Kate Elliott - Jaran

Arina loitered behind and, when Vera said nothing, ventured a few steps closer. But Vera was not actually paying any attention to Tess either. She was staring past Tess toward-Tess turned-Bakhtiian.

"He looks no different," said Vera softly. She glanced at her husband, who still stood talking eagerly and with all the enthusiasm of youth to Yuri. What lay in that glance Tess could not read for it lasted only a moment. Then Vera looked again toward Bakhtiian. He stood talking easily with the older man who had first hailed him.

"Well, Tess Soerensen," said Vera finally, breaking her gaze away from Bakhtiian. "You have ridden an unusual road for a woman."

"Yes, I suppose I have."

Vera smiled again and she had that rarest of things in a self-conscious beauty: a smile that enhanced her. "We will have a dance tonight. You must meet our young men." A glance here again for Bakhtiian. "And tell us about your own. Oh, are you still here, Arina? Why don't you take Tess along and have Petya take her horse and then show her where she can pitch her tent?" Without waiting for a reply, she nodded to Tess and walked away, straight across toward Bakhtiian and his companions.

Tess looked at Arina, who scarcely came up to her chin. Arina smiled. "Can you really use a saber?" Arina asked.

"A little."

"Oh," said Arina with such reserve that Tess wondered if she had offended her. "I always wanted to learn. I made my brother teach me when I was little, but then Vera said it was unbecoming in a woman to-" She flushed. "I beg your pardon. I didn't mean-"

"No, I know what you meant," said Tess kindly. "You are Mother Veselov's daughter, then?"

"Yes. Here is my brother Anton." She called to a burly, black-haired man who looked to be about twice her age. "He will take your horse." A brief exchange, and Anton took Myshla from Tess with the greatest courtesy. "Vera oughtn't to have offered Petya," Arina muttered darkly, "but then, she'll always do as she wishes, whether it is seemly or not." She shot an expressive glance toward her cousin, who had insinuated herself into the group surrounding Bakhtiian.

"Who is the older man?" Tess asked.

"Who? That is my uncle, of course, Sergei Veselov. Vera’s father."

Tess was finding the undercurrents in this tribe more and more interesting. "I beg your pardon for seeming stupid, Arina, but if he is her father, how can he have the same name? Who is her mother? And isn't he-he must be the dyan of this tribe."

Arina sighed and led Tess out of the chaos attending the arrival, over to a quiet corner where she helped her set up her tent. A few young women strayed by, pausing hopefully to watch, but Arina gestured them away with more authority than Tess would ever have guessed she would have based on first impressions.

"Cousins, of the same grandmother, through sisters. Everyone knows they oughtn't to have married, but they never cared for anything but to please themselves. And they say," she added, lowering her voice ominously, "that the children of cousins possess all their worst traits twice over. Six children they had before she died bearing the last one, and only two are still alive today. And look at them.''

"Ah," said Tess, feeling terribly embarrassed.

Arina looked up at her with unexpected and acute understanding. "I'm sorry." She smiled and again appeared like a perfectly harmless and unusually diffident young jaran woman, black-haired, petite, and charming. "What must you think of me? But I really hoped to get you aside to ask you about Kirill Zvertkov. I see he is with the jahar. Has he married again?"

Tess felt as if she had been slapped. She bent to busy herself unrolling her blankets, desperate to hide her reaction. "No." She stuck her head into the tent to at least attempt to disguise the sound of her voice. All the while, her thoughts raced wildly. Hoist with your own petard, my heart, she said to herself, and not a damned thing you can do about it because it would be the worst of ill-bred behavior, and you 're the guest here, not she.

"Oh," said Arina, with a flash of that unexpected acuteness. "He's your lover."

Tess withdrew from the tent, blushing madly, and grasping for every shred of dignity and graciousness she could muster. "Well, yes," she admitted. "I beg your pardon. I know it isn't-isn't seemly to be-" She trailed off, feeling like an idiot.

Arina sighed and suddenly looked very sad. "Is he going to marry you, do you think?" she asked, without anger or jealousy.

"No," said Tess, feeling firm enough on that score. "I'm traveling south. I won't be here past the winter."

Arina brightened. "Oh, well, that's all right, then. I can speak with Mama, who can speak with Bakhtiian, who can speak with Kirill. And then when we meet up with them again…" She hesitated. "If you'd rather I not approach him at all while you're here-"

"No, no," Tess lied, not wanting to get a bad reputation. "I couldn't possibly be so selfish." Oh, yes, you could, her heart muttered, but she found it impossible to dislike Arina Veselov, especially after her selfless offer to leave Kirill alone. Arina was playing fairly; by God, she would, too. After all, Kirill could damned well refuse her offer, couldn't he?

"Arina!" Vera marched up to them, leading a trail of young women like a host of worshipers in her wake. "Are you keeping our guest to yourself? For shame. Here, girls, you see, she does have brown hair. I beg your pardon,

Tess, but Aleksia refused to believe me. Come, we'll show you the camp." With no discernible expression on her face, Arina retreated to the background.

The time until supper had all the tranquillity of a windstorm. They were a lively enough bunch and good company. They made sure that she was thoroughly bewildered as to what their names were, showed her the spot where they would hold the dancing, and besieged her with so many questions that she could only laugh. At last Vera took her to supper.

The estana's tent shared a fire with Vera's tent, and Tess saw immediately that the two tents were sited so as to receive equal standing. Indeed, it surprised her that so young a woman as Vera even possessed one of the great tents that usually housed a grandmother and her adult daughters and multitudinous kin. But Mother Veselov, though of the same fair-haired and slender stock as her cousin and niece, was utterly dwarfed by their personalities. She presided, as was proper, over the supper served by her daughter and son and his wife and assorted other relatives, but she never once spoke unless an opening was given her deliberately by Sergei Veselov or Vera. Besides three men who evidently acted as Veselov's lieutenants, and Tess, five of the men from Bakhtiian's jahar had been honored on this occasion. Bakh-tiian, of course, and Niko and Josef-Tadheus having gone to his sister's husband's kin-and Yuri, because he was Bakhtiian's cousin. And Kirill, who had astonishingly, and to Tess's great dismay, been seated next to Mother Veselov. The better to size him up, Tess thought uncharitably, but she had to concede that given such blatant provocation, Kirill behaved circumspectly and Arina, moving around him frequently, did not flirt with him at all.

Bakhtiian and Veselov spoke together mostly. Tess, placed across the fire, could not join in but only listen. Vera had, of course, placed herself on the other side of Bakhtiian and banished her young husband to Yuri's company, next to Tess. Yuri and Petya were reminiscing, oblivious to the others and, for that matter, to her.

"You have not yet explained to me, Bakhtiian," Sergei Veselov was saying, "how you intend to feed so many jahars, all gathered into one army."

"A fair enough question, Veselov," replied Bakhtiian smoothly, letting the hostility in Veselov's voice slip off him, "and one which I will return to you. Let us assume the situation. What would you do?"