‘Except that life without it would be sterile and empty,’ Bevier asserted.

‘It would indeed, Sir Bevier,’ Itagne agreed. ‘Anyway, Delphaeic literature – which probably doesn’t have anything at all to do with the real Delphae – grew up around these ridiculous literary conventions, but after several centuries of that nonsense, the potentials of the pastoral tradition had been pretty much exhausted, so our poets began to wander afield – like untended sheep, if I may extend the metaphor. Sometime during the last century, they began to posit the notion that the Delphae practice a non-Styric form of magic. That really upsets my Styric colleagues at the university.’ Itagne looked back over his shoulder to make sure that Sephrenia, who still rode in the rear with Berit, was out of earshot. ‘Many people find something fundamentally irritating about Styrics. The pudding of smug superiority and accusatory self-pity doesn’t cook up very well, and the favorite form of Styric-baiting on the university campus is to mention “Delphaeic magic” to a Styric and then watch him go up in flames.’

‘Can you think of anything at all that might explain Sephrenia’s reaction to the Delphae?’ Vanion asked with troubled eyes. ‘I’ve never seen her behave this way before.’

‘I really don’t know Lady Sephrenia that well, Lord Vanion, but her explosion the first time I mentioned Delphaeic literature provides some clues. There’s a very brief passage in “Xadane” that hints that the Delphae were allied with the Styrics during the war that was supposed to have exterminated the Cyrgai. The passage was clearly based on a very obscure section in a seventhcentury historical text. There’s mention of a betrayal and not much more. Evidently, when their war with the Cyrgai began, the Styrics contacted the Delphae and tricked them into mounting an attack on the Cyrgai from the east. They promised aid and all manner of other inducements, but when the Cyrgai counter-attacked and began to over-run the Delphae, the Styrics chose to renege on their promises. The Delphae were almost exterminated. The Styrics have been wriggling and squirming for eons trying to justify that blatant breach of faith. There are many people in the world who don’t like Styrics, and they’ve used that betrayal as a vehicle for their bigotry. Styrics quite understandably don’t care much for the literature.’ He looked pensively out across the featureless desert. ‘One of the less attractive aspects of human nature is our tendency to hate the people we haven’t treated very well. That’s much easier than accepting guilt. If we can convince ourselves that the people we betrayed or enslaved were sub-human monsters in the first place, then our guilt isn’t nearly as black as we secretly know that it is. Humans are very, very good at shifting blame and avoiding guilt. We do like to keep a good opinion of ourselves, don’t we?’

‘I think it would take more than that to set Sephrenia off,’ Vanion said dubiously. ‘She’s too sensible to catch on fire just because somebody says unflattering things about Styrics. She’s spent several hundred years in the Elene kingdoms of Eosia, and anti-Styric prejudice there goes far beyond literary insults.’ He sighed. ‘If she’d only talk to me about it. I can’t get anything coherent out of her, though. All she does is splutter wild denunciations. I don’t understand at all.’

Sparhawk, however, had at least some slight inkling of what was happening. Aphrael had hinted that Sephrenia was going to encounter something extraordinarily painful, and it was growing increasingly obvious that the Delphae would be the cause of her pain. Aphrael had said that Sephrenia’s suffering would be necessary as a prelude to some kind of growth. Itagne, who really didn’t know any of them that well, may have hit upon something very relevant. Sephrenia was Styric to her fingertips, and the acceptance of racial guilt for an eons-old misbehavior would cause her the exact kind of pain Aphrael had so sorrowfully described. Sephrenia, however, would not be the only one who would suffer. Vanion had said that Sephrenia’s problems were also his. Unfortunately, the same held true of her pain.

Sparhawk rode on across the desolate waste, his thoughts as bleak as the surroundings.

Chapter 12

Kring looked pensively out across the lawn. ‘It came on me like a madness, Atan Engessa,’ he told his towering friend. ‘From the moment I first saw her, I couldn’t think of anything else.’ The two were standing in the shadows near the Ministry of the Interior.

‘You are fortunate, friend Kring,’ Engessa replied in his deep, soft voice. ‘Most men’s lives are never touched by such love.’

Kring smiled a bit wryly. ‘I’m sure my life would be much easier if it hadn’t touched mine.’

‘Do you regret it?’

