Servants of the Sands, page 19
“Yes, lord. She is in good health, and the matter of her waking in the night has, I believe, been handled. However, one aspect falls under your hand. She has become inappropriately intimate with Lord Darden’s kathain.”
Seg’s forehead creased in a rare, disapproving frown. Retiae drooped a bit more. What Cafad could see of her face was dark with shame.
Cafad regarded them all without bothering to hide his bewilderment. “I’m not sure I understand the problem.”
Retiae glanced up in obvious astonishment at that answer. The other two men stared at Cafad as though he’d grown an extra head.
“Did you order Retiae to lie with Lord Darden’s kathain, lord?” Seg inquired.
“No, of course not. But why does that—oh.” Cafad put a hand over his eyes for a moment. This sort of thing is exactly why I avoided the southlands for so long. “Right. I forgot. She has to have my permission, doesn’t she, to sleep with anyone....”
“She could have approached any of your other kathain, lord,” Gano said. “Outside relationships, however, are not permitted.”
“You are the bound lord of a Fortress,” Seg said. “Your kathain are a critical part of your life. It is too dangerous to allow them to form outside emotional attachments that might disrupt your own balance.”
Cafad rubbed a hand over his face, considering. “All right,” he said finally. “What do you suggest, Seg?”
The tall man shook his head, pale eyes half-lidded. He said, “Gano is the one to advise you on this particular matter, lord. I stand outside of their circle. It is not proper for me to offer suggestions.”
“Both parties have offended against a bound lord,” Gano said promptly. “You would be within your rights to execute them both—”
“No.”
“—But that is not the Scratha way,” Gano went on without pause. “It would be expected at Darden or F’Heing Family, but here it would be considered far too extreme a reaction. You would also be within your rights to demand service from Lord Darden’s kathain for a period of time equal to the length of the inappropriate relationship.”
“I advise against that, lord,” Seg interjected.
“As do I,” Gano agreed. “Lord Darden could then request that Retiae serve her for the same length of time, and being forced to turn a bound lord’s servant over to a visiting lord of another Family is a steep humiliation.”
Cafad nodded. “I’m beginning to remember all these ridiculous rules and details,” he said. “I’d hoped to be able to forget them forever.”
Seg lifted a shoulder in a shrug, a smile briefly flickering across his lean face.
“Please allow me to speak with Retiae alone. Seg, bring Ishru to wait in my study.”
The two men bowed and departed. As the door shut behind them, Retiae went to her knees, leaning forward to put her forehead on the floor. “Grace to your grace, lord,” she said, her voice muffled. “I—I—I’m sorry, lord, for failing you.”
Cafad crossed his arms over his chest, forcing himself to set sympathy—and a sudden awareness of how young she was—aside. “You knew you were in the wrong? From the beginning?”
“I—I—”
“Sit up,” Cafad said sharply. “Speak to me, not the floor.”
Retiae pushed herself into a kneeling posture. She was pale around the eyes, but her face was dry. She met Cafad’s gaze with uncommon resolution.
“I did, lord.”
“You were trained by F’Heing, if I recall correctly?”
She swallowed once, twice, then answered. “Yes, lord.”
“So under your own training, you would have expected to be executed when caught. Why in the hells would you risk that, Retiae? Are you that unhappy?”
She shook her head firmly. “No, lord, not at all. I’m happy here, happier than I expected to be. It’s only....” She hesitated, looking at her hands for a moment, then looked up again. “Ishru is... so very kind, lord. It’s... it’s as though he sees me in a way nobody else ever has.”
Cafad raised an eyebrow. Retiae ducked her head.
“I know it’s foolish, lord. I know it’s exactly what I’ve been trained to avoid, and I know I should have told Gano, or yourself, immediately. I deserve whatever punishment you feel is appropriate, lord. I have failed you, failed my training, betrayed my oaths.”
Cafad rubbed the bridge of his nose with two fingers, caught between sympathy and an urge to throttle the girl. “Did anyone else in the household know about this?”
“No, lord,” Retiae said. “I’m sure of that. I was... we were... careful.”
