Cara clapped her hands in delight. "You're certain it's Léac's daughter?"
"No doubt, Ma'am. Sat behind them in The Emperor, I did. Then I followed them back after they left. I was careful, mind. They didn't know I was there, they were so wrapped up in each other. They went back to Léac's place. I followed them several times. It's Meracad alright."
Cara fell silent for a moment, stunned at the intelligence. She had caught the bitch out ─ just as she had embarked on the riskiest liaison of her life. It was all there: the potential for scandal, for public ruin, not to mention the prospect of a double revenge. For the girl's coward of a father would no doubt watch the whole sorry story unfold without raising a finger to stop it. His reputation was, after all, of greater value than the girl's. She almost burst with the news.
"Here, take this." She handed the spy her promised fifty shillings. "I'm immensely pleased with your work. I take it you won't mention what you've seen to a soul?"
"My word's good, Ma'am."
"Excellent. I may require you to repeat what you have said to someone, but all in good time."
"I understand."
"Thank you. Goodbye."
The girl left the room, and Cara turned immediately to her writing bureau. There was not a moment to waste. Léac was in the North, she had heard, and it might take him several days to return. Pulling out a quill, she began to pen a letter.
***
Hal sat on a wall beside the fountain in the main square, thankful for the refreshing sensation of water as it billowed out into spray behind her back. The day's merciless heat had transformed unpaved streets into dusty tracks, rendering stonework and masonry so hot they brought blisters to the fingers of those who touched them. The evening shade now provided some welcome relief against the cruel intensity of the sun, and Hal closed her eyes, inhaling the heady sounds and scents of early dusk: the perfumes of rich women as they crossed the square, perhaps on their way to secret assignations, and the constant ebb and fall of voices coming, it seemed, from every corner of the city.
To her left, a cluster of poor musicians struck up an impromptu melody. She caught the strain of a fiddle working busily above the low-plucked harmonies of a lute, and when she opened her eyes a couple were dancing before the minstrels. The woman's scarlet and olive dress flared out as she swayed and twisted to the music. Her partner, dressed in linen shirt and ragged canvas breeches was clearly another poor arrival from the provinces, seeking to make his fortune in the city.
Hal leaned forward, cupping her face in her hands as she admired the carefree agility with which the couple moved, as if dancing were as natural an activity as breathing for them. Her attention wavering, she turned to the opposite side of the square, squinting hard against the sunlight filtering down between rooftops and buildings. No sign of Meracad. And she had promised...she had promised! With a nervous little tapping of her feet, she gazed intently at the wide boulevard which linked the square with the merchants' district. Perhaps Meracad had persuaded herself that meeting in such a public square carried too great a risk. But surely there were few better places to remain concealed than in a crowd? Besides, they could always head over to her quarters on Riverside or to The Emperor.
Someone tapped her on the shoulder and she started in surprise at the sudden interruption to her thoughts.
"Not like you to sit around idly, Hal."
Hal froze. That was not Meracad's voice. "Good evening, Orla." She forced her lips into a fixed smile before twisting round to face her former lover.
She was blinded briefly by the last rays of sun as they fell across her line of sight. Orla's face was shadowed, and Hal shielded her eyes with her hands, tracing the lean, wiry outline of the soldier's silhouette. The light dropped away altogether, giving way to the grainy haze of dusk. Orla's hair hung loose, plastered to her forehead with sweat, her angular features tanned to golden brown by months spent fighting rebels on the empire's southern frontier.
"Expecting someone?" The soldier's tone was dry, laconic.
"Well perhaps, maybe...I thought your battalion had left already."
With a shake of her head, Orla sat down beside Hal, her bare arm lightly brushing against the duellist's jacket. Without thinking, Hal pulled away, the reflex drawing such an expression of pain and irritation from Orla that she regretted it instantly.
"Don't worry, Hal." Her voice was now laced with sarcasm and suppressed fury. "I was hardly going to ravish you."
Biting her lip, Hal stared at the ground. "I know that, Orla," she said quietly.
"What does it matter if I've left or not?" Orla continued, half to herself. "If you had wished to, you could have sought me out days ago."
"You seemed content enough a few nights' past, Orla. What's changed?" Hal peered out across the square again. If Meracad were to come now...she immediately cursed her own selfishness. She had shared Orla's thoughts, her bed, her life. Now she saw her as no more than a mere obstacle, lodged between herself and a new love.
"It's not too late you know." Ignoring Hal's question, Orla suddenly seized her hand. In half-despair the duellist closed her eyes, already knowing what was to follow.
"Come with me, Hal. Sign up for the army. I'll give you a reference. You have no idea..." Orla's voice trailed away. "You have no idea how long and lonely those southern nights can be without you lying by my side." For a brief moment the pain in her eyes disappeared, replaced by hope. Hal felt her own heart crumple; how could Orla fail to understand?
"I cannot give you what you want, Orla." The words came out as little more than a whisper. Orla continued to hold her hand for a few moments and then let go, that wan light of hope in her eyes fading as quickly as it had appeared. She followed Hal's gaze to observe a girl in a faded blue dress pacing across the square towards them, her fawn-coloured hair spilling out in waves across her bare shoulders and down her back.