‘Not for a moment. I’d thought that my life was full. I was the Domi of my people and I’d assumed that my mother would find me a suitable wife in due time, as is customary and proper. I’d have married and fathered sons, and that would have satisfied the requirements. Then I saw Mirtai, and I realized how empty my life had been before.’ He rubbed one hand over his shaved scalp. ‘My people will have a great deal of trouble with her, I’m afraid. She’s like no other woman we’ve ever encountered. It wouldn’t be so difficult if I weren’t the Domi.’

‘She might not have accepted you if you hadn’t been, friend Kring. Mirtai is a proud woman. She was meant to be the wife of a ruler.’

‘I know. I wouldn’t have dared to approach her if I hadn’t been Domi. There’ll be trouble, though. I can see that coming. She’s a stranger, and she’s not at all like Peloi women. Status is very important to our women, and Mirtai’s of a different race, she’s taller than even the tallest of the Peloi men, and she’s more beautiful than any other woman I’ve ever seen. Just by themselves, those things would shrivel the hearts of Peloi women. You saw how Tikume’s wife Vida looked at her, didn’t you?’

Engessa nodded.

‘The women of my people will hate her all the more because I am their Domi. She will be Doma, the Domi’s wife, and she’ll have first place among the women. To make matters even worse, she’ll be one of the wealthiest of all the Peloi.’

‘I don’t understand.’

‘I’ve done quite well. My herds have increased, and I’ve stolen much. All my wealth will belong to her. She’ll own vast herds of sheep and cattle. The horse herds will still be mine, though.’

‘Is that the Peloi custom?’

‘Oh, yes. Sheep and cattle are food, so they belong to the women. The women also own the tents and the beds and the wagons. The gold we get from the king for Zemoch ears is owned by all the people in common, so about the only thing we Peloi men own are our weapons and our horses. When you get right down to it, the women own everything, and we spend our lives protecting their possessions.’

‘You have a strange society, friend Kring.’

Kring shrugged. ‘A man shouldn’t have his mind all cluttered with possessions. It distracts him when the time comes for fighting.’

‘There’s wisdom there, my friend. Who holds your possessions until you marry?’

‘My mother. She’s a sensible woman, and having a daughter like Mirtai will increase her status enormously. She has a great deal of authority among the Peloi women, and I’m hoping she’ll be able to keep matters under control – at least among my sisters.’ He laughed. ‘I’m going to enjoy watching the faces of my sisters when I introduce them to Mirtai and they have to bow to her. I’m not really fond of them. They all pray for my death every night.’

‘Your own sisters?’ Engessa sounded shocked.

‘Of course. If I die before I’m married, everything I’ve won becomes the property of my mother, and my sisters will inherit all of it. They already think of themselves as women of property. They’ve turned down perfectly acceptable suitors because of their pride of position and the wealth they think they’ll inherit. I’ve been too busy making war to think much about marriage, and every year that passed made my sisters feel that their ownership of the herds was that much more secure.’ He grinned. ‘Mirtai’s sudden appearance is going to upset them terribly, I’m afraid. One of the customs of our people obliges a bride-to-be to spend two months in the tent of her betrothed’s mother – learning all the little things she’ll need to know about him after they’re married. During that period my mother and Mirtai will also select husbands for all my sisters. It’s not a good idea to have too many women in one tent. That will really upset my sisters. I expect they’ll try to murder Mirtai. I’ll warn them against it, of course,’ he added piously. ‘I am their brother, after all. But I’m sure they won’t listen – at least not until after Mirtai’s killed a few of them. I’ve got too many sisters anyway.’

‘How many?’ Engessa asked him.

‘Eight. Their status will change drastically once I marry. Right now they’re all heiresses. After my wedding, they’ll be possessionless spinsters, dependent on Mirtai for every crust of bread they eat. I think they’ll bitterly regret all the suitors they’ve refused at that point. Is that somebody creeping through the shadows over by the wall?’

Engessa looked toward the Interior Ministry. ‘It seems to be,’ he replied. ‘Let’s go ask him his business. We don’t really want anybody going inside that building while Atana Mirtai and the thieves are in there.’

‘Right,’ Kring agreed. He loosened his saber in its sheath, and the oddly mismatched pair moved silently across the lawn to intercept the furtive shadow near the wall.

‘How far is it from here to Tega, Sarabian?’ Ehlana asked, looking up from Sparhawk’s letter. ‘In a direct line, I mean?’

