2: Servants of the Crossed Arrows by Ginn Hale Read Free Book Online

sister is so very proper. She wouldn’t speak a single word in her husband’s absence. She put all our gossiping to shame.” The lady didn’t look or sound entirely pleased.
    John wasn’t sure how to respond. He couldn’t say that it was good, but he didn’t think he should say that Laurie’s silence was wrong either, since it was apparently proper. He decided to try and just sidestep it entirely.
    “I’m sorry for having to ask this, but I’m not sure how you would like best to be addressed.” John bowed his head slightly.
    “That is difficult, isn’t it?” the lady said. “If we were to hold ourselves to the holiest codes, you would not be here in my presence at all. But Rashan Pivan’ro’Bousim says that you may have saved my son’s life, and also that you fought the Fai’daum demoness, Ji Shir’korud, for the very life and soul of Rashan Alidas’ro’Bousim. So it would seem that I am most deeply in your debt. I certainly could not bar you from my table. But what shall you call me?”
    She sighed and lifted the small bowl in front of her to her mouth. The chains on her fingers clicked against the porcelain bowl.
    As she drank, John became acutely aware of the smell of the food wafting over him. He hadn’t eaten since the night before and then it had only been broth. Succulent slices of what looked like pork steamed in heaps on a silver platter in front of him. The distinct scent of fresh bread drifted up from golden rolls and there even seemed to be something like the smell of coffee in the air.
    His stomach groaned.
    The lady glanced up at him in obvious amusement. The two young women on either side of her put their hands over their mouths to hide their grins.
    “I should decide before you are starved to death, shouldn’t I?” The lady laughed but without making a sound. Her lips parted and the small tremors of laughter shook her chest but all that came out was breath.
    John stole a glance to Laurie and Bill but the two of them looked as bewildered as he felt. John could only guess that noblewomen of Basawar trained themselves to laugh mutely. He had seen groups of common women out in their fields cackling with laughter. It seemed to follow what the lady had mentioned earlier about Laurie’s silence being proper.
    “You may call me Gaunvur Bousim. Since I am the only one of Gaunsho Mosh’sira’in’Bousim’s wives residing in this city, there shouldn’t be any confusion,” the lady decided.
    John nodded. Ravishan had told him that wealthy men often took several wives, and that in aristocratic gaun’im households, each wife held a formal title according to the number and quality of sons she bore her husband. John didn’t even try to remember the husband’s full title and name; he just concentrated on the lady’s: Gaunvur Bousim, Lady Bousim.
    “It’s an honor,” John said.
    “The honor is mine as well.” Lady Bousim swept her hand out over the trays of food. “Please, eat all that you like. I only regret that I have such poor dishes to offer you. If we were in Nurjima, I would give you fruit and flowers from my husband’s garden. Here, at the edge of the shattered world, I can only offer you this.”
    “This is more than enough,” John assured her. “Thank you.”
    John took one of the empty plates and filled it with food. He wasn’t sure if Laurie or Bill had followed much of the conversation, so he simply passed the plate down to Laurie. She passed it to Bill while John filled a second plate for her. Last, he served himself. The three women also ate, but much more slowly than any of the three of them.
    At first John was so hungry and ate so quickly that he hardly noticed anything about the food that he devoured. But as the sharp pangs of hunger abated he began to realize how little flavor there was to the dinner fare.
    Though it had obviously been roasted, the pale cutlets of meat were as tasteless as if they had been boiled for days. The bread was as bland as a communion