He clucked his tongue chidingly and sighed. "But what are you doing in Sanctuary, cousin? Did your father come with you?"
It was Chenaya's turn to laugh, and the sound rolled silver-sweet in her throat. "Still my Little Prince," she managed finally, patting his head as if he were a puppy in her lap. "Impetuous and impatient as ever. So many questions!"
"Not so little anymore, my dear," he answered, patting her head in the same condescending manner. "I'm taller than you now."
"Not by so very much." She spun away, her gown billowing with the movement. "Perhaps we should wrestle to see if it makes any difference?" She regarded him from across the room, her head tilting slightly when he didn't reply. A silence grew between them as he studied her, brief but suddenly more than she could bear. She crossed the apartment again in swift strides and seized his hands in hers. "It's so very good to see you, my Little Prince."
Their arms slipped about each other, and they embraced again. But this time his touch was different, distant. She backed off, slipping gently from his grasp, and gazed up at his face, at the eyes that suddenly colored with tints of sadness, or something just as disturbing.
Could he know the news from the capital?
"I smelled a garden when I entered the grounds," she said, tugging his hand, urging him toward the door. It struck her now how dark his quarters seemed, how sparse and empty of warmth or light. "Let's go for a walk. The sun is bright and beautiful."
Kadakithis started to follow, then hesitated. His gaze fixed on something beyond her shoulder; his hand in hers turned cold, stiff with tension. She felt his trembling. Slowly, she turned to see what affected him so.
Four men, guards apparently, stood just beyond his threshold. She had noticed several like them as she passed through the palace-strange, blank-eyed men of a racial type unknown to her. She'd been so eager to see her cousin, she had paid little attention. She'd assumed them to be mercenaries or hirelings. She took note of their garb and the weapons they wore, and hid a private smirk. A man would have to be good with his steel to dress in such a tasteless, gaudy fashion.
One of the four clapped the haft of a pike on the floor stones, needlessly announcing their presence. "The Beysa requests that Your Highness join her on the West Terrace." Then, Chenaya's confusion gave way to a flush of anger as the guard looked directly at her and added with more than a hint of insolence, "At once."
Kadakithis carefully slipped his hand from hers and swallowed. With a shrug of resignation he drew himself up and the tension appeared to melt from him. "Where are you staying, cousin? There are quarters in the Summer Palace if you need them. And I must prepare a party to celebrate your arrival; I know how you love parties." He shot the guard commander a haughty glance as he lingered over this small talk, but he took a first step toward the door.
His expression begged her indulgence; more, it warned her to it. She watched, brows wrinkling, as he moved away from her. "My father has purchased an estate just beyond your Avenue of Temples. The lands reach all the way to the Red Foal River. The papers are being finalized at this very moment." She pushed the small talk, forcing the Prince to defer his exit, studying with a subtle eye the guards' minute reactions. Whoever this Beysa was, these were certainly her men. And who was she, indeed, to command sentries within a palace of a Rankan royal governor?
The Prince nodded, drifting farther away. "Good land can be had cheaply these days," he observed. "How is Lowan Vigeles?"
"Loyal as ever," she said pointedly. What the hell is going on? was the message her expression conveyed. Are you in trouble? "Though somewhat tired. We made the journey with only eight servants. Protectors, really. Gladiators from my father's school. I handpicked them myself."
Kadakithis pursed his lips ever so slightly to acknowledge her offer. If they were from Lowan's school, better fighters could not be found, and she had placed them at his service. "Go home and give Lowan my well-wishes. I'll need time to plan your party, but I'll send you a message." He turned to join the four guards who barely hid their impatience or their indignation at being made to wait. But he stopped once more. "Oh, have you seen Molin, yet?"
She frowned, then put on a very wide, very forced smile. "I wanted to delay that unpleasantry and visit a friend first."
The smile that spread on the Prince's face was genuine; she'd learned to read his moods in early childhood. "Don't be so hard on the old priest. He's been a great comfort to me, always full of"-he hesitated, and a twinkle sparked in his eyes-"advice."
"Maybe I'll see him," she agreed, running her hands over her bare shoulders, down her arms, feeling somewhat naked and alone as Kadakithis went through the door and out of the apartments.
Two of the fish-eyed sentries remained. "Would you accompany us, please."
Polite words, but she sensed there was no courtesy in them. She shook back her hair, batted her lashes, lifted her nose to a neck-straining angle, and walked over the threshold into the corridor. She was very careful to step on their toes as she passed between them.
Chenaya held her anger in a clenched fist behind her back and regarded the tall, fair-skinned woman who addressed her. Obviously a foreigner like the four guards, she thought, but from what god-cursed land? Painted breasts, indeed! Was that really some kind of webbing between those bare toes? Why, she must be a freak! The woman would be laughed out of any court in Ranke, if only for her garish costume.
Yet, she was also the Beysa, whatever that was, and the guards had bowed when they had presented Chenaya.
The Beysa moved about a room that had to be part of her private apartments. With a short clap of her hands, she dismissed guards and servants all. Only the two of them remained facing each other.
"What did you want with Kadakithis?" the Beysa probed, moving to a chair in the center of the room. Chenaya suspected it had been placed there for just this audience. The foreign woman sprawled there, making a show of appearing at ease.
Chenaya answered slowly, containing herself. There was much to learn here, a secret she had not known when she had come to this city. Now she began to suspect why no word had come to Ranke from Sanctuary in some months.
"The world is a vain collection of private pursuits," she responded vaguely. "By what right do you issue commands in a Rankan governor's palace, or in violation of Rankan law, dare to maintain a personal guard within these walls?"
The Beysa's gaze hardened, fixed on her with a subtle ^ menace. Chenaya lifted her chin and hurled the same cold glare back at the foreign bitch.
"I am not accustomed to rudeness. I could have your tongue ripped out by the root." The Beysa straightened in her chair; the carefully manicured nails of one hand began to tap idly on the chair's carven arm.
Chenaya arched a brow. "You could try," she answered evenly. "But I rather suspect I'd be holding both those marbles you call eyes in the palm of my hand before your guards could answer your summons."