Naamah's Curse - Jacqueline Carey [169]
I winced.
“I’m sorry.” He gave me an apologetic glance. “But I think we must assume this is a trap.”
Amrita stroked her son’s hair. “Wise boy. I think so, too. And I am not going to let you walk into it, Moirin.”
“Well, I am not going to let the Falconer send assassins after you, highness!” I said in frustration. “I could not live with it.”
“It is not your choice!” There was a sharp note in her musical voice I had never heard before.
I spread my hands. “Do you intend to lock me away? Unless you do, I will go. The gods have sent a sign. What else am I to do?”
“It is a game to them, I think,” Ravindra said in a clear, precise voice, one slim finger touching the carved figure of the black king. “The Falconer and his Spider Queen. They sit atop their mountain, controlling the board with their pawns and knights. This was the opening gambit. What we must do is neither accept nor reject it, but offer a gambit of our own.”
Now my diadh-anam flared—and I knew.
“A trade,” I whispered. “Me for Bao.”
Ravindra nodded in approval. “That is a very good gambit, Moirin.”
“No!” Amrita shook her head. “No, I do not like it, not at all. What if Tarik Khaga accepts it?”
I swallowed. “Well, then… I go to Kurugiri and bide my time until I can escape. Sooner or later, I will find a way. After all, I am a dakini.”
She looked unhappy. “Yes, and you are also a young woman of whom I have grown fond. You will suffer there.”
“Do not worry, Mama-ji,” Ravindra said in a soothing tone. “He will not accept the trade.” His hovering finger moved from the black king to the black queen. “Jagrati will not let him.” He picked up the piece and moved it, setting her in play. “The interesting thing will be seeing their countermove.”
I eyed him. “You will make quite a ruler one day, young highness.”
He smiled modestly. “Thank you.”
SIXTY
The Falconer’s messenger returned the following day, and the Rani Amrita delivered our reply to him.
“I can say neither yes nor no to your master,” she said to him, her hands folded, middle fingers steepled. It was the ritual gesture I had seen her make the first day we met in the street outside the temple, one I now knew was meant to calm conflict. “As you noted, Moirin mac Fainche is a foreigner, and no subject of mine to compel.”
The fellow opened his mouth to protest.
“However!” Amrita raised her right hand in the pose of fearlessness. “She offers a trade. There is a young Ch’in man named Bao in your master’s service. He is the beloved of the dakini Moirin. If Tarik Khaga frees him, she will go willingly to Kurugiri.” She smiled. “A touching sacrifice, do you not think?”
The messenger scowled and stared at his feet. “I do not know if that is an acceptable answer, highness.”
She inclined her head. “Nonetheless, it is my reply. Go, and tell him.”
He went; and we waited.
I hated waiting, the hard lesson of patience that it seemed I was fated to learn over and over.
And yet… I had learned it. And I had endured enough to be grateful that if I must be patient and wait, I was very, very fortunate to do so in this very pleasant valley kingdom, the guest of this kind and gracious ruler with her clever, thoughtful son who was wise beyond his years.
Days passed.
No one could say for a surety how long it would take. With Manil Datar’s caravan, I’d made the descent from the peak opposite Kurugiri in two days; but the region was deep in winter’s grip by now. Amrita assured me that the route to Kurugiri was at a low enough altitude that it would not become impassable for months on end, unlike other places in the Abode of the Gods. Still, it could be blocked for days if there were snow-storms.
And no one knew how long it took to ascend the slope itself, navigating the secret path through the torturous maze.
So we waited.
We traded tales. I told the whole long story of helping to rescue the Emperor’s daughter and the dragon, and ending a civil war in Ch’in. My lady Amrita and Ravindra listened to it wide-eyed, both of them clapping excitedly at the good parts.
She told me about growing