CHAPTER TWELVE
S he had been told the fourth captain’s mansion was nearer the middle of the city. Technically, a higher status. The choice had been his after Captain Tsenturian opted for one of the mansions closest to those who scrubbed waste bins.
“You are lucky to be the courier of such a humble man,” Miriam had said.
However, Petra only nodded and hurried away.
It was a humble decision; the last mansions were intended for the lowest ranking officers of Shivalry. Living where the smells of an entire city might drift over the walls at any time of the day, especially when the summer sun cooked all it touched, took humility.
He hid something behind his unassuming nature. It was false. No one would believe a righteous man would harm an innocent but that was precisely it. His actions were justified by the book of moral code and Aldney had broken decorum.
Into the backs of her hands, Petra dug her nails though she felt nothing. Conviction and confusion toiled within her. Although she laced her fingers as she walked, it did not stop the shaking.
She was desperate for an answer, ready to believe anything grim that filled the spaces haunting her. Simultaneously, she wanted to have been helped by the same man who helped her brother. In this way, she might have one more connection to Aldney before she was forced to live with memories.
Rand’s eyes were garnet stones and clear. Their heat was not buffered. And she could not reconcile those eyes to the answer she seemed to be getting. Today her hands were numb. Tomorrow it might be her arms, and the next her lips, until the lack of sensation incapacitated her entirely.
I’ll crawl if I must. I’ll pull myself with my teeth. When he returns, I will have the answer.
At the gate of the fourth captain’s mansion, two servants stood. Petra touched the chest pocket, and they pushed the big gate inwards.
Statues decorated the courtyard. Animals with strangely feminine faces and womanly curves. Even the ones depicted as human had cat tails or rabbit ears. All were finely polished stone. Most of them stood in a reflection pond in which no fish nor lotus blossom leaves ruffled the water.
Unlike the sand and pavers of other courtyards, wooden planks had been laid here in a thatch-work pattern. The soles of her shoes scuffed as she walked towards the rounded door of the dwelling. However, her visit had been noted and the disk shaped opening rolled aside before she was within arm’s reach.
A manservant beckoned her forward.
“I do not know if I am to wait for a reply.”
With both hands, he took the scroll she passed him. “I shall ask lord Larkin.”
He zipped away. The space she stood in had been decorated for receiving and boasted of long tables on low legs with chairs that were little more than arm and back rests. Incense burned at the corners of the space, filling the air with a sweet, thick aroma. From rooms unseen, she heard voices and laughter of conversations that seemed to consist of men and women.
Eventually, one of the voices pulled away from the rest. Still talking and laughing, Petra saw the same man to grab and shake her that first night as a courier emerge. Dressed sumptuously in purple brocade and brushed wool, this was the same man Rand had told to control himself.
This was Captain Larkin.
Bending forward, she genuflected, quick to avoid seeing if there should be recognition in his expression.
“Ah!” he barked. “Not only am I cast off by my compatriot, now I am served by his conniving chit.”
Useless, apparently.
Keeping her gaze down, Petra asked if she was to wait for a reply. In turn, he stalked around her.
“Tell me, Little One , while your master is away, how will you spend your time?”
“My master is the emperor, my lord.”
“Don’t play dumb with me. Off all the officers in this city, you set your sights on the one man who clutches his vows like other men clutch their gonads. I’ve seen women undress in front of him and not a flicker of color arises in his cheeks.”
“Captain Tsenturian is very kind.”
He paused. “And I am not?”
“I said no such thing, my lord. It is well known men of Shivalry—”
“Silence!” He pushed her. “I remember you. You were the one who did not bow when we passed. The one Rand defended. And now he makes you his courier. And he shames me by leaving me in the company of mere soldiers. So, show me!” He grabbed her chin between his thumb and first finger. “I want to experience the same wiles, if I am to have nothing else.”
Across the city, moments like this happened at every hour. Women and men alike. An enraged superior yanks the thick, invisible chain they are tethered to in this existence. The servant drops to their knees, not bothering to fight the way the chain cinches around their skin. There was no other correct response. Their dignity was an illusion. They were reminded to whom they owed their life.
Petra did not jerk away.
