Quiet Knives Read Free Page A

mattress.
Later, she would move it to the secure hidey hole, but, for now,
the mattress would suffice.
    "Well?" Shereen asked, acidic. "Are you
going to sleep all day?"
    "No, sister," Inas said meekly and pushed
the curtain aside.
    * * *
    THE DAYS OF THEIR father's
absence was a frenzy of needlework. At night, after her sisters had
fallen, exhausted, into their beds, Inas read the curiat , and learned
amazing things.
    First, she learned that the
geographical volume mislocated several key markers, such as the
Ilam Mountains, and the Sea of Lukistan. Distrustful of her own
knowledge in the face of a work of scholarship, she stole off to
her father's study in the deep of night, and pulled down the atlas.
She compared the latitudes and longitudes given in the curiat volume against
those established by the Geographical College, verifying that
the curiat was off
in some areas by a league, and in others by a day's hard
travel.
    Next, she discovered that the habits of
certain animals were misrepresented--these, too, she double-checked
in the compendium of creatures issued by the Zoological
College.
    Within the volume of universities and
temples were bits of myth, comparing those found in Lahore-Gadani
to others, from Selikot. Several fragments dealt with the exploits
of the disorderly Natesa; one such named the aspect Shiva, another
Nawar; all set against yet a third mythic creature, the Coyote of
the Nile.
    Then, she discovered that
the whole of volume five had been machine printed, in perfect
reproduction of the fine hand of the scholar. So the curiat was not as ancient
as it appeared, which gave her cause to marvel upon the scholar who
had created it.
    Minerals--well, but by the time she had
found the discrepancies in the weights of certain ores, she had
made the discovery which explained every error.
    She had, as was her habit,
waited until her sisters retired, then lit her lamp, pulled up the
board under the carpet, and brought the box onto her chatrue . She released the
three ivory hooks, opened the lid--the box overbalanced and spilled
to the floor, books scattering every which way.
    Inas slipped out of bed and tenderly
gathered the little volumes up, biting her lip when she found
several pages in the third book crumpled. Carefully, she smoothed
the damaged sheets, and replaced the book with its brothers inside
the box.
    It was then that she
noticed pieces of the box itself had come loose, leaving two neat,
deep, holes in the wood, at opposite corners of the lid. Frowning,
she scanned the carpet, spying one long spindle, tightly wrapped in
cloth. The second had rolled beneath the chatrue , and by the time she reached
and squirmed and had it out with the very tips of her fingers, the
cloth covering had begun to unravel.
    Daintily, she fingered it, wondering if
perhaps the cloth held some herb for protection against demons, or
perhaps salts, to insure the books kept dry, or--
    There was writing on the
inside of the cloth. Tiny and meticulous, it was immediately
recognizable as the same hand which had penned the curiat .
    Exquisitely careful, breath caught, she
unrolled the little scroll across the carpet, scanning the columns
of text; heart hammering into overdrive as she realized that she
had discovered her nameless scholar's key.
    Teeth indenting her bottom lip, she unrolled
the second scroll next to the first, and saw that she had the
complete cipher.
    Breathless, she groped behind her for the
box, and extracted a book at random.
    Slowly at first--then more quickly as her
agile mind grew acquainted with the key--she began to read.
    Illuminated by the cipher, it was found that
the volume geographical did not concern itself with mountain ranges
and rivers at all, but was instead a detailed report of a
clandestine entry into the city of Selikot, and a blasphemous
subterfuge.
    I regret to inform you, oh, brother in arms,
that our information regarding this hopeful world was much
misleading. Women are not restricted; they are