Faro left her alone, after he promised her with a smile that he would take advantage of the room himself once she was done. She stepped into the smaller tub, and added an herbal extract to the water; the fresh scent cleared her head. The bath in her home was a good place in which to think, but it was functional, not beautiful, and it was just barely large enough for a good soak. She reveled in the sweetly-scented soap, giving her hair a good wash that left it smelling faintly of violets, and rinsed herself off. She bound up her hair, then took her place in the large bath. There were places built into it suitable for reclining, and that was what she did, with hot water up to her chin, and her head pillowed on a folded towel.
The white marble chamber, full of steam, seemed dreamlike; as if she floated beneath a huge cloud, cradled in the warm hand of a lake. The only sound was the occasional plink of a drop of water into the bath.
She half closed her eyes, still gathering her impressions and memories of the day. Day? It seemed like a month- too much had happened today. The wild horse that was her life had carried her into truly unknown country.
It seemed too late for second thoughts-and yet, she could not help but have them. She appreciated how readily a person might be corrupted by such luxury, and knew that it was part of Ware’s campaign to win her favor. But she was not one to forget her ultimate values, or to yield to mere convenience. She was here because her situation required it. She might enjoy it, but it was business, and she would give it up when it was appropriate to do so.
Her real concern was of a larger nature. True, she had agreed to this task of Adria’s, but in the light of all she had learned, could she truly go through with this? Would she not be betraying her people, and everything she had ever learned of honor?
No. She had to. She was committed. She must attempt to fetch this stone for the Queen. She had given her word, and her word must be good, or she had no honor.
And at the same time, it seemed to her that she was tradingher well-being, her release from the threat of exile or prison, for the wholesale destruction of her entire world. Ware’s words had left no doubt in her mind that the destruction would come, and within her own lifetime.
If that was all there was to it, simply saving herself at the expense of the women of the realm-then that would be a selfish thing to do. If only she could tell the Queen-if only she could make her realize that what she was asking for was death-
But Ware had made it clear that Adria was already too influenced by the promise of the shard to believe anything Xylina told her. The Queen would never give credence to the notion that the promise of the shard was false. If, indeed, Ware permitted her to tell Queen Adria. It was very clear to Xylina that Ware was more in control of events than he had ever allowed anyone to guess. Perhaps all the demons were.
That was a thought as fascinating as a hooded hissing serpent. Were the demons controlling affairs, yet allowing the women of Mazonia to think thatthey were in control?
Xylina was horribly confused; she felt as if she were compromising her honor-yet she had given her sworn word. How could she preserve her honor by violating her word? How could she keep her word without violating her honor?
She closed her eyes, and let sweat trickle down her face, emptying her mind in the hopes that an answer would come to her. She was no longer in control of anything but her own actions, and that only insofar as they affected only herself and Faro. That much was quite clear. Between them, the Queen and Ware governed her destiny, her actions. She had no choice in that. So in a way,they were the ones responsible, weren’t they?
No, that was no answer, either. It was casuistry.
She could only do her best to keep her honor and follow whatever runaway course they set for her.
Faro moved a little in the outer room; she heard him stirring in his chair, then turning a page in one of the books Ware had placed in their chambers. Faro had been eager to get to those books; she fancied he missed the reading that he would have done as a scribe. She had often wished she had more books for him to read, but she simply could not afford them. There were so many things she wished she could have done for him. He deserved better. Marcus had deserved better. And that brought another, and very odd, thought to her mind.
Suppose that the change that would come, though drastic, would be beneficial to everyone? The past few hours had brought changes to her thoughts as well as to her life. She was able to look at circumstances in an entirely different light. What right, after all, did the Mazonites have to keep the men enslaved? Only the “right” of custom. Of power, stemming from the magic. Faro, and Marcus before him, had been very good to her. They had served as parents to her; they protected her-
It was more than that; she owed Faro her very life. If it had not been for him, she would have succeeded in destroying herself. Faro had shown her the reason to continue living. If circumstances had been different, if she could have, she would have freed both Marcus and Faro. Faro she could not free, by law, and Marcus had not lived long enough to be freed.
Both deserved a better lot than they had, under the Mazonite government. Neither would ever have it. The best she could do for Faro, if he ever changed his mind and chose freedom over whatever rewards she could give him, would be to take him to the border, give him gold, and tell him to run. He would then be on his own, in a strange land, among people who by all accounts were barbarians.
Would it be so bad, then, for a change to bring a betterment in the lot of men?
She shook her head, finally, sending drops of sweat into the bath. These things were too deep, too complicated for her. She could go on only as she had been, and hope that, whatever happened, she could make the right choices.
Chapter 10
Xylina looked back along the dusty, sun-drenched track, at the long string of men and pack-animals behind her. She herself rode a mule at the head of the string, a mule being the only animal she felt she could trust herself on, since she had not ridden since her mother died. Her beast was a tall, gentle, gray-white, with a shaggy coat and a patient nature. While a mule was not exactly a prancing charger, it would not bolt with her, and if danger threatened, it would keep its head. That was far more than she could count on from a horse. Or so Ware had told her when she had been given her choice of mounts from the Queen’s stable. She was inclined to believe him. He had not once misled her, either in the kinds of supplies he had advised her to take, or the route he advised her to follow. And he had nothing to gain and no real reason to mislead her, which was the final reason to trust him. He wanted her love as well as her body, and he knew that deceit could never win the former.
