demonstrated the brush-and-step in the gallery of her ancestors.
I was to discover that shadow trespass is specifically a Colendi convention. Even as children at play we are taught not to step upon someone else’s shadow when we are indoors, for if the space was not well lit, to blend your shadow with another’s was to request or declare intimacy, or to challenge another for place. The only time one is safe from shadow etiquette is when one wears a shrouding domino veil, which means one is regarded as invisible.
All Colendi, even the most poor, try to light their rooms in all four corners.
Lighting from a single source can be startling, dramatic, full of expectation. A popular game among youth newly come to the years of interest is to walk amidst a circle of your friends gathered in a dark room where a lamp swings freely. Whomsoever your shadow touches, you must kiss.
The gesture for shadow kiss—sycophancy—was a forefinger held up, as I have said. In court, the fan closed and held upright.
But the courtiers also had the moth kiss, (forefinger touching the lips) was regarded as the highest style in insult—far above the clumsiness of what the rest of us called south-gating. The moth kiss appeared to be flattery, but its purpose was to humiliate the victim, exposing him or her to the amusement of the group.
Lady Ananda Gaszin and her brother, Young Gaszin (as the heir wasknown—nearer thirty than twenty, he favored the nod to his fleeting youth), aspired to begin the season at their father’s Dance of the Spring Leaves, which was held on Flower Day, the day the sun rose at Daybreak and set at the Hour of the Cup. The game was that everyone would be seen assiduously obeying the queen’s injunction to be friendly to the Chwahir king, to mask a courtly moth kiss.
Lady Ananda was so confident of triumph that her outer robe was made of sheerest moon-glow silk, woven in curled-leaf patterns, with the tiniest gems caught in the gossamer fabric, like drops of rain, her sleeves draped in the then-popular fan shape. Her first underrobe was pale green, her innermost underrobe a darker green, its sleeves, neck, and hem visible a ribbon-width at the edges of the pale green; her nails were tipped with tiny emeralds.
That hint of dark green was considered presumption by many, as it was the custom at this dance for the royal family to wear the color of spring and the court to wear shades of white and silver, symbolizing the crown’s liberating the season of warmth from winter’s isolation. Although Lady Ananda’s intent was to highlight her incipient triumph by mocking the Chwahir forest green—which Jurac invariably wore—most saw her gesture as arrogance, presuming on the royal prerogative.
All this Kaidas Lassiter saw at a glance when he arrived at a ball he’d very nearly skipped. He was only there because Young Gaszin insisted that he join the game by making a very expensive wager on Jurac of Chwahirsland’s ignorance of Colendi dance. Wagers were always fun, and it was even funnier that every dancing master in Alsais had been hired away by the Gaszins.
Purely on whim, Kaidas wagered… against Young Gaszin.
He arrived late to find everyone in motion. There was Ananda sporting dark green, there was Young Gaszin, uncharacteristically paying assiduous court to the queen.
And there was Princess Lasva waltzing down the middle of the room with King Jurac.
“When’s he going to fall down?” he asked Lord Rontande behind his fan.
Lord Rontande laughed silently; he followed Young Gaszin because the latter was powerful. Rontande enjoyed Ananda’s flushed face, her modulated laugh that rang the false note to sensitive ears, causing her urbane father to send a long look her way. And he especially enjoyed Young Gaszin’s failure to distract the queen, who had proved time and again to be distressingly observant.
“He isn’t,” Rontande said, the diamonds braided into his silver hair shivering as he
I was to discover that shadow trespass is specifically a Colendi convention. Even as children at play we are taught not to step upon someone else’s shadow when we are indoors, for if the space was not well lit, to blend your shadow with another’s was to request or declare intimacy, or to challenge another for place. The only time one is safe from shadow etiquette is when one wears a shrouding domino veil, which means one is regarded as invisible.
All Colendi, even the most poor, try to light their rooms in all four corners.
Lighting from a single source can be startling, dramatic, full of expectation. A popular game among youth newly come to the years of interest is to walk amidst a circle of your friends gathered in a dark room where a lamp swings freely. Whomsoever your shadow touches, you must kiss.
The gesture for shadow kiss—sycophancy—was a forefinger held up, as I have said. In court, the fan closed and held upright.
But the courtiers also had the moth kiss, (forefinger touching the lips) was regarded as the highest style in insult—far above the clumsiness of what the rest of us called south-gating. The moth kiss appeared to be flattery, but its purpose was to humiliate the victim, exposing him or her to the amusement of the group.
Lady Ananda Gaszin and her brother, Young Gaszin (as the heir wasknown—nearer thirty than twenty, he favored the nod to his fleeting youth), aspired to begin the season at their father’s Dance of the Spring Leaves, which was held on Flower Day, the day the sun rose at Daybreak and set at the Hour of the Cup. The game was that everyone would be seen assiduously obeying the queen’s injunction to be friendly to the Chwahir king, to mask a courtly moth kiss.
Lady Ananda was so confident of triumph that her outer robe was made of sheerest moon-glow silk, woven in curled-leaf patterns, with the tiniest gems caught in the gossamer fabric, like drops of rain, her sleeves draped in the then-popular fan shape. Her first underrobe was pale green, her innermost underrobe a darker green, its sleeves, neck, and hem visible a ribbon-width at the edges of the pale green; her nails were tipped with tiny emeralds.
That hint of dark green was considered presumption by many, as it was the custom at this dance for the royal family to wear the color of spring and the court to wear shades of white and silver, symbolizing the crown’s liberating the season of warmth from winter’s isolation. Although Lady Ananda’s intent was to highlight her incipient triumph by mocking the Chwahir forest green—which Jurac invariably wore—most saw her gesture as arrogance, presuming on the royal prerogative.
All this Kaidas Lassiter saw at a glance when he arrived at a ball he’d very nearly skipped. He was only there because Young Gaszin insisted that he join the game by making a very expensive wager on Jurac of Chwahirsland’s ignorance of Colendi dance. Wagers were always fun, and it was even funnier that every dancing master in Alsais had been hired away by the Gaszins.
Purely on whim, Kaidas wagered… against Young Gaszin.
He arrived late to find everyone in motion. There was Ananda sporting dark green, there was Young Gaszin, uncharacteristically paying assiduous court to the queen.
And there was Princess Lasva waltzing down the middle of the room with King Jurac.
“When’s he going to fall down?” he asked Lord Rontande behind his fan.
Lord Rontande laughed silently; he followed Young Gaszin because the latter was powerful. Rontande enjoyed Ananda’s flushed face, her modulated laugh that rang the false note to sensitive ears, causing her urbane father to send a long look her way. And he especially enjoyed Young Gaszin’s failure to distract the queen, who had proved time and again to be distressingly observant.
“He isn’t,” Rontande said, the diamonds braided into his silver hair shivering as he
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