Ardain darkened. “Never!” she said.
“I don’t mean you, Ardain, or the Cyncaidh. I was thinking about households less well regulated. Less honorable. I’m a stranger in your land, you know.”
This mollified the girl somewhat. “I’ve heard of such, I’ll admit,” she said, “but it wouldn’t happen here. If the Cyncaidh had sons, and they—troubled a serving girl, he’d discipline them severely, I have no doubt.”
If the Cyncaidh had sons. “I suppose he would. He’s considerate of others.” A noble without sons, whose wife is far beyond child-bearing. “Thank you for answering my questions, Ardain. I think I’ll go to the study now.”
Vordan, the second steward, took her, and at her request, showed her the shelf on local and family history, then left her to herself.
Varia ate in the small dining room. Would have eaten alone, if she hadn’t again requested Ardain’s company. The second steward acquiesced gracefully. Clearly there was no taboo connected with it; it was simply something out of the ordinary. Varia could see the value of not hobnobbing with the help. If the staff was like part of the family, there’d be little privacy, and the distinctions between duties and personal relationships could get badly blurred. But she was a guest, wanting company.
When she and Ardain sat down alone, she asked Vordan when she might talk with the Cyncaidh, or A’duaill, or Lady Mariil. Vordan brought the steward, who promised to get her a more specific answer. He was back before she’d gotten to dessert. The Cyncaidh, he said, was with A’duaill and the Lady Mariil in A’duaill’s office, where they’d had lunch as they worked, and would remain till they were finished. She’d be informed at once when they were.
In the study again, Varia did as much thinking as browsing. She’d found nothing about any gate in this part of the world. Were there gates in the empire? If there were, Ylver could safely pass through, at least those with talent. What regulations and policies might they have?
From auras she’d seen in the empire, most ylver had only modest talents, probably because among commoners, breedings weren’t arranged. Apparently they weren’t among noble families, either, but nobility might originally have been a function of talent. In which case, if nobles married nobles more or less exclusively, most noble children would be born with substantial talent, and no doubt be trained to use it.
Fertility was a problem among the ylver; that was well known to the Sisterhood. Sarulin, the founder and first Dynast, had been ylvin, a sorceror’s daughter in the court of a high noble. At least in those days, ylvin nobles sometimes warred on each other, took other ylver captive and made slaves of them. And if the story was true, Sarulin had been such a captive. Beautiful red-haired Sarulin; among the mostly black-haired ylver, she’d been conspicuous. Her captor, who was also red-haired, had raped her—impregnated her at any rate—and the story was that he’d been an exceptional magician.
Sarulin had already decided to escape and start a rebel movement, and with her powers, she’d known almost as soon as it happened that she’d conceived. So she’d undertaken to manipulate the microscopic creature in her uterus to produce a multiple birth, something that had never been tried before, and she’d succeeded. Then she’d run away with her master’s discontented son, also very gifted.
Or so the story went, and the truth might well have been something like that.
Varia wondered again what A’duaill’s questions had been. Had he learned how fertile her clone was? That among the Sisterhood, multiple births were a learned skill? Had he learned how it was done? Was that why she’d been brought here?
She had her audience with him that afternoon, and didn’t ask any of those questions. Perhaps later, but just now . . . Her loyalty to the Sisterhood had been battered since her kidnapping from Farside. But on the other hand, while clearly the ylver were not an evil race, they had their Quaies in high places. Thus she didn’t want them learning to do what Sisters routinely did—produce litters.
If A’duaill hadn’t learned about this already, to ask would result in another interrogation. Then he’d surely know.