Faro and Ware also rode; Faro was on a mule, a big-boned rangy black beast with brown rings around its eyes. Very odd he looked, too, perched uncomfortably on its back. Ware rode the kind of spirited horse she, as the expedition leader, would have been riding, had she followed the Queens suggestions. And, without a doubt, if she had, she would have been thrown a dozen times in the first day. Yes, she looked a little silly on a mule, but she would have looked even sillier falling over her horses tail, or black and blue from spills. She had too much sense to ride something like that when she did not really know how to ride. But she couldn’t help but look enviously at the demon out of the corner of her eye. He looked supremely comfortable and elegant on his graceful beast; the horse was a rich chestnut, and he wore brown riding-leathers to match it. This was not a beast out of the Queen’s stable, but rather, out of his own. Another indication of his wealth.
The three of them headed up the column of armed men. Amazingly, Adria had granted the entire expedition permission to bear arms within the borders of Mazonia. Xylina had wondered about that; it seemed very strange to allow so many men to carry weapons, with only herself to command them.
But perhaps Adria had a rival for this crystal, one that she had not seen fit to warn Xylina about. If that were the case-well, such a threat had not materialized during the last month. Perhaps a show of force had been more than enough to keep s
uch a rival from attempting to turn the expedition into a failure before it started.
As Ware had told her, all the servants and guards were men, and all were personally bound to the Queen’s service. Xylina had appointed Ware as her advisor, and Faro as her chief of staff-telling the former wryly that since she was going to be burdened with him anyway, he might as well make himself useful.
There were two dozen guards, three servants, and three carts bearing supplies, driven by the servants, plus themselves. As she had gone over the supplies they would need, Xylina had been able to point out that there were things they would not need to take with them. Tents, for instance; blankets and bedding, soap, most clothing for herself, in short, anything she could conjure. Ware assured her that conjuring would work for some considerable distance outside Mazonia. They would not need firewood or oil for lamps. They would not need replacement axles for the wagons, or foul-weather capes. Thus, they were able to eliminate some of the bulkiest and heaviest things and replace them with more food for themselves and the mules and Ware’s horse, more weaponry, and medical supplies.
She hoped that they would not need the latter.
While they journeyed through Mazonia, they did not need to use many of their supplies. She was able to purchase fresh food wherever they stopped. But once they reached the border, there was no telling what they might meet.
The men seemed tame enough. They responded immediately to her orders, and to Faro’s. She had asked him to spend a great deal of his time with them, if he could, to get to know what they were like. She did not think that Queen Adria had planted a traitor amidst them, but it was possible that one or more of them was unreliable.
At least they looked as if they knew how to use those weapons they carried, although as yet that had not been put to the test. So many of the men that Faro had trained had been totally ignorant of how to defend even themselves. Many had been favored house-slaves, or even husbands and concubines, and they had never needed to think about weaponry. They needed only to keep themselves attractive, raise the children properly, and tend to the duties they were assigned within the household. Faro had often said, in disgust, that it was a good thing his pupils had women to protect them, or they would have been helpless against any kind of assault. This did not appear to be the case with Adria’s guards.
There were also several dogs, who would be useful on guard duty, and to sniff out devious trails, and perhaps in hunting. They were well trained, and did not run around getting in the way.
It took Xylina a while to realize that there was something odd about the three servants. Finally she broached the matter to Ware. “Those servants-they don’t urinate. They never go to the sanitary trench with the soldiers.”
Ware smiled. “They are normal for their gender. They prefer to use the trench privately, as the men do when they defecate.”
“Their gender?” she asked blankly.
“They are female. I thought you understood.”
“Female! The Queen sent other women along?”
“Not Mazonites. These are from what we call the Animal Kingdom, tolerated here in much the manner we demons are, because they serve a need that it might otherwise be inconvenient to accommodate.”
Realization dawned. “Like the stripes!”
“Like the stripes,” he agreed. “But less obviously different, in the body.”
“Different?”
“Let me introduce you.” He whistled, surprising her. In a moment one of the servants made an appearance in the tent. Now it was apparent that under the loose-fitting clothing was the body of a fairly well endowed woman. “Pattée, show Mistress Xylina your paw,” he said.
The woman put one hand to the other and pulled off her glove. There was a-paw. It looked like the appendage of a dog, with stubby claws and thick underlying pads.
Ware glanced at Xylina. “Do you wish to see more? Her feet are similarly configured. It is done magically in infancy, among her people. Some have bird appendages, or goat hooves. It varies. But their torsos are normal by your definition, and the men don’t seem to mind.”
“No,” Xylina said, taken aback. “No more.”
