The van Sietter Bride Pt. 02 of 03

Arkyll turned back to the Knight, who was standing with his head towards them, holding his arm, a savage grin on his face. "What, no glove?" the Knight said in a sneering tone. "No, you do not truly want her honour under your eye, do you? pretty peace corps boy."

Arkyll stepped up and seized him by the lapels of the jacket and shovelled him back against the wall, staring intently into his face. "Do you want it?" he snarled in a voice hoarse with rage. "Do you want the glove of el Maien van Sietter over his ... betrothed?" His slanted blue eyes had become cold slits through which he peered at the man he shoved back so easily.

The Knight looked startled and Arkyll could see him thinking it over. He was remembering him that Arkyll wore a sword and dagger and gloves in his belt when off duty, he was a member of the peace corps but he was not a pacifist. He was a man of honour.

He was the son of el Maien van Sietter, who marked el Parva van Selaine in the face for only writing a poem addressed to his Lady wife; he was the nephew of el Maien van H'las, that infamous cold killer in the duel who had slaughtered like animals those who had stained the el Maien family honour.

"I never meant any thing, Sevie," the Knight whined, looking round at her standing and sobbing helplessly. "You mistook me ...." Arkyll shoved him against the wall again and he hurriedly muttered, "I beg for the Lady's pardon."

"Get out," Arkyll said, slinging him at the door. He resisted the temptation to kick the Knight in the backside since with his peace corps training he knew this might cause the Knight to rethink taking the glove. Sevianne's reputation would never survive him fighting some louche boar of a Knight over her honour. An handsome young officer would have been another matter.

Sevianne was still sobbing and crying, her plump little fingers clutched up together in the skirts of her dress, the paint streaked down her face. Arkyll regarded her ruefully. The aristocrat in him recognised that there would be no getting her back to the dining hall for a couple more dances so she could waft off to court on a golden cloud of gossip suggesting that she was so desirable even el Maien van Sietter rather than some buffton old friend of her father's was sniffing her bottom. Then the peace worker remembered that the poor kid had nearly been raped, he went over and bent to look gently into her face, saying: "Did he ... did he take your favour?"

She stared speechless into his eyes. He remembered him that he was the last person she would want to confess such a thing to and his face clenched up. But there was no other peace worker here. He stood back from her and said in as bland a tone as he could manage, "If you care to tell me what has been going on, perhaps I can help you arrange matters."

After a while she sobbed out, "I thought ... it would only be a kiss."

Arkyll absorbed this surprising information then enquired, "You ... prefer his kisses?"

She looked into his gentle handsome humorous face: the serene broad brow with the dark curls elegantly tumbling over it, the exquisite slanted blue eyes so kindly bent on her, the full red mouth soft with sympathy. He was gorgeous. She knew he was not supposed to take her seriously but even to be able to pretend that this delicious staple of the gossip-sheet menus was chasing her skirt had been Heaven. She had never hoped for more than the callow young officers who were not wise enough to give the chance of her favours the go-by but she had vaguely stupidly fantasised about el Maien van Sietter seeing something in her he liked (although what there could be that he could not find in an hundred other girls was a question) and ending by giving her a romantic kiss. Instead she had been found by him in this horrible situation, which in one of her novels might seem sexy but in actuality made her feel cold and shivery and as if she was some ragged dirty thing for men to wipe themselves on before throwing aside. Her paint-streaked tear-blotched face suffused with scarlet. She blurted out: "No! of course not. I .... He ... has always had a kiss. He never tried ... this before -- just made me give a kiss." In the wide brown eyes staring into his he saw that habitual frozen blankness which in his work he sometimes had to see in young people's faces who had been exploited in this way by someone they were obliged to treat with trust and he would struggle not to make obvious how angry he felt on their behalves. "When I was a little girl," she said, as if this would explain the matter to everyone's satisfaction, "he used to give me a sweetmeat but ... of course not now."

Arkyll stood with his face immobile to hear this.