“That lowers the chances that he deliberately seduced you to cause me embarrassment, at least,” Cafad observed. Retiae’s gaze jerked back to his face, the high color fading to a stark fear.
“No, lord,” she protested. “He wouldn’t do that! And Lord Darden wouldn’t ask that of him!”
“How would you know that?” Cafad said. “How would you know anything about Lord Darden’s limits? Have you served her before?”
“No, lord,” Retiae said, ducking her head again. “I’m sorry, lord. I—I was speaking based on what I’ve seen and heard of her. She’s very—very fair to the servants, lord. They like her.”
“Do you like her, Retiae?” Cafad inquired, beginning to see a way out of this mess at last.
“Yes, lord,” Retiae said firmly. “I do, very much.”
“Good. Because when she returns, I’ll be offering her your service on a permanent basis. If she agrees, well and good; there’s room enough for another kathain in her suite. If she isn’t interested—for any reason—you’ll leave this Fortress.”
Retiae stared, mouth half-open, as though utterly paralyzed. “Leave, lord?” she croaked after a moment. “Where would you send me?”
“I don’t much care where you go, Retiae,” Cafad said, allowing chill to flood his voice. “You’ve broken your oaths. That releases me from my obligations to you. I’m allowing you to stay on as my kathain, and you may continue serving Riss, until we have a chance to speak with Lord Darden. After that, you’ll be released from my service, whichever way the decision goes.”
Retiae’s eyes brimmed with tears. She gulped in breath several times before speaking. “Lord Scratha, please don’t turn me out,” she said. “I don’t want to leave your service. I truly, truly don’t.”
“You are leaving my service,” Cafad said. “There’s no way around that.” His building annoyance laid a hard edge on his voice. “And Retiae—until and unless you are accepted into Lord Darden’s service, you will stay away from Ishru. Completely. If I hear of another incident, you’ll be turned out on the spot. Go.”
The girl scrambled to her feet and almost bolted from the room. At the doorway, she caught herself, turned, and offered a hasty, sloppy bow. “G-g-grace to y-y-your—” she stuttered, then fled without completing the salutation.
“That was kinder than she deserved,” Mei said from the doorway of the kathain room. Her face was set in a stern scowl.
“She’s barely above a child,” Cafad said. He flopped back onto the bed.
“She’s kathain, lord,” Mei said. “And F’Heing trained. She stopped being a child a long time ago.”
Cafad shut his eyes. “Go back to sleep, Mei.”
“Lord—”
“I’m not discussing this.”
She sniffed disapproval. He heard the curtain move in her wake as she retreated; entertained a brief image of going after her to—what? Shout at her, hit her—no. Must keep my temper even. Mustn’t get angry. Mustn’t be violent. He was under too much strain, that was all. He needed some sleep. Sleep would take care of his edgy mood.
Yellow hazed his vision as he sank away from conscious thought once more.
Chapter 26
The acrid taste of coffee coated the back of Riss’s tongue, just one of many things she hated about this place. She’d ingested far too much of the noxious stuff since arriving at Scratha Fortress, out of due courtesy. It always gave her a headache and, soon after, a fit of the shits.
The water cup wasn’t on the bedside table. Retiae was nowhere in sight, and didn’t respond when Riss called for her. Nobody came, although Riss yelled herself nearly hoarse, her temper growing more sour with every moment. What was the good of being a noble southern lady if she couldn’t even have someone fetch her a simple cup of water?
She’d get the water herself. The ewer of drinking water was only a few steps from the bed. She could do it herself. And then she’d punish that stupid girl for not being in proper attendance. That was absolutely within her rights.
She rolled out of bed, grunting with the effort. Her vastly swollen stomach made her feel like a lumbering draft-ox. The child kicked as Riss put her weight fully on her feet, and kicked hard. It hurt. Her knees buckled, nearly dropping her to the floor. She caught herself against the bed, yelping as her shin caught against the frame.
She couldn’t bend over to rub her shin. Her stomach got in the way. Instead, she gritted her teeth and limped over to the table to get the water.
