Petrodor: A Trial of Blood and Steel, Book 2 (5 page)

There were few good views over neighbouring streets, for defensive purposes. Serrin archers were good shots. Soon Alythia grew tired of peering through the little stone window in Vincen and Rovina's chambers, and went back to her own. But there was nothing to do besides sit on her bed and sulk.

This year's Sadisi Festival was going to be thrown at the Steiner Mansion. Family Steiner was the wealthiest, most powerful family in Petrodor. Family Halmady liked to style themselves the second-most powerful, but in Petrodor, such things were always debatable. Steiner Mansion was even more grand than Halmady Mansion, and their celebrations and parties were opulent beyond imagining. Such grand events were Alythia's raison d’être. She loved to socialise. She loved to impress. She loved to be near real power, and feel its warmth radiating through her. She'd been looking forward to this day since she'd first arrived in Petrodor. Now, it was all ruined.

The family would say she was ill. A few might believe it at first, but not later, when the gossip started. Halmady Mansion had many servants, and where there were servants, there was gossip. It had been the same in Baen-Tar. News of the conflict between Lady Halmady and her son's new wife would soon make the rounds. Such conflicts were not uncommon, she'd gathered. No doubt everyone would find it very amusing.

She snorted at the thought and curled her bare feet up on the bed, touching the swelling on her face. It wasn't all bad, she realised. Such gossip could easily hurt Lady Halmady worse than it hurt herself. Men in particular might take the beautiful princess's side before they took that crusty old battle-axe's. Especially if she gave them some extra persuasion. She thought about it for a while, watching the odd firework streak across the bay, and refusing to become too dispirited. She was clever at this kind of thing, she knew she was. It was a puzzle, but all puzzles had a solution.

After a while, she began to wish she hadn't allowed Selyna and Vansy to leave. There was a servants’ party somewhere along the lower slope. They'd volunteered to stay behind and keep her company, but obviously their hearts weren't in it. Alythia couldn't blame them. Both would stay with her in Petrodor for a year to help her settle in. The pay was good, some of which
would be sent back to their families in Lenayin. There was also the prospect of a Petrodor husband, one reason both were so eager to attend the Sadisi celebrations. But until that husband arrived, or the year was up and they returned home to Lenayin, they were both very much in the same position that she was—young Lenay women abroad for the first time in their lives, and very often overwhelmed by the foreignness of it all.

They were the lucky ones, though, said a small voice at the back of Alythia's mind. They'd either find a husband and stay here by choice, or they'd get to go home. You're stuck here for life, whether you like it or not.

She shoved the voice aside angrily and jumped from the bed. Damned if she'd sit here and sulk, that was just what the old witch would wish her to do. The night air was lovely in the memory of a hot day. She'd go for a walk.

The gardens of Halmady Mansion were terraced as the slope began to descend. And they were truly beautiful. Alythia walked barefoot on the lush grass, then stepped onto smooth, stone pavings. Trimmed bushes waved their leaves in a cool breeze, and the garden lamps cast gentle shadows across the slope. Water tinkled in a nearby fountain.

Alythia paused behind a garden chair. The lower garden fell away beneath, affording her a clear view over the top of the perimeter wall. At the very bottom, where the dark sea met the shore, the lights burned especially bright. Sounds carried faintly from far below; distant celebrations. The docks were full of rough folk, it was said, and they celebrated accordingly. Rough folk, serrin, and Nasi-Keth. Alythia still thought it odd that the serrin, who had so much wealth, would spend more time near the bottom of the Petrodor Incline than the top. She'd asked some of her new family about it, but none of them had an answer. None of them had ever been to the bottom of the slope, save passing through for the occasional sea voyage. And none of them expressed a desire to ever do so.

The mild air felt lovely on her skin beneath a simple, summer dress. The garden air was alive with fragrances, and the view across the fire-lit curve of Petrodor Harbour was more spectacular than even the most wonderful mountain-view in Lenayin. For a while, her face ceased to ache so badly and her frustrations faded from her mind. This transition in her life was full of challenges, but she would face them and make a good life for herself. All royal women had to go through this. Her second-eldest sister, Petryna, had married to the Lenay province of Yethulyn, where there was considerably less
culture and excitement than Petrodor. Her eldest sister, Marya, of course, had married the Heir of Steiner…and would now be happily entertaining at the Sadisi Festival that Alythia was missing. And her littlest sister, Sofy, would soon have to manage an even more difficult transition than this one when she married the heir to Regent Arrosh in Larosa, the most powerful of the Bacosh provinces. Of all her sisters, Alythia was surely the most in her element in a social cacophony like Petrodor. If she could not survive this experience, then no one could.

The soldiers in the garden watched her as she climbed the gentle terraces back toward the house. There were always soldiers on guard these days—men from loyal houses, mostly sons of Patachi Halmady's numerous cousins, their loyalties carefully vetted.

They watched her as she walked, with just the right combination of anxious deference and obvious lust. Alythia smothered a smile and allowed her hips to swing just a little more, within the breezy folds of her dress. Torovan men were a fascinating puzzle of many contradictions. Intensely selfless in their loyal service to higher families, and yet intensely proud, too, of their own heritage. Very protective of their own female family members, and yet (she'd heard) scandalously forward in their lascivious discussions of other men's wives, sisters and daughters. Devoutly Verenthane and pious when it suited them, and yet utterly obsessed with women and sex. It made a young woman who had the gifts and the aptitude for such games feel alive.

The mansion loomed above, four floors of stone walls, segmented windows and sloping, red tile roofs. It was the most beautiful fortress Alythia had ever seen. She walked the smooth, paved patio past another fountain. Rows of columns and arches lined the patio, and she stepped through the main arch into a lamp-lit passage.

