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DREAMS AND REALITY

‘T HE DREAM-BOX IS MISSING .’

Malta looked from one solemn face to the other. Both her mother and grandmother were watching her intently. Her eyes widened in surprise. ‘How could it be? Are you certain?’

Her mother spoke quietly. ‘I am very certain.’

Malta came the rest of the way into the room and took her place at the breakfast table. She lifted the cover from the dish in front of her. ‘Not porridge again? We can’t possibly be this poor! How could the box be missing?’

She looked up to meet their eyes again. Her grandmother’s glance was narrowed as she said, ‘I thought perhaps you might know.’

‘Mother had it last. She didn’t give it to me, she barely let me touch it,’ Malta pointed out. ‘Is there any fruit or preserves to go on this stuff?’

‘No. There is not. If we are to pay our debts in a timely fashion, we are going to have to live simply for a while. You have been told that.’

Malta heaved a sigh. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said contritely.

‘Sometimes I forget. I hope Papa gets home soon. I’ll be so glad when things are as they are supposed to be again.

’ She looked up at her mother and grandmother again and essayed a smile.

‘Until then, I suppose we should just be thankful for what we have.’ She sat up straight, put an agreeable look on her face, and spooned up some of the porridge.

‘So. You have no thoughts on the missing dream-box?’ her grandmother pressed.

Malta shook her head and swallowed. ‘No. Unless… did you ask the servants if they moved it when they tidied? Nana or Rache might know something.’

‘I put it away. It was not left out where it might be moved by chance. Someone had to come inside my room, search for it, and then remove it.’

‘Is anything else missing?’ Malta asked quickly.

‘Nothing.’

Malta ate another spoonful of porridge thoughtfully. ‘Could it have just… disappeared?’ she asked with a half-smile. ‘I know, maybe that is silly. But one hears such extravagant tales of the goods of the Rain Wild. After a time, one almost begins to believe anything is possible.’

‘No. It would not have disappeared,’ her grandmother said slowly. ‘Even if it had been opened, it would not disappear.’

‘How do you know so much about dream-boxes?’ Malta asked curiously. She poured herself a cup of tea and sweetened it well with honey as she waited for a reply.

‘A friend of mine was given one once. She opened the box and dreamed the dream. And she accepted the young man’s suit. But he died before they were wed. I believe she married his brother a few years later.’

‘Ick,’ observed Malta. She took another spoonful of porridge and added, ‘I can’t imagine marrying a Rain Wilder. Even if they are supposed to be our kin, and all. Can you imagine kissing someone who was all warty? Or having breakfast with him in the morning?’

‘There is more to men than how they look,’ her grandmother observed coldly. ‘When you realize that, I may start treating you as a woman.’ She turned her disapproving stare on her own daughter now. ‘Well. What are we going to do?’

Malta’s mother shook her head. ‘What can we do? Explain, most politely, that somehow the gift was lost before we could return it. But that we still cannot consider the suit, as Malta is far too young.’

‘We can’t possibly tell them we lost his gift!’ her grandmother exclaimed.

‘Then what can we do? Lie? Say we are keeping it but refusing the suit anyway? Pretend we never got it and ignore the situation?’ Keffria’s voice was getting more and more sarcastic with each suggestion she made.

‘We’d only end up looking more foolish. As it was my fault, I shall write the letter, and I shall take the blame.

I shall write that I had put it in a place I deemed safe, but it was gone in the morning.

I shall offer most sincere apologies and reparation.

But I shall also refuse the suit, and most tactfully point out that such a gift so early in a courting is scarcely appropriate… ’

‘By Rain Wild standards, it is,’ Ronica disagreed. ‘Especially for the Khuprus family. Their wealth is legendary. The boy probably considered it little more than a trinket.’

‘Mm. Maybe we should marry Malta off to him, then,’ her mother offered facetiously. ‘We could certainly use a wealthy relative these days.’

‘Mother!’ Malta exclaimed in irritation. She hated it when her mother said things like that.

‘It was a joke, Malta. Don’t fly into a fit about it.’ Keffria stood up from the table. ‘Well. This is not going to be an easy letter to compose. I had best get started.’

