Santeel thought that the Galantines were devils incarnate who would whip her unless she joined their “incense-fogged idolatry” and seemed ready to give her up for dead, burned as a heretic, and even Vii regretted her going because she had an idea for a bracer for her (used but once!) flying kit laced at the back that would be better than the hip-pinching leather girdles the men wore.
They didn’t have long to prepare. While hurrying to what probably would be her last dinner in the hall for some time, she passed through the darkness under the loom of Mushroom Rock. The wind was blowing from due northeast, an unusual occurrence, and a lamp that hadn’t been hung properly had fallen and smashed out, leaving a long stretch of darkness.
“Hullo, Ileth,” a voice said from the shadows.
It startled her. For one moment there was Gorgantern, mountainous, reaching for her—
Rapoto Vor Claymass gave her a tentative smile. “May I speak with you for a moment?” He lit and hung up a replacement lantern.
She felt more than a little like a frightened cat that needed coaxing down from a tree. “I . . . I suppose.”
Awkwardly, he thanked her for her little ruse with Santeel. “She’s the sort of woman my family would like me to marry as well. Old name. Old lands. Old wealth.”
“It seems you’re-you’re coming to a but.”
“Old customs. Dun Huss won’t marry until he’s retired. He’s my model of a dragoneer. He told me he didn’t think it was fair to a woman to make her a widow. When he’s too old to fly he’ll see about a marriage and a family. I was thinking of following his example.”
Ileth, in her tongue-tripping way, made much worse by her fright, started to say that if this was his way of bringing up his old, panicked offer of marriage—
“Oh, no, just—I don’t want you to think the worst of me if I don’t end up making an offer to Santeel. But that’s not why I wanted to talk to you—I was actually on my way to the Beehive to have a word, but I thought I’d better get this light working again. “
Ileth nodded.
“I’ve heard you are off to the Galantine lands.”
Ileth wasn’t sure if she was supposed to talk about her commission, but since Ottavia had told the dancers, it must be all right to speak with Rapoto. “Yes.”
“You and Galia. Be wary, there.”
“What do you mean?”
“They gave some of us who handle letters and so on a long lecture about Galantine spies. They stressed that the Galantines have a strong group of spies in the Republic, better than ours, I was told. They probably have managed to put a spy or two in the Serpentine. We were warned that they always want to recruit people who work with dragons.”
Ileth hadn’t thought much about spies or traitors, but she could see how it would be so.
Rapoto was satisfied with the light and left off working with it. “They told us the Galantines don’t use many women. They don’t think much of women, believe they can’t keep secrets, rot like that.”
Ha! Ileth thought. She had trouble keeping track of her secrets, she had so many.
“I’m not so sure,” Rapoto continued. “Just—if they come to you with some kind of offer, money or a title or something, just remember that they’re probably lying. We were told of several unfortunates—a couple from the Serpentine, even—who played the Galantine game and their only reward was a quick stab. I’d hate for something like that to happen to you. Turn them down. Or better yet, make them think you’re a fool. I know you have a certain talent for—playacting.”
“Why are you telling me this instead of—instead of Caseen or the Charge?”
“I don’t know enough about you, Ileth, but it seems the Republic hasn’t given you much reason to love it.”
“The Serpentine has,” Ileth said, emotion smoothing her words. “I wouldn’t fail a commission for Galantine gold.”
“Take care of yourself, Ileth.” He leaned in to kiss her on the cheek, but she shifted, her nerves still on edge from the scare.
“Oh,” she said. “I don’t want another misunderstanding.”
“Understood. Then let’s have arms. Ever done the Dragon Grip?”
“No.”
“It’s supposed to be for dragoneers and their wingmen and such, but—” He took her arm, sliding his forearm against hers to nearly the elbow, where he opened his hand wide and gripped her forearm, thumb tight against the pulse point at her elbow. He arranged her fingers so she did the same. They squeezed each other.
“You have some muscle,” he said, surprised. “Bit wiry; reminds me of a rabbit hound.”
“You have some fine mat-material for a shirt,” Ileth said. “When it wears out I’d very much . . . very much like it to make a new sheath.”
“You can have it now,” Rapoto said, taking it off and rebuttoning his quilted winter coat. “Never let it be said a Vor Claymass wouldn’t give you the shirt straight from his back!”
She did find time, at dinner, to say good-bye to her one remaining friend from her Manor days. Quith being Quithier than usual had to run through all the iterations of possible combinations with Ileth and Galia both gone, leaving Rapoto entirely within the webs of Santeel and Yael Duskirk without the female companionship of either Galia or Ileth. Ileth wasn’t convinced Rapoto had an interest in anything of hers that didn’t jiggle or flex when she danced, and as for Duskirk, their talks were entirely innocent and she thought Duskirk’s tilt toward Galia was more from her being the most promising young woman in the Serpentine and a person from whom he could learn something other than the best way to please her so that she might kiss him. But to Quith, unless there were layers of motivation behind every encounter and exchange like a candlestick-high holiday serving of sliced tenderloin in pastry, she had nothing to think about and would fret. So Ileth at least indulged her and admitted that Rapoto had told her to watch herself in the Galantine lands and write if she could.
Speaking of writing, she sent off a quick letter to Falth updating him on Santeel’s flying (Santeel had been up three times since her introductory flight, an unusual number for an apprentice) and the number of times Rapoto had been able to get away from his other duties to watch them dance or to take tea in the Dancers’ Quarter.
The precise day of her departure depended on the fluky late-winter weather. Ileth suggested they consult the innkeeper’s wife, but the sagacity of their own scryer, who combined the talents of an astronomer, astrologer, calendar-keeper, and weather-reader would have to do. He was an old man, and if Serpentine folk tales could be believed, five major dragon-fighting campaigns had gone ahead only once he made a determination of a stretch of fair weather long enough for the operation. But that was the Serpentine, a great machine where sometimes a small cog had to turn before anything else would move.
The cog turned one morning and Galia came to collect her. Galia, dressed in her flying leathers and a heavy riding cloak, helped Ileth get into her rig and the pair met Preece in the flight cave. The whole way Galia was tense, silent. Ileth had a feeling there was something she hadn’t been told. Preece had a round rustic’s face and ears that jutted out like dragon wings. Ileth, had she met Preece in a market, would have taken him for a vegetable farmer who had a half-filled stall because he couldn’t bring himself to send his dogs out after rabbits, so mild was his manner. But he knew his business. They went to Joai’s little house and shared the traditional Serpentine precommission meal of cave-aged beefsteak, eggs, and fried slivers of potatoes cooked in a good deal of butter, with Preece explaining the chain of landmarks they would follow to the border, which they should reach by the afternoon, unless the weather changed.