The shutters were taken down in the hall to let air move through, although there wasn't much wind. The afternoon shadows had lengthened, and if there wasn't precisely a breeze rising up off the river and delta, there was a softening of the heat. The hall was lined with benches. It was a vast space bridged by huge crossbeams of wood. Trees never grew so large in Kartu, not even on Dezara Mountain where the sacred grove was tended. Already, these Olossi people were bickering, seating themselves in clots and clusters that suggested factions and alliances.
The murmur of their voices was like the whisper of wind in leaves -just like in the poem! Although that tale had a bad ending.
She shifted, feeling anxious. Priya and Sheyshi knelt on the floor. Anji sat utterly still, hands resting on his knees, back straight, expression smooth and pleasing in the manner of silk. She could not guess what he was thinking.
In Kartu, of course, the overlords ran everything, even back in the days of the Mariha princes. The council met only when the rulers of Kartu called in the leading men of the town to inform them of new regulations to be implemented.
The din of competing voices from the council chamber was rising. A young woman hurried past clutching pens and several scrolls; ink stained her fingers. She glanced at Mai and Anji, and her eyes widened in surprise. She dropped a pen. Bending to pick it up, she lost two more. A grand gentleman swept up the steps behind her. He was attended by a surly-looking man with a crooked nose who was wearing a leather vest and leather trousers almost exactly like those worn by Reeve Joss. Reeve leathers, Joss had called them. The clerk cast a frightened glance back as he approached, and scrambled to gather her things and get into the hall.
"Shut the doors," said the grand gentleman, pausing in the entry chamber with a gaggle of attendants bringing up the rear. He wore a magnificent overrobe of iridescent green silk, embroidered with orange feathers and gold starbursts along the hem and sleeves and neckline. His long hair was braided in three loops, decorated with ribands and beads. If he saw Anji and Mai, he did not deign to notice them, but the man with the broken nose stared rudely at them, gaze dropping down to examine Mai's chest.
A grating and quite high woman's voice shouted for silence in the hall. When it was quiet, the gentleman strode into the chamber with his gaggle trailing him in the manner of nervous goslings. Attendants shoved the doors shut, screens colliding with other screens in a series of sharp reports like staffs whacking wooden targets.
That nasal soprano rose again, calling the council to order in rapid-fire words Mai had trouble following; at speed, and muffled by the closed doors, the differences in pronunciation and phrasing made it difficult to understand. The long wait and the stifling heat had turned her thoughts to mud. She found it hard to concentrate as words and comments emerged from the council hall.
"… never allow outlanders to settle… bad luck… goes against the gods…"
"… fools not to hire out a guard for caravans going north.. ."
"… we must get the trade going again!"
"… no need, the road is still safe…"
A burst of furious and disorderly disagreement, shouted down.
"… no news from the five-flags caravan that left after the rains…"
"… no trade out of…"
"… desperate!… need that wood in order to…"
"… you have stuck your heads in the sand… the threat.. ."
"… perfectly safe… this other is exaggeration… heavy rains have washed out the roads…"
A loud voice penetrated clearly. "Rains! Last year's rains, perhaps! How long must we wait while our commerce dies?"
Others took up the call. "We have lost patience…" And were called to order.
"Strange," said Anji in a soft voice. "Any merchant of Sirniaka speaks the arkinga, but the holy language of the empire is nothing like the same, although bits of it show up in the trade tongue. We among the Qin have our own speech, but most of the Qin who ride the Golden Road also learn the arkinga. So do the folk in Kartu Town. Yet haven't you an older speech there?"
She was startled. "The grandmother words, we call them. I knew enough to speak to my old aunt, though she's dead these ten years. They still speak that speech in the temple. The Qin forbade its use in town. Everyone uses the arkinga now."
"Here, too, it seems they use the arkinga, not just in the marketplace but in their council halls. Maybe it came from here first."
"Can a language travel?"
"It must, just as folk do."
Of course that was obvious, once you thought of it. Mai blushed, not liking to look stupid; it was the worst thing people had said of her in Kartu. Good thing she's pretty. She hasn't otherwise many eggs in that basket. Not much to say! Not like the chattering of the others, which they kept at all day. Better to keep your mouth shut to keep people guessing than to open it and prove yourself a fool. How glad she was to be rid of her family!
She smiled a little, thinking of it.
He brushed his fingers over her left hand.
"What are you thinking?" he asked her softly.
"Are you nervous?" she asked, surprised he had touched her in public.
"I suppose I am," he said, savoring the moment of consideration. "We can't go back."
It was true. The thought of returning to Kartu Town was like poison. In a way, it was a blessing that they had lit a fire behind them in the empire. They dared not travel back that way. And could not return whence they had come, because Anji's life also was forfeit in Qin territory.
A hush fell abruptly within the hall. On its wings, a door slid open. Captain Waras appeared and beckoned to them. "You are called." He surveyed their attendants, and motioned that the slaves and soldiers must stay behind.
Anji rose, waited for her, and strode confidently into the hall. She could not match his stride, so walked with clipped steps, trying to remember how to glide, how to compose her face into an expression both pleasant and unthreatening.
The hall opened above them, crossbeams floating away into shadows; the opened windows fed light mostly onto the floor of the hall. In such a building it was easy to imagine mysteries and secrets and whispered intrigues despite the crowd that jammed the space now. Benches were packed with seated people crammed in legto-leg; more folk stood behind them, elbows rubbing the backs of heads, or lined up along the back of the room and along the side aisles against the windows and even up on top of the long strip of bench that ran along each of the long outer walls. Every human emotion was displayed among those faces: a sullen old man; disdain and envy in a pair of elegant women; a bored girl, half sleeping with chin propped on a hand; anger in some faces and bitterness in many; a woman who looked frightened and a man who looked sardonically amused; that handsome young man from the entryway who was now, oblivious of all else, flirting with a pretty young woman dressed in a gorgeous length of gold-white silk wrapped cleverly around her body in the fashion that most of these women wore, a costume both discreet and enticing. Mai looked for the father, but he stood a few steps away from his son and had his attention fixed on the council table. The broken-nosed reeve stood with his back to the far wall, watching with an ugly sneer on his face.