a hand to touch the hair her mother was twining into gleaming coils. Her mother pushed her hand away.
‘Most of being a woman hurts,’ Keffria told her daughter pragmatically. ‘This is what you wanted. Get used to it.’ She tugged at the weight of shining black hair in her hand, then deftly tucked a few stray strands into place.
‘Please don’t fill her head with nonsense like that,’ Ronica said irritably. ‘The last thing we need is her going about the house feeling martyred simply because she is a female.’ Malta’s grandmother set down the handful of ribbons she had been sorting and paced a restless turn around the room. ‘I don’t like this,’ she said suddenly.
‘What? Getting Malta ready for her first beau?’ There was bemused, maternal warmth in Keffria’s voice.
Malta frowned to herself. Her mother had initially refused to accept Malta being treated as a woman. Only a few weeks ago, she had said her daughter was much too young to have men courting her. Did she now approve of the idea? Malta shifted her eyes to try to see her mother’s face in the looking glass, but Keffria’s head was bent over her hairdressing task.
The chamber was light and airy, perfumed by hyacinths in small glass vases. Sunlight spilled into the room from the tall windows. It was a lovely afternoon in early spring, a day that should have brimmed with promise. Instead, Malta felt weighted with the listlessness of the two older women. There was no lighthearted chatter as they readied her to meet her first suitor. The house seemed stagnated in mourning, as if her grandfather’s death last spring had visited a permanent desolation upon them.
On the table before Malta were small pots of paints and creams and perfumes. None of them were new. They were leftovers from her mother’s rooms. It rankled Malta that they thought she deserved no better than that. Most were not even from the bazaar. They had been made at home, in the kitchen, rendered down like soup stock from berries, flowers, cream, and tallow. Her mother and grandmother were so disappointingly old-fashioned about these things. How could they expect Bingtown society to respect them if they lived as meagrely as paupers?
They spoke over her head as if she were a baby incapable of understanding them.
‘No, I’ve surrendered on that.’ Her grandmother sounded more irritable than resigned. ‘I don’t like that we haven’t heard anything from Kyle and the Vivacia. That is what worries me.’
Keffria’s voice was carefully neutral when she spoke of her husband and the family ship. ‘The spring winds can be fickle. No doubt, he will be home in a handful of days…if he chooses to stop in Bingtown. He may pass us and go directly to Chalced to sell his cargo while it is still in good condition.’
‘You mean while the slaves are still alive and marketable,’ Ronica observed relentlessly. She had always opposed using the family liveship as a slaver. She claimed to oppose slavery on principle, but that did not prevent her from keeping a slave in the house. Ronica had claimed it would be bad for the ship to be used as a slaver, that a liveship could not cope with the dark emotions of such a cargo. Vivacia had quickened only a short time before she set out on this voyage. Everyone said that liveships were very sensitive to the feelings of those who lived aboard them and young ships even more so. Malta had her doubts. She thought the whole thing about liveships was silly. As far as she could see, owning a liveship had brought her family only debt and trouble.
Look at her situation now. After she had begged for months to be allowed to dress and socialize as a young woman instead of a little girl, her family was finally giving in to her. And why? Not because they had seen how reasonable her request was. No. It was because some stupid contract said that if her grandmother could not keep up the payments on the family liveship debt, one of the family’s children would have to be offered to the Rain Wilds in place of the gold.
The unfairness of the whole thing rose and choked her. Here she was, young, lovely, and fresh. Who would her first suitor be? A handsome young Trader like Cerwin Trell, a melancholy poet like Krion Trentor? No. Not for Malta Vestrit. No, she got some warty, old Rain Wild Trader, a man so hideously deformed he had to wear a veil if he wished to come to Bingtown. Did her mother and grandmother even care about such things? Did they ever stop to think what it might mean to her to have such a man foisted upon her? Oh, no, not them. They were too busy worrying about the ship or what was happening to her precious brother Wintrow or where her Aunt Althea was. Malta counted for nothing. Here they were, helping her dress, doing her hair, and still not paying attention to her. On what might be the most important afternoon of her life, they were arguing about slavery!
‘…doing the best he can for the family.’ Her mother spoke in a low even voice. ‘You have to admit that much. Kyle can be thoughtless of feelings. I admit that. He has injured mine more than once. Nevertheless, he is not an evil man, nor selfish. I have never known him to do anything that he did not believe was best for all of us.’
Malta was a bit surprised to hear her mother defending her father. They had clashed badly right before her father sailed, and her mother had spoken little of him since then. Perhaps in her own dowdy, homebody way she still cared about her husband. Malta had always pitied her father; it was a shameful waste that so handsome and adventurous a sea captain should be married to a mousy little woman with no interest in society or fashion. He deserved a wife who dressed well, one who orchestrated social gatherings in their home and attracted fit suitors for their daughter. Malta felt she deserved a mother like that too. A new thought filled her with sudden alarm.
‘What are you planning to wear today?’ she asked her mother.
‘What I have on,’ her mother replied tersely. She added suddenly, ‘I will hear no more about that. Reyn is coming to visit you, not I.’ In a lower tone she added, almost reluctantly, ‘Your hair gleams like night itself. I doubt he will see anyone else but you.’
Malta did not allow the rare compliment to distract her. The simple blue woollen robe her mother was wearing was at least three years old. It had been well cared for and did not look worn; merely sedate and boring. ‘Will you at least dress your hair and put on your jewellery?’ she begged. Almost desperately, she added, ‘You always ask me to dress well and behave appropriately when I am about Trader business with you. Will not you and Grandmother do the same for me?’
She turned away from the mirror to confront them. They both looked surprised. ‘Reyn Khuprus may be a younger son, but he is still a member of one of the most wealthy and influential Rain Wild Trader families. You told me that yourself. Should not we dress as if we are receiving an honoured guest, even if you are secretly hoping he will find me unappealing and simply go away?’ In a lower voice she added, ‘Surely we owe ourselves at least that much self respect.’
‘Oh, Malta,’ her mother sighed.
‘I do believe the child is right,’ her grandmother said suddenly. The small dark woman, burdened in her widow’s robes, suddenly straightened herself. ‘No. I know she is right. We have both been near-sighted in this. Whether or not we welcome Reyn’s courtship of Malta is not the issue here. We have given permission for it. The Khuprus family now holds the note for the Vivacia. Our contract is with them. Not only should we treat them with the same courtesy we did the Festrews, we should present the same face to them as well.’ Ronica paced a quick turn about the room. She ticked off her concerns on her fingers. ‘We have prepared a fine table, and the rooms are newly freshened for spring. Rache can wait upon table; she does well at that. I wish Nana was still with us, but it was too good of an opportunity for her to ask her to let it go. Do you think I should send Rache to Davad Restart’s, to beg the loan of other serving folk?’
‘We could,’ Malta’s mother began hesitantly.
‘Oh, please, no!’ Malta
