Fortune's Fool - Mercedes Lackey [131]
“Of course!” Swinging their legs over the benches, they followed Klava out to the practice grounds.
There a number of would-be young Champions were hard at work under the direction of the two dragons. Gina was instructing one group in swordwork, while Adamant was patiently on the receiving end of blows from quarterstaves.
“More wrist!” they both happened to be saying, as the three of them came into view. Both looked up at the same time, and all work on the ground halted as the students craned their necks to see who was coming.
“Sasha! Katya!” Adamant reared up a little and arced his wings. “Oh good to see you! How do you like the changes?”
“Impressive,” Sasha chuckled. “Anyone would think this was a place where important people came.”
“Well of course it is!” Adamant said, grinning. “We’re here, aren’t we?”
Gina cuffed him with a wing.
“In all seriousness,” the emerald dragon said, slowly. “This is something that has been needed for a while. Not just a Godmother for this part of the world, and not just a Chapter House, but a place where those who are not human can safely send representatives to those who are. There has been some very interesting talk going on over in those embassies. I think we’ve done a fine thing here.”
“If so, it was entirely by accident,” Sasha replied, and shrugged. “The way most things tend to happen with me.”
“Trust to Luck,” Katya added, and grinned.
After a few more pleasantries, they parted. Klava led them through the gardens, then paused, waiting for their reaction.
Before them was a statue carved from a single piece of quartz crystal, of a young woman in a dancing dress, arms and face raised toward the sky. The crystal had been carved, and the statue placed so that the sun filled it with light.
It was Guiliette.
Katya gasped. “How—”
“The Queen’s carvers,” Klava said with pride. “They asked me questions and made sketches until they got her face right. Then they carved the statue.”
“It’s perfect,” Katya said quietly. And then she smiled. “If there is one single thing I am happiest about, it is that she freed herself.”
Klava nodded, and they both gazed at the statue for a while in silence. The carvers had somehow managed to put on the statue’s face the one expression that Katya had not seen on Guiliette’s until the end.
Joy.
Finally Sasha cleared his throat. “If we don’t see the others soon, they are going to have our hides,” he reminded them.
Katya laughed. “I think I shall keep my hide thank you! Let’s go!”
Magda was holding court, so to speak, in the gypsy camp. She insisted on brewing them tea and told them firmly that she would not read their fortunes, since she never read the cards for family. She introduced them to most of the camp, people who looked so much alike that Katya wondered how Magda kept them all sorted in her mind, and then she sent them on their way after extracting a promise to come back that evening for dancing and music.
Lyuba greeted them just as enthusiastically as Klava had. Although they had both heard of the changes to the mercenary company that had once worked for the Jinn, this was the first time they had actually seen these changes with their own eyes.
The livery was now light and a dark grey and cotton mix had lightened the wool. All the men wore a snarling Wolf head on their tunics, and the company banner bore the likeness of a running female Wolf. Lyuba herself wore the same uniform as the men, and they all treated her with respect and as an officer—except for Piotr, who treated her with respect in public, and with relentless teasing in private. But she teased right back, just as relentlessly, and with the same good humor.
They paid their respects to the Queen’s Ambassador. Sasha didn’t recognize him, but he didn’t expect to, though they both paid close attention to everyone else in the Embassy. After all, tomorrow the man who served them tea might be the Ambassador, and the Ambassador might be serving as a secretary. The Queen herself, it was said, would likely not be coming out of her mountain