.”
Gar’Dena whirled about, his broad face everything of apology. He took my hand, wrapping my fingers about his forearm and patting them gently. “Forgive me, madam, but it always seems so interminably long between my trips home, and I miss these lovely gems of mine most fearfully. Please, let us have a seat and speak of your future plans.”
He led me to one of the red draperies that swept in a long arc from the high ceiling. When I sat down, the silky stuff wrapped itself around me until I felt as cozy and comfortable as if I were nestled in a cloud. Paulo drew back when Gar’Dena pointed to a yellow drape. Instead the boy dropped to the thick carpet just beside me. Noting Paulo’s sooty face and filthy clothing, I realized that I too was streaked with ashes and stable dirt. Not at all like the wife of a prince, even a dead one. Oh, gods… don’t think. My chest ached.
Gar’Dena dragged a giant pillow to a spot just in front of Paulo and me and settled his bulk onto it. “Tomorrow I shall retrieve your remaining companion and bring her here. You’ll be much more comfortable here than at the Guesthouse of the Three Harpers.”
My face must have shown my discomfiture.
“Yes, I know of you-and of many other things that might surprise you. Ah, thank you, my loves!” On a low table of black marble that appeared just beside Gar’Dena, Aiessa, the dark-haired girl, set down a tray bearing a steaming urn made of beaten gold and encrusted with emeralds. Alongside the urn sat three gold cups and a painted, gold-rimmed plate piled high with slices of hot bread, dripping with butter. Little Aimee accompanied her sister. The girl with golden curls felt for the edge of the plate and set a crystal pot of honey beside it, at the same time knocking over the stack of cups. She giggled as she righted them again. Hardly any time had passed since the tall Arielle had left to finish her baking.
Gar’Dena was the youngest of the Preceptors, so Bareil had told us, appointed by the Prince D’Marte, D’Natheil’s father, only weeks before D’Marte’s death in battle. Neither the Preceptors nor other Dar’Nethi kept secret their opinions that the massive gem-worker had been appointed because of his wealth, not for his power or wisdom. Even in my exhausted confusion, I had already begun to doubt that.