A week or so after Mahkas refused—yet again—to unseal the city, Krakandar Palace had settled into a strange state of anticipation. It was almost as if everyone in the palace was holding their breath, waiting for something terrible to happen. The children could feel it, the slaves were so jumpy they were dropping things, and Luciena was starting to wonder if she was going crazy because of it.
Her latest problem seemed to be that she was losing her mind. Or her memory. Things were missing she could have sworn she’d seen only the day before. Nothing so large it was noticeable, but odd things, like the silver tray that sat on the sideboard in the dining room that seemed to be there one day and gone the next. Or the silver figurine depicting Kalianah, the Goddess of Love, that was on the mantle in her bedroom last week and now was nowhere to be found. And now, just as the light began to fade, when she’d reached for the candelabra that normally sat on the side table in the morning room, she discovered it wasn’t there. In fact, there wasn’t a candlestick to be had anywhere in the room.
“Orleon, have you done something with the silverware?” she called, emerging from the morning room into the main foyer of the palace in search of some light. The grand staircase sweeping up toward the upper storeys was already shadowed by the gathering gloom.
The Chief Steward stopped and turned to look at her. “No, my lady. Why do you ask?”
“There’re no candles in the morning room.”
“I’ll see to it at once, my lady,” he said with an apologetic bow. The old steward snapped his fingers at a nearby slave who was lighting the lamps in the foyer and ordered him to see to the morning room first. “The problem will be rectified immediately.”
“Thank you, Orleon. I swear they were there last night before I went to dinner. Every time I turn around lately, there seems to be something missing.” She hesitated a moment, before asking, “Have you ever had a problem with pilfering among the staff?”
He shook his head, a little offended by the question. “The vast majority of the servants and slaves in Krakandar Palace have been with the family for years, Lady Taranger. If there is a problem with thievery, it’s only started since you arrived.”
She smiled at his thinly veiled insinuation. “I’m not even sure if there is a problem, Orleon. This isn’t my home and I don’t really know what’s what. I might simply be imagining things.”
“I can order a full inventory to be taken, my lady, if you so desire. Just to be certain nothing is missing.”
Luciena frowned. Such a move might unsettle the already nervous staff. On the other hand, it might give them something to worry about, other than the possibility of Mahkas exploding unexpectedly and ordering them all lashed to death, a fear—her slave, Aleesha, had informed her anxiously—that was the prime topic of conversation below stairs these days.
“Perhaps we should look into it,” she agreed. “But let’s do it discreetly. I’ve no wish to pour oil on a simmering tinderbox at a time like this.”
The Chief Steward bowed in acknowledgment of her wisdom. “As you wish, Lady Taranger.”
The old man turned and continued on his way, leaving her standing in the vast entrance hall, wondering if perhaps the insanity of this place really was starting to get to her. She hoped she was wrong. Given the mood of the palace, if one of the staff was discovered stealing, the fear of being lashed or beaten to death by Krakandar’s regent was quite a reasonable one.
“It can’t be that bad.”
Luciena started a little and turned to find her husband standing behind her. “What do you mean?”
“You’ve been standing here in the foyer, just staring off into space, looking like you have the weight of the entire world on your shoulders, Luci. It can’t be that bad, can it?”
“You’ve just come from Mahkas,” she replied, tartly. “You tell me.”
“He’s not too bad today,” Xanda replied uncomfortably. The topic of Mahkas Damaran was not a happy one between them.
“As opposed to yesterday?” she asked. “When he ordered a man hanged for complaining he was hungry?”
Xanda was obviously pained by her interpretation of events. “The man was standing on a box in the marketplace, suggesting the people of the city rise up and slaughter the Regent of Krakandar,” he reminded her. “And everybody else in the palace, incidentally. Including you and our children.”
“Because he was hungry,” Luciena retorted.
Xanda sighed heavily. “I’m trying my hardest to fix this, you know.”
“You’re trying your hardest only so far as it doesn’t rock the boat,” she corrected.
“Which is precisely what Damin asked me to do.”
“Don’t try shifting the blame onto your cousin, just because he’s not here to disagree with you. Damin wouldn’t put up with what’s happening here, Xanda, and you know it. He’d have openly challenged Mahkas weeks ago.”
“Which is just fine for Damin Wolfblade, my love, because he’s actually the heir to this province and has the legal right to do something about the way it’s being managed. I’m only his cousin and my authority to do anything in Krakandar is strictly limited. You know that.”
She shook her head, unwilling to acknowledge their helplessness. “You have to make him unseal the city, Xanda. People are getting very, very hungry out there and there’s no good reason to keep them confined any longer. That poor man Mahkas condemned yesterday was only the beginning. More and more people are going to start complaining and the louder they get, the more they’ll start to wonder why Mahkas Damaran is keeping them virtual prisoners in their own city. He can’t hang every soul in Krakandar who disagrees with him.”
