She stopped in astonishment when the Damjatt leaned over and laid his hand on her mouth. “Don’t make rash vows, my lady. Do what you must to survive. A Damjatt philosopher once said, ‘Seeing into the darkness is clearness. Knowing how to yield is strength.’ ”
Her eyes opened wide then narrowed in speculation. Gently she took his hand and lifted it from her lips. Still holding his callused fingers, she said, “Is that what you’ve done, Afec? Do you see into the darkness? Is that how you survived so long?”
His face looked weary to her and his skin seemed thin and dry. He closed his eyes, and for a moment, Linsha thought he had fallen asleep. But eventually he sighed and made an answer. “When I was a little boy, my clan was overwhelmed by the Tarmaks. They took the young people for slaves and slaughtered the rest. They made me a eunuch and put me to work here. It was only after that I started having visions. I have been in the palace nearly fifty years, serving the Tarmaks, biding my time. I thought it was too late for me, but now you are here. You have spirit and compassion. And you fight.” His voice dropped until she could barely hear him. “You are the Drathkin’kela.”
Linsha pushed up on her elbows and stared at him, her mouth slightly open. The intensity of his voice surprised her; the meaning of his declaration took her breath away. His tone was unmistakable. It was pure awe.
She was about to make some sort of reply when he climbed stiffly to his feet and looked toward the palace brightly gleaming in the afternoon light. “If you will excuse me, Lady. I will leave you to your contemplation. The Empress wishes to see you tonight so that you might choose a dress. I will come for you when she is ready.”
Linsha, whose idea of formal dress involved armor and polished chain mail, looked over the array of colored robes and long dresses and immediately lost interest. The Empress’s rooms were much more intriguing. No tiny barracks-style sleeping chamber for her. The Empress had a large suite of rooms for herself and her slaves that included a meeting room, dressing rooms, a private bedchamber, and a bathing room. The entire suite was decorated with exquisite fabrics, leopard pelts, potted trees, and various weapons.
Afec cleared his throat, drawing her attention back to the clothing. Linsha shrugged. She couldn’t have cared less what she wore.
The Empress surprised her though. After fitting her with a green wrap dress that barely gave her room to take a stride, she presented Linsha with a long-sleeved black robe embroidered with a blue dragon that curled sinuously around the sweeping hem.
“Your quartal,” the Tarmak woman said proudly.
Linsha looked so quizzical that Afec hastened to explain. “You have no family to represent you, so you have no family quartal. Umm, that is what you might call a family crest or a clan emblem. All the old Tarmak families have one. The Empress thought a dragon would be appropriate for you.”
Linsha thought about that and ran her hand lightly over the exquisite blue silk embroidery. It was a blue dragon, a dragon of evil, a minion of Takhisis. But it was a dragon, and something about it reminded her of Cobalt, Sara Dunstan’s remarkable blue. It seemed better to Linsha to have her own symbol than to be faceless in the presence of the Akkad-Dar. Bowing, she expressed her thanks to the Empress.
After the meeting, Afec escorted her back to her quarters. At the wide door into the building, he handed her the robe and the green dress. As he passed it to her hands, he made a respectful bow and murmured so only she could hear, “When you go to the dragon, use the powder for the guards only in an emergency. Wear the belt. It will protect you from the priests’ magic. The liquid is for the dragon. Make her drink it. It will help her regain her strength.”
Linsha saw two woman approaching and quickly laid a hand on his wrist. Without a change in his expression, he nodded goodnight and shuffled away. Holding the dress and the robe and the items he had hidden in their folds, she watched him go until he disappeared in the direction of his small workroom.
She hurried into her sleeping chamber where she hung up the wedding finery and hid the small items with the dark green tunic and pants under her pallet.
With the patience born of a hundred past clandestine missions, she lay down on her pallet to wait.
Sometime close to midnight Linsha woke to the cry of the wind under the eaves. Lying still for a time, she listened to the sounds of the sleeping room, and when she heard nothing more than the moan of the wind, the creak of the timbers in the roof, and the common noises of the sleeping women, she rose silently to her feet. She gathered the bundle of clothes and the items she had collected and held them close to her body, then she wrapped a blanket around her shoulders. If anyone found her and asked, she would say she couldn’t sleep and was going to the privy. However, there was no need for subterfuge. The sleeping quarters remained quiet, and the halls were empty. Linsha hurried down a corridor and slipped outside.
The wind greeted her with a roar and a bite. The clouds she had seen in the western sky had bulled in after sunset and now covered the entire sky in a black velvet wrap. The clouds’ consort, the wind, roared and rolled over the palace grounds with a strong smell of rain on its skirts.
Linsha took a deep appreciative breath of air and hurried to the cover of a thick planting of shrubs and trees. She changed into the dark clothing, wrapped a gray scarf around her head, and tied Afec’s knotted belt around her waist. She hadn’t had a chance to ask him why he felt the belt was important to ward off the priests’ magic, but it made a good place to hang the small bag of powder and the container of liquid he had given her, a pair of archer’s gloves, and several lengths of a strong lightweight rope she had borrowed from the exercise room. She shoved her light tunic and the blanket out of sight and rubbed dirt over her hands, face and ankles. In this gloomy night, she knew she would be very difficult to see.
A shadow among the tossing shadows, she flitted through the windy night across the grounds to the hedge and stood at last at the foot of the circling wall. If she was right, the guards would be changing soon, which would give her the distraction she wanted to slip over the wall.
Low voices spoke on the parapet above her, and Linsha abruptly realized the change of the guard was already occurring. On silent feet she eased up the stairs by the tower and pressed into the darkness where the tower bulged out from the wall. An archway bisected the tower to allow the guards to pass through and to give them access to a ladder that led up into the higher levels of the watch turret. Linsha peered cautiously through the tower entry and saw six guards quietly conversing along the wall on the other side. Three were leaving and three would be staying. Or four. Hadn’t she counted four the other day?
Footsteps clattered overhead and a trap door suddenly opened in the tower ceiling. A guard climbed down the ladder and hurried to join the others. Another conversation ensued between the two watch leaders.
Linsha eased into the darkness of the tower archway, straining her ears to hear their voices. It was difficult to catch what they said over the roar of the wind and the crash of the surf below, but she thought she heard the Tarmak words for sick and three.
The Tarmaks saluted one another then four marched for the stairs, leaving only three on the walls. Linsha grinned. Apparently one of this guard unit was ill and they didn’t feel it was important enough to replace him on a night like this. So much the better.