“I was there when you came to the palace, though you only had eyes for him. The emperor did not notice the way your powers made him jump to his feet, the way your insipid voice seduced him.”
“Please, my lord. I am no one who deserves your notice.”
He let go of her chin only to clamp his hand around the back of her neck. “Show me! Seduce me the way you seduced him!”
“My lord, please!”
“He’s not here to protect you, Little One. He’s not here to outrank me and command me to stop.”
An evil, lustrous gleam tinted his eyes. Over her he towered like a cobra over a buttonquail. His nostrils flared and she was sure she’d see a forked tongue slip from between his thin lips. If he wanted to violate her, he could. His grip tightened and he closed what little space there was between them.
Imagining her naked body before him, forced to yield, made her eyes feel as if they would pop from their sockets.
“Show me,” he seethed. “I see no beauty in your face. Only your eyes are of note. Show me how liquid they can become.”
Only one chance to get away would be afforded to her. Her thoughts raced. She would have to move first and then scream. Without being strong enough to overpower him, her movement must be unexpected and give her enough space before he could catch and silence her. Whatever chairs or paintings, statues or vases she might be able to overturn, causing commotion, would be the only aid.
Was this how you felt, Aldney? When Lady Melisende made her desires known?
She jumped. Not forward at him but straight up, kicking her feet towards her buttocks and landing on her knees. Pain exploded over her shins into her ankles, but Petra did not falter and immediately scrambled away.
“Help! Someone, help!”
“Whore!” he thundered.
She tore off her robe and thrust it at him, getting to her feet and running to the opposite end of the room.
“Help!”
Maybe she had two strides on him. Maybe the robe caused him to stumble for half a second. There was no time to turn and look. Petra ran, screaming. If she could make it to the threshold, the sound of her voice would carry before he got her under his control. Someone might come. It was her only chance.
“Cursed, conniving wench! I will spread you and choke you with my seed!”
“Captain Larkin Maltencent!”
The voice came from the opposite end of the room at the opening of another hallway. Something in her recognized the voice but already she could feel the heat of Larkin’s body.
“Cease this instant, Maltencent!”
“This does not concern you, old man!”
She felt a deft blow between her shoulder blades. The air from her lungs launched out and she dropped to all fours, gasping.
Bartholomew rushed forward and stood between them.
“I act on authority of my master, and I forbid you one more step or Captain Tsenturian will know the instant he returns! I saw her enter your gate when I was on the road. It is my job to keep her safe while my lord is away.”
By now, other bodies from the gathering heard the commotion and came forward, like a macabre audience. Both Larkin and Bartholomew seemed unaware but through her fear-blurred vision, she saw the way the scene appeared. A disheveled servant, possibly wanton, on her knees before the superior she had offended. The reason and rationale of another servant, no matter his age and distinguishment, truly meant nothing.
Some of the male guests looked bored. This was an interruption of their enjoyment. Some of the women looked angry that their time had been taken over by a spat with a servant. A few looked concerned. None looked on with empathy.
“Be gone, old man!” Larkin ordered. “You have no authority here!”
Bartholomew then used the crowd to his advantage. Larkin could not, in front of his peers, seemingly go against his captain’s orders.
“And you have no authority over a courier of this city, let alone one charged to Captain Tsenturian’s service!”
Several faces looked with renewed interest upon her. Chattering hummed through the guests. Larkin cursed foully and Bartholomew bent down over her, placing his hands, with care, under her arms.
“Get up, child,” he said.
“I can’t...can’t breathe yet!”
“It will be no more difficult on your feet. Get up,” he repeated just as softly but with more urgency. “You serve the city of the emperor, not this man. Do not be a mouse. Do not let him shake your dignity.”
Dignity.
Bartholomew had that. He was an indentured servant, but his chin was upright and the expression in his eyes calm. He did not look over his shoulder in fear that a hand would strike. The same with Augustine. Miriam, too. It was not resignation that radiated from her, it was satisfaction. The work she did was noble because it was necessary.
Aldney had been stripped of his dignity.
Not me. I cannot champion you if they rob this from me.
Still fighting to take and keep air in her lungs, she pushed herself upright and let Bartholomew help her stand.
