Kethry raised an eyebrow in surprise. That meant Tarma was in an extraordinarily good mood. While time had brought a certain amount of healing to the ruined voice that had once been the pride of her Clan, Tarma's singing was still not something she paraded in public. Her voice was still harsh, and the tonalities were peculiar. She sometimes sounded to Kethry like someone who had been breathing smoke for forty-odd years. She was very sensitive about it and didn't offer to sing very often.
"What brought this on?" Kethry asked, as they crunched through the half-trampled snow, heading back to their double room in the Hawks' barracks. "You're seeming more than usually pleased with yourself."
Tarma grinned. "Partly this afternoon."
Kethry nodded, understanding. Tarma adored children -- which often surprised the boots off their parents. More, she was very good with them. And children universally loved her and her never-ending patience with them. She would play with them, tell them stories, listen to their woes -- if she hadn't been Kal'enedral, she'd have made an excellent mother. As it was, she was the willing child tender for any woman in Hawksnest who had ties to the company.
When she had time. Which, between drill and teaching duties, wasn't nearly as often as she liked. Somewhere in the back of her mind, Kethry was rather looking forward to the nebulous day when she and Tarma would retire to start their schools. Because then, Tarma would have younglings of her own -- by way of Kethry. More, she would have the children that would form the core of her resurrected Clan.
And bringing Tale'sedrin back to life would make Tarma happy enough that the smile she wore too seldom might become a permanent part of her expression.
"So -- what's the other part?" Kethry asked, shaking herself out of her woolgathering when she nearly tripped on a clump of snow.
Tarma snickered, eyes narrowed against the snow-glare and the westering sunlight. Her tone and her expression were both malicious. "Leslac's cooling his heels in the jail as of last night."
"Oh, really?" Kethry was delighted. "What happened?"
"Let's wait till we get inside; it's a long story."
Since they were only a few steps from the entrance to their granite-walled barracks, Kethry was willing to wait. As officers, they could have taken more opulent quarters, but frankly, they didn't really want them. Tarma hardly had any need for privacy; Kethry had yet to find anyone in or out of the Hawks that she wanted to dally with on any regular basis. On the rare occasions where comradeship got physical, she was more than willing to rent a room in an inn overnight. So they shared the same kind of spartan quarters as the rest of the mercenaries; a plain double room on the first floor of the barracks. The walls were wood, paneled over the stone of the building, there were pegs for their weapons, and stands for their armor, a single wardrobe, two beds, one on each wall, and three chairs and a small table. That was about the extent of it. The only concession to their rank was a wood-fired stove: Tarma felt the winter cold too much otherwise. They had a few luxuries besides: thick fur coverlets and heavy wool blankets on the beds, some fine silver goblets, oil lamps and candles instead of rush-dips -- but no few of the fighters had those, paid for out of their earnings. Both of them felt that since they worked as closely as they did with their underlings, there was no sense in having quarters that made subordinates uncomfortable. And, truth to tell, neither of them would truly have felt at ease in more opulent surroundings.
They pulled off their snow-caked garments and changed quickly, hanging the old on pegs by the stove to dry. Kethry noted as she pulled on a soft, comfortable brown robe and breeches, that Tarma had donned black, and frowned. It was true that Kal'enedral only wore dark, muted colors -- but black was for ritual combat or bloodfeud.
Tarma didn't miss the frown, faint as it was. "Don't get your hackles up; it's all I've got left -- everything else is at the launderers or wet. I'm not planning on calling anybody out -- not even that damned off-key songster. Much as he deserves it -- and much as I'd like to."
Warrl raised his head from the shadows of the corner he'd chosen for his own, with a contemptu-ous snort. The kyree liked the cold even less man Tarma, and spent much of his time in the warm corner by the stove curled up on a pad of old rugs.
:You two have no taste. I happen to think Leslac is a fine musician, and a very talented one.:
Tarma answered with a snort of her own. "All right then, you go warm his bed. I'm sure he'd appreciate it."
Warrl simply lowered his head back to his paws, and closed his glowing golden eyes with dignity.
"Tell, tell, tell!" Kethry urged, having as little love for the feckless Leslac as did her partner. She threw herself down into her own leather-padded hearthside chair, and leaned forward in her eager-ness to hear.
"All right -- here's what I was told -- " Tarma lounged back in her chair, and put her feet up on the black iron footrest near the stove to warm them.
"Evidently his Bardship was singing that song in the Falcon last night."
That song was the cause for Tarma's latest grievance with the Bard. It seemed that Leslac, apparently out of willfulness or true ignorance, had not the least notion of what being Kal'enedral meant. He had decided that Tarma's celibacy was the result of her own will, not of the hand of her Goddess --
The fact was that, as Kal'enedral, Tarma was celibate because she had become, effectively, neuter. Kal'enedral had no sexual desire, and little sexual identity. There was a perfectly logical reason for this. Kal'enedral served first the Goddess of the South Wind, the Warrior, who was as sexless as the blade She bore -- and they served next the Clans as a whole -- and lastly they served their individual Clans. Being sexless allowed them to keep a certain cool perspective that kept them free of feuding and allowed them to act as interClan arbitrators and mediators. Every Shin'a'in knew the cost of becoming Kal'enedral. Some in every generation felt the price was worth it. Tarma certainly had -- since she had the deaths of her entire Clan to avenge, and only Kal'enedral were permitted to swear to blood-feud -- and Kethry was mortally certain that having been gang-raped by the brigands that slaughtered her Clan had played no little part in the decision.
Leslac didn't believe this. He was certain -- without bothering to check into Tarma's background or the customs of the Shin'a'in, so far as Kethry had been able to ascertain -- that Tarma's vows were as simple as those of most other celibate orders, and as easily broken. He was convinced that she had taken those vows for some girlishly romantic reason; he had just recently written a song, in fact, that hinted -- very broadly-that the "right man" could thaw the icy Shin'a'in. That was the gist of "that song."
And he evidently thought he was the right man.
He'd certainly plagued them enough before they'd joined up with Idra, following behind them like a puppy that couldn't be discouraged.
He'd lost track of them for two years after they'd joined the Sunhawks and that had been a profound relief. But much to their disappointment, he'd found them again and tracked them to Hawksnest. There he had remained, singing in taverns to earn his keep -- and occasionally rendering Tarma's nights sleepless by singing under her window.
"That song" was new; the first time Tarma had heard it was when they'd gotten back from the Surshan campaign. Kethry had needed to practically tie her down to keep her from killing the musician.