“Well, as to that,” Bahzell gave her a smile of his own, “no doubt you’ve heard as how any father is after getting wiser and wiser as his son gets older?” She nodded, and he chuckled. “I’ll not say my Da’s gotten one bit wiser as I’ve grown older, but this I will say-he’s gotten a sight more patient than ever I realized he was when I was after finding every way as how I could try his patience.” He shook his head, his smile turning into a grin. “It’s a rare wonder, I’m thinking, that ever I had the chance to finish growing up at all!”
‹ Really? › Walsharno’s ears flicked in amusement. ‹ I wasn’t under the impression that you were particularly “ grown up ”!›
Bahzell laughed, but then his ears pricked as a hradani woman-tall, even for a Horse Stealer-in the green surcoat of the Order of Tomanak rose from the bench under one of the streetlamps at the ramp’s foot.
“So, here you are…at last,” she observed, folding her arms and looking up at him. “Taking your own sweet time about it, were you?”
“And it’s a joy as ever to be seeing you, too, Sharkah,” Bahzell replied mildly. He dismounted and cocked his ears at his older sister. “And would it happen as there’s a reason you’re biding here in the dark?”
“Oh, it’s not so dark as all that yet,” Sharkah replied, and opened her arms to him. He embraced her, hugging her tightly, and tall as she was, her head scarcely topped his shoulder as she hugged him back. There was nothing fragile about that hug, though, and ribs less substantial than Bahzell’s might not have survived it.
She gave him one last squeeze, then stepped back with a smile.
“As for how it happens I’ve been sitting here this last hour or so,” she said, “Harshan decided as how it might not be so very bad an idea to use one of Baron Tellian’s pigeons to give Da and Mother a wee bit of warning. Not”-she added innocently-“that I’ve the least idea at all, at all, what that warning might have been, of course.”
“And you a servant of Tomanak.” Bahzell shook his head. “It’s amazed I am that himself hasn’t fetched you a smart rap for such a fearsome lie as that!”
“I’ve no doubt he was too busy clouting someone else about the head and ears to be bothering with such as me,” she told him, and cocked her head with a quizzical smile as Leeana swung down from Gayrfressa’s saddle beside Bahzell.
“And this-” Bahzell began, but Sharkah snorted a laugh.
“You’ve no need to be telling me that, little brother! I told you Harshan’d sent word ahead. And even if he’d done no such thing, I’ve eyes in my head, you know!”
Bahzell’s ears pricked, but then he looked down, following his sister’s gaze, and shook his head. The bracelets about his and Leeana’s wrists had begun to glow-softly, at first, but steadily brightening, the opals shining like bright, tiny moons in the gathering evening.
“So you’re the woman as was daft enough to take him on,” Sharkah said, reaching out to Leeana. “It’s glad I am someone was, but truth to tell, I’m wondering if you truly looked before you leapt!”
“Oh, I looked more carefully than you might think,” Leeana replied. “And to be honest, I think I did fairly well out of it.”
She smiled as Sharkah clasped arms with her. Leeana Hanathafressa had never met the woman who could make feel petite…until now. But Sharkah Bahanksdaughter managed it quite handily. She was at least eight or nine inches taller than Leeana, and broad-shouldered for a woman even in proportion to her height. The hand-and-a-half sword sheathed across her back was nowhere near the size and weight of Bahzell’s massive blade, but Leeana suspected most Sothoii men would find it uncomfortably heavy even as a two-handed weapon.
Sharkah, obviously, did not.
“I’ve met your Da,” Sharkah said, releasing her forearm. “You’ve the look of him. And although I’m thinking he might not be wishful of admitting it to you, he was fair bursting with pride when he spoke of you.” Her teeth flashed in a white smile under the street lamp. “It might be as how he was of the mind that one scapegrace daughter might appreciate another!”
“I believe I may have heard a little something about you, too,” Leeana acknowledged. “Something about stubbornness and sword oaths, I think.”
“I’ve no least idea what it possibly could be as you’re talking about,” Sharkah said, and then raised an eyebrow at Bahzell as he stepped back a full pace from her.
“Pay me no mind,” he told her. “It’s just stepping clear of the lightning bolt I am.”
Sharkah laughed, then looked back at Leeana.
“I’m thinking we’ll deal well together, you and I, Sister,” she said, “and anyone as could get this fellow”-she jabbed a thumb in Bahzell’s direction-“into harness will be coming as a welcome surprise to Mother and Da. So why don’t we just be taking you off to meet the family?”
Chapter Twenty-Two
“She’s a likely lass,” Bahnak Karathson allowed, looking across the hall at his newest daughter-in-law. “Mind,” he smiled a slow smile as his youngest son, “I’m thinking as how the ears might take some getting used to.”
“Do you, now?” Bahzell asked mildly, his own ears flattening ever so slightly. He glanced across the hall at Leeana-totally surrounded by his sisters (all his sisters) and his mother-and then looked back at his father. “It’s fond of her ears I am,” he said in that same, mild tone.
“Aye?” His father raised his eyebrows and took a long, slow considering sip of ale, then set the tankard back on the table and gave Bahzell another smile, this one warmer and broader. “Well, that’s all any man could be saying, isn’t it then? And the only thing as matters, when all’s said. I’ve not forgotten how your grandfather argued and shouted-aye, and threatened to disown me entire, more than once-when I’d the questionable taste to be falling in love with your mother. A stubborn man, your grandfather, but a wise one, too, when all was said. He came to love your mother like his very own daughter by birth, and it’s in my mind as how a son should learn from his father’s wisdom. So if it’s all the same to you, Bahzell, I’ll just be skipping over the stubborn bit and allow right now as how it’s a rare, beautiful wife you’ve found, and one it’s pikestaff plain has wit and wisdom enough for three…even allowing as how her taste in husbands might be just a wee bit odd.”
Bahzell gazed at his father steadily for a handful of heartbeats, then twitched his ears in solemn agreement.
“She is that, all of it,” he said softly, turning his head to look in her direction once more as she went off in a peal of laughter at something his youngest sister Adalah had said.
At twenty-five, Adalah came closest to Leeana in age of any of his siblings, but she wasn’t yet out of the schoolroom, given the difference in hradani and human lifespans, and it seemed fairly evident she was in the process of developing a deep, schoolgirl’s admiration for her new, exotic, redhaired, human sister-in-law. It rather reminded him of the way Sharkah had reacted when she first met Kaeritha Seldansdaughter, although he doubted Adalah would be particularly tempted to take up the sword. Like his immediately younger sister Halah-and most unlike Sharkah-she was more inclined towards the domestic lifestyle.
“I’ll admit, it’s more than a little hesitant I was at her age,” he admitted quietly to his father. “She’s naught but a girl, by our people’s way of thinking.”
“A well grown ‘girl,’ for such a wee little thing,” his brother Tormach said dryly. He was only twelve years older than Bahzell himself, and his…admiration for Leeana was evident.
Bahzell cocked an eyebrow at him, and Tormach colored quickly.
“I’ve no doubt as how your brother meant only to be saying she’s a way about her as makes you think she’s older than her years,” Bahnak said blandly, and Tormach’s face burned still hotter. He looked helplessly at Bahzell for a long moment, then shook his head.
“I meant nothing of the sort, Bahzell,” he admitted, “and it’s your pardon I beg. Aye, Father’s the right of it-I’d not believe she was a year less than forty, to see how she carries herself and the confidence of her-but that’s not what I meant, and it’s a wonderful muddy taste that boot in my mouth is after having.”