The passage opened onto the inner courtyard, a square patio overlooked with balconies on two sides, and windows on two others. About the patio, great ceramic pots with flowering plants, more water features with golden fish and green lilies, and more columns, lit with lamps. A servant hurried past the columns, but otherwise the courtyard was quiet. At least half the household staff were at Sadisi celebrations. With nothing else to do, Alythia picked a direction she'd not yet walked. She would explore.

The direction she chose led to the southern defensive wall, lined with metal spikes. Alythia walked along the wall, glancing up to see guards atop their posts. So strange to think that a house like Halmady Mansion might consider itself vulnerable. And yet she'd heard some hair-raising tales of what Nasi-Keth fighters had done to several great houses in the past. Night Wraiths, the family men called the Nasi-Keth, and sometimes the serrin too.
Shadows in the night, bloodthirsty and godless. Some men made the holy sign when they spoke of them.

The path ended in a wooden fence. Alythia peered over the gate, inside was dark. A lattice covering made for a ceiling, overgrown with a grapevine. Alythia reached over the gate and undid the latch. Closing the gate behind, she reached up for the nearest bunch of grapes. She popped one into her mouth and it was delicious. Another bunch hung near and she moved to sample it.

A throaty snarl in the dark was the first hint that she was not alone. Alythia froze, her heart pounding. That sounded like…She turned, very slowly. Two reflective eyes were watching her, not six paces away. The eyes moved and a chain tinkled. A shadow resolved itself. A dog, shaggy and chained. It snarled again, bloodcurdlingly. It was a big dog, too. Alythia had never particularly liked dogs. Now, that sentiment was reconfirmed a thousandfold.

Trying to stop herself from shaking with fear, she began a very slow retreat to the gate. Dogs, she recalled someone in Baen-Tar saying, could smell fear and see it in a person's posture. They reacted to that fear with fear of their own, and aggression. Best not to let them see your fear, that person had said. Well, it was too late for that, because she was terrified.

As she reached the gate, she began to hope that she might make it out without getting mauled. Then the dog lunged. Alythia screamed, colliding with the gate as she stumbled backward. The dog's chain pulled tight with a snap, its teeth snarling barely an armspan from her throat. Alythia scrambled along the overgrown fence, then fell on her backside. The dog strained, thrashing and darting, but Alythia was out of its reach.

Running footsteps came up the path and the gate rattled open. A man yelled at the dog, running at it. It backed off, then turned and lunged, only to receive a savage whack from the man's scabbard. It yelped and scrambled to retreat. Another soldier grabbed Alythia by her arm and pulled her out of the gate.

“M'Lady, are you hurt?” Other soldiers were running up, and a few servants. Alythia struggled for breath, her limbs trembling. Her knees felt as though they were about to give way. “M'Lady?” From within the enclosure, there came yells, whacks and yelps as the other soldier meted out some harsh punishment.

“I'm…I'm all right,” she managed, breathlessly. “The chain stopped him short.”

“I'm very sorry, M'Lady,” said the young soldier, gallantly. He seemed most pleased at his successful rescue. “Someone should have warned you about the wolf. It was an oversight. Someone shall be punished for it, I assure you.”

“Wolf?” Alythia blinked at him.

“Yes, M'Lady, it's a wolf. A she-wolf.” The second soldier was emerging
now, his sword and scabbard in hand, closing the gate behind him. “It was a gift from a merchant just eight months ago. A beautiful little cub it was then, with big paws and big ears, and soft grey fur. Master Tristi and Mistress Elra were very fond of it and it followed them everywhere.” The soldier's lips twisted with an ironic smile. “But pretty wolf cubs, you know, they soon grow into big wolves.”

“You can't keep a wolf for a pet!” Even Alythia knew that. “They can't be tamed, no matter how friendly they are when they're little! And they grow up so fast!”

“Doubtless M'Lady has much highland knowledge of such things that we lowlanders have not learned,” said the soldier. “I think the animal should be killed, myself, for its own sake as much as others’. But the children still recall the little cub, and cannot bring themselves to…”

“Wait…highland knowledge?” Alythia looked back toward the gate. “It's a Lenay wolf?”

“Yes, M'Lady.” The soldier's look was quizzical. “There are few wolves left in Torovan, they kill the farmers’ livestock. The dukes of many regions offer great rewards for wolf pelts. The merchant who brought this cub had just returned from Lenayin. What happened to its mother, I do not know.”

Alythia ventured cautiously back toward the gate. The second soldier stood aside, with a questioning look to his companion. Alythia ignored them, and peered over the gate. The wolf now huddled in a far corner, mostly invisible in the dark. A Lenay wolf. She'd heard them howling, once or twice, when she'd visited Baen-Tar town nearer the forest at the bottom of Baen-Tar hill. Now it was here, chained in a Petrodor mansion, where no Lenayin wolf had any business being.

Strangely, she found herself recalling a silly argument her wild brat sister Sashandra had had with their brother Damon upon one of her rare visits to Baen-Tar many years ago. “They don't attack people, Damon!” Sashandra had insisted, as loudly as always. “That's a Verenthane myth! They might eat you once you're already dead, but they're scared of people, mostly. They'll only attack if they're scared and cornered, or if they're protecting their cubs!” Sashandra might have been a crazy, selfish tomboy, but she certainly knew animals.

Scared. She'd walked into its enclosure, a stranger in the dark. Those snarling teeth, those laid-back ears…they'd certainly scared
her
well enough, but it'd been the wolf who'd been terrified first. Perhaps it had cause to be terrified. Perhaps it had learned to be. Now it huddled in the dark, beaten, bruised and chained.

“Perhaps,” said the small, dark voice in the back of her head, “in a few more years, that will be you.”