Page 28 of The Summer Pass

“He certainly cannot break the engagement with honour,” said Gurti.

She was reluctant to admit it, because it wasn’t something she’d realized before, but Halza had behaved very badly by this young woman, and Tirtu was right. His course now was clear.

“Exactly!” Tirtu said.

“Yes, yes, of course.” Padunu waved a hand irritably. “They take the matter of a betrothal very seriously in the lowlands. But do you not think, Na Gurti, it would be best to convince Halza of the desirability of marrying Auxshna, quite apart from an appeal to honour? In the interest of securing not only a marriage but a happy union?”

“What nonsense!” Tirtu scoffed. “He has to do it, that’s all there is to it.”

“There is something in what you say, Shaman,” Gurti admitted, still a shade reluctant.

“The fact of the matter is,” Padunu went on, “that whether or not she was his first betrothed, Auxshna is a much better choice for Halza’s wife than Susami.”

“Are you insulting Susami, now?” Tirtu demanded. “How dare you?”

“Of course I am not insulting Susami, you clod—she is worth ten of you! No, now you’re going to say I’m flattering her and I must be in love with her—just shut up. What I am saying, and perhaps it is a radical suggestion, is that I believe a marriage founded upon mutual respect and understanding is more likely to flourish than one in which neither party is able to speak the other’s language!”

“Oh, is that why you blessed the marriage between Lord Vanu and Lill? ‘Mutuous respect and understanding’? Is that the kind of thing you mean?”

Padunu gasped with affront. “You know very well that I had no more idea than anyone what would come of that marriage! That young person was an elite spy, and no one knew what they were up to! Besides, as the man who conceived of the idea in the first place, you have a great deal of nerve making such an argument. And you are changing the subject—I merely said that I would prefer to see Halza marry Auxshna and forget about Susami!”

Something made Gurti turn to look at the wagon at that moment, and she saw that Auxshna was looking straight at them. Gurti had no doubt that she had heard what Padunu had just said. The shaman had a loud voice. But Auxshna looked away quickly and said nothing. Gurti shushed the men hastily. Padunu realized what had happened and was distraught.

“What shall I do to repair the damage?” he wailed.

“Nothing,” said Gurti sternly. “This is something for Halza and his betrothed to talk about, and not us.”

“Too right,” Tirtu hissed, as if he hadn’t just been as interested in discussing it as Padunu a moment before.

Gurti followed Padunu’s gaze to where Halza was riding by himself, far out of hearing at the head of the party. He had been doing that all day and the day before. In truth, it would serve him right, she thought, if Auxshna had overheard the shaman and asked Halza what it meant. She only hoped Susami would not be blamed for any of it. That would be unfair. She had done nothing wrong.

Mercifully, Gurti did not hear the conversation Halza had with his betrothed that evening, as they had it at a distance from the camp, but by their expressions when they came back to rejoin the group, it had not gone well. Auxshna looked angry, Halza crushed. No one said anything about it or asked any questions, though Gurti kept glancing sharply at the men to make sure they weren’t about to. Auxshna and her mother conferred quietly in their language.

Gurti wondered what she could say if Auxshna asked her, “Did you know Halza was betrothed?” Yes, she had known. Lord Vanu had told her some time after Susami turned down Halza’s first proposal.

“He told you this?” Gurti had asked him, surprised.

Lord Vanu had shaken his head and made the sign for Lill’s name. So maybe that had coloured her reaction. Maybe she’d thought Lill hadn’t come by the information honourably or had betrayed Halza’s confidence in telling Lord Vanu. She couldn’t remember now just what she had thought. But she had not told anyone else about Halza’s betrothal. She knew Lord Vanu had looked to her for guidance, and when she didn’t tell anyone, neither did he—apart from Susami, whom he had told already. And Halza had kept asking, and Susami had kept refusing him, and Gurti did remember what she had thought as it went on.

She felt it her duty to go to Auxshna and talk to her the following morning as they struck camp.

“In the mountains, betrothals are very … breakable,” she said. “So perhaps we did not think rightly about Halza’s duty to you. I am sorry for that. There is more, too—I have a special reason to be sorry. My own marriage was arranged by my husband’s family. Neither my husband nor I wished for it, and we were not happy together. I am a widow now, and I am making this journey to my home village so that I may avoid another marriage I don’t want. I saw Halza courting Susami, and although I did not think they would suit one another, I did not have the heart to say that I thought he should go back to make the marriage arranged by his kin, if he no longer wanted it.”

Auxshna nodded, although her expression did not soften.

“I gave no thought to what you might want. I am sorry.”

“What could you have done? Would Lord Vanu had forbidden the marriage at your request? But he did forbid it, so … ”

“Is that what Halza told you? Lord Vanu gave his daughter leave to choose her own husband. She refused Halza herself.”

Auxshna gasped. “I knew that I was right to like her! She would not marry another woman’s betrothed. But he chose to stay and keep courting her!”

“At first we would not let him leave,” Gurti said, as it seemed only fair. “And it can happen that captivity changes a man—he may have begun to think that he could not go back to his old life.”

She had heard of things like that happening—men taken into slavery in the Steppes who might have escaped but did not because they had forgotten what it was like to be free.

“It isn’t that I want him so very much,” Auxshna said, as if she was embarrassed that anyone might think it. “But I thought he was in trouble. When we travelled up to Umtúshta and found out that he had gone over the wall and never come back, I gave him up for dead. But then we heard news that the Lion was on the move again, and I thought perhaps Halza was a prisoner after all. And we had word that there was someone like him in Urártu’s camp, so we followed you out here. Has he told me lies at every turn? Is it even true that he went over the fortress wall to rescue a boy destined to be the Lion’s bride?”