The months had changed her. Where before she had been pretty, now she was lovely as well. Perhaps that difference was only that she wasn’t wearing the road clothes I had met her in, but a long dress instead. But it was Denna without a doubt. I even recognized the ring on her finger, silver set with a pale blue stone.
Since we parted ways, I had kept foolish, fond thoughts of Denna hidden in a secret corner of my heart. I had thought of making the trip to Anilin and tracking her down, of meeting her by chance on the road again, of her coming to find me at the University. But deep down I knew these thoughts for nothing more than childish daydreams. I knew the truth: I would never see her again.
But here she was, and I was entirely unprepared. Would she even remember me, the awkward boy she had known for a few days so long ago?
Denna was barely a dozen feet away when she looked up and saw me. Her expression brightened, as if someone had lit a candle inside her and she was glowing from its light. She rushed toward me, closing the distance between us in three excited, skipping steps.
For a moment, she looked as if she would run straight into my arms, but at the last moment she pulled back, darting a glance at the people sitting around us. In the space of half a step, she transformed her delighted headlong run into a demure greeting at arm’s length. It was gracefully done, but even so, she had to reach out a hand and steady herself against my chest, lest she stumble into me due to her sudden stop.
She smiled at me then. It was warm and sweet and shy, like a flower unfurling. It was friendly and honest and slightly embarrassed. When she smiled at me, I felt…
I honestly cannot think of how I could describe it. Lying would be easier. I could steal from a hundred stories and tell you a lie so familiar you would swallow it whole. I could say my knees went to rubber. That my breath came hard in my chest. But that would not be the truth. My heart did not pound or stop or stutter. That is the sort of thing they say happens in stories. Foolishness. Hyperbole. Tripe. But still…
Go out in the early days of winter, after the first cold snap of the season. Find a pool of water with a sheet of ice across the top, still fresh and new and clear as glass. Near the shore the ice will hold you. Slide out farther. Farther. Eventually you’ll find the place where the surface just barely bears your weight. There you will feel what I felt. The ice splinters under your feet. Look down and you can see the white cracks darting through the ice like mad, elaborate spiderwebs. It is perfectly silent, but you can feel the sudden sharp vibrations through the bottoms of your feet.
That is what happened when Denna smiled at me. I don’t mean to imply I felt as if I stood on brittle ice about to give way beneath me. No. I felt like the ice itself, suddenly shattered, with cracks spiraling out from where she had touched my chest. The only reason I held together was because my thousand pieces were all leaning together. If I moved, I feared I would fall apart.
Perhaps it is enough to say that I was caught by a smile. And though that sounds as if it came from a storybook, it is very near the truth.
Words have never been difficult for me. Quite the opposite in fact—often I find it all too easy to speak my mind, and things go badly because of it. However, here in front of Denna, I was too stunned to speak. I could not have said a sensible word to save my life.
Without thinking, all the courtly manners my mother had drilled into me came to the fore. I reached out smoothly and clasped Denna’s outstretched hand in my own, as if she’d offered it to me. Then I took a half step backward and made a genteel three-quarter bow. At the same time my free hand caught hold of the edge of my cloak and tucked it behind my back. It was a flattering bow, courtly without being ridiculouly formal, and safe for a public setting such as this.
What next? A kiss on the hand was traditional, but what sort of kiss was appropriate? In Atur you merely nod over the hand. Cealdish ladies like the moneylender’s daughter I had chatted with earlier expected you to brush the knuckles lightly and make a kissing sound. In Modeg you actually press your lips to the back of your own thumb.
But we were in Commonwealth, and Denna showed no foreign accent. A straightforward kiss then. I pressed my lips gently to the back of her hand for the space of time it takes to draw a quick breath. Her skin was warm and smelled vaguely of heather.
“I am at your service, my lady,” I said, standing and releasing her hand. For the first time in my life I understood the true purpose of this sort of formal greeting. It gives you a script to follow when you have absolutely no idea what to say.
“My lady?” Denna echoed, sounding a little surprised. “Very well, if you insist.” She took hold of her dress with one hand and bobbed a curtsey, somehow managing to make it look graceful and mocking and playful all at once. “Your lady.” Hearing her voice, I knew my suspicions were true. She was my Aloine.
“What are you doing up here in the third circle alone?” She glanced around the crescent-shaped balcony. “Are you alone?”
“I was alone,” I said. Then when I could think of nothing else to say, I borrowed a line from the song fresh in my memory. “‘Now unexpected Aloine beside me stands.’”
She smiled at that, flattered. “How do you mean, unexpected?” she asked.
“I had more than half convinced myself that you had already left.”
“It was a near thing,” Denna said, archly. “Two hours I waited for my Savien to come.” She sighed tragically, glancing up and to one side like a statue of a saint. “Finally, filled with despair, I decided Aloine could do the finding this time, and damn the story.” She smiled a wicked smile.
“‘So we were ill-lit ships at night…’” I quoted.
“…‘passing close but all unknown to one another,’” Denna finished.
“Felward’s Falling,” I said with something that touched the outward boundary of respect. “Not many people know that play.”
“I am not many people,” she said.
“I will never forget that again,” I bowed my head with exaggerated deference. She snorted derisively. I ignored it and continued in a more serious tone. “I can’t thank you enough for helping me tonight.”
“You can’t?” she said. “Well that’s a shame. How much can you thank me?”
Without thinking, I reached up to the collar of my cloak and unpinned my talent pipes. “Only this much,” I said, holding them out to her.
“I…” Denna hesitated, somewhat taken aback. “You can’t be serious..”
“Without you, I wouldn’t have won them,” I said. “And I have nothing else of any value, unless you want my lute.”
Denna’s dark eyes studied my face, as if she couldn’t decide if I was making fun or not. “I don’t think you can give away your pipes….”