Chapter 9 - Part IX

"Stop."

The sedan, now wielded by 4 very tired but very stoic men, halted at the command.  The men laid their lady down gently while one of them draw back the thick, heavy lilac curtains.  Lady Kreihl dropped two tired feet to the well groomed dirt path that neatly wound through the clustered courtyard of cherry, plum and peach trees that populated the lower bailey of the Tsitul compound.   

Lady Tsitul dismissed her sedan while her head of house, an old maid by the name of Sejae greeted her with a padded robe.  The woman was bent over, old as she was, but she hardly let that get in the way of her duties as she helped her mistress into the robe.  "My lady is out late tonight." she uttered with a smile.

"Yes, mehra" Kreihl smiled back to her old confidant and one time wet-nurse.  "And it will be later still.  See that no one disturbs me.  The magnut are out tonight."

"Ah dear," the old woman sighed, "I do hate when those raccoon dogs get into our fruit stores.  Do take care." and she too departed.

Kreihl was sad to see Sejae go, but the magnut were skittish, and it was a strange notion to include servants in subterfuge.  In another world she would have treasured her old friend's input.

She was going to face this complication with her head held high, but it was never easy dealing with the servants of the empire.  Pho-Boteth wanted too much information and gave too little in return.

In the east the horizon was painted a subversive shade of purple and pink while the minor moon had made a stealth ascent since her visit to the Archne household.  Afterall, it was only once a tide or so that the night was completely devoid of any moon all night.

The lady walked past some of the cherry blossom blooms and was greeted with a satisfyingly sweet breeze.  The plums had all but finished their spectacular displays of pink, purple and white and had since lost their petals, but the cherries were in their full glory.  She rested her arm on a nearby branch and the path at her feet was littered with a rain of soft pink petals.

"Naming us magnut is hardly a new invention."

Lady Tsitul felt her heart stop as she spun around and saw the man she had been waiting for, Lord Vaughn.  She knew, of course, that he was no true lord.  It was likely the empire had bestowed upon the man some great and honored duty that could not be trusted to mere laypeople like herself. 

"It is childish of you people.  But Empress Coth Di understands that children need to be allowed to play from time to time." he condescended to her.

 "Perhaps if you did not growl and whine when you were unhappy we'd have less cause to make the comparison.  But you didn't come here to discuss the finer points of Eirdren slang now did we?  You and yours have put me in quite a bit of trouble now.  My son is to be wed to that husband-killing whore and take on the name Archne."

Vaughn was unable to determine what she was more upset about, the fact that her son's marriage would put him in potentially mortal danger or that a Tsitul son would walk the halls of a hated house. 

"She accepted?  Where is the box?  I told you, you must bring back the box!" though he was typically composed, as a son of Pho-Boteth, he was not immune to his upbringing and he uttered a guttural growl to indicate his displeasure.

"How was I to?  She accepted the gift.  If I had taken it from her then she'd be in her full right to claim betrayal and I might not have left her compound alive!  Are you daft?  Surely you might have expected this eventuality?  And now the Empire's ambition has caught the two of us." Lady Kreihl spit back with frustration.  Empire promises of autonomy were barely worth this relationship.
Vaughn did not hold back as he delivered a swift slap to Kreihl's face.  "Watch your tongue.  You border on treasonous."

Shocked at the physical abuse, the lady kept her composure and glared back at him.  "As ever the House Tsitul serves the Scholar Empress.  I speak only of the short-sightedness of her magnut."
Vaughn thought for a moment.  Nobody was supposed to accept the box.  It was plain and ordinary.  It had been compromised - a fact the Lady Tsitul knew nothing about - but the nature of the compromise was such that whoever opened the box would see an object of secrecy and shame.  It should have elicited rejection.  That was the weakness of the compromise.

"What was the color of the box when you gave it to the Lady Archne?" he demanded.

"What?  I don't know.  It was an oak box right?  Then brown.  I didn't see anything unusual." she replied unsure of what information he was trying to extract.

"Then it did not change" he muttered under his breath, careful to keep his rhetorical question from reaching the ears of the Lady Tsitul herself.

"What did you say?" she huffed impatiently.

"I don't think the Lady Archne is our quarry.  I will have to obtain another box for you to present to the Nogrem Household tomorrow."

"And about him?" Lady Tsitul asked.

Vaughn had nearly forgotten the initial demands Lady Tsitul made when they had first approached her.  "He's resting comfortably at the edge of the city.  Tomorrow he will begin the journey to the University on High and his new life."

Kreihl looked satisfied.  "Then I leave you to your nightly wanderings, magnut.  Good night."
Vaughn bowed and took his leave of her but continued to walk through the fruit gardens of the Tsitul compound contemplating the situation.  The box was supposed to change color at the presence of a nearby gegleth; alive or otherwise.  But rather than a simple hue of blue, it remained the same, and he felt this left him at square one.  Lady Archne had drawn a great deal of attention to herself in the previous tide, with the death of her husband and her reportedly reclusive nature.  She was his best guess as to who might have kidnapped the creature, and now that there was no evidence to incriminate her, he felt at a loss.

"Damn." he sighed, but no sooner had he let out a grunt of unhappiness than he felt a trembling quake at his feet.  The rapidly reddening sky, blushing at the onset of dawn, was now assisted with the tips of huge flames licking at the horizon.  In moments the Lady Tsitul had run back to the fruit garden and found Vaughn, grunting audibly.

"What happened?" she yelled.

"I don't think you have anything to worry about your son.  Go back to bed and prepare yourself an alibi for your peers.  After the flames die down, I am sure your fellow lords might wonder if you had anything to do with the death of Lady Archne."