She moved to the crate she used as a linen chest and dressing table, grunted as she lifted a small iron-bound box. Shoulders bent, she elbowed past the curtain.
Carup was sitting on the bed. She’d put the shift on again, and pulled a quilt around her shoulders, but she blushed when Brann came in, then looked uncertain as she saw the old woman who’d bought her free. She stole a look in the mirror-it was on the box beside the candle; she’d put her sandal behind it to tilt it up so she could see herself when she glanced that way. She blushed again, stared down at her hands as they rested in her lap, fingers twined tightly together.
Brann nodded at the candle and the mirror. “Push those aside, will you, Carup? So I can set this down. It’s heavy.”
Hastily the girl tossed the mirror onto the bed, brushed the sandal off the box and pushed the candle back. “Is that enough?”
“It should be.” The flimsy box creaked under the weight of the small chest. “This isn’t locked now, though you should keep it so later. Open it.”
“Me?”
“It’s your dowry, young Carup. Now, do what I tell you. Open the chest.”
“Oh.” Carup turned back the lid. Inside, there were two doeskin bags and a small belt-purse. She loosened the drawstring on the larger bag, reached in and took out a handful of coins. Gold coins, thick, heavy, with a cold greasy feel to them. “Jorpashil jaraufs,” she whispered. “Sahanai the Siradar’s daughter wore hers at her wedding, threaded round her neck.”
“One hundred,” Brann said. “I promised you a queen’s price, child.”
“She only had ten.” Carup turned the broad coins over and over, rubbing her fingers across them, then she put them back in the bag and pulled the drawstrings until the opening was gone; neat-fingered as always, she wrapped the thongs into a smooth coil and tucked it between the side of the box and the bag. She opened the second bag. Silver this time. Takks.
“Fifty,” Brann said. “Those are for you alone. A woman should always have her own money, Carup. It means she has a way out if she needs it. Pass what you don’t use to your daughters; tell them what I’ve just told you. It is a trust, Carup Kalan.”
“I hear and I obey, Jantria Bar Ana.” She put the takks away and opened the purse. There was a pile of worn dugnas inside it.
“One hundred dugnas, Carup, to buy clothing, hire a bodyguard and transport to get you home.”
“I don’t want to go home.” The words came out in a rush. “My father will just take the dowry and give it to my brothers. He did that all the time with the money my mother brought in.”
“Gods! Does nothing go right? I can’t leave you here.
The vultures would be down on you before I was gone an hour.”
“Take me with you, Jantria. I’ll serve you. You said I was good at serving you. The One Without a Name, I’ll serve that One too.”
Brann sank onto the hearth, her back against the rough bricks of the fireplace; their heat seeped through her shirt and into her bones. Sleep flooded through her, waves and waves of sleep. Thinking was like shoveling mud. “Carup,, I can’t.” The lies were catching up with her, twisting around her like a fowler’s net. That last bit was true enough, though. She couldn’t keep the girl with her. A deeper truth was, she didn’t want to. Carup was reading that, though she wasn’t fully aware of it, and trying to fight against it, flailing out helplessly, futilely. Brann drew her fist across her mouth, let her eyes droop closed for a minute. Fine time for the girl to dredge up some independence. “Where I go, no one can come.” Make it convincing, Brann; she’s going to be stubborn. “Even if you tell him the dowry is the gift of a god?”
“He wouldn’t listen to me. Even if he listened, he wouldn’t believe me.” Camp wrapped the quilt tighter about her body, pulled her legs up and tucked them under her. She was fighting now, at last she was fighting for what she wanted. “If I go home and he takes me back as his daughter, I belong to him. Listen,” she said. Her voice broke in the middle of the word. “This is how it went in my home, Jantria. My mother made shirts and sold them in the Pattan Haria Market; she had made herself a name for her broideries. Sometimes she got more from her shirts than he did off the land.” She cleared her throat; her hand crept from beneath the quilt and stroked the side of her face where the mark had been. When she spoke again, it was in a hoarse whisper; she was talking about family things, breaking one of the most rigid taboos of her culture. “He took her money whenever the tribes came to Lake Tabaga and my brothers wanted to go into Pattan Haria and get drunk with them. My mother spent her eyes and her fingers on those shirts, she took from sleep time to make them and he took her money for my brothers to waste. Didn’t matter what she said, what she wanted to do with the money; he owned her so he owned what she earned. If I go back, he’ll do the same to me.”
Brann rubbed at her eyes as her plans fell in rubble about her. She’d been so sure she could send the girl home and let her family have the care of her. Double damn, Tungjii help! What do I do now? She sneezed. What I do now is sleep. She sighed and got to her feet. “I’m too tired to think, Carup. It’s late. Get some sleep. If you’re up before I am and you find people waiting for me, send them away, will you? Tell them I’m meditating; it will be the truth, child. Get some sleep yourself, you should be tired too.” She didn’t wait for a response but pushed past the curtain and fell on the bed, asleep as soon as her body was horizontal.
10
Brann rubbed her eyes and sipped at the near boiling tea that Carup had brought to her as soon as she heard her moving around. She yawned and tried to clear the clots out of her head.
Hands clapped outside the curtain. Brann’s hand jerked and she nearly spilled tea down her front. She swore under her breath, brushed some drops off her trousers. “Yes, Carup, what is it?”
“Subbau Kamin brought fresh bread this morning, she says her grandson is full of devils and laughter and her son is over the moon about the change, she blesses you and hopes you will accept this small gift. Piara Sansa came with her and brought sausages. Would you like me to bring you some of this? The bread smells wonderful.”
“Yes, yes, but take some for yourself, hmm?”
“I will, thank you, Jantria.”
Brann finished her breakfast and stretched out on the bed, her fingers laced behind her head. She stared up at the ceiling, traced the cracks and played games with the stains, but found no answer anywhere. She was still tired, her energy badly depleted. And her head seemed to have shut down completely. She closed her eyes.
The sounds of the Kuna trickled in, women gossiping as they did the wash at the aqueduct overflow across the alley, slap-slapping the clothing against the washboards, laughing, scolding their children, the children running in slap-and-kick games, screaming, laughing, bawling, creating a cacophony thick enough to slice like sausage. Dogs barking, howling, whining and growling in sudden fights that broke off as suddenly when someone threw a brick at them or tossed water over them. Several streets off, some men were fighting, she couldn’t tell how many, others were gathered around them yelling encouragement or curses, making wagers on the outcome. Voices everywhere, the Kuna was stiff with noise, wall to wall, every day, all day, late into the night. There were always people in the alleys, going and coming from the lodgings, thieves coming back from their nightwork, pimps with their strings of whores, gamblers inside and out, running their endless games. To say nothing of the people who couldn’t afford even the meager rents and were living on the street. And the caudhar’s baddicks sniffing out those pimps who didn’t pay their bribes, running down thieves suspected of dipping their fingers into high purses, pride having outmatched sense, or just looking out for healthy youths who’d make good quarry in the Isun chases. Though she despised these hunters of men, they smelled like rotten fish to her, she left them alone when they were working the alleys; if one was found dead, the whole quarter would pay.