From the floor, he picked up her robe and handed it to her. Then, with perfect cordiality, asked Larkin if there was any reply that needed waiting upon. The captain’s face purpled. He stomped his foot and threw his arms across his chest. His eyes burned. The same color as Rand’s. The same as all men of Shivalry but she saw only muddied, rusty, clay soil in his.
Caught by the witness of his guests, Larkin could only shake his head and command his visitors retire to the other room. Apparently, he desperately needed a drink.
***
L ETTERS STILL CAME for Rand. Clearly, few knew he had left the city. Petra often found herself at his mansion, delivering scrolls to an ever-increasing pile. Much of the time, Bartholomew was there to greet her, and pleasant conversations began to grow. Frequently, he offered her a restorative of sweet oat tea or pickled makrut lime rind. The tart, chewy specialty was one of the rare treats his master permitted himself.
Bartholomew talked a great deal about Rand. He had known him since his master was an adolescent, training for the chance to take the Shivalry entrance exam.
“Back then, his eyes were gray.”
Petra could not envision his eyes such. Nor could she wrestle with the two versions of him warring like wolves within her. A white wolf with fangs to defend battled a black wolf whose fangs were crooked and meant to tear flesh, torturing rather than killing. The more Bartholomew talked, the stronger the white wolf grew, and Petra desperately wanted it to win over her doubts.
Yet, Bartholomew loved Rand, as a grandfather loves his son’s son. There might be little Rand could do that he wouldn’t defend.
It ate at her. Indigestion late at night. Loss of appetite even when she could hear her stomach growling.
Ardently, she wanted to cling to the stories he shared. Wasn’t this the man who had carried her brother’s lifeless body? But he had spent years witnessing cruelty in battle. This was the same cruelty he was trained to enact. Something within him might have bent into depravity. True warriors of Shivalry were sworn to a higher moral code but did the aged words and injections used to alter their bodies prevent them from being the humans they once were?
She tried to ask those questions of the devoted manservant. It was hard. His company and conversation were kind and Petra did not want him to think she used him for her own gains. So, she tried to poke fun when she inquired about Captain Tsenturian.
If he was so perfect all the time, did he not snore when he slept? Did the man never belch? Did he never lose his patience? Does Shivalry produce saints?
Most of these questions made Bartholomew laugh and Petra began to smile whenever he chuckled; he had a habit of rubbing his nose to keep from sneezing. He was convinced it was punishment from another lifetime when a family member was a court jester who never took a day seriously in his life.
Sometimes Petra intentionally asked absurd questions just to see if she could make him sneeze.
And the days passed.
The pile of letters increased.
Bartholomew explained the havoc that would ensue if Bessarabiah breached Mynydd Pass. Not only would the men and families who lived within the keep be slaughtered, it would signal to other nations that Vale could be invaded.
“But we have many men at the pass, surely? Even without this threat.”
Even in the small community she had grown up in, Petra knew about Mynydd. Imports and exports traveled through there. Immigrants were required to enter Vale through the pass. If any were found to have crossed into the country by another route, they were sentenced to hard labor there.
“It is not manned as it has been in the past.”
“Rand tells you a great deal.”
“I am honored to have his confidence.”
“He saved you; I think you said?”
“From having my tongue plucked, yes. I was brazen in my fiftieth year. I spoke out of turn before one of the corporals. My lord Rand received word of it in time and claimed me as his personal attendant.”
“His actions are always beyond question.”
“He is permitted to be human, too. I have seen his temper.”
Have you seen him harm a man who did nothing more than refuse the only heart he had to give?
“I suppose I have seen it, too,” she mumbled.
“Should you want to see it? You ask a great deal about him.”
Saying this, of course, he did not look at her. Instead, he focused on stirring the sweet oat tea sediments so the beverage could gain the most flavor.
“I am curious about him, I suppose.”
“Ancient energies have altered him. He is not like other men.”
I know. That’s what terrifies me because it fascinates me. I do not know how I shall look him in the eye and demand to know his part at the end of Aldney’s life. I have no hold on him; he does not owe me the truth. But if he is as good as Bartholomew says, he will tell me the truth. And I must be prepared for the worst answer—that he had no part in my brother’s end at all.