Carnelian tried to smooth the frown from his face by smiling.
The man crouched and began to unpack the box onto the rug. Carnelian watched his short brown fingers with increasing irritation. He waited until the man had stood up with a pad, looking at Carnelian's skin as if it were some tower wall he had to whitewash.
'How're the lads?' Carnelian said.
The man stared at him.
Carnelian nodded, sculling his hand, trying to scoop some words out of the man's mouth.
'Master?' the man said, as yellow as a corpse.
The tyadra, the guardsmen, you know, the people outside with the weapons?'
They're… doing their job, Master.'
Carnelian was afraid that if he pushed for more the man might vomit. 'I see,' he said, and tried to stand perfectly still as the pad crossed the distance between them. It settled on his skin like a butterfly. Carnelian fought a grimace as the pad tickled lightly over his skin. Though he tried to suppress it, at last the laughter came like a gale.
The man stepped back gaping.
Carnelian struck himself repeatedly in the chest to quell the laughter. He pointed at the man. 'Gods' fiery blood, man, what… are
… you doing?' The man's knees struck the ground with a crack that made Carnelian wince, and then he hunched forward in a clumsy prostration. Carnelian stared, shaking his head. 'Get out. Come on, leave me. I'll clean myself.'
The man began to shuffle backwards.
'Stand up, and get out,' said Carnelian, not managing to keep the anger from his voice.
He watched the man leave, the door close, then sat heavily on the bed still staring at the door, shaking his head. He felt like crying or smashing furniture. They would all have to change. 'I couldn't bear it if they didn't,' he muttered. He imagined himself in Coomb Suth surrounded by fawning slaves. The chameleons on their faces seemed counterfeit. He nodded. His own people would bring change. He felt himself lighting up as he thought of them. Ebeny, Keal, Brin. 'Even Grane,' he sighed. At that moment he would have given anything for one of his scoldings. Tain.
Tain would soon be through the quarantine. The light dimmed. The first image of his brother that had come into his mind was of a vague face with blood running down it like lank hair.
'No,' he cried, stood up and walked about. There was no point in thinking about that yet. Time would come soon enough to count the cost. For now, he would allow himself to believe that his people would bring something of the warmth of the Hold back into his life.
The arrival of the Quenthas was announced to give him time to put his mask on. The syblings walked into the chamber and knelt. He strode over to them, pulled them up, easily managing to span both their shoulders. 'I cannot tell you how happy I am to see you.' He stood back to look at them. Left-Quentha had her head bowed but Right-Quentha was grinning at him all bright-eyed. He gave them both a bow. 'What brings my Ladies to this humble prison?'
Left-Quentha raised her stone eyes. 'Prison, Seraph?'
The Regent has sent us to amuse you,' her sister said.
'He did?' Carnelian frowned.
Right-Quentha shook her head. 'Oh, not like that, Seraph.' Then she smiled coyly. Though…?'
Her sister turned to her, frowning, then back to him. 'We have some skill with instruments, we sing and play a fair game of Three.'
Carnelian noticed the sword hilts appearing above their shoulders. He pointed at them. 'And can protect me?'
That also, Seraph,' they said together. 'I will allow you to stay on one condition.' Left-Quentha angled her head back, a little anxious.
'And what is that, Seraph?' That you call me Carnelian.'
For several days the sybling sisters strove to amuse him. They produced an instrument that had many strings, and frets and a gilded gourd at either end, and squatted with it on the floor. Their outer legs would have been called crossed if they had not been so far apart. Their middle leg folded under them. The instrument sat across their thighs. Two arms were under the neck, two over the strings. Their long fingers plucked and strummed all at once, coaxing cascades of sound, arpeggios, complex percussion. Sometimes they interwove their voices into the melodies, singing harmoniously, one voice sometimes chasing, sometimes shadowing the other. They could also play reed flutes made from hollowed saurian bones. As one blew a continuous drone, the other would waft over it rich, heart-rending melodies.
Carnelian became addicted to the strange game they called Three. It was played on a circular board with a black centre within two concentric bands of red and green. The three sets of pieces each took one of the colours. The sisters always chose the jade and the obsidian sets, smiling conspiratorially, saying the colours of the House of the Masks were naturally theirs. He acquiesced. After all, the red pieces were made of his name stone. He assumed they would ally against him, but instead he was ignored as they fought each other to destruction. He became tired of winning. Losing his temper, he insisted that they fight the game fairly and try to defeat him. They shrugged, grinned, and in the games that followed overwhelmed him. He rejected their offer that they should begin the game with fewer pieces. Slowly, he began to learn strategy from his defeats. The games became tortuous, subtle, merciless wars in which his red pieces began more and more to triumph.
Often, as they played, he would try to talk to the Quenthas about the election, the candidates, their factions. They met his questions with elegant deflections. They grew positively sullen if he ever strayed close to mentioning Ykoriana.
'No more music,' said Carnelian, adding quickly, 'though you play like the rain.'
Left-Quentha reached for the Three board.
'Not that either.' He stood up, stretched, groaned. 'My body aches from inactivity.' He frowned, locked his hands together and tried to tug them apart. 'I know,' he said brightly, looking at the syblings. Right-Quentha was wearing her green copper mask. At his insistence, she and Carnelian took turns at being masked. 'You girls can give me a tour of these Halls of Thunder.'
They both made evasive gestures with their hands. 'We would have to put you in your court robe, Carnelian,' said Left-Quentha. She glanced at it, an intruder gleaming in the comer.
'You might well come across other Seraphs,' said Right-Quentha.
'And then again, it might not be wise that we three should be seen together,' said her sister.
'It certainly would look strange,' said Right-Quentha.
'Strange,' echoed her sister.
Carnelian sank cross-legged to the floor. He propped his face up with his arm. 'You confirm what I have suspected. My father has sent you to keep me imprisoned here, in the Sunhold.'
The sybling sisters looked blindly at each other. There is nothing to stop us giving you a tour of the Sunhold.'
Carnelian brightened, leapt up, grabbed his mask. 'Come on then.'
They sallied out into the passage where they gathered up an escort of his tyadra. In the chamber set around with doors, the Quenthas pointed out the portcullises that they told him led off down long passageways to various gates giving into the Encampment. Between these were other doors which they said led into barracks. At his insistence they opened one and lighting a lantern they all went in.
'Soon this warren will be filled with a cohort of Red Ichorians,' said Left-Quentha and both sisters frowned.
'Apart from the side on which they are tattooed, how do they differ from the Sinistrals?' he asked them.
'In every way, Carnelian,' Right-Quentha replied indignantly. They belong to the Great and we to the House of the Masks. We live in different worlds.'
'Worlds…?'
Left-Quentha caught him in her stony gaze. 'We can no more be in the same world than my sister and I can be on the same side of the mirror as our reflection.'
