"Are all in his head."

"That's what Hoku says." Ozchan stretched his arms along the sides of the tub. One hand rested in Quilla's hair. She ignored it.

"What else? How's Meya?"

"I've barely seen her," he said with dissatisfaction.

"She's recovering, Ozchan. It was harder on her than on us."

"I know. But she's my wife, damn it. We've been married just a month, she's carrying my child. I think I have a right to know what she's up to."

"Do you? That's what's wrong with marriage, you know. Sign a sheet of paper and you think you own someone."

"I don't think I own her," he said.

"Then stop worrying about it."

"But how do I know what she's up to? Where she's going, and who she's going with? What she's doing and who she's doing it with?"

"Oh-ho," said Quilla.

"Stop that. She wasn't a virgin, you know."

"I'd have been surprised if she was. Were you?"

"That's beside the point. If she had someone here before, she could be having someone here now."

"So?"

"So, that's unfaithful!"

"What's faith?" Quilla said. "Quit scowling and listen to me. Where do you make boundaries on love? Are you being unfaithful if you fuck someone else, or if you love someone else? Or if you stop loving one to love another, instead of loving both? What about that, if there are two, which one are you being unfaithful to? Do you think a piece of paper freezes people, locks them in, turns them into things that they aren't? Meya married you because she loved you, and needed you, and she still does. But I don't believe she mortgaged her soul to you, and I don't believe she expects you to mortgage yours to her." Quilla closed her eyes and rested her head against his hand.

"She needs to be away now. She's had to kill one person and let go of another.

Don't ride her, Ozchan. She'll be back."

"Do you really believe all of that?" he said.

She nodded.

"Have you ever been? Unfaithful to Tabor?"

"Tabor and I didn't live together until the twins were seven years old."

"That's no answer."

"You asked a dumb question. If you mean, have I slept with anyone other than Tabor, the answer is yes. If you mean would I do it again, the answer's still yes. And if you mean, would Tabor do the same thing, has he done the same thing, you'll get the same answer."

He moved his hand so that her head turned toward his.

"Would you fuck with me? Now? Here?"

"Perhaps," she said, not moving. Ozchan put his other hand between her legs.

"But I won't," she said. "Because you'd be fucking not because you want to, but because you want to hurt Meya. And of all the reasons for making love, that's the stupidest one of all."

He moved away as though she had hit him. She drew her knees up under her chin and looked at him, her head tilted. She couldn't help smiling, and after a moment of frozen-faced anger, he smiled back.

"All right," he said. "One for your team. I'm a jealous man, I suppose.

And I'm upset that she's spending so much time with Jes, when it's obvious that Jes hates me."

"He seems to, doesn't he? What did you do to him?"

"Do to him? Nothing. I cared for his father. I married his sister. I live in his house. I don't know what the hell he's got against me. I haven't poisoned his dinner, but he acts as though I have."

Quilla frowned. "It's odd. I thought he'd get over it after the first week, that he was shaken by Jason's death and that was that. I haven't seen much of what's gone on recently, but I can't believe that Jes hates you that much. Jes has never hated anyone."

"That's a big statement. Besides, you're his sister."

"I'm Hart's sister, too," Quilla said.

Ozchan nodded. "I'm afraid he'll make her hate me the way he does."

"Give Meya credit for having a stronger mind than that. If you're that worried, why don't you ask her?"

"I've tried to. I can't. She gets to bed late and goes to sleep immediately, and by the time I'm awake the next morning she's gone. The rest of the day she's always with Jes, and I can't very well ask her in front of him, can I?"

"I suppose not. Tell you what, I'll try to talk to Jes, okay? This isn't an offer to spy, but we've had enough dissension around here. I'll see what I can do."

Ozchan nodded and glanced at the clouds.

"What time is it?" he said.

"Jev'al," she said.

"Lord, I'm going to be late, and Hoku will have my ass." He clambered from the tub and dried off. Quilla watched him until he looked embarrassed.

She looked away.

"Listen, if you can help me with Jes..."

"Sure."

Ozchan clambered down the steps and into the rain. Quilla remembered her beer, but when she reached for it, it was warm. She made a face and climbed from the tub, dried, dressed, and went through the rain toward the Tor.

Word got out to Haven that Quilla was free again, and throughout the next day she was besieged by people come with complaints, suggestions, reports, requests. Mish and Hetch were still locked in the office, so Quilla dealt with the people in the living room. They sat along the edges of the room, waiting their turns, and she could no longer imagine Jason's coffin in the room. Most of the requests she turned aside; see Hoku, take this to Judge Hirem, talk this over with Kayman Olet. Others took some time, some thought, some scurrying around for records and documents. In mid-evening Tabor came to the door and stood watching her for a time, and when the last stragglers had left, he brought her some dinner and sat beside her as she ate.

"You need a secretary," he said, handing her a glass of wine.

