She crossed over and sat beside him on the bench. "My lord--I can't thank you enough for making me dance tonight. I was nervous--I was real scared--when you first told me; but you knew better than I did, didn't you?"
"I thought you ought to have the opportunity. One can't always expect to have Fordil, you see."
"Oh, he was wonderful! I never knew--I couldn't have imagined--and the drummers, too--I mean, I couldn't have gone wrong if I'd tried."
"I've paid him for you, by the way. I gave him what he'd have got from a shearna."
This was her cue--all the cue she seemed likely to get, anyway. She flung her arms round his neck, and would have kissed him; but he turned his face aside.
"Oh, thank you, thank you, my lord! And did you like it? Did I do as well as you'd hoped?"
"You weren't bad as Shakkarn." He paused, considering. "And you were most resourceful, I admit. It hadn't occurred to me--it should have, of course--that without a costume or a dresser you'd be in difficulties over the old woman. I blame myself for that. But you certainly got over it very neatly."
"You've been marvelously good to me, my lord, really you have. I'm so grateful! What can I do to show it to you?"
He shrugged. "Practice, I suppose."
She waited for him to go on, but he was silent. Elated and full of her triumph, she was now consumed with sheer, raw desire. For him? she wondered. For a man, anyway. Then, Yes! yes! certainly for him! Yes, of course, for him! Come on, then!
She rose, put her wine-cup on the table and sat down on his knee. After a moment, since he made no move to support or embrace her, she once more put her arm round his neck. Her other hand, finding his, drew it up to her bosom and fondled it back and forth.
"You're the kindest man I've ever known. I mean it, truly. Oh--" She looked impatiently about the room-- "isn't there somewhere we can go--?"
Rather absently, he drew his hand away. "Well, I came to take you--I can't call it 'home,' unfortunately for you-- but to where you live, anyway."
"To take me home, my lord?"
"Well, you see, there are a great many people in the hall who want to--well, give you money and so on. Here's Sarget's lygol, by the way. I asked him to give it to me, so that you wouldn't have to go back. That'll keep your saiyett happy, I suppose. And Elvair-ka-Virrion will be seeing to your friend, I'm told."
Maia stood up, and at once he did so too.
"What do you mean, my lord, 'I won't have to go back'?"
"There's a jekzha waiting for you in the courtyard," replied Bayub-Otal, "just along the corridor."
Before she could control herself, Maia had hurled her bronze wine-cup across the room. Dented on one side, it leapt, rolled a few feet and came to rest in a corner.
"And suppose I happen to want to stay here, my lord?"
Bayub-Otal picked up the goblet and put it back on the table.
"There seems little point in staying in this room."
"I mean, suppose I happen to want to go back into the hall?"
"I'm afraid you can't: I don't wish it."
"And I do!"
"As I've already told you once before this evening, Maia, you were brought here at my request. It would be a pity if Elvair-ka-Virrion had to tell your saiyett that you wouldn't do what you were told."
Maia walked over to the window and stood staring out into the moonlight. Tears' of mortification filled her eyes. Yet there was no point in saying more: Bayub-Otal, she knew, would be immutable. But what could he want? What did he mean by subjecting her to this motiveless, pointless humiliation, involving no gain to himself?
"Just as you wish, my lord. But perhaps you'd kindly allow me to go back alone to the High Counselor's. It's only a mile through the upper city, so there's no danger."
"I'll fetch your cloak," replied Bayub-Otal.
Maia, left alone, stood with closed eyes, gripping the edge of the table. Gradually she sank down until she was kneeling, her forehead resting on the wood.
"O Cran and Airtha, curse him! Lespa, darken his heart! Shakkarn, send down on him the Last Evil!"
Realizing that she was kneeling in the spilt wine, she got up. Anyway, where was the sense? She was no priestess; she hadn't the power of cursing. She had no power at all--yet. Ah! but she'd a fair taste of it tonight, before he'd gone and spoilt everything.
"To be desired," she said aloud--and now she spoke calmly--"to be desired by everyone--that's power! To be desired, that's--an army of soldiers. If ever I can harm him--oh, if ever I can harm him, I will!"
38: THE TEMPLE OF CRAN
It was two hours after dawn. Durakkon, clad in the golden, black-dappled robes of the High Baron, was standing with a small entourage on the rostrum outside the Blue Gate. On either side of him rose the backward-sloping walls of the outer precinct, forming a kind of funnel down which the paved roadway led eastward from the gate itself to the junction, outside the city, of the highways from Thettit-Tonilda and Ikat Yeldashay.
In spite of the water sprinkled on the stones below, dust covered Durakkon's robes and had filled his mouth and nose. For half an hour he had been standing on the platform, while below him the Tonildan and Beklan regiments, some three thousand men in all, marched out of the city for the Valderra front. The two contingents, having mustered in Bekla upon the first slackening of the rains and spent several days in equipping and refitting, had been assembled by Kembri at dawn that morning in the Caravan Market.
Apart from his anxiety to reach the Valderra as soon as possible, the Lord General wanted no delay in getting the men out of the city, where soldiers in the mass were always liable to cause trouble through fighting, theft, rape and the like. Watched by the usual crowd of grieving girls, proud but sorrowful parents, envious younger brothers and angry tavern-keepers, trulls and similar creditors making last, vain efforts to collect what was due to them, the regiments had been inspected and addressed by Kembri and then marched out of the city by the nearest gate.