drawing the circle of the All-Seeing God on their foreheads.
Some blocks past Touchstone Glass, above the shabby stores that sold overpriced items to newly arrived tourists, Tris saw the bright yellow pillars that marked Khapik’s entrance. They towered over the district’s walls, which were painted with dancers, musicians, bunches of grapes, illusionists, wine jugs, plates of steaming food, tumblers and all the other delights which lay inside. The guards at the gate watched the flood of tourists go by them with blank faces, unimpressed by the number and variety of the visitors.
The moment she passed inside the wall, Tris felt cool moisture in the air. Ahead of her lay a shaded expanse of ground divided into small islands by streams and riverlets, some broad enough to allow boats to pass along their length. Inside the boats people lazed, nibbled on fruit, talked, or trailed their fingers in the water. Squat candles burned inside flower-shaped cups that floated in the water, like fireflies that skimmed its surface: those who poled the boats avoided the candles with the ease of long practice. Trees grew here and there along the banks, cooling the streets under them. On the islands she saw delicate pavilions lit by lanterns and torches where musicians, singers and dancers performed for small groups.
Scents drifted on the air: roses, jasmine, patchouli, sandalwood, cinnamon. She heard bits of music and the splash of fountains. Her breezes, which had come back when she lowered her protections on the glassmaker’s workshop, whirled around her like small children, eager to run away and explore the maze of streets and streams. She let them go, reminding them to come back to her. As she looked around, watching the guests break up into small groups and disappear down the streets, something tightly knotted inside her loosened a bit.
She had to walk a distance to leave the area where the streams flowed. Beyond them she found the streets where businesses thrived: eating houses, wineshops, theatres, tea houses, gambling dens and shops that sold trinkets, perfumes, scarves, even toys. Here too were houses where entertainers performed for smaller audiences than those found in the theatres, in courtyards and in brightly lit rooms with gauze curtains.
Tris saw yaskedasi at street corners, beside the many fountains, on the stream banks, in courtyards, on the islands, on balconies and porches. Six tumblers stood on one another’s shoulders to shape themselves into a human pyramid, then to leap free, tucking, rolling and landing on their feet. Next to a many-tiered fountain Tris listened to a handsome boy play a melancholy song on a harp. On the far side of the fountain an older woman juggled burning torches. An illusionist produced flowers and birds from his sleeves under a willow tree while dogs danced together under a trainer’s eye. A woman draped in an immense snake and a handful of veils perched in a low window, stroking her pet. When she saw Tris watching, she beckoned, but Tris shook her head and walked on.
In low houses circled by colonnades, women and men lounged on couches, talked, ate, drank and gambled. When Tris glanced down the inner passages of such houses into the courtyards, she saw scantily clad dancers, female and male, performing to harp, flute, or sometimes only drum music. She heard lone singers and groups of singers, their melodies twining among the songs played on instruments. In one courtyard a poet declaimed verses on the art of love. In another, a group of people played Blind Man’s Buff.
When her belly reminded her that it was nearly dark and she had not eaten for some time, she found an eating-house whose bill of fare promised a decent meal. The prices would have made her gasp if she had not seen those posted beside houses whose charges were even higher. She chose a table outside, on the street, so she could better watch the crowds. She ignored the stares, thinking it was her pale complexion and red hair that drew attention, rather than her youth and the fact that she looked like no pleasure-seeker.
The serving maid brought her a supper of lamb grilled on skewers, lentils cooked with onions and bay leaves, plum juice, flatbread and cheese. Tris thanked her politely, then turned all of her attention on the street as she ate.
Why the yaskedasi? she wondered. Six dead women, all of them yaskedasi — why did he choose them? It wasn’t for their money, not from what she’d heard. And why only women?