“This lovely girl is Elene,” said the madam. “Her price is of course a little higher, but you have the look of a man prepared to pay for the highest quality.”
The girl was truly beautifuclass="underline" her dark hair bound up to reveal a white curve of neck and shoulder, her waist narrow in the lady's corset. She sauntered to Jaryd, and trailed her fingers on his chest, gazing up at him with sultry fire. Jaryd did indeed feel the stirring in his loins. But mostly, he thought that her cheeks were fatter than Sofy's, and her lips did not quirk with crooked humour, and her eyes did not sparkle as Sofy's did.
“I'm sorry,” he said flatly. “Perhaps another day.” And to his friends as they ascended the stairs, “Take your time, I'm going to explore.”
“Aye,” said Jandlys, admiring the girl beneath his arm, “me too!” The girl looked a little nervous with the big, bearded Lenay, but Jaryd knew she had little to fear from Jandlys. Save for what was in his pants, which he supposed for a girl accustomed to less might be somewhat frightening.
Jaryd retreated onto the road. This was Reninesenn, or Renine's Town, in literal Rhodaani. These were the docks, just a stroll from the harbour, and territory loyal to Family Renine. Those who knew the place insisted that, like most of the city, things were very quiet lately. It did not look very quiet to Jaryd, as people went about their business, a bustle of commerce and tradesmen, officials, merchants, dockworkers, and sailors.
Jaryd stretched his shoulders and looked at the clear sky. He knew he was a fool. He had coin, and like his friends, he hadn't been with a woman in months. The last woman, in fact, had been Sofy. And now here he was, passing up a high-class, if expensive, fuck because he couldn't stop thinking of the impossible.
A man was approaching him. Or was he? For a moment, Jaryd was not sure, for the man wore the wide-brimmed hat common to the lowlands, beneath the brim of which he was glancing from side to side. But now he looked straight, and met Jaryd's eyes. Jaryd put a hand to his sword hilt. The man extended his own hand instead.
“Master Jaryd Nyvar?” Jaryd nodded. “My name is Zulmaher. I am a general in the Rhodaani Steel.”
Jaryd blinked. “General Zulmaher? Who led the invasion of Elisse?” Zulmaher nodded. Jaryd shook his hand. “That was quite a feat of arms, I hear. Though of course, we should be enemies.”
“Many things are not as they should be,” said Zulmaher. He was slightly taller than Jaryd, which was considerable for a lowlander. “You are allied to the Army of the Bacosh, whose allies-the Elissians-I defeated. But now the boot has shifted to the other foot. I hear you are a friend to the Princess Sofy?” Zulmaher's glance shifted to the brothel entrance, and the red lanterns hanging at the threshold. Jaryd wondered how much he guessed.
“I am. I hear you are Lord Alfriedo's right hand these days?”
“The Lord Alfriedo may be young, but he has two hands of his very own. I give him guidance.”
“I see,” said Jaryd.
“He would like to speak with you.”
“With me?” Jaryd frowned.
“Your princess is walking onto very thin ice. Lord Alfriedo and I would like very much to see her succeed, but there are many others who would not. If you wish to safeguard her life, there are things you will need to know.”
Sofy had never seen a place as extraordinary as the Mahl'rhen. Tracato's house of the serrin was less a building than a collection of open spaces, interlinked by chambers, gardens, paths, and low buildings that could not seem to decide where they ended and began. Sofy walked with her grand entourage along winding ways, beneath lattices overgrown with vines and dangling fruit, past semicircular courtyards overlooked by open chambers, and past public pools seemingly suited for bathing that became water features and little falls in the gardens into which they flowed.
She was taken by the pride with which ordinary Tracatans showed off this jewel. As though it were not some alien imposter within their human city as the priests might suggest, but rather an ornament for all Tracatans, human and serrin alike. There was a sadness too, Sofy thought, in that there were no serrin here. Most had fled to Saalshen, as Jaryd had suggested, though Sofy guessed that many more were merely hiding, in safe houses or with sympathetic human families. But the Mahl'rhen was not empty, for in every courtyard or open space there were people, guarding the place from looters and now welcoming these royal guests.
“Did Maldereld build this?” Sofy asked Premier Chiron as they walked.
“Oh no,” said Chiron, “Maldereld spent much of her time at the Justiciary. She was many things, but she was no architect. This was previously the land of a castle and great surrounds belonging to a family wiped out in King Leyvaan's invasion of Saalshen. Many serrin wandered Rhodaan, Enora, and Ilduur for years after, and those architects with the most inspiration gathered here, and made something peculiar to human and serrin styles.”
“A tapestry,” Sofy murmured. “Or perhaps a fusion. The serrin mind is surely not like the human.”
“No,” Chiron agreed, a little uncomfortably.
“In a good way,” Sofy hastened to assure him.
As they stood to marvel at a small amphitheatre incorporated into a garden and overlooked on another side by a wall and balconies, Jeddie arrived somewhat breathlessly at Sofy's side.
“Princess, there is someone you should meet. He is asking for you in person.” She pointed to a doorway. “Just in here, it's perfectly safe.”
Two knights insisted on walking with her regardless, and looking inside. Within was an extraordinary room, like many grand chambers save that there was a wide, circular hole in its roof. Beneath that hole was a corresponding wide circle on the floor, ringed with a balustrade. Upon that balustrade were many symbols engraved on copper and inlaid into stone, and across the tiled floor were strange shapes, like angular sculptures, some as tall as a man, but in abstract form.
Jeddie went to an old man who sat overlooking the odd circle, and murmured to him. The knights checked that there was no other way into the chamber, then at Sofy's insistence left them alone.
Jeddie assisted the old man to stand. He wore lordly clothes, a fine silk shirt and boots, and his hair was long and white. But when he faced her, Sofy could see that he was serrin. The knights had not seen his face and eyes, so long was his hair, and so human his clothing.
“Princess Sofy,” said Jeddie, “this is Ambassador Lesthen. He is Saalshen's senior representative in Rhodaan.”
Lesthen made a light bow. Sofy hurried to him and grasped his hands.
“Ambassador. Where are your people? Are they well?”
“I cannot say,” said Lesthen, and his eyes were apologetic. And yet, quite firm. “I am sorry.”
He would not say, Sofy realised. She was the princess of a people whose religious folk swore to destroy all serrin. Whatever intentions she professed, he did not trust her.
“Of course,” she said. “You have decided to remain?”
“I am too old to sacrifice what life I have left on the battlefield,” said Lesthen. “If sacrifice is required, I shall sacrifice here. As ambassador, it is my task to meet with you. My uthis'ul…I am sorry, there is no precise translation in any human tongue. A purpose greater than oneself.”
Sofy sighed. “I have long been envious of my sister Sashandra, that she speaks your tongue and I do not. It does seem precisely the linguistic task I would enjoy most in all the world, whatever its challenges.”
“Sashandra,” said Lesthen with a faint smile. It wrinkled his face, with lines more dry and flat than human wrinkles. “She does speak the tongue well. Of all the humans I have met, I feel that she is perhaps the best equipped of all to understand the serrinim.”
“The best?”
“You are surprised.”
“Well, I admit I do not always think of Sasha as a greatly cultured person,” Sofy said in humour.