---

Dame van Thiel shouted and made excuses and blamed everyone but herself, getting redder and redder in the face. van Thiel blustered and ramped up and down the carpets of the floral ladies' sitting-room, past van Sietter sitting very still in an armchair with a cold lack of expression on his face, Lady van Sietter sitting on one sofa with her back very straight and a veil in her blue eyes, her face cold pale and statuesque, and Captainofthepeace-Lord el Maien standing on the hearthrug in front of the low flickering fire. Finally van Thiel turned on his daughter who was sitting on the other sofa with her shoulders hunched, contorting her sweet plump figure into an hideous lump, her face still blotched with tears and streaky with face paint. He said pitifully: "I might have known you would put a spoke in the wheel and ruin it all! Is this what it comes to? I invite so fine a young man as any stupid cow of a girl could wish to have pretend an interest in her to our home and you treat him to such an entertainment!" Arkyll saw Sevianne's head lift and her face went pale under the streaks of paint so that her eyes became brown woodland pools in which the terror lurked like wounded deer seeking a last desperate refuge. "And now I've to give the glove to a man who has fought by my side and ridden to the hunt with me for years," van Thiel whined.

van Thiel was of course going to take his daughter's honour under his eye so he was just venting his grievance about losing a long-established and pleasurable companionship with a former comrade in arms but at this, van Sietter jerked upright out of his armchair and stalked over to Sevianne on the sofa. He rested an hand on her shoulder and squeezed it, turning a face livid with hot scorn on van Thiel.

"Give the glove to yourself," he snarled, "if you cannot keep the honour of your daughter safe under your eye, never mind her happiness."

Dame van Thiel leapt improvidently to her husband's defence, declaring: "You are a fine one to tell us of how to keep a daughter's honour bright! Bestowing your own daughter on a mere Knight. They said she could even have got el T'fel van P'shan but you threw her away on a Knight of your own region, just for the sake of his father!"

van Sietter's lip curled and his slanted grey eye flashed. "While her honour was under my eye, Captain-Lady el Maien was never suborned to sell a kiss for a sweetmeat!" he hissed. "I bestowed her mindful of her happiness although I knew it would expose both her and myself to slack-mouth gossip. And I taught her to defend her own honour if she so pleases." Suddenly he said, "I beg for your forgiveness, Dame Sevianne. You are overset and I am wrong to push you in such a situation." He gave an heavy sigh and added, "Any man who tries to take the honour of my wild kitten under his eye has my sympathy," his grey eye, his thin mouth were soft with tears, "but yours is not a wild cat like mine, just a little chicken whose honour has been attempted by someone sneaking in under the cloak of friendship. I ... know how that feels, Clair, but before you go and give the scum what he deserves for it, be mindful of your little one." He pressed his hand on Sevianne's shoulder again, looking down at her with that gentleness which he bent over all those who came under his eye: his former soldiers, his servants, his children. "You must not blame yourself, my dear," he said softly. "You must not think we will think the worse of you because some scum floated close to your skirt."

But in the desolation of her pretty shallow brown eyes Arkyll could see she knew that the gossip rippling out from this ball was wrecking all her hopes: for the rest of the evening's dancing, the trip to court, the marriage of high honour and prestige enhancing her family's position, all lost and her to sit on in the back region of Thiel, stitching and listening to her parents grumbling irrationally about it. She was not like his mother or his sister or his colleagues in the peace corps, women who went out into the world seeking knowledge and challenging injustice while the men fell adoringly at their feet. Marriage was everything to her but she must be taken, she might not choose on whom to depend for the happiness in home and family which she longed to enjoy with honour.

And here was his beloved mama, sitting stiff-backed on the sofa with her blue eyes veiled to disguise the pity she felt for a young woman awkwardly situated and her regret at the wreck of her hopes for van Thiel's counter and her splendid humanitarian programme.

When he stirred on the hearthrug they all looked at him: desolately, hopelessly, with sympathy, wistfully. He stood big and muscular in the suit cut to the latest fashion, the candlelight sparkling on the sapphires and grey pearl in his ear and on the rueful smile in his exquisite slanted blue eyes, the curve of his warm red el Jien mouth: sweet as a bowl of cherries.

"Mama," he said, "may I have the pleasure of a word?" They were all surprised at this but not as surprised as she was when they had stepped outside the room and he said to her, "have you got some sapphire ring with you that you no longer care for, my dear? Any old sapphire ring will do; I will get you a much nicer one for mid-winter Angels' day in return."

