Maia (Beklan Empire 1)

"I'm not goin', banzi," she said. "Doan' ask me why; I'll tell you another time. I've told Pussy and she's agreed that you're to go instead."

"Me?" said Maia, astonished.

"Yes, you!" replied Occula impatiently. "Doan' look so damn' surprised, as if you didn' know a zard from a par-snip. Get your deldas pulled up and your dress on. And look sharp too--the jekzha's here."

The next moment Terebinthia appeared to corroborate Occula. "The High Counselor says he can't spare her this afternoon," she said. "He's still not himself, I'm afraid. Your powder-blue dress will do very well, and as it's an Urtan you'd better wear plenty of jewels--that always impresses them."

"Now listen, Maia," she added later when she had given her her cloak and was walking with her to the courtyard, "Eud-Ecachlon's lodgings are in the lower city--somewhere near the Tower of the Orphans, I believe. You're to go straight there and come straight back, and you're not to get out of the jekzha on any account, do you understand? A slave-girl of the High Counselor has a position to maintain, and if I hear that you've been racketing round any shops or bazaars by yourself there'll be serious trouble. If Eud-Ecachlon chooses to take you, of course, that's another matter. You shouldn't be away more than four hours at most--the High Counselor may want you at sup-per-time. I'm sure we all hope he will."

It so happened that, as sometimes occurred during Melekril, the rain had let up for a few hours. Maia set off in high spirits. This would be the first time she had been out of the upper city since Lalloc had sold her to Sencho. In her restricted life to go out at all was an excitement, but to be bound for the lower city--smoky, pungent, clamorous, spread out before her like a sunset sky full of rooks-was exhilaration itself. As soon as they were well outside Sencho's gate she began chaffing the jekzha-man, giving as good as she got all the way down the walled road to the Peacock Gate. Going through the Moon Room by herself--for the jekzha-man, of course, was known and required no scrutiny from the guards--was somewhat daunting, but once back in the jekzha and trundling comfortably down the steep Street of the Armorers towards the Caravan Market, she quickly recovered her vivacity, gazing about her with delight.

At the entrance to the paved market they had to stop while a string of pack-oxen plodded by, their bales covered in rain-soaked sacking. An apothecary's 'prentice, standing at the door of his master's shop, gazed at Maia admiringly.

"Where are you off to, sweetheart?"

Maia, leaning round the side of the jekzha, let her cloak fall open for his benefit and gave him a warm smile.

"To see a friend from Urtah."

"Urtah?" said he, tossing his head. "You'd much better come in here. I'll teach you all about pestles and mortars, if you like."

"My friend's a champion javelin-thrower!" retorted Maia as the jekzha moved on: at which the young fellow roared with laughter and stood watching her out of sight.

They found the house without difficulty and Maia paid the man while the porter's boy went up to Eud-Ecachlon's rooms. The Urtan came down at once: his face, when he saw Maia standing at the foot of the stairs, fell all too plainly.

"Maia?" he said, stopping short on the lowest step. "But I thought--Occula---"

Maia had already anticipated this. At least he remembered her name, which was better than she had expected. Taking three quick steps forward, she put a hand on his arm, looking up at him and smiling as she unfastened her cloak.

"Occula's so sorry, my lord. Sometimes things happen when girls aren't quite expecting them--you know? But I'll tell you something else if you like." She looked round, then stood on tiptoe and whispered "I wouldn't let anyone else come instead; only me. At the party--that night-- when I first saw you, I felt--oh, can't we go somewhere where I can say what I really mean? It's not just by accident I'm here, tell you that." And with this she half-closed her eyes and took another step upward, so that she was standing beside him. Eud-Ecachlon, without a word, led her up the staircase.

Thereafter there was not much that he or any other normal man could have done to resist her, for Maia entered upon their business with a fervent, happy confidence that carried all before it.

The occasion proved more successful than she had dared to hope. She surprised even herself. Indeed, it was during this same afternoon that Maia came to realize that she had the luck to possess not only exceptional beauty but also an exceptional erotic aptitude. Occula, she knew, despised Eud-Ecachlon and had formed a poor opinion of his virility. Very well: it took all sorts to make a world; if Occula couldn't get the bull through the gate, she'd just have to do it for her, wouldn't she? Sharp-set after her recent, frustrating days, she was eager for pleasure and by no means disposed to be critical. Her forthright ardor was something for which Eud-Ecachlon, rather impassive and a little slow off the mark by nature, was quite unprepared. Despite being the heir of Urtah, he was not really very self-confident, and in his dealings with girls had become all-too-used to tepid acquiescence. This tended to make him nervous and often barely successful--as with Occula; but no one could have felt nervous of a happy-go-lucky, frisking childlike Maia. With a kind of rapturous astonishment, Eud-Ecachlon suddenly found himself giving as good as he got. The afternoon took on an unreal, extravagant quality, with after-play imperceptibly turning into fore-play and pleasure becoming uncoordinated, to everyone's enjoyment and no one's frustration. Kembri had been accurate in judging Maia's artless charm capable of exercising a strong appeal. The essence, of course, lay in her being as yet a stranger to dissimulation.

