A Bloom in the North Read online

  "I see," I murmured.

  "What happened to Nelet?" Hesa asked.

  "Oh, Nelet... Nelet was executed," Abadil said. "By the emperor, at his lover's request."

  Hesa glanced at him. So did I.

  "Part of the story," he said, flushing at the attention. "The one that's not mine to tell. Suffice to say Nelet made mistakes." He grinned. "One of the reasons Thesenet's been so dedicated to not making them."

  "This coyness of yours, Abadil," I said, and this time I wasn't teasing. "If the information you're withholding endangers us in any way—"

  "No," Abadil said, very sober. "I vow it, ke Pathen. I'll tell you before I let anything happen to us." He drew in a breath. "But het Narel has a lot of history with the Stone Moon. Thenet lived there for a while. So did Roika. And Keshul—the Fire in the Void—him too. When I tell you it's not my story to tell, it's as much because I don't know it all as for any other cause. I'm afraid I'll get some crucial detail wrong."

  "All three of them?" I said, startled.

  "And ke Dlane too," Abadil said softly. "Though you have never met Dlane, and few people will speak of her anymore."

  "Thenet's beloved, the anadi who died," Hesa said.

  "Yes," Abadil said.

  Darsi sounded reluctant as he asked, "Why do they not speak of her?"

  "Because," Abadil said. "Thenet won't."

  We stopped at noon to stretch our legs on the side of the road. Abadil and the weavers took the opportunity to eat; Hesa remained at the road's edge, staring into the distance.

  And I... I grasped my "prize" by the arm and led him off beneath the shade of a stunted black yew tree, out of easy hearing of the others.

  "Pathen?" he hissed.

  "Darsi," I said, low. "We need to enter het Narel as lovers—"

  "—I know that!"

  "Not," I finished, "as a Claw and his cowed pet. I know you're no actor, but I need you, need you to do this. No meekness. No flinching. You can be demure if you want, but not anxious."

  "Why does it matter what kind of partners we look like?" Darsi asked. But I was glad he asked, no matter how suspiciously. It proved he was thinking instead of reacting.

  "Because if Abadil is right, if the minister of het Narel can be cultivated, then our freedom to act will be significantly increased," I said. "So I mean to read his reaction to our relationship. He is expecting a triumphant Claw of the empire, one who finagled his way into the hearts of others and then used their trust to destroy them. By all rights you should be my cowed pet. If you don't act that way we might surprise him into revealing how he feels about any of it."

  "And if he's pleased to see you're not cold," Darsi said, reluctant, "then we'll know that at very least he isn't attracted to cruelty."

  "Right," I said. "So. Can you do this?"

  "Pathen," he said, ears splaying.

  "I can tickle you again if it will help."

  That made him laugh. "Pathen!"

  "Darsi." I took a chance and rested my hands lightly on his arms. "Darsi, I've often thought you were useless at running a House, I won't hide that from you. But we're not Darsi Laisira-emodo, false Head of Household, and Claw Pathen of the Stone Moon. We're two rebels now, united by a common cause. I know you volunteered for this. But if you feel that you can't play this part, I won't let Hesa force you. What we're doing is too important."

  "But where will we get our safety from scandal if I back down?" Darsi said, but he hadn't shaken my hands off yet.

  "I may try to romance the minister instead," I said, and meant it.

  His pupils dilated. "Are you mad?"

  "No," I said, amused. "Determined, perhaps. Mad, not as much. At least, I hope not."

  "Arrogant, though!" Darsi said with a scowl. "Worse than a Stone Moon emperor. Or a god."

  "I hope not," I said again. And shook him lightly. Just a little. "So. Yes? No?"

  He looked away, grimacing. "Much as I'd like to see you try to seduce someone and maybe have your tail handed to you... I still think our plan's the safest plan." He sighed. "So. No cowed pet. I can do that."

  "Tickling required?" I asked.

  He wrinkled his nose. "Stop trying to make me laugh."

  "Is it working?" I asked with a grin.

  And it did. I let him return to the others and watched him go, smiling to see the fear gone from his gait... for now, at least.

