She watched them as they arrived, and she wondered. How did one choose, how did a woman know? There were so many kinds, and yet in her whole lifetime, a woman could possess but one. Or two, perhaps, if her husband died young and left her a widow while she could yet bear children. Still, she supposed, if one truly loved her husband, she wouldn't hope for that to happen, no matter how curious she might be. Still. It did not seem fair. There, on the black horse, pulling him in so abruptly that the horse's hooves clattered on the paving stones, that was Roed Caern. His hair flowed down his back in a black stream, as glistening as his horse's mane and as unbound. His shoulders strained the seams of his tailored coat. He had a sharp nose and narrow lips, and Delo had shivered when she spoke of him. “Oh, but he's a cruel one,” she had said so knowingly, and then only rolled her eyes when Malta had demanded to know what she had meant.

Jealousy gnawed at Malta's heart that Delo knew such things and she did not. Delo's brother frequently invited his friends to dine at his home. Roed was one such. Oh, why couldn't she have a brother like Cerwin, who rode and hunted and had handsome friends, instead of doltish Wintrow with his saggy brown robes and beardless chin? She followed Roed's striding steps with her eyes, and marked how he gave way suddenly with a deep and courtly bow to allow a young wife to precede him into the hall. Her husband looked none too pleased at his gallantry.

Yet another carriage pulled up. The Trentor family's, the crest on the door proclaimed it. The white horses that pulled it had ostrich plumes on their headstalls. Malta watched the family alight, the parents dressed so sedately in dove gray, followed by three unwed daughters, all in shades of goldenrod and holding hands as if they feared some man would try to separate such devout sisters. Malta snorted softly at their fearfulness. Krion came last. He was dressed in gray, like his father, but the scarf at his throat was a deeper gold than that his sisters wore. His hands were gloved in white tonight. Krion always wore gloves, to cover the terrible scars where he had stumbled into a fire as a child. He was ashamed of his hands, and modest, too, of the poetry he wrote. He never read it aloud himself, leaving that task to his devoted sisters. His hair was auburn and as a boy he had been as freckled as an egg. His eyes were green. Delo had confided to Malta that she thought she was in love with him. Someday, she said, she hoped to be the one to stand before chosen friends and read his latest verses aloud. Such a gentle spirit, Delo had breathed, and then sighed.

Malta watched him ascend the steps, and sighed herself. She longed to be in love. She longed to know more of men, to speak knowingly of this one or that, to blush at the mention of a name or frown sternly at the glance of dark eyes. Her mother was wrong, wrong when she said there was plenty of time, to wait to be a woman. The years of being a woman with a choice were far too few. All too soon women married and grew fat with babies. Malta did not dream of a solid husband and a well-filled crib. She hungered for this, these nights in the shadows, these hungers of the soul, and the attention of men who could not claim to possess her.

Well, it would not happen to her hiding in the shadows. Resolutely she took her cloak from her shoulders. She bundled it up and tossed it under a bush to retrieve later. She almost wished that her mother and grandmother were here, that she were arriving in a carriage, certain that her hair had not been mussed, that the paint on her lips was straight and fresh still. For an instant she imagined them all arriving here together, her handsome father presenting her his arm to escort her into the Ball. But with that thought came an image of awkward little Wintrow trotting along behind them in his brown priest's robe, and Mother in some stiflingly modest dress. Malta winced. She was not ashamed of her family. She would have enjoyed having them here, if only they knew how to behave properly and could dress well. Had she not asked, over and over, for her mother to come to the Ball this year? Well, they had refused her that. If she was to enter life as a woman, Malta would have to do it on her own. And she would be brave, allowing only a hint of her tragedy and loneliness to show on her face. Oh, she would be merry tonight, laughing and charming, but in an unguarded moment, perhaps one knowing eye would look at her and know the neglect she suffered at home, ignored and passed over by her family. She took a deep breath and walked forward towards the torchlight and the wide beckoning doors.

The horses pulling the Trentor family carriage clopped away. Another took its place. The Trells, Malta realized with both delight and dread. Delo would be in that carriage. Her parents and older brother Cerwin would, unfortunately, be with her. If Malta greeted them as they alighted, Delo's parents would be bound to ask where Mama and Grandmother were. Malta was not ready to face awkward questions just yet. Still, it would be so fun to go in arm and arm with Delo, two dazzling young women of the Bingtown Traders entering society together. She ventured a step closer. If Delo's parents and brother preceded her, there was a chance she could hiss to Delo and have her wait for her.