She was no djeli, to see the threads I wove so easily. “No one could have been more shocked than I was,” I agreed politely. “How do you know he is so… potent?”
“I can divine cold magic in others.” My blank expression prodded her into an enigmatic smile. “Diviners like me seek out blooms of magic among people not born into the mage Houses. When we find them, we bring them into the House to strengthen our lineage. Have you any children yet?”
I blinked, not sure how to answer this without seeming acerbic. “Why do you ask?”
“It is not usual for a young man to be sent on his Grand Tour with a young wife accompanying him. I thought you perhaps had borne him children already and sought a child by another magister. But if you’ve as yet had no children with him, then there can be no reason for you to seek to be impregnated by any of our men. Perhaps you are of the Sapphic persuasion, in which case I can let you know which women of the House may be interested in your attentions.”
I stared at her in confusion, as bewildered as if she had started to speak in a foreign language.
Her brow wrinkled. “I beg your pardon. Some people have no interest in sexual liaisons, nor is there any reason they should. Perhaps you prefer to choose for him from among the women who seek a child? I assure you that we keep careful records so no near relatives inadvertently mate.”
“Choose for him? I don’t understand…” Then, of course, I did. My eyes must have gotten very round, and then very narrow. She took a step back. I reined in my temper, trying not to snap, for I sensed no hostility. If anything, she seemed puzzled. “Is this the way you greet every male visitor? By offering to let him impregnate the women of your House?”
“Yes. It is the custom among the mage Houses when the visitor is a powerful cold mage.” She studied me as if I had sprouted antlers: a surprising turn of events but not yet a threatening one.
“What do you mean by the Grand Tour?”
“You truly have no idea.” She folded her hands at her waist in the manner of a governess about to launch into the day’s lesson. “Exceptionally potent cold magic is vanishingly rare, despite how it seems to people outside the mage Houses. Promising young men are commonly sent all around Europa, visiting other mage Houses and offering their services to young widows and to married women who have already had several children out of their husbands. Many years ago some wit called it the Grand Tour, and the name stuck.”
“You send them around like you would breed livestock.”
“Not at all. No one is forced to the task. It is a sensible way to attempt to increase the number of cold mages born within the Houses.”
I remembered a thing Vai had told me on the night we had consummated our marriage. “Might women travel to a mage House where it is said a promising young cold mage resides? To see if they can get pregnant by him?”
She smiled with relief, at last assured my intelligence was not wanting. “Yes, that also happens, but only among those Houses who have both wealth and prestige enough to make such visits. Please excuse my plain speaking, since I comprehend I have surprised you. We are a small House, very isolated and not rich, a trifling country cousin compared to Four Moons House. We have struggled for over fifty years to survive here in the frozen north among savages. Our mansa is unseasonably young because we lost all of our experienced magisters in a cholera epidemic ten years ago. Our djeliw died as well. For us the arrival of a powerful cold mage is a precious opportunity to strengthen our lineage.”
I did not want to get us tossed out into the cold, and furthermore, she had a point. “My apologies if it seemed otherwise to you, but we are not here on a Grand Tour.”
She seemed more curious than annoyed. “Your ignorance of mage House customs and that blush in your cheeks suggest you are newly come to the marriage bed and that your husband pleases you, as well he might, for he is certainly handsome. I shall not press you further on this account. It would be an inauspicious time.”
Apparently without having taken offense, she changed the subject to practical matters. Not that cultivating a new generation of mages wasn’t, at root, a practical matter among people whose wealth and station depended on the presence of intimidating magic.
“Let me take you to the baths. We’ll launder your clothing and fit you with clean things. I can see the magister’s clothes need replacing. There are a number of good tailors’ shops here.”
A tailor’s shop called Queedle & Clutch. Towers surmounted by gilded eggs. A cat waiting in the shadows. Bee had drawn these things! As the memory struck, I gasped out loud.
“Maestra, are you well?”
Palm pressed to my chest, I smiled, made tremulous by hope. “I hope and pray we might stay here a few days to rest,” I said, a little hoarsely. “It has been a long and difficult journey.”
“Of course. Come along. The women are eager to welcome you. We have turnip stew.”
Having become accustomed to the free and easy manners in Expedition, I had to remind myself that I once would have found it unexceptional for men and women to dine in separate chambers. Anyway, I was grateful for the friendly greeting I received in the women’s hall. The young women plied me with so many questions about Vai that I prudently entertained them instead with tales of Expedition and the Taino kingdom. They demanded to know if it was true that a woman had ruled the Taino kingdom, and that the new Expedition Assembly would include women as assemblymen, with the right to speak and vote just like the men.
“Of course it’s true. No troll clutch in the city of Expedition would support the Assembly if females did not have the same rights as males. Do you not speak to the trolls who live here? As we came into town I saw trolls and airships. Where did they come from? Does your mage House support their presence here?”
“Of course,” said Vinda. “Our House and the
“Truly? I had always understood that the technology of combustion is anathema to cold magic. Why, you are quite at the forefront of the tide of change!”
They were shocked their tedious backwater could be seen as a place where interesting things were happening. Twelve years ago the first trolls had arrived from North Amerike. They had petitioned at the ghana’s court—
“What do they mine?” I asked.
Vinda said, “Iron and silver. The early settlers fifty years ago got rich on silver, but the trolls brought in more efficient methods. They’re building manufactories. They pay wages by the day.”
“Yes, but you have to live in one of their settlements,” objected a girl. “Who wants to live out there in the wild where they might eat you if they felt like it?”
“Have you heard rumors of trolls eating their employees?” I asked.
“No,” said the girl, her cheeks flushed with excitement, “but we hear bloody tales of trolls gone out to survey the land who get into violent altercations with local tribesmen. The tribespeople are angry that foreigners are disrupting their hunting and trapping. Are you well acquainted with trolls?”
“I have been adopted into one of their clutches.” It was remarkably gratifying to see how they quieted, quivering with anticipation.
Really, I could have talked all night, but I wanted to tell Vai about Bee’s dream. At last I retreated to the guest suite to discover Vai not there. Gracious Melqart! How late did the men intend to celebrate? Had he let down his guard too easily? Had we fallen into a trap?
Knowing White Bow House had lost all its djeliw made me bold. I drew the shadows around me and went in search of the men’s courtyard, even though I knew I ought not to venture there. The corridors lay empty. Elsewhere in the compound, children were being sung into their sleep, the youths were reciting their lessons before bed, and an old man was snoring. Drums tapped a festive rhythm. The scent of liquor spilled through the air as the seal of friendship. Like a hunter I followed its trail.
An open door admitted me into the mansa’s formal audience chamber with a carved stool and several cushions. Past another door I entered a formal dining chamber with a table and about thirty chairs, all undisturbed. Past that lay an informal receiving chamber. Here the remains of a generous supper littered the low tables, cushions all awry. Beyond glass-paned doors lay an inner courtyard lit by cold fire. Snow glittered on the shrubs and trimmed hedges.
Four drummers laid down a rhythm. Every dance has a story, every rhythm a meaning, through which it converses with the pulsing heart of the world. Like the other men, Vai had stripped off his winter coat and his dash
