Kushiel's Chosen - Jacqueline Carey [64]
"Let it be," I said wearily, climbing inside. "Yeshua's House is divided against itself; I will not add to their sorrows. I owe a debt to his children." Remembering Taavi andDanele, the Yeshuite couple who had been so kind to Joscelin and me in our dire flight, I wondered if they were caught up in this schism, and prayed not.
I had money; I bought books, and read them, tracing with my finger the lines of Habiru text. I slept ill at night and tossed in my sheets, waking fevered from dreams I could not remember. I read, and studied, and learned, and came no closer to answering the riddle.
Hyacinthe.
Elua, but I missed him!
I suppose that my rootless sorrow made me reckless, although it may have been in part the slow-wearing frustration that arose from my stalled inquiries. Whatever the source, it was recklessness that led me to accept an assignation with Nicola L'Envers y Aragon.
It was in the Hall of Games that she approached me, where I watched Fortun engaged in a game of rhythmomachy with the Baronesse de Carvoile, whose mother had been an adept of Bryony House. It is a game for which I have no especial gift, being the province of those whose strength of wit lies in dealing with numbers; I can play it, if I must, but I do not do it well. Fortun, who had never once laid hand to the board ere becoming my chevalier, showed considerable skill at it.
Back and forth they went, placing their different-shaped counters in varying progressions, according to varying mathematical formulae, until I was well-nigh lost. "Ah!" murmured a watching connoisseur, as Estelle de Carvoile laid down a sequence with surety. "A Fabrisian series!"
I blinked, bewildered, seeing no correlation in the numbers she played; Fortun merely frowned and countered with something called a Tertullian set. I can see patterns in events, and behaviors—in mathematics, I follow slower. Still, I added my voice to those lauding Fortun's play.
"A dull game," murmured a nearby voice, "for those who would rather dally with somewhat other than numbers." I turned to meet the violet gaze of Nicola L'Envers y Aragon,who gave me the lazy smile of a stalking leopardess. "Your chevalier is skilled, Comtesse."
"Yes," I said automatically. "He is." I eyed her sidelong. "Where is your companion, Lord Shahrizai, my lady?"
"Oh, Marmion." Nicola shrugged. "Sulking, no doubt. I told him I'd not divorce on his account, and he is wroth with me. It will do him good, in time. Meanwhile, I grow bored." She laid the tips of her fingers on my arm and smiled at me. "Do you know there is a term for your dalliances, Phèdre? Hunting hyacinths, they call it, those peers who have enjoyed your favors."
"No." With an effort of will, I kept my voice steady. "I did not know there was a term for it." I did not need it explained. Every patron knew my signale.
"Oh, yes." She smiled again, lazy and dangerous. "And no one has plucked one yet, I am told. Tell me, if I made you a proposal, would you accept it?"
Something happened at the gaming table; a good-natured cheer arose. Fortun had won. I stared at Nicola's violet eyes—so like her cousins', Duc and Queen—and weighed the risks, making my decision in spite of them. "Yes," I said, calculating. What was it worth, to Barquiel L'Envers? "If it was fitting."
The proposal came the next day by courier.
TWENTY
A long white cord sturdily-wrought of silken threads hung around my neck.
"I knew a man in Aragon," Nicola mused aloud, drawing the ends of the cord beneath my arms and crossing them at my back, "who had travelled the spice routes to the uttermost east; the Empire of the Sun, they call it. They have arts of the bed-chamber as would interest even Naamah, he said." She wrapped the cord about my waist and moved behind me, using it to secure my wrists together. "Of course,I'd not time to learn them all. But what I did was most interesting. Ah, yes, that's nice."
Stepping back, she regarded her handiwork. I