Kay, Guy Gavriel – Sarantine Mosaic 01 – Sailing to Sarantium

Already, curiously, the interlude in the forest itself was receding, blur­ring, becoming lost in a kind of fog of its own, too difficult to master or retain. Had she actually seen a zubir with those dark eyes, that dwarfing size? Had it really been that large? Kasia had the strangest sense, drowsy and half-entranced by the fire, that she was meant to have been dead by now, that her entire being was.. . unrooted, oddly light, because of that. A spark flew and landed on the cloak; she brushed it quickly away. Could the future of such a person be known? Could her grandmother have seen anything at all in this fire, or was Kasia now a blankness, unwritten from this moment forward, unknowable? A kind of living ghost? Or freed from fate because of that? We’ll talk tonight, Martinian had said in the litter, before drifting to sleep again. Need to sort out your life.

Her life. A north wind was blowing outside; a clear night tonight but very cold, winter behind the wind. She put more wood-a little waste-fully-on the fire. Saw that her hands were shaking. She laid one palm against her chest, feeling for the presence, the beating of her heart. After a while she realized her cheeks were wet and she wiped away the tears.

She had fallen into a shallow, fitful sleep, but they made a great deal of noise coming up the stairs and one of the merchants in the room across the hall shouted at them, causing a soldier to pound truculently on the shouter’s door, eliciting further laughter from his fellows. Kasia was there­fore on her feet in the middle of the room when they pushed open the unlocked door and Martmian stumbled in, supported-almost carried, in fact-by two soldiers of the Fourth Sauradian, with two more behind.

Weaving erratically, they led him over and spilled him onto the bed, good humoured and amused, despite-or because of-another furious volley of shouts from the room across. It was very late and they weren’t being quiet. Kasia knew all about this: by law, the Imperial Inns had to put up as many as twenty soldiers at a time free of charge, doubling up paying guests to make room for them. They had to do it, but no one needed to enjoy the disruption of those nights.

One of the soldiers, a Soriyyan by his colouring, gazed at Kasia in the flicker of the firelight. ‘He’s all yours,’ he said, gesturing to the man sprawled untidily on the bed. ‘Not much to you. Want to come down with us? Men who can hold their wine then hold a girl?’

‘Shut fucking up,’ another said. ‘Orders.’

The Soriyyan looked for a moment as if he’d object, but just then the man on the bed intoned, quite clearly, though with his eyes closed, ‘It is considered indisputable that the rhetoric of Kallimarchos was instru­mental in the onset of the First Bassanid War. Given this as a proposition, ought later generations then lay the blame for so many cruel deaths at the philosopher’s tomb? A vexing question.’

There was an extreme, disconcerted silence, then two of the soldiers laughed. ‘Go to sleep, Rhodian,’ one of them said. ‘With luck, your head will be working again in the morning. Better men than you have been knocked senseless or bested in a drinking bout by the tribune.’

‘Not too many’ve had both happen,’ the Soriyyan added. ‘All hail the Rhodian!’ More laughter. The Soriyyan grinned, pleased with himself. They left, closing the door with a bang.

Kasia winced, then walked over and slid home the bolt. She heard the four of them pound, in sequence, on the merchant’s door across, then their boots sounded on the stairs descending to the ground-floor sleep­ing room.

She hesitated, then walked back towards the bed, looking uncertainly at the man lying there. The firelight made unstable shadows in the room. A log settled with a snapping sound. Martinian opened his eyes. ‘I begin to wonder if I was meant for the theatre,’ he said, speaking in Sarantine and in his normal voice. ‘Two nights in succession I’ve had to do this. Have I a future in the pantomime, do you think?’ Kasia blinked. ‘You aren’t. . . drunk, my lord?’ ‘Not especially.’ ‘But… ?’