"No, I need two of me. Why won't these people take things to the right places first, instead of bringing them all to me? I'm not judge and arbitrator and marriage counselor and confessor and land manager all in one."

"To them you are."

"Lady of the castle?" she said, and he smiled.

"Sure -- Quia Tor Kennerin."

"No, thanks." She pushed her plate aside and stretched. "The children have eaten?"

"And bathed, and gone to bed. Did you know that Jared's writing a book?"

"I hardly know what day it is. I saw them yesterday afternoon, and again this morning, and that's been it. I don't like this, Tabor."

"I don't either, but it'll be over soon. They've been saving things up since Jason got here. They'll be done soon."

"Hah! Argument is the Aerie national sport, remember?"

Tabor laughed and laid wood in the fireplace, then put his cane on the floor and sat on the rug, warming his hands. Quilla brought the wine and glasses with her to the hearth and sat on the rug beside him. The wood crackled and hissed as translucent flames slid around the dark gray kaedo wood.

"Remember the first winter you spent in the Cault," Tabor said, "after I made all sorts of promises about how good it would be?"

"During the blizzard, the time the barn fell in?"

"And we spent a month with the drays quartered downstairs, and burned all the chairs to keep warm."

Quilla laughed. "Some wonderful vacation. Some great time." She touched his ear. "I've missed you, Tabor. That's what I hate most about this sort of day, these past two weeks. I don't think we've talked once since Mish got here."

"Having just discovered talking, it would be a pity to lose it again this soon."

She nodded, then frowned. Tabor put his fingertips on her cheek. "Why the grimness, Quil?"

"Talking. Have you been around Jes much lately?"

"Not really. He's been keeping to himself."

"I know. Squiring Meya around, and scowling at Ozchan. I tried to talk with him last night, and it was like talking with the avenging angel. I can't figure out what in hell is wrong with him."

"Jason?"

"That's part of it, sure, but not the whole thing." She turned around and put her head on Tabor's lap. "Something must have happened during his last trip out, something he won't tell me about. It's changed him."

"Does he have to tell you about it, Quil? It's his business, not ours."

"Except that he's been rude and unpleasant, and he hates Ozchan, and none of us can figure out why." She frowned. "At the funeral, did you see how he looked at Taine? If I didn't know him better, I'd have been frightened. He looked ... savage. Of course, he hasn't been close to her since her marriage, but why that look? It's not like Jessie to hate people, Tabor. You know that."

"People change."

"Not that much. Not that quickly."

Tabor looked down at her and shook his head. "I think if there's anything we should have learned this winter, it's that people change faster than we expect, that perhaps people are never what they seem to be."

"So we're to accept Jes' nastiness and leave it at that?"

"If necessary."

"And if it hurts Meya? Or disrupts her marriage?"

"Why this sudden concern with marriage?"

"Not marriage per se. I'm more concerned about Meya and Ozchan. And us.

And Jes." She paused. "There's something going on, Tabor. Do you think you could ... well..."

"Talk with him? Pry out all his guilty secrets? Put him to the question?"

"Lady above, you don't have to be so grim about it."

Tabor chuckled. "I'll talk with him. I don't promise to interrogate him, but I'll talk, if he wants to talk with me."

"I suppose that's as much as I can ask of you."

"On that subject, yes."

"And on other subjects?" She grinned. "For example, the subject of tonight."

"I see. I take it, Quia, you wish to retire."

"Right. I would like to seek the solitude and tranquility of my own room, and fuck until daybreak."

"That's a serious request. I'll have to take it under consideration."

She moved her head on his lap. "Big deal, Quia Negotiator. I think you already have."

Tabor sighed and followed her upstairs.

Jes sat by the window in Ped Kohl's beer hall and scowled at the rain.

It was marketday, and, despite the wetness, the market across the street was filled with people. The vendors had rigged white awnings over their stands, under which Jes could see piles of fruits and vegetables, stacks of jugs, sides of meat hanging in neat, red rows and dripping blood onto the wet pavement. A fishmonger's cart moved through the crowd, laden with shining forms and drawn by an unhappy dray. The dray stopped before a vegetable bin and mooed and the kasir came out of his stand, shouting and flapping his four arms.

Jes signaled for another beer and slumped lower in his chair. Meya was at the dressmaker's, being fitted for something expandable. She had announced that for the next eight months she intended to pamper herself. Jes couldn't see why she was so happy at the prospect of a bloated belly and a brat, why she was so confident that of all the things she'd done wrong since winter's beginning, this and her marriage were the two things she had done right. Merry domesticity. The damned family was full of it. Except for Mish, of course. And Hart. And himself. Three out of five miserable, and although he understood his own lack of reason, the feelings remained.

Meya's friend Mertika brought him his beer and wanted to talk, but he put her off. She shrugged and went away, waggling her ass as she retreated.