They both recoiled from the near collision, eliciting only cursory glances from the partygoers around them. There were a few stuttered apologies, furtive glances, only passing the other’s gaze, and they stepped away from each other, he with boot heel clacking on the polished wood floor, her in a rustle of skirts and a toss of an errant strand of hair.
Before Willem could voice a suitable apology, he finally really saw her.
She was young, but Willem couldn’t say how young. Her body, hidden as it was in the formal skirts and fold after fold of silk and satin, was difficult to make out but she reflected a sense of slimness devoid of athleticism. Her pale face with its prominent cheekbones and slightly too-sunken eyes was one that in a woman of her youth would be called “homely” but would surely turn to “handsome” by her fortieth year. Her eyes blazed blue, and one of them peeked at him from behind that errant strand of chestnut hair, long and straight, with just the hint of a curl at the very last quarter inch. She smelled of rose oil and her thin lips were brushed with just a wisp of red. Her hands, as pale as her face, were tiny, ending in thin fingers that came almost to points at the tips, fingernails well manicured but not painted.
“Do please accept my apologies, miss,” Willem said finally, hoping his voice didn’t sound as reedy and trivial to her as it had to himself.
She smiled at him, and for just the briefest moment it was a smile of such warm sincerity that Willem was all but knocked over by it. He felt the curve of her lips, and the sparkle that passed like a shooting star in her eyes, in the deepest bottom of his heart.
Then her smile faded to one of polite graciousness, and Willem wanted to take a step away from her but didn’t.
“May I introduce myself?” he asked her, his voice finally sounding like his own.
She cleared her throatnot a dainty sound, Willem was surprised to enjoyand said, “If that is your custom, sir.”
Her voice wouldn’t have sounded like music to anyone else’s ears but Willem’s.
“Willem Korvan,” a man’s voice said, startling both Willem and the girl.
Willem had to consciously refocus his eyes, forcing them away from the girl and to the man in military regalia who had appeared as if by some translocational magic at his left elbow.
“There you are,” the officer went on. Willem finally recognized him as Thenmun, a minor but quickly rising lieutenant who had been recently assigned to aid in the reconstruction of the wall. The lieutenant had apparently been told by someone in authority precisely what had led to his predecessor’s reassignment and since then he had done an admirable job of avoiding the master builder’s wrath or Willem’s.
“Yes, Lieutenant,” Willem said, grasping right forearms with the man as was the custom in Innarlith. “Here I am”
“Ah,” said the young officer, “do you two know each other?”
“No,” Willem answered before the girl could. “I’m afraid we have not been properly introduced.”
The girl smiled at him again, showing only a half-second of that true smileenough to cause Willem’s palms to sweat.
“Well, then, please allow me,” said Thenmun. “Miss Halina Sverdej, this is Master Willem Korvan, late of the kingdom of Cormyr.”
Thankfully, it was not custom for men and women only just introduced to take hands, so instead she curtsied again.
Willem nodded and said, “Miss Sverdej, I am most pleased to make your acquaintance.”
“Likewise, Master Korvan,” she said. “Please, call me Willem.” The girl blushed but smiled.
“Well, then,” Lieutenant Thenmun said, grinning as well, “I’ll leave you two alone.”
The officer gave Willem a secretive leer, his back carefully placed to Halina, and withdrew.
“You are from Cormyr,” Halina said.
“I am,” he replied, then chanced: “Your accent is… pleasing. I would guess that you are a stranger here yourself?”
“I am,” she replied. “I have come from Thay to live with my uncle.”
“Have you’ve been here long?”
She shook her head as the minuet came to a close, and they paused to participate in the quiet smattering of applause that followed.
Before the musicians began to play again, Willem said, “Then I hope you will allow me to introduce you to the city I have come to call home.”
Her answer was a smile that almost caused Willem Korvan’s heart to break apart in his chest.
14
13 Marpenoth, the Year of Shadows (1358 DR) Second Quarter, Innarlith
A. copper for your thoughts,” she whispered, snuggling closer to him, if such were possible, her leg sliding up along his and her arm circling tighter so that she wound around him like a snake.
Her skin was as soft as her smile, as gentle as her manner, and as intoxicating to Willem as the finest wine.
In the tenday since they’d met, they had seen each other four times and all four times had ended up in Willem’s bed. Though it wasn’t discussed and would have been frowned upon in the most polite circles, it wasn’t uncommon. They were young, after all, and life was short.
“We’re young, after all,” Willem whispered in response, “and life is short.”
She giggled, and the series of little exhales tickled his neck. He turned his head and kissed her.
“Is that all?” she asked, her voice so quiet he felt it against his lips more than heard it with his ears.
He shook his head and she looked so deeply into his eyes all he could do was speak.
“I’m afraid,” he said.
She shook her head, closed her eyes, and dug her forehead into his shoulder. He traced a circle on her shoulder, raising gooseflesh for a moment, then eliciting a sigh from her.
“I am,” he went on, “and why shouldn’t I be?”
“Because you’re good at what you do,” she whispered into his neck, then the tip of her tonguenot warm but hotflicked against him, sending a thrill through his body he didn’t try to mask.
“Am I?” he asked, his mind refusing to follow his body into the pure physical bliss he knew she could bring to him. “I’m not so certain.”
“The master builder seems to trust you,” she replied.
“How can he not? All I do is agree with him. That and do all the work he’s been tasked by the ransar to do himself. He’s claimed credit for enough of what I’ve brought to this project and others that should he dismiss me he would have to explain my mistakes as his own. If he could even identify them as mistakes.”
“You don’t enjoy your work?” she asked, then kissed his neck, her lips as hot as her tongue.
“I do,” he admitted. “I do very much, but sometimes… often… occasionally, anyway, I don’t feel up to it.”
“You do your best,” she whispered, her voice growing heavier, sleepy.
“That’s precisely the problem, and if I was the only one who suffered for it, that would be enough.”
“No one has suffered for what you’ve done,” she said, her fingertips beginning to play at the hair on the back of his head.
“There was a man,” Willem said, closing his eyes, concentrating on the feel of her skin against his, “who would tell you differently, a lieutenant with a promising career ahead of him.”
“Not Thenmun,” she said, then started to nibble on his earlobe.
“No,” he replied, “No, not Thenmun, but someone very much like him. I had him reassigned… exiled, almost, for arguing with a decision I’d made, for questioning my figures.”
She had no response, only continued to work at his ear because she knew how much he liked it.
“He was right, you see,” Willem admitted, “and I was wrong.”
