She didn’t seem to notice, though, just tossed back her mane and pawed at the ground. “At the feast, then. He is anxious to meet with you.”
“At the feast.” I nodded. “Looking forward to it.” I pushed Naji aside. He stayed close, though. He’d been staying close a lot lately. Closer even than when we’d been stranded on the Isles of the Sky and had to stay close cause we were the only two humans around other than Eirnin.
“The feast!” the manticore cried, chiming with delight.
The night of the feast, Marjani and Naji and me all walked from the servants’ quarters to the garden together, along with the braver crewmen – including Jeric yi Niru, who Marjani didn’t want leaving on the newly repaired boat alone. The manticores’ servants brought us clean clothes, soft cotton robes dyed the color of pomegranates and saffron, and they gave us steam-baths and lined our eyes with red powder, the way the manticores did.
Naji had his face wrapped up in a scarf.
I wondered if he really thought the manticores cared about his scars.
The feast was in the garden, with long low tables set up beneath the fruit trees. We sat down in the grass, lining up on one side of the table, and waited.
“The pride will join you soon,” said one of the servants, who tilted her head when she spoke and never looked any of us in the eye.
The sun was just starting to set, and the light in the garden was purple and gold and turned everything into shadow. A trio of servants began to strum harps and sing in a language I didn’t recognize, and soft pale magic-cast lanterns blinked on one by one up among the trees.
“Why’re they making us wait?” I asked Marjani.
Marjani shook her head. “I don’t trust manticores.”
“They won’t do anything,” Naji said. He leaned forward on the table, drumming his fingers against the wood. “As many deals as Ananna has made with Ongraygeeomryn, there’s no way they’d risk killing her now.”
“What? Why?”
“Their elaborate system of boons and favors.” Naji looked at me. “You’re lucky,” he said.
I knew he wanted to say more, but a loud, reverberating trumpet cut through the thick air.
All the servants scrambled to line up behind us.
The music twinkled on in the background.
The manticores marched into the garden.
It was the entire pride, I guess, cause there were about fifteen manticores in all. They walked one after another in a long procession. Ongraygeeomryn came in toward the end, flanked by an older lady-manticore and man-manticore. They sat at the center of the table, right across from me.
The man-manticore reared back his head and trumpeted, and this was the loudest trumpet I’d ever heard. It seemed to echo out for miles.
The music stopped playing.
“Girl-human,” he said, turning his golden eyes to me. “Do you have a name?”
The silence in the garden was so thick I thought I might choke on it. All the manticores stared at me expectantly.
“Yes,” I said. “Your Grace.”
“Don’t call me that. I am not a human king.” He leaned forward, sniffed the air. “What is your name?”
I glanced at Naji. Should you tell a manticore your name or not? He must’ve known what I was thinking, cause he kinda nodded at me like it was alright.
“Ananna of the Nadir.”
Ongraygeeomryn smiled at me.
“Ananna,” the manticore leader said. “I will gift you a boon in exchange for rescuing my daughter from the foul Wizard Eirnin.”
The other manticores trumpeted and flapped their wings and furled and unfurled their tails. I saw Marjani shrink down out of the corner of my eye, but nobody let loose any spines.
“You will receive the boon tonight, after the feast.” He nodded at me. “It is rude to divulge the nature of the boon in public, but Ongraygeeomryn told me what you would like most in the world, and I am confident in her judgment.”
That got my suspicions up a bit, cause much as I liked the manticore I wasn’t convinced she knew what I wanted most in the world. Mostly cause I didn’t know what I wanted most in the world. I used to think it was being a pirate captain, but I wasn’t so sure of that anymore.
Still, I knew better than to say something. When it comes to dealing with people who think of themselves as important, it’s usually best to keep your mouth shut.
“You will find the boon most satisfying,” she told me. “I am certain of it.”
I nodded and plastered on a smile that I hoped came across as polite.
“Servant-humans!” bellowed the manticore leader. “Bring us food!”
The servants disappeared into the gardens and then reappeared with heavy stone platters laden with fruits and little savory pies and bottles of Empire wine. They set them down first, and I could see all the manticores trying to act like it didn’t turn their stomachs.
Then the servants brought out more stone platters covered with slabs of raw meat, pink and glistening in the candlelight. I knew it wasn’t sheep.
“We thought this would be more comfortable for you,” Ongraygeeomryn said to me, nodding her head at the piles of meat.
“Yes,” said her father. “Normally we catch them alive.”
Marjani and I glanced at each other.
“We appreciate your thoughtfulness,” Marjani said, though her mouth twisted up when she spoke.
Naji didn’t say nothing, just slipped his mask into his lap and picked up a lemon-salt fish.
I’d never been to a proper feast before, just the big drunken parties that pirates call feasts. Nobody got up and danced on the table, or groped any of the servant girls – even the crewmen we had with us seemed too terrified to do anything but pick at their food. The music playing in the background was soft and fancy. The conversation was polite and didn’t say nothing of any substance. The only thing that made me realize I wasn’t up in the palace with the Emperor was the way the manticores ate: they leaned forward and tore chunks of meat off with their teeth, and red juices streamed down their faces and tangled up in the manes.
After dinner, the servants came around with cloths and wiped the manticores’ faces clean. One of ’em came at me with a cloth but I declined polite as I could. So did Marjani, though she sounded like a right proper lady – “I don’t require your services tonight, thank you.” The servant kind of smiled at her. Then she turned to Naji, his scars shadowed and deep in the dim light. He scowled at her until she shuffled away.
When all the platters of food had been cleared, all us human stared at the manticores like we expected something bad to happen. I didn’t think they were going to eat us or nothing, but I was still a little concerned about the boon.
“We would be most honored if you would share a dessert wine with us,” said the manticore leader. “Ahiial. It is a delicacy from the northern part of our island, and a very precious nectar indeed.”
“What’s it made of?” I asked. Somebody had to say it.
“It’s derived from the pollen of the ahiiala flower,” said Ongraygeeomryn. “The only plant we consume.”
“The stories say it has magical properties,” said a lady-manticore with pale white dappling on her coat.
Marjani and me both looked at Naji.
“It’s fine,” he said.
“Of course it’s fine!” boomed the manticore leader. “Servant-humans, bring us the wine!” He smiled, and he only showed the points of his teeth. “You will not be able to drink any of that human swill after tasting ahiial.”
Naji shrugged, and I got the sense that he’d had it before.
The servants trotted up to the table, half of ’em holding shallow porcelain bowls and the other half holding rough-hewn stone goblets. They lined ’em up on the table. Then another row of servants marched out, this time carting huge carved pitchers. They made their way around the table, slowly pouring a bit of ahiial for each guest.
The ahiial was pale gold, the color of morning sunlight and a manticore’s fur. It smelled sweet, like honey, like a man’s perfume.