"Oh,, you liked it?" he said. "That's good. King Karnat sent it to me a year or two back, but we're not really expert in such things here, you know. I'm glad to have been able
to give it to someone who appreciates it. Still, I dare say you've been used to better in Bekla?"
She shook her head and smiled. "None better, sir."
There were several stools in the room. She motioned to them to sit down, rinsed two cups and poured more of the wine. The elder inquired about her escape from Bekla and the dangerous Valderra crossing, and went on to deplore the discomfort of Suba to anyone not used to its mists and marshes. To all of this she replied as she hoped he would wish.
"And-er-you grew up in Tonilda?" he asked at length. "On Lake Serrelind? That's near Thettit, isn't it? You've really lived there all your life?"
"Almost all sixteen years of it, U-Makron!" she smiled.
"Something over sixteen years since you were born?" said he, sipping his wine with a thoughtful air. "Well, I myself never saw Nokomis, you see, though my wife did." He paused. "She tells me it's more than strange. I'm glad to have had this chance of seeing you. I wish you luck: but I must leave you now. I've got to talk to the young men before they go to Melvda tomorrow." She stood up, and he took her hands. "We shall meet again before you go. I feel honored to have met you, Maia of Serrelind, bringer of good fortune-as I'm sure you are."
"Good-night, U-Makron." (And I wonder what he'd call me if he knew how I lived in Bekla?)
As Makron went down the ladder Nasada picked up one of the lamps and put it down by Maia's bed.
"You've had a long day: why don't you lie down? You'll be more comfortable."
She did so. He remained standing, sipping his Yeldashay and looking down at her.
"You'd like a man in that bed, wouldn't you?"
She looked up quickly, angry for a moment; but his tone was entirely matter-of-fact and there was no mockery in his eyes.
"Yes, I would."
"Natural enough, wouldn't you say, for someone who's lonely and anxious in a strange place? Who likes being alone in the dark?"
"I never thought of it that way, U-Nasada: I just like- oh, well, I just enjoy basting, I suppose."
"Great Shakkarn!" he said. "Any reason why you
shouldn't? People do, or none of us would be here, if you come to think of it."
"Well, that's one thing, U-Nasada, but-" She stopped.
"Well, what's another thing?" He sat down beside the bed. She pondered, and as she did so realized with delight that he was in no hurry and glad for her, too, to take her time.
"Well," she said at length, "I suppose I meant that in Bekla men just used me, really, same as they might use a hawk or a dog, for sport; and I enjoyed it-or a lot of it I did-'cos it meant they admired me and wanted me. It was a sight better 'n working in a kitchen, too, wasn't it? But some of them despise you as well-for what you are, I mean-even though it's none of your own choosing; and that just about makes me mad. It's crazy, really, U-Nasada. You're supposed to like it, because that's what they want-to think they've made the girl enjoy it: but then there's some people, if you act natural they just despise you, like Lenkrit and the others that night when I took my clothes off to cross the river."
"Well, I don't despise you," he said. "In fact, if you want to know, I very much admire the way you seem to be able to stand up to anything and still keep your spirits up. But Lenkrit, yes; I'm glad you reminded me of him. Can you remember what Lenkrit said when he first saw you? I'd be interested to know."
"Let me think. Only I was that frightened that morning- Far as I can remember, Bayub-Otal said to Lenkrit as he must be forgetful-something like that-and to look at me again. And then Lenkrit said something about he wondered he hadn't seen it before, only the light was that bad."
"And that's all?"
"Far's I can recollect. No, wait! I remember now, he asked Bayub-Otal whether I was his sister; that's right."
"But you don't look much like him, do you?"
She laughed. "I don't reckon old Sencho'd have given fifteen thousand meld for me at that rate, do you?"
"You're proud of that, aren't you?"
She nodded.
"I'm not surprised. Why shouldn't you be? And Bayub-Otal?"
"Well, then he kind of cut Lenkrit off short. But I was that upset and moithered with everything-you ever had
a knife held at your throat, Nasada, have you?-tell you the truth I wasn't really taking in all that much of it."
"What do you know about Bayub-Otal? Do you know about his father and mother, and how he grew up?"
"Oh, he told me all about that, yes: how his mother was sent to Urtah as a dancing-girl, and how the King-High Baron-whatever 'twas-fell in love with her and hid her away in Suba to save her from his wife. And about the fire-why, Whatever's the matter, U-Nasada?"
To her horror, she saw tears running down his rough, wrinkled cheeks. For an instant he actually sobbed.
"You're very young, Maia: young people are often unfeeling-until they've learned through suffering themselves. It wasn't really so very long ago. Nokomis-she was like moonlight on a lake! No one who saw her dance ever forgot her for the rest of his life. All Suba worshipped her, even those who never actually saw her. When she died, the luck ran out of Suba like sand out of a broken hour-glass. You never saw Nokomis-"
"Well, how could I?" she answered petulantly. "I wasn't even born when she died."
"As far as any of us here can make out, you were born more or less exactly when she died. The night of the tenth Sallek?"
Maia stared. "What do you mean, my lord? Why do you say it like that?"
He drank off his wine and put the cup down on the table. "And then," he said, as if continuing, "last night I asked you whether you were sure about your father. You were." He paused. "So that just leaves us with the will and power of the gods, doesn't it?"
"The gods? I don't know what you're on about, U-Nasada, honest I don't."
"Arid you say Sencho paid fifteen thousand meld?" he went on. "Well, for what it's worth, that's what Nor-Zavin, the Baron of southern Suba, paid her parents for the daughter they'd called Astara. I happen to know that. I'm not sure who first nicknamed her Nokomis, but I suppose that doesn't really matter."
It may seem incredible that no inkling had dawned earlier in Maia's mind. Yet just so will a person often fail to perceive-resist, even, and set aside-the personal implications of a dream plain enough to friends to whom it is told.
"U-Nasada, are you saying that I look tike Nokomis?"
He paused, choosing his words. At length he answered, "To someone like myself, who remembers her well, it would be quite unbelievable-" he smiled-"if it weren't here before my eyes."
She reflected. "Then why doesn't everybody see it? Tes-con, say, or Luma?"
"Because they're too young. It's more than sixteen years, you see, since Nokomis died. But as well as that, you have to realize that Suba isn't Bekla. This is a wild, marshy country and most people seldom travel far. Everyone in Suba knew the fame of Nokomis-she was a legend-but thousands never actually saw her. No one in that little village we left this morning, for instance, had ever seen Nokomis. But Penyanis, Makron's wife-she saw her more than once. How did she take it when she met you this evening?"
"She seemed-well, kind of mazed, like."
"And Makron-well, did you think it strange that they didn't ask you to have supper with them?"
"I never really thought."
"Anda-Nokomis had already told them what to expect, you see. They have some old servants, some of whom would also remember Nokomis, and they thought it better not to set the whole place buzzing with tales of witchcraft and magic and so on. I suppose-"