Kushiel's Avatar - Jacqueline Carey [233]
Let Joscelin laugh—and he did, thinking me vain—but I dressed in D'Angeline finery for the audience, hauling my one court gown out of our trunks; the rose-silk with crystal beading that I had worn to meet Pharaoh. I would accord no less to the Queen-Regent of Jebe-Barkal. At Kaneka's insistence, we contracted an entourage and made our way to court thusly, beneath the fringed shade of our hired parasol-bearers.
Queen Zanadakhete received us in her inner courtyard, her august personage concealed behind a curtained alcove while the soft cries of caged birds and the redolent scent of citron surrounded us.
"So," she murmured in Jeb'ez, a half-glimpsed figure, her breath stirring the gauze curtains. "You have come from Khebbel-im-Akkad."
"If it please your majesty." I knelt, proffering the Lugal's letter. A dark arm swathed in ivory bangles emerged to take the letter; an older woman's hand, I thought, the knuckles swollen. There was a stir behind the curtains, and I heard a second voice murmur, translating the Akkadian text into Jeb'ez.
"It is good," the Queen's voice said when the translation was done, soft and satisfied. Behind the curtains, her gauze-misted figure inclined its head. "Although they have not come here, whispers have reached our ears of these . . . these things, these bone-priests, which even Pharaoh in Menekhet feared. It is good they are overthrown, that my people are not in thrall there. The Khalifs son is pleased. Daughters of Jebe-Barkal, you have done well. You shall be rewarded for it, and every honor given unto your families."
Kaneka and Safiya bowed low before her.
"Majesty." I drew a deep breath, redolent with citron. "My companions and I—we seek your permission to travel further south, in search of the descendents of Makeda, the Queen of Saba. Do you grant it?"
There was a pause, and a rustling; a swift exchange of whispers.
The gauze curtains were twitched apart and a bright black eye peered out, set in a wrinkled visage. "You are the chosen of your gods?" the soft voice inquired. "The one who defeated the bone-priests?"
I hesitated, unwilling to make that claim.
"She is, Fedabin." It was Kaneka who spoke, firmly, bowing to press her brow to the earth. "I have seen it. Though she appears weak, the breath of her strange gods blows hard upon her neck."
Another long, assessing pause ensued. I knelt and held myself still, abeyante, in the earliest manner to which I had been trained. 'Twas naught new to me, Kaneka's revelation. Hyacinthe had spoken the prophecy for me long ago, delivering it to Melisande Shahrizai in the days when he would not dare bespeak my fate. That which yields is not always weak.
Not always, no. I have learned that much about myself.
"So be it," whispered the soft voice of the Queen, the aged hand turning palm-outward, scored with dark lines, ivory bangles clattering. "In the name of Amon-Re, in the blessed names of Isis and Osiris, your request is granted. Such aid as we have will be given. Where the name of Zanadakhete of Meroë holds sway, let these people pass unmolested."
I let out my breath in a sigh. It was done.
Inside, we were met by Ras Lijasu, a grandson of the Queen. He was a handsome young man with his grandmother's bright inquisitive gaze, his ebony skin set off by splendid attire in cloth-of-gold—shirt and breeches, and the togalike chamma. I was glad, seeing him, that I'd worn my D'Angeline garb.
"So!" he exclaimed, clapping his hands. "All the way from Terre d'Ange, you have come! And Grandmother likes you, I am told. Such fun! Muni, where are the passage-tokens for our guests?"
His attendant comrade grinned and opened a coffer, and the Jebean prince reached in to grasp a handful of gold cords, each strung with an ivory cylinder that bore the seal of Meroë—Isis enthroned and lion-headed Apamedek.
"With these," Ras Lijasu said, taking my hand and knotting a corded token about my wrist, "you may wander anywhere in Jebe-Barkal, and declare yourself under the