Ship of Magic

Page 183

Nana entered the room with a tray of tea things. She also had a bottle of port tucked under one arm, and a towel draped over the same arm. She set the bottle and the tray down on the table and then turned to present Malta with a towel. It was damp. “Clean your face,” the old serving woman told her brusquely. The adults all glanced at her, then looked away. They would grant her the privacy in which to obey. For an instant she was grateful. Then it dawned on her what they were doing to her, telling her to wash her face like a dirty child.

“I will not!” she cried, and flung the wet towel to the floor.

A long moment of silence followed. Then her grandmother asked her conversationally, “Do you realize you look like a whore?”

“I do not!” Malta declared. She had another moment of doubt, but thrust it aside. “Cerwin Trell did not seem to find me unattractive this night. This dress and this way of painting my eyes are what is currently fashionable in Jamaillia. ”

“For the whores, perhaps,” Grandmother continued implacably. “And I did not say you were 'unattractive. ' You are simply not attractive in a way any proper woman would be comfortable with. ”

“Actually,” Davad Restart began uncomfortably, but Grandmother continued, “We are not in Jamaillia, nor are you a whore. You are the daughter of a proud Trader family. And we do not so flaunt our bodies or our faces in public. I wonder that somehow this has escaped your notice before this. ”

“Then I wish I were a whore in Jamaillia!” Malta declared hotly. “Because anything else would be better than being suffocated here. Forced to dress and act like a little child when I am near a woman grown, forced to always be quiet, be polite, be . . . unnoticed. I don't want to grow up like that, I don't want to be like you and Mother. I want to . . . to be beautiful, and noticed, and have fun, and have men want to be near me and send me flowers and presents. And I don't want to dress in last year's fashions and behave as if nothing ever excited me or angered me. I want . . . ”

“Actually,” Davad broke in awkwardly, “there has been a, uh, similar fashion in Jamaillia. Since last year. One of the Satrap's, uh, Companions appeared thus. Uh, in the guise of a, uh, street woman. Not at a public function, but at a very large private gathering. To proclaim her, shall we say, complete devotion to the Satrap and his needs. That she was willing to, well, to be seen and treated as his, well . . . ” Davad took a deep breath. “This is not something I usually would discuss with any of you,” he pointed out awkwardly. “But it did happen, and there were, uh, shall we say echoes of it seen in fashionable dress in the months that followed. The ear paint, the uh, accessible panels of the skirts . . . ” He suddenly flushed very red and subsided.

Grandmother only shook her head angrily. “This is what our Satrap has come to. He breaks the promises of his grandfather and father, and reduces the Companions of his Heart to whores for his bodily pleasures. Time was when a family was proud to have one of their daughters named as a Companion, for it was a post that demanded wisdom and diplomacy. What are they now? His seraglio? It disgusts me. And I will not see my granddaughter dressed as such, no matter how popular the garb becomes. ”

“You want me to be old and dowdy, like you and mother,” Malta declared. “You want me to go from being an infant to being an old woman. Well, I won't. Because that's not what I want. ”

“Never in my life,” Keffria declared suddenly, “have I spoken so to my mother. And I won't tolerate you speaking so to your grandmother. If-”

“If you had, maybe you would have had a life!” Malta pointed out suddenly. “But no! I bet you've always been mousy and silent and obedient. Like a cow. Shown one year and wed the next, like a fine fat cow taken to auction! One season of dancing and fun, and then married off to have babies with whatever man offered the best bargain to your parents. ” She had shocked the whole room. She looked around at them all. “That's not what I want, Mother. I want a life of my own. I want to wear pretty clothes, and go to wonderful places. I don't want to marry some nice Trader boy you pick out for me. I want to visit Jamaillia some day, I want to go to the Satrap's Court, and not as a married woman with a string of babies following me. I want to be free of all that. I want - ”

“You want to ruin us,” grandmother said quietly, and poured tea. Cup after tidy cup, calmly and efficiently as she spoke her damning words. “You want, you say, and give no thought at all to what we all need. ” She glanced up from her tea duties, to inquire, “Tea or port, Davad?”