Think I'd let them leave it behind in that garden?'
Hyacinth said, 'You followed when we carried him up here, didn't
you? I saw you watching us from the foot of the stairs, but I didn't
know you from a rat then.'
'I understand.' Silk nodded almost imperceptibly. 'His Eminence
left at once, I imagine. I had told him to find you if he could, Your
Cognizance. Did he?'
'No,' Quetzal said. With halting steps, he made his way to a red
velvet chair and sat, laying the baculus across his knees. 'Does it
matter, Patera Calde?'
'Probably not. I'm trying to straighten things out in my mind,
that's all.' Silk's forefinger traced pensive circles on his beard-rough
cheek. 'By this time, His Eminence may have reached
Maytera Mint--reached General Mint, I should say. It's possible
they have already begun to work out a truce. I hope so, it could
be helpful. Mucor reached her in any event; and when General
Mint heard Mucor's message, she attacked the Palatine hoping to
rescue me--I ought to have anticipated that. My mind wasn't as
clear as it should be last night, or I would never have told her
where I was.'
Hyacinth asked, 'Mucor? You mean Blood's abram girl? Was she
here?'
'In a sense.' Silk found that by staring steadfastly at the yellow
goblets and chocolate cellos that danced across the carpet, it was
possible to speak to Hyacinth without choking, and even to think in
a patchy fashion about what he said. 'I met her Phaesday night, and
I talked to her in the Glasshouse before you found me. I'll explain
about her later, though, if I may--it's appalling and rather complex.
The vital point is that she agreed to carry a message to General Mint
for me, and did it. Colonel Oosik's brigade was being held in reserve
when I spoke to him earlier; when the attack came, it must have
been brought up to strengthen the Palatine.'
Hyacinth nodded. 'That's what he told me before we woke you.
He said it was lucky for you because Councillor Loris ordered him
to send somebody to kill you, but he came himself instead and
brought you a doctor.'
'I operated on you yesterday, Calde,' the surgeon told Silk, 'but I
don't expect you to remember me. You were very nearly dead.' He
was horse-faced and balding; his eyes were rimmed with red, and
there were bloodstains on his rumpled green tunic.
'You can't have had much sleep, Doctor.'
'Four hours. I wouldn't have slept that much, if my hands hadn't
started to shake. We have over a thousand wounded.'
Hyacinth sat on the bed next to Silk. 'That's about what we got,
too--four hours, I mean. I must look a hag.'
He made the error of trying to verify it, and discovered that his
eyes refused to leave her face. 'You are the most beautiful woman in
the Whorl,' he said. Her hand found his, but she indicated Quetzal
by a slight tilting of her head.
Quetzal had been dozing--so it appeared--in the red chair; he
looked up as though she had pronounced his name. 'Have you a
mirror, my child? There must be a mirror in a suite like this.'
'There's a glass in the dressing room, Your Cognizance. It'll show
you your reflection if you ask.' Hyacinth nibbled at her full lower
lip. 'Only I ought to be in there getting dressed. Oosie will come
back in a minute, I think, with a speech for Patera and one of those
ear things.'
Quetzal rose laboriously with the help of his baculus, and Silk's
heart went out to him. How feeble he was! 'I've had four hours
sleep, Your Cognizance; Hyacinth less than that, I'm afraid, and the
doctor here about the same; but I don't believe Your Cognizance
can have slept at all.'
'People my age don't need much, Patera Calde, but I'd like a
mirror. I have a skin condition. You've been too well bred to
remark upon it, but I do. I carry paint and powder now like a
woman, and fix my face whenever I get the chance.'
'In the balneum, Your Cognizance.' Hyacinth rose, too. 'There's
a minor, and I'll dress while you're in there.'
Quetzal tottered away. Hyacinth paused with one hand on the
latch-bar, clearly posing but so lovely that Silk could have forgiven
her things far worse. 'You men think it takes women a long while to
get dressed, but it won't take me long this morning. Don't go
without me.'
'We won't,' Silk promised, and held his breath until the boudoir
door closed behind her.
'Bad thing,' Oreb muttered from a bedpost.
Xiphias displayed the silver-banded cane to Silk. 'Now I can show
you this, lad! Modest? Proper? Augur can't wear a sword, right?
But you can carry this! Had a stick first time you came, didn't you?'
'Bad thing!' Oreb dropped down upon Silk's shoulder.
'Yes, I had a walking stick then. It's gone now, I'm afraid. I broke it.'
'Won't break this! Watch!' Between Xiphias's hands, the cane's
head separated from its brown wooden shaft, exposing a straight,
slender, double-edged blade. 'Twist, and pull them apart! You try it!'
'I'd much rather put them back together.' Silk accepted the cane
from him; it seemed heavy for a walking stick, and somewhat light
for a sword. 'It's a bad thing, as Oreb says.'
'Nickel in that steel! Chrome, too! Truth! Could parry an azoth!
Believe that?'
Silk shuddered. 'I suppose so. I had an azoth once and couldn't
cut through a steel door with it.'
The azoth reminded him of Hyacinth's gold-plated needler;
hurriedly, he put his hand in his pocket. 'Here it is. I've got to return
this to her. I was.afraid that it would be gone, somehow, though I
can't imagine who might have taken it, except Hyacinth herself.' He
laid it on the peach-colored sheet.
'I gave your big one back, lad. Still got it?'
Silk shook his head, and Xiphias began to prowl around the
room, opening cabinets and examining shelves.
