The Dragon Revenant - Katharine Kerr [65]
“Aha.” Salamander leaned over the table. “I see many things, dark, hidden, recondite, a time for pain followed by rejoicing, laughter followed by tears, shafts of sun breaking through clouds, storms followed by sunsets of peace.”
With a delighted little shiver, Alaena stared at the tiles.
“I see you standing at a crossroads in life, oh favored one of the Star Maidens. Look at the Flowers blooming among Spears. The Raven is crying out, but he will be silenced. First of all …” He paused to lay one finger on the Ten of Flowers. “You have many loyal friends who care for your welfare. They have been worried about you, worried to see you fretting and listless, no doubt, over the question of whether to remarry soon or to wait and see what the waves of Life wash up on your shore. Always you must worry about being loved for yourself. There are some suitors who would marry your investments and your connections with the great trading houses.”
“That’s exactly right!” Her breathy voice held a note of childlike excitement. “Some are so blatant about it, good sir, why, you’d hardly believe their lack of tact!”
“Alas, I fear me that I’d believe it all too well, knowing as I do the hearts of men.” He frowned at the tiles for a long, dramatic moment. “I see a young man from another island here, a handsome man, but arrogant.”
“Why, yes!”
“His youth tempted you, and his virility, because a great sorrow in your life is that you’ve never had children.”
“Yes.” Her voice wavered with real pain. “That’s true, too. But he had other flaws.”
“I can see them quite clearly. Fear not—you made the right decision. But now, alas, you wait, your mind running first one way, then another, while you wonder if your life will simply peter out, like a stream spent in the desert that buries itself in the sand. Yet few would pity you, because of your wealth.”
“I find it hard to pity myself, good sorcerer. I’ve been very poor in my life, and I know just how lucky I am now.”
“And yet, something gnaws you, an emptiness. Hum, I see that it makes you desperate at times. Now what’s this? I see a great threat of scandal, but I can’t seem to divine its cause.”
At that exact moment Rhodry came in with a tray of glass goblets and a glass pitcher of orangeade. He glanced at Jill, then at Alaena in a kind of tormented desperation, and blushed scarlet.
“Terrible, terrible scandal,” Salamander was saying. “Do you see the Queen of Wands? You must be like her, so full of righteousness that none can impugn you, so strong that you can dismiss enemies with the flick of a single finger.”
Rhodry put the tray down, backed noiselessly away, and fled the room. Although Alaena never acknowledged his presence, Jill was certain that only an iron self-control kept her from blushing in turn. She looked up and waved a vague hand at the pitcher.
“Jillanna, would you pour? I simply can’t stop listening to Krysello’s reading.”
“Of course, my lady.” Jill would rather have slit her throat, but she smiled, and smiled again as she passed the goblets round.
“Now, after the trouble passes—and it will pass, I promise you this, oh vision of feminine perfection—I see happy times ahead. There are those who would love you for yourself alone. One man I see, shy, filled with humility, whose feeling of unworthiness is all that keeps him from speaking. Wait! I see two such—one barely known to you; another who is an old friend. The friend travels for the winter, far away it seems, although the dies cannot tell me where. The new acquaintance hovers closer at hand than you would ever think.”
“By the Stars themselves! I wonder who …” Alaena bit her lower lip and thought hard. “Do go on, good sorcerer.”
Salamander managed to stretch out the reading for a good five minutes by the judicious selection of platitudes and vagaries. After Alaena had asked a few questions, she turned the talk to his travels throughout the country. As usual Salamander reveled in the chance to tell a long