The Floating Islands (3 page)

His cousin flushed and looked down again.

“She really does,” Aunt Edona assured Trei.

Araenè looked at Trei and added grudgingly, “Not that Tolounn hasn’t its own arts, I’m sure.” She sounded like she didn’t know of any and didn’t think they’d count for much anyway.

“Araenè—” Aunt Edona said.

“Cen Periven prides itself on the eternal arts, and we on the ephemeral. Tolounn’s only art is the art of war,” Uncle Serfei said grimly.

His wife patted his hand. “Not at the table, love, I beg you.”

Uncle Serfei looked embarrassed. He said to Trei, “Well, we do claim that our Island chefs are more skilled than any elsewhere. And Araenè truly is gifted.”

“Pastries are hard to get right,” Araenè muttered to her plate.

“You make wonderful pastries,” Aunt Edona said firmly. “What did you make tonight, love?”

Araenè had made tiny crisp pastries filled with cream that was pink and delicately rose-scented. Each pastry was topped with a single candied rose petal.

“They’re almost too pretty to eat,” Trei said fervently, holding his third pastry up to admire it and trying to decide whether he had room left to eat it. His mother had never attempted anything like these.

His cousin smiled at last. “They’re meant to be eaten. That’s why it’s an
ephemeral
art.”

Trei ate the pastry in two bites and was sorry it was the last one. “You really ought to be cooking for the king!” he told his cousin.

Araenè lost her smile again, so that Trei understood that she did actually want to be a royal chef, and famous. Only she couldn’t because, he supposed, she was a girl. From the way they acted, he thought that neither of her parents really understood this about their daughter, even though it was obvious. No wonder she was fierce. No one had ever tried to tell his sister she couldn’t draw or paint, and someday Marrè probably
would
have been famous. He wanted suddenly to show Marrè’s sketches to his cousin, to tell Araenè about his sister. He thought the two girls would have understood each other, that they would have been friends. His throat closed with the effort to restrain tears.

Uncle Serfei said to Trei, rescuing him from a public outcry of grief, “I checked this afternoon, and the next kajurai auditions will take place in forty-four days. That’s a nice piece of luck; they only have auditions every few years. Tomorrow I’ll petition for you to audition, and then while we wait for a response, you can attend proper Island classes. I hope you had a decent grounding off there in Rounn.”

Trei recovered himself, stung. Rounn had hardly been some little cow-mire village. “Of course I did. But—” He started to say that he didn’t want to attend library classes, but stopped himself. Uncle Serfei had already agreed to try to get a place for him with the Island fliers. It would be shameful—childish—ungrateful, even—to argue about the library.

But he wished Araenè could also attend the classes.

2

A
raenè’s Tolounnese cousin caused her much less trouble than she had feared. He kept out of her things—Araenè cleared out three of her drawers and half a wardrobe for him and covertly checked every day to be sure everything was exactly as she had left it in the rest of the drawers.
Especially
in the back of her most private wardrobe. As far as she could tell, her cousin never poked about. He seemed to understand he was intruding. Probably he was as eager to move into his own personal attic as she was to have him out of her room.

Araenè was surprised to find that the attic looked like it was becoming a fairly nice room, after everything was taken out and the walls dusted and the floor scrubbed. Mother bustled happily about the business of choosing the rugs and linens, delighting over a bed frame of twisted iron and matching iron lamps. Araenè thought the linens pale and insipid, the ornate bed frame and lamps overdone. But Trei, apparently reluctant to offend his uncle and aunt, agreed with Mother in all her choices. Araenè made no comment, so eager to have her own room back that she scrubbed and dusted with a will. Then, after Mother complimented her industry, she was a little ashamed—but still eager to have her cousin safely installed in his own room and out of hers.

Trei was a quiet boy. Really quiet. He was polite to Mother and Araenè thought he sincerely liked Father, but he didn’t follow Araenè around, and he stayed out of the kitchen when she was concentrating. Nor did Trei often leave the house, except, as soon as his classes were arranged, to go to the library—though he was obviously, boy-like, completely sky-mad. Araenè thought that in his place, she would have been wild to explore Canpra. Her cousin could have roamed the whole city if he liked. A boy’s freedom was wasted on Trei, Araenè decided. Absolutely
wasted.

In general she was glad her cousin kept his distance from her, and was willing to let her keep her distance from him. The very last thing she wanted was a new shadow clinging to her heel. She was glad classes had been arranged for him; it was good to have some of her privacy back.

Now, at last, the Moon’s Day after Trei’s arrival, Araenè finally found an opportunity to put that privacy to real
use.
She folded back the shutters of her room. The late-morning heat rolled into the room at once, but she only leaned out and studied the narrow alley behind the house. No one was about: it would be too hot until dusk for anyone to willingly venture into the streets. There was a high, pale haze across the sky, blurring the brilliant sun, but this didn’t mute the heavy, smothering heat.