  Hesa stepped up beside me and murmured, "How did you do that?" When I glanced at the eperu, it said, "While I wouldn't say he hates you, precisely, his feelings about you are... rather strong. And not in your favor."

  Abadil was waving to us from the back of the rikka; the rest of our party was already mounted. As we moved to join them, I said, "I don't know how I did it, beloved. I just knew it had to be done." And as I pulled myself into the saddle, I finished, dry, "And don't worry. I don't think it's permanent."

  Hesa laughed under its breath. "There's always a season or two between planting and reaping," it said.

  "So!" Abadil said as we urged our mounts back onto the road. "Our last few hours before our adventure in het Narel! How shall we spend them?"

  "I don't know," I said. "Can you sing, Abadil?"

  "Of course!" he said, beatifically. "Though you may regret my efforts."

  "How bad could you be?" Darsi asked, fascinated.

  "Since you asked..."

  When Abadil had finished scouring our ears we all took Darsi to task for inspiring the episode and he mournfully agreed he had earned every moment of our opprobrium. Abadil cackled at our expressions, and that handily demonstrated the humor in it to the rest of us: we ended up laughing too. Nevertheless, we decided it the better part of wisdom to move on to rhyming games to pass the remaining time.

  That is how we came to enter het Narel in the early autumn afternoon, with the coppery light on our shoulders and laughter in our mouths. That was Minister Thesenet's first impression of us, and to this day I look back on that moment and give thanks for everything it helped shaped afterward.

  Pathen Asara-emodo

  I was not surprised that Thesenet was waiting for us at the perimeter of the city. Jushet had been in contact with the minister in response to my request to move to het Narel, and no doubt the arrangements had required a great deal of coordination. I hadn't been watching for a courier but I was certain one had been dispatched the day we'd set out to carry news of my impending arrival. If nothing else, the empire was efficient.

  "Is that a welcome?" Abadil asked, squinting at the figure sitting on a rikka in the middle of the road, bracketed by two emodo in uniform.

  I laughed. "Didn't you know, dear clay-keeper? We are infamous among Jokka."

  "As if I needed more to be infamous about," Abadil said with a truly dramatic sigh.

  "I've run out of words that rhyme with the sound in 'about'," Darsi said, exasperated. "Be sorry for yourself with words that rhyme with something else."

  "Pity?" Hesa suggested.

  "Hyperbole," I offered.

  "I feel quite put upon!" Abadil complained.

  "'Put upon'," Darsi said. "That I can do. Wait, let me think...."

  I reined up before Thesenet with my people laughing behind me, and that was how it should be. And for a moment in the stranger's eyes, I saw surprise... surprise, and hope?

  "Ke Pathen?" he said. "Do I have the honor...?"

  "Minister Thesenet," I said, and that wasn't a guess; he was wearing the robes of state issued only to the Jokka of the Stone Moon authorities and I recognized the city's mark on his breast. "It's you who do us honor by opening het Narel to us."

  "Who would not wish to host a hero of the empire?" he said, studying me now with open curiosity. He was a decade my senior perhaps, with thoughtful eyes the color of stone. "Would you like a tour or are you tired from your ride?"

  I looked over my shoulder, reading the expressions of my party. "I believe some of us may wish to ride ahead to the residence, if that's well with you? The principals of my House and I
would be delighted to accept your invitation, though."

  "That sounds perfect," Thesenet said, glancing at the three alongside me. "I'll be glad to meet them."

  Laisira's weavers and their eperu escorts rode on past us with congenial farewells, leaving the four of us behind. To Thesenet, I said, "If I may present my people? My clay-keeper Abadil—"

  "Abadil!" Thesenet exclaimed. "Not our Abadil, surely? The lost historian? Ke Eduñil told me a great deal about him, he was desperate at the loss."

  And affable Abadil, who'd seemed so irrepressible in humor, became still and his smile was full of old pain. "Ah, gods. Poor Eduñil. He's well, I hope? I'd like to find him and tell him what became of me. I owe him that."

