Part 13 (2/2)
I began to walk toward the table to see what had been put there for us to eat, but company arrived before I made it. Garam walked in, nodded to me with a neutral expression, then turned his attention to the food. Seeing that I felt distinctly relieved, as I'd been expecting a fuss from him like the one I'd gotten from Fearin. It looked like Garam had gotten tired of playing concerned, just the way I'd always known he would. The change had come none too soon, and let me take a plate and choose my meal in peace.
But that was as far as the peace would stretch. I was turning away from the table when Talasinarrived, shattering the delightful silence and sending it scurrying for cover.
”So there you are,” Talasin announced in tones of outrage, stopping to put his fists to his hips.
”Back for the first meal of the day and acting as though nothing at all had happened! What have you got to say for yourself?”
”Nothing at all happened,” I supplied with a shrug, heading for my usual chair. That should have taken care of anything else he had to say, but the G.o.ds must have been in a fun-seeking mood again.
”You're very funny,” Talasin growled, light eyes boring into me as I sat. ”Where were you most of yesterday and last night, and why didn't you tell anyone you'd be gone? You wouldn't have done something like this to your own people, so why did you do it to us?”
”Once a Kenoss child reaches p.u.b.erty, he or she is no longer considered a child,” I said as I gave most of my attention to the food I'd taken. ”Adults can go and do exactly as they please, and aside from being responsible for their actions, need account to no one at all. If they don't survive whatever it is they choose to do, it's conceded they might not have been very wise in doing it. If they do survive, no one has the right to say anything at all. My people find it a comfortable, sensible arrangement.”
”What it really is is cold and unfeeling,” he stated, slowed down a little but hardly stopped.
”I'm beginning to understand why you act the way you do, but it's still no excuse. You're not among your Kenoss now, you're with us. The least you can do is act the way we do.”
”Leave her alone, Talasin,” Garam said as he took his own chair, also not looking at the man.
”There was no harm done, so leave her alone.”
”No harm done?” Talasin echoed, back to being outraged. ”What about the way we ate ourselves up, wondering where she could be? What if we'd all gone out looking for her?”
”Then that would have been your mistake rather than mine,” I snapped, more than tired of his hysterics. ”If you've all convinced yourselves I need looking after because you'll all be in trouble with our Guardian if I turn up lost, that's your problem. If it had been one of you who was missing, no one would have thought about it twice.”
”You're wrong,” Talasin said flatly, his stare very direct. ”We would have worried no matter who the missing one was, but you're wrong in another way too. If it had been one of the rest of us, that one would have told someone what he intended to do. That way we wouldn't have had to worry.”
”He's right,” Garam said without looking up. ”We're all free to come and go as we please, and our Guardian would be angry if any of us disappeared. But the rest of us would have told someone, because we're all part of something that makes us closer than family. Families don't always care what their members are doing, but we do.”
By now his eyes had come to my face, and he wasn't making any attempt to avoid my gaze either. They were both looking at me from under lowered brows, and I could feel the old confusion returning. I would have had trouble thinking of the next thing to say, but Ranander's arrival saved me the effort.
”Aelana, you're back!” he exclaimed, striding onto the porch with a grin. ”It took me forever to think of trying to know if you'd be all right, but once I did I was convinced of it. The others weren't sure at all, but I was.”
”But only after you knew,” I pointed out, beginning to feel depressed. ”I love the confidence everyone has in my ability to take care of myself. I'm out of sight for half a dozen heartbeats and you all start to build a funeral pyre.”
That got them all arguing at once, and in the middle of their protests Master Lokkel showed up to add his own demands about whether or not I needed his skill. I gritted my teeth and simply ignored them, but it wasn't easy. I had no idea what they thought they would get out of acting like this, and not knowing made me very uncomfortable.
After a while all the yelling died down, and by then Ranander had filled a plate and brought it over to the chair next to me. He sat carefully, and then moved his gaze to my face.”I was really worried about you before I knew you would be all right, Aelana,” he said, keeping his voice moderately low. ”I was going to talk to you last night, but since you weren't here I'll have to do it tonight instead. After we set up camp, of course.”
”And what did you intend to talk to me about, Ranander?” I asked, suddenly remembering what Garam had said about Ranander's intentions. ”Why don't you tell me right now?”
”Really, Aelana, I couldn't do it here,” he answered with a laugh. ”If you don't believe it would upset everyone, just take my word for it. When we're alone I'll tell you how much I admire you and then I'll show you.”
”All this admiration,” I said, turning my head to look directly at him. ”Does it come before or after the fight?”
”Fight?” he echoed, stopping with the food half way to his mouth. ”What fight is that? You don't think I want to fight with you, do you, Aelana? What I want to do is take you to bed, not hurt you in any way.”
”Ranander, the only way to take a Kenoss woman to bed is to first best her in a fight,” I said, putting it as flatly as possible. ”Even an ordinary Kenoss woman isn't easy to best, but when it comes to me... If I lose control the beast will escape, and the concept of friends.h.i.+p is totally beyond her. Do you really want to make me responsible for your death?”
”But - but, we're friends!” he protested, looking shaken and almost desolate. ”You might have to fight with someone you didn't know, but with a friend you could - ”
”Ranander, I'd have to fight you even if I'd known you all my life,” I interrupted, doggedly refusing to let him talk himself out of believing me. ”It's the way my people do things, the way I was raised to accept as the only way. You'll just have to find someone else to admire.”
