I had not long come to the conclusion that one of the most irritating things of the many galling facts of life as a slave was the way I hardly ever had a moment to myself to think my own thoughts. Sure enough, just as I was trying to address these mysteries, the door behind me opened and Shek Kul emerged, bare-chested, trousers loosely tied and his tunic slung carelessly over one shoulder. Despite his lack of gems and adornment, the Warlord looked no less intimidating, formidably muscled for a man of his age, self-possession in every fiber of him. He nodded to me, his smile broad with satisfaction, and he padded softly down the corridor, whistling softly under his breath. I watched him go, partly envious of his good fortune and partly resenting him and all his kind, with their unchallenged power over the likes of me.
I looked through the partly open door to see Laio fast asleep, lying on her stomach in a soft tumble of silken quilts, face child-like in sleep with a lock of hair over her eyes, her nakedness inviting a caressing beam of sunlight that reached through the louvers to finger her smooth thigh. The morning breeze stirred the air in the room, heavy with perfume and the scents of sex.
Stifling a churlish desire to drag my pallet noisily inside and start a thorough tidy-up, preferably with a rasping floor brush, I pulled the door to and began looking through my clothes for a clean tunic. A booted footfall at the far end of the corridor startled me and I looked up to see the Elietimm priest looking at me, an unpleasant anticipation in his eyes. The man was dressed in plain, inconspicuous clothes, a black tunic and trousers, well washed and somewhat faded, looking no threat to anyone, a supplicant for honest trade. Only those eyes gave him away as far as I was concerned, dangerous as a dog trained only to understand the lash and brutality.
“Let me see that sword,” he commanded abruptly.
I looked at him blankly, summoning the expression of polite incomprehension I had been perfecting on Gar.
“I know who you are, Tormalin man.” The priest halted, hands on his hips, looking down at me with disdain. “You are nothing. All I want is the sword. Let me have that and I will let you live.”
I stood up, the scabbard in my hand. The priest was no fool; he was staying just out of the reach of the blade. I put my hand to the hilt and saw an odd mixture of apprehension and anticipation in those light-blue eyes, cold as the winter sky.
“I will have that blade and you as well,” he sneered, my continuing silence evidently needling him. “You will be at my mercy. Before I am done you will be weeping like a whipped child.”
“I think that it is my place to chastise my own property.” Laio opened the door with a swift movement and stared haughtily at the Elietimm, her eyes hard. Her queenly manner was not diminished in the slightest by the fact that she was inadequately clad in a gossamer undertunic. “Your behavior is hardly respectful, for a guest of Shek Kul,” she added with unmistakable emphasis.
The Elietimm’s face was wiped clean of expression in an instant and he bowed low to Laio before turning on his heel and stalking rapidly back down the corridor.
“What a peculiar man.” Laio shook her head in puzzlement. “What is Kaeska thinking of, bringing him here?”
I seized the moment. “I can tell you exactly what she is planning. I overheard them talking last night.”
Laio’s eyes brightened. “Excellent. I knew you would learn to be a good slave eventually. Get something for us to eat and you can tell me all about it.”
She opened the long shutters to the balcony and found a plain, loose dress among the jumble of clothes on a bench, the fact that she was doing things for herself the best evidence that she was seriously interested in what I had to say. I hurried to fetch a plentiful breakfast of unleavened bread, cheese, fruit and juice. I was still ravenous and, anyway, I had learned to make a hearty breakfast whenever I could, it being the meal least likely to spring a nasty surprise on me.
“So, what did you hear?” Laio demanded, settling herself on a cushion and reaching for some berries. “Tell me everything.”
I hesitated, wondering exactly where to start. I couldn’t see the whole business of the sword being of any interest to Laio; I had to tell her something directly relevant to her own ambitions and interests. “Well, to start with, I know where that man comes from. It is a group of islands far to the east and north, in the heart of the great ocean. The thing is, they are very poor lands, they have no metal, no wood, no beasts to give them fine leathers. He is lying to Kaeska about the trade he can offer her.”
Laio shrugged, but I could see satisfaction in her eyes. “Then she will look extremely foolish when she can achieve nothing and she will lose even more status. Go on, and eat something as well. I’ve got things I want to do this morning.”
“The promises of trade are only an excuse.” I took a hasty drink. “He is telling Kaeska that he will help her bear a child and regain her place as First Wife.”
To my surprise, Laio laughed heartily. “Then he is as much a fool as she is. Kaeska is barren, we all know that.”
I chose my next words with extreme care. “She might be barren with Shek Kul but what if she were to take this man as a lover and pass off his child as the Warlord’s?”
Laio frowned at me. “Shek Kul has no difficulty getting children—women in several domains can attest to that; Mahli took particular care to make sure her first child was of his blood as well. Anyway, if it was only a matter of finding a fertile man, Kaeska would have been pregnant years ago.”
Now it was my turn to look puzzled. “Wouldn’t Shek Kul have objected?”
“I keep forgetting how ignorant you can be. Do see sense; the wind may sow the seeds but the farmer who tends the seedlings reaps the harvest.” Laio sighed and shook her head. “It is a wife’s duty to bear children for her husband but it is her business who begets them. After all, some wives are closely related to their husbands, some men cannot get women pregnant, others prefer to go clean-shaven. In any case, we are an island people; bringing new blood to a domain is always beneficial. It’s understood that a good wife will do that with at least one of her children. If we always bred to our own, we would all be three measures tall with six fingers by now.”
She tossed the stripped berry stem on to the floor and took a spoon to a dark green pod of milky seeds. I drizzled honey on a piece of the leathery flatbread and rolled it around a little white cheese, cramming my mouth full while she was busy talking.
“Kaeska is definitely barren,” Laio stated firmly through her mouthful. “She has been married to Shek Kul for nearly twenty years and in all that time has never even quickened. If she would only acknowledge the fact she could quite easily retain her status as first wife, trade for a baby from an Islander and rear it herself, for instance. There is no shame in being infertile among civilized people. The whole problem is that Kaeska won’t admit it. She stays away from the domain as much as possible and lets it be rumored that is why she doesn’t conceive; she has been making herself and Shek Kul ridiculous for years, but he has had to indulge her in order to protect his treaty with her brothers, who dote on her as well as benefiting from her rank. She also does everything she can to provoke him into doing something that would entitle her to divorce him, but he’s too clever to let her get away with that. Still, now that her brothers have been ousted from the Danak domains, Shek Kul does not need to protect her status as First Wife any longer. That alliance is as dead as yesterday’s fish. Now our husband can finally get himself some heirs.”
Laio giggled sunnily. “He and Mahli were busy before Danak Mir’s blood was dry on the sand. I will be next and once Gar has recovered from Kaeska’s demotion, I imagine she will want a child as well. Our husband hasn’t decided yet how long he will keep from her bed, just to make sure she understands he knows about her plots with Kaeska, but I imagine Sezarre will be capable of doing his duty.”