His foxy features were perfectly opaque as he smiled at Hamnet. "Well, I try to do that. Harder to be taken for a fool when you do, eh?"
"Er—yes." Hamnet had to drop it. Ulric left nothing on which to get a conversational grip.
The street zigzagged again. Jesper Fletti, who was riding ahead of Hamnet and Liv and Ulric, let out a war whoop no Bizogot in the world would have been ashamed to claim. "The palace!" he shouted. "The palace!" He might have spotted water in the southwestern desert. In an instant, all the guardsmen who'd gone north with Gudrid were shouting the same thing. "The palace! The palace!"'They'd come home at last, and probably all of them had wondered if they ever would.
Come to that, Hamnet Thyssen had wondered if he would come back to Nidaros, too, even if he was still a long way from his castle in the southeast at the forest's edge. A moment later, very much to his surprise, he found himself shouting, too.
Sigvat II didn't stint. He let the travelers use the imperial bathhouse. That was luxury by anyone's standards. Soft robes waited when the newcomers emerged. The gown the Emperor's maidservants presented to Liv told Count Hamnet what a fine figure she really had. Seeing her clean and dressed so was a far cry from the grubby woman in Bizogot-style furs and leathers. Those clothes, the same for women as for men, hardly showed which sex she belonged to. The wine-colored gown left no room for doubt.
It also flustered her. "How do your women stand outfits like this?" she asked Hamnet. "It's drafty!"
The gown did reveal more of her than he'd seen except when they were making love. "It shows the world how beautiful you are," he said.
Liv blushed. Now that she was clean, he could watch the flush rise from her throat all the way to her crown. "It's none of the world's business," she said, which alone would have proved her no Raumsdalian.
"Well, I like the way you look," Hamnet said.
"That's different. You already know more than this. But—" Liv waved her bare arms. "I feel like I'm naked in front of everyone. And it is drafty, even though more fires burn in this palace than in all the tents of the Three Tusk clan put together."
"Which bothers you more? The cold, or everyone looking at you?" he asked.
"Everyone looking at me," Liv said at once. "What will people think?"
"The women will think, I wish I looked that good," Hamnet Thyssen answered. "And the men? The men will think, I wish she were on my arm, not that gray-bearded count's."
Liv flushed again. "Your beard isn't gray," she said. "Only streaked."
"A matter of time." Hamnet didn't worry about his own looks. They were what they were, and he couldn't do much about them. "If things really bother you," he went on, "ask the servingwomen for a fur stole. That will warm you up and cover you up. I think it would be a shame, but do what you like."
"You're a man," Liv said, more or less tolerantly. "Of course you like to look at women."
"Pretty ones, yes."
"There is a what-do-you-call-it at sunset tonight," Liv said. "Could I really come to it dressed like this?"
"A reception. Gudrid will, or in something that shows even more of her," Hamnet answered. "So will plenty of other noblewomen, and noblemen's mistresses. And they'll all say, Who is that fair stranger?"
"You're making that up." But Liv's back stiffened. Hamnet smiled to himself. She liked the idea of outdoing Gudrid, and she thought she could, too. He judged she was right—she was a fine-looking woman with about a twelve years' head start. If they were born on the same day? Count Hamnet wasn't so sure. But, while the calendar might not be fair, it was part of life.
Liv did wear the gown to the reception. She wore it with a stern, jut-jawed determination that warned people not to dare to look at her twice. Because of that, some didn't look at her even once. Others, of course, couldn't get enough.
Hamnet Thyssen proved right about that, and about Gudrid. Her gown revealed and emphasized instead of concealing. She had a lot to show, and showed it to best advantage. When she strode into the reception hall with Eyvind Torfinn, the men already there gave her a couple of heartbeats of... respectful . . . admiration. Then most of them had to turn to the women they were with and pretend they’d done no such thing.
There, at least, Count Hamnet had no problem with Liv. She knew he was content—more than content—with her, and not ogling the woman to whom he'd once been married. All she said was, "Well, you knew what you were talking about." A bit later, she added, "If she tried to wear that up in the Bizogot country, she'd freeze."
"No doubt." Hamnet hid a smile. "But you're not in the Bizogot country anymore."
"Yes, I'd noticed that," Liv said.
"It has its advantages," he told her. "Come drink some wine."
She'd put up with beer and ale on the way south from the frontier. They were different from the smetyn she was used to, but not necessarily better. Wine, even in Nidaros, was an expensive imported luxury. One thing being Emperor meant, though, was not worrying about expense.
The tapman dipped her up a cup of wine red as blood, and another for Hamnet Thyssen. Liv's eyes widened as her nose caught the bouquet. "It even smells sweet," she said, and Hamnet nodded. She raised the silver cup to her lips. "Oh," she whispered.
Hamnet took a pull at his own cup. He nodded again. Nothing else was like wine, not even mead. Some of the southern Bizogots, who lived in country where bees could survive the year around, knew of mead. Liv's clan, though, wouldn't be able to brew it. Hamnet wondered if they ever got any in trade. He hadn't seen or heard of any while he was with the Three Tusk Bizogots.
Liv emptied the cup as fast as she could and held it out to the tapman. Face impassive, he filled it again. She made a good start on the refill, then said, "With this wonderful stuff to drink, why don't Raumsdalians stay drunk all the time?"
"Some of us do." Hamnet thought of Audun Gilli. He looked around for the wizard. As often happened, his eye slid past Audun and had to come back. Audun was drinking, or holding a silver cup, anyhow. He didn't seem drunk—but then, the night was still young. He was talking with a woman who wasn't wearing a great deal more than Gudrid. Maybe she would give him an incentive to stay somewhere within shouting distance of sober.
Ulric Skakki materialized at Hamnet's elbow. So it seemed, anyhow— one heartbeat, he was nowhere near; the next, there he stood, a winecup in hand, a slightly mocking smile on his face. "Not a bad bash," he said.
"No, not bad at all," Hamnet agreed. "I'm getting used to beef and mutton and pork again, after so long eating musk ox and—"
"And worse," Ulric finished for him. Maybe he was thinking of the dire-wolf liver he'd downed on the frozen plains. Hamnet Thyssen had no trouble calling it back to mind. Ulric went on, "How much do you suppose the Rulers would enjoy a spread like this?"
"Oh, maybe a little," Count Hamnet answered. "Yes, maybe."
"I think they might, too." As Hamnet had before, Ulric Skakki looked around. But he wasn't seeking Audun Gilli—he wanted Sigvat II. "I wish his Majesty would come in," he said when he didn't see him. "He hasn't wanted to hear about the Rulers, has he?"
"Not as much as I hoped he would," Hamnet Thyssen said. "As soon as he found out we didn't find the Golden Shrine and we weren't bringing home any treasure, he stopped being interested. I think this reception is a consolation prize."