In this land where such were considered menaces and the best of prey I was surprised at the detail and lifelike appearance of Ravinga’s collection. Here were free sandcats engaged in their own lives as I had seen Myrourr and those who had gathered for the “sing.” These had surely never been fashioned by one who had only seen them from a distance, or stood above dead bodies after a hunt.
I thought often of the scars on my hostess’s wrist, hidden always by her bracelet. She had not mentioned those, only was sure I had seen them. When had Ravinga entered that other world and why? I had made the point of watching Allitta and she certainly bore no such markings.
From childhood I had been schooled to patience but sometimes now I wanted to confront Ravinga and demand answers, clear-cut answers. Since the night that she had shown me that black ball and taken it again out of my hand while I still goggled over what I had seen and what might be the meaning of it, she had spent very little time with on me, being occupied with the shop—and her work table.
I made myself useful on the second day—the first I had gone to the market to inspect the dealers in stones and jewel work. Twice I had seen pieces which undoubtedly were from my sister’s fashioning being resold and at prices which I think would have truly astounded Kura. I began to plan how that her work might be brought directly to Vapala so that not only might her fine creations be appreciated by collectors but that she would have the pick of stones and other raw material, the like of which never appeared in our own trading fairs.
Ravinga not only sold from her shop, she had also a leased market slip and it was there that during this time her servant Mancol took the less of her wares. I helped him transport and set up the stall before I wandered about on my own.
The turquoise I had brought out of the outlands I was able to sell for some silver shavings which seemed a goodly bargain to me, though I am sure, had I known better the ways of this market, I could have made an even better trade. But there was too much to see and listen to, so much which was distracting.
Processions wound up and down the streets. There were constant cries from harsh-voiced running servants to clear the way for those of one Great House or another. Youths in their finest were arriving—perhaps not to make the trials—but to mingle and gamble, race their mounts outside the city, drink the wines known nowhere else, generally show their arrogant persons that at times were boorish beyond belief.
Once I saw Shank-ji with a crowd of followers. He was fair-skinned as any Vapalan—but he did not wear the bush wig of a warrior, though he was armed well enough with superbly forged weapons, gem-hilted. His own white hair was knotted back in as simple a fashion as my own, though the clasp which held it so blazed with diamonds.
His face was narrow, clean of any hair on cheek or chin, though most of his companions sported narrow threads of mustache or jawline of beard. There was something oddly masklike about his countenance—no expression showed. Heavy lids appeared to hide, by chance or design, most of his eyes. There was certainly that about him which drew the attention—perhaps a certain tension throughout as if he held himself in tight rein against flaming action for which he longed.
He was young, though there again one could not say he was like the other youths. Rather there was about him some of the authority which my father has always worn as a daunting cloak. Still, Emperor’s son though he might be, he had by custom held no open power in Vapala and ranked lower even than any House lord.
People made way for his party. I observed that some in the crowd looked at him oddly in question as he rode by. Once I saw a woman’s fingers move quickly in a sign which in my land was used to ward off ill fortune. On the other hand there were a portion of those who called out his name, though he did not look at who so hailed him or make an answering gesture.
During my prowling of the market Murri had withdrawn to the ruined house in the small court where Ravinga’s shop stood. When I questioned his safety Allitta said, with that stiff impatience she always used for me, that the ruin also belonged to the dollmaker and there would be no one to visit it untimely.
My desert-born comrade was bored. Had it not been that at night he could come back to Ravinga’s own roof and that the kottis appeared to trot back and forth regularly to his place of refuge, I think he might even have climbed to the housetops again and gone exploring on his own. I took to describing to him in the evening what I had seen. How much human affairs meant to Murri when they did not actively affect his own life I could not tell, but he listened, and once in a while asked a question which surprised me.
He seemed particularly interested in my sight of Shank-ji, though he growled several times and at last stated flatly:
“That one kills—kills not to eat—but to—” He seemed to be searching for some way of expressing a thought important to him in the limited vocabulary we could share. “He kills—to wear teeth—to take skin—for the seeing of others.”
A killer for red sport. Certainly that could be true of more than half those I had watched riding so proudly through the streets. Yet Shank-ji, if he shared that with most, had more. Kynrr had been hostile and forbidding at our first meeting, yet there had been that in him which I could understand. Even my brother I could read after a fashion. However, this would-be Emperor-no, he rode alone.
“Not one—” Murri broke in upon that thought, “two—
“Two what?” I asked.
The sandcat blinked. Again it seemed he struggled to make clear some thought. Then he answered:
“Here stands that one.” He placed a paw flat on the floor close to my knee. Then he moved his other foot to position several finger lengths behind the first. “Here—other—
“Other man?”
Again Murri blinked. “Other—” I thought I could sense puzzlement as if he could not truly give a clear answer.
Someone behind Shank-ji? That suggested that the Vapalan’s bid for the throne of his father might indeed have covert support.
I had heard enough sidewise comments from time to time since I had reached the city which suggested that there was an unrest under the surface, that all was not as it had once been in the Diamond city, bound by custom into a narrow trail.
That I could get any more out of my desert-born companion was impossible now. I only hoped that what he might know or learn in the future he would share with me.
Night’s shadows lay on the city. The shop was closed, and, though the music of the mobiles was still in chime, this pocket of a court which held us was relatively quiet. For the first time since I had entered Vapala I brought out Kynrr’s treasured Kilongg and tuned it, glad to see that the hard trek had not affected it in any way.
The bowl was worn indeed, polished very smooth by long handling, so polished that only the faintest of designs remained— an intricate twisting of lines of which I had never been able to make anything. They could have once been a running script such as those of Vapala used for their “high” writing of music and sound.
I moved my fingers back and forth in an exercise to limber them, then dared to strike the chords of one of those songs Kynrr had taught me. Allitta had gone elsewhere in this sprawl of building which I had never fully explored, keeping strictly to the section Ravinga had made free for me. The dollmaker herself came to settle on a pile of mats, sighing as she relaxed, rubbing her back with one hand as if hours spent above her work table had left her aching.
One of Kynrr’s songs came easier as I reached the proper strings. I kept my voice low. Murri loosed a rumble of purr and the three kottis gathered in about Ravinga, watching me as they rubbed lovingly about the dollmaker. They were as one in their black coloring and always they went together as if invisibly linked. They had paid me the courtesy of notice now and then, but it was plain that in this house only Ravinga and the girl rated their whole attention and devotion.