For a long moment, Ash stared at her. He would have been less surprised to hear his pony reciting poetry.
“Who knew you were a philosopher?” he said finally. “Now. If you’re staying, let’s talk about something else. Where’s your posting this term?”
“I’m going back to the Shivering Fens,” Lila said, “where the taverns are as rare as a day without rain. Where you have to keep moving or grow a crop of moss on your ass.”
Good-bye, poetry, Ash thought. “Sounds lovely. You can’t get a better posting?”
“Not with my record,” Lila said, not meeting his eyes. “But you—you have a choice, and you’re going back to Freetown? There aren’t enough dusty old libraries and indecipherable manuscripts for you here?”
“There’s plenty,” Ash said, “but they have different dusty old libraries and indecipherable manuscripts in the Southern Islands. Anyway, I need a change of scenery.”
“How will you get there? I hear that Arden has stepped up patrols along the river all the way to Deepwater.”
“I’ll go via Sand Harbor,” Ash said. “It’s a little out of the way, but I want to go to the market there, anyway.” He schooled his face to display nothing. Drunk or sober, Lila didn’t miss much.
He shouldn’t have worried. Lila was already restless, shifting in her seat, on to the next thing. “Listen,” she said. “Renard Tourant is hosting an after-hours party over at the Turtle and Fish. Everything’s bound to be top-shelf. Want to come?”
Ash stared at her, surprised. Lila had long since given up inviting him to parties. “Not if it means spending time with Tourant.”
“Aw, c’mon,” Lila said. “It’s not that late, and you’ve scarcely come out with us all term.”
“I’ve been busy.” Ash slid a sideways look at Lila, wondering if Suze would happen to be at this party, too. “Anyway, given Tourant’s reputation, I’m surprised you’d want to go.”
“I can take care of myself,” Lila said, which was certainly true. “It might be my last chance to spend an evening with drunken Ardenine swine—for a while. Besides, Tourant insists on introducing me to some rising star in the Ardenine army.”
“If he’s a rising star, then what’s he doing here?”
Lila shrugged. “Maybe he wants to recruit me. Wait till he finds out I don’t have the right equipment.”
“What do you mean?”
Lila slapped at the front of her skirt. “In here. I’m not a man.”
Ash rolled his eyes. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you preferred the company of swine.” At this point, he was being just about as disagreeable as he knew how.
“A girl can learn a lot from a drunken southerner,” Lila said, bestowing that familiar tight-lipped smile that could mean anything at all.
“Well, I’ve got better things to do. Like sleep.”
“You should come,” Lila persisted. “Tourant’s invited everyone from Brocker and Stokes, so it won’t be a totally Ardenine crowd. At least it’ll be diluted a bit.”
“You’re welcome to stay here with me,” Ash said, knowing what her answer would be. “We could read Askell and Byrne and discuss military campaigns during the Wizard Wars.”
“Um. No,” Lila said, making a face. “I’m done with textbooks for now.”
“Give my regards to Tourant then,” Ash said. “Tell him I hope he’s less of a bunghole next year.”
“Suit yourself,” Lila said. “But don’t say I didn’t warn you—it’ll be a graveyard here at Stokes tonight.”
9
TOURANT’S PARTY
The coin was still piling up—Fellsian girlies and Tamric double eagles and Ardenine steelies, so-called because people doubted there was really any silver in them these days. Even a few coppers from those unwilling to put real money on the table.
There were two piles—some bet on Lila Barrowhill, others on Renard Tourant, the class commander. Lila noticed with some satisfaction that her pile was bigger. She spent a lot of time in the Turtle and Fish, and the regulars knew better than to bet against her. She was known to have a high tolerance for intoxicants and a lot of demons to drown.
Those who bet on Tourant were only brownnosing, and they stood to lose.
Tourant had secured a table next to the kegs so he could play the gracious host. His father was a high-up in the Ardenine army, which meant he had a paved road to the top. All of the high-ups in the Ardenine army were men, because in Arden, apparently, there were no competent women.
The class commander fancied himself a ladies’ man. Lila suspected he took his standard-issue Wien House uniforms to a tailor, because they always had a custom fit. He also sported one of those ridiculous tiny mustaches that probably take hours to achieve, but that look like a shaving mistake.