'Neh. He did not tell me. He could not, considering the first cloak he killed was my beloved Uncle Hari, who trusted him only because I had assured him that Anji could be trusted.'
'We tracked the commander's movements eventually to Merciful Valley, but it's under heavy guard.'
T told you not to rush in,' observed Marit with a tone of amused if critical intimacy that made Zubaidit wince and Mai suddenly wonder if Joss and Marit were lovers. Surely this could not be the very murdered reeve his heart had pined for all those years?
'It is,' said Joss wryly, and Mai jerked her gaze away, realizing she had been staring at him.
He's tethered to one post, Anji had said scornfully when they had first heard the tale from Joss. Hu! And look how things had turned out for Anji, riding all the way across the Hundred to try to get her back.
Maybe the breeze shifted. Maybe the singing changed cadence, or one of the budding night candles opened to release its heart-easing scent. The night was still dark, but her mood unaccountably lightened. She had a life yet before her, and with the grace of the Merciful One it might be a long life. There were a hells lot of things you could do with a long life.
'Yes,' she agreed. 'It would make sense that Merciful Valley is heavily guarded. There are five chains hammered into stone just beneath the rim of the pool, under water. At the end of each chain, in the depths of the pool, lies a small jeweler's chest, wrapped in chains. It's easier to throw them in than to drag them out. During the season when the firelings are birthing, or if the ancient ones are wakened, the water burns you. But the rest of the time, it's just water.
'I admit, I love my silks, and such clasps and hairpins and other ornaments that go with them. When I was stabbed, no one thought to clean out my garments and such trivialities as I had brought with me to the valley. My things were just shoved into a cupboard and forgotten, as some of my clothes chests were forgotten in the compound in Astafero. So it was possible for me, with Miravia's help, to drag five small chests up from the deeps and hide them in one large chest, and toss five objects down into the depths in their place.
'I asked myself, if Anji truly wanted to rid the Hundred of the Guardians, why riot throw the chests into the pool without a chain? Why not sail them out onto the ocean and dump them overboard weighted with rocks so no one could ever hope to retrieve them? Because he would never take the chance that they might not serve him as weapons later. Yes, I know where the cloaks are. They're right here, in my house.'
A burst of laughter rose from the porch, and there was whooping and stomping in appreciation of some doubtless crude jest. But in the garden, it was silent.
Finally, Joss whistled softly.
'And an outlander will save them,' he said with a smile so charming and bright and handsome she was glad he was too old for her because she might otherwise have been tempted.
'Zubaidit,' she said softly, 'come with me?'
They went inside to the dark house. Mai paused, after she'd slipped off her sandals, to light a lamp with which she illuminated their progress down a corridor to her private rooms.
'Are you crying, Zubaidit?' she asked as she slid the door aside. Priya was sitting comfortably beside the baby's cot in the darkness, and she nodded but did not leave the baby as the two women quietly walked past her and into a narrow storeroom with closed cupboards and shelves stacked with bolts of silk.
'A little.' Swallowed tears made Zubaidit's voice hoarse. 'It was cursed good sex, I have to tell you, not that you really want to
know, and it hurts to know that was the one and only time. He's a holy Guardian now. You can see he loves her. But I swore my oath to the goddess years ago. I know my path.'
'Well,' said Mai, 'I'm sorry. Or not sorry. However you wish it.' She kissed the other woman's cheek before turning to the second cupboard and opening it.
She had hidden the chests in plain sight, stacked among her other chests and fripperies. Easy to pull out, they had so little weight she could stack three in Zubaidit's arms and easily carry the other two. Such a small thing, to mean so much.
Peddonon and Joss were deep into a serious conversation, heads down, not touching but standing close together as Peddonon sounded irritated and Joss regretful, when Mai and Zubaidit returned. The men broke off as the women set the chests down on the ground. Mai went into the garden shed and returned with a wedge and a big hammer, which she handed to Peddonon.
He bit his lip. Then, with a set of neat blows, he shattered the locks. They watched her unwrap the chains and, one by one, open the chests.
Uncle Hari's cloak was first. She hadn't meant it that way, but it seemed appropriate. There was something unsettling in the way they slithered and twisted out of their cages, and yet their flare and flash caught at her heart like banners rumbling in a bright joyful wind. Twilight-sky; blood-red; earth-brown; seedling-green. Last rose night, sewn with stars fallen deep within a cradle of black, its corner brushing her hand with a shiver of memory. It's the ones who can't let go — of fear or anger, lust or greed, vanity or pride or power — who are most at risk of becoming corrupted.
Then they were gone, vanished into the darkness.
On their wings the Guardians took their leave. They were no longer truly part of that world where fussy babies slumber restlessly, and reeves sing bawdy tales on the porch, and a young woman contemplates her future, which after all looks like a series of gates, one after the next and no two alike. Hard to say what lies beyond each threshold.
We must be ready for anything.
