Free The Braided World by Kay Kenyon

her up, giving her a chance to climb up the crossbars on the pier.
    He glanced at her hat.
    It was a gift. When at Samwan's compound she'd mentioned the need of a hat to keep off the sun, and the mistress's hoda were set to devising a head-covering-with-brim. The first designs were hopeless, but she quite liked this one.
    Bailey threw him a smile. “Like it?”
    His hand came around her elbow. “Yes, it's smashing.” He led her down the dock. “While you've been out trying on hats,” he said, “the king's been looking for you.”
    “Whatever for?”
    “Stick around and you'd know more.” She could see that he was enjoying this, keeping her in the dark. Then he turned serious. “It's dangerous for you to be out there, on the river, alone. I'd like your support, Bailey. I'd like everyone's support, so that we're all… paddling in the same direction.”
    She pushed her hat more firmly on her head so as not tolose it in the breakneck pace Anton was setting. “Where are we
paddling
at the moment, Captain? It would entirely help if I had the sense we were in fact going somewhere.”
    Anton kept his gaze straight ahead, maneuvering her to the left to ascend a long ramp. “To the plaza,” he said.
    “Oh dear, dressed like this?” But where they were headed at the moment was not the question she'd intended to ask, as Anton very well knew.
    He said, “Vidori is taking a walk to view his plaza, and we're invited.”
    “Well, I saw it this morning, and I can tell you it's nothing but mud.”
    “You've been gone all morning or you'd know that about one hundred hoda have been in the square since dawn shoveling mud and washing the flagstones.”
    Bailey took advantage of his softening grip by pulling out of his reach and stopping in her tracks. “I've been
productive
this morning. I've been at Samwan's compound, and I've discovered some very interesting things that Nick, for all his training, has failed to notice.” She had his attention. Those black eyes, so startling in a fair-skinned boy.
    “For one thing,” she went on, “the judipon. They have their fingers everywhere—knee-deep in family affairs, advising, cajoling, meeting in committees to decide disputes. They're inveterate busybodies, they know everyone's secrets, and yet the Dassa actually seem to
like
them. They're only males, by the way, as Nick guessed.” She shrugged. “He gets some things right, Anton, but of course he's limited by the situation.” The
situation
that Vidori kept them in the pavilion, and Anton complied. Of all the crew, only Bailey was welcomed abroad. Nick said it was out of respect for her age, and that she was beyond bearing years.
    “So you don't need to worry about me. They're a peaceful people from what I've seen.” After all, the little incident with that fellow breaking into their sleeping hut hadn't been repeated, had it?
    But Anton wouldn't let it go. “We're dealing with abrand-new culture, and you don't have the training, Bailey. I'm afraid you're not being cautious.”
    She sighed. “Of course I'm not being cautious, you ninny. Cautious is what's wrong with this expedition. Cautious is why it took me eight years to convince the authorities to even let our ship launch. Cautious is what's keeping us cooped up in this house of cards. No, I'm not cautious. Nor should you be, Anton Prados. How does it look to the Dassa that an old woman's the only one with the guts to go paddling on the river?”
    She backed up a half-step at the look on his face. Oh dear, she might have gone too far. She lifted her chin to brazen it out.
    His voice came more gently than she expected. “We
will
go on the river. Soon.”
    They stared at each other, neither one giving in. She hadn't quite seen this stubborn side of Anton before, back an eternity ago when she made her impulsive choice for captain. But it
was
her choice, for better or worse.
    “I'm trying to befriend him, Bailey.”
    Vidori. The old fox who was playing political games, no