Naamah's Blessing - Jacqueline Carey [168]
“I didn’t think so,” he said with satisfaction. Picking up a small earthenware bell, he rang it, summoning his handmaidens, my inept young spy Cusi among them. “Take your mistress back to her quarters, little one,” he ordered her. “I’ve no further taste for her company tonight.”
Eyes downcast, Cusi bobbed in her approximation of a curtsy. “Yes, Lord Pachacuti.”
A stream of ants followed us back to my quarters. Elua help me, I was beginning to take their presence for granted.
My thoughts chased one another in a futile endeavor, like a dog seeking to catch its own tail. Somewhat that Raphael had said tonight teased at my thoughts, but I could not catch it, only circle around it. Remembering Master Lo’s teaching, I did my best to let go, breathing the Five Styles, willing my mind to be still and letting one thought give rise to another.
Beside me, Cusi shivered despite the warmth of the evening.
It came to me that I was paying attention to the wrong things.
I watched her bustle around my quarters when we reached them, kindling a lamp filled with oil that burned with a pleasant, nutty smell, turning down the blanket that covered the feather pallet on my bed. “Cusi? Why are you frightened?”
She shot me an unreadable look. “Pampachayuway. I am sorry, very sorry! I was not having such fear before.”
“Why now?” I asked. “Do I frighten you?”
Cusi shook her head vigorously. “Not you, no. Not you, lady.”
“Lord Pachacuti?” I guessed.
Her slender shoulders rose and fell. “Always, a little. But it is not that. I cannot say. It is not for me to say. I am not wise enough.” She cast a yearning look at my feather pallet. “Lord Pachacuti say maybe you want me to sleep beside you some night, yes?”
Ah, gods!
Whatever Raphael had said to her, for a mercy, she hadn’t understood it. There was naught but a scared child’s innocence in the question, enough so that it made my heart ache for the girl. She was so very, very young. Maybe fifteen, no older than sixteen. Too young for whatever was being asked of her.
“Would it make you less afraid?” I asked gently.
Cusi nodded wordlessly.
I sat on the feather pallet and patted it. “Come.”
The simple comfort of human contact is a thing that transcends all boundaries. Beneath the woven blanket, Cusi burrowed against me, hiding her face against my shoulder. I put one arm around her and breathed the Breath of Ocean’s Rolling Waves, slow and deep, until I felt her own breath deepen into sleep and her body slacken.
I lay awake.
“What is the secret of the ancestors?” I asked the darkness. “What does it have to do with Bao? And why is Cusi afraid when she was not before?”
In her sleep, Cusi whimpered.
I stroked her hair. “Hush,” I whispered. “Hush, and sleep.”
She did.
In time, I did, too.
FIFTY-NINE
I awoke to an empty bed.
I found Cusi in the courtyard, tending to the ants. She had a pair of good-sized lizards in a basket. While I watched, she slit each one’s belly with a little bronze knife, carefully laying their still-twitching bodies amidst the swarming ants. Within a matter of seconds, both lizards were stripped to the bone.
Cusi gave me an apologetic look. “It is not nice to see. I try to do while you sleep.”
“It’s all right,” I assured her. “Lord Pachacuti told me that they prefer flesh.”
“Yes.” She closed the empty basket. “It make them strong.”
In the daylight, she no longer looked so frightened, but there were dark circles below her eyes, and it seemed to me that a shadow hung over her. I tapped my lips with one finger, considering her.
“Why do you look at me so?” Cusi asked.
“I am wishing you would tell me what frightens you,” I said.
She looked away. “I cannot.”
“Ever?”
Her haunted gaze came back to me. “It is not for me to say.”
“Forgive me,” I said to her. “I will stop asking. After I break my fast, I would like to visit my men again. Will you come or would you rather not?”
“I will come.” She gave me another apologetic look. “You know I listen for Lord Pachacuti?”
“I know,” I said. “You are in his service. I understand this, Cusi. You