“Remember, Spider. I will be watching to see if you pass muster.”
33
Once when Father and I were returning home after I had accompanied him on a visit to his military camp, he stared for the longest time at the terraces of ripening grain cut through by irrigation channels. Shades of brilliant green stretching away to the horizon mark the richness of the soil of Efea, the land that nourishes us.
To my astonishment he said, “Even after all this time I can never quite get over how different the fields look here.”
“Father,” I asked daringly, “why did you leave your home and come to Efea?”
He almost smiled. “Funny you should ask in quite that way, Jessamy. For when I told my family, kin, friends, and acquaintances that I had decided to take my chances and sail to the fabled land of Efea, that was the only question they asked me. ‘Why are you leaving?’”
“What did you tell them?”
He leaned out from under the carriage awning to watch a falcon fly past. When it was gone, he sat back and addressed me.
“I told them that the choice was made for me when I was born the youngest son in a poor household. My older brothers would inherit the bakery. My father could not afford me the bride-price for a wife, so I had no expectation that I would ever marry. In Saro-Urok, men of our caste could be nothing but foot soldiers with no rank in the army, because only men of wealth and connection can become officers. But we had all heard the poets and sailors and merchants and tale-tellers. They said that in Efea a man from Saro can be anything he wants.”
He took my hand in his, an affectionate gesture he so rarely made that I was stricken and tongue-tied. His grave face made me think he was about to impart his most precious secret.
“There will come a moment in your life where you find yourself confronted with two choices, and both are bad ones. For me it was to stay in a place where I was choked and had nothing to look forward to and no way to prove my talents, or to leave everyone I knew and loved behind forever for a chance that might not work out. That is how the gods test us, by laying before us what seems to be a choice and yet is no choice at all. When we come to that fork in our path down which no road is clean, all we can control is with what dignity and honor we take our inevitable step.”
34
The representatives of the Garon Stable enter the Royal Fives Court in procession, Tana in the lead, Kalliarkos behind her and after him Lord Thynos, then me, with Darios bringing up the rear. To walk into a building I have only ever glimpsed from the outside numbs me. The Royal Court is built of marble and hung with painted silk tapestries depicting famous adversaries of the past. The stairs down to the undercourt are swarmed by women and men who toss flowers at the feet of those of us who are entering. Many call out Lord Thynos’s Fives name of Southwind.
My feet tread on rose petals as I descend. The scent floods me with the memory of my father bringing flowers from the market as offerings for my mother.
Blinking back tears, I enter the attiring hall. Everything is polished to a shine. The benches have cushions. Mats woven of soft reeds cover raised beds where trainers work stiffness out of the muscles of waiting adversaries. Ropes mark out private curtained chambers where the Illustrious await their trials in a privacy the rest of us have not earned. I glimpse the faces of men and women I have seen win on the Fives court. I am walking into my most cherished dream.
That my father will sit in a place of honor on the royal balcony just makes me even more nervous and excited.
I have to concentrate.
Tana takes me aside. “Do not get distracted,” she says.
She leaves to go up top to the trainers’ balcony, from which she will watch the trials. Thynos retreats to the roped-off area to wait in privacy for the Illustrious rounds, which will come much later in the day. Darios leads Kalliarkos and me through a warm-up of menageries.
I haven’t spoken to Kalliarkos since Lord Gargaron told us we would both run trials in the victory games. They have kept us apart, and I can’t help but watch him moving through the patterns beside me. He’s graceful and precise as he moves, although his angles are a little off. It’s impossible not to marvel at his perfect profile with its strong chin, straight nose, dark eyes, and short hair. He flashes a glance at me that is almost as good as a kiss, and I purse my lips and blow a kiss back. Darios whaps me on the butt with his baton.
When Darios tells us to pause so he can adjust my gloves and check my mask, he says, “You have a chance, Spider. Don’t get distracted.”
“I don’t understand why I’m entered,” I say, because I’ve been running this maze in my head. I’m sure Lord Gargaron must have an ugly motive. Perhaps he hopes I’ll lose in front of my father or maybe even means to run me against Kalliarkos. “I’ve never competed at anything like this level.”