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She had been thinking of a certain kind of love, then. But perhaps that wasn’t the only kind she might have been missing. What about the love between friends, between citizens of a community?
What about the love between a people and their goddess?
This time, instead of a twinge of discomfort at the thought of the word, Oriane felt a strange flare of warmth.
‘I want to go into the city.’
Kitt blinked at her over the rim of his cup. They were drinking tea in the gardens, chatting amiably, Kitt asking her the occasional question about her transformations. Andala stood nearby, making Oriane uncomfortable. She had refused Oriane’s offer to sit down with them. Kitt had tried to persuade her as well, to no end. Andala might have been his friend (Issheminetoo?Oriane found herself wondering), but she was still a servant, she said, and that meant staying within the bounds of propriety. Kitt had muttered something about propriety not usually being one of her primary concerns, but she had levelled a look at him and taken up her position nearby, quiet and serene as a sculpture.
‘Of course,’ Kitt said. ‘I do have to pick up a few supplies for a project this afternoon. And now that you mention it, Andala did suggest that I take you with me, next time I went.’
‘She did?’
‘She thought it might stop you from worrying, while you wait for your father.’
Oriane glanced over at where Andala stood, hands clasped neatly behind her back. ‘That was … kind of her.’
More than that, it was thoughtful. Was this what friends did? Thought about things that might make each other’s lives better?75A mixture of feelings swirled within Oriane, each a different paint on a palette, not all of their colours familiar.
‘Will you come too?’ she called to Andala impulsively. ‘To the city?’
Andala’s statuesque pose faltered as her head snapped in Oriane’s direction. She opened her mouth, closed it again. She seemed to be debating something with herself.
‘If you’d like an attendant to join you, I’d be happy to oblige,’ she said eventually.
That hadn’t quite been what Oriane was asking, but she was pleased nonetheless. She turned back to Kitt with a grin.
He glanced between them, one corner of his mouth quirked slightly upwards. ‘It’s settled, then. Off to Aubrille we go.’
Stepping into the city was like entering another world.
Aubrille lay at the foot of the hill upon which the palace stood: a sprawl of buildings gathered like children at a storyteller’s skirts. They made their way down from the palace in a small carriage. Oriane felt rather silly about it – walking down would have been perfectly fine – but Kitt had insisted. So she had pressed her face to the window, excitement fizzing within her like the sparkling wine she’d been drinking at the palace dinners. And when they had at last exited the carriage and passed through the city gates, she felt as if that golden liquid were running through her veins again.
There were people everywhere, ten times as many as she’d seen in the palace so far – a riot of colour, like a living portrait that surged and moved around her. The smell of the summertime city was almost overwhelming: perfume and flowers and baking bread and roasting76meat, but also sweat, and dirt, and several other scents Oriane preferred not to identify. And thenoise… Shouts, laughter, music drifting along the street from an instrument she didn’t recognise. It was a cacophony – a symphony.
Eventually she looked to Kitt and Andala, standing beside her on the cobblestone street. To her surprise, they weren’t watching the city like she was; they were watching her. Kitt wore a wide grin, and Andala’s face was softer somehow, as if she were a statue slowly coming to life.
‘You look like you’ve seen the heavens themselves,’ Kitt told her.
She laughed. ‘Have I not?Lookat this!’
Andala’s nose wrinkled. ‘If this is what the heavens smell like, send me below when I die.’ But the hint of a smile remained.
They made their way along the main street, Oriane trailing like a child, distracted by every new sound or sight. Kitt patiently identified each establishment for her: dressmakers and apothecaries, perfumers and silversmiths, public houses and gambling halls and pleasure dens. At the last, Oriane felt her cheeks growing warm. She hadn’t minded feeling like a child before, but she was excruciatingly aware now of just how unworldly she was.
‘What’s your preference, love?’ called a boldly dressed woman who leaned against the wall of one establishment. ‘Men or women?’
Oriane froze, mortified. But to her surprise, Andala saved her from the agony of a response.
‘You don’t have to answer that,’ she muttered, rolling her eyes at the stranger and taking Oriane’s arm to steer her down the street. The woman’s throaty laughter followed them along. Too humiliated to speak, Oriane gave Andala a weak, grateful smile. Andala merely dropped her arm and nodded.
Kitt soon stopped at a market stall, where he purchased three apples mounted on sticks and dipped in a sweet, sticky golden liquid.77‘They’re called sugar suns,’ he explained, offering one to Oriane with a wink. ‘A suitable delicacy for you.’
Oriane took a bite as they continued to stroll. ‘This might be the most delicious food in the world,’ she remarked, and Kitt chuckled.
‘They are good, aren’t they? They’ve always been Hana’s favourite.’
Oriane turned to him. ‘The princess? How do you know that?’
