“You’re nervous as the fleas on a dead dog.” Jassi set her fists on her hips after she deposited the tray on the table by the window, narrowed her eyes at him. “Negomas says last night went good, what you fussing about? This business with the slaves? Peh! Taga, that happens a half-dozen times a year. We spend a few days dodging damn guards, then they’ll catch the running fools and things’ll settle back the way they were. Hey, you know why they leaving this inn alone? Cause you here, that’s why. Grandda he even had a thought maybe he’d let you stay here free, well, that one he din keep in his head for long.” She giggled. “So you got nothin to worry about.”
He dredged up a smile, flipped a silver bit to her. “Just nerves, Jass, it’s the waiting and not knowing.”
She winked at him. “No sweat, Taga, you got it. We see a lot of ‘em here and we know.” A giggle, a side-to-side jerk of her hips, and she was gone.
He pulled the door shut and went back to pacing, gulping down several cups of the strong steaming liquid as he paced. The hollow in his belly that spurred him into ordering the sandwiches had vanished before Jassi came in with the tray. Helpless, that’s what he was, nothing he could do to change what was going to happen; he couldn’t remember feeling this helpless since the day four-year-old Taga drifted lost in an angry ocean clutching a ship’s timber, sure nobody would ever find him.
THE FORT’S MAIN tower was a dark gray thumb thrusting into the sky. Sammang stood in the bow glaring at it when he wasn’t scanning the water for the constantly shifting sandbars that were the plague of the coast along here. The Arth Slyans were below decks again, out of sight and out of the way. They crept closer to the fort. The sun was a hammer beating down, the glare from the water hard and bright, hiding the sand until they were almost on it, until it was almost too late to avoid jamming the ship into the soft sucking traps. They crept along, feeling their way through the water. The fort was silent. No one on the walls, no challenges. The ship came even with the dark mass. Silence. Hot, limp, cataleptic. They slid past into the deeper water, the brownish stain from the outflow vanishing into the blue of the open sea. Sammang drew his arm across his face, slapped at the rail. “Turrope, Rudar, ‘Reech, get those sails up.”
MID-AFTERNOON. A knock. He smoothed his hair down, composed his face, walked with slow controlled steps to the door and pulled it open.
Jassi grinned at him. “He downstairs again. That slave.” She tapped at Taguiloa’s arm. “Din I tell you?”
He cleared his throat. “Tell him I’m meditating, but I’ll be down in a breath.”
“I give him a jar of the good stuff. He happy. No sweat.” She giggled. “You come down ‘f you want, but he din ask to see you. He give me this.”
Lead seals clanked dully at the ends of the red ribbon tied about the roll of parchment. He steadied his hand, lifted the roll until he could see the pattern squeezed into the lead. “The Emperor’s sigil,” he said softly. “Maratullik’s man you said?”
“Yeah, I said. You gonna read that?”
Taguiloa smiled. “I am gonna read it.” He carried the scroll to the window, rubbed the ribbon off, hitched his hip on the sill and flattened the parchment on his thigh. After skimming through the elaborately brushed signs, he started at the top and read it again. His name. The names of the others in the troupe. Horses. Wagon. Props. All listed. Commanded to appear before the Emperor and his consort two nights hence. Under the name PLAYERS OF THE LEFT HAND. They were further commanded to move next day into the rooms provided in meslak Maratullik where they would be the Emperor’s resident company. He set his hand on the notice, grinned at Jassi. “Command performance. Before the Emperor.”
She slapped her hand on her thigh. “Din I tell you, din I? din I?”
“That you did, jass. Tell Papa Jao to lay on a feast tonight. Everyone in the inn and all the players in the Quarter you can fit at the tables. Scoot.”
He watched her swing out laughing and excited, shouting the good news as she clattered down the stairs, then frowned at the parchment. He had no intention of spending the rest of his life in this dead-alive steambath of a city. Breaking loose would take some tricky maneuvering, though. He couldn’t just pick up and leave. Seshtrango send the man boils on his butt and a plague of worms. He sighed. Brann and Harra would have to get to Maratullik somehow, change his mind. Or… well, that’s for later. Maybe he’s not so hot to keep hold of us, just wants something to distract the Emperor from the way his security chief had lost a clutch of slaves. The troupe was a toy to dangle in front of him. Brann, do I owe this to you like all the rest? He tossed the parchment roll on the table and settled himself into a corner of the room to do his breathing exercises and meditate himself back into the calm he needed to handle what was happening.
ANOTHER LATE AFTERNOON. The troupe turns onto the lakefront avenue, this time passing through the gates of Maratullik’s meslak. Guards before, guards behind, slave on a cranky white mule. Lake water turned hard and bright as sapphire shards, the sun burning hot in a cloudless sky. Rumbling past slaves trotting on late errands who cringe into the walls and watch the procession nimble along. Air burning in Taguiloa’s throat, catching there when Cymanacamal rumbles and belches a gout of steam… The walls, the stone blocks of the paving creak beneath and around him. No wind, the latening day is so still every sound is a slap against his ears. Ominously still, once the noise of the mountain’s stirring has subsided. Premonition sits like an ulcer in his belly. He tells himself it is pre-performance jitters. This is perhaps the most important performance of his life, not because he will be dancing before the Emperor-he has few illusions about the quality of the Emperor’s appreciation and a deep-seated Hina resentment of all Temuengs, especially those in positions of power-it is important because it will determine the course of the rest of his life. He sits with the reins draped loosely through his fingers letting the cob pick his own pace, a willed nay-saying in his head. Nothing is going to go wrong, disaster will not happen, nothing happened in the Hand’s house before that crowd of louts, nothing will happen when they perform before a court certain to be better mannered. Brann riding in front of the cob, Jaril perched behind her, Yaril-hound running beside her, her dun is restive, jerking his head about, drawing his black lips back, baring long yellow teeth. Harra riding beside the wagon, strain showing on her face. Nay-saying again, he will not see that strain, will not look at her again. Linjijan sitting up for once, fingering his practice flute, shifting continually. Even Linjijan the self-absorbed is restless and uneasy. About what? He will not think about Linjijan.
The palace gates open to take them in.
AN UNDERSTEWARD led them to a room opening off the audience hall where they would be performing and left them to get ready after telling Taguiloa that the hall was being prepared as he requested, matting on the floor, low stools for the musicians, a screened-off area to retire behind when one or the other of them wasn’t on stage.
There were screens here also, set up at the far end of the long narrow room, dressing rooms of a sort. Along one wall two coppers of hot water simmered on squat braziers with soft white cloths heaped high on small tables beside the braziers, fine white porcelain basins beside the towels. Taguiloa smiled as Brann went immediately to the basins, ran her fingers over them hunting makermarks. Against the other wall, nearer the door, a long low table with pots of tea, wine jugs, fingerfood in elaborate array. Runners of braided, reed taking the chill off the stone floor, a scatter of plump silk pillows. The Hand must have enthused wildly about them.