The Gantean (Tales of Blood & Light Book 1) (8 page)

I
waited
. Costas did not answer, and though I tried the door again, I could not force it open. I had no choice but to return to my rooms, though my heart fluttered with panic.
What had I done?
The loss of my necklace was a bigger disaster than making the ung-aneraq with Costas, but both lapses struck me as unforgivable to a true
Iksraqtaq
. I didn’t sleep at all, desperately planning how to get the necklace back.

In the morning Ghilene demanded that I run down to the kitchen to order her a breakfast tray. I detoured to the garden again for my
necklace, but the door remained locked. My hand had already adopted the habit of clutching the bottom of my throat to fill the void. I had to find it!

You know what must be done.
Nautien’s words pounded in my head. I had been derelict in my Gantean duty. If I ever found the Cedna—and how I would do that, I did not know—I’d need the anbuaq. It contained the spall from the Hinge that would allow me to feed the Hinge and perform the necessary magic when I confronted the Cedna. My clammy hand slid from the garden doorknob. Perhaps Costas had the charms? I could only hope.

Upon my return to Ghilene’s room, I had to set the table on the sun-porch and plump up the cushions on the bench so she could sit. Then she refused to settle, pacing the length of the porch, scowling. I remained standing as well—Lethemian etiquette said I could not sit until she did. I clasped both hands in front of me and painted a calm aspect upon my face.

Ghilene clutched her morning dress and faced me, her dark eyebrows pulling together in that angry line I dreaded. “You danced with Costas Galatien! What were you thinking, you scheming little harlot? How did you even learn to dance? Was it that damned Tiercel? I’ll have words with him when we get home! Teaching a savage Gantean to dance! How typical!”

I remained motionless. “The Prince asked me. I had no choice but to accept.”

“He asked you?”

I came up with an appeasing lie. “He wished me to tell him more about you.”

“Well, next time send him to me directly! If you dare do something like that again, Lili, I swear I’ll—”

A knock sounded on the chamber door. Ghilene and I stared at each other in surprise. The hour was far too early for a summons or message. My relief at the sudden end to Ghilene’s diatribe was tempered by my concern about who might be coming so early. What if Costas’s servant had arrived to bring me another message ore return my necklace? How would I explain?

Ghilene rubbed her face. She still had dark kohl smeared beneath her eyes, as she hadn’t fully washed her face after the night’s activities. She flung her arm towards the doors that opened between the sun-porch and the bedroom. “What are you waiting for, Lili? Answer the door! But tell them I’m not available. It’s too early.” She finally slumped into the bench I had prepared, crossing her arms and staring sullenly over the High City, a skyscape of narrow turrets and white stone facades.

I hurried to the door as the knock sounded again.

Finding Costas’s servant waiting, I winced and prepared to urge his discretion, but he peered over my shoulder as though alert to the risks Ghilene posed. First he shoved a slender box at me and whispered, “This one’s for you, and secret.” Then he offered up an envelope of Costas’s gold-edged stationary, saying in a carrying voice, “A message for Lady Ghilene.” As soon as I took the card he disappeared in his usual silent way. I shoved the slender box up my sleeve.

My hands shook as I carried the envelope back to Ghilene.

“Who was it?” she asked, tearing her gaze from the ramparts of the Conservatoire, the High City’s school of mages, visible at the far eastern end of the city.

“A message, my lady.” I did not say it came from Costas. She might want to know why I recognized his paper and mark.

She snatched the letter from my hands and ripped it open, yanking the card from within. When she dropped the envelope on the ground, I stooped to pick it up.

“It’s from Costas,” she cried as she scanned the message. “Oh—oh! He’s sent me an invitation to tour the Temples and visit the Conservatoire with him today! Oh!” She sprang from her seat and threw the card on the table, forgetting the breakfast she had been so demanding about earlier.

“What shall I wear?” she exclaimed, darting into the bedroom. I followed her slowly, taking care to keep the box stashed safely up my sleeve.

Already Ghilene threw gowns onto the bed in a flurry of purple and green.

