“I’ve barely ridden her except to get back and forth between the palace and home,” Ilsa admitted, feeling a twinge of guilt. Her teamster father, were he alive, would have given her one of those looks.
“You can have the diwan of stables exercise her for you,” Atisheh said.
“I can?” She was not used to the level of service Red Fort provided even temporary visitors to the palace. None of the Mission members were. Perhaps if one of them had been nobility in Europe, they might have been. But none of them had been remotely of that class, so they tended not to think that they should be waited on hand and foot.
“Indeed. They should have offered, really, but someone was obviously being lazy or…”
Ilsa mounted. “Or what?”
“Just a passing thought,” Atisheh said with a shrug of armored shoulders, setting her horse in motion without apparent command.
The soldiers parted for her as meat from a cleaver.
Flower was not so well trained nor her rider so confident, and required Ilsa to put heels to her flanks before she would advance into the milling mass of men. Even then, the mare tried to follow in Atisheh’s wake rather than carve her own path through the men.
“I would know your thoughts,” Ilsa said as they rode into the shade of the gatehouse.
“Are you certain? It’s really not that important.”
“Not important, but you do not wish to tell me? These things, as my husband might say, ‘does not compute.’”
“You mean like a mathematician?” Atisheh said as they exited the gatehouse into the heat of the afternoon sunlight.
Ilsa squinted. “John says it’s a line from a show, supposedly said by a very complex machine that does computations.”
“A machine?”
“You’ll have to ask John. I never watched the show, so I don’t know the details well enough to explain.”
“Perhaps I will,” Atisheh said, spurring her horse to a canter as they cleared the traffic lined up to enter the fortress.
Flower, given her head, gamely set out to catch the bigger gelding. After a few furlongs she began blowing hard and Ilsa reined her in.
Atisheh, instead of immediately reining in to a matching pace, rode a wide circle before returning to the road and Ilsa’s side. Watching the warrior woman ride, Ilsa realized Atisheh hadn’t answered the question she’d posed.
“Fine day for a ride if it were not so hot,” Atisheh said.
“And for avoiding answering questions?” Ilsa said it lightly, not wanting to alienate the big warrior woman.
Atisheh grunted, then shrugged. “I merely wanted to be sure you were…certain you wanted to know.”
“I am.”
“There are those at court who resent you and the rest of your companions for your rapid rise to the pinnacle of power. Some of those resentful fools play the usual petty games, cutting at you with minor inconveniences, such as refusing to offer proper care for your mounts and circulating foul rumors behind your back.”
“You’ve heard such rumors about us?”
“No, not me. But then I am known to be an ally to you and yours, not to mention to Jahanara Begum, so I would not be a likely target for those looking for ears to pour such poison into.”
“But you know such rumors circulate?” Ilsa asked, hating how veils, even chain mail ones, made it so hard to read expressions.
“They always do. Do not take it personally.”
“I don’t. Just interested to confirm it’s been going on.”
They rode in silence for a little while, then Ilsa twitched the reins as an alarming thought occurred. Flower tossed her head in irritation.
“We aren’t a liability for Begum Sahib, are we?”
Atisheh looked across at her. “No, not at all.”
“Good,” Ilsa said. Even as she said it something pricked at her mind. Something in the other woman’s tone that was less than reassuring.
“How goes recruitment?” Ilsa asked, more to give herself time to think than out of any real interest.
“More slowly than I would prefer.” Atisheh’s immediate answer told Ilsa the issue had been weighing heavily on the warrior woman’s mind. “My tribe is not as large as it was in my youth, so my kinsmen have taken to recruiting from among clans that are not counted among the friends of my own kin.”
“Things are that desperate?”
“Desperate, no.” Atisheh said, then sniffed. “But even in my tribe, women like me are not common.”
“No, I don’t think anyone could ever call you common,” Ilsa said, laughing at the thought. “God broke the mold when He made you.”
“You should have known my aunt. I am but a rough-hewn imitation.” Atisheh’s voice was thick with emotion, surprising Ilsa.
“She must have been a most formidable woman,” Ilsa said quietly.
“She taught me everything I know about riding and fighting.”
“Not your father?”
Atisheh sniffed derisively. She was silent a moment, then said harshly, “When he was not drunk, my father was, at best, a passable swordsman, though he did know a thing or two about horseflesh and riding.”
“My father taught me a great deal about horses, too,” Ilsa said, hoping to navigate the sudden angry turn the conversation seemed to have taken.
“Oh, he didn’t teach me anything. The only and best thing he did for me was sell my services, and that only because he was paid handsomely by the recruiter.”
“How long ago was that?”
“Fifteen—no, seventeen years ago now.”
“That would have made you, what, ten?”
Atisheh snorted. “I was fully sixteen. Old enough my father despaired of finding me a husband…”
“And here I thought you only in your twenties.”
“When I was younger, I’d hoped a facial scar or two might make me look less a child, but none of the men I’ve fought with live steel have landed blows on my face. But then, I am here to complain of it and they are not.”
Ilsa’s smile made her glad of the veil, for once. “I know we were all so grateful for the skill at arms you and your sisters showed that day. I don’t know if I, personally, expressed my gratitude for your her—”
“Please, I only did my duty. And by one measure, failed,
