Kheda took a deep breath to try to calm his racing blood at the notion of her wet nakedness. ‘Are we going to continue this conversation?’
‘What conversation?’ Dev appeared in the archway.
‘When we can find the time, and the privacy.’ Risala looked at Kheda, her expression eloquent. ‘What’s going on?’ Dev demanded with scant courtesy. ‘Any news I should know about?’
Not as such.’ Kheda walked swiftly past Dev and out into the velvet night where the lamps along the walkways glowed like amber. ‘Just an unexpected turn of events.’ He smiled into the darkness. ‘And a reminder that the unexpected need not always turn out badly.’ He took another long, deep breath and strode towards Itrac’s distant pavilion, leaving Dev hurrying to match his pace.
Though best not get there too soon or Rekha will certainly see that you welcomed another woman’s embraces after you spurned her. This evening’s going to be fraught enough without adding that complication
But what will tomorrow bring, if you and Risala can find somewhere away from the ever-present eyes?
Chapter Five
Well, we won’t be overheard, but I wouldn’t call this private, Kheda.’ Risala looked around the deck of the Amigal and then up at the Gossamer Shark towering above the little ship. Dev looked down on them both, stony-faced, from the rail above. ‘What made you change your mind about continuing what we began in the observatory?’ she asked bluntly.
‘I was hardly in the mood for dalliance after an evening sitting between Rekha and Itrac,’ Kheda said ruefully. ‘And besides, as I saw all the shipmasters watching our every move, weighing our every word . . .’ He sighed. ‘I really cannot complicate Itrac’s life by being seen to take another woman. And you were right: you can hardly be my chief spy with everyone knowing you’re my lover.’
‘And if they don’t know?’ Risala looked steadily at him. ‘What then?’
Kheda hesitated.
‘What then?’ the girl asked again. ‘Come on, Kheda, there are no secrets between us. I want to know where I stand. I’ve been waiting for eight days. You didn’t even come to tell me you were launching this expedition the very next morning. I had to hear it from Dev.’ Her tone was reasonable but firm. There was a sign when we read the stars: silverlight shimmering all around the Ruby and the Spear,’ Kheda began slowly, ‘which were opposite the arc of foes, which is where the new-year stars aligned.’
‘I didn’t ask why you decided to launch this expedition so quickly,’ Risala began. ‘Never mind.’ She turned away from Kheda, reaching a hand out towards the little ship’s mast.
‘And there’s this,’ Kheda said abruptly. As Risala turned back, he dug into a pouch on his belt and pulled out a string of tiny shark’s teeth pierced and threaded on a narrow leather thong. ‘When I was taking the omens at the pearl reefs, they caught a shark for me. There was an infant shark inside it. It nearly bit me as I read the entrails.’ He tossed the shark’s teeth necklace over and Risala caught it reflexively. ‘An infant shark alive inside its mother? I’ve never heard of such a thing.’ Risala looked wide-eyed at the talisman for a long, tense moment. ‘The last wild wizard, the one that we had to hunt down, he wore a necklace of shark’s teeth. Is that what you’re thinking of? What do you think such a sign could mean?’
‘I don’t know what I’m thinking,’ Kheda said rather wearily. But yes, I remembered that savage wizard.’ The warmth of his blood on my skin when I caught him and cut his throat from ear to ear. The weight of him in my arms and the stench of his death. Dev tells me to souse such memories in liquor. Is that why the barbarians drink so much, to make killing easier? Don’t they see how that devalues their deeds?
‘After I left Itrac and Rekha, I spent most of that night seeing if Chazen’s forefathers recorded any lore on sharks that might explain such a portent.’ Kheda shook his head. ‘I found nothing to make sense of it. But after what you said about not having fulfilled Shek Kul’s commission, it set me thinking how we need to be free of all these invaders and all their mysteries.’ He looked at her. ‘That applies to you and me as much as to the Chazen domain. We can’t look to our future until we’re free of the past.’ Risala made a noncommittal noise. ‘Then let’s get rid of these last savages as soon as we can. What exactly do you want me to do?’
