Her scent clung to the bedding, sweet enough to make him want to weep, and even some of her warmth remained, or maybe that was just the sun, the golden light streaming in from the window and carrying with it the vaguely disturbing sound of birds mating in the tree in the back yard. No need to be so frantic, little ones. There’s all the time in the world. Well, he would be feeling that right now, wouldn’t he?
She was working the wheel in the outer room, a sound that had once filled his life, only to vanish and now, at long last, return. As if there had been no sordid crimes of banditry and the slavery that came as reasonable punishment, as if there had been no rotting trench lying shackled alongside Teblor barbarians. No huge warrior hanging from a cross amidships, with Torvald trickling brackish wa-ter between the fool’s cracked lips. No sorcerous storms, no sharks, no twisted realms to crawl in and out of. No dreams of drowning-no, all that had been someone else’s life, a tale sung by a half-drunk bard, the audience so incredulous they were moments from rage, ready to tear the idiot to pieces at the recounting of just one more unlikely exploit. Yes, someone else’s life. The wheel was spin-ning, as it always did, and she was working clay and giving it form, symmetry, beauty. Of course, she never did her best work the day after a night of lovemaking, as if she’d used up something essential, whatever it was that fed creativity, and sometimes he felt bad about that. She’d laugh and shake her head, dismissing his concerns, spinning the wheel yet harder.
He’d seen, on the shelves of the outer room, scores of mediocre pots. Should this fact bother him? It might have, once, but no longer. He had vanished from her life-no reason, however, for her to waste away in some lonely vigil or pro-longed period of mourning. People got on with things, and so they should. Of course she’d taken lovers. Might still have them, in fact, and it had. been some-thing of a miracle that she’d been alone when he showed up he’d half expected some over-muscled godling with tousled golden locks and the kind of jaw that just begged to be punched to answer the door.
‘Maybe he’s visiting his mother,’ Torvald mumbled.
He sat up, swung his legs round and settled feet on the woven mat covering the floor. Noticed that flat pillows had been sewn on to the mat, stuffed with lavent-der that crackled under his feet. ‘No wonder her feet smell nice.’ Anyway, he didn’t mind what she’d been up to all that time. Didn’t even mind if she was still up to a few things now, though those things might make things a little crowded. ‘Things, right.’
The day had begun, and all he needed to do was settle up certain matters and then he could resume his life as a citizen of Darujhistan. Maybe visit a few old friends, some members of his estranged family (the ones who’d talk to him, any-way), see the sites that’d make him the most nostalgic, and give some thought to what he was going to do with the rest of his life.
But first things first. Pulling on his foreign-cut clothes (the clean set, that had dried in a rather wrinkled state, alas), Torvald Nom made his way to the outer room. Her back was to him as she hunched over the wheel, legs pumping the pedals. He saw the large bowl of clean water where it always was, went over and splashed his face. Was reminded that he needed a shave-but now he could actu-ally pay someone else to do such things. To the opportunistic shall come rewards. Someone had said that, once, he was sure.
‘My sweetness!’
She half turned and grinned at him. ‘Look how bad this is, Tor. See what you’ve done?’
‘It’s the temper, of course-’
‘It’s tired thighs,’ she said.
‘A common complaint?’ he asked, walking alongside the shelves and leaning in to study a stack of misaligned plates.
‘Pretty rare, actually. What you think you’re seeing up there, husband, isn’t. It’s the new style everyone wants these days. Symmetry is dead, long live the clumsy and crooked. Every noble lady wants a poor cousin in the country, some aunt or great-aunt with stubby fingers who makes crockery for her kin, in be-tween wringing chicken necks and husking gourds.’
‘That’s a complicated lie.’
‘Oh, it’s never actually stated, Tor, only implied.’
‘I was never good at inferring what’s implied. Unless it’s implicitly inferred.’
‘I’ve had precisely two lovers, Tor, and neither one lasted more than a few months. Want their names?’
‘Do I know them?’
When she didn’t reply he glanced over and found her looking at him. ‘Ah,’ he said wisely.
‘Well, so long as you don’t start squinting at everyone who comes in here or says hello to me on the street-if that’s going to be the case, then I’d better tell you-’