Sarabian had removed his doublet, and he really looked quite dashing in his tight-fitting hose and full-sleeved linen shirt. He had tied back his shoulder-length black hair, and he was practicing lunges with his rapier, aiming at a golden bracelet hanging from the ceiling on a long string. ‘About a hundred and fifty leagues, wouldn’t you say, Oscagne?’ he replied, contorting his body into en garde position. He lunged and caught the rim of the bracelet with the point of his rapier, sending the bracelet spinning and swinging on the string. ‘Blast!’ he muttered.

‘Perhaps closer to a hundred and seventy-five, your Majesty,’ Oscagne corrected.

‘Could it really be raining there?’ Ehlana asked. ‘The weather’s been beautiful here. A hundred and seventy-five leagues isn’t really all that far, and Sparhawk says right here that it’s been raining on Tega for the past week.’

‘Who can say what the weather’s going to do?’ Sarabian lunged again, and his rapier passed smoothly through the bracelet.

‘Well thrust,’ Ehlana said a bit absently.

‘Thank you, your Majesty.’ Sarabian bowed, flourishing his rapier. ‘This is really fun, you know that?’ He crouched melodramatically. ‘Have at you, dog!’ He lunged at the bracelet again, missing by several inches. ‘Blast.’

‘Alean, dear,’ Ehlana said to her maid, ‘would you go see if the sailor who brought this letter is still on the premises?’

‘At once, my Queen.’

Sarabian looked inquiringly at his hostess.

‘The sailor just came from Tega. I think I’d like to hear his views on the weather there.’

‘Surely you don’t think your husband would lie to your Majesty, do you?’ Oscagne protested.

‘Why not? I’d lie to him if there was a valid political reason for it.’

‘Ehlana!’ Sarabian sounded profoundly shocked. ‘I thought you loved Sparhawk.’

‘What on earth has that got to do with it? Of course I love him. I’ve loved him since I was about Danae’s age, but love and politics are two entirely different things, and they should never be mixed. Sparhawk’s up to something, Sarabian, and your excellent foreign minister here probably knows what it is.’

‘Me?’ Oscagne protested mildly.

‘Yes, you. Mermaids, Oscagne? Mermaids? You didn’t really think I’d swallow that story, did you? I’m just a bit disappointed in you, actually. Was that the best you could come up with?’

‘I was a bit pressed for time, your Majesty,’ he apologized with a slightly embarrassed look. ‘Prince Sparhawk was in a hurry to leave. Was it the weather that gave us away?’

‘Partly,’ she replied. She held up the letter. ‘My beloved outsmarted himself, though. I’ve seen his letters before. The notion of “felicity of style” has never occurred to Sparhawk. His letters usually read as if he’d written them with his broadsword. This one – and all the others from Tega – have been polished until they glisten. I’m touched that he went to all the trouble, but I don’t believe one word of them. Now then, where is he? And what’s he really up to?’

‘He wouldn’t say, your Majesty. All he told me was that he needed some excuse to be away from Matherion for several weeks.’

She smiled sweetly at him. ‘That’s all right, Oscagne,’ she said. ‘I’ll find out for myself. It’s more fun that way anyhow.’

‘It’s a big building,’ Stragen reported the following morning. ‘It’s going to take time to go over it inch by inch.’ He, Caalador and Mirtai had just returned from their night of unsuccessful burglary.

‘Have you made much progress?’ Sarabian asked.

‘We’ve covered the top two floors, your Majesty,’ Caalador replied. ‘We’ll start on the third floor tonight.’ Caalador was sprawled in a chair with a weary look on his face. Like his two companions, he was still dressed in tight-fitting black clothing. He stretched and yawned. ‘God, I’m tired,’ he said. ‘I’m getting too old for this.’

Stragen unrolled a time-yellowed set of drawings. ‘I still think that the answer’s right here,’ he said. ‘Instead of opening doors and poking under desks, we should be matching dimensions against these drawings.’

‘Yer still a-thankin’ there’s sekert passages an’ cornsealed rooms in thar, ain’t ya, Stragen?’ Caalador drawled, yawning again. ‘That doesn’t speak too well for your taste in literature, old boy.’

Sarabian gave him a puzzled look.

‘Thalesians are addicted to bad ghost stories, your Majesty,’ Caalador explained.