Jana, Episode 6

Ianthe watched from the shadows behind a high window overlooking the courtyard. At first her eyes were round with amazement at how much Stefan knew, considering he had never held a sword before he left the castle last August. Could Jana have taught him starting from nothing? She tried to imagine herself doing it.

After a while, she became bored with it, but watched anyway, for any tell-tale signs of seduction, or mushy behavior, soulful looks, and such. Would the girl make eyes at her brother? But they were padded to the eyeballs; it was as unromantic as it was possible to imagine. Now the action became faster and wilder. Ianthe could see that it was indeed a dance. Faster, faster, faster they moved, thrust and parry, feint and lunge, attack and retreat, moves for which she had no words. Then they collapsed on the ground, and panted. The foreign girl was making Stefan drink water all the time. Then it was quarter staves. Their tunics were soaked in perspiration. They pulled off their tunics, and sparred away in padding and loincloths only.
Half an hour of archery practice. There was a fine collection of bows, in the northern style, and lots of arrows. After his accuracy got sufficiently good, she focused on his speed. Quiver at the hip. He had to pull the arrow, draw and release, in one smooth motion, over and over. Finally he threw the bow down, and sat on the steps.
“What did you tell her?”
Jana came to sit across from him. She covered her cheeks in shame.
“I told her... I took responsibility...”
“Oh dear gods!” Stefan was aghast; Jana had as good as confessed that they had slept together.
“... For my part of it.”
“What does that mean?”
“I’m a girl, you’re a boy, and we...”
“You told her that?” he asked, exasperated.
“Think! You asked the King to bring me here! What will anyone think? They’re not stupid, you know! I only admitted that all the --lust --was not on your side!”
Stefan groaned. “Now she’ll think you’re some greedy adventuress, after what she can get out of us!”
Jana laughed, without humor.
“Blunt swords,” she said. “Get up!”

The Queen joined Ianthe at the window.
“What are they up to?”
“Bashing each other’s brains out,” said Ianthe, thoughtfully. “They break for water, every now and then. Sometimes they sit and talk between bouts.”
“Any touching, any -- you know, making eyes at each other?”
“Not so far. Serious talking, though.”
“No doubt saying how cruel I am.”
“Well, were you?”
“Child, the girl seduced him!”
Ianthe looked at her mother, wide-eyed. Stefan had more or less confessed something like that. She turned back to watch the sparring. “What good could she expect to have gotten out of it?”
“Who knows? People get foolish notions!”
They watched the fierce battle together for a while.
“Why are they fighting naked?” demanded the Queen.
“Mother, just look! Sweating like that, what could they wear?”

Life at the Palace
Gradually, Jana’s life settled down into a routine. Breakfast was always in the Royal kitchen, with Sophie and little Nina. Lunch was with the Prince, and more recently, also with the Princess. Then there was riding in the afternoons, after which Jana was free. She practiced her knife-throwing in the courtyard, or the exercises for her unarmed combat. These two arts were the province of women, and Jana never thought to teach them to the Prince.
Supper was in the barracks, and then it was bed with Andromache. Andromache and her friends drew Jana into their circle, so that she had people to talk to, when she was lonely. At the palace, Cook, little Nina and Sophie were always warm and friendly, but they were never at leisure to simply visit. There was always work to be done; cooking, sewing, mending, tidying, and generally looking after the Queen and her children, and running messages between the administrative side of the palace and the Queen.
Jana never asked for a bed of her own; she became accustomed to Andromache, a warm affectionate girl, and in time Andromache’s wild thrashing about at night ceased as she learned to sleep quietly with her arms around Jana. Jana was considered a part of the Palace Guard, and invited for all their functions and entertainments, and Jana began to feel at home in the City.
One day while Jana was practicing her knife-throwing in the courtyard by herself, she happened to look up, and saw Ianthe watching from a window. She beckoned the girl down to the courtyard. Soon she joined Jana with a grin, her merry blue eyes sparkling with mischief.
“Would you like to learn knife-throwing?” Jana asked, “You never know when it might come in handy!”
“I would like that, thanks!”
“Come, let’s start close to the target. Bend your legs, like this, and ... straight in. Now you try.”
Ianthe bent her legs, and to her surprise, her first throw shot the knife straight into the target, all the way in. By supper time, Ianthe could hit the target from ten paces away, a skill that usually took considerably longer to acquire.
“What is that other thing you do,” she asked, “like a dance, kicking and so forth?”
And so Jana found herself teaching both brother and sister.