He had remembered him that that soppy biscuit loved to read romantic novels about pirates and brigands. Of course he would ask for her to be bestowed on him in marriage in order to save her from this dreadful mess but if he had to send her the ring by King's messenger in some mundane way she would be down-hearted and her soft brown eye would not sparkle nor her little bow of a mouth curve in the kissable smile.

His mother gripped her long pale fingers on his arm, looking with intent anxiety into his face, her round blue eyes suddenly clear with the veil ripped away from them. He gave her a smile back that was cherubic with innocence; that same smile he used to give when he had been accused of stealing the jam: Oh no, I never would, his father would become incandescent with fury at the lie, outraged that any son of the el Maiens should stoop to such subterfuge. She sighed, her head went down, then she lifted her head to smile softly into his slanted blue eyes and then she sighed again. She had always looked forward to his marriage, imagining that this would bring someone with similar intelligence to her own as a companion to her in her work. She would be glad to get van Thiel's counter, which would be in her pocket forever now. But she did not think it was worth it, to get a daughter by marriage of the likes of Sevianne el Shosta.

When they were sitting together in the splendid guest room which had been assigned to Lord and Lady van Sietter, Lisette brought them Lady van Sietter's jewellery boxes. Lisette was thrilled at the prospect of a new young Lady wife for the van Sietter family. She opened a small box to show to Lady van Sietter who took it with the smile still regretful on her wide warm el Jien mouth and then showed the ring to Arkyll: an huge heart diamond with tiny sapphires embedded in the setting around it. She said, "this was my mother's betrothal ring. Would this please your heart, my son?"

"Oh yes," he said with a twinkle of the blue eyes which gossip-sheets said were like sapphires. "My maternal grandmother's ring, I would probably have held her in great affection -- if we had ever spent much time with her, so her ring would have particular meaning for me. Very romantic, my dear. Eminently suitable."

"We-ell," she said with an hesitant slide of the eyes at Lisette, who sniggered, "my mother was an infamous slut in her day. Nearly as scandalous as your father," she sighed.

He burst out laughing, saying, "that sounds promising, my dear. I will buy you some splendid set in return: bracelet, necklace and all."

"No no," she said affectionately. "I will do much more than this for you if I may. And for her," she added hurriedly.

Arkyll strode back into the sitting-room where the van Thiels were sitting sullenly on one sofa while Sevianne sobbed on the other in the sympathetic curve of his father's arm. His father looked suspiciously at his mother coming in behind him and his face became crosser when she gave him an angelic look of innocence in reply. Arkyll went and knelt in front of the silly daughter of the el Shostas, raising blue eyes to her in which he was unable to repress a sniggering laugh at this romantic game he was playing. She was leaning back from him with her tear-bedewed face anxious, in fears that he had some tease on the go. His father had taken the opportunity to give her a rough cleaning with his kerchief so that she looked as if she did ordinarily have a prettiness about her, when her cheeks were not blotchily red and swollen and her eyes creased up small with misery.

"I beg of you to do me the honour of bestowing your hand on me in marriage," Arkyll said, adding hurriedly, "although I realise it is most improper of me not to have approached your father first and can only live in the hopes that he will smile on my suit and not cut me to ribbons for my impertinence." van Thiel started spluttering behind him. He held the ring carelessly out to her, the firelight and candlelight flashed in the diamond and made rainbows run over her face. His father stiffened in disbelief at the sight of a ring with which he was probably all too familiar in rather different social settings. "We el Maiens usually give sapphires of course," Arkyll said. "This ring was my maternal grandmother's betrothal ring and has particular meaning to me. I hope you will find it acceptable although the main stone is a diamond? Happy to buy you any other you have a preference for, my dear, of course," he added in a final mumble. He was starting to laugh too much to keep up the charade.

Her face suddenly flushed with joy, the brown eyes which lifted to him sparkled in a tremulous appealing delight almost as much as the diamond. It was almost worth it.

"Mama!" she was saying, lifting her head in excitement.

Dame van Thiel was already there staring incredulous at the ring which Arkyll slipped hurriedly onto Sevianne's trembling finger. He got stiffly off his knee and stepped back into the joyous embrace of that undeserving dog van Thiel's arms. They were bustling all about with excitement, van Thiel going to call the servants to fetch something very special from his cellars then coming back without calling to look again in disbelieving wonder at the precious ring on his precious daughter's finger. "Give the man a kiss then!" he cried. "No no!" Arkyll said hurriedly. Sweetmeats or sapphires, he did not want a kiss bought from anyone's lips unless she was a properly trained prostitute.

