“I will not,” said Panduv, regarding him for the first, and smiling.
“You desolate us.”
“I’m expected elsewhere.”
“Tomorrow, then?”
“Perhaps.”
In the well-lit salon prepared for her convenience, Panduv cleansed her skin and donned her expensive garments. She drew a half-mask of thin hammered gold on to her lower face. It was an affectation, for all the city knew her, or of her, and besides, her covered carriage was always recognizable, Zakorian black, with the Double Moon and Dragon device of the Old Kingdom, once the sigil exclusively of rebels and pirates.
The slave-girl had collected the dancer’s fee. As in the case of all the city’s entertainer-elite, this was virtually superfluous. Her Swordsmen and charioteers were kings, and her acrobat dancers queens, welcomed and honored everywhere. It was well-documented, and might be seen anyway, any day on Tomb Street, that this fraternity died so rich their burial houses rivaled the sarcophagi of Dorthar’s Storm Lords.
Even so, Panduv had not yet reached the pinnacle—to be accorded publicly the name of her birthplace, Hanassor. This recognition—which others, such as the Lydian, had gained—she had sworn to have, on the altar of Zakorian Zarduk, the fire god.
By the gate, the unmistakable carriage stood ready. Panduv entered it, and beheld another was before her.
A woman, mantled and hooded, who surely must have bribed the driver some vast amount, and be besides of high birth. It was almost Zastis. Such things did happen. The Zakorian was not necessarily averse, depending on what was offered when the wrappings came off.
“Good evening, lady,” said Panduv, through her own mask. “I’ve contracted to be at the Guardian’s palace before moonset. I can grant you a few minutes.”
“Hanassor,” said the other woman, softly. “You know nothing of it. Did they never tell you, for example, that the dancer’s craft which brings your celebrity here, was reckoned of small worth, there? In the taverns of your Zakorian capital, women burnt their rags from them for a few coppers. It was a commonplace, not especially skilled. The clumsy were frequently scarred. Every such dancer was treated as a harlot. Go to Free Zakoris now, and see the value of a woman.”
Panduv held her breath. Her hand slipped to her breast, to the dagger she wore there in a sheath of nacre. The intruder was a telepath. And one who could breach even a Vis mind having itself no such knack.
“Yes,” said the hooded woman. “I can speak within. And read you quite well.”
“Then you’re Shansar.” Panduv spoke with all the hauteur of Visian Alisaar.
“No. The Shansarians are not generally so adept. I am Amanackire.”
Panduv swore. “A Lowlander.”
“Amanackire, I said. There is a difference.”
This then explained why the driver had allowed the woman into Panduv’s carriage. While the invader-conquerors might occasionally be denied something, one denied nothing to Lowlanders. They could totter cities, the rabble of the serpent witch, and summon gods from under the sea.
“What do you want?” Panduv said. Patently it would not be oneself. Which was lucky, for white flesh repelled her.
“The Lydian,” the woman said. “The Children of Daigoth know each other’s business. Tell me how he’s to be come at.”
“You do surprise me,” said Panduv. “How should I know? Go to the stadium. Petition him, like the others. Send a gift.”
“You misunderstand what I want. To speak with him, privately.”
“The stadium. Petition. A gift.”
“Zakorian,” said the woman-. Her soft voice chilled the very air of that hot pre-Zastian night, “my kind are never refused.”
“Then he won’t refuse you. Why come to me?”
“To ease my path. Yes, now I see it. He’s at a supper—will leave shortly, since in four days more he fights in the stadium—how explicit, your mind—And which homeward route will he walk, Panduv Am Hanassor, alone in Alisaarian night?” (Panduv, her inadvertent thoughts rifled, robbed, attempted to wall off her knowledge of the city’s avenues. Failed, of course.) And, “Thank you,” said this Amanackire bitch, gentle as a killing snow.
Just past midnight, a group of Saardsin Swordsmen came out from under the portico of a mansion of Pillar Square. They were laughing, and a touch drunk, dressed in all the splendor of youth and strength and money. One of their number was Rehger Am Ly Dis.
As they crossed under the columned arcades, moving toward Sword Street, a voice called to the Lydian.
His companions, unheeding, went on. He hesitated, and glanced back. A pale shadow, that of a woman, was framed between two pillars.
“Not tonight, beautiful,” he said, already turning from her. “I fight the first day of Zastis.”
Then he realized that no one had spoken. His name had been surely uttered, but within his own skull.
All the blond races boasted of their ability to mind-speak. Most unmixed Vis abhorred the notion. Rehger turned again, and went to the woman. A lamp burned near, but it was behind her; he could see nothing of her but the pallor of her cloak. He stood over her, and carefully shut the anger from his face and tone before addressing her.
“That trick could earn you a beating in New Alisaar. Don’t do it, even in play.” He looked around, and added, “Where’s your escort?”
“I have none,” she said. She used her real voice now, it was cool, it did not invite.
“That’s unwise,” he said. “Next time, take your servant or slave.”
“Because only a champion is safe on these streets? Even cutthroats follow the races and are gamblers in Saardsinmey.”
“No man would try for me,” he said. “He knows I could kill him.” It was not vanity, only a fact.
But she said, “No man would try for me. That would also mean death.”
She took a step away, under the lamp. And as she did so, brushed the hood from her head.
He had never seen such whiteness. Perhaps, in a figurine of marble. Her skin, her hair—there was a trace of shadow on her brows and color at her lips, and maybe that was paint. Her eyes were unhuman, they rasped his senses—the white eyes of a snake—he did not want to look at them, or at any part of her.
All her race were said to be magicians. He supposed he believed it, seeing her.
“Why have you detained me?” he said.
“You acquiesce, then. I may detain any man I wish, roam where I will and as I want? You admit, my people have your people now under the booted heel.”
“I’m a Swordsman and charioteer. I know nothing about your people.”
“All Vis knows something of us.”
“And a slave, the property of this city. My opinion isn’t worth anything to you. So much said, lady, excuse me. Good night.”
“I don’t give you leave to go.”
“Madam, with or without your leave, I regret.”
He moved away from her and had begun to walk again toward Sword Street, when she said, “A paradox. A slave who is a king. Lydian.”
“What do you want?” he said, finding he had stopped after all.
“Come to my house tomorrow evening.”
“Again, my apologies. I’m obliged to be somewhere else.”
“You can find it with no trouble. Ask on Gem-
Jewel Street. Anyone will tell you where the Amanackire is lodging.”
He strode out now, and left her standing under the lamp.
The columns marched by him. Some were scratched with mottoes or poetry, or the names of feted prostitutes.
He had known this city nearly all his life, been famed and free of it since his nineteenth year. Yet now some drifting memory of the other land, the first, surfaced in his mind. The mountains of Iscah. A woman, whose face he did not remember, only the springing blackness of her hair. He thought of her sometimes, his mother. Sometimes even, in lieu of jewels or the gold chain, he wore in his ear the stud of coin, the drak his father had paid her with for their night. He did not lament or eschew the incoherent past.