Had anyone else had similar desires? Aris intended to ask his assistants, but found himself instead confronted with an emergency that drove everything else out of his mind. Several children had eaten poisonous wild berries, and it took all Aris’s skill and power to save them. By the time they were out of danger, he’d forgotten about his earlier concerns. He needed to find out which plants were poisonous, and make sure all the parents knew them; he needed to find remedies for snakebite and sting that could serve when he was not at hand. Luap was right, he thought: he had more than enough work to keep him busy right here.
Chapter Twenty-six
Luap had no idea what to expect from the Khartazh ambassador. Seri and Aris had described the soldiers and their captain in terms of weapons, and tactics. To his questions about what they wore, and what they looked like, they’d returned doubtful answers. “They’re all sunburnt, of course,” Seri had said. “Very brown.”
“I think it’s their natural skin,” Aris had said. “Not just the sunburn. Perhaps a natural protection.” Both had had much to say about the soldiers’ gear, the use of headcloths to keep the sun from their helmets, the small, light horses they rode, the very different shape of their bows . . . but he had gained no insight at all into the men themselves. Nor had Seri been able to describe their language. She and Aris both were quick-tongued; they had learned the horse nomads’ difficult speech with ease, and would no doubt learn this before anyone else, but she had spent the past hands of days in the west, with the Khartazh soldiers: she had not been back to teach him what she had learned. He would have to rely on her and on Aris for translation.
Although the captain Seri and Aris had met had told them it might be easily six hands of days before an ambassador would come (“at your convenience” Luap recognized as a term of courtesy, not a reality), in fact he had appeared in less than four. The earlier decision to allow Arranha and the Rosemage to go wandering off to explore the gray mountain now seemed less wise; Luap did not expect them back for days yet. In the meantime he was having to meet a royal ambassador alone, without their help, and it bothered him. He knew it had been his decision to let them go, but he had to fight off the temptation to blame them anyway.
He wished he knew more about protocol in royal courts. His was not, of course, a royal court, but the ambassador represented a king. He ought to show some magnificence, he thought. He had decided to offer the man a chance to rest and eat, if he wished, before their meeting; it was what he himself would want, after a journey up the canyon. He had a chamber prepared, with what luxuries they had brought, and hoped it would do. He had a sinking feeling that it would not.
Seri and Aris, in Marshal’s blue, escorted the ambassador from the lower entrance to that chamber by a route that did not take him past the kitchens. One of Aris’s prentices ran by the shorter way to let Luap know the man was inside.
“And he has moustaches down to here,” the boy said, excitedly. “And four servants with boxes and bags and things, and—”
“Did you hear whether he would eat and rest, or whether he wished to meet at once?”
“He was glad of a chance to rest, I think. I can’t understand his talk, but Seri and Aris seem to. Aris said he’d come talk to you in a little while.”
Luap waited in his office, forcing himself to do necessary copywork to stay calm, until Aris appeared.
“Seri’s staying beside the door,” he said. “He’s happy enough to rest first; he’s used to riding wherever he goes, and that climb up into the mountains tired him. We should build a horse trail there, he said. I’d agree; if we ever want to trade, that would make it easier. He didn’t think much of our horses when we got to them, but he rides well.”
“What’s he like?”
Aris shrugged. “It’s hard to say. We barely understand each others’ words; I think the captain we learned from has a different accent. He’s very polite, but then that’s what ambassadors are: it’s his duty. He talked about some kind of demon that used to live in these mountains, but also about those who built the stronghold. They knew it was here, I think, but were afraid of something if they tried to come. Brigands, possibly; the captain said robbers had been in these mountains forever.”
“I wish I could speak their language. It’s awkward—”
“Perhaps not. He can’t understand us, either. And misunderstandings can be laid on the language problems, not on any ill will.”
“Do you have any idea what he wants? Why they sent an ambassador now, rather than letting that captain you met come talk to me?”
“If I understood them, they would consider that disrespectful. Once the captain had agreed that we weren’t demons of some kind, he seemed to think we were something more than human. He would not dare, he said, to—I think the word means ‘insult’—you by coming himself, when at the very least you should be welcomed by a royal ambassador, if not the king.”
“What did you tell them about our settlement?”
“Not much—we’re still learning the language. We tried to tell them that we had come from far away sunrising, and we had to travel by magery, not overland. That we lived in a great hall carved in the stone, and were friends of those who built it, not invaders.” Aris looked doubtful. “I know that’s not all the story, or exactly what you would have said, but it’s the best we could do.”
“That’s fine—it may make us sound grander than we are, but that has its advantages. We don’t want to be anyone’s conquest.”
“That’s what Seri said, sir. Today, riding up the canyon, we could tell he was impressed, as much by the children playing in the stream and the fields as by the fields themselves. ‘Is it safe?’ he kept asking. ‘You have not been attacked?’ We said no, not by any worse than brigands, and his captain could tell him how we dealt with brigands.”
“Good. We want peace with our neighbors, whoever they be. But trade could not hurt us, either.” Luap stretched, easing tight shoulders. “Do you know anything of the way they spend the days? Would it be better to meet in the morning or evening?”
“I would think morning, not too early. Perhaps after an early breakfast?”
“Very well. I’d like you and Seri both to be there.”
Luap chose to receive the ambassador in the great hall, where he had had two chairs and a table placed near the dais. The banner Dorhaniya had embroidered hung behind it. He awaited the ambassador in his Marshal’s blue, which the Council had agreed he should wear even though his title was Archivist, not Marshal. He had shaved his face, since Seri reported that the captain had not had a beard, but the soldiers did.
Aris’s messenger had brought word that the ambassador was on his way, and had withdrawn hastily. Luap’s heart pounded; he felt a great weight on his shoulders. If he failed, if this man became an enemy, all his people would suffer. He turned to the doorway, struggling to appear calm. A moment more . . . then Aris paused in the door, standing very straight. It had not occurred to Luap before just how impressive a man he had become.
“My lord . . . the Khartazh ambassador.” Or how formal; in Aris’s deep voice, that sounded as courtly as anything he’d ever heard, and his bow was as smooth as if he did it every day. He said something in a foreign tongue; Luap assumed he was repeating his announcement.