  "He's a man of substance still," Thesenet said with a smile. "I'll tell him you're looking for him."

  "Please," Abadil said.

  Thesenet drew in a breath and shook his head. "Well, ke Pathen. What other surprises do you have for me?"

  "None so great as a lost Jokkad returned, I fear," I said, chuckling. "My pefna-eperu, Hesa."

  "Ke emodo," Hesa said with that reserve I found so alien.

  "And this is my prize," I said, offering Darsi my most innocent look. "My lover Darsi, who puts up with me I know not why."

  Darsi said to Thesenet, "It's because he makes me laugh."

  That surprised a laugh out of me because it was true, and Darsi grinned at me with thinned eyes as if to say 'you see, I can do this.'

  I cleared my throat, amused, and said to Thesenet, "My best and trusted, ke emodo."

  "And a good beginning it looks to me," Thesenet said, impressed. "Very solid, ke Pathen. Have you chosen your House name yet?"

  "I have," I said, and felt the attention of all my companions. "Asara, if you please."

  "A good name," Thesenet said without any hesitation, which told me I'd done a good job disguising the source of my choice. I could feel Hesa's quivering answer as if it was standing beside me, though. It had taken some delicacy to uncover the name of the eperu who'd died on the pedestal, but I'd had a good excuse to be going through Molan's records in het Kabbanil thanks to the fiction that had brought me my people. That unfortunate had actually been named Saraa but I had given it the rhythm of the word "Laisira" to obfuscate my intent.

  "I like it," Abadil said.

  "Because he needed your approval, is that it?" Darsi asked.

  "Of course!" Abadil said. "I'm a historian! If you make decisions without consulting a historian you will indubitably regret them. We know everything, you see."

  Thesenet grinned and said to me, "You are certain you can drive this team, ke Pathen?"

  "Ke Thesenet, I must," I said dryly, "or they will surely drive me."

  He laughed. "Well said! Come along then and let me give you a tour of the next capital of the Stone Moon. If you'll pardon the ambition..."

  "Pardon it?" I said, amused. "I hardly am one to take issue with ambition, Minister. By all means. Let us have a look at your project."

  "This way, then," Thesenet said.

  The tour held very little by way of surprises. Het Kabbanil had been the first city claimed by the empire and the second had been het Serean further to the south, the settlement established by the first Jokka to give up their nomadic ways... but het Narel had been the third, and it had a sizeable population, more than enough people to put to work implementing the empire's many initiatives. The Stone Moon's amenities had long since been established here, and the fields were lush with crops nearing their harvest, bronzed by the cold snaps that were becoming more frequent as autumn advanced. The expected irrigation systems had been built out into the farmlands, fed by wells and cisterns; I saw the cones of the sunken granaries in the distance. The horizon was new, at least; het Kabbanil had been built on a flat stretch but was clasped by hills, and the nearby mountains dominated the views. Het Narel was bordered by grasslands and near-deserts and only in the north were there gentle furrows that would become the hills that rumpled the land around het Kabbanil. Everywhere I looked I could see all the way to the horizon, and the long distances distracted my eye.

  The town itself was a little over half the size of het Kabbanil; being smaller it was easier to navigate, and it hadn't had the chance to sprawl the way the empire's capital had. And it looked more contemporary, probably because it lacked Kabbanil's ubiquitous ruins. I found that lack somehow freeing. No matter what the past had given us, our only way now was forward. We would have to make our own answers.

  Thesenet was a charming host. Not effusive, which I would have distrusted, but Abadil was right: he cared about het Narel and the people he'd been tasked with administrating. I wondered if he would have allowed a public torture to stretch on for two months in his town square and couldn't imagine it; it would have been too disruptive for someone with Thesenet's sensibilities.

  The ride lasted two hours and surprised me by not seeming interminable. Nevertheless it was late afternoon by the time Thesenet was done and I was ready to be off the back of a rikka and out of my travel-stained clothes.

  "And here is your home, ke emodo," he said. "House Asara. I hope it pleases. We've been preparing it for you for several days now."

