Page 34 of The Boy Bride

“Vanu says that,” he repeated finally.

“He does, yeah,” said Khatu. He grinned. “Sorry about all the … ” He waved a hand vaguely. “The thing is, you should know Lord Vanu never wanted you thrown over the wall or any of that.”

“Why should we believe you?” Halza was clearly trying to talk tough, but it came out sounding rather reedy.

“What are you telling them?” Vanu’s daughter asked suspiciously.

“Just filling them in on what happened.”

“You told them it was your father’s idea to chuck them over the wall?”

“Yeah, so … ” He turned back to Lill and Halza. “My da made a mistake, see. Lord Vanu just said he didn’t want to marry you, but Da, er, misunderstood. Sooo … that’s how that happened—you could even say Barda and me saved the day, hey?”

That, Lill thought, was going a little far. He said nothing.

“Anyway, that thing you did, dropping out of the tree onto Tirtu?” Khatu went on enthusiastically. “That was some pure bee-fuckery! Mikhi here thinks so too—she was telling me⁠—”

“Earth’s tits, Khatu!” Vanu’s daughter stamped her foot. “You’re supposed to be acting as my interpreter, remember?”

“Sorry, Mikhi, sorry.”

Mikhi turned back to Lill and composed herself. “The message from Lord Vanu is that he’ll let you go if you want to go. But if you don’t, then this is for you.” She held out her hand. In her palm was a gold ring with a small red stone. “He heard it’s your custom, um, where you’re from. For a betrothal.”

“What’s going on?” Halza hissed.

Lill shook his head, looking at the ring in Mikhi’s hand. Waiting for Khatu to translate again gave him time to assimilate this new development. He heard Halza gasp as he realized what was happening.

“What about him?” Lill asked finally, inclining his head toward Halza. “If I accept this—what happens to him?”

“He wants to know what we’d do with the other lowlander if he accepts,” said Khatu.

“We haven’t decided what to do with him. We might hold him for ransom, or we might let him go. Is he your friend? Do you want us to keep him?”

She had been telling the truth, before, when she said they were planning to send both Lill and Halza home. She was probably telling the truth now. He would assume that she was.

“I would rather you let him go. I don’t want him to come to harm. But he is not my friend.” He wasn’t sure why that would matter, but he also didn’t see any need to pretend.

Khatu translated this, and Mikhi nodded. “You want us to promise not to hurt him. I can give you that assurance. So long as he behaves himself, he will not come to any further harm. That is my father’s assurance—I speak for him. It’s not conditional on you accepting the ring.”

“Uh … ” said Khatu. “Are you … ”

“Honestly! Just do your job, Khatu. Yes, I’m sure. You’re terrible at this.”

“She says, uh—yes. We’ll let him go. Not to worry.”

She was right; he wasn’t any good as an interpreter.

Lill nodded. He didn’t know if he believed the assurance—he thought she meant it, and maybe Vanu even meant it, but Vanu wasn’t the only one in the village capable of acting to harm Halza. That had just been proven. Still, Lill felt he’d done his best now, discharged his debt of honour to Halza. He could move on with his mission.

He reached out his hand, and Vanu’s daughter dropped the ring into it, a wide smile blooming on her face as she did so. Halza gasped. Khatu let out a throaty cheer.

Lill looked at the ring. It was a delicate band of gold with tiny details worked in it, little grains of gold surrounding an opaque, faceted, orange-red stone.

“That was made in my village,” Mikhi said proudly. “Taskhabara in the Summer Pass. We have very famous goldsmiths. But the stone came from all the way across the Steppes, from Shing or Durba or one of those places.”

Lill slid the ring onto a finger at random and found that it fit. It felt strange; he’d never worn a ring before.

“What happens next?” he asked, looking up at Mikhi and Khatu.