“Pattée, cover and return to your business,” Ware told the woman, and she did so without a word. “They can’t speak,” he explained. “Only with animal sounds. This is the way women are expected to be, in that culture.”
“It’s appalling!”
He shrugged. “By your definition. They do, however, made excellent sexual company for the soldiers. Such women are standard equipment on missions such as this. Your proper course is to ignore them. Certainly they will not cause you any trouble.”
Xylina swallowed uncomfortably. “I’ll ignore them,” she agreed.
As for the men themselves, while Xylina had not gotten overly friendly with any of them, she had been able, through Faro, to learn quite a bit about some of them.
Most were “surplus” men-too rough and too plain to be desirable as husbands, not graceful or clever enough to learn the skills of entertainers, household servants, or craftsmen. That left them only one possible use: as common laborers or as guards. Faro had told her than these men were only too happy to be spared the lot of the common laborer-men who worked from dawn to dusk, and rarely lived beyond the age of forty.
But of the remainder, there were some surprises. Three of them were what Faro slightingly referred to as “used” men-those who had somehow displeased their mistress-wives. They had not had any skills beyond the ordinary-tending the household and the children. No one wanted them as husbands or even harem-slaves, since they were beyond the young and nubile age. Wanting to be rid of them, their mistress-wives had deeded them to the Queen; the Queen, in her turn, had ascertained that they had a certain talent with weaponry, and so had them trained as guardsmen.
“Somewhat the way you were,” she said softly.
He nodded agreement. “They were not angry in the way I was, so were not relegated to the arena. But they do resemble me in having exploitable resources.”
And there were two young and remarkably handsome men who hoped by their bravery on this expedition to catch the Queen’s attention and be added to her harem-or even given supreme status as her husband. Queen Adria had not yet elevated any of her harem slaves to that position, and the young men of the harem were constantly hoping that she might choose one of them. These two had hit upon the notion that since bravery and strength were the prime Mazonite virtues, the Queen might well prefer a brave and strong man to sire her daughters, as well as a handsome one.
As the expedition traveled across the breadth of Mazonia, Xylina became aware that these two men sought Faro out at every opportunity for long, serious discussions. Finally her curiosity got the better of her, and she asked him why they kept dragging Faro off to consult with him. Neither of these men was a sub-leader, and there should be no reason why they would want to speak so closely with him so very often.
He gave her one of those darkly inscrutable looks from beneath lowered eyebrows. “I’m not certain that you wish to know, little mistress,” he said.
She frowned a little. “Whatever is going on among the guards, I think I should know about it,” she insisted. “Especially if there is any likelihood that it could signal troubles among the men.”
Faro had sighed. “They wanted my advice,” he said, with great reluctance.
“Advice about what?” she persisted.
“Ah-” To her immense surprise, he flushed, profoundly embarrassed. She had seldom seen him so discomfited before. “Ah-you are a very brave, very highly regarded Mazonite, little mistress,” he said, looking steadfastly at his feet. “They, ah-they wanted my advice on how I, ah-attracted you. Since they feel the Queen’s tastes are likely to be similar, you see.”
“Attracted me?” she had replied. “But-” Then some of the sly comments she had heard from the Queen’s Guard, directed toward her, but about Faro and the other men of the expedition, suddenly came flooding back. And at that moment, al
though she had not realized what those remarks had meant at the time, she suddenly understood them.
“Oh,” she said faintly. Now she put all the pieces together, and she felt just as embarrassed as Faro. It was assumed, of course, that she and Faro were enjoying the same relationship that Elibet and Marcus had; that Xylina would eventually declare him to be her husband, or at least, the head of her harem.She could no more have thought of Faro in that way than she could have thought of her mule- but they didn’t know that, and certainly the men of the expedition and those few Mazonites who were her friends, like Lycia, must have assumed the liaison. She wasn’t sure if she should be annoyed or if it mattered at all. In fact, she slept completely alone, as she always had, with Faro lying across the threshold. But the fact that he always slept in her tent must have strengthened the assumption.
“Was there anything else?” she asked, since something in Faro’s expression told her she had not yet heard all of it.
He coughed, and his flush deepened. “Ah-yes,” he had admitted. “They-ah-wanted to know ifthey could-ah-catch your eye. They told me it would not matter since they were not yet harem slaves, and that if the Queen was willing to release them after this, you might-ah-choose them for your own harem-ah- based on the-ah-sample.”
Now it was her turn to stare at her feet. That was a natural question of course; even if she and Farohad been together, he would have no right to deny her if she chose to take one or more men to her bed. It was, in fact, often the case; few Mazonites could afford a harem, and an expedition like this one would offer a chance at variety they might not otherwise enjoy. On a mission like this one, undoubtedly, the leader could take any man she chose to “play” with, and there could be no assumption of commitment. It was the sort of thing that happened, she supposed, without regard to whether the men liked it. That, or so Lycia had hinted to her, was one of the perquisites of such a mission. She hadn’t understood the hints at the time, about the “appetite of a younger woman,” and the “greater variety available.” She had honestly thought Lycia was referring tofood .
If I Pay Thee Not in Gold Page 20