”But how could I do that?” he asked, heavy disturbance showing in his eyes. ”There isn't anyone else like you. I've been counting on this for quite some time, but I didn't count on Kenoss beliefs. I'll have to think about it.”
He got to his feet in the grip of deepening distraction, and left the porch carrying his still-untouched plate. We all watched him gone, me with a curious feeling I couldn't define, and then Garam made a sound of satisfaction.
”It isn't over yet, but at least you side-tracked him with a good excuse,” he said, obviously speaking to me. ”Ranander's fighting skills have to be minimal at best, considering none of us have ever seen him show any. He may decide he wants to face you, girl, but if he does he won't have a chance. Just stick to that story and he may even back down permanently.”
”It can't be just a story,” Talasin stated, clearly having thought about it. ”Don't forget it's Ranander she said it to, and if it wasn't true he would have known immediately. That means she had to be telling the truth, no matter how strange it sounds.”
”It's the truth?” Garam said with amus.e.m.e.nt, his dark eyes searching my face for confirmation. ”Well, how about that. I didn't really believe it the first time you told me, but I suppose it makes sense. If a man wants a woman like you he has to work for the privilege. And if he isn't good enough, all he gets for his trouble is some lumps. I like it, I really do. And it makes the man who manages it someone ... special.”
The grin he gave me was very wide, but he held it only long enough to make sure I saw it. After that he went back to eating, and the discussion seemed to be over. Talasin kept glancing at me, probably thinking over the ”strange” new truth he'd just learned, and Lokkel was completely unbothered. I had the feeling Garam would have teased me more if he'd had the time, but since he had to get ready for the earlier departure he didn't have any time to waste. Later would be another story, but right now...
Right now I suddenly wished it was time for me to leave. I'd had enough of this city to last me forever, and I also wanted our group effort to be over and done with. Once it was over we would all go our separate ways, and I would be free of things like criticism for my actions and teasing about my beliefs. I wanted to be free of those things, I did ... I did...
Chapter 14
It was the middle of the afternoon rather than late, and the heat of the day was doing its best to squash us all flat. Riding through the heavy glare was easier than walking or marching - or running with arrows flying all around - but I was still feeling impatient. Fearin had gotten everyone ready to move, and then had made us wait.
”He didn't do it on a whim,” Ijarin said from beside me, apparently reading my mind. ”He had to seal the palace with his Power, to be sure no one finds it possible to take it over. I'd say he had a reason for doing that, even if he didn't care to tell the rest of us.”
I looked around at the empty, trampled-down fields where the slaver caravans had been, and past that area to the other untended fields beyond. Those left in the city would have a lot of trouble feeding themselves for quite a while; it would take them time to realize there weren't slaves out tending the crops, and by then there would be few crops left to tend. A lot of them might even decide to desert the dying city...
”That man you found yesterday had been in charge of the city's emergency gold supply,” Ijarin said, pretending I was joining in the conversation, or at least paying attention. ”He'd intended to wait for us to leave and then would have set himself up as the new city ruler. Or would have taken the gold and found a more prosperous city to spend it in. Whichever, Fearin and Ranander persuaded him to part with the gold, and now it's ours.”
The guardsmen from our half of the army were marching along as though the heat didn't bother them, as though they were looking forward to their short time on the road before they made camp. They'd be marching almost until sundown, while our first half would camp early. That way, so Fearin said, we'd have the army back together again with no fuss at all. Why he'd divided it in the first place was something else he hadn't cared to mention, at least not to me.
”Ignoring me won't do any more good than insulting me,” the barbarian commented, just mentioning the point in pa.s.sing. ”You deserved that scolding I gave you this morning, and you can't say you didn't.”
As a matter of fact I didn't say anything at all, especially since he'd reminded me of that morning. His ranting around had made the reaction unanimous, something I hadn't needed after the way the others had acted. Since I couldn't understand what they were all after, I'd decided not to think about any of it.
”I also heard about what you said to Ranander,” he went on, the change of subject accompanied by a change of tone. ”You'll have to be very gentle with him, considering how attracted to you he is. The others can obviously handle the feelings, but he may not be up to it.”
”What the h.e.l.l are you talking about?” I demanded, then immediately wished I'd bitten my tongue instead. He'd caught me again, and I felt like an idiot.
”You can't mean you don't know how attractive you are to the men around you?” he said in a very bland way, only his light eyes showing a hint of the grin he hid. ”Most women develop the ability to judge that at the age of four or five.”
”You mean everyone was bowled over at first sight of my unparalleled beauty?” I asked, barely glancing at him. ”Well, I knew that, of course, but I've learned to overlook it. It gets to be such a bore, having men constantly throwing themselves at your feet.”
”You think you're being sarcastic,” he said, and the grin that escaped his control was softer than the one I'd expected. ”You look in a mirror and the face looking back isn't outstandingly beautiful, so you a.s.sume that the men around you can't possibly be interested. I'll grant you that beauty of face and figure will attract men the fastest, but that doesn't mean it's all we look for. Some men are shallow just the way some women are, but most do want something beyond looks.””Ah, now I understand,” I said with a sober nod. ”If a man can't have a woman who's beautiful, he's more than happy to accept one who can kill a dozen attackers instead. He finds the beast inside her adorable, and doesn't even think about the fact that she might be better with a sword than he is. He just shrugs it off with a grin, and goes out to pick some flowers for her.”
”Hasn't any man ever brought you flowers?” he asked, his tone and smile now very gentle. ”If they haven't, I'm sure it's only because flowers aren't something they would normally think of.
<script>