Ariah (23 page)

“
Ariah, already?”

“
Yes?”

Dirva sighed. A hint of nervousness crossed Nisa’s face. The matchmaker pointed to the door, and Dirva and I slipped out to the hallway. “I don’t know what I’m doing,” I said.

“
I can see that.”

“
I don’t know what I’m supposed to ask. What am I supposed to ask?”

Dirva shrugged. “I don’t know.”

“
What do you mean, you don’t know?”

“
I’ve never been matched before. My parents weren’t matched.” He leaned against the wall. “She knows I am unconventional. She did not run away screaming. I think you should just ask what you want to ask. Within reason.”

“
Oh. All right.”

Dirva leaned forward suddenly. “What do you think of her?”

“
She is…Dirva, I don’t know. I’ve only spent five minutes with her. But she seems smart. And she seems to have a sense of humor. And she seems warm. Anyway, it doesn’t matter what I think. What do you think of her?”

He smiled. “I think she’s a good match.”

“
But…why?” Dirva shot me a look that told me to drop the subject, but I didn’t. “You said I should ask what I want to ask.”

“
I also said to do that within reason.”

“
I am trying, Dirva.”

He sighed. He cut a glance at the closed door. “Well, when I am with her, I…I find I don’t think so much about things before. People before. She pulls my focus. She is a fresh start.”

That made sense to me. It seemed to answer my question. I nodded and went back inside where the match and the matchmaker waited for us. It did not occur to me until hours later that Dirva had never actually said he liked her, or that he loved her. Later, it troubled me greatly. But at the time, I felt his happiness, his hopefulness, and I found I really just had the one question for her. “Nisa,” I asked when I sat down across from her, “do you know what you’re getting into?”

She looked at Dirva. “Yes,” she said. A second later, she smiled. “No. Probably not. It’s a risk, but it seems one worth taking.”

It was a good answer. I liked her. I liked her ease; I liked the measured way she spoke. Cleverness just poured out of her, and I knew Dirva well enough to know he needed someone who could keep pace with him, the type to now and again outsmart him and leave him perplexed. I knew he gravitated to talent, and she had it. She had the unspoken confidence of someone with proven talent. I liked her enough that I could see us as friends. It wasn’t just him she was marrying, after all, but his family, and I was his family. “All right,” I said. “You have my blessing.”

Her eyes went wide. “Really?”

“
Yes?”

“
That was so fast!”

“
Should it have taken longer?”

“
No, I guess not,” she said. She laughed. “My parents grilled Dirva for hours, until past curfew. You must be very decisive.”

Dirva laughed. “He isn’t. Stop questioning him, or he’ll reconsider. It’s done,” he said, taking the glass of wine in front of him. The shaper reached out to stop him, but he ignored her. He drank the wine in one go. “It’s done. It’s official,” he said. The rest of us drank our wine while he watched.

CHAPTER 16

I was no longer Dirva’s student in any official capacity, but we lived as if he was still my mentor. The old rhythms were still there. The old habits remained. I still picked up his mail from the shop below our apartment. On my way back from a long day of classes, I stopped into the ink shop below our apartment. The boy at the counter grinned at me. He was fascinated by both Dirva and I, curious about us, but curious in an open, unfettered way that I found a little flattering. He was the type to be seduced by danger and intrigue. His mother was the smuggler who lived below us, after all. I think he saw me in my City clothes and assumed I was up to no good. In that neighborhood, the City clothes made me look like a potentially bad influence.

“
Afternoon, sir.”

“
Afternoon, Mosol. Mail?” I felt peculiarly adult when I interacted with him.

He nodded. “Oh, yes. More than that, sir: a package.”

I looked up. “What kind of package?”

The boy winked. “Very special delivery. If you catch my meaning. Very hush-hush.”

“
Oh.” The clothes made me look like I flouted the law, but actually flouting it made my stomach turn. “I’ll take it.”

The boy hauled a large, flat package wrapped in brown paper onto the counter. The brown paper stretched tight and clean, unmarked by official transport stamps. Wisps of hay clung to the twine that held the brown paper in place. “It came in a hay bale. What is it, do you think?”

“
It’s a painting,” I said.

“
Really? How do you know?”

“
My father’s an artist. I’ve seen works wrapped for transport before.” It struck me as odd, this painting appearing there with no warning. I felt I shouldn’t pry, but I pried anyway. I tore the corner of the paper. The boy at the counter gasped, half in shock and half in anticipation. I peered inside, and I recognized the painting. It was by Liro, and it was one of Dirva as a young man. It was
The Reader Unbound
, a portrait of Dirva with mussed hair, shirtless, grinning. It was a moment of flushed youth, a frozen second of Dirva in a state of profound contentment. It was a dagger, this painting. I ripped the rest of the paper away. Tucked into the bottom of the frame was a note written in spiky, lean handwriting. It read as follows:

Liro says you’re getting married. Consider this a wedding gift. I hear there’s a blank spot on your wall these days.

