“Quick! Catch him! Catch him! Quickly!”
“Aah!”
“Too late!”
“I win I win I win!”
“You win again! What cunningness in one so young!” Perrund picked the boy up with her good arm and swung him on to the seat beside her. Lattens, UrLeyn’s son, squirmed as he was tickled then yelped and dived under a fold in the concubine’s gown and tried to hide there as DeWar, who had run most of the length of the visiting chamber of the outer harem in a vain attempt to head Lattens off, arrived panting and growling.
“Where’s that child?” he demanded gruffly.
“Child? Why, what child could that be?” the lady Perrund asked, hand at her throat, her blue-flecked eyes wide.
“Ach, never mind. I’ll just have to sit down here to get my breath back after chasing the young scamp.” There was a giggle as DeWar sat down right beside the boy, whose hose and shoes stuck out from the woman’s robe. “What’s this? Here are that rascal’s shoes. And look!” DeWar grabbed Lattens’ ankle. There was a muffled shriek. “And his leg! I’ll bet the rest is attached! Yes! Here he is!” Perrund pulled away the fold of her gown to let DeWar tickle the boy, then brought a cushion from another part of the couch and put it under the boy’s bottom. DeWar plonked him there. “Do you know what happens to boys who win at hide-and-seek?” DeWar asked. Lattens, wide-eyed, shook his head and made to suck his thumb. Perrund gently stopped him from doing this. “They get,” DeWar growled, coming very close to the child, “sweets!”
Perrund handed him the box of crystallised fruits. Lattens squealed with delight and rubbed his hands together, staring into the box and trying to decide which to have first. Eventually he grabbed a small handful.
Huesse, another red-gowned concubine, sat heavily down on a couch across from Perrund and DeWar. She too had been involved in the game of hide-and-seek. Huesse was Lattens’ aunt. Her sister had died giving birth to Lattens towards the start of the war of succession. Huesse was a plumply supple woman with unruly fair ringleted hair.
“And have you had your lessons for today, Lattens?” Perrund asked.
“Yes,” the boy said. He was small made, like his father, though he had the red-tinged golden hair of his mother and his aunt.
“And what did you learn today?”
“More things about equal triangles, and some history, about things which have happened.”
“I see,” Perrund said, settling the boy’s collar back down and patting his hair flat again.
“There was this man called Narajist,” the boy said, licking his fingers free of sugar dust.
“Naharajast,” DeWar said. Perrund motioned him quiet.
“Who looked in a tube at the sky and told the Emperor…” Lattens screwed up his eyes and peered up at the three glowing plaster domes lighting the chamber. “Poeslied—”
“Puiside,” DeWar muttered. Perrund frowned severely and tutted.
“— there were big fiery rocks up there and Watch Out!” The boy stood and shouted the last two words, then sat down again and leant over the box of sweets, one finger to his lips. “And the Emperor didn’t and the rocks killed him dead.”
“Well, it’s a little simplified,” DeWar began.
“What a sad story!” Perrund said, now ruffling the boy’s hair. “The poor old Emperor!”
“Yes,” the boy shrugged. “But Daddy came along and made everything all right again.”
The three adults looked at each other and laughed. “Indeed he did,” Perrund said, taking away the box of sweets and hiding it behind her. “Tassasen is powerful again, isn’t it?”
“Mm-hmm,” Lattens said, trying to squirm behind Perrund in pursuit of the box of sweets.
“I think it might be time for a story,” Perrund said, and pulled the boy back to a sitting position. “DeWar?”
DeWar sat and thought for a moment. “Well,” he said, “it’s not much of a story, but it is a story of sorts.”
“Then tell it.”
“It is suitable for the boy?” Huesse asked.
“I shall make it so.” DeWar sat forward and shifted his sword and dagger. “Once upon a time there was a magical land where every man was a king, every woman a queen, each boy a prince and all girls princesses. In this land there were no hungry people and no crippled people.”
“Were there any poor people?” asked Lattens.
“That depends what you mean. In a way no, because they could all have any amount of riches they wanted, but in a way yes, for there were people who chose to have nothing. Their hearts’ desire was to be free from owning anything, and they usually preferred to stay in the desert or in the mountains or the forests, living in caves or trees or just wandering around. Some lived in the great cities, where they too just roved about. But wherever they chose to wander, the decision was always theirs.”
“Were they holy people?” Lattens asked.
“Well, in a way, maybe.”
“Were they all handsome and beautiful, too?” Huesse asked.
“Again, that depends what you mean by beautiful,” DeWar said apologetically. Perrund sighed with exasperation. “Some people see a sort of beauty in ugliness,” DeWar said. “And if everybody is beautiful there is something singular in being ugly, or just plain. But, generally, yes, everybody was as beautiful as they wanted to be.”
“So many ifs and buts,” Perrund said. “This sounds a very equivocal land.”
“In a way,” DeWar smiled. Perrund hit him with a cushion. “Sometimes,” DeWar continued, “as people in the land brought more of it under cultivation—”
“What was the name of the land?” Lattens interrupted.
“Oh… Lavishia, of course. Anyway, sometimes the citizens of Lavishia would discover whole groups of people who lived a bit like the wanderers, that is, like the poor or holy people in their own land, but who did not have the choice of living like that. Such people lived like that because they had to. These were people who hadn’t had the advantages in life the people of Lavishia were used to. In fact, dealing with such people soon became the biggest problem the people of Lavishia had.”
“What? They had no war, famine, pestilence, taxes?” Perrund asked.
“None. And no real likelihood of the last three.”
“I feel my credulity being stretched,” Perrund muttered.
“So in Lavishia everybody was happy?” Huesse asked.
“As happy as they could be,” DeWar said. “People still managed to make their own unhappinesses, as people always do.”
Perrund nodded. “Now it begins to sound plausible.”
“In this land there lived two friends, a boy and a girl who were cousins and who had grown up together. They thought they were adults but really they were still just children. They were the best of friends but they disagreed on many things. One of the most important things they disagreed about was what to do when Lavishia chanced upon one of these tribes of poor people. Was it better to leave them alone or was it better to try and make life better for them? Even if you decided it was the right thing to do to make life better for them, which way did you do this? Did you say, Come and join us and be like us? Did you say, Give up all your own ways of doing things, the gods that you worship, the beliefs you hold most dear, the traditions that make you who you are? Or do you say, We have decided you should stay roughly as you are and we will treat you like children and give you toys that might make your life better? Indeed, who even decided what was better?”
Lattens was shifting and wriggling on the couch. Perrund was trying to keep him still. “Were there really not any wars?” the child asked.
“Yes,” Perrund said, looking concernedly at DeWar. “This may all be a little abstract for a child of Lattens’ age.”
DeWar smiled sadly. “Well, there were some very small wars very far away, but to be brief, the two friends decided that they would put their arguments to a test. They had another friend, a lady, who… very much liked both of the friends, and who was very clever and very beautiful and who had a favour which she was prepared to grant either of them.” DeWar looked at Perrund and Huesse.