We were taught crafty things, calligraphy and flower arranging; costume design and stitchery—we needed to be able to supervise the making of all the clothes needed in a Demesne, including all the Game costumes involved—and then how to walk and sit in the costumes we had designed. And conversation. Hours and hours of conversation. We spent ages learning to make graceful compliments, and I was reminded of Cat Candleshy drilling me before my talk with Joramal.
We learned precedence and protocol, who would walk first in procession, who would sit by whom at dinner. We learned the Index. We learned a lot of cartography, the names and locations of Demesnes, which ones were allied with which and which should be avoided. (At all costs stay away from the Dukedom of Betand, the High Demesne, and a new Demesne northeast of Betand ruled by the Witch Huldra.) We learned a good bit about contracts, since most of us would be contracted for in one way or another.
There was a class called The Way of Prudence, which I assumed to be something literary (we were encouraged to read books, since it kept us out of trouble) but found to be the study of all the various ways one might duck for cover. Things like determining whether a dangerous level of tension existed and getting oneself out of it—excusing oneself to go to the privy, for example. And how to appear so stupid and generally inadequate that enemies would pay no attention to one. And how to set up a ransom fund for oneself as part of a contract, just in case prudence didn’t work. Part of this class was dedicated to things like stopping bleeding or fixing broken bones temporarily until a Healer could be found.
And, surprisingly, we had a class in babies. I hadn’t thought of such a thing at all until I came to Vorbold’s House, but it made as much sense as many of the other things we learned. Queen Vorbold got the babies from the town around. I very quickly adopted one for myself whom no one else wanted. He reminded me of Grompozzle in a way—that same sad-animal look to his eyes. I think his own mama whapped him entirely too much for his good, but we got along quite well. It was expected we would all have babies as part of whatever alliance we had, so we were taught some few useful things about that—including an absolute prohibition against using midwives. Midwives can see into the future of the babies they deliver, and those who will not get a soul, they do not allow to live. The great Demesnes do not care much for souls; they care more for power. I marked that down to ask Murzy about. If I had a child who would never have a soul, I think I’d not want it to go on living, contract or no contract. I determined to use a midwife if the need arose, prohibition or not.
None of it was very ... well, intellectually challenging. I wanted to know about the dangerous new alliances, and who Huldra was, and what we might choose to do if we didn’t make an alliance for ourselves. I was politely hushed and told none of that was relevant to my future. It was no wonder the girls occupied themselves with silliness. There was certainly nothing very serious for them to talk about. None of it was the kind of thing the dams were teaching me. That had reach to it. Even the easiest kinds of magic have oddly curled edges to them, places where the understanding goes away into some other dimension and one has to intuit meaning and draw similarities from complexity. This is called simply “connecting”, and it is anything but simple.
Some of the girls, whatever they may have heard about my arrival, offered me politeness, which I respected. None offered friendship, which I understood. Most of these girls had been in school since they were four or five. They had no experience of the world at all. Their ideas of reality were oddly at variance with the world I knew, sometimes more romantic and notional, other times more brutal. All their opinions were formed by others, not by themselves, and so they suspended their attitudes toward me, waiting for someone to tell them whether I should be accepted or not. None of them decided for themselves. They were in Xammer to remove them from the Game until some good alliance could be made, and each of them would take her own positions eventually through some Gamesman or other. So, all their intelligence was bent on capturing or holding the interest of a major Gamesman, and the talk of the powers of this one or the Talents of that one and the wealth of some other one occupied all their time and attention. Some of them had Talents of their own, which they were forbidden to use in Xammer and discouraged from making much of wherever they might be, for most Gamesmen would value them as subject allies or breeders but would reject them as Gameswomen. Still, many of them had Talents. I had none. It did not make me feel any more secure.
I didn’t realize all this at once or even very soon after arriving. Much of it I did not put together until much later when I was older. It was all strange, this place, and I knew nothing at all. I was gauche. I broke the custom every time I opened my mouth or took a step. I asked “why” in class instead of “who”. I said things were “interesting” rather than “potent”. (That was a favorite word at Vorbold’s House that year, “potent”.) I ate because I was hungry, whether or not the foods being served were in fashion. I refused a taste of a dream crystal that
