Fate

by Mary Corran

  ‘Generous of you!’ But she had won.

  ‘How soon can you get away? We shall need more than ten days, there and back and some time at Kepesake.’

  She produced her trump card. ‘I think I can arrange an official leave.’ She told him of Avorian’s offer to make up the tribute shortfall, and was surprised he already knew of it. ‘It’s my job to make up the totals, and it may be I shall have to visit some of the southern districts to check the accounts. I’ve done such trips before, normally with one of the Treasury clerks. I could ask her and another friend to come and do my work while you and I go on to Kepesake.’

  ‘That would be helpful.’ He displayed none of his earlier incredulity at the responsibilities of her position. ‘Let me know if you can arrange it, and I’ll travel at the same time.’

  It was clear he saw her as an encumbrance interfering in his business, but Asher let it rest for the moment. ‘I’ll know in a week.’

  ‘Tell me, is there anything else you think I should know about your activities here?’ He was smiling faintly. ‘I mean, what do you actually do with your group of women?’

  ‘I organize our funding.’

  ‘I’d forgotten you were good with accounts.’ He leaned back on his elbows, making himself more comfortable, apparently in no hurry to return to the city. ‘How do you manage for money?’

  ‘It’s our greatest problem, as you can imagine. We all give what we can but it’s appallingly little, and there are so many in need.’ Prudently, she did not tell him of her other, more lucrative, source of funds. ‘Perhaps you could help us, as a councillor.’

  ‘I think there’re more urgent problems to deal with first.’

  ‘But that’s the point.’ She rounded on him. ‘They say there’s always something more urgent, or more important, than the needs of women and children! It’s a question of values. We’re half — no, more than half — the city’s population, but our needs are invariably put last — which is to say ignored. Can you really say that’s fair or reasonable?’

  ‘No,’ he said slowly. ‘Not put like that.’

  ‘I’d forgotten how easy you were to talk to.’ She was not sure, later, why she said it. ‘Even at your most annoying; like when you fell in love for the first time, and discovered girls were different from boys.’ She paused, remembering. ‘You were a dreadful prig then, suddenly telling us girls didn’t climb trees, when only the year before you were helping us to the top of the tallest.’

  ‘Asher!’ He sat up, outraged.

  ‘Don’t look so shocked!’ I know when we were young Callith and I would hang on your every word, but that was different. And you were five years older, anyway.’

  ‘I’d have boxed your ears then!’

  ‘Do you know, I haven’t asked you what you’ve done in the last six years.’ The omission struck her forcibly; shamingly, she had been too engrossed in her own problems to consider his.

  ‘You and Callith always used to ask what I’d brought you instead of whether I’d had a good journey.’ He smiled at the memory. ‘There’s nothing to tell. Ships and ports and markets, as ever.’

  ‘It must be strange to stay in one place now, with a sister-in-law and nephews and nieces — or are you sending them down to Kepesake?’

  ‘Not if Kelham’s widow can help it!’ Asher saw the unknown woman evidently possessed, from Mallory’s long-suffering tone, a mind of her own. ‘I suppose I’ll get used to it, in time; living in Venture, I mean.’

  ‘It’s not so bad. So Perron takes your place?’ Asher mused, remembering him only as a sickly boy, younger than herself and unable to join in their games. She said: ‘Poor Mallory.’ And meant it.

  ‘Perhaps I should employ you as my clerk.’

  She scowled at him. ‘Not a hope!’

  ‘But I should enjoy it.’ He grinned. ‘In some ways, you haven’t changed a bit!’

  Asher felt herself relax, sensing that at some point during the past hours — how long was it? — they had progressed from argument to dissonance, and back to something approaching their old friendship; except that in the past he had always been the leader, she the dutiful follower. That was a mistake she would never make again. Yet, despite their present differences, there was an ease, an acceptance that came from having known one another all their lives, that made it easier to talk to him than to anyone else, except perhaps Mylura.

  ‘I suppose we should get back. It’s getting late.’ She looked up at the sky, astonished to find it well on in the afternoon.

  ‘True.’ But he did not move. ‘It’s good to see you again, Ash. We all missed you.’