‘Assure them that if we find the box, it will be returned,’ her grandmother suggested.

‘Of course. And I do intend to search my room again. But I’d best get this letter written if I am to have anything to send with the Kendry when she sails.’ Malta’s mother hastened out of the room.

Malta scooped up the last spoonful of porridge from her bowl, but she was not quite fast enough.

‘Malta,’ her grandmother said in a soft but firm voice.

‘I want to ask you, one last time, if you stole the box from your mother’s room.

No, think before you answer. Think what this means to our family honour, to your reputation.

Answer truthfully, and I promise not to be angry with you about your first lie.

’ Her grandmother waited, holding her breath, watching Malta like a snake.

Malta set down her spoon. ‘I did not steal anything,’ she said in a quivering voice.

‘I don’t know how you can believe such things of me.

What have I ever done to you, to deserve these accusations all the time?

Oh, I wish my father were here, to see how I am treated while he is away.

I am sure this is not the life he intended for his only daughter! ’

‘No. He’d have auctioned you off like a fat calf by now,’ her grandmother said shortly.

‘Do not flap your emotions at me. You may fool your mother but you don’t fool me.

I tell you this plainly. If you have taken the dream-box and opened it, well, that is bad enough a hole for us to dig out of.

But if you persist in lying and keep that thing…

oh, Malta. You cannot flaunt a courtship from one of the major Trader families of the Rain Wilds.

This is not a time for your childish little games.

Financially, we are teetering. What has saved us thus far is that we are known for keeping our word.

We don’t lie, we don’t cheat, we don’t steal.

We pay our debts honestly. But if people lose faith in that, if they start believing we do not keep our word, then we are lost, Malta.

Lost. And young as you are, you will have to help pay the forfeit for that. ’

Malta stood slowly. She flung down her spoon so it rang against her plate.

‘My father will be home soon, with a fat purse from his hard work. And he will pay off your debts and protect us from the ruin your stubbornness has brought us to. We’d have no problems if Grandpa had traded up the Rain Wild River, like any other man with a liveship.

If you’d listened to Davad and sold off the bottom land, or at least let him use his slaves to work it for shares, we wouldn’t be in this hole.

It’s not my stubbornness that threatens this family, but yours. ’

Her grandmother’s face had gone from stern to shocked.

Now her mouth was pinched white with fury.

‘Do you listen at doors, sweet grand-daughter? To the words of a dying man to his wife? I had thought many things of you, Malta, both good and bad. But I never suspected you of being a prying little eavesdropper.’

Malta wagged her head coldly. She made her voice sweet.

‘I was told it was how one became accepted as a woman in this family. To know the family holdings and finances, to be aware of both dangers and opportunities. But it seems to me you would rather risk any opportunity for the sake of keeping my father in ignorance. You don’t really see him as a member of this family, do you?

Oh, he’s fine for fathering children and keeping my mother content.

But you want nothing of him beyond that.

Because then he might threaten your own plan.

To keep power and control for yourself, even if it means ruin for the family.

’ Malta had not known the depth of her own anger until she heard it poured out as venom.

Her grandmother’s voice was shaking as she replied.

‘If your father is ignorant of our ways, it is because he never took the time to learn them. If he had, I would not be so fearful of the power he already wields. Malta.’ The woman took a breath.

‘You show me, here and now, that you have understanding I did not suspect in you. If you had shown us the depth of your understanding before, perhaps your mother and I would have seen you as more adult than child. For now, understand this. When Ephron… when your grandfather died, I could have retained far more control of the family fortune than I did. His wish was that Althea have the ship. Not Keffria and your father. It was I who persuaded him that your father would be a better choice for captain. Would I have done that, if my hope were to keep control for myself? If I opposed your father being a full member of this family? I believed in his stability and wisdom. But he was not content to inherit. He brought too much change, too fast, with no real understanding of what he was changing, or why such change would be bad. He never consulted any of us about it. Suddenly, it was all his own will and what he thought was best. I do not keep him in ignorance, Malta. His ignorance is a fortress he has built himself and defended savagely.’