Bored, Senya glanced around to where Highlord Taquar sat at the end of their row. Because of the way the balcony curved, she had a good view of the interesting planes of his face. He was perhaps darker than she liked, but that made him interesting, too. Forbidding. Mysterious. Dangerous. And so-ooo handsome.
He looked her way, smiled and winked. Then he rose and threaded his way through the other guests to the exit. Her heart thumped faster. He had smiled at her.
"Mother," she whined, "do we have to wait until all that water's gone?" "Sunlord be thanked that's over," Ryka said. "I swear, I thought that water would never dry up. My nose must be as red as a ripe bab fruit, being out in the sun for so long."
"I never understood why those in the ceremonial courtyard are not permitted palmubras," Kaneth replied.
"Me, neither. As though wearing a hat indicates impiety."
"And discomfort and worship must go hand in hand."
"Exactly."
They fell silent, until she looked around in desperation to find something to say. "You swear this is all new?" she asked with a wave at the room furnishings.
They had compromised on where to live. Ryka had agreed to move into Carnelian House, as long as all the bedrooms were totally refurbished and rearranged. She would not, she had informed him, sleep where he had once bedded his succession of hussies. Rather to her surprise, he'd swallowed the humiliation of that with good grace, even though the new furniture had taken fifty days to be made and he'd been compelled to beg the Cloudmaster for an extension of the deadline for their marriage.
"I swear," he said. "In fact, this used to be my sitting room."
"And no hussies in the house in the future. You want to be unfaithful, you do it somewhere else. And now, let's get this over and done with. I am going to need you to unlace this stupid dress for me, unless you'd prefer me to ring for a maid."
"Oh, I think I have plenty of experience in undressing women," he said dryly, "as you so frequently remind me." He hesitated, then continued, "Ryka, I don't like this. It's not something that should be got 'over and done with' like taking a dose of kalo oil for indigestion. I've never taken a woman against her will, and I sure as the sands are hot don't want to start now. Especially not with you. I value your friendship too much, for a start, but even without that-" He shook his head unhappily. "It's distasteful, and I object to the position you have been placed in."
"There's someone waiting outside the door, isn't there? Granthon's man? A water sensitive waiting to see if we mingle our water today?"
He nodded apologetically. "I'm sorry. Um, we could fake it."
He sounded doubtful, though, and she shook her head. Blighted eyes, the idea that he could die, thrown out into the desert, because of her foolish scruples gave her the shivers. "No," she said, more forcefully than she intended. Modulating her tone, she added more quietly, "We are not going to take such stupid risks."
"You don't deserve to have your first experience forced on you like this. We could probably fool the fellow-"
She blinked at him in startled surprise. "You're scoffing me!"
He stared back. "We could try-"
"Not that! No, I mean-you can't possibly think this is my first experience, surely!"
"Why, y-" He stopped and reddened in embarrassment as the silence lengthened; her eyebrows were raised so high they disappeared under her fringe. "Er-I guess not."
"I'll be damned. You did. Kaneth, I'm twenty-nine years old!"
He was silent.
"You arrogant, condescending, ridiculous male! You can bed women from one end of the land to the other, but I am expected to forgo all such pleasures simply because I am a woman?"
"Well, you made such a fuss about my pleasures-"
"Not the fact that they occurred but that they were so promiscuous, so blatant and-and-so commercial!"
"I grant you that no one can say you were blatant. I have no idea who you favoured. Can I ask why you didn't marry him?"
"Who?" she asked, puzzled, and then started to laugh when she realised what he was thinking, but there was a bitter edginess to her mirth. "You really are impossible! Whatever makes you think there could only ever have been one? You have insulted me in just about every possible way in the past few moments. Am I so unattractive that you can't imagine anyone wanting to bed me? Should we wait until it's dark, perhaps, so that you find all this more… palatable because you can't see the body in your bed?"
"Oh, shit!" He turned away from her, throwing his hands up in the air, then spun to face her again, anguished. "Blighted eyes, Ry, why is it I have a genius for spewing forth turds instead of sense when you are around? You are the last person I want to hurt and yet I have an aptitude for doing just that. Forgive me, please. What I said was thoughtless and insulting, you're right. And I am a fool."
She took a deep breath, torn between loathing and loving him. "It's just as well I have a sense of the ridiculous, isn't it?" she asked at last. "Or that water sensitive outside the door would be running back to the Cloudmaster with a tale to tell. Even now, he's probably wondering just why we are standing on opposite sides of the room."
"We can rectify that," he said diffidently and rounded the bed to stand in front of her. "I have a mind to rid you of that cumbersome garment, for a start. Ry, we may not be lovers, but I would very much like to bed a friend. To build something worth keeping, especially if we have children. I can't think of anyone I would prefer to bear a child of mine than you, you know."
"I can live with that, I suppose." The words were ungracious, sharpened by her need to have him look at her as a lover, not as a necessary wife or prospective mother. She tried to soften them with a smile, but it came a shade too late to be convincing.
He held out a hand to her and struggled on. "I don't really want to wait for dark," he said. "I've always wanted to see your legs without the benefit of clothing. I don't think there's another woman in the Quartern who can match them."
She raised an eyebrow. "Lord Kaneth, are you attempting to charm me?"
"Er… yes. I guess I am. Trying to charm the breeches, um, the dress off you. Ry, I do think we can make this work, if we try."
She took his hand. "Especially as the alternative is a little grim, eh? All right, let's give that spy outside the door something to think about." And she lifted her face to receive his kiss, hoping he would not feel the wild beating of her unruly heart.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Red Quarter Dune Scarmaker Vara Redmane had been born on the dune called the Scarmaker and expected to die somewhere along its mighty length. She was sixty-four years old and the furthest she had ever been from the red sands of the dune was the edge of a nearby waterhole, to fill dayjars, as she was doing now. It was a task she and the other women performed every morning, in the cool of the long dune shadows, carting the dayjars in panniers on the back of two packpedes.
It was Vara's favourite job and collecting the water was a pleasant time between waking in her tent and facing the true work of the day. At the edge of the waterhole, where bab palms grew and flame creeper insinuated itself like a thread-snake among the rocks, she was at peace, in harmony with life and the water of life. Here she could, with trueness, offer up a prayer to the god of Dune Scarmaker; here she really did feel grateful for the gift of living water and life. And here, when she spilled the water in sacrifice to their dune god, she took pleasure in the idea that the precious drops would find their way back into the cool greenness of the pool where they belonged and not be sucked up into the greediness of the dry air.