The ewer was gone.
She stared, puzzled and outraged. The ewer was nowhere to be seen. Neither was her bed. It had been replaced with a giant crib, large enough to hold an adult human.
“That’s way too big,” she said aloud.
“Not for my child,” Idisio said. He grinned at her from the other side of the crib, his hands splayed comfortably along the rail. “It’s going to be a big one. Ha’ra’hain always are.”
“When did you get back?” she demanded.
“I never left,” he said, laughing. “Now, about the child—”
“It’s not your child!” she protested. “I know that! I was already pregnant when I met you. It can’t possibly be yours.”
He shook his head, his eyes turning an odd greyish-yellow color. “You were pregnant with a human child,” he told her. “I’m not human. I’m ha’ra’ha. I’m more powerful in every way than a human.” He smirked. “It was a human child. But it’s my child now.”
Horror sent her stumbling back, weak-kneed once more.
“That’s impossible!”
“You don’t get to choose what’s possible in this world,” Idisio said. His face elongated, eyes turning round and golden, pupils disappearing. “It’s mine, Riss, and I want it. Give me the child. Tell me it’s mine. Give it to me.”
“No! You can’t have it!” Vague memory of another confrontation stirred, and she added, “Go away. You can’t have my child. Go away. I don’t want you here. I don’t believe you’re real. Go away!”
“I’m real, Riss,” Idisio said, still smirking, even as he began to fade into greyish-yellow smoke. “You’ll find out soon enough. I’m what’s real. You’re the illusion.” The words trailed off into a serpentine, hissing cackle.
She turned around, desperate for solid surroundings. A yellowing mist hung around her, dense and opaque. Everything disappeared, even the floor and ceiling. “Dear gods,” she said, then, her nerve breaking, began to scream: “Somebody—someone—help!”
Laughter hissed through the mist.
“It’s never going to be your child,” Karic said, somewhere far away, down some back corridor of her mind where light bent sideways and all of time was, horribly, whole. “A whore doesn’t get to keep her children. You’re not a fit mother. You’re good for nothing but mucking out stables and then being fucked up against a wall, still sweaty and straw-covered. Give it the child. It will take care of the child properly. You never would.”
Riss shut her eyes and screamed, “Go away!”
Silence echoed into place with a peculiar, shifting not-noise. A familiar voice yelped in startled outrage. Before Riss could do more than open her eyes, someone grabbed her up into a tight embrace.
“Wake up, Riss!” a man demanded in her ear. His arms tightened, and he shook her. “Open your eyes. Holy gods and murders—wake up!”
“‘M’wayg,” she said into his shoulder. “Leggo, dnnit!”
As he released her, a second set of arms came from behind, pulling her back into a considerably softer embrace, and Retiae whimpered in Riss’s ear. “I’m sorry, lord,” the kathain said, breath choking as though she were in tears. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t—I should have woken—”
“Quiet,” Cafad snapped. “Go ask Lord Darden’s kathain to provide a safe sleeping draught.”
“Lord—I shouldn’t leave—”
“Go!”
“Yes, lord,” Retiae said, scrambling upright. She was still tying her wrap closed as she ran from the room.
“Riss,” Scratha said, his voice still stern. “Look at me.”
She blinked, rubbing at her face to clear her vision. His face was grey with strain, and heavy lines marked the skin around his eyes and mouth. He studied her intently for a few moments, then let out an explosive sigh and sat back.
“Gods—half the Fortress was screaming in their sleep. What were you dreaming about?” His attention went to her stomach, and the lines around his eyes deepened into a scowl. “What’s this?”
He reached out and touched her nightgown. She looked down, bewildered, and gasped. The thin fabric was speckled with fresh blood. “Am I having a—”
“No,” Cafad cut her off, not taking his gaze from her stomach. “No, a miscarriage would bleed further down. Hold still.” He touched one of the blood spots lightly. “Still damp—and it isn’t yours.” His frown deepened.
Riss stared at Cafad in dawning horror. “You think—you think I did something?” she demanded. “That this—that the blood—you can’t be serious! How can it not be mine?”
