Our Lady of the Islands Read Free Page B

apparently.”
    Arouf shook his head, his dark eyes flashing. “I do not like you going there.”
    “Oh?” She gave him a wry smile. “Does that mean you will go next time?”
    He scowled at her. “That is your world, down there, wife. This is mine.”
    Such a powerful-looking man , Sian mused, and yet such a child, to be so upset by even a mention of the outside world . She bit her lip and went to set the table, refraining from telling him that someone in the crowd had flung a fistful of mud at her as she had left the townhouse in Viel to meet Pino that afternoon. They had missed. So what did it matter?
    “Did you do any entertaining while you were in town?”
    Sian looked up at him. “No. Why do you ask?”
    Arouf shrugged, not looking up from the cutting board where he was dicing firefruit. “Why doesn’t the Factor do something about all this unrest?”
    “I don’t know.” She thought a moment. “He might be too distracted. I hear his son is not recovering quite as quickly as they’d hoped.”
    “That’s unfortunate.” He dropped the peppers into the stew and stirred vigorously. Then he lifted the spoon to his lips, frowned, and returned to the board to dice another.
    “Indeed.” Sian thought about their own daughters, with the mingled love and fear that fills any mother when she hears of a child’s illness. Because they would always be her babies, no matter that they were grown and gone. Maleen, at least, still lived in Alizar; Sian had been meaning to visit her and the grandchildren for far too long. Life just seemed to crowd out every space she tried to clear for such things lately. She shook her head and resolved more fiercely to do it — soon.
    “Well, supper is ready,” Arouf said, ladling stew into a serving bowl. A good measure remained steaming on the stove when he brought the filled bowl to the table.
    She dipped her bread in the fragrant broth as the first bite seared pleasantly down her throat. “Your best yet.”
    Arouf patted his belly and swallowed his own generous spoonful. “A little bland.” Tears leaked from the corners of his eyes and his cheeks flushed slightly. “But, it was the best I could do with these poor ingredients.”
    “Any better and this old body could simply not stand it.”
    “Well, then. It must be exactly good enough.”
    “Exactly.”
    As they ate, Sian asked Arouf about matters in the dye works. He had nothing much to report, beyond complaining of being short-staffed, and soon enough they were passing their supper in silence.
    “I’ll take the sacks out to the shed, if you’ll see to the dishes,” Arouf said, pushing back from the table with a contented sigh.
    “Of course. Go ahead.” Sian rose and gathered the bowls, carrying them to the washbasin. “A one-pot meal shouldn’t be much trouble.” Though if you wouldn’t keep sending Bela home early, I wouldn’t have to do even this , Sian thought. It had been a long day, and she had more to do before bed.
    Her husband pulled his boots on and went out the kitchen door. He hefted the sacks of dye two at a time, which made Sian cringe in sympathetic pain. Small as they appeared, they were dense and weighty. Arouf must not be feeling arthritis in his joints, like she was.
    Or maybe it was all the spicy meals he ate. Sian felt her insides burning as she scraped the bowls into the bin for the flamingos and tamarins. Not an unpleasant burn, exactly; but she couldn’t make three meals a day of the peppers as Arouf could.
    The dishes done, she moved to the sitting room and lit a lantern by her reading chair, batting off a Luna moth that fluttered toward it through the window. After going to pull the shutters closed, she sat down, took a report from the large stack on her side table, and began to read, making occasional notes on a small sheet of paper as she went. The reports were gathered from everywhere Sian could acquire informants, and spoke, in one way or another, of the future of the market for