Music, drumming, and singing came from the ball courts. Oddly, the only Expeditioners I saw were a single troop of wardens standing off to my left, and a few local vendors who had set up along the plaza with fried plantains, cassava bread straight off the griddle, seafood being cooked over charcoal, and mounds of fruit. Their customers were Taino streaming out from the ball courts, men from the courts to my left and women from the courts to my right. They wore loosely draped cloth in an antique Roman-like way, although both young women and men wore only a pagne-like cloth wrapped around their hips and no shirts at all, casually bare-chested.
But none of these things robbed me of words. What rendered me speechless were the thirty or more airships tethered at the border between the Taino kingdom and Expedition Territory. Some were scout ships no larger than the one navigated by the Barr Cousins. Many were the size of the ocean-crossing airship Bee and I had seen in Adurnam, the one Vai had destroyed. Among them floated three leviathans monstrous in their glamour. It was a stunning show of wealth and force.
Bee slipped an arm around me. “I have a fancy to be like the didos of old, the queens of Qart Hadast who sailed at the head of a mighty fleet. I shall draw my fleet as a school of bloated silvery fish released from a vast heavenly gourd.”
“I can scarcely imagine what it must be like to sail the seas of a noble court, when any courtier is ready to stab you in the back or flatter shamelessly for a step up the ladder. I would far rather wait tables at Aunty Djeneba’s.”
“Where the customers try to put their hands on your ass? How is that different? Do not worry for me. I shall crush my rivals with smiles and the axe blow of my indomitable will.”
“I can’t bear it if they take you away from me, Bee.”
“Dearest, we shall all return to Europa together like conquering heroes.”
The other carriage rolled in, and the general emerged, followed by Vai wearing the dash jacket he had worn the night of the areito. He marked me with the smile that belonged to me alone.
As the sun shimmered against the horizon, the central gate opened. A procession of women appeared. They were dressed in skirts that lapped their ankles and in bodices like wide belts woven with beads. Feathers adorned their long black hair, which they wore unbound. Two at the front walked with hands outstretched and fire—actual flame—rising from their palms as if they contained the oil that lit the lamps. The two fire mages were flanked by four women equally richly garbed, one of whom was not Taino but red-headed, pale, and freckled like a refugee from the Europan north. Were they catch-fires? Hard to tell. By the elaboration and richness of their clothing, they seemed equally honored. Behind walked three more women heavily draped with thick stone pendants and gold bracelets on their bare arms, their skin patterned with lines and dots. When they reached a raised circular platform in the middle of the plaza, they halted.
My sword bloomed against my hand as day crossed twilight’s border.