“He said he would send his servant to fetch me during the White Lady’s hour. I haven’t much time! What do you think it means, that he asked me? It must be that he wants to see me, what else? Oh! I think I must wear my green ramie—Mother says it flatters my eyes. Hurry, Lili, brush it down, it wrinkles so easily. You can do my hair after. He’s going to walk in public with me—oh—damn!” She froze, one hand cupping her cheek, glaring at me with a look of pure loathing. “Damn, damn.” Her voice had flattened.

“What is it?” I took up the green dress she wanted to wear and hung it so I could brush it smooth.

“What is it? What is it? It’s you! I can’t walk alone on the streets of Galantia with Costas Galatien without a servant. I can’t!” Her voice rose.

To walk out in public without a servant to attend her, with or without Costas, would be considered beyond the pale, according to Tiercel and his many instructions.

“Damned Amatos!” she cursed as she leaned towards me with that angry, intense expression marring her face. “Don’t even speak to him. Just—just stay behind me and keep your head down. I don’t want him to even know you’re there, do you understand?”

I nodded despite the impossibility of her request.

Once I had Ghilene adorned like a gift box wrapped and beribboned for Costas Galatien, I had only a few moments to ready myself. I hurried to the tiny chamber adjoining her room, where I slipped the box from my sleeve and opened it, praying it contained my necklace.

Instead I found a dagger the length of my hand, with a steel blade barely thicker than a finger. A women’s knife. I turned it to examine the ornate pommel, a golden flower—the chrysanthemum sigil of House Galatien—inset at the end with a large, round blue stone that seemed to suck the glow from the magelight sconces. A simple leather holster nestled in the box. I strapped it to my arm and put the women’s knife in place. I’d never been given any kind of gift before, and this beautiful, thoughtful knife only further deepened my tendre for Costas Galatien. The man and his sayantaq world had thoroughly seduced me. Even so, I needed to get my necklace back, as soon as possible.

“Lili!” Ghilene called. “He’ll be here any moment.”

My heart hammered to match the excitement in her voice.

Costas’s servant escorted us to the Palace’s ground floor where Costas awaited us at the exit through the western wing. The route took us directly through a tunnel in the opal crystal pillar, which fairly hummed with magic, like the Hinge back in Gante. Neither Costas nor Ghilene acknowledged the sensation the crystal walls elicited, if they felt it.

We hadn’t walked two steps from the Palace grounds before I understood that one could not blend in when escorted by Costas Galatien in the High City. Not only were we flanked by four bodyguards in Galatien livery, but also a hundred eyes turned towards us the moment we stepped onto Temple Road. Of course Costas cut a recognizable figure with his pale clothes and bronze skin.

Ghilene held his arm, beaming under the attention. People bowed and curtseyed and smiled and saluted; Costas’s personal servant walked right beside him, but I stayed two steps behind Ghilene.

“The Temples of the Amarantines line the road,” Costas explained, loudly, including me in the conversation. “At the far end lies the Temple of Amassis, patron god of Lethemia. Our Galantia temples are the finest. That one we cannot enter, of course.” He pointed to the first temple on our right, a small chapel with a stern blackstone figure guarding the entrance. “That is the Temple of Amatos, and only those who carry the ashes of the dead enter there.”

I glanced at Costas. His voice held an unmistakable tang of derision.
He waved a careless hand towards the temple. “They say the brothers Amatos and Amassis possessed a drink that kept those who imbibed eternally young. Amatos is said to have stolen it from his brother Amassis. Why then does Amatos guard the dead? There should not
be
any dead if he had such a magical elixir! Such nonsense.”

Ganteans had a saying:
there is no belief but fear.
In a world of ice and predatory bears and two-moon storms, fear governed us. We lived by the rules to survive in harsh conditions, and we died by the rules to keep the world’s magic alive. Fear and death loomed over all our days. Every moon, one Gantean would die for the Hinge. We never knew who might be asked to serve.

Costas’s flippancy unnerved me even as his charm infected me. How different his life had been than mine, to live free of these concerns. We walked on, passing a building with an oval gate.

“This is the Temple of Karenne, our lady of dreams. The acolytes here will read your dreams.” He gave another mocking smile. “And your dreams will foretell good fortune if you give a large donation to the temple.”

Ghilene giggled at his impiety.

“Come,” Costas went on, “Next door they offer you blessings even if you have no jhass.”

