discarded these useless thoughts at once. She knew better. Taking his hand, she allowed him to pull her to her feet.
'I will do what I can,' he said. 'This is a temporary measure, but I have decided. There will be no more discussion.'
35
Despite living for twelve years as a slave to one of the most prominent men in Olossi, Keshad had never set foot inside the council hall. As a lad he had often waited outside in Fortune Square for half the day, slumbering in the heat with his master's umbrella tipped over him to keep off the sun, waiting for Master Feden to emerge so he could shade him on the walk back to the clan compound.
Situated at the city's highest point, Fortune Square offered a view over tile rooftops and the steep peaks of raftered halls, over narrow alleys and broad avenues, courtyard gardens and humbler courts where washing was hung out. The noise of construction rose out of the lower city, where buildings were rising in the gaps where the fire had eaten holes. The light was muted today, pearly beneath clouds. No one was carrying shade umbrellas.
A pair of militiamen stood guard at the door to the stone watch-tower with its open roof and fire cage. A line of supplicants, rain cloaks slung over their shoulders or draped over an arm, waited with varying degrees of patience in front of the council hall. Here a free man could bring a grievance, although no slave ever could. In Captain Anji's company, Kesh walked past the supplicants and up the steps. The soldiers took up positions on the porch as he followed the others inside. An entry chamber stretched the width of the hall. It was empty except for a clerk sitting at a low table among
a disorganized scatter of tablets and scrolls. Looking up, she spattered ink from her brush onto the table.
'Marshal! Captain. Verea.' She offered Kesh a puzzled nod, not sure how to place him, then bent to wiping up the stain. She was a bit older than he was, nicely curved but nothing special to look at even if the cursed reeve flirted with her.
'I'm glad to see you well, Jonit. You and your family survived the assault unscathed, I hope.' The grin flashed.
The woman blushed. 'I did, thanks to the Qin.' She smiled nervously at Captain Anji.
Mai smoothly interposed herself into the breach. 'Jonit! We've met once before, in the guest house of the Haf Gi Ri. Aren't you a dear friend of-' She hesitated, glancing at the men. '-Master Eliar's sister?'
Keshad knew that her name must never be spoken aloud. He still did not know it. He closed his eyes, and at once recalled her face, the subtle smile, the moist red lips, the searing gaze that had cut right through him until he could see nothing else.
'Keshad. This way.'
The captain's voice was as good as a yank on a chained man. Kesh stumbled up another rank of steps, looking over his shoulder at the chamber they were leaving behind. The central screen depicted a lovingly painted Ladytree beneath whose branches lay a pair of abandoned orange slippers. How appropriate! Every council hall ought to ornament its entry hall with the tale of the Silk Slippers, which featured much lying and conniving and brutality, even if the innocent girl did triumph in the end. They crossed under a stone archway that opened onto the council garden. Here council members might while away the heat of the afternoon before an evening council session. Here allies might plot among the troughs and terraces of flowering shrubs and ornamental trees ruthlessly pruned back. Here enemies might agree to agree as they undertook to stab a third party.
He knew what he had to do.
Their allies waited under an open pavilion. The three Silvers — two old and one young — turned toward the approaching company. With punctilious courtesy they greeted Mai, Anji, Marshal Joss, and Jonit. The resemblance between the young Silver man and his sister
–
was noticeable, the same straight brow and full lips, but the brother lacked the intangible boldness of spirit that animated the young woman. Eliar cast a look at Kesh as venomous as the snarl of an enraged lilu thwarted of her prey, so Kesh hung back on the steps, using one of the pavilion's pillars as a shield. The older men pointedly ignored him, but he knew who they were because they worked with Mai on various mercantile pursuits: Isar, and his elderly cousin Bethen, both with forearms entirely ringed with silver bracelets.
On the other side of the pavilion, across from the Silvers, a curtained palanquin rested across two benches. A youth dressed in vest and kilt bent to tie back the curtains, revealing the Hieros sitting on pillows within. The old bitch greeted Anji and Joss, acknowledged the Silvers with a polite gesture as cold as it was correct, nodded at Jonit to include her, and paused to look at Keshad and then deliberately away. The slight did not disturb him. Nothing disturbed him now, except the memory of her face.
Last, she examined Mai. 'Captain, is this your wife?'
Before the captain could reply, Mai stepped forward with a smile and a courtesy. 'You are the holy priestess, the Hieros, who presides at the Ushara temple outside of town. I give you greetings, holy one. I am Mai.'
'Prettily spoken,' said the Hieros. 'You have not come to the temple to worship.'
'No offense is intended, holy one. I pray at the altar of the Merciful One, who is not known in these lands.'
'Gone altogether beyond. An odd philosophy, if you ask me, but there is no accounting for the thinking of outlanders. There was an orange priest who lived for many years on the Kandaran Pass, begging for alms. He also dispensed healing and — so folk said — wise advice on the topic of household troubles. But he is gone now, to wherever his kind go after their spirit departs the world.'
'You have heard of the Merciful One!'
'Do not look so surprised, verea. It is my business to keep my eyes and ears open. That is why your husband and I must meet. To exchange information.'
'Of course, holy one.'
'There, now, Captain Anji. I have satisfied myself as to her beauty and her good manners. You are a fortunate man.'
He lifted both hands in a gesture of surrender to the inevitable.
'When I was a child, folk would talk about me as if I wasn't there,' said Mai in a sweet voice.
'And with a bite, too,' added the Hieros. 'You may come to visit me, verea, if you wish it.' She smiled, seeing the captain's expression transform from a pleased smile to a sharp frown. 'Come directly to me, I mean, without walking in Ushara's garden, Captain. I have no hidden motives. You outlanders have peculiar customs, binding to yourselves what is meant to be shared freely according to the will of each person. But in any case, I am merely interested in talking to a outlander woman who walked into these lands of her own free will. The few outlander women who come here, come as slaves. They are often ill used. While I accept that those with debts must sell their labor to survive, I agree with my Ri Amarah colleagues, even if they remain suspicious of our gods and of the Devourer in particular. Those who have no choice in the act of devouring are being abused, not honored. Indeed, I say so especially because it is my life's service to honor the path of the Merciless One, the All-Consuming Devourer.'
'I would like to visit you, holy one,' said Mai, the words so sincerely meant that it seemed she was oblivious to the undercurrents swirling through the pavilion.
'Best we discuss this at another time,' said Captain Anji, looking cursed grim.
The Silvers wore sour expressions, their trim little noses out of joint as if someone had suggested one of their hidden women dance naked at the festival.
With a burst of feeling as strong as being up to his neck in an outgoing tide, Keshad knew where he belonged: on the side of those who thought young women ought not to be locked up in their father's brother's house, or bound into years of unwanted servitude to the temple. Yet those who owned the chains would keep binding what they found useful, or desirable.
'I have something to say!' He leaped up the steps.
The captain set a hand to his sword's hilt, and the marshal gripped his baton. Eliar cocked a first, ready and
