'Lord. I wonder what she thinks of, sitting there. Silent in any case. I'm going to be respectful, which is what this boy needs, I think. In order to be able to allow himself to hear what I'm saying.'
'You're never respectful to Bakhtiian.'
'Gods, if I was as respectful to Ilya as the rest of you are, he'd become insufferable. Shall we?' She walked forward around the outskirts of the camp and halted at the farthest fringe of awning. Aleksi followed two paces behind her.
Tess stood there, patient, until Syrannus rose and approached her. If Jiroannes was aware that she was there, he showed no sign of it. He kept reading.
'I thank you for recognizing me,' said Tess to Syrannus, in Rhuian. 'I ask for permission for myself and my companion to enter, and to speak with His Eminence.' The final words, Jiroannes's title, she spoke in Vidyan, and that did make Jiroannes glance up in surprise. He lowered his gaze as swiftly, still pretending to ignore her, but the line of his mouth tightened.
'Please.' Syrannus gestured for her to step onto the carpet. 'If you will wait.'
The old man looked nervous, and when he turned to hurry over to his master's chair, he wiped his hands on his black sash as if he were wiping sweat from his palms. The two men spoke together. Jiroannes handed Syrannus the parchment and the servant rolled it up carefully and called a second guardsman over to take it away. The first guardsman shifted position, angling the lantern light to include a patch of ground before the chair.
Syrannus hurried back to Tess and gestured her forward. She crossed the outer carpet and inclined her head respectfully to Jiroannes. 'May the Great King live many years, and his affairs prosper, and your fortunes follow his,' she said, still in Vidyan.
Jiroannes hesitated. From what little Tess knew of Vidyan, she had now put him in a position from which he had either to greet her respectfully in return or else insult her deliberately.
At last, he spoke. 'May your name dwell a thousand years in the heart of the Great King.' He did not stand. Neither did she kneel. After a moment, he signed to Syrannus, and the old man brought a stool.
Tess sat. It was parity, of a sort. 'I hope, your eminence, that you will forgive my speaking in Rhuian, since I do not speak your language well enough to converse in it.'
'Where did you learn it? Surely you have not visited the Great King's lands?'
'No, to my sorrow I have not. But I always seek to learn new languages.'
'Ah.' He appeared satisfied that some piece of a puzzle known only to himself had just fallen into place. 'You are an interpreter.'
Tess suppressed her grin. 'Yes,' she agreed, realizing just then the best tack to take with him. 'But I am also a khaja-a foreigner-traveling with the jaran. In this, you and I are alike. Originally, I came from Jeds.'
Now he looked interested. 'Jeds is a great city. The Great King has exchanged royal gifts with his cousin the prince of Jeds, and we have sent envoys there in the past. Indeed, a Jedan merchant admitted to the palace school taught me and the other young nobles Rhuian, since the Great King deemed it an important language to learn for those of us aspiring to become envoys and ambassadors.'
'Perhaps, your eminence, you will kindly allow me to tell you a few things I have learned in my years with the jaran. I have every hope that your mission will succeed. Certainly I hope to avoid war between Bakhtiian and your Great King.'
He prickled, definitely, but he did not dismiss her. 'How did you come to be with the jaran?' he asked at last. 'Are you a slave?'
For an instant, Tess allowed herself the pleasure of imagining how Nadine would react to such a remark, directed at any jaran woman. But then, Nadine would never make a good ambassador. 'Your eminence, I am married to Bakhtiian.'
He blinked. In the cast of light from the lantern, his narrow face bore an almost demonic look, framed by the white cloth bound around his head and his pointed black beard.
But Jiroannes came from a polygamous culture. She could be any junior wife, of marginal importance, except perhaps that she was khaja and an interpreter.
'I beg your pardon, your eminence,' Tess added. 'I did not make myself clear. I am Bakhtiian's only wife. I am also the sister of the prince of Jeds.'
There was silence; a long silence, as the poor boy absorbed the full meaning of her simple declaration. 'Your grace,' said Jiroannes at last, reluctantly but with a kind of fascinated horror. He stood up.
'Please, your eminence. Do sit down.' He sat. She considered his chastened face. Doubtless the knowledge that the Jedan prince had already deemed Bakhtiian and his jaran hordes dangerous enough to offer a marriage alliance to them made a formidable impact on the Vidiyan ambassador. Not to mention insulting her by calling her a slave. Lord, he really was quite young, and probably as spoiled and self-absorbed and isolated a young noble as she herself had been, growing up as the only sibling of the great hero of humanity, Charles Soerensen.
'Your grace, I beg pardon for any rudeness you may have received on my behalf.'
'' You are forgiven.''
'Certainly I would be honored to listen to your wisdom concerning these jaran barbarians.'
How quickly they came to an accord, civilized cousins thrown in with the savages. Tess allowed herself a smile, and then she began, gently but firmly, to make him begin to understand how different things were with the jaran.
The slave-girl still knelt behind Jiroannes's chair. Could the girl understand Rhuian? She did not move. She might have been carved from stone, so still was she. Tess realized that she wasn't particularly angry with Jiroannes for keeping a slave. Disgusted. Resigned, knowing that the institution could not be erased with a wave of her hand. One had to work slowly. That's what Charles would say. She winced internally. Who was acting like Charles now?
At last she took her leave. Jiroannes rose and bowed to her, then escorted her personally to the edge of the carpet. She walked out onto the grass with Aleksi and just stood there, breathing in the air. The wind brushed her hair. Stars filled the night sky, brilliant with promise. Over by Nadine's tent, the fire pit had long since smoldered into coals. On a far rise, an edge of darkness against the darker sky, the tiny figure of a scout blotted out stars. Horses stood scattered beyond the camp, some staked, some hobbled. A few tents had been set up, but most of the men slept on the ground, dark lumps wrapped in blankets.
'I love the plains,' said Tess in a low voice, letting the sky and the sweep of ground envelop her. 'It's so open here.'
'Look there.'
Tess followed the line of Aleksi's gaze to see a man pause beside Nadine's tent and then duck inside. 'Grekov, again? He's in love with her. She'll never have him, though.'
'But women have no choice in marriage,' Aleksi objected.
'Jaran women don't, it's true. But Nadine is no longer truly jaran. Jeds marked her too well.' Tess's gaze flicked over the Vidiyan encampment and halted on the slender form of the ambassador, watching-what? But it was clear enough what he was watching. He, too, stared at Nadine Orzhekov's tent. A moment later his slave-girl approached him and knelt at his feet. He retreated inside his own tent. She followed.
'Sonia's not going to like this,' Tess said, to no one in particular, to the stars, perhaps. And why should Sonia like it? That she would not was one of the reasons that Tess could love her so well.
'Aren't you going to sleep?' asked Aleksi.
She shook her head. 'I can't sleep. I think I'll walk for a while.'
'I'll walk with you, then.'
And Tess was glad of his company.
The night wind came up, swelling and ebbing around them, sighing through the grass in waves. Above, stars shone. Men slept below. The deep silence that lay here was otherwise complete and, in its immensity, liberating.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
The first day, Yomi told the actors to stay within their little enclave of tents and on no account to venture out
