A Time of Omens - Katharine Kerr [70]
“The young lady found those most interesting, sir.”
“Oh, I’m sure she did.” Ebañy was smiling, but his gray eyes were oddly cold and distant, like a flash of steel. “Tell me, where did you buy these?”
“From a merchant up in Delinth, last year it was. He’d won them in a gambling game, he told me, over on Surtinna. He trades there regularly.”
“You don’t happen to remember what city he got them in, do you?” Ebañy put back the knave and picked up a careless handful of other tiles. Seeing them lying in his long, pale fingers made Marka feel like fainting, but why, she couldn’t say.
“Um, well.” The vendor thought for a moment. “Wylinth, maybe, but I wouldn’t swear to that. I’ve talked to a lot of people and heard a lot of tales since then.”
“Of course. How much do you want for them?”
“Ten zotars.”
“Huh, and the moon would cost me only twelve! Two zotars.”
“What! The box alone is worth that.”
“But it’s got that wine stain on the bottom. Three zotars.”
As they went on haggling, enjoying themselves thoroughly, Marka could barely listen. Ebañy knew about the stain, too, just as she somehow knew, when neither of them had picked the box up and looked at the bottom. She was sorry she’d ever stopped to chat with the vendor, sorry she’d wanted the set of tiles, even sorrier he was buying them—and then it occurred to her that he was buying them just for her, just because he knew she wanted them. When he happened to glance her way and smile, she felt as if she would die from happiness. At last five zotars changed hands, and Ebañy settled the lid on the box, picked it up, hefted it briefly, and gave it to her. Clutching it to her chest, she leaned over and on a sudden impulse kissed him on the cheek.
“Oh, thank you. They’re so lovely.”
He merely smiled, so warmly, so softly, that her heart started pounding. He rose, then helped her up, taking the box from her to carry it.
“Let’s get back to the camp. Oh, and by the way. This isn’t much of a place to ask, but will you marry me? I know that under your laws I should be asking your father, but going back to find that esteemed worthy would be a journey tedious beyond belief, and a reunion oppressive beyond sufferance.”
“Marry you? Really actually many you?”
“Just that.”
When he laughed at her surprise, she realized just how ready she’d been to do anything that he might ask of her,
“Shall I take your silence as a yes or a no?”
“A yes, you idiot.”
With one convulsive sob, hating herself for doing it, Marka began to cry, and she sniveled inelegantly all the way back to the caravanserai.
“You stupid blithering dolt!” Jill was yelling, but she did remember to use Deverrian. “I could strangle you!”
“Do calm down, will you now?” Salamander stepped back, honestly frightened. “I don’t understand why your heart is so troubled, I truly don’t.”
Jill stopped, the anger ebbing, and considered the question as seriously as it did indeed deserve. She was worried about the girl, she supposed, who thought she was marrying a young traveling player much like herself while the truth was a fair bit stranger.
“Well, my apologies for getting’ so angry,” she said at last. “I suppose it’s because she’s so young, and you’re not, no matter how handsome your elven blood keeps you.”
“But that’s a reason in itself, Here, consider this. I’m well over a century old, my turtledove, old for a human being, young for a full-blooded man of the People, but I’m neither, am I?” His voice cracked with bitterness, quickly covered. “Who knows how long a half-breed lives? Marka’s little more than a child, truly. I keep hoping that this time, well have the chance to grow old together. Before, even if she hadn’t caught that fever, I would have lived long past her.”
“Oh.” Jill couldn’t find it in her heart to reproach him. “Well I mean, none of my affair, is it now? Whether the lass marries you or no.”
“Mayhap I was a bit sudden about it. It was seeing her with those tiles. Ye gods, how many hours have I watched her, sitting there at that