  She guessed he, too, felt at ease. Tell me, Mallory,’ she asked hesitantly, ‘what was it that changed you? That year, I mean — the invasion year? Before that you were different, a real friend, but afterwards it was never quite the same, as if you couldn’t look at me or Callith without thinking “that’s a girl”, as if we’d changed fundamentally while you were at sea.’

  ‘How odd you should ask that; I was thinking about it myself the other night. And it wasn’t you, but me.’ Mallory rolled on to his side, leaning on his left elbow, frowning. ‘Since you don’t seem easily shocked, you might as well know why.’ He paused, then went on: ‘That was the fourth year I’d been to sea, but it was the first the men on board ship treated me as a man, not a boy, and took me with them when they went to the stews in Refuge.’ He glanced up at her, but she was not really surprised. ‘When I came home, you and Callith looked different. You were growing up and letting down your skirts, and I knew as well that all the men would have laughed at me for spending my days playing with two little girls. Not a manly activity,’ he added with a half-grin.

  ‘Strange, isn’t it, that manly is supposed to encompass all sorts of positive virtues, but womanly, if you say it about a man, is a dreadful insult,’ Asher mused. ‘Womanly always seems to mean being weak, or soft, or having babies.’

  ‘But those are the qualities men like in women.’

  ‘Are they?’ Asher gave an unwomanly snort. ‘Only if you believe the Fates created us just for your amusement.’ But saying even this, now that she acknowledged they must exist in some form or other, was suddenly terrifying to her; she wondered if it could possibly be true that there was no greater meaning to her existence than that. A feeling of sick familiarity grew in her stomach as she recalled some of Lewes’ more picturesque taunts about her own lack of worth.

  ‘What’s troubling you?’ Mallory was watching her with concern.

  ‘Nothing.’ She was not ready to talk about these feelings, not to anyone. ‘How do we keep in contact from now on? I can hardly come openly to your house.’

  ‘No.’ He considered the problem fora moment. ‘By messenger, I think. Mark any note for my private attention. And where do I find you?’

  ‘At an old inn in Scribbers.’ She gave him the address.

  ‘It’s one of the things I dislike most about cities; all this formality, I mean. At Kepesake it would be much easier.’

  Asher nodded idly. ‘You’re an important person now. I shall have to bob my head and show you a proper respect when you come to the Treasury.’

  ‘Not before time!’ But he was joking. ‘I wish you hadn’t dyed your hair.’

  ‘Why? It was only a precaution, in case Lewes came looking for me.’

  ‘It doesn’t suit you.’

  ‘Yours is receding, but I didn’t mention it — until now.’

  He laughed. ‘Message received.’ Asher warmed to him, liking him the more for his sense of humour, and even, against her better judgment, for his sense of duty. He, at least, was a man who knew his responsibilities, and would not shirk them.

  I wonder, has anything I said today made a difference to his life, or mine, or anyone’s, or was everything we said and did predestined? Have we any choice at all in our actions?

  The idea terrified her, for it meant that everything she wanted to believe in was a lie, her fears the only truths. The certainty sh
e had known when the Oracle spoke to her was gone, but she had opened her mind to doubt and the fear that accompanied it. What sickness could there be in the minds of the Fates, if they existed, to give her a life destined for pain, to make her suffer in being a woman and thus subject and held in contempt, even deep dislike, by the men who controlled her world? What reason could they have for such cruelty?

  ‘It was only — Lewes was always making comments about how I looked, because he knew it hurt me.’ She made the apology so he should not misunderstand her. ‘My friends here, they taught me I could value myself, and not rely on his opinion.’

  ‘He’s a fool.’

  She glanced at him, and saw he meant it; he was far too honest a person to use such weapons against an opponent. ‘I have to get back. My friends will be wondering where I am.’

  ‘And I have to buy fairings for my young niece and nephews.’ He got to his feet and reached out a hand to her. ‘May I buy one for you, too?’

  ‘No, thank you.’ She realized, with a sinking heart, that he still saw her as the Asher he had known, a childhood playmate.

  But I’m not. She’s no longer a part of me, not any more. Asher of Venture was a very different person, one who had put aside the past and learned to live apart from the shame of her marriage; she had a useful existence, one which allowed her to respect herself as the old Asher had not.