A few weeks after Jana’s arrival, the Queen and Ianthe met to discuss matters.
“Stefan is crazy about her,” Ianthe said.
“Yes,” growled the Queen.
“They’re never alone together except in the practice court.” The Queen nodded with a sigh. “He keeps trying to get her to come up to his room, but she won’t.”
“How do you know?”
“Trust me, I know!”
“You’re far too precocious!”
“I’m only trying to help you, my Lady.”
“Go on.”
“She’s an excellent teacher. She’s taught me knife-throwing!”
“Oh my child!” the Queen exclaimed, horrified.
“It’s perfectly safe,” laughed Ianthe, “I’ve never hit Jana once! And Stefan watches us all the time.” The Queen regarded her daughter skeptically. “I saw him, that’s how I know!”
“Go on.”
“She has hardly any clothes. She has three tunics, the black one, the green-edged brown uniform, and a grey one borrowed from someone.” The Queen said nothing. “Each night she washes her tunics, and wears them the next day.”
“Ianthe, be careful. This is a dangerous girl, not what she appears to be. We have no idea whom she is working for; it could be anybody!”
“Well, whoever it is, they should give her better clothes!”
Jana was surprised when she was sent for after supper one night. She was measured by the Royal Seamstress, and shortly afterwards she received several tunics, shifts and dresses. Jana liked the simple dress of Queen Ione’s people. The women wore simple, loose, sleeveless tunics of various lengths, sometimes slit on the sides, for ease of movement, and often with a belt or sash at the waist. For formal occasions, as among the horse-people, the women wore in addition shawls or veils. The men wore belted tunics, sometimes with a shawl thrown over the shoulder. For hard labor, men and women alike wore loincloths or breechclouts, sometimes with a singlet, as Jana and Stefan had done.
An unanticipated by-product of Ianthe’s constant spying on Jana was that she was coming to realize not only Jana’s good nature and character, but to appreciate her beauty. It was impossible to watch her hour after hour without noticing her grace and balance, the perfection of her musculature. She was a beautiful animal, and Ianthe came to admire her without realizing it. No one could compare, man or woman, to the muscular perfection of Jana’s legs, the smooth strength of her arms, and not even her loose tunic could disguise the depth of her chest. On the other hand, most of what Ianthe saw from her window was the top of Jana’s head, the streaky blonde hair pulled back and tied with leather. Ianthe began to notice, with amused wonder, how she looked forward to seeing that sleek head again whenever Jana went out to the fields for a long run.
On a market day, one time, it was arranged that the Queen, Stefan and Ianthe would go out to the city with Jana, Sophie and Little Nina, to sacrifice at the temples, and show Jana a little of the culture of the City. Jana was made to wear more feminine garb, and leave her sword behind. Ianthe assured her mother that Jana needed no weapons to be an effective guard for them.
Though Markets in most cities were similar in many ways, there were also startling differences, in the ways wares were laid out, the variety of available merchandise, the process of buying, not to mention the interaction between customers. Jana found that it was far more fascinating than she could have imagined, even if many of the things she saw on the way were quite familiar. The delight that the other four found in every little thing doubled and tripled Jana’s own pleasure; Nina went into raptures about such things as polished pebbles. Jana spent all her money on gifts for Sophie and Nina, while Ianthe bought her little ornaments and a small piece of jewelry she could wear on a chain, or pin to a tunic. Much as Stefan might have liked to buy Jana a gift, it was not permitted.
The people paused in their haggling to stare at the Queen, as could have been expected, but the party’s little visit did not disrupt business unduly. The Queen did not buy anything, only looked at the merchandise with polite interest. It was an effort for Ianthe to make shopkeepers accept her money, since they were eager to give the pretty child whatever she desired as a gift. On the other hand, it was considered auspicious to have the Princess or the Prince make a purchase, according to local superstition, which made for an interesting experience altogether.
As they walked from one group of shops to the next, Jana placed herself between the Queen and the street, and the watchful eyes of the foreign girl were remarked by many in quiet whispers. The Queen herself could not help feeling particularly safe with Jana near. Jana laid her hands on the Queen only once, when she tripped on a bit of uneven pavement, and found herself steadied immediately by a pair of large, warm hands. She turned and thanked Jana, with a smile, and Jana withdrew her hands politely.
They returned to the Palace by way of the duck pond, and of course the children had to feed the fish and the ducks, and the Queen waited at the guard post nearby with the Prince and Sophie, while Jana took Ianthe and Nina to obtain the little bowl of food to feed them, and to watch that Nina did not fall in as she did the feeding. The girl of the Horse People was happy that day, and the Queen marveled at how her joy lit her face. Her rather plain face was transformed by pleasure and happiness, in contrast to the look of gloom she seemed to normally wear.
Ianthe’s warmth towards Jana was quickly serving to distract the latter from her misery, and despite all her suspicions, the Queen began to distrust Jana a lot less. Once it was verified that Jana did not communicate with anyone on her runs in the fields, it was obvious that she was not in touch with anyone outside the palace grounds. Jana, it appeared, was not a spy.