He shook his head, expression bleak. “I don’t know, Riss,” he said. “I can’t sense anything more, only that it’s not your blood.” He paused. “Tell me about the dream. Please. It might help me understand.”
His quiet, reasonable tone dragged through her resistance, pulling compliance to the forefront. Even knowing he was doing that desert lord thing, she couldn’t fight it. She shut her eyes, as much to assert some control as to avoid seeing his face as she spoke.
“It’s always so vivid, so real,” she said. “I—I keep seeing Karic. He calls me a—a whore—saying I have to give him the child—that I’m no good for anything but—but being—” Her breath caught, emotion swelling. She stifled a sob into a soggy hiccup.
“That’s only your own fears, Riss, not the truth. You were tricked by a practiced liar. Everyone falls prey to that sooner or later.” Cafad’s voice soured noticeably on the last words.
“But what if I’m no good as a mother—my mother always said that the clearer the dream, the more the gods are trying to tell you something. These are so real—so, so, distinct—what if my child really is going to be taken away? What if it should be—”
“No,” Cafad interrupted firmly. “You’ll be a perfectly fine mother. Nobody’s going to take your child from you.”
She began to relax. What had she been so upset about in the first place? Of course it wasn’t true. Of course she wasn’t a bad person. She was a smart person, and she was safe here.
Absolutely safe.
“Was there anything more to the dream?” Scratha asked.
“Idisio,” she said vaguely. “He was in the dream too, this time.”
“I certainly hope he didn’t call you a whore,” Scratha said, his voice dry as the desert sands.
“No. No—he just—” Riss paused, trying to remember; sat up, dragging her arm across her nose. Mucus streaked her arm in a thick snail-trail. She grimaced, feeling the blush heating her face again. “He—uhm. He wanted my child. That—that it was his, not—not Karic’s. That ha’ra’hain are stronger than humans and it started out human but now it wasn’t, because we’d... you know. He said it was his child, and he wanted to take it from me.”
Cafad sat very still, staring at her, an odd pale cast to his features. “I never thought—” he said, then cut himself off and patted her hand reassuringly, forcing a smile. “Just a dream, Riss. Don’t worry about it.”
“You think that’s possible?” she demanded, panic hammering through her.
“No, no, no,” he said. “No. I wasn’t thinking clearly, Riss, I’ve only just woken up myself. Please, don’t take that so to heart. No. I was startled at the thought, but of course that’s not possible. That’s not how it works.”
He patted her hand again, and looked tremendously relieved when Ishru and Retiae came through the door a moment later.
Chapter 27
Cafad made room for the two kathain by moving to stand near the door. He folded his arms, uncertain whether he ought to leave them or wait. Ishru seemed entirely capable of handling matters from here, and gods knew he didn’t want to look at Retiae just now.
She’d betrayed his trust, as tharr generally did. She could have come to him if she needed that sort of comfort—she’d certainly seemed satisfied in the past! But she’d gone and created a complication instead. Women. Tharr. There was no use trusting them—
Cafad shook his head, rubbing a hand across his eyes. Disorientation leaned him hard against the wall for a moment.
Those were unworthy thoughts. I need to go back to sleep.
Something caught his eye as he straightened: a smear of red-brown in the wrong place. He took a step forward, latching onto Retiae’s thin arm, and hauled her away from hovering over Riss. She yelped, in surprise more than pain. Ishru turned, too quickly, his expression alarmed.
After a scant heartbeat of matching stares with Cafad, Ishru turned back to his patient, his shoulders noticeably stiff. Cafad ignored him.
“Lord?” Retiae said in a small voice. “Have I offended again, lord?”
Still gripping her arm, he looked at the smudge on the ties of her wrap. Dried blood, long since turned brown. He found himself reluctant to touch it. “Your hands,” he said. “Show me both your hands. Front and back.”
He focused his vision tightly enough to pick out dust motes in the air before he saw it: A pin-tip speckling across the palm of her right hand, the dried blood almost imperceptible against her dark honey skin tone.
