He waited.
It sounded again, barely audible through the thickness of the portal.
He walked, dumbfounded, to the door and slid away the bolt. An assassin?
To either side, the crenels looked down into deep courtyards. Naobi glowed fat and white, a reptilian eye wreathed in green. Stillness covered everything. The clear balmy night seemed devoid of sound. Not even cricket song. The gardens lay too far below.
Caliph took a half step out. He stopped. A heady sweetness lingered on the air. A whisper from behind the door. “Caliph?”
He turned slowly.
She stood in the shadow of the arch that sheltered the seldom-used portal, all but her face masked in darkness.
Caliph’s eyes burned her image into his brain. Hair, silvery-gold and short. Her eyes were worlds of blue.
Fear filled him instantly. Had she returned to finish what the witches in Tue had failed to accomplish? Was this a trick? But her eyes communicated a silent apology; a sincere vulnerability, real or imagined, that made him want to hold her and protect her.
His tongue lay ignorantly at the bottom of his mouth. His head might as well have been severed for the all the help it was in determining what to say.
Almost cautiously, as though afraid she might vanish, he reached for her face. As his fingers touched her, her lips twisted into that familiar smile that both mocked and tempted him at the same time.
Caliph couldn’t help himself. He attacked her. She gave way easily, kissing him back, letting his emotions come out.
“I guess you’re glad to see me,” she breathed into his ear.
They fell apart. A test fit after two years. But their bodies had remembered, had conformed to each other with aching familiarity.
“How—what are you doing here?” He felt inebriated. A tailless cat stepped out of the shadows and marched into the castle as though inspecting newly conquered territory.
“How am I doing here?” She laughed softly. Her shoulders lifted then fell. Her voice was husky. “Feels all right to me.”
Her lashes slipped. Lazy. Blue planets eclipsed. Only the corners of her mouth turned up. It was a well- practiced look. One that Caliph supposed had sent many men into short-term madness.
Caliph came at her again.
She was shocked by his eagerness. Of all things, this had been the one she least expected. Not from quiet, lethally rational Caliph Howl.
His hands ran over her like the fingers of a votary, leaving no line uncaressed. They traveled from wrist to ankle, drawing her up, off the parapet, off her feet, inside the castle.
Like walking lines, she moved without sense. Caliph carried her away, cradled her. A pearly light flickered in darkness. She was disoriented. She struggled free from her clothes, desperate to be rid of them.
Caliph had turned her arrival into something wild. It was better than she had hoped. It was necessary. It was urgent. She felt herself let go of the controls, let go of the premeditated steps, the calculations she used with sex. It had been a while.
Sena bit her lower lip. Her mind slipped away as the catapult fired. She was floating . . . drifting . . . in an ocean of stars, stuttering again . . . zoetrope spinning.
In the morning, the light lay crisp and white across the rich crumpled sheets of the High King’s bed. Sena had no idea how she had arrived in this room but by the look of the sheets she must have been awake at the time.
Her memory fogged with feelings that pulled her mouth into an amazed and contented smile. Caliph was nowhere to be seen.
White marble flooded the floor. The four-poster bed she had slept in was carved from cherry wood with tall spindles at every corner. In the center of the room a gleaming enameled tub stood steaming on short recurved legs. It crouched like a fat cat above a plush colorful rug.
Several wardrobes, a desk and a chest all sat at attention. They were crafted from imported woods, carved laboriously and stained deep red tones. On the walls, tapestries of inestimable value curled with the outside air.
Leaning back, she gazed up at the ceiling which comprised a vaulted affair whose ribbing floated from pillars in the four corners and met at a recessed oval where some artisan had done a fresco in the dome. It showed a cherubic youth with black wings descending from a sunlit cloud aiming a bow at an innocent-looking rabbit. Archaic lettering around the fresco read in Hinter,
Her journey had certainly been worth it. She had walked lines to an abandoned cromlech on a low hill amid fog-draped mountains. Surrounded by dark, worn-down stones and brambles, she had used her sickle knife to cut her way through.
Relying on road signs and other travelers for directions, she had taken a road south and after walking several days she had finally come to Isca.
She had seen it in the distance: the mighty wall, the city pouring smoke. Blue-gray worms from a hundred chimneys had bent beneath the castle spires, everything caked in evening light.
Inside the city, a sea of people had sloshed against walls and buildings. Sena had been surprised at the chill twilight brought and the women in long coats who wore next to nothing underneath, showing skin and multiple belts around tightly circled hips. Shouting boys had torn through the crowd, dragging dead things on strings attached to poles. A gypsy with a beard had scowled and offered her toothpaste from a tray just before a huge man pushed past, nearly shoving her into a lamppost.
Sena had seen shops for tobacco and unicycles and soap. Mechanized cars and strange creatures moved through tunnels in the walls. Metal boxes on pulleys carried regular deliveries on wires strung across the street. Clotheslines garroted gargoyles. Iron strangled brick. Windows slid up and down like teeth. People screamed and bartered and talked about war.
A door opened somewhere and Caliph stepped out from behind one of the tapestries, breaking her reverie. She heard him thank a servant and shut the door. In his hand, he carried a copper kettle that he emptied directly into the tub.
“Plumbing problems,” he said and looked around the room as though making sure everything met with his approval before coming to stand somewhat shyly near the baseboard.
“I thought you might want a bath. No one knows you’re here.” He glanced at the ceiling where she was still looking at the fresco. “Yet.”
“What did you do to me?” She climbed from the sheets and walked shamelessly to the tub.
Palms up, silent, he felt suddenly uneasy, almost bashful.
“I don’t even remember what you like for breakfast. I don’t know if you’re staying. I don’t know . . .”
His words trailed off and he walked to the window. From behind he heard her slide into the water.
“I didn’t come here just to have breakfast,” she said lightly.
“What then?”
“Caliph, you think too damn much. You always have. Relax. I’m here. I came here for one reason. You.”
Her words surprised herself. She sank up to her neck. “Nice scar, isn’t it?”
Caliph came over and sat down by the tub. “What do you mean?”
“My scar. You didn’t notice it last night?” She pulled herself up so he could see.
He put his finger on the pink line.
“I missed you.”
“I could tell.” She grinned. “I didn’t expect treatment like that. Thought you might even throw me out. You’ve got better things to do now than think about me.” Suddenly she sat up straight. “Where’s my pack?”
“I put it over there.” He pointed to where it hung on the back of a chair. N
s lay sleeping on the seat. She slipped down again until her chin touched the water, feeling relieved.
“So—” Caliph tried to start any kind of conversation, “nearly two, two and a half years now.” He nodded. “I