The Pool
Now there was an enclosed pool adjoining the palace near the sea, where at high tide the Royal Family could bathe and swim in privacy. Stefan was allowed to go there, but the Queen would not let Ianthe go. Young Lady Penelope, Ianthe’s closest friend, having remembered the pool, pestered her to have a bathing picnic there. “The Lady Jana could watch us, we would be perfectly safe!”
This was a good idea. Ianthe took it to the Queen, who decided to allow it. A picnic was prepared, and the girls conducted Jana to the pool.

It was a lovely building, with high walls for privacy, a section for washing in fresh water, and a large pool for swimming and bathing, and benches on which a picnic could be eaten. The girls carefully undressed, with Jana’s help, all the way down to the skin, to Jana’s discomfiture. She did not know how to act with two quite nude ladies of the high nobility. Penelope, a beautiful green-eyed blonde child with an innocent, almost angelic disposition sometimes turned into a wild thing in Ianthe’s company. Once they were in the water, Penelope’s silly side came to the fore. She spent as much time prancing around the pool as in the water, dancing and showing off her pretty body, flaunting herself to an imaginary audience.
Penelope had always been admiring of Jana, and after a particularly silly episode, Penelope saw Jana look mildly disapproving. To her amazement, she noticed that Jana was in a bathing cloth. Ianthe had seen it, and realized that it was a cultural issue, that Jana’s people must surely have different standards of modesty. They thought nothing of sparring with blunt swords almost naked, but nude bathing was possibly not ever indulged in --which was absolutely correct, as it happened. Penelope, though, was affronted. No one should bathe with clothes on! It was mortifying to be capering around naked, when Lady Jana --as she called the humble Horse Officer -- was skulking wrapped in a cloth. “Off, off, off it comes!” called Penelope, pointing accusingly at the bathing-cloth, and Ianthe decided to side with her friend. Faced with two determined girls who wanted to get her naked, Jana gave in with good grace.
For a long while Ianthe stared at Jana’s naked body in awe. The parts of Jana that were usually visible were as nothing compared to what they saw now, as Jana went to lay her cloth on the bench. Now her chest, her abdomen, all of her was revealed, and how harmonious was the whole!
“You are beautiful,” Ianthe whispered, and Penelope stopped her antics, and looked.
“Yes, you are,” agreed Penelope, in a hushed voice, “like a very goddess.”
“So are you both,” said Jana with natural humility, and sincerity.
The two girls eyed each other, truly seeing each other for the first time.
“It’s getting chilly,” said Jana.
“It’s time to dry up,” agreed Ianthe, a little red in the face.
“Picnic time!” sang Penelope, who could not be subdued for long.

“Oh, my Lady,” said Penelope to the Queen later, “we had the most wonderful time!”
“And what did you do?” asked the Queen.
“Well, we swam,” said Penelope, leaving the Queen to imagine what other mischief she had gotten up to.

For Ianthe, though, that afternoon was a turning-point. She recognized the admiration for Jana that had lain hidden in her heart. She loved beauty in all its forms, and as she had declared so frankly, Jana was a beauty in her eyes. When Jana fought, or practiced her unarmed combat, or knife-throwing, or fencing, it was pure poetry in motion.

K