Arha felt the pale gold satin skins of the apples, looked at the twigs to which brown leaves still delicately clung. “They are pretty.”
“Have one,” said Penthe.
“Not now. You do.”
Penthe selected the smallest, out of politeness, and ate it in about ten juicy, skillful, interested bites.
“I could eat all day,” she said. “I never get enough. I wish I could be a cook instead of a priestess. I’d cook better than that old skinflint Nathabba, and besides, I’d get to lick the pots… Oh, did you hear about Munith? She was supposed to be polishing those brass pots they keep the rose oil in, you know, those long thin sort of jars with stoppers. And she thought she was supposed to clean the insides too, so she stuck her hand in, with a rag around it, you know, and then she couldn’t get it out. She tried so hard it got all puffed up and swollen at the wrist, you know, so that she really was stuck. And she went galloping all over the dormitories yelling, ‘I can’t get it off! I can’t get it off!’ And Punti’s so deaf now he thought it was a fire, and started screeching at the other wardens to come and rescue the novices. And Uahto was milking and came running out of the pen to see what was the matter, and left the gate open, and all the milch-goats got out and came charging into the courtyard and ran into Punti and the wardens and the little girls, and Munith waving this brass pot around on the end of her arm and having hysterics, and they were all sort of rushing around down there when Kossil came down from the temple. And she said, ‘What’s this? What’s this?”’
Penthe’s fair, round face took on a repulsive sneer, not at all like Kossil’s cold expression, and yet somehow so like Kossil that Arha gave a snort of almost terrified laughter.
“’What’s this? What’s all this?’ Kossil said. And then-and then the brown goat butted her-“ Penthe dissolved in laughter, tears welled in her eyes. “And M-Munith hit the, the goat with the p-ppot”
Both girls rocked back and forth in spasms of giggling, holding their knees, choking.
“And Kossil turned around and said, ‘What’s this? What’s this?’ to the – to the – to the goat…” The end of the tale was lost in laughter. Penthe finally wiped her eyes and nose, and absentmindedly started on another apple.
To laugh so hard made Arha feel a little shaky. She calmed herself down, and after a while asked, “How did you come here, Penthe?”
“Oh, I was the sixth girl my mother and father had, and they just couldn’t bring up so many and marry them all off. So when I was seven they brought me to the Godking’s temple and dedicated me. That was in Ossawa. They had too many novices there, I guess, because pretty soon they sent me on here. Or maybe they thought I’d make a specially good priestess or something. But they were wrong about that!” Penthe bit her apple with a cheerful, rueful face.
“Would you rather not have been a priestess?”
“Would I rather! Of course! I’d rather marry a pigherd and live in a ditch. I’d rather anything than stay buried alive here all my born days with a mess of women in a perishing old desert where nobody ever comes! But there’s no good wishing about it, because I’ve been consecrated now and I’m stuck with it. But I do hope that in my next life I’m a dancing-girl in Awabath! Because I will have earned it.”
Arha looked down at her with a dark steady gaze. She did not understand. She felt that she had never seen Penthe before, never looked at her and seen her, round and full of life and juice as one of her golden apples, beautiful to see.
“Doesn’t the Temple mean anything to you?” she asked, rather harshly.
Penthe, always submissive and easily bullied, did not take alarm this time. “Oh, I know your Masters are very important to you,” she said with an indifference that shocked Arha. “That makes some sense, anyhow, because you’re their one special servant. You weren’t just consecrated, you were specially born. But look at me. Am I supposed to feel so much awe and so on about the Godking? After all he’s just a man, even if he does live in Awabath in a palace ten miles around with gold roofs. He’s about fifty years old, and he’s bald. You can see in all the statues. And I’ll bet you he has to cut his toenails, just like any other man. I know perfectly well that he’s a god, too. But what I think is, he’ll be much godlier after he’s dead.”