My eyes moved from the breathtaking view to slide across the roof where I saw my girls gathered around the table at the opposite corner. I saw the sun twinkling off the bangles at their wrists and their earrings.
Gaal was on her knees draping a bolt of fabric around a standing Quixa’s hips. Vibrant swathes of different colored cuts of fabric were strewn everywhere around the table, the bolts of fabric I bought my girls in the marketplace that day.
I had decided some weeks ago that a queen’s girls did not wander around in drab, threadbare sarongs and bandeaus but they wore jewelry, makeup and brightly colored, fashionable clothing. To their delight, they each had received four pieces of fabric since the first one I bought so many weeks ago and a new piece today as well as their jewelry and pots of makeup for their own. They also had more than one candlestick by their bed and each had mirrors in their rooms as well as small pieces of art and brightly colored quilts on their beds to break up the monotony of cream adobe in their quarters.
Movement caught my eye, I looked to the winding, black, wrought iron staircase that led to the roof and I saw Twinka was arriving.
Twinka disapproved of me outfitting my girls and made this very clear nonverbally, as she was doing now with a tight-lipped look in their direction.
I ignored it and so did my girls but I watched as she made her way to me.
She stopped two feet from our mats.
“Does my queen actually need a slave to do something?” she enquired.
We’d already had dinner and I looked down at the plate of carob drops, candied fruits, honeyed almonds, the jug of wine, the jug of mango juice and Sabine, Narinda and my silver chalices that were littering the mats, all of which my girls had brought to us before they’d settled with their fabric.
Then I looked up at Twinka and replied, “Me.”
Her lips got tighter and she inclined her head.
Then she turned and walked three feet away.
That was when I called, “Twinka?”
She sighed visibly, audibly and heavily and turned back then she lifted her brows.
“I bought three bolts of fabric for you today. Gaal will make you dresses,” I told her for she didn’t wear sarongs around her h*ps and bandeaus or halter tops to cover her br**sts but a long, wrap of material she crossed under her neck and tied at the back.
She had one. It was always clean but also threadbare.
“Your kindness is extraordinary, my queen,” she lied about her opinion with obviousness, “but my clothing is fine.”
“I disagree,” I returned.
“The old Dahksahna gave me this fabric,” she informed me.
“Well, the new Dahksahna is giving you more,” I replied, she opened her mouth to retort but I got there before her. “Fine, if you want to wear that in the house, that’s your choice. You leave this house; you do it representing your Dax and Dahksahna and wear your new sarongs.”
She glared at me. Then she inclined her head. Then she turned and moved quickly off the roof.
My girls watched her and waited before they emitted their low giggles, doing so only after she was well out of sight.
I smiled down at the mats, picked up my chalice of juice and took a sip.
“You’re very hard on her,” Narinda muttered, I put my chalice down and looked at her in surprise.
“Sorry?” I asked and her eyes went from the top of the stairs to me.
“She is old and she is stubborn, set in her ways. She has the running of this house for months and lives alone, clearly liking it that way,” Narinda replied. “She is a slave and this is rightfully your home with your husband but you must understand the way she feels.”
I made no response for this was true.
Narinda carried on. “And my father taught me the best way to handle someone who is stubborn is to let them be stubborn and live with their decisions. If she wishes to wear shabby sarongs, then she denies herself kindness and beauty. That is her choice, Circe, and it is the wrong one but it won’t hurt you to allow her to live with it.”
I still made no reply for this was true too.
“You can’t force kindness, my lovely,” Narinda said softly.
And this was true too.
“All right, sweet Narinda,” I replied, “I’ll ask Gaal to make them and I’ll tell Twinka it’s her choice whether or not she wishes to wear them.”
Narinda smiled at me. I smiled back thinking it was good, having wise friends.
Then I said quietly, “Your father was very wise.”
She nodded and took a sip from her own chalice before her eyes drifted away and she said quietly back, “Indeed, he was.”
She was smiling her small, weird smile so I left her to her thoughts and looked back at the view. The pinks were disappearing, the gold was gone and stripes of vermillion and midnight blue slashed the sky as stars started to come out. I heard one of my girls moving around and, as the roof illuminated, I knew she was lighting the torches that were stuck in holders around the edge of the roof.
I felt my leg nudged, looked down at it and saw that Narinda had given me a light prod with her toe. I looked at her to see she wasn’t smiling small and weird but knowing and amused. Her eyes were on Sabine who I noticed belatedly had been completely silent for at least the last ten minutes.
I looked to my friend who was lounging across the top of the mats at Narinda and my heads to see she was gazing at the vista as well, her face soft, her lips tipped up, her eyes, though, were heated.
Someone was thinking good thoughts.
I pressed my lips together and bugged my eyes out at Narinda.
She smiled big, tipped her head back and called in Korwahk, “Sabine? My lovely, are you with us?”
Sabine started and her head jerked to us. “Sorry, so sorry, I was miles away,” she replied in Korwahk.
“No you weren’t, you were in bed with your savage brute,” I teased, watched her face flush then her eyes light then she scooted her cushions closer to us and asked, “Can I be forthright?”
This was familiar, and therefore was likely to get good, so Narinda and I closed into each other and Sabine as Narinda replied, “What you can do, my lovely, is not ask if you can be forthright every time you want to be forthright. I think you can take it as given you can be forthright.”
I stifled a giggle for this was true. Sabine always asked if she could be forthright before talking about what she got up to with Zahnin. And after breaking the seal on it the day I was attacked, she talked about this a lot. We never demurred so she had to know she could be forthright.