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Kharbranth’s palace offered far more luxury. The stone pool in the ground resembled a small personal lake, luxuriously warmed by clever fabrials that produced heat. Shallan didn’t know much about fabrials yet, though part of her was very intrigued. This type was becoming increasingly common. Just the other day, the Conclave staff had sent Jasnah one to heat her chambers.
The water didn’t have to be carried in but came out of pipes. At the turn of a lever, water flowed in. It was warm when it entered, and was kept heated by the fabrials set into the sides of the pool. Shallan had bathed in the chamber herself, and it was absolutely marvelous.
The practical decor was of rock decorated with small colorful stones set in mortar up the sides of the walls. Shallan sat beside the pool, fully dressed, reading as she waited on Jasnah’s needs. The book was Gavilar’s account—as spoken to Jasnah herself years ago—after his first meeting with the strange parshmen later known as the Parshendi.
Occasionally, during our explorations, we’d meet with natives, she read. Not parshmen. Natan people, with their pale bluish skin, wide noses, and wool-like white hair. In exchange for gifts of food, they would point us to the hunting grounds of greatshells.
Then we met the parshmen. I’d been on a half-dozen expeditions to Natanatan, but never had I seen anything like this! Parshmen, living on their own? All logic, experience, and science declared that to be an impossibility. Parshmen need the hand of civilized peoples to guide them. This has been proven time and time again. Leave one out in the wilderness, and it will just sit there, doing nothing, until someone comes along to give it orders.
Yet here was a group who could hunt, make weapons, build buildings, and—indeed—create their own civilization. We soon realized that this single discovery could expand, perhaps overthrow, all we understood about our gentle servants.
Shallan moved her eyes down to the bottom of the page where—separated by a line—the undertext was written in a small, cramped script. Most books dictated by men had an undertext, notes added by the woman or ardent who scribed the book. By unspoken agreement, the undertext was never shared out loud. Here, a wife would sometimes clarify—or even contradict—the account of her husband. The only way to preserve such honesty for future scholars was to maintain the sanctity and secrecy of the writing.
It should be noted, Jasnah had written in the undertext to this passage, that I have adapted my father’s words—by his own instruction—to make them more appropriate for recording. That meant she made his dictation sound more scholarly and impressive. In addition, by most accounts, King Gavilar originally ignored these strange, self-sufficient parshmen. It was only after explanation by his scholars and scribes that he understood the import of what he’d discovered. This inclusion is not meant to highlight my father’s ignorance; he was, and is, a warrior. His attention was not on the anthropological import of our expedition, but upon the hunt that was to be its culmination.
Shallan closed the cover, thoughtful. The volume was from Jasnah’s own collection—the Palanaeum had several copies, but Shallan wasn’t allowed to bring the Palanaeum’s books into a bathing chamber.
Jasnah’s clothing lay on a bench at the side of the room. Atop the folded garments, a small golden pouch held the Soulcaster. Shallan glanced at Jasnah. The princess floated face-up in the pool, black hair fanning out behind her in the water, her eyes closed. Her daily bath was the one time she seemed to relax completely. She looked much younger now, stripped of both clothing and intensity, floating like a child resting after a day of active swimming.
Thirty-four years old. That seemed ancient in some regards—some women Jasnah’s age had children as old as Shallan. And yet it was also young. Young enough that Jasnah was praised for her beauty, young enough that men declared it a shame she wasn’t yet married.
Shallan glanced at the pile of clothing. She carried the broken fabrial in her safepouch. She could swap them here and now. It was the opportunity she’d been waiting for. Jasnah now trusted her enough to relax, soaking in the bathing chamber without worrying about her fabrial.
Could Shallan really do it? Could she betray this woman who had taken her in?
Considering what I’ve done before, she thought, this is nothing. It wouldn’t be the first time she betrayed someone who trusted her.
She stood up. To the side, Jasnah cracked an eye.
Blast, Shallan thought, tucking the book under her arm, pacing, trying to look thoughtful. Jasnah watched her. Not suspiciously. Curiously.
“Why did your father want to make a treaty with the Parshendi?” Shallan found herself asking as she walked.
“Why wouldn’t he want to?”
“That’s not an answer.”
“Of course it is. It’s just not one that tells you anything.”
“It would help, Brightness, if you would give me a useful answer.”
“Then ask a useful question.”
Shallan set her jaw. “What did the Parshendi have that King Gavilar wanted?”
Jasnah smiled, closing her eyes again. “Closer. But you can probably guess the answer to that.”
“Shards.”
Jasnah nodded, still relaxed in the water.
“The text doesn’t mention them,” Shallan said.
“My father didn’t speak of them,” Jasnah said. “But from things he said…well, I now suspect that they motivated the treaty.”
“Can you be sure he knew, though? Maybe he just wanted the gemhearts.”
“Perhaps,” Jasnah said. “The Parshendi seemed amused at our interest in the gemstones woven into their beards.” She smiled. “You should have seen our shock when we discovered where they’d gotten them. When the lanceryn died off during the scouring of Aimia, we thought we’d seen the last gemhearts of large size. And yet here was another great-shelled beast with them, living in a land not too distant from Kholinar itself.
“Anyway, the Parshendi were willing to share them with us, so long as they could still hunt them too. To them, if you took the trouble to hunt the chasmfiends, their gemhearts were yours. I doubt a treaty would have been needed for that. And yet, just before leaving to return to Alethkar, my father suddenly began talking fervently of the need for an agreement.”
“So what happened? What changed?”
“I can’t be certain. However, he once described the strange actions of a Parshendi warrior during a chasmfiend hunt. Instead of reaching for his spear when the greatshell appeared, this man held his hand to the side in a very suspicious way. Only my father saw it; I suspected he believed the man planned to summon a Blade. The Parshendi realized what he was doing, and stopped himself. My father didn’t speak of it further, and I assume he didn’t want the world’s eyes on the Shattered Plains any more than they already were.”
Shallan tapped her book. “It seems tenuous. If he was sure about the Blades, he must have seen more.”
“I suspect so as well. But I studied the treaty carefully, after his death. The clauses for favored trade status and mutual border crossing could very well have been a step toward folding the Parshendi into Alethkar as a nation. It certainly would have prevented the Parshendi from trading their Shards to other kingdoms without coming to us first. Perhaps that was all he wanted to do.”
