The Lady of the Snowmist by Andrew J. Offutt

Author:Andrew J. Offutt [Offutt, Andrew J.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2018-08-28T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Eleven

The waters of trust run as deep as the river of fear through the dark caverns in the bone.

— Marge Piercy

Jarik remembered Metanira. She and another came at once, even while he remembered that on his previous visit here the great chamber had been filled with attractive women and girls, all in pastel-hued gowns or tunics and all aflash with gems and silver. And now here was Metanira once more, while once more he still lacked answers. She he assumed was in her twenties was draped in a clinging sleeveless gown of palest shadeflower blue. Its skirt flowed all down her hips and legs to the floor as if it were a fabric woven of liquid sky. With her was that child he had seen here previously. A girl-child of a half-score years or fewer. Her eyes were the pale blue of his own and her hair nigh white, like Delath’s.

Metanira smiled. The child did not.

Jarik was both tired and hungry. Yet he had also been cut off, and he was not serene of face as he rose. He and Jilain followed Metanira to that room that was beyond the dream of any wark-dweller in its luxury, and that yet was not soft. An exclamation sprang from Jilain’s lips when she entered and saw the chamber.

His buskined feet on a carpet the hue of sheepgrass in June, Jarik glanced back. The girl was gone.

“I well remember how that coat of armor is removed, warrior,” Metanira said, smiling. “Will you show me again?”

Jilain glanced rather sharply at Jarik, who was careful not to notice or to look at her. He removed weapons belt and then the warcoat, while Metanira watched. Jilain did not, but looked away. A seamless coat of multiply-interlinked chain was too heavy for normal drawing off over the head, and Jilain did not care for the sight of her man with his head low and his rump in the air while he wriggled, clinking, out of his mail.

When she looked his way again he was straightening, jerking his head to toss mussed hair away from his lean, rather bony face. His mail formed a gleaming little pile of black metal on the floor. It did not look big enough, now, to cover his broad-shouldered torso, however lean of hip and small of backside he was.

Rather than look at Jilain, Jarik removed his padded undercoat. A glance showed him the earthenware amphora he remembered, beautifully decorated in red and amber, orange and vermillion. He remembered the goblets of sweet yellowish-white wine he had been handed from it, on his previous visit to Snowmist Keep.

“Will you remove your leathern coat?” Metanira asked, of Jilain. Her voice seemed oddly … dull. She was almost startlingly blue of eye, with a deeply dimpled chin and fascinating hair, all wavy like spun, crinkled copper. Her expression was serene. Stupid, Jilain thought.

She looked at this one called “Metaneerah” with the smallest frown, shot a glance at Jarik — who was peering into that colorful jug — and nodded, slowly.

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