  Houses among the Jokka could be small enough for a handful of people and their employees... or as large as the Great Houses of het Kabbanil with upward of a thousand people. In practice only the capital could support Houses of that size, but het Narel came very close. Because of the size of our draft, I'd been expecting something smaller than the estate Thesenet had brought me to, but an estate it was, a luxurious property with a metal gate and even an expensive fountain in its courtyard. I could have administrated five hundred people from a House of its size—it would easily fit the two hundred we'd planned.

  It was situated not far from the north-south trade road and opened out onto a set of fields so expansive I judged the House had once been employed in agriculture. In keeping with Stone Moon protocol, those fields had been cultivated and were near ready for harvest; the ministry would have put work details on food production even with the House unclaimed, particularly given the size of the House's plot. The ornamental plants, which used to be a sign of wealth before the Stone Moon made water plentiful, were old enough to have been trained all the way up the three-story facade in green arabesques, so the estate certainly dated back to before the Stone Moon's arrival... which meant Thesenet had awarded me an important deed.

  I would be lying if I said I didn't feel a sense of satisfaction at the sight. I hadn't earned this place yet, but I was going to.

  "It's a fine House," I said. "Very fine."

  "I'll leave you to it, then," Thesenet said, pleased. "Will you have time for a meeting this week, ke Pathen?"

  "If you have time tomorrow, I'd like to tell you my plans," I said. "I can stop by in the morning after I finish the formalities at Transactions."

  "I look forward to it," Thesenet said. "Welcome to het Narel, ke emodo."

  "Thank you," I said, and then he was off.

  "Good start," Abadil observed when he was out of earshot. "He likes you."

  "Let's hope that continues," I said. As we rode into the courtyard with its splashing fountain, I said, "So... these fields are where you are planning to... raise grass?"

  "Eventually," Abadil said. "For now we're going to have to ride out to gather it from the plains. I've got the weavers building frames... to make the paper, you know. You need molds and frames to dry it on and—"

  I held up a hand. "I'll leave it in your capable hands. For now I want to be off a rikka. Preferably for at least a day."

  We were greeted by familiar faces, Jokka from House Laisira whom I recognized from my time investigating the House. Some number of them led the rikka away and the others showed us inside, and the inside of the estate was as fine as the outside, with finished walls hung with tapestries or tiled with mosaics in abstract designs that reminded me of the spirals of the vines climbing the facade. As with most Houses, all three sexes had se
parate quarters; as Head of Household, however, I had my own chambers on the second floor. There was a receiving room; from it, doors opened on an office, a bedroom and a renovated bathing chamber. They'd been furnished enough to be useful, but not decorated... and for that I was grateful. There was such a thing as too much efficiency. A person wants to have a hand in at least some decisions involving where he puts his head down to sleep.

  Thinking that made me realize... I wanted to make my room my own. I hadn't had such desires since the empire consumed het Kabbanil, and took the world I'd been born into with it. So I was sitting on the bed, moving through that realization, when Hesa found me. It leaned on the door frame, arms crossed over its vest.

  "You've moved up in the world, ke emodo," it teased, though the tone was gentle.

  "I had no idea the Heads of Households lived so extravagantly," I said. "If I had, I would have become one sooner."

  Hesa laughed. "This sort of arrangement is only typical of Great Houses. In the smaller ones the Head of Household has an office to himself and maybe a private room in the emodo's quarters, but nothing like this. This place is so big even I have a room to myself, which is... truly opulent."

  "My room has a bed," I said. "After riding all day, that's all I need. But do you know what I observe, pefna-eperu?"

  "What is that, Head of Household?" Hesa asked.

  "That there are two doors between this room and anyone blundering into it."

  Hesa looked over its shoulder and said, "Why, you're right."

  I held out a hand and it stepped to me, just far enough to rest its palm on mine. By that clasp I pulled it gently down until we could kiss, and that we did, and gods what a relief that was after days of being close enough to touch it, but unable to.

  "Nevertheless," Hesa said after I bent away. "We should be discreet. If people find me in here with you with the door closed too often, they'll talk."