"And bloody," I said gently, "even when washed clean."
The humor faded from her eyes, but not the determination. "And how often do you wash the blood from yours?"
"I dance," I retorted. "Rarely do I kill."
"I steal," she said. "Rarely do I kill."
Impasse. I sighed and jerked my head toward the cliff. "Which one of those are we bound for, captain?"
"None of those," she answered. "The Stessa household is on top of the island, in the midst of the vineyards."
"Well," I said resignedly, "at least they'll have something to drink."
The captain laughed. "Do you take nothing seriously in this world?"
"I take you very seriously."
She eyed me sidelong. "No, I do not believe so. In fact, you have no idea at all what to think of me."
"You ran our ship aground and plucked us off the island like so much ripe fruit," I remonstrated, "which is not precisely easy to do, plus you had me heaved me over the side of this ship-which also is not easy to do-and nearly drowned me. Not to mention the hole you poked in the back of my leg. Why shouldn't I take you seriously?"
"Because you are a Southroner."
"Ah-hah!" I stabbed the air with a forefinger. "But I'm really Skandic, am I not?-or we would not be undertaking this deception of a dying old woman designed to gain you coin. And anyway, what do you know about Southroners?"
"You very probably are Skandic," she agreed, "in blood and bone, if not in mind, which is definitively Southron. As for what I know about men like you, you forget I am the daughter of a slaver. As heir, I was trained in the business from childhood."
I very nearly asked if her father had sired no sons-and checked abruptly as I realized that kind of question would back up her argument. Which was not a particularly comfortable realization on my part. I scowled.
"I saw many Southroners brought beneath my father's roof," Prima continued. "Not a man among them respected women."
As annoyed with myself as with her, I challenged sharply. "You don't even know me, captain. I submit that you are in no position to evaluate my mind."
"I was taught to evaluate men's minds as much as their bodies," she said serenely.
"As the daughter of a slaver," I shot back, "which somewhat limits your capacity to make a legitimate evaluation. Having been captured and made over into a slave when one was freeborn is not designed to bring out the best attitude in a man, you know?"
"You know," she answered. "You may be a sword-dancer now, and very likely freeborn-but sword blades do not leave the kind of scars your back bears."
"Which renders me somewhat more familiar with the experience than you. No slaver ever knows a slave's mind."
"And is that how you escaped? Because your owner did not know your mind?"
"I didn't escape. I earned my freedom." And bore other scars to show for it as well as a name; the sandtiger I'd killed had been devouring children of the tribe who had made me a slave.
"As my crew earned theirs," Prima said quietly. "But there is more inflexibility to a Southron man's mind than what slavery may cause. And if you are truly as free in thought as you suggest, you will admit it."
"Now that's a double-edged sword if I ever saw one. Cursed if I do, cursed if I don't."
She grinned. "Then you may as well answer."
I glowered at her. "You're as inflexible, captain."
"Why?"
"You said you prefer women. Isn't that inflexible?"
"You prefer women."
"Of course I do!"
"Then you are against men."
"I am a man-" I began.
"As your lovers," she clarified.
"Hoolies, yes," I said fervently.
"Then we are the same, are we not?"
"How can we be the same? You're a woman. You're supposed to sleep with men, not with other women!"
"Why?"
"Because that's how it's supposed to be!"
"Is it?"
"Yes! "
"Why?"
In frustration, I set fingers into my hairline and scratched vigorously. "Because that's just the way it is."
"For you."
"For most people!"
"What about the woman?"
"Which woman?"
"The one you sleep with." She paused. "The one you currently sleep with."
"Three years' worth," I snapped. "Don't assume I take our relationship lightly."
"But of course you do. Did you not intend to seduce me?"
I scowled. Cursed if I did, cursed if I didn't.
Her expression was impish. "And would you have pursued it had the captain been a man?"
"Hoolies, no!"
"Therefore because I was a woman I was judged fair game, and you assumed I would succumb to your charms the way so many other women have." She nodded. "An inflexible-and purely Southron-way of thinking."
She was tying me up in verbal knots. "Now, wait a minute-"
"Of course, were I a woman who desired men in her bed, I might well have allowed myself to be seduced. Because you do have a certain amount of charm-" Startled, I shut my mouth on an interruption. "-and you did approach the campaign with more integrity than another man might."
That made no sense. "Integrity? I thought you were accusing me of having no respect for women."
"Integrity. Because you were at pains to pick a fight with your woman so there was reason to look to me as an alternate bedmate, and because you did not approach me directly. It was, as I said, a campaign. And I respect that. It requires imagination and forethought."
"You yourself just said I picked a fight with Del. If you value truth, how can you respect that?"
Her eyes were steady. "You would rather drown than be made a slave again. A man may lie for effect, to manipulate, and while the truth served you, it was indeed truth."
"You know that, do you?"
"I am a very good judge of slaves-"
"I'm not-"
"-and you are no longer one in mind or body," she finished. "There is no need for you to lie."
It was time to take control of this discussion. "Then if you respect truth, let me offer you this." I paused, marking her calm expression and determining to alter it. "If you attempt to seduce Del, I'll take you apart. Woman or no."
Calmness indeed vanished, but was replaced by an open amusement I hadn't expected. "Male," she said, and "Southron. So male, and so Southron!"
"I mean it, captain."
"I know you do. Honesty, if couched as a threat. Save I wonder which frightens you more: that I will attempt to seduce her-or that she might accept."
I shook my head. "She won't."
"And so I offer to you my own truth, Southroner: I will let the woman decide what she will and will not do. It should be her decision, yes? Because anything else is a slavery as soul-destroying as that which you experienced."
The Southroner in me hated to admit she was right. The man who had accompanied Del for the last three years, thereby learning truths he'd never imagined, did admit it-if privately-and could muster no additional argument that contained validity.
"Well," I said finally, "at least you've got to give me credit for threatening you the same as I would a man. "
Prima Rhannet's generous mouth twitched, but she had the good grace not to laugh aloud.
It was midmorning as Del stood at the rail by the plank, waiting silently. I saw the stillness of her body, the posture of readiness despite that stillness, and knew she, as I, missed her sword badly.
Or even a sword. We'd both of us lost our true swords: I three years before, when Singlestroke had been broken; Del to the maelstrom of angry sorcerers who considered themselves gods. She had broken that sword, the jivatma named Boreal, to save my life, and nearly extinguished her own. Meanwhile, I had also lost the sword I'd made in Staal-Ysta. It was, in fact, buried in the rubble that covered Del's broken jivatma. We had purchased new swords, of course-only a fool goes weaponless-but neither of them had suited us beyond fulfilling a need. And now we had none at all, thanks to the renegadas.