Reyn's family had provided it, as they did the room where she slept and the food she ate and the clothes she wore. Her family had come away from Bingtown with nothing. Nothing. They had lived on charity since they arrived here.
'Let me,' Reyn begged. He took the brush from her hand. She stared out the window as he drew it gently through her hair. 'It's so thick. Like strands of heavy silk, and so black. How do you manage it? My mother always complained of my hair when I was a boy, yet I think long straight hair would be harder to manage than curls.'
'You have curly hair?' Malta asked him idly.
'Like fraying knots, my older sister tells me. When Tillamon had to comb it for me when I was little, I swear she ripped out as much as she left on my head.'
She turned to him abruptly. 'Let me see you.'
He went down suddenly on one knee before her, hairbrush in hand. 'Malta Vestrit, will you marry me?'
It shocked her. 'Do I have a choice?' she demanded.
'Of course.' He didn't move from where he knelt.
She took a breath. 'I can't, Reyn. Not yet.'
He stood easily. Taking her by the shoulders, he turned her away from him. He drew the brush smoothly through her hair again. If she had hurt him, it didn't sound in his voice. 'Then you can't see my face.'
'Is that a Rain Wild custom?'
'No. It's Reyn Khuprus' custom regarding Malta Vestrit. You can see me when you say you'll marry me.'
'That's ridiculous,' she protested.
'No. It's crazy. Just ask my mother or my brother. They'll tell you I'm crazy.'
'Too late. That was more news my little brother brought me. Reyn Khuprus is crazy from spending too much time in the city. You drowned in memories.'
She had spoken the words lightly, as a jest. It shocked her when he dropped the hairbrush and stood stock-still. After a moment, he asked in hushed horror, 'Do they really say that of me?'
'Reyn, I jested.' She turned to face him, but he walked swiftly away from her to stare out the window.
'Drowned in memories. You can't have made that up, Malta Vestrit. It's a Rain Wild phrase. They do say that of me, don't they?'
'One little boy speaking to another… you know how children tell tales to impress one another, how they exaggerate-'
'How they repeat what they've heard their elders say,' he finished dully.
'I thought it was just a… Is it truly that serious? To drown in memories?'
'Yes,' he said dully. 'Yes it is. When you become dangerous, they generally give you a very gentle poison. You die in your sleep. If you are still able to sleep. Sometimes, I can still sleep. Not often, and not for long, but it makes true sleep all the sweeter.'
'The dragon,' Malta confirmed softly.
He started as if stabbed and turned to stare at her.
'From our dream,' she went on softly. How long ago that seemed.
'She threatened she would go after you, but I thought it was an idle boast.' He sounded ill.
'She-' Malta started to tell how the dragon had tormented her. Then she stopped. 'She hasn't bothered me since I was hurt. She's gone.'
He was silent for a time. 'I suppose when you were unconscious, she lost her link with you.'
'Can that happen?'
'I don't know. I know very little about her. Except that no one else believes in her. They all think I'm crazy.' He laughed tremulously.
She held out her hand. 'Come. Let's walk. You promised me once to show me your city.'
He shook his head slowly. 'I'm not supposed to go there anymore. Not unless my brother or mother deems it necessary. I promised.' There was deep loss in his voice.
'Why? Whatever for?'
He choked on a small laugh. 'For you, my dear. I bargained away my city for you. They promised that if I stayed away from it, save by their leave, that if I surrendered all hope of ever freeing the dragon, they would forgive the liveship debt, and give me a man's allowance to spend as I wanted, and allow me to visit you whenever I wished.'
If she had not shared dreams with him, she would not have understood what he had given up for her. But she did know. The city was his heart. Plumbing its secrets, walking its whispering streets, coaxing its mysteries to unfold for him was his essence. He had given up the core of his being, for her.
He continued quietly. 'So, you see. The contract is already settled.
You don't have to marry me to discharge it.' His gloved hands tangled desperately against each other.
'And the dragon?' Malta asked breathlessly.
'She hates me now. I suppose that if she can drown me in her memories, she will. She tries to get me to come to her. But I resist.'
'How?'
He sighed. With a twinge of humor, he confessed, 'When it gets really bad, I get so drunk I can't even crawl. Then I pass out.'
'Oh, Reyn.' She shook her head in sympathy. And she has him to herself then, Malta conjectured. To torment as she wishes, in her world, with no escape for him. She took a breath. 'What if I married you as part of the contract? If I said I preferred to pay it off that way, rather than have your family forgive it? Would that free you from your bargain?'
He shook his head slowly. 'It wouldn't release me from my contract.' He cocked his head at her. 'Would you really do that?'
She didn't know. She could not decide. He had made such a terrible bargain, just to be with her. But she could still not say, easily, that she wished to marry him. She knew so little about him. How could he have doubted her, and yet still have given his city up for her? It made no sense. Men were not at all what she had believed they were.
She held out her hand to him. 'Take me for a walk.' Without a word, he took her hand. He led her out of the small chamber, to take her strolling on the walkway that spiraled up the trunk of the immense tree. She held his hand and did not look down nor back.
'I FAIL TO SEE WHAT GOOD IT DOES FOR US TO KEEP HIM. IT LOOKS LIKE we've kidnapped him.' The lean Rain Wild Trader flung himself irritably back in his chair.
'Trader Polsk, you are thick-witted. The advantage is obvious. If we have the Satrap, he himself can speak out for us. He can say he was not kidnapped, but rescued by us from the New Traders' assassination plot.' Trader Freye, the woman who criticized Trader Polsk so roughly, sat next to him. Keffria decided they were either friends, or related.
'Have we completely convinced him that that is the truth of the matter? The last time I heard him speak, he seemed to feel he had been snatched from an affable host and spirited away. He didn't use the word kidnapped, but I don't think it was far from his tongue,' Trader Polsk replied.
'We should put him in different chambers. He cannot help but feel a prisoner, held in such a place.' This from Trader Kewin. His veil was sewn so thickly with pearls that it rattled when he spoke.
'He is safest where he is. We all agreed to that hours ago. Please, Traders, let us not re-tread ground we have already packed into bricks. We need to move past why we hold him or where we hold him to what we plan to do with him.' Jani Khuprus sounded both weary and annoyed. Keffria sympathized.
There were moments when Keffria looked around herself and wondered where her life had gone. Here she was, sitting in a large chair at an imposing table, flanked by the most powerful Traders of the Rain Wild folk. The plans they discussed amounted to treason against the Jamaillian Satrapy. Yet, what surrounded her was not as strange as what was missing. Everything. Husband, son, mother, wealth and home had all vanished from her life.