Father was at the ministry, in the First City, at the edge of the Island; he would be gone until long past dusk. As was the custom on Moon’s Day, Mother had gone to pay calls on other Second City matrons. By now she would be comfortably ensconced in the home of one of her friends, where she and other visitors would sip cooling ices and exchange all the Second City gossip. Trei, of course, was at the library. Even the servants were out: Araenè had given both of them permission to visit the market and take the afternoon off.

So Araenè was alone. That made it a perfect day. Wholly perfect.

Araenè stepped back into her room and turned to gaze at herself in her mirror. Dark green trousers and a dark red shirt, both from that carefully hidden stash in the back of her own wardrobe. A dusky purple sash, pinned on the right side. Her hair bound up and tucked under a hat with a broad, floppy brim—the hat was ridiculous, but conveniently popular among the sillier young men right now. Slender pins to hold the hat firmly in place. She had sewn pads into her shirt to broaden her shoulders and wore thick bracelets, foppish but very masculine, to disguise the fineness of her wrists.

Araenè glanced at herself in the mirror one last time. There was nothing she could do about her slender girl’s throat, but no one had ever seemed to notice this flaw. Little more than the change of clothing was required: in a year or two she might have more difficulty, but Araenè did not yet take after her generously figured mother. If she was lucky, she’d take after her father’s side of the family instead. She nodded, satisfied: it was not a girl who looked back at her from that mirror, but a boy. A vain boy, a boy who apparently thought too much of himself, yes. But a boy.

She made one more cautious inspection of the alley, then swung neatly out the window, hung by her fingertips for an instant, and dropped. It was several feet to the cobbles; Araenè bent her knees as she hit, put out her hands for balance, and straightened. She touched the brim of her boy’s hat to make sure it was still in place and then walked quickly down the alley, turned the corner, and let her demure girl’s step lengthen to a boy’s free stride.

The avenues of the Second City radiated away from the white towers of the First City. These avenues were arranged in even, precise concentric arcs, cut through by long, straight streets that gave swift access to the First City. Araenè knew where to find the nearest open market, where the shops were that carried the most interesting Yngulin silks or the newest imports from Cen Periven, where the finest restaurants were, the high-class ones that well-bred women, if escorted, could patronize. Every Second City woman knew these things.

But Araenè also knew the three fastest ways to get from her house to the University. She knew her way around the University, too, and she doubted any other well-bred Second City woman knew
that.

If one stayed on proper streets, then the University lay nearly a bell from Araenè’s home. But she could cut more than half that time by crossing through two private gardens and climbing up and over the roof of a shop that sold secondhand clothing. Though it was important not to be spotted in the gardens, no one looked askance at boys taking the rooftop shortcut. Students, perennially late for one or another lecture or demonstration, used this shortcut as though it were one of the official student pathways, and paid for the privilege by donating clothing to the shop (if they were wealthy) or buying clothing there (if they were poor). Long ago someone had fixed hand- and footholds to make the climb even faster, and now Araenè went up and over the shop almost as quickly as she might have walked down a street.

The southeastern half of the University was First City, all white marble and wrought iron. But gradually the University had pressed out into the Second City, and—in keeping with the decree of the ministry of stoneworks—as it passed that traditional boundary, its architecture shifted to the low style and red stone of the Second City. But the University ran right up to and past the outer border of the Second City, and so along its northwestern edge it dissolved into the congested, narrow, odd-angled Third City streets.

This, of course, was where the used-clothing shop lay, and this was also Araenè’s favorite part of the University. She loved the narrow crowded streets, the freedom, the noise, and the unpredictable excitement of Third City. But she did not have time to venture out into the maze of Third City, not if she was to catch Master Petrei’s long-awaited lecture—she’d been sure, after her cousin’s unexpected arrival, that she would miss it, an outrageous disappointment.

But this perfect day had rescued her after all. Araenè did a dance step or three in sheer delight at regaining the freedom of the streets, and a passing older student shook his head at her in mock disapproval and called, “Not so happy, youngster: don’t you know a show of joy makes the masters think we can handle extra work?”

Araenè laughed. “I
can
handle extra work,” she called back, boy-bold. “So I’ve no need of a sober face, though I thank you for your concern!”

The other student grinned and gave her the gesture that meant
And good luck to you,
with its implication that really you were riding too high and could expect a fall.

“Time enough to flinch when I’m falling,” Araenè called over her shoulder, and ran on.

Once across the rooftop shortcut, she hurried past the main Classics hall on her left and one of the Rhetoric theaters on her right. After that, there was only a small courtyard before the Ephemeral Arts building where Master Petrei would be lecturing. A flight of stairs led down into the relative dimness of the thankfully cool lecture hall.

She made her way quietly along the back of the hall and found a place to stand, since there were few seats left.

“Hsst! Arei!” a voice whispered, and a discreet hand lifted in the very back row, beckoning Araenè to one of these few.

Gratefully, Araenè crept forward and slipped into the offered seat.