Kheda looked out across the broad blue channel where the fleet of boats was riding a substantial swell. ‘We know they are still infesting the Snake Bird Islands.’ He gestured towards green tufts of islands barely visible on the horizon. ‘And I very much doubt any would manage to escape the Gossamer Shark’s patrols, even if they didn’t simply drown in these waters. All the same, I want to be certain there is still no sign of any of the vermin lurking in Balaia or Dalao.’ He turned to look at a scatter of long, low islands on the far side of a vast reach of shallows where sea grasses grew thick, placid brown and grey turtles grazing on them. ‘Can you sail around the villages and make doubly sure for me?’ Because I can’t spare any swordsmen for such a duty. Because even if I can’t take you to my bed, I’m torn between wanting you close to me but wanting to keep you out of danger.
Risala looked around the small fleet idling on the waters. ‘I take it there’ll be someone keeping station hereabouts, for me to report to and who will send you a courier?’
Kheda nodded. ‘The Yellow Serpent has earned that privilege.’
‘Then let’s be about it.’ Risala looked up at Dev’s impatient face and smiled sunnily before offering the string of tiny shark’s teeth back to Kheda.
He waved it away. No, you keep it. The one piece of shark lore everyone agrees on is that their teeth are a talisman against drowning or their attack. I want you kept as safe as possible.’ He looked at her and hoped she could see the longing in his eyes.
‘You keep yourself safe, too,’ she said huskily before lifting her fingers to whistle shrilly to the trireme. Now go on and do what you have to do.’ She turned her back on him and went to unlash the little ship’s tiller, to guide the Amigal close to the looming trireme’s stern.
Kheda watched the dangling rope ladder carefully and caught it deftly. He climbed, resolutely not looking behind him.
There should be no secrets between us. Every time I say there aren’t, I wait for the thunderclap or some other sign in a clear sky to set everyone wondering who the liar is and what falsehood has been spoken. Though I haven’t lied. I just haven’t told you all I might. When we have time to ourselves, there’s more I will tell you. Will you be able to explain it to me? In all Rekha’s endless chatter about the Daish domain, how they are thriving, all the children and Sirket most of all, as she gave me message after message from Janne, she made no mention at all of Sain, beyond assuring us in passing that Daish’s erstwhile third wife is prospering in her trades for the domain.
Did Sain truly send no message? Am I dead to her? Or is she so full of hate or sorrow that there was no expressing it? How well did I serve her, in offering her Daish wealth and status in return for alliance with her brother’s domain of Toe, with its sheltered sea lanes to the eastern reaches, beyond Ulla Safar’s fat and grasping hand?
None of the women who’ve shared my bed seem to relish the memory or to have profited by it. Itrac Chazen doesn’t even want to take the chance. Hadn’t I better wait for some more hopeful portent before embarking on any new liaison?
Especially with Risala. I never felt such longing for a woman before, such fear that I might lose such a jewel.
‘Are we ready to go, my lord?’ Dev reached out a hand and helped Kheda over the Gossamer Shark’s stern rail.
‘We are.’ Kheda nodded to the shipmaster, resolutely ignoring the dull ache of desire for Risala that perversely was slower to fade every time he thought of her. ‘Let’s make for the Snake Bird Islands, Master Mezai.’
‘As you wish, my lord.’ The mariner waved a signal to the rowing master on the oar deck below and folded muscular arms across his sleeveless mantle, a short garment of pale blue patterned with waving sea grasses. The rowers bent over their oars and the sail crew hurried to spread the great expanse of billowing canvas hanging from the square-rigged mast to take advantage of the wind at their stern. Even with this bonus, the rowers still toiled long and hard to cross the dark-blue waters where the shallows fell away into mysterious darkness. His record of these reaches tucked in his lizardskin belt, Shipmaster Mezai stood close to his helmsman, lending his strength to the steering oars as the fierce current sought to drag the heavy vessel off course. Kheda watched astern as the little fleet slewed across the waters, fighting the insistent tug of the seas that would so easily sweep them out to battle the dangers of the open ocean.