David Drake - Out of the waters

"I'm sure mother is in better shape than whoever tried to get in her way," Varus said, smiling faintly. Until father got involved with magic, he hadn't appreciated how terrifying an enemy Hedia would be.

"I thought…," Pandareus said with a hint of reserve. "That I saw you and your sister arrive here on the back of a gryphon?"

"Yes," said Varus. "That's what it seemed to me also. It may have been a metaphor, though."

He lurched to his feet. The toga clung to his legs, threatening to bind him. Well, if that was the worst problem he had-and it was-then he was a very fortunate man, and Carce was fortunate also.

"Master?" he said. "Typhon isn't a danger any more, because of my sister. Alphena saved us all."

Pandareus lifted his chin in acknowledgement. "I gathered from what Lady Alphena said to your mother that the danger was past. I'm glad to have that confirmed, though. Your sister, ah, seemed distraught."

I really don't know what has been happening to my sister since she disappeared from our garden, Varus thought. And I think it will be better if I never try to learn.

Aloud he said, "Come, my honored teacher. I will greet my father, the consul; and then we too should look into a change of garments."

Alphena lay on the table under the hands of the masseur. He was a tall eunuch, a friend and perhaps relative of Abinnaeus, whose shop Hedia had taken over with her usual brusque authority. The clothier would be paid, of course, and probably greatly overpaid, but Alphena doubted he'd been thinking of money when he leaped to obey the cascade of orders.

Alphena had stopped crying. The rough toweling had warmed and dried her, and she'd found herself drifting into a blurred reverie punctuated by flashes of vivid memory.

She and Hedia lay with their heads in opposite directions on parallel tables-display tables, originally, but sturdy enough for this use-and each had turned her face to the right. When Alphena opened her eyes, her mother was looking at her.

"Are you feeling better, dear?" Hedia asked, her voice pulsing with the quick rhythm of the assistant masseur who chopped at her back with the edges of his hands. He was a Libyan with dark skin and tightly wound hair as coarse as wire.

Hedia had insisted that the master work on her daughter, so of course that was what happened. Alphena could watch the assistant, though, and she had been impressed by the economy, strength, and precision with which he moved. He'd make a good swordsman…

"I don't feel anything," Alphena said as the masseur worked the muscles of her right buttock with fingers as hard as wood. "I don't think I'll ever feel anything ever again!"

Her voice sounded petulant, even to herself, and she knew as she spoke that the words were a lie. She wouldn't have been able to judge the Libyan's skill if she hadn't resumed taking an interest in the world around her.

"That isn't true," she said flatly before her mother could say anything. "I don't want to feel anything, but I do."

To her furious amazement, she started crying again. "I feel awful! Awful! What they did was wrong!"

Hedia sat up abruptly. "You may all leave," she said, gesturing toward the outer door.

"At once, your ladyship," said Abinnaeus, who with his two assistants had been standing before the hanging which covered the storage room and stairs to the upper level. "Since your own attendants haven't arrived yet, would you like me to leave one of my boys? He speaks only Aramaic, though I suspect he's picked up some Common Greek. Not Latin, though, as he's only been in Carce for the past week."

"I think my daughter and I can pour our own wine in a crisis, Abinnaeus," Hedia said calmly. "Though if my maid Syra arrives, you may pass her through."

Smiling at Alphena, she said, "I sent a messenger to the house to bring my servants when I arrived, but I don't expect them to reach us for some while yet. I'll get some wine, dear."

Alphena sat up slowly. The masseur, his assistant, and the four attendants accompanying them went out first. They had started to pack up their paraphernalia, but after a quick discussion with Abinnaeus they had simply left it behind. The clothier's assistants chivied them to move faster.

Abinnaeus himself followed at the end of the procession. Before he banged the outer door behind him, he dropped a neatly folded packet on the table beside Alphena.

She picked it up: it was a napkin. She wiped her face and eyes, then blew her nose on it and set it down again.

Alphena had known that people obeyed her stepmother's orders, but nobody had given the shopkeeper an order about the napkin. Hedia surrounded herself with people who thought for themselves, which was a very different thing.

Alphena was suddenly glad to have become one of the people around Lady Hedia.

Hedia handed Alphena the two cups she had filled at the sideboard and sat down beside her. They sipped together.

The wine was straight from the jar. Alphena had already learned that what she drank with her mother was likely to be the pure vintage.

That was all right this time. Alphena took a deep draft. It was probably better this time, though she didn't expect to get drunk.

Hedia took another sip and looked at Alphena over the rim of her cup. "Who treated you unfairly, daughter?" she said. Her tone was mild but her face was not. "I may not be able to put it right, but there's a chance that I can demonstrate to those who wronged you that they have made a serious mistake."

"It's not me," Alphena said. She snatched up the napkin but she managed not to resume blubbering. "It was Uktena. I know what you think but he's not a monster, not really, he's a man, a brave man, and he, and he-"

She broke off because she found herself crying after all. She felt Hedia take the cup from her hand though she'd probably sloshed out half its contents already. A moment later, Hedia's arm went around her shoulders.

After a time, Alphena snuffled. She blew her nose hard into the napkin, then wiped her eyes with the back of her hand.

"Uktena is your name for Typhon, dear heart?" Hedia asked. Her voice was calm, hinting of no emotion except kindly concern.

"No!" Alphena said. Then, very quietly, she said, "Yes, I guess so. But it isn't fair. He only got that way because he had to fight Procron. His own people sent him away, put him in prison because they were afraid of him. He saved them!"

"Drink some more of this, dear," Hedia said, offering the cup again.

Either she had somehow refilled it or it was the one she had poured for herself. Alphena took a gulp, then second and third gulps.

"Did they have reason to be afraid of Uktena?" Hedia said. She lowered her arm but she continued to sit very close.

"Yes," Alphena whispered. "But it doesn't matter. He got that way by saving them! They can't cast him away like that, it isn't right!"

Hedia turned her face toward a wall where bolts of silk were stacked, but her eyes were far away. In a voice which throbbed with an emotion which Alphena couldn't identify, she said, "I suppose it must be right, dear, because that's what happens to soldiers all the time. We give them land to settle on the frontiers, because that way they don't come back to Carce. They're far too dangerous, you see."

Alphena looked at her. "He's a warrior," she said. "He fought for them."

"Yes, dear," Hedia said, meeting her eyes again. She smiled; a sort of smile. "The tribunes don't spend long out there, a year to be qualified for office and then come back to find jobs in the government. But sometimes a year is too long. They go away boys like your brother, and when they come back they're not really human."

She hugged Alphena again, harder; taking comfort this time, not trying to give it. "And there's nothing anyone can do, dear one, not after it's happened," Hedia said. "Except that sometimes we women can bring a little solace. Remember that, when you're older. Remember your friend Uktena."