Damen leaned in. It was sickly sweet. He didn’t let his lips touch Laurent’s fingers. A great many people were looking at them. Laurent washed his fingers fastidiously in the gold washing bowl when he was done, and dried them on a little square cloth of silk.
Torveld stared. In Patras, slaves fed masters—peeling fruit and pouring drinks—not the other way around. It was that way also in Akielos. The conversation recovered from its pause and turned to trivial matters. Around them the creations of sugar and candied spices and glazed pastries in fantastical shapes were slowly being demolished.
Damen looked around for Nicaise, but the boy had gone.
In the relaxed end-of-meal lull before the entertainments, Damen was given free rein to wander about, and went to find him. Laurent was occupied, and for the first time there were not two guards looming perpetually over him. He could have walked out. He could have walked right out of the palace doors and from there into the surrounding city of Arles. Except he couldn’t leave this place until Torveld’s embassy departed with the slaves, which was of course the only reason he was off the leash at all.
He didn’t make very good progress. The guards might be gone, but Laurent’s caress had bought Damen another type of attention.
‘I predicted when the Prince brought him to the ring that he was going to become quite popular,’ Vannes was saying to the noblewoman beside her. ‘I saw him perform in the gardens, but it was almost a waste of his talents, the Prince wouldn’t let him take an active role.’
Damen’s attempts to excuse himself had no impact on her at all.
‘No, don’t leave us just yet. Talik wished to meet you,’ Vannes told Damen. She was saying to the noblewoman, ‘Of course, the idea of one of us keeping males is grotesque. But if one could—don’t you think he and Talik would make a good matched pair? Ah. Here she is. We’ll give you two a moment together.’ They were departing.
‘I am Talik,’ the pet declared. Her voice carried the strong accent of Ver-Tan, the eastern province of Vask.
Damen recalled someone saying that Vannes liked pets who could sweep the ring competitions. Talik was almost as tall as Damen, her bare arms well muscled. There was something slightly predatory about her gaze, her wide mouth and the arc of her brows. Damen had assumed that pets, like slaves, were sexually submissive to their masters, as was the custom in Akielos. But he could only guess at the arrangements between Vannes and this woman in bed.
She said, ‘I think a warrior from Ver-Tan would easily kill a warrior from Akielos.’
‘I think it would depend on the warrior,’ he said, carefully.
She appeared to consider him along with his answer, and, eventually, to find both acceptable.
She said, ‘We are waiting. Ancel will perform. He is popular, “in fashion.” You’ve had him.’ She didn’t wait for him to confirm this statement. ‘How was he?’
Well instructed. Damen’s mind supplied the answer, sly as a suggestion murmured in his ear. He frowned at it. He said, ‘Adequate.’
Talik said, ‘His contract with Lord Berenger ends soon. Ancel will seek a new contract, a high bidder. He wants money, status. He is foolish. Lord Berenger may offer less money, but he is kind, and never puts pets into the ring. Ancel has made many enemies. In the ring, someone will scratch his green eyes out, an “accident.”’
Damen was drawn in against his will. ‘That’s why he’s chasing royal attention? He wants the Prince to—’ He tried out the unfamiliar vocabulary. ‘—offer for his contract?’
‘The Prince?’ said Talik, scornfully. ‘Everyone knows the Prince does not keep pets.’
‘None at all?’ said Damen.
She said, ‘You.’ She looked him up and down. ‘Perhaps the Prince has a taste for men, not these painted Veretian boys who squeal if you pinch them.’ Her tone suggested that she approved of this on general principle.
‘Nicaise,’ said Damen, since they were speaking of painted Veretian boys. ‘I was looking for Nicaise. Have you seen him?’
Talik said, ‘There.’
Across the room, Nicaise had reappeared. He was speaking into the ear of Ancel who had to bend almost in half to reach the little boy’s level. When he was done, Nicaise made straight for Damen.
‘Did the Prince send you? You’re too late,’ said Nicaise.
Too late for what? was the reply in any court except this one.
He said, ‘If you’ve hurt any one of them—’
‘You’ll what?’ Nicaise was smirking. ‘You won’t. You don’t have time. The Regent wants to see you. He sent me to tell you. You should hurry. You’re keeping him waiting.’ Another smirk. ‘He sent me ages ago.’
Damen stared at him.
‘Well? Off you go,’ said Nicaise.
It was possibly a lie, but he couldn’t risk the offense if it wasn’t. He went.