“It won’t come to that …”
“Xanda! Open your eyes! You can’t really think he’s doing this for any other reason than fear, surely?”
Her husband shrugged. “He wouldn’t be the first man in history to make a foolish decision out of fear of the plague, Lucy.”
“I’m not talking about the plague. I’m talking about Damin. Mahkas is terrified of losing Krakandar.”
“Damin’s not even here …”
“And if he was, he’d be camped outside the walls, unable to get back in,” she pointed out bluntly. “Think about that, my love, the next time you stand by and do nothing to stop your precious uncle from butchering innocent people.”
He grabbed her arm and pulled her closer, aware that the main foyer of the palace was the last place they should be having a discussion like this. “Don’t you think I want to see an end to this insanity?”
“Xanda …”
“Do you have any idea what it’s like for me?” he hissed impatiently, lowering his voice as a slave hurried by, heading for the kitchens. “This man raised me. He’s like a father to men.”
“He lashed your cousin to within an inch of her life, drove
her to suicide and then beat one of your best friends into a bloody pulp. Oh, did I mention he killed Raek Harlen in cold blood? He was a friend of yours too, wasn’t he? Exactly what part of your idyllic childhood does his death evoke fond memories of, Xanda?”
He let her go, clearly wounded by her lack of sympathy. “I’m doing what I can, Luciena, to keep you, our children, the Lionsclaw children, and the rest of the city safe. I’m also trying to ensure my cousin has a city to come home to. I’m sorry if you don’t like the way I’m going about it, but I can’t help that.”
Luciena sighed apologetically, feeling a little guilty for attacking him so harshly. “I’m sorry, Xanda. You didn’t deserve that. I know you’re doing what you can. I just worry about the children, that’s all.”
“We’re all worried, Luci,” Xanda agreed, his expression grim. “You don’t have a monopoly on that.”
“Then I should …” Her voice faltered as she noticed Bylinda Damaran walking in their direction. “We should talk about this later.”
Wondering at her warning tone, Xanda glanced over his shoulder. Bylinda was walking slowly across the foyer dressed in her nightgown, even though it was just on sunset, smiling vaguely, as if something only she could see amused her. Luciena wondered if she’d even bothered to dress this morning.
“Aunt Bylinda?” Xanda said warily. “Is everything all right?”
“Hello Xanda,” she replied distantly. “Luciena.”
“My lady,” she replied, with a small curtsey. “You’re still in your nightgown. Are you unwell?”
“Not particularly.”
She glanced at Xanda with concern before asking, “Would you like me to see you back to your room?”
“Where are the children?”
“In the day nursery, my lady,” Luciena told her. “Given the hour, they’re probably having dinner. Perhaps you’d like to visit them?”
It might help, she hoped. Bylinda’s grief over Leila’s death had destroyed her. The woman who wandered so aimlessly through the palace corridors these days, looking for something only she knew how to find, was a pale echo of the Bylinda Damaran that Luciena had met the first time she came to Krakandar. His aunt’s descent into inconsolable grief had been even harder for Xanda to witness. If Mahkas Damaran had been the father Xanda never knew, Bylinda had been his mother, the woman who had taken him and his brother, Travin, to her heart after their mother hanged herself with a harp wire in the fortress at Winternest when Xanda was barely six years old.
“Watch over Emilie, Luciena,” Bylinda advised, reaching up to touch her face gently. “You never know when she’s going to be taken from you.”
Bylinda’s hand was icy against her cheek. Luciena glanced at Xanda in concern before she answered. “Is there some particular reason I need to watch over my daughter, my lady?”
“Because she’s your daughter,” Xanda’s aunt advised, her empty eyes blazing with passion for a rare moment. “Daughters are precious commodities, Luciena. They sell precious commodities, don’t you know? Trade them. Barter them. And sometimes they destroy them.” She smiled and the passion faded, to be replaced by the familiar hollow emptiness. “But then … you’re in trade, aren’t you dear. You’d know that already.”
“I’d never let anybody hurt my daughter, my lady,” Luciena assured her. “Nor would her father.”
Xanda, who was standing right beside Luciena, nodded in agreement. “Luci’s right, Aunt Bylinda. I swear, nobody will ever hurt my daughter and live to tell about it.”
Bylinda Damaran’s smile faded. She fixed her eyes on Luciena. “Don’t make the mistake of believing their lies. That’s what my husband said about his daughter, Luciena. I’m still waiting for him to keep his oath.”
Without another word, Bylinda wandered off, leaving Luciena and Xanda staring after her with concern.
“What do you suppose she means,” Xanda asked after a long silence, “by Mahkas fulfilling his oath?”
“I’m almost afraid to ask,” Luciena replied, more disturbed by Bylinda’s strange words than she cared to admit.