“You’re always late! Even for Master Petrei!” murmured her benefactor, Hanaiki Cenfenisai, a boy a year or so older than Araenè. She had met Hanaiki two years ago. She remembered everything about that day vividly: Master Toranvei Hosidai had been visiting from Bodonè. Furious that she could not attend his lecture, agonized at the rules that constricted her life, amazed to find herself by chance with the entire day to herself, Araenè had hidden her hair under a hat for the very first time and made her way across Canpra to the University. She had timidly asked impatient passersby and older students, all of whom gave her confusing, complicated directions; she had been amazed at the size and complexity of the city and the University. Twice she had almost crept back home, but then she had found the hall at last and paid the fee for the right to slip inside.

Hanaiki—tall, sarcastic, and self-possessed—had borrowed a quill from her, broken it, and insisted on buying her supper after the lecture to make up for it. She’d barely dared speak to him, but he’d spent the meal dissecting Master Toranvei’s fascinating lecture, until Araenè forgot her agonized shyness and started to enjoy herself. He’d been the first boy to ever treat Araenè—Arei—with the casual, uncomplicated acceptance one male offered another. His was a friendship Araenè cherished.

Now Araenè shrugged and whispered back, “I know!” She didn’t apologize—a boy wouldn’t apologize. She whispered instead, “Can I see—”

Hanaiki shifted his notes so that Araenè could see them.

The lecture was a good one, all about special Yngulin techniques that you could use to capture the essence of spices in hot oil for the last-minute finishing of a dish. Master Petrei was talking about finishing savory dishes, but Araenè instantly started thinking about using the same technique for finishing sweets. Grain-based sweets were the obvious extension: saffron and cardamom with rice, for example. But could the technique be used to flavor pastries? Or the creams one filled them with? What about using butter instead of oil? Well, but butter would burn at the high temperatures Master Petrei seemed to consider necessary for the technique.… Oil couldn’t be substituted for butter in pastry, not if you wanted the pastry delicate and flaky, but, hmm … one might use clarified butter.…

“A good lecture,” Hanaiki said afterward, walking with Araenè through the warren of Third City alleys. The afternoon sun pounded down upon the streets; the cobbles cast the heat back into the air and gave the thick afternoon air an almost physical body and weight. Hanaiki took off his own floppy hat and fanned himself with it. “Hot!” he complained. “And that lecture made me hungry. Want to run over to Cesera’s? Everyone’s going.”

Araenè gave Hanaiki a playful—masculine—shove. “Everything makes you hungry. Yes, I would, but no, I can’t.”

“Your father’s unreasonable,” Hanaiki began.

“I grant you’ve the right of it, and indeed there’s no possibility of denying it. But for all that, and for good and all, he’s—”

“Still my dear, my honored, my own progenitor—and besides, he controls the family purse,” they said together, finishing a quote from a play ragingly popular among the students.

“I’ll need to run as it is,” Araenè added.

“It’s far too hot to run! Much better come to Cesera’s,” Hanaiki coaxed.

Araenè laughed and shook her head. “I truly can’t! But you go, and start a contest of pastry-making—maybe you’ll even win.” She made the gesture that meant
And good luck to you.

Hanaiki pulled a mock-sorrowful face and said, “Ah, that’s why I want you to come! You never do fall!”

Araenè laughed again and heartlessly left her friend on his own. Yes, a good lecture. A wonderful day altogether. But a glance at the sun made her blink: she hadn’t exaggerated as much as she’d thought when she’d said she needed to run. Thinking about the lecture, Araenè followed a couple of other students over the rooftop of the clothing shop without paying much attention to where she put her hands and feet, scrambled down the other side, turned automatically to the left, and strode into the Third City alleyways, heading for a familiar shortcut.

Some of Third City was red stone or red brick, but the rest was built of cheaper yellow brick or dingy plaster. Most of the buildings housed small shops below, selling handcrafts, cheap copper jewelry, dried herbs, old books—whatever could help support the families that lived above the shops. The buildings were crowded tightly together, sometimes leaning out over the narrow alleys so far that they roofed tunnels through which the alleys threaded. Children ran in noisy packs, weaving in and out among their elders, intent on business Araenè could not even imagine. She had never been able to decide whether she should envy them their freedom or pity them their poverty—both, maybe.

Monkeys ran along the rooftops: mostly the gold-flame marmosets and some of the larger brown ones with long white mustaches. Children fed them, even when their parents warned that no one was going to hand
them
a dinner free out of the air and did they think bread grew from the cobblestones? Sapphire-winged birds perched on clotheslines and hopped along the cobbles, independent and quick, finding their own crumbs in the streets. Araenè liked the birds best. She bought cumin bread from a cart to crumble for them, though she did eat a few bites of the fragrant, chewy bread herself. She could buy pastries on her way home, she decided: spicy lamb and lentil pastries. She knew a vendor who made good ones. That was the sort of thing she might have made if she’d spent the afternoon at home, and there were figs and pomegranates, so she could make a compote for dessert; that would be easy—she scattered the last of the bread crumbs, lengthened her stride, and looked up.