Trader's Honour

Trader's Honour Chapter 1

The envelope lay in the middle of the table, between the silver tableware and the gold-rimmed plates. A bowl with rolls of fish bread stood on one side, and a steaming terrine of bean soup on the other. Father, dressed in his Lawkeepers tunic, sat at his usual place at the head of the table, Mother on the other end and little Liseyo with her silken hair on Father's right hand side. Old Rosep stood at Mother's elbow while ladling soup into her plate and talking to her in a low voice.

All of them were looking at that envelope.

Mikandra hesitated in the doorway. Her face still glowed from having run from the hospital against the biting cold wind to be home in time for dinner. Father cast a Meaningful Glance at the envelope, and then met her eyes in that severe way of his that said Young lady, I demand an explanation.

Mother stopped talking to Rosep, and Rosep scurried out the room as fast as his sore knees and bow legs allowed him, shutting the door behind him with a soft snick. The fire popped.

"Good evening, Mother and Father." Mikandra crossed the room and sat down at her regular spot at the table, facing Liseyo who looked at her with large eyes.

Into the heavy silence, Mother said, importantly, "A Trader Guild courier brought this for you this morning."

Totally unnecessary. The envelope could have been anything if it wasn't so unforgivingly carmine red, and that colour meant only one thing: Trader Guild. And the Guild only ever used couriers to deliver these types of messages.

Mikandra licked her lips and, avoiding her father's penetrating gaze, picked the offending object off the table. The paper was heavy and smooth in her hands. It exuded a faint smell of ink, which was old-fashioned and classy all at once. A white label affixed to the front held her name, written by hand by the Guild's calligraphers in Coldi and Mirani script. Mikandra Bisumar. As if there was any doubt.

She clutched it on her knees, out of the reach of her parents' penetrating gazes, and met Liseyo's eyes, whose expression said, Well, aren't you going to open it?

Mikandra didn't want to, not here where her parents were watching her, not now, before she'd sorted out this part of her future, because certainly, the Trader Guild wouldn't use a courier if her application to the academy had been rejected, would they?

The thought filled her with panic. She hadn't expected a reply so quickly; she had expected a rejection, because almost everyone who didn't come from a Trading family got rejected, right? Because at night in bed, she'd been telling herself that she was full of stupid dreams to even have applied and that she should be preparing herself to bandage frost-bitten fingers in the hospital forever. And if her dreams ever came true . . . well, didn't the older people say that dreams looked good when you were young, but seemed silly in a yeah-like-that-is-going-to-happen way when you were older?

Going to the academy had been such a silly dream, something she'd never seriously thought would happen, but now she had this letter and all of a sudden, the dream that had been her childhood wish became frighteningly real.

She didn't want to open the letter at the table while her family were watching.

But Father would never let her leave the room. He'd stop her before she could reach the door, grab her by the arm and lift her up so that her shoulder would be jammed up against her ear and that his fingers dug into the soft flesh under her arm and demand that she show him the contents. She still had the bruises on her arm from last time he'd done that. That time it had been about her not wanting to audition for the boring classic theatre. This was worse. Much worse.

He said, in his hard and unforgiving voice, "Open it, daughter." In that unemotional tone that masked the worst kind of his anger.

No choice then.