Costas insisted we enter the Temple of the White Lady. Six colored glass columns flanked the entry. We paused in the foyer where music wafted on the air. Ghilene darted forward to examine a mural painted on the wall. Costas closed his eyes, half-smiling as he listened to the music.

When his eyes opened again, he caught me staring. His smile distracted me.

Surely if he could smile at me so sweetly he did not mean only to play with me? He must have some plan. “It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” he murmured, gesturing as if he could catch the music out of the air. He stepped closer and ran the back of his hand along my cheek. “Beautiful.”

I tore my eyes from Costas—hard to do, as once again, I drowned in the amber of his eyes—and glanced over my shoulder, exhaling with relief that Ghilene continued to admire the painting. Costas’s servant, on the other hand, saw all. I hurriedly stepped back while Costas returned to Ghilene’s side.

We proceeded to the Temple of Amassis with its white columns arranged in a symmetrical design, pausing inside to glimpse the vast inner chapel and a newly finished painted ceiling by the famed artist Aranti Marsus. Once again, Lethemian elegance stupefied me. I’d never seen such a realistic painting on such a large scale.

“Lady Ghilene, I want to take you to see the Conservatoire,” Costas said, taking her arm.

“The Conservatoire!” Ghilene cried as we walked back towards the Palace along the Temple Road. “I’ve wanted to see it, badly.”

Costas smiled. “And so you shall.” He pointed to his right, at the final Temple we passed. “Our Galantia Temple of Amarite is known the nation over as the finest, in both acolytes and architecture. Our Galantia mages and magitrixes suffer no shortage of strong Sources for their magic. Perhaps someday you will have cause to make use of the Temple, Lady Ghilene.”

Ghilene actually froze on the street, all her happiness falling from her face in one sudden shift. “Oh,” she murmured. “Oh. I’d only wish to become a magitrix if…”

Costas filled the silence. “If what, Ghilene?”

Ghilene bit her lip and turned towards the Temple of Amarite. I did not quite follow the undercurrent of their conversation. “A magitrix can’t marry,” she said sulkily.

Costas did not reply, though he had to have recognized her hint. He led us east, following the route that took us past the gates of the Palace and two of the crystal pillars, one pink and the other sapphire blue. Surges of magic emanated from them, but again, none of the others showed any notice.

By the time we stood before the Conservatoire, I had developed more than one blister from my southern shoes. The ramparts I had seen from Ghilene’s sun-porch were constructed from the same glassy material as the bridge that led to Galantia.

“I made you an appointment with an analyst,” Costas said to Ghilene.

“What?” She turned to gape at him, looking as young as her years.

“To have your magic tested.”

“But—my mother—I—”

I had never heard Ghilene stammer before.

“You needn’t act on anything the analyst tells you,” Costas explained. “But wouldn’t you like to know if matriculation at the Conservatoire were an option?” He mounted the broad steps that led to the institute’s entrance, hauling Ghilene by the arm. His servant hurried before them to open the door. Not knowing what else to do, I followed.

The entry hall to the school was surprisingly narrow and dark. A tall, gaunt man with eyes like an addict’s approached. He held a stack of papers beneath one arm. “Lady Ghilene Entila?” he asked.

Ghilene shook herself free from Costas and smoothed the front of her dress. “Yes.”

The gaunt man surveyed her. “You submit yourself for analysis?”

“I—yes, yes I do.” Ghilene maintained her poise despite his scrutiny.

“Come with me.” The tall man proceeded deeper into the building after offering a brief bow to acknowledge Costas.

Ghilene glanced back with apprehension. “You’ll—you’ll wait for me?” she asked Costas, again sounding youthful and slightly frightened.

“Of course, my lady. It will be my pleasure.” Costas’s smile could not have put her much at ease; he looked like a satiated cat, indolent and far too pleased with himself.

Ghilene glared a warning at me, as if to emphasize her earlier command:
Don’t even speak to him.

After Ghilene disappeared Costas took my arm. His servant, moving with practiced discretion, faded back towards the front entry.

“Come into the library,” Costas murmured, gesturing to two tall double doors. “You’ve never seen anything like it, Leila. It’s the biggest collection of magical texts in the world.”

I didn’t doubt that it would awe me, but I worried what Ghilene would do if she caught us together in there.