They both laughed, and Maia shook her head Wonderingly. "Well, there's a tale! Who'd ever have thought! When T'maa asked you, you weren't in two minds at all, then?"
"Not for a moment. You see, there wasn't anything for me to go back to. Oh, I don't mean I'd have been poor. I never really thought about that one way or the other. No, it's just that people in Chalcon don't think about things the way they do here. Never been there, have you?"
Maia smiled. "No, but I've been in Suba. Reckon it can't be all that much different."
"I'm a spoiled bargain, my dear. That's all they'd have seen in me, even though they'd have treated me kindly for my father's sake. Shop-soiled in Bekla." She tossed her head and stamped her foot; at which the finches flew away. "But not to Elvair. I'm not damaged goods to him. And he's all the world to me."
This showed the free-and-easy Elvair-ka-Virrion in something of a new light, thought Maia: yet it sounded genuine enough--he might very well have fallen sincerely in love with this beautiful, high-born girl in her distress, and determined to save her from degradation and slavery. And for her sake he had gone the length of openly defying the temple authorities. Presumably he--or at any rate his father--could have afforded thirteen or fourteen thousand meld for Milvushina. But to have bought her would have been to accept the contention that she was legally a slave. Yes, and to have people saying, too, that his consort had once been a slave.
"So he really loves you?" she said. "Well, I'm that glad! I am truly."
"He's made life worth living again," said Milvushina. "That's what it comes to. Apart from everything else, he's given me standing and position here in Bekla, and I suppose I wouldn't be human not to like that."
She paused. "It's all so strange, though."
"Strange?" asked Maia. "But you're a baron's daughter--?"
Milvushina laughed--the same happy sound which had so much startled Maia at Sarget's party.
"Bekla isn't Chalcon, dear. The kind of standing a Chalcon baron's daughter has is quite different from a Leopard's wife. I've had just as much to learn as ever you can have had, Maia, believe me."
"D'you see much of the Lord General?" asked Maia.
"He's been very kind to me," replied Milvushina. "You know the Sacred Queen tried to make trouble about me and Elvair? She told Elvair to send me back to Chalcon, and when he refused she told Kembri to make me go. But Kembri wouldn't." She picked up a carved onyx rabbit which one of Shend-Lador's friends had given to Maia, and began stroking it. "He says I'm the luck of the em-pire!"
"Did he say that to Fornis?"
"I don't know," said Milvushina. Then, suddenly, "Maia, are you afraid of her?"
"Yes, I am," said Maia, "and I'll tell you straight, I wouldn't want anyone telling her I'm the luck of the em-pire, that I wouldn't."
"Well, you are, aren't you? Oh, but Elvair wouldn't let anything happen to me! It's only that--oh, Maia, I do feel so frightened sometimes! I wish Elvair hadn't upset the chief priest and the Sacred Queen, even though I know it was for my honor. He told them straight out that I'd never been a slave--well, and that's true--and he wasn't going to pay a meld for me. But now, quite soon, he's got to go away, you know, to fight in Chalcon--"
"To fight Erketlis, isn't it? You don't mind that, then?"
"I only met Santil twice in my whole life," answered Milvushina. "And even then it wasn't the two of us alone. That's how things are done in Chalcon, you know. He was very charming, but, oil--it's not like Elvair. How could it be? When Elvair's made his name as a commander--as he surely will--and come back to Bekla, then I'll let myself feel safe and happy. I don't trust Fornis, Maia; not an inch. I have all my food tasted before I eat it. Do you?"
Before Maia could answer, Milvushina suddenly stood up, swaying on her feet, put her hands up to her face and took a few tottering steps across to the window.
"Oh, Maia! I'm so sorry, I think I'm going to be sick!"
She leaned over the sill, retching. Maia, thoroughly frightened by this sudden crisis following immediately upon her talk of the poisoning, jumped up and threw an arm round her shoulders.
"What can I do, dear? Shall I send for a doctor? Ogma! Ogma!" she called hysterically.
"No, no, it's all right, Maia," answered Milvushina quickly. "There's nothing wrong; don't worry. In fact the doctor says it's a good sign. Means everything's going on well." She sat down again. "It's all right. It's passed off." She wiped her sweating forehead and looked up at Maia smiling, one hand on her belly.
Maia stared. "You mean--Elvair's baby?"
Milvushina nodded happily. "No one else's, that's for sure. If you'll stay with me I'll lie down for a little while and then I'd best be getting home." She flung her arms round Maia's neck. "Home! Yes, really home--something I thought I'd lost for ever! Oh, I'll make him such a home before I've done, you see if I don't!"
And now at last Maia did feel real envy, but not on account of Elvair-ka-Virrion. Why should she have her man, she thought, and not me mine? It was only for an instant. The next, she was once more mistress of herself and sat down beside the bed, holding Milvushina's hand and sending Ogma for cold water, a towel and some fresh fruit-juice.
"I'm so glad, dear," she said. "Just think--that night when Occula and me came back and found you alone-- who'd ever have guessed it'd all turn out so well?"
58: A NEW SACRED QUEEN?
Durakkon was walking with Kembri and Elvair-ka-Virrion on the western ramparts--one place where they could be in the open air with no personal bodyguard and without fear of being overheard. The sun was setting, and below them, on their left, the Beklan plain stretched awa
y fifty miles to the hills of Paltesh, now blackly outlined against a red evening sky. Here and there, in the hollows of its gentle undulations, villages showed as patches canopied with drifts of smoke in the windless air. From below came up the hum of the lower city, the countless, distant noises that comprised it merging "into a general, evening grayness of sound, like reflections on a distant lake. A few hundred yards in front of them the Tower of Sel-Dolad rose high above the ramparts, the facets of its topmost balcony--a lofty bloom raised on a slender stem--catching the sunset light and momentarily gleaming here and there in their eyes as they strolled on, absorbed in talk. Each sentinel, as they passed, faced about from looking out over the plain and saluted, extending his right forearm across his chest.
"Well, I don't care," said Durakkon, deliberately looking away from Kembri and letting his gaze rest on the distant, square bulk of the Gate of Lilies below and ahead, "I'm glad the filthy brute's dead. How can it possibly have been in the public interest for a man like that to exercise power? Associating with him was too high a price to pay for anything he did for us. We're better off without him."
"Oh, come, sir," replied the Lord General. "You must admit he was very successful in what he set out to do. He had a great flair for the work, you know. It's not just anyone who can succeed at that sort of work--picking the right men, knowing where to send them, being able to sift the information that comes in, tell what's important and what isn't and so on. We're going to have a job to replace him, I'm afraid. The great pity is that he kept nearly all he knew in his own head. After more than three months our intelligence is still going limping."
"Well--" Durakkon gestured impatiently. "Have you had any important information recently from the provinces?"
"The most important piece of news we've received," replied Kembri, "is that Karnat himself s gone back across the Zhairgen into Katria. Apparently he's got some trouble over in western Terekenalt which he thinks requires his personal attention. According to my information it's likely to keep him occupied for the rest of the summer. He's left troops in Suba, of course, but his personal departure means that there won't be any further attempts to cross the Valderra for the time being. That's all to the good. We can leave Sendekar to watch the Valderra, keep a regiment or two in Bekla in case of trouble elsewhere and use the rest against Santil-ke-Erketlis in Chalcon."