He tried to look innocent and trustworthy. 'But what you've said is important.''
She rose and walked slowly across the tiny sitting room to the door, and opened it. 'Come back in two days,' she said, in tones that brooked no argument. 'I may decide to tell you more then.'
Nearly ready to burst with frustration, Valdir left, doing his best to show none of it.
She shut the door behind him, and he wandered back down to the Row, looking for a good place to set out his hat for a few more hours.
He still had to eat, after all.
:How much of this can you trust?: Yfandes asked.
:Well, I'm hardly going to be able to run Truth Spell on her,: he replied, staring up into the darkness and listening to old Petar snoring loud enough to shake the chimney down. :Although-gods help me, it seems as if something was doing that for me. And you have to admit, this report of alternate petting and abuse certainly explains some of his reaction toward women. Mothers in particular.:
:But it doesn't explain what happened that night.:
One of the two girls murmured in her sleep. Vanyel shivered, and pulled his blanket a little closer. The cold of the dirt floor was seeping through his thin straw pallet :There's more. I know there's more. I think she - or whatever it was that made her talk - is testing me, and I don't know why. Gods, and the questions I have - why allow only blood relations to serve the Remoerdis Family? And why does it feel as if the old lady is - Gifted? Or geased, bespelled. Or both, I don't know. And I don't dare test her to find out, with Vedric in the city:
:Mm,: she agreed. :Wise. What's he up to?:
:Being utterly charming,: Valdir replied. :He's got the locals coming more and more over to his side. And he's agreeing with them on every point. It's hard to believe that this is the same man my sister called a viper.:
:Interesting. And these Lineans are a hard-headed lot.:
:It would just about take an angel to change their minds about the Mavelans,: Vanyel told her. :But Vedric seems to be doing just that.:
Petar snorted, coughed, and turned over. There was silence for a moment, then he snorted again, and the snores did not resume.
:Take the chance to get to sleep while you can,: Yfandes advised dryly.
But sleep refused to come.
Tonight had been particularly bad. Not only had Bel made another try, but Valdir had fended off the attentions of someone else as well.
Even if he hadn't taken Bel's glare as warning that she meant what she'd said about not taking up with her customers, he'd have avoided this one. Shaych, yes - but in a way that made Valdir's skin crawl as much as Bel did. The man hadn't been physically repulsive, but there was something twisted about him, something unhealthy. Like a fine velvet glove over a taloned hand. The man had looked at him with a hunger that made him shiver with reaction even now. He had reminded Vanyel - not Valdir - of the mage that had called himself 'Krebain.'
I don't know what to think anymore. If I'm not shaych, then why can't I just do what Bel wants and get it over with? If I am, then why did that hunter revolt me? He turned onto his side, curling into a ball against the cold, the ache of his empty stomach, the misery his own uncertainty was causing.
And today - gods. That sick little game I was playing on the serving girls. Leading them on - knowing I was leading them right down a dead end. Yes, I got information - but I was actually enjoying deluding them, having a little power over them. Gods, that was sick. And I would have gone right on playing little sex-flirtation games if 'Fandes hadn 't threatened to kick me into next week. I'm turning into something I don't much like.
He curled up a little tighter. I don't even know my own feelings any more.
He tightened his lips in exasperation. Look, Van, you’re supposed to have been trained in logic. So why don't you try putting things into some kind of category, you goose? Maybe you don't know what you feel, but you certainly know what you don't feel. You 've been agonizing over that enough lately! Then figure out what it is that everything you don't care for has in common.
