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it would have been an even better day to go fishing. Not the most exciting pastime, but it was the one thing he’d ever found to do that made people stop talking at him.
Her cloak slipped off her shoulder, revealing Temple braids pinned there marking a divine—not in the green and gold of the Mother of Summer, as he would have expected, or perhaps the blue and white of the Daughter of Spring, but the white, cream, and silver of the Bastard, the fifth god, master of all disasters out of season.
He wanted nothing so much as to run away, but her hand, falling back from his face, found his and gripped it weakly. He wasn’t enough something—cowardly, brave?—to shake it off.
For a moment, her brown eyes seemed to flash with a deep violet light. Then, between one breath and . . . none, her eyes went dull and still.
His head, throbbing with tension, seemed to explode in a thick, tangled net of lightning, all white. Then all black.
Better it seemed to export cheese or cloth, but it was true that fortunes were made in the military trade. Though seldom by the soldiers, any more than by the cheeses.
though the cadences seemed to tease his understanding;
“You expect us to do arithmetic?”
Dear gods. Have I just acquired a council of twelve invisible older sisters?
But a name is a thing of the air, of the mind and the spirit, so a fellow could give it to a spirit, right?”
His hand had barely touched its target when his mouth commented, “Ooh, I’ve not felt it from this angle before. This should be interesting.” Pen’s hand froze. “Don’t stop on our account,” said Desdemona. “Physicians, remember?” “Yes, don’t be shy. I’ve seen a thousand of ’em.” “Speak for yourself!” “Well, I’ve certainly diapered them a thousand times.” Pen had no idea what the next comment was, and it might just have been the language, but it certainly sounded obscene. He rolled from the bed and dressed as fast as possible. He couldn’t be out on the road soon enough.
Half of why Pen had not made his escape through his window last night had been the reflection that it would be a cruel trick to play on his guards, who were only carrying out their duties and who had done him no harm.
He told off the porter to take Ruchia’s things to his chambers, which resulted in a bustle of unloading from the packsaddle into the hall, then sent him off with Gans and Wilrom to deliver the horses to some nearby mews that kept a place for Temple beasts.
Pen’s own land was more noted for producing cheese than history, he feared.
“Thank you, sir!” Pen waved and left quickly, before Tigney could change his mind about either the errand or its reward, after the capricious manner of seniors.
“And it indicates a deep confusion of thinking to mistake one’s own discomfort for a benefit to another.”
It was mere fancy that Pen imagined him a veteran, praying for forgiveness, but he couldn’t shake off the impression.
Essentials of Sorcery and the Management of Demons, the title page read. The Work of Learned Ruchia of Martensbridge, Senior Divine and Sorceress of the Bastard’s Order. With Aid from Learned Helvia of Liest and Learned Amberein of Saone. Volume One.
The sock balls rose—and slowed. They curved in the same trajectories, but Pen felt he might almost take a sip of ale between having to attend to each. His hands moved more languidly, though, and with more effort, as if he were stroking through water. “That was fun,” he said, collecting all four out of the air and stopping. “We can’t keep that up for very long,” said Desdemona, “but it is useful in a pinch.” “Should I wish to take up the trade of a marketplace juggler, I suppose.” “It works as well for dodging blows. Whether from fists or blades.”
“Once, at Greenwell. There was a man hanged for robbing and murdering on the road. Learned Lurenz took us, he said, so that we might learn the true wages of crime. Just the boys, though.”
It perched on an islet only a dozen paces out from shore, its walls seeming to grow out of the rock that was its foundation. High and solid and forbidding, they followed the contours of the islet’s bounds. This had resulted in something other than foursquare, though four round towers with conical slate caps jutted up at its corners, with a fifth for luck over the drawbridge.
“Ah, you have secured our guest,” said Rusillin amiably to his brother. “Any difficulties along the way?”
“Lord God Bastard, Mother’s Son, Fifth and White. Please spare Desdemona. She’s a good demon.” Pen considered that descriptor, in all its ambiguity—good for what?—and decided to let it stand. “She has no life save through me, and, by your leave, please . . . please let me serve her in her need.” And, in what was surely the most foolhardy impulse of his life, even beating out Drovo’s drunken oath to the military recruiter, added, “And Yours.”
“The gods do not act for our ends, but for Theirs. Presumably, the god has some interesting future in mind for you—for you two. This is not a blessing. Good luck. You’ll need it.”
The immense absence did not seem to leave an empty space, precisely, so much as one reserved, freed of all life’s clutter and waiting for its Guest again.
The princess-archdivines of Martensbridge were by three centuries of tradition daughters of the Hallow King of the Weald, called or perhaps assigned to this pocket palatine duty on behalf of their royal parent, though this one was, by the grind of time, now aunt to the present king. Lacking a spare or willing daughter, the office was sometimes filled by a cousin or niece; sometimes elected from the Daughter’s Order. Like all things human, the princesses had varied over time in their abilities, but everything about the orderliness of this place spoke well of its current ruler.
“If the Bastard’s Order at Rosehall can’t handle a little disorder, they have taken oath to the wrong god.
“You looked a god in the eyes and bore witness for me, by which alone I am preserved.” She took a deep breath, through his mouth. “You looked a god in the eyes. And spoke for me. There is nothing in my power that I will ever refuse you, after that.”