At length, roused out of sleepy contentment by the gongs of the clock towers sounding for the sixth hour after noon, she sat up in panic.

"O Lespa! That's never the time? Oh, I'll just about have to fly! No, don't try to stop me, my lord" (as he put his arm round her), "you'll only get me into trouble. But next time you're in Bekla--oh, soon soon soon!"

"It can't be too soon for me," he answered. "I'll let you know in good time, Maia, when I'm coming back. To tell you the truth, I like you better than Occula."

Occula's sophisticated expertise might perhaps have been a little too much for him, she thought. Indeed, now that she had got to know him for herself, she could sense as much. So she, Maia, could actually manage something Occula couldn't! Eud-Ecachlon was the better for her, and she was the better for knowing it. He wouldn't forget her: that she was sure of. (Nor, as will be seen, did he.) Dressed--more or less--and climbing into the jekzha for which the porter's boy had run out into the rain, she leaned back in a state of delightful self-satisfaction, fingering the lygol in her pocket (which felt heavy) and with her other hand fanning the humid air before her face.

It was not Maia's way--as it is many people's--to cool down excitement or gratification by searching for snags. (If only it had been, of course, she would probably never have become a slave-girl at all.) On the contrary, she normally gave full rein to every mood, one way or the other, until the fit was out. Now, triumphant in the waning light, she pulled aside the rain curtain and rode down the street like a princess, gazing from side to side and even, once or twice, happily waving to those passers-by (and there were more than a few) who chanced to look at her.

Thus gazing about her, she noticed a sweet-shop a little way up the road. Its lamps, which had already been lit, glistened invitingly on ju-jubes, crystallized fruits, slabs of toffee and honey-nut thrllsa like that which Tharrin had given her in the fishing-net. After all her romping activity, Maia was hungry (and to do him justice, Eud-Ecachlon would probably have done something about this, if only she had given him time). At the mere sight of the confectionery her mouth began to water, and a moment later, as the jekzha moved nearer, she caught the spicy, nutty smell of the shop, warm from the lamps.

Oh, bugger Terebinthia! she thought. Who did she think she was, anyway? When Terebinthia was an old hag with rotten teeth, she, Maia, would be a golden shearna and the friend of princes. And talking of teeth--

"Stop a moment!" she said to the jekzha-man. "I'm going into that sweet-sho

p; I shan't be a minute!"

Taking his hand to help herself down, she crossed the paved, well-drained footway--it still delighted her that in Bekla the rains were mudless--and went in under the propped-up, penthouse shutter of the shop.

Beside the scales, with their pile of little, brass weights, an old woman, black-clad, was sitting on a stool, while near-by a sturdy young fellow, holding a stick, leant against the wall. Maia could guess well enough what his job was, for in cities of the Beklan Empire sweet-shops had an effect no different from that which they had always had on penniless urchins.

"Good evening, mother!" she smiled, throwing back the hood of her cloak and giving the old woman the full benefit of her happy elation. "Would you like to sell me some thrilsa?"

The old woman, who knew all the local shearnas by sight, stared to see such a young, pretty girl out by herself. At all events, she thought, the customer looked well-dressed and prosperous.

"Is it the best you'd like, my dear?" she said. "There's two or three kinds, but this one's made with serrardoes, look--very nice."

She held up a piece between a none-too-clean finger and thumb.

"Oh, yes that does seem nice," said Maia, bending forward and sniffing. The smell vividly recalled Tharrin and the net. "It looks even nicer than the kind the High Counselor usually has. D'you reckon p'raps I ought to take him some back for a treat?"

In her high spirits, the idea of standing treat to the High Counselor struck her as exquisitely funny, and she roared with laughter.

The old woman stopped hitting the slab of thrilsa with her little hammer and looked round at her sharply.

"Are you the girl from the High Counselor's?" she asked.

"Yes, I am," answered Maia, in a tone that meant "and proud of it, too!"

The old woman put her face close to Maia's.

"Why have you come here yourself?" she whispered. "D'you want to get us all killed?"

"What--whatever do you mean?" gasped Maia, stepping back in astonishment and alarm. Presumably the poor old thing must be a little touched.

The old woman paused, uncertainly it seemed, as though in her turn wondering what to make of her visitor. Then, turning back to the tray of thrilsa, she said, "Oh, just my little joke, my dear: you mustn't mind me. Oh, look over there, now! There's my old cat coming in, see? Need a sharp cat in a sweet-shop, you know: Colonna, we call her."

This brought to Maia's mind the recollection of Zirek and Occula chaffing each other about the pottery ornament. She had never understood the joke, whatever it might be. All the same, perhaps she could make use of it for a bit of light conversation to turn what had seemed to be going to be an awkward corner. For all she knew the point might be something quite clever and amusing.