Tarma snickered, eyes narrowed against the snow-glare and the westering sunlight. Her tone and her expression were both malicious. "Leslac's cooling his heels in the jail as of last night."
"Oh, really?" Kethry was delighted. "What happened?"
...Warrl raised his head from the shadows of the corner he'd chosen for his own, with a contemptuous snort. The kyree liked the cold even less than Tarma, and spent much of his time in the warm corner by the stove curled up on a pad of warm rugs.
:You two have no taste. I happen to think Leslac is a fine musician, and a very talented one.:
Tarma answered with a snort of her own. "All right then, you go warm his bed. I'm sure he'd appreciate it."
Warrl simply lowered his head back to his paws and closed his glowing golden eyes with dignity.
"Tell, tell, tell!" Kethry urged, having as little love for the feckless Leslac as did her partner. She threw herself down into her own leather-padded hearthside chair, and leaned forward in her eagerness to hear.
"All right-here's what I was told-" Tarma lounged back in her chair, and put her feet up on the black iron footrest near the stove to warm them. "Evidently His Bardship was singing that song in the Falcon last night."
That song was the cause for Tarma's latest grievance with the Bard. It seemed that Leslac, apparently out of willfulness of true ignorance, had not the least notion of what being Kal'enedral truly meant. He had decided that Tarma's celibacy was the result of her own will, not the hand of her Goddess-
The fact was that, as Kal'enedral, Tarma was celibate because she had become, effectively, neuter. Kal'enedral had no sexual desire and little sexual identity...
Leslac didn't believe this. He was certain-without bothering to check Tarma's background or the customs of the Shin'a'in, so far as Kethry had been able to ascertain-that Tarma's vows were as simple as those of most other celibate orders, and as easily broken. He was convinced that she had taken those vows for some girlishly romantic reason; he had just written a song, in fact, that hinted-very broadly-that the "right man" could thaw the icy Shin'a'in. That was the gist of "that song."
..."That's not a wise place to sing that particular ballad," Kethry observed, "Seeing as that's where your scouts tend to spend their pay."
"Hai, but it wasn't my scouts that got him," Tarma chuckled, "which is why I'm surprised you hadn't heard. It was Tresti and Sewen."
"What?"
"It was lovely-or so I'm told. Tresti and Sewen sailed in just as he began the damned thing. Nobody's said-but it wouldn't surprise me if Sewen set the whole thing up, though according to my spies, Tresti's surprise looked real enough. She knows what Kal'enedral means. Hellfire, we're technically equals, if I wanted to claim the priestly aspects that go with the Goddess-bond. She also knows how you and I feel about the little warbling bastard. So she decided to have a very public and very priestly fit about blasphemy and sacrilegious mockery."
That was one of the few laws within Hawksnest; that every comrade's god deserved respect. And to blaspheme anyone's gods, particularly those of a Sunhawk of notable standing, was an official offense, punishable by the town judge.
"She didn't!"
"She ruddy well did. That was all Sewen and my children had been waiting for. They called civil arrest on him and bundled him off to jail. And there he languishes for the next thirty days."
Kethry applauded, beaming. "That's thirty whole days we won't have to put up with his singing under our window!"
"And thirty whole days I can stroll into town for a drink without hiding my face!" Tarma looked very pleased with herself.
Warrl heaved a gigantic sigh.
"Look, Furface, if you like him so much, why don't you go keep him company?"
:Tasteless barbarians.: