The Unseen Hand

Ch 4: The Man in the Mask

Venedi, Seventh of Sund'im, 445 A'A'diel 

Avaren awoke to a sound akin to the whop a fish makes when slapped down on the chopping block. Startled, she sat up. Her bedroom was dark; the air filled with the familiar scent of lavender and starched linen. The shadows of the branches that hung over her balcony danced and shifted upon the floor.

The house was quiet.

Avaren lay back down and pulled the sheet over her head. The sound had either been caused by the wind or one of the guards in the hall. Either way, it was much too late or much too early to lie awake. She hadn't slept in days, and her eyes felt like buckets of sand. She curled into her side and closed her eyes with the intention of going back to sleep, but it soon proved hopeless. In two days' time, she would be married to a man whose very presence repulsed her. Duty would rule her life, and she would lose what limited freedom she enjoyed.

Avaren flung the sheet from her head and turned on her side. She reached under the mattress and ran her fingers over the handle of the dagger she kept hidden. Contact with the cold steel caused angry tears to well up in her eyes. Her father had referred to her upcoming marriage to Jarle Rigo as a 'necessary sacrifice.' He had plied her with affirmations that no harm would befall her; that the princeling could be controlled; that she only need suffer until a male heir was born. After the child's birth, her father had promised her freedom. She could go back to his homeland in Thromm; to the city of Thyra, a place she had never seen and live as she pleased. She could have a household by the sea; choose her lovers at will.

She did not believe him.

Avaren pulled the blade free of its soft prison and held it up to the moonlight. She wondered at which point her father had ceased to see her as his beloved child. At which point did he look at her and see not his kin, but a woman whose beauty would hobble a king? How long had he groomed her for such a task? How long since her happiness ceased to matter? Why had he taught her to fight with such a blade if her most valuable skill was to spread her legs?

Avaren tossed the dagger on the bed. The weapon was a slim jeweled thing that seemed unfit for anything except opening letters.

Thoughts swirled like flotsam. The weight of the knowledge that her loyalty could bring about positive change pulled at her heart. Her father had worked tirelessly to rid Reyza of the pirates that plagued her shores. He had brought law and order to the squabbling guild houses and integrity to the city's markets. Under her father's stewardship, the city's coffers overflowed with wealth. Even the mages in their lofty pinnacles held his name in high esteem. Her father loved her, and she loved him, but there was no denying the truth. Though a foreigner to Reyza's shores, her father cared more about the city than he did for his family.

Avaren got up and walked to the armoire. She opened its mirrored doors and stared at the rows of dresses. She ran her hand over tulle and silk, brocades embroidered with strings of pearls, lace appliqués, gold piping. In the bluish light, colors became indistinct. Deep reds became zaffre; greens indigo; ivories periwinkle. There was a quality to the light of the moons that seemed if only for a moment, to transfigure the very nature of what was real. Among the shadows of the night, in the less than wholesome glow of moonshine, Avaren dared to imagine a different fate.

Reaching into the bodice of a rarely worn dress, she withdrew a parcel of folded letters. She brought the papers to her nose and inhaled. The scent of wax mingled with a trace of almond and vanilla. The parchment had come from her father's study, but the sentiments had not. Paulo was her father's valet and her most ardent admirer. He was charming and soft spoken with hair the color of cloves and cinnamon skin typical of Vendraedi stock. They had rendezvoused thrice in the terraced olive groves that hugged the cliffs. With each subsequent meeting, Paulo had grown bolder and her lady in waiting, Dannia, terser.