  They rejoined the track, walking in silence; a soft breeze blew, and the scent of the pines was stronger as they descended. Asher felt quite well again, the headache that had troubled her completely gone.

  As they emerged from the belt of trees, the city came into view below, and she heard Mallory sigh. For a while, it had seemed they existed outside time and place, and she found she, too, was unwilling to plunge back into the maelstrom inside the walls. She stifled the feeling, not wanting to admit to herself any dissatisfaction with her present existence.

  ‘You go first through the gate. I’ll wait here and follow later,’ Mallory said quietly as they drew near the walls.

  ‘It would be better.’ She stopped, feeling awkward and not knowing what to say. ‘I’ll send word, when I’ve seen Avorian.’

  ‘Be careful of yourself. Come to me if you need anything.’

  ‘Thank you.’ She would not, but the offer was well-meant. They stood together, neither of them speaking, unwilling to part now the moment had come.

  ‘Welcome home, Ash!’ Mallory did not touch her, but, with a surge of happiness, Asher could feel the warmth of his gladness at seeing her again, at finding her alive. She, who had no family now, still had a home in his affection, roots in their shared history, and it surprised her to discover quite how much difference it made to her to know it. She turned away, unwilling to expose her vulnerability through her expression.

  ‘I must go.’

  She left him, walking rapidly, descending the hillside with exaggerated care, acutely conscious of his eyes following her; but she knew that for the moment he saw her as a friend, only second as a woman, and was glad of it. He was not like Lewes.

  How much would her life, and Mallory’s, change as a result of their meeting, of that one day? Asher sensed that in the future she would look back and say events came ‘before’ or ‘after’ her reunion with Mallory, itself a crucial point in her life.

  Was it sensible to continue to hope everything, her meeting Mallory before the Oracle, was only coincidence? What if she had not agreed to visit the Oracle, had fought against Margit’s coercion? Would that have been possible, or would the Fates have found some other way to bring her to the citadel at precisely the right time? Was everything pre-ordained? What if I hadn’t run away from Lewes that night? Then I’d be dead. But had she made the choice to run, or had the Fates made it for her, that she should survive and come to Venture, and befriend Margit, and thus come to the citadel at precisely this time on this day? The thought made her dizzy, for she understood the full implications of such a belief.

  She could not accept there were no choices in her power to make. The prophecy of the Oracle had been vague, after all. And what had it said: ‘Look, with eyes that choose to see. Look, or lose.’ That suggested she had a choice.

  As she reached the Nevergate, she saw there was only one solution to her difficulty. One way or another, the next few weeks should prove the point. If the girl in the internment camp was Vallis, then she would know that her belief in her own control over her life was an illusion; everything in life was predestined.

  And if not — what then?

  It was a question to which there was no answer; or none, at least, that she could discover for the present. But at least if the girl were not Vallis, she herself would still have the hope of freedom.

  Chapter Six

  The seven days that had elapsed since her meeting with Mallory had been peaceful for Asher. She had received only one unexpected communication: a small crystal flask of scent she supposed to be the fairing he had offered to buy her.

  The morning sun was warm after days of cold, gusting winds that had battered the harbour, sending up massive waves of spray across the quays and keeping even the most daring fisherman ashore. Only that morning, rumour had it that another of Councillor Hamon’s ships had been caught in the storm and sunk with all hands, unlucky news that spread a pall of gloom throughout the city as a harbinger of worse to come. Asher, however, was more concerned about her own errand; she shifted the heavy ledgers to rest on her hip and began to climb the hill that would take her to Avorian’s mansion, experiencing an unaccustomed fit of nerves, borne partly from an awareness of guilt and partly from simple apprehension.

  ‘Make way, make way!’

  She stepped to one side to allow a troop of grey men to pass, heading for the Kamiri governor’s compound further up and to her left. In their midst stumbled five men and a woman, chained together, all bearing the slave-brand.

