Steven Brust - Athyra

The drink was provided quickly. She smiled her thanks and sipped from whatever she’d been given, nodded approval, and poured some of the liquid over the mouthpiece of the long black flute.

“What’s she doing?” whispered Savn.

Vlad shrugged. “It must be good for it. She wouldn’t wreck her own reed.”

“I’ve never seen one of those before.”

“Neither have I.”

“I wonder what it sounds like.”

This question was answered almost at once, when a low, rich dark sound emerged and at once spread as if to fill every corner of the room. She went up and down the scale once or twice and the instrument went both higher and lower than Savn would have guessed. Then she began to play an eerie, arhythmic tune that Savn had never heard; he settled back to enjoy the music. Vlad’s face was expressionless as he studied the minstrel.

She sat on a table, one foot resting on a chair, tapping slowly and steadily, though Savn could not find a rhythm that she might be tapping to. When the tune ended, she played another, this one more normal, and, while Savn couldn’t remember its name, it was very familiar and seemed to please Tern’s guests.

After playing the pipe for a while, she picked up the other instrument, quickly tuned it, and with an expression of sweet innocence, began singing a scandalously bawdy song called “I’ll Never Trust a Shepherd, I’ll Never Trust a Thief,” that, without ever saying anything directly, implied things about her character and pleasures that Savn found unlikely. Everyone pounded on the tables, laughed, and bought Sara more drinks.

After that, she could do no wrong, and when she began singing an old, sweet ballad about Chalara and Auiri, everyone sighed and settled back to become lost in music and sentimentality. In all, she performed for about two hours. Savn liked her singing voice; she chose good songs; and there were stories he had never heard before, as well as some that were as familiar to him as his sister’s face. Eventually Sara stood and bowed to the room at large, making it seem as if she were bowing to every man or woman present. Savn found himself whistling and slapping the table with everyone else. She said, “You are all charming and very kind. With your permission, I will have something to eat, and then, if you wish, I will play again in the evening and tell you what news I have.”

Everyone in the house did, indeed, so wish. Sara bowed again to acknowledge the compliment, and carefully set her instruments down.

For the first time since the minstrel had begun, Savn remembered the Easterner sitting next to him, and said, “Did you enjoy the music?”

“Hmmm? Oh, yes, it was fine,” said Vlad. He was looking quite fixedly at the minstrel, and his thoughts seemed to be elsewhere. Savn decided against asking what he was thinking about; he sipped his watered wine and looked around the room. Once more he noticed people at other tables surreptitiously glancing at him, at Vlad, or at both of them.

Savn drank slowly and let his mind drift, until, after perhaps a quarter of an hour, Vlad suddenly stood up.

“Are you leaving?” asked Savn.

“No, I wish to speak with this minstrel.”

“Oh.”

Vlad walked over to her. Savn stood up and followed.

“Good evening, my lady,” began Vlad.

The minstrel frowned at him briefly, but said, “And a good evening to you as well.”

“My name is Vlad. May I join you for a moment?” As he spoke, he seemed to show her something in his hand. Savn looked at her face in time to see her eyes widen very briefly.

Then she recovered and said, “By all means. Please sit down. It is a pleasure indeed to meet you, Vlad. Who is your friend?”

“My—” Vlad turned, and Savn realized that the Easterner hadn’t known he’d been followed. For an instant he seemed annoyed, but he only shrugged and said, “His name is Savn.”

“How do you do, Savn?”

Savn found his voice and made a courtesy. “Very well, m’lady.”

“Would you both do me the honor of sitting with me?”

They sat. Vlad said, “Please accept my compliments on your performance.”

“Thank you,” she said. And, to Savn, “You seemed to be enjoying the music a great deal.”

“Oh, I was,” said Savn, while he wondered if the Issola’s remarks contained a hint that she had noticed how little attention Vlad had actually been paying to the music. If so, Vlad gave no sign of it.

“First things first,” said Vlad. He handed her a small piece of paper, folded so that Savn couldn’t read it.

The Issola opened it up, glanced at it, put it into her pouch, and smiled. “Very well, my lord,” she said. “Now, what can I do for you?”

“My lord’? thought Savn, startled. How can an Easterner be ‘my lord’?

“I have a few questions for you. Perhaps you can answer them, perhaps not.”

“I will certainly try,” said the minstrel. “Do you know Baron Smallcliff?”

“Indeed, yes. I gave him a performance yesterday.”

“Excellent.” He paused, thinking, then glanced at Savn. “I wonder,” he said, “if you would be so good as to return to the table, Savn. I’d really rather make this private, if you don’t mind.”

“I don’t mind,” lied Savn. He stood and gave the minstrel another courtesy. “It has been an honor to meet you, my lady,” he said.

“And a pleasure to meet you, Savn,” said the minstrel.

As Savn walked back to the table he felt that everyone was either staring at him or pointedly not staring at him. He glanced at his friends, and this time there was no mistake; Coral, who was speaking to the others, was at the same time directing a look of unconcealed hatred at Savn.

The feeling of being the center of hostile attention suddenly became so strong that before Savn could reach his seat, he found that he had turned and begun walking toward the door.

And by the time he reached it, he was running.

How long he ran or where he went he did not know, but at last he found that he was lying on the soft grass of a hill, staring up at the dead night sky, breathing in the smell of autumn leaves.

He tried to account for his friends’ behavior, but he couldn’t. He tried to understand his own reaction, his panicked flight, but his mind shied away from the subject.

He thought about going back to Tem’s house and asking his friends to tell him what the problem was. But what if they did? What if, as they were almost certain to do, they berated him for associating with the Easterner? What would he say?

And, for that matter, why was he spending so much time with the Easterner?

He stood up and looked around. He was west of town, not far from Master Wag’s, and quite near the road. The way home would take him past Tem’s house. He thought of taking a long way round, but chided himself for cowardice.

He climbed up to the road and turned toward town. It was late; Mae and Pae would be starting to worry about him soon. He broke into a jog. He passed Tem’s house. It was quiet, and he thought about going in, but quickly rejected the idea; he had no intention of confronting his friends tonight—not until he knew what to say to them.

His lengthening shadow, cast by the lamp from Tem’s, preceded him down the road out of the cluster of buildings he thought of as “town.” As it disappeared, he nearly ran into an indistinct shape that appeared in front of him. He stopped, and the shape resolved itself into several, he thought three or four, individual areas of darkness darker than the night around them. It took the length of two breaths for Savn to realize that they were people.

The panic that had gripped him before was suddenly back, but he resolved not to give in to it. If it was only his imagination at work, he’d look ridiculous if he ran away. And if it wasn’t, running probably wouldn’t help.