drunks and abusive customers into the street. He came – huge-bellied, naked
except for a skimpy loincloth and a dozen rings in his ear – he had once had a
lover who was an earring-seller and had used him to display her wares.
‘How may we serve the magician Lythande?’
The women on the couches and cushions were twittering at one another in surprise
and dismay, and Lythande could almost hear their thoughts; None of us has been
able to attract or seduce the great magician, and this ragged street wench
has caught his eyes? And, being women, Lythande knew they could see the
unclouded beauty that shone through the girl’s rags.
‘Is Madame Myrtis available, Jiro?’
‘She’s sleeping, 0 great wizard, but for you she’s given orders she’s to be
waked at any hour. Is this -‘ no one alive can be quite so supercilious as the
chief eunuch of a fashionable brothel – ‘yours, Lythande, or a gift for my
madame?’
‘Both, perhaps. Give her something to eat and find her a place to spend the
night.’
‘And a bath, magician? She has fleas enough to louse a floorful of cushions!’
‘A bath, certainly, and a bath-woman with scents and oih,’ Lythande said, ‘and
something in the nature of a whole garment.’
‘Leave it to me,’ said Jiro expansively, and Bercy looked at Lythande in dread,
but went when the magician gestured to her to go. As Jiro took her away,
Lythande saw Myrtis standing in the doorway; a heavy woman, no longer young, but
with the frozen beauty of a spell. Through the perfect spelled features, her
eyes were warm and welcoming as she smiled at Lythande.