He didn’t remind her that any such child would be a slave also.
Yet before they slept she murmured something else, which he thought she might well not have let slip if she were fully awake: “We have been one flesh tonight, my lord, and may we be so often again. But know that I know we are not of one people.”
“What?” An iciness stabbed him. He sat bolt upright.
She snuggled close. “Lie down, my heart. Never, never will I betray you. But… I remember enough things from home, small things, and I do not believe Geyils in the mountains can be that different from Geyils by the sea…. Hush, hush, your secret is safe. Why should Bronwen Brannoch’s daughter betray the only person here who ever cared about her? Sleep, my nameless darling, sleep well in my arms.”
At dawn a servant roused Everard – apologizing, flattering all the while – and took him away to a hot bath. Soap was for the future, but a sponge and a pumice stone scrubbed his skin, and afterward the servant gave him a rubdown with fragrant oil and a deft shave. He met the guards officers, then, for a meager breakfast and lively conversation.
“I’m going off duty today,” proposed a man among them. “What say we ferry over to Usu, friend Eborix? I’ll show you around. Later, if daylight remains, we can go for a ride outside the walls.” Everard wasn’t sure whether that would be on donkeyback or, more swiftly if less comfortably, in a war chariot. To date, horses were almost always draught animals, too valuable for any purposes but combat and pomp.
“Many thanks,” the Patrolman answered. “First, though, I’ve need to see a woman called Sarai. She works in the steward’s department.”
Brows lifted. “What,” scoffed a soldier, “do you Northerners prefer grubby housekeepers to the king’s choice?”
What a gossipy village the palace is, Everard thought. I’d better restore my reputation fast. He sat straight, cast a cold look across the table, and growled, “I am present at the king’s behest, to conduct inquiries that are no concern of anybody else’s. Is that clear, gossoon?”
“Oh, yes, oh, yes! I did but jest, noble sir. Wait, I’ll go find somebody who’ll know where she is.” The man scrambled from his bench.
Guided to an offside room, Everard had a few minutes alone. He spent them reflecting upon his sense of urgency. Theoretically, he had as much time as he wanted; if need be, he could always double back, provided he took care to keep people from seeing him next to himself. In practice, that entailed risks acceptable only in the worst emergencies. Besides the chance of starting a causal, loop that might expand out of control, there was the possibility of something going wrong in the mundane course of events. The likelihood of that would increase as the operation grew more long-drawn” and complex. Then too, he had a natural impatience to get on with his job, complete it, nail down the existence of the world that begot him.
A dumpy figure parted the door curtain. Sarai knelt before him. “Your adorer awaits her lord’s bidding,” she said in a slightly uneven voice.
“Rise,” Everard told her. “Be at ease. I want no more than to ask a question or two of you.”
Her eyelids fluttered. She blushed to the end of her large nose. “Whatever my lord commands, she who owes him so much shall strive to fulfill.”
He understood she was being neither slavish nor coquettish. She neither invited nor expected forwardness on his part. Once she had made her sacrifice to the goddess, a pious Phoenician woman stayed chaste. Sarai was simply, humbly grateful to him. He felt touched.
“Be at ease,” he repeated. “Let your mind roam free. On behalf of the king, I seek knowledge of certain men who once visited his father, late in the life of glorious Abibaal.”
Her gaze widened. “Master, I can scarcely have been born.”
“I know. But what of older attendants? You must know everybody on the staff. A few might remain who served in those days. Would you inquire among them?”
She touched brow, lips, bosom, the sign of obedience. “Since my lord wills it.”