“You’re a bold speaker, young one. I would advise you keep your lips pressed firmly closed when you meet with the mansa.”
But they were not unfriendly as they pinned up my hair and wrapped it in a scarf according to the fashion of the House. I heard no hostile edge to their voice, unlike what it seemed Andevai was enduring over on the other side under a litany of songs, laughter, and taunting jokes. Of his voice, I heard no whisper.
“Is it your custom that his attendants should speak so cruelly to him?” I asked.
“Young men will taunt,” said the tawny-haired woman. “It’s their way.”
The other continued. “It isn’t that surprising, Fama. He is not in his rightful place.”
“Honestly, Brigida, you and I both know they resent him because he received abundance where they received scant. Still, they should not hold these grudges. It brings conflict and trouble upon all of us.”
“Sss! Best speak of such things later.” They exchanged glances that spoke of shared knowledge. The House was like a sea of hidden currents and shifting whirlpools ready to suck me down.
They examined my travel-worn riding clothes with frowns. “You’ll need fitting clothing. In time. In time. Go softly. Be respectful. And don’t speak.”
Out I was hustled down a corridor whose walls were woven patterns. I caught a glimpse of a room with a vast hearth and many seats, but my chest was too tight for me to be able to see. It was all I could do to place one foot before the other, to be given coat and cloak and gloves, to be shown a door and step into the overcast day where I walked as stiffly as a sun-struck ghoul along the twisting garden path and over the gravel to a waiting landau.
I halted, staring at the unfamiliar equipage.
The harnessed team consisted of four good-looking horses chosen for build rather than matched by color, a detail of practicality that gave me the courage to accept an attendant’s arm as I climbed the steps into the carriage. The magister, warden of the gate, already sat in the seat facing the four-arched gate.
What had happened to our carriage? My sword? The eru and coachman who had accompanied us all this way, whom I had come to feel were my only allies? Like me, they were bound to Four Moons House. Servants might pity me, but they had no power to change what was now happening.
I climbed into the carriage and sat facing the magister with my back to the gate, trying to breathe normally and not in gasps and bursts. Andevai strode out of the house looking like he was eager to leave or eager to arrive or eager to be shed of all this, and I supposed he had come later because he was dressed yet again in a flattering jacket, tailored to his form and ornamented by a thin gold necklace. I looked away.
“Magister,” he said from the base of the carriage.
She gestured to give him permission to enter.
I had not asked to enter! One humiliating mistake after the next! I had to behave as my father would have, observing, recording in my mind, and remembering so I could write it down and try to make sense of this bewildering rhythm of rules quite unlike the pragmatic customs of my own people. That’s what I would ask for, first of all, when I dared ask: notebooks, ink, pens. If I kept my father’s spirit in my heart and imagined his hand guiding mine, then I could behave as he had behaved, a steady walk down turbulent, storm-ridden roads.
Three footmen perched on the back, faces without expression.
A command spoken. A song for our passage. As we crossed under one of the arches, invisible threads caught on me, strings binding my lips and fingers and knees. Then we came clear of the shadow and the pressure released. We rolled to a halt. The warden of the gate descended, Andevai moved to the seat opposite me, and we two alone continued on our way. The horses shifted into an easy trot down a wide avenue that curved first around one slope and then around a copse of black pine and then around a wide pond dense with reeds. We drew up at a ring where the avenue circled a crude stone pillar and split into five paths. Andevai descended and poured water from a flask at the base of the pillar. He turned and looked at me, and for a moment I felt as uncomfortable as I had when Fama and Brigida had examined me when I was naked, as though he were inspecting me and deciding whether what he saw was adequate to the purpose. I did not understand his expressions at all; he was remote from me, and yet must a man not hold back a part of himself if he is to learn how to kill?
He made an impatient gesture. Aei! Of course, I was to make an offering as well. I must copy what he did. Had I already forgotten?
The servants’ expressions did not flicker by even one twitch as I clambered down, crunched across the gravel, took the flask from him, and poured water at the base of the pillar. What a fool I must look!