Amran

“
What is it, sir?” Mosol asked.

“
It’s not wanted.” I looked at him across the painting. His eyes were wide; he vibrated with excitement. “Can I ask you a favor?”

“
Yes, of course,” he said.

“
Send this back where it came from. Wrap it up and send it back, and never mention to Mr. Villai’Muladah that it was ever sent here in the first place. Will you do that?”

He blinked. “There’s no return address, sir.”

But I knew the address. Amran lived in a converted bar named The Refuge on Rivai Street. I asked Mosol for a piece of paper. On one side I wrote the address; on the other side, I wrote a reply. I wrote that Dirva did not need Amran’s help filling that blank spot.

“
Send it here. Make sure this note makes it into the package. I very much appreciate this,” I said.

Mosol chewed his cheek. “It won’t be cheap.”

I tabulated all of my savings. “How much?”

“
Probably more than you have.”

I cursed under my breath. “I have…uh…around seventy-five marks saved up. How much?”

The boy sighed. He gave me a sympathetic look. “Close to three hundred.”

“
Can you…can you keep it here? I’ll pay you as I get the money. Can you hold it down here and send it back when I’m paid up? Just so long as Mr. Villai’Muladah never knows it’s here.”

Mosol took the painting. “I’ll talk my mother into it. He won’t know.”

“
Thank you, Mosol. Thank you.”

It took me nearly six months to pay up the smugglers.

When I went up to the apartment, Dirva could tell immediately that something had happened. He didn’t ask anything; he just stuck his head around the corner, eyebrows raised. Nisa sat curled in his armchair, still in her coveralls, fiddling with a small clockwork mechanism. “I’m fine,” I said.

“
Are you?”

Nisa glanced at me over her mechanism.

“
Yes, yes, I’m fine. Shayat, you know, she gets under my skin. That’s all.”

Dirva watched me for a second longer. He went back to whatever he was doing in the kitchen. I sat on my cot across from Nisa. “What is that?”

“
It’s nothing yet,” she said. “Just clacking gears right now. I should make a bird from it or something, but I never get that far. I always end up leaving them naked. Who’s Shayat?”

“
My student. I tutor her in languages.”

“
She gets under your skin?”

“
Oh, she’s awful.”

“
Then why tutor her?”

“
Because Ariah is vain,” Dirva yelled from the other room.

Nisa laughed and cast me a curious look.

“
Well, her father’s a tailor,” I said, blushing. “We have a deal. I get clothes made for free if I tutor her.”

Nisa smiled and went back to her mechanism. “I read that set of poems you translated for me. The ones from the gold elves.” She pulled the notebook out of her pocket and handed it to me. I flipped through it and saw copious notes in the margins. “I think your translations are getting better.”

“
They are?”

“
I think so. Without speaking Droma it’s hard to tell, but they read better.” She sighed. “I wish you’d give me something less depressing to read.”

“
What? They’re not depressing.”

She looked at me, one eyebrow raised. “Slave songs, Ariah. There’s nothing not depressing about them.”

“
I think they’re beautiful.”

“
They are. In a depressing way.”

“
I know what this is about. Nisa, we’re all just elves to them. Slave status, how is that anything more than a technicality? How are we not slaves, too?”

“
We are not slaves.”

“
How much choice did you get in your assignment?”

“
I,” she said with audible pride, “was recruited.”

And I couldn’t help it; I grinned at her. “You didn’t pick it, then. It was handed to you.”

“
Oh, it wasn’t like that.”

“
You know I’m right.”

“
You don’t know what you’re talking about. You’re so dramatic. We have rights. We have papers. The slaves…”

I laughed. She sighed at me.

“
Those rights are a mirage! I was detained, Nisa!”

“
I know, I know, you never stop going on about it. ‘Nisa, they held me at the border! Nisa, Dirva rescued me!’ I know. But the papers got you out.”

“
It was a technicality. I was lucky.”

“
You were.” She leaned forward, a sly smile on her face. “But here’s the thing, Ariah: we have technicalities to exploit. The slaves don’t. How are those not rights?”

I admit, she stumped me. She did that often. Once the courtship became a betrothal, Nisa came to our apartment nearly every day after her shift at the prototype lab ended. We spoke often, disagreed nearly every time, but it was playful and it was warm. I waved at her, dismissive, still full of righteous ire, and went into the kitchen. She laughed at me as I walked away.

Dirva was waiting for me in the kitchen. He sat at the table, reading the borough’s newspaper, drinking tea. “So,” he said. He spoke Vahnan. “This is not a day you usually tutor your student.”

“
All right, it wasn’t her.”

He looked up at me over his cup. “It was not the law, I hope.”

“
No, it wasn’t.” I took a seat next to him at the table. “Can we declare it personal? It’s fine; it’s done. I’m fine. I promise.”

He nodded. “Yes, of course. We can leave it. Have you thought about Vilahna?”

“
Dirva, I don’t know.”

“
Just consider it.”