and his voice sounded as raw and strange as when he’d spoken to Eskie. He cleared his throat, lowered his eyes. In the shadows behind Bogrevil, others were arriving, stumbling, shambling.
“Never mind the words now. Pick that thing up.” Bogrevil pointed at the shawm.
Reluctantly, Diverus obeyed. “I meant no harm,” he said.
“Put it to your lips again.”
He needed no coaxing: Drawn to action by the very touch of the shawm, he tasted the reed again, tasted his own spit, and in an instant the sound emerged. He tried to watch his fingers close over the holes, to watch as a tune settled over him like a cape, coming from he knew not where; but his eyes rolled up of their own accord and he floated away, back into the dreamspace where she dwelled. His mother the sphinx was there, somewhere; he could feel her like a breeze upon his cheek, and in the distance that pale rectangle of light that he’d seen in his vision, and there, the pink slab of marble…Whether the song lasted one minute or ten, he didn’t know, but when he returned to his senses he saw that the client in the front had sunk to his knees and was sobbing. Others—boys who should have been abed, other clients who emerged from the corridors—gaped at him, struck dumb. Weaving through the paidika, the sound had pulled them here, its magic so powerful that clients had come without their masks and costumes. Two women stood in their midst, having shed their male disguises; one was half undressed, as was the man with her, suggestive of the manner in which they’d been sharing the afrit smoke. And the afrits—had they allowed the people to escape? Did the music affect them, too, the way the flute of a snake charmer entranced a cobra?
With the tune ended, some of them looked at the others with a shock of recognition, as if they were acquainted outside the brothel and would never have dreamed of finding one another here. At the back, Eskie peered apprehensively between two of the boys.
Bogrevil drew a deep breath. If he’d been angry at first, the wide-eyed look upon his face now wasn’t rage at all, but something like ebullience. He entered the parlor and held out his hand. Diverus gave him the shawm.
“Why,” he asked gravely, “have you kept this skill, this gift—for it’s surely what the gods gave you upon that dragon beam—why have you kept it a secret from us?”
“I didn’t know I knew it.”
A moment longer Bogrevil stared at him. Then he laughed deep in his throat, once, twice. He turned to look at the assembled clients. “This is my anniversary present.” He pointed back at Diverus, chuckling as he did. “I’m blessed by the gods themselves, am I not?” He seemed to become aware of the state of his audience, cleared his throat, and then to no one in particular stated, “Yes, it is not the policy of this establishment to cater to the female sex. It’s not my prejudice, but the law of the span, which I’m sure everyone on the span knows. This being a special night, exceptions will be made…still, let’s not be advertising our violation, hmm?” When no one moved, he added, “He’s not going to play no more right now, so get off.”
At that they did disperse, albeit with reluctance, some up the stairs, others to collect their masks and costumes. The boys looked their new musician over with a mix of resentment and reverence. Bogrevil had Kotul help the weeping client up and on his way, and then said to Diverus, “I can’t let you have this back just yet. Got to get them all out the door and the rest of us to bed, or we’ll be standing here all night. You could transfix the sun and hold the night with that reed.” He bent down and lifted the untuned lute by its neck from the pillows, then handed that to Diverus. “Here. Amuse yourself with this instead.”
He strode back to Eskie and presented her the shawm. “For safekeeping. We’ll need it later, assuming—” He was interrupted by the strumming of the lute. Still out of tune, yet that had not kept Diverus from plucking a lilting phrase from it. Bogrevil wheeled about and watched him, amazed.
Diverus held the lute away from himself, and with his free hand turned the pegs one by one as though knowing exactly how much each needed to be adjusted.