"I understand." She hissed through gritted teeth as Meracad picked her way through the throngs of city dwellers towards them.
"No, Orla." Hal turned to her at last. "You don't understand. And you never did. I can't just blithely follow you to the South. I can't leave everything I have here."
"You mean you can't leave her," Orla growled with a nod at Meracad. Her face now clouded and distant, she rose. "You could at least pay me the respect of honesty, Hal."
Meracad had almost reached them, her smile giving way to confusion on witnessing Hal's joyless expression, the passive aggression implicit in Orla's stony face and clenched fists.
"I wish you joy of her." The soldier threw a look of disgust and disappointment in Hal's direction before storming away across the square. Hal watched her go, gripped for a brief moment by a strange, unfathomable fear.
"You came," she said at last, attempting a grin, but she knew that her voice betrayed her anxiety.
"Did you doubt me?" Meracad sank down next to Hal in the place that Orla had just left.
"No. No, of course not."
Meracad shook her head. "You're a terrible liar, Hal," she said at last. "What just happened?"
Sighing, Hal arched her back in a long, drawn out stretch, raising her hands above her head. "She wanted me to join the army and fight southern rebels alongside her," she said at last.
Meracad gasped. "And what did you say?" Her eyes searched Hal's face in desperation.
Hal threaded her arm around Meracad's waist. "I told her that I would not go," she said at last. "Not now. Not ever." She felt the release of tension as Meracad relaxed against her, closed her eyes, inhaling the herby scent of her hair.
"Did you love her?" Meracad asked quietly. Hal stared down at her feet in quiet embarrassment. Then she raised her head to observe the dancers for a few moments. They had been joined by several more couples who swirled and swayed to the music, separating and meeting again, parting and returning in a frenetic whirl of arms and legs.
"I don't know," Hal said at last. "I thought perhaps I did but...she wanted more than I could give her."
"I'll not place such demands on you. I promise."
"You don't have to," Hal said. "This is different."
"In what way?" Meracad twisted around to face her.
"Orla fed off me. She left me drained." Instinctively, Hal caught Meracad's hands in her own, entwining their fingers together. "And when I'd given her all I could, she still wanted more." She had never spoken to anyone of her feelings for Orla: not to Kris or Jools and certainly not to Marc. It felt as if she were closing a door on the past.
"Orla thinks she's strong because she's a soldier; because she fights for the good cause of the empire. But in fact she's the weakest person I know." Hal gave a rueful smile. "She can't survive alone; she needs the energy and attention of others to keep going. I tried. The ancestors alone know that I tried. But whatever I did, it just wasn't enough."
She stopped for a moment, having surprised herself at the release of thoughts which had claimed such a hold on her for so long. Meracad made no reply, patiently waiting for her to continue.
"You're different," Hal said at last. "You have a kind of power inside you; you burn with a fire all your own. Perhaps you don't see it yourself, but...what?" She stopped, confused, for Meracad had just begun to smile, her body shaking with suppressed laughter.
"What is it?"
"Oh, you poet, Hal. That's a side of you I never expected to see."
Her pride piqued, Hal rose abruptly, nerves still jarred after the earlier conversation with Orla. "Fine. I never told anyone what I just told you now. I'm pleased you find it so amusing."
She turned to go, bristling with anger. How could Meracad find it in her heart to laugh at words which had cost her so much?
"Wait, Hal. Please!" Meracad grabbed her hand, pulling her backwards with such force she almost landed in the fountain. "Hal, I never meant to mock you. I was just surprised. You never seemed given to eloquence before."
"I never met you before."
Meracad rose and they stood, facing each other. "I hear what you're trying to tell me, Hal." Once again, Meracad's fingers worked their way between Hal's. "I think perhaps you overestimate me. But your words touch me here." She put her other hand to her chest. "No one ever said such things to me before. And I reacted in the way I did because I am unused to such praise."
Hal relented. She had no genuine desire to leave Meracad alone in the square. In fact, she would have stayed with the girl all night, until the music and dancing had faded away and the starlight caved into day. She put her two arms around the girl's waist, drawing her close. "You'd better get used to my poor attempts at praise. I don't have words enough to tell you how I feel."
Smiling, Meracad buried her head against Hal's shoulder. "We'll be seen," she whispered in her ear.
"Let them look. I haven't the strength for secrecy tonight." She lifted Meracad's face up to her own and they kissed, lightly and quickly. The musicians had altered their melody now from a fast-paced reel to a slower, measured pavane, a more sensual variant on a dance fashionable amongst courtiers. Hal felt Meracad sway in her arms to the music.
"What are you doing?" She whispered.
"I thought all you courtiers knew how to dance, Hal."
"Not this one. Besides, I'm very much an ex-courtier."
"It's never too late to learn." Meracad tried to pull her in the direction of the dancers, but she refused to follow, peering over in trepidation at the couples and the fluid, natural grace with which they moved. She felt a tug on her hand and Meracad cast her an ironic smile.
No better place to remain concealed than in a crowd. With a sigh, she allowed herself to be led towards the dancers and once in the midst of the tapping feet and waving arms, caught hold of Meracad again. She felt the girl submit to the rhythmic pulsing of the music, found herself mirroring Meracad's steps until they moved as one, caught up in the midst of the gyring, rippling motions of the dancers.