Later, as he walked back to their room with his Lady wife, van Sietter said in a tone of immense displeasure, "here's a fine basket of fruit you have landed us in."

"Promiseds't it me woulds't never speak to me again if this came about," she reminded him demurely.

---

Arkyll sat in one of the flowered armchairs in the ladies' sitting-room alone with his head in his hands, staring at the carpet which clashed with the armchairs and with the curtains, and wondering what he had gone and done. What was Captainofthepeace Daria Inien going to think of this silly bitch on his arm? What were Mimi and Lisette going to think? What would Tisha ... his mouth twisted wryly at the corner. No, Tisha would approve of the comely young bird-brain with her big round hips so promising for easily pushing out the van Sietter babies. He knew exactly what Arrie would think and she would say it in no uncertain terms.

He heard a noise behind him and sat up to find that van Thiel had come back in the sitting-room and was wending his way between the armchairs. Arkyll had no wish to be exposed to more of his future father by marriage's nonsense and started to get up but van Thiel nodded his head insistently to make Arkyll sit back down again. Arkyll saw with a qualm that he was holding a tray with a decanter and small bowls on it.

"Ver' special brandy," van Thiel slurred. "Las' bottle. Won it off van Athagine one time. Took his encampment inna practice raid. van Athagine's own brandy. Ver' special, my son." He blubbed a bit to call Arkyll his son.

Arkyll calculated that van Thiel must have won the brandy off van Athagine at least twenty years previously and if it was from van Athagine's own cellar it was certain to be a rare treat so he accepted a bowl and sniffed it expectantly.

van Thiel sat staring solemnly at Arkyll and finally he said: "My son. Everyone was cross when I ran off with Sevie's mother. Only a Dame, no polish, not fit for the sworn Lord," he pulled an expressive face and Arkyll briefly saw through the weathered skin and wrinkles and little layer of fat a laughing careless young officer-aristocrat with blond hair and brown eyes like Sevie, who had engaged in practice battles with Arkyll's uncles in the Vail plains and Thiel woodland where they liked to practice the summer manoeuvres -- when they were at peace. "Never regretted it," van Thiel said solemnly. "Comfortable. Like to come home of an evening and take my ease, not be troubled with a lot of stuff about art and politics and whatever. Excellent mother," he said with emphasis. "Devoted. Always had my happiness under her eye. Eh?" He looked anxiously at Arkyll.

"Oh yes, sir," Arkyll said politely. He smiled at van Thiel's owlish solemn drunken face, his slanted blue eyes crinkling appealingly. "I like to take things easy myself."

He took a cautious sip of the brandy, reflecting that it would certainly be pleasant to have the compensations of someone maturing in his bed into the luscious charms of a tame tigress like Dame van Thiel to look forward to. He smiled again, in deep appreciation. The brandy truly was superb. Almost worth it.

---

Owing to the war and the van Thiels' eagerness not to let him slip through Sevianne's plump little fingers with the sapphires and diamond on one of them, Arkyll was able to push for a modest and early wedding the following Spring. Sevianne said, "Oh! no trip to court?" mournfully but Arkyll glared at her mother and said in repressive tones that he would take her himself on an honeymoon trip. He had no intention of letting loose his prospective bride in unsuitable garments featuring the new cut at parties where el V'lair and those slack-moral el Statens would come sniffing around her skirt.

He walked down the corridors of Thiel Castle from a final bowl with the menfolk, resplendent in a dark blue silk high-collared jacket and breeches, a flight of birds embroidered in silver flashing up and over one shoulder. Sevianne had made a pleasing appearance one step in front of her father at the chapel door. His father had arranged for one of the older ladies' maids from the Castle Sietter staff to go down to Thiel and lend her advice on the el Shosta bride's trousseau. Tillia had clearly gained considerable influence (well worth the double pay van Sietter had been obliged to give her to get her to go to some back region where the women-lovers only had rough bars to go to instead of pleasant sophisticated cafés). Sevianne had still been wearing the charming old-fashioned dresses which suited her best and had learned to manage her face paint so that you could actually see how pretty she was.