Qey turned an astonished face away from the stove. "What did you say?"
"Nothing," she quickly amended. "Nothing, just a joke."
"Your father's brother is dead, Hezhi. It isn't something to joke about."
"I know." She wiped the plum juice from her mouth with the back of her hand.
"Anyway," Qey remarked, changing the subject, "how was your meeting with Wezh Yehd Nu?"
"He tried to be pleasant, and succeeded well enough, I suppose." She smiled. "I think he was very surprised to hear from me. He told me he had given up."
"Did he bring a present, then?"
"Oh, yes. I think his mother picked it out." She reached into her bag to show Qey her present, feeling a brief, inexplicable sadness when her hand brushed the statuette. She drew out Wezh's gift and set it on the table.
"Oh, that's a nice perfume," Qey said, examining the crystal bottle.
"So I hear. I'll wear it next time I meet him."
"You'll be meeting him again?" Qey asked, a bit surprised.
"Yes. He's taking me to a drama tomorrow."
"Which one?"
Hezhi cleared her throat. "The Eel and the Lion it's called. A romance, I think." She half sang the title, the way Wezh did. He was quite excited about taking her to it.
"Will you like that?" Qey asked, doubtfully.
"Almost certainly not," Hezhi said. "But I have to learn to tolerate such things. After all, I can't spend the rest of my life in the library, like Ghan."
"Well, but I never expected to hear you say that, little one."
"Everything changes," she philosophized, biting into another plum.
"Yes," Qey agreed. "If there is any truth in the world it is that."
The next day Hezhi went into the library early. Ghan raised an eyebrow and his face puckered into a frown.
"Will I be graced with your presence for the entire day today?" he asked sarcastically.
She blushed. "I'm sorry, Ghan. I've been… I don't know. I'm sorry."
"It's nothing less than I expected," he remarked sourly.
"I'm here now. What do you want me to do?"
"Do what you like. I shelved yesterday. And by the way,"—he frowned up briefly at her before continuing—"a 'friend' of yours came by this morning. One 'Wezh,' I believe. Since you weren't here, he asked if I might deliver a message pertaining to the drama you will be attending tonight."
Hezhi felt her face burning furiously as Ghan went on. "He said you should wear something 'frip' with lots of 'lacies.' It's the style for this show."
"Ah… thanks," she stuttered. Ghan glowered at her.
"You have better uses for your time than that, don't you? Do you even know what 'frip' means?"
"No," she replied. "He says it a lot."
"Does he?" Ghan sneered.
Hezhi felt a surge of anger swarm up through her embarrassment. "This isn't your affair, Ghan."
"Isn't it? I've wasted too much time on you to have you running off with boys who say 'frip' and 'lacies'! By the River and Sky, you can do better than that!"
"What would you have me do, Ghan? I have to make a life here! Soon I will no longer be a child, and people will expect things of me. Maybe it's fine for you, buried here with these books, but my clan isn't banished away somewhere! They're right here, watching me, wondering what to do with me when I come of age. I've denied reality long enough, don't you think?"
Ghan gaped for just a moment, but he quickly shut his mouth so he could form a reply. "Who are you?" His voice was suddenly mild. "Who is this?" he asked the air. "Is this the same girl who lied to me just to get in here? Who taught herself to read— however poorly—in the ancient script? Who came in here, day after day with no help and no encouragement at all, who fell asleep with her nose in my books because she wasn't even sleeping at night but thinking about what she had been reading all day?" Ghan rose off of his stool, and as he did, his voice rose as well. "What have you done with her?" he demanded.
That stung, much more than she was willing to admit. "Everything is different now," she told him, fighting back tears.
Ghan regarded her for a long moment before answering.
"It must be," he finally said, and returned to his work.
She waited for him to say something else—anything else—but he did not. He kept to his pen and paper. Glumly, Hezhi trudged over to the new books, produced her pen—the new one Ghan had given her—and began to make notes for the index. She looked up at Ghan now and then, but he was studiously ignoring her. Unable to bear it, she took her things and went back into the tangle.
She had been working only a moment when someone coughed quietly behind her. Briefly she thought it was Ghan, and she turned, ready to try to explain. It wasn't Ghan, though, but Yen, a gentle smile on his face.
"I guess he isn't in a very good mood today," he commented.
"It isn't his fault," Hezhi replied.
Yen shook his head. "He shouldn't have snapped at you like that. He should understand."
"No," she disagreed. "He can't understand. No one can."
"I'm willing to try," Yen said softly. "If you want to talk."
She gazed up into Yen's kind eyes. "It's nothing I can talk about," she explained apologetically. "It's just that… have you ever discovered that your life wasn't at all what you thought it was?"
Yen frowned, tapped his chin with his thumb. "No," he finally said. "No, I've always known what my life is. I've had some nice surprises, and some unfortunate ones, but I've always known myself."
"You're fortunate, then," she said. "When you grow up in the palace, you never know. Ever. There's just one betrayal after another, and you never know where you stand. But you think you do anyway, and then…" She trailed off. "I'm sorry, Yen. It's very kind of you to listen, but nothing I can tell you will help me, and it might be bad for you."
"It can't be that bad," Yen soothed.
"My life is like the River," she said. "It flows one way, always downstream, inevitable. I never faced that before. I guess I always believed that I could somehow remain a child, stay in the cracks of the palace—here, in the library, where no one would ever notice me."
Yen sat down across the table from her. "When I was a child, I always wanted to be my father, always wanted to be older than I was. I was impatient to grow up, to captain a boat, to sail up-River and see strange sights. Not at all like you, I guess. You always wanted to be yourself, and I wanted to be someone else." He sighed. "But it was my father who encouraged me to join the priesthood. I joke about him, but he really wants me to succeed at this, to be a great engineer and have my name go down as the one who designed such-and-such a shrine. 'Don't be a sailor like me, boy,' he told me. 'You were cut out for finer things.' "
Hezhi shook her head ruefully. "I was always told what to be. I've never been offered a choice, but I was too stupid to realize that." She attempted a smile. "I should like to meet your father one day. He sounds like a nice man."
"He is," Yen assured her. "Perhaps one day you will meet him."
"Maybe," she doubtfully allowed, but then brightened a bit. "But when I am a woman, when I join my family, then I will be allowed to leave the palace. Perhaps then. I should like to sail in a boat."
"Well." Yen chuckled. "I know more about that than I care to admit. But you will have royal barges at your disposal, won't you? No battered trading scows for you."
"Yes," she said, suddenly feeling very shy. "But royal barges never sail up the River, never visit the Mang or any other strange lands. I envy your father that, even if you do not."