  They must be for the spring Games ... Asher shuddered inwardly, knowing it was impossible to help the six; they must have either been caught attempting escape, or taken for some other imagined crime against their owners. The grey men held their Games twice a year, an abomination they had brought with them from their homeland. Games? Slaughter, they should call them. Convicted slaves were forced to take part in a series of games of chance where the stakes were always life or death; many survived one, or even two of the trials, but it was rare indeed for even one to survive them all.

  The troop disappeared inside the spiked walls of the compound, and Asher resumed her upward trudge. If Avorian should discover her part in the theft, the Games could be her own fate; although there was some comfort in the thought that the Oracle had suggested no such ending.

  Or was there? Her mind still scurried between doubt and certainty, refusing to accept belief or the reverse.

  She had entered the north-west corner of the city, dotted with the large houses and walled gardens of the merchant clans. The unfortunate Councillor Hamon’s house showed signs of disrepair, in keeping with his increasingly impoverished status. Mallory’s, however, which stood higher, displayed every evidence of continued prosperity. Two small boys were visible in the terraced gardens, playing some game or other, watched by a girl a little older; Asher guessed them to be Mallory’s niece and nephews. The angle of incline gave her a clear view of them briefly before she climbed higher and they were hidden from sight by high walls.

  Avorian’s mansion stood highest of all, an immense structure fronted by ornately patterned railings and backed by a brick wall that hid the gardens; his status as the richest and luckiest man in Venture was made abundantly plain to allcomers. Although the gates stood open, two watchmen kept a close eye on her as she approached, ignoring the painfully thin man in tattered rags who sat beside the railings, an empty pewter plate and mug beside him suggesting it was his usual pitch. He was presumably another of Avorian’s luck-charms, a minor expense for a wealthy man.

  The house was bulky, a three-storey rectangle of pale grey stone with a mass of wi
ndows looking down on the city. Avorian’s clan symbol had been carved on the cornice over the main entrance, a huge wolf’s head that stared down at her, piercing carved eyes reminding her uncomfortably of Stern and her own guilt. Several armed men stood about the foreground, all in Avorian’s grey livery with wolf’s head badges at their shoulders.

  She stated her errand and the gatekeeper waved her through. The forecourt had been paved, but immense formal flower-beds gave colour to what might otherwise have been a dark, if massive, facade, for all that it faced east and the sea. Asher followed the path to the main doors, which were open, and went in, only to be instantly accosted by yet another of Avorian’s servants.

  ‘What is your business?’

  An elderly man rose from his desk to the right of the doors, regarding her with a look of deep suspicion. Ink-stained fingers held out his quill like a weapon, pointed at her; he was bald, with a beak of a nose, and ears that stuck out at sharp angles to his skull.

  ‘The Chief Councillor asked me to attend him this morning,’ Asher answered politely, indicating her ledgers.

  ‘On what business?’

  ‘From the Treasury.’

  Dark eyes snapped irritably. ‘What is Darrian coming to, that we must have women clerks?’ He gave her a disgusted look. ‘Wasting our time!’ Asher remained prudently silent. The old man kept her waiting, enjoying his brief moment of power, and she shifted the heavy ledgers to her other hip; at last, however, he relented, perhaps recalling his duty to his master.

  ‘Very well.’ He pointed to a bench set against the wall in the far corner of an immense hall. ‘Go and sit there. I’ll ask the councillor if he wishes to see you. Stay there, and don’t touch anything!’ With which parting shot he turned his back and hobbled towards a door in the left-hand wall, glancing round every few paces to see if Asher had complied. She moved to the indicated bench and sat down, favouring the clerk with a sweet smile.

  Now that she had leisure to observe it, Asher saw the hall was almost as large as the Treasury, but furnished in so lavish a manner that she could only stare, open-mouthed, at the riches on display. Overhead, the ceiling was fan-vaulted, adding to the impression of height, but her eyes were drawn down to the walls and floor, everywhere displaying evidence of the success of Avorian’s trading empire. Rich carpets from Petormin were spread in profusion over a costly polished-wood floor; tapestries from Asir and Baram festooned the walls, against which stood ornately carved dressers, their shelves covered with gold plate. The wolf’s head insignia was much in evidence, marking wood and gold alike, and Asher was startled to see a full-size marble statue of a wolf confronting her from the far side of the hall.