On the sideboard stood a range of bottles containing vile-coloured liquids, together with numerous clay bowls heaped with lurid powders.A purple cloth covered the round table and opposite sat Dr Irfan Paya, hunched within his hooded robes. A long greying beard poked from his shadowy face, and from his neck, strung on a thick silver chain, dangled a long twisted piece of metal.Octavia’s palm was upturned in his slender bejewelled fingers.‘There have been many men in your life,’ said the doctor after an interminable silence.Octavia snorted. ‘I don’t need a soothsayer to tell me that,’ she said, her bass voice resonant. ‘It’s common bloody knowledge.’The doctor raised a hand for silence, and resumed his contemplation of her palm.‘Many have pleased you; many have charmed you.’ The doctor inhaled deeply, his head raised, his eyes closed. His skin was like tanned leather, dark and lined, and his eyebrows were thick and grey. ‘I see a man watching you,’ he continued.
