Aerie

Kiron? Did they guess at the game she was playing? It was a delicate balancing act. Because Letis, along with the other demands she was making on her son, had wanted to present him with his wife-to-be as a fait accompli, and press him to wed her.

Peri was absolutely certain in her own mind that this would do her no good at all. She managed to persuade Letis to concentrate on what was, in Letis’ mind, the more important issue anyway: getting the family home back.

It had been a long and tiring “discussion”—it was an argument, but that was not what Letis called it. Patiently, Peri had pointed out that Jousters seldom married, to which Letis replied that Kiron wouldn’t be a Jouster once he had the farm back. That was when Peri had nodded and said, “So the important thing is for him to concentrate on that, then, and not get diverted.”

She hated being so duplicitous, but she knew that having Letis present her now would only mean that Kiron would lump her in with all of the other pressures his mother was putting on him, and that would spell the end to any thoughts of love.

No young man really cares to have his mother pick out his wife, after all. Perhaps the noble-born and wealthy were used to that sort of thing, but they could afford concubines and mistresses and more than one wife. A young farmer needed to be sure that the wife he was getting was one he wanted. And though Kiron was no longer a farmer, and probably never would be one again, he thought like one of the young men in her village.

Meanwhile Peri had continued her quiet campaign. But if the other women had noticed . . .

“How so?” the other woman laughed. “He is easy on the eyes, that one. And much more amusing than our sober trainer or our quarrelsome wingleader.”

So they hadn’t noticed. She smiled with relief. “Now that is a true thing.”

Her campaign was going well. Kiron sought out her company when he had time. He called her “restful.” She spoke always of things he cared about—dragons, mostly, telling him of Sutema’s antics, asking his advice. A man liked having a restful wife. Peace in the house; that was what they liked. A man liked to be deferred to.

It would be a strange sort of life. She could not imagine giving up Sutema, so they would be Jousters together, of course. What would that be like?

Hmm. Probably much like life now. Well, that was hardly a bad thing. Life now was very good, and she really could not see a way to improve on it.

“Hesh-ret is flapping his wings hard now,” Sit-aken-te said into the hot silence. “I was glad when he tired, because he had long since worn me out. I think I will persuade him to use those perches tomorrow.”

“You should use some other command than ‘fly’ when you want him to exercise his wings,” Peri warned. “You’ll want to use the word ‘fly’ later when he is really flying. I use ‘wings.’ But it really doesn’t matter what word you use as long as the dragon understands what you mean.”

Sit-aken-te laughed quietly. “Now that is a very true thing. Are you cool now? We could go study one of those scrolls Huras brought with him.”

Peri flushed. “I cannot read,” she said reluctantly.

Surely Sit-aken-te would stare at her in uncomprehending astonishment.

“I did not think you could, which is why I said we should study it together,” the young woman replied. “You are sensible and practical, and we can, I think, do a commendable job of sifting grain from chaff together. Unless you had rather go to placate that friend of yours.”

“Placate?” It hadn’t occurred before to Peri that this was what she was doing with Letis. But it was, of course. That was exactly what she was doing.

The lily pads moved a little as Sit-aken-te shrugged. “One doesn’t choose one’s friends’ friends. But I would not spend nearly the time with her that you do, if it were me. She does not approve of us, nor of your being one of us, and will not accept that you wish to be here. I would have reached the limit of my patience long ago. But then, she is not my friend. She may have many worthwhile qualities that I cannot see.” The other woman chuckled a little. “And I must admit, her voice grates on me. I never could bear people whose words say one thing, while their spirit says another.”

Peri blinked. “I must be missing something,” she said carefully. “Whatever do you mean?” Was this a priestess attribute again?

“Hmm. It is a matter of paying a little less attention to what she says and more to the tone of her voice and the look in her eyes, the way she moves,” Sit-aken-te explained. “She says that she is proud of her son, and yet I can tell that she is angry that he has risen to so high a place. She defers to us, and yet I can tell that she despises us because we are nobly born. Her words are soft and mild, yet her heart is full of bitterness and anger. I can understand why she would be so, of course, and in her place I should probably be just as bitter and angry. But this does not make her a comfortable person to be around. And if she would simply admit to you and to herself that this is how she feels, perhaps she could rid herself of some of it.”

“She lost much,” Peri replied, feeling as if she had to defend Letis now.

“So have others, on both sides,” Sit-aken-te pointed out with justification. “But—there, you see, it is not my place to judge. I merely say I do not find her a pleasant person, and I would spend less time in her company than you do. If you would rather—”

The other woman rose from the water, and reached for a cloth to dry herself, though it was so hot that the faint breeze dried her before she even picked the oblong of linen up.

“No, no, if you will be so kind as to read the scroll to me, I had much rather do that while the little ones nap,” Peri said hastily, also standing. “You do me a great favor.”

“Well, and I do owe you for far too much time you spent watching over my dragon,” the young woman replied, with a smile over her shoulder, as she shook back her hair and wrapped the linen around herself.

Peri did the same, feeling touched and a little surprised at the same time.

“Huras is right; we have been . . . hmm . . . taking advantage of your good nature,” Sit-aken-te said. “It is time to change that.”

Them-noh-thet, the Priest of Haras who had gone with Kiron the first time, had spent hours setting up elaborate ritual equipment to work his magic.

Rakaten-te, the Chosen of Seft, set up nothing but himself.

Kiron had more than expected the Chosen to ask him to find some other venue than the Temple of Haras and had resigned himself to moving all of the provisions that they had found to a new location.

Instead, Rakaten-te had dismounted—a bit stiffly, which was hardly a surprise, given his age—and followed Kiron into the temple by the simple expedient of keeping one hand on Kiron’s shoulder. He had stood in the middle of the sanctuary floor for some time, with his head cocked a little to one side as if he was listening to something.

“Properly cleansed and purged,” he had said at long last, with an approving nod. “I shall have to tender Them-noh-thet a compliment when we return.”

Then he had sat down where he stood, without any preparations, elaborate or otherwise, and apparently went off into meditation.

That left Kiron and Aket-ten to set up the living space, fetch water, prepare food, and hunt, all in blistering heat. From time to time Aket-ten would glance at the Chosen with resentment.

“I don’t know why he wanted me,” she finally said, crossly, as she kneaded dough. “All I’m doing is acting as a servant.”

“So am I,” Kiron reminded her, thinking as he did so that being made a wingleader, the one thing she had wanted above all others, had not improved her temper any.

“Yes, but I’m having to cook,” she continued, looking down at the dough resentfully.

“So am I,” Kiron reminded her, as he banked coals around the pot of lentils they would be having for dinner.

“Yes, but anyone could have done this,” she responded. “Probably better than I could.”

At this point, it was clear to Kiron that Aket-ten didn’t want to hear anything logical, she only wanted to vent her frustrations. On the one hand, he could agree with her. After all, he was certain that, eventually, Rakaten-te would have magical need of Aket-ten’s training and skills. All he had served as was a kind of cart driver on a very superior cart indeed. And now his only purpose here was to attend to whatever need the Chosen had.