When his eyes found her, his face went suddenly still. His smile faded. She held his gaze, challenging him to change his mind now. Instead, as he regarded her solemnly, he nodded slowly, as if confirming something to himself. Dozens of well-wishers had moved forward to greet him when he had entered. He moved through them as a ship cut through waves, not rudely, but refusing to be delayed or distracted by them. When he reached Alise and her father, he bowed formally to both of them. Alise, startled, managed a hasty curtsey. As she rose from it, Hest held out a hand to her. But it was her father he smiled at as he said, ‘I believe this is mine now, isn’t it?’
She put her hand in his.
‘I believe that there is a contract to be signed first,’ her father said, but he spoke jovially. With that one gesture, Hest had changed his anxiety to good nature. Her father was beaming proudly to see his daughter claimed so confidently by such a handsome and wealthy man.
‘That there is!’ Hest exclaimed. ‘And I propose that we get to it immediately. I have no patience with lengthy formalities. The lady has made me wait quite long enough!’
A thrill shot though Alise at his words while a murmur of approving amusement and some small laughter rippled through the gathered guests. Hest, ever charming and charismatic, literally hurried her across the Concourse to the waiting contracts.
As tradition demanded, they moved to their positions on opposite sides of the long table. Sedric Meldar came forward to hold the inkwell for Hest. Alise’s elder sister Rose had demanded the honour of being her attendant. They would move in unison down the long table, each reading aloud a term from their wedding contract. As each term was agreed to, both would sign. At the end of the table, the couple would finally stand together, to be blessed by their parents. Each contract scroll would be carefully sanded and dried, and then rolled up and stored in the Concourse archives. It was rare that the terms of a dowry or the subject of a child’s inheritance came into question, but the written records often served to prevent such strife.
There was nothing of romance in these written words. Alise read aloud that, in the event of Hest’s untimely death before he sired an heir, she would relinquish all claim to his estate in favour of his cousin. Hest countered that by reading and then signing the clause that stipulated his widow would be granted a private residence of her own on his family’s land. In the event of Alise’s death with no heir, the little vineyard that was her sole dowry would revert to her younger sister.
There were standard pledges expected in all Bingtown marriage contracts. Once they were wed, each would have a say in the financial decisions of the household. The amount of each one’s personal allowance was agreed to, and provisions were made either to increase or decrease such allowances as their fortunes prospered or faded. Each agreed to be faithful to the other, and attested that neither had already produced a child. Alise had requested the old form of agreement, in which the first-born child of either sex was to be recognized as the full heir. It had warmed her that Hest had not objected at all to that and when she read aloud the clause that she had insisted on, that she be allowed to travel to the Rain Wilds to continue her study of the dragons, at a date to be agreed upon in the future, he signed his name with a flourish. She blinked away tears of joy, willing that they not spill and make tracks down her powdered face. What had she done to deserve such a man? She vowed to be worthy of his generosity.
The provisions of the contract were precise, not vague, and recognized that no marriage was perfect. Term after endless term was delineated. Every detail was considered; nothing was too intimate to be mentioned. If Hest sired a child outside of the marital bed, such a child would be ineligible to inherit anything, and Alise could, if she chose, terminate their marriage agreement immediately, while claiming fifteen per cent of Hest’s current estate. If Alise were found to have committed an infidelity, Hest could not only turn her out of his home but could dispute the parentage of any child born after the date of the transgression; such children became the financial responsibility of Alise’s father.
It went on and on. There were provisions by which they could mutually end their agreement, and stipulations on transgressions that rendered the contract null and void. Each had to be read aloud and formally signed by both of them. It was not unusual for the process to take hours. But Hest was having none of that. With each phrase he read, he increased the tempo of his reading, plainly anxious to be done with this part of the ceremony. Alise found herself caught up in play, and matched the speed of her words to his. Some of the guests seemed affronted at first. Then, as they noticed Alise’s pink cheeks and the sly smile that wafted across Hest’s face periodically, they, too, began to smile.
In a remarkably short time, they reached the end of the table. Alise was out of breath as she babbled through the last stipulation from her family. She spoke the final proviso aloud, the standard one. ‘I will keep myself, my body and my affections, my heart and my loyalty, solely to you.’ As he repeated it, it seemed a redundancy to her, after all they had already promised to one another. They signed. The quills were handed back to their attendants. Finally freed of such tedious formality, they joined hands and stepped to where the table no longer divided them. Together they turned to face their waiting parents. Hest’s hands were as warm as Alise’s were cold; he held her fingers gently, as if afraid he might harm her with a firmer grip. She closed her hands on his; let him know now that all her hesitations were gone. She was his, and gave her well-being into his hands.
First their mothers and then their fathers joined in blessing the couple. Hest’s parents spoke a much longer blessing than Alise’s did, imploring Sa for prosperity, many children, a happy home, longevity with health for both of them, healthy dutiful children – the list went on and on. Alise felt her smile grow fixed.
When the blessings were finally finished, they turned to face one another. The kiss. It would be their first kiss and suddenly she appreciated that he had reserved it for this moment. She took as deep a breath as her gown would allow her and turned her face up to him. He looked down on her. His green eyes were unreadable. As he bent to her, she closed her eyes and let her lips relax. Let him take charge of this moment. She felt his breath as his mouth hovered over hers. Then he kissed her, the lightest brushing touch of his mouth against hers. As if the wing of a humming bird had just brushed her lips.
A small shiver passed over her, and she caught her breath as he stepped back from her. Her heart was thundering. ‘He teases me,’ she thought, and could not keep a smile from her face. He would not meet her eyes, but a sly smile stole across his face as well. Cruel man. He would make her admit to herself that she was as eager as he was. ‘Let the night come,’ she thought to herself and stole a sideways glance at her husband’s handsome face.
‘So. Tell me about her,’ Leftrin ventured when the silence had grown long.
Swarge sighed and then looked up at him and smiled. It transformed his face. Years dropped away, and the bluish glints behind his blue eyes seemed almost kindly. ‘Her name is Bellin. She’s, well, she likes me. She can play the pipes. We met a couple of years ago, in a tavern in Trehaug. You know the one. Jona’s place.’
‘I know it. River folk trade there.’ He cocked his head and looked at his tillerman, reluctant to ask the question that came to his mind. Most of the women he’d met at Jona’s were whores. Some of them were nice enough, but most were good at their trade and unlikely to give it up for one man. He wondered if Swarge were dim-witted in that area and was being deceived. He almost asked if he’d been giving her money to save up for a house for them. Leftrin had seen that trick played on a gullible sailor more than once.
But before he could ask Swarge anything, the tillerman must have seen his captain’s doubts in his eyes. ‘Bellin’s river folk. In there with the rest of her crew for a drink and a hot meal. She works on that little barge, the Sacha, that goes back and forth between Trehaug and Cassarick.’
‘What does she do?’
‘Poleman. That’s part of what