From the second floor window of her room, Charissa watched the scattered clouds sailing north and homeward.  She would have gladly traded her life with any of the birds drifting effortlessly through the sky.  She sat so long and so silently that Sphal, her guard felt compelled to repeatedly check her room to ensure she hadn't somehow escaped.  He seemed to have taken Amantis' threat to put his head on a pole to heart.

The door opened quietly behind her.  From the corner of her eye, she watched him poke his head in, start to withdraw, then as if changing his mind he stepped inside and closed the door behind him.  She ignored him as he stood watching one of his own feet twisting nervously before taking a steadying breath.

"Mahd, is something wrong?"

Charissa didn't reply.  How could she?  She wouldn't know where to begin.

"Are you ill?  Do you need anything?"

I'm dying, she thought, but said nothing as she faced the man, noting the pained frown on his earnest young face.  The young man was not like Amantis' usual brutish thugs.  He had a gentle spirit about him that seemed to belie any soreav training he might have suffered and, though a few years her junior, a handsome boy-next-door sort of charm.  "No.  I am well enough.  I lack for nothing—-at least nothing you could give me."

"I only ask because, well, I see you every day and I can't help but notice how sad you seem.  I ask myself why, and I think it must be that you are ill, for why would a lady so beautiful be so sad when she has such a beautiful baby and a beautiful house and a distinguished husband—-"

"Ha!" Charissa let out a single burst of bitter laughter.  "I have no husband."

"No husband?  But the oracle—"

"Is my keeper, nothing more."

That handsome furrowed brow rose in confusion.  "Were you not wed?"

"There was a ceremony—-a mockery of a wedding—-but Amantis is only wed to his stone and his power.  He doesn't know what it means to be a husband."

Sphal's brow clouded over in sympathetic anger and he took a step closer.  "Then the oracle is a very great fool.  I may never have taken a wife, but I would know how to treat such a beautiful woman."

Something lurched in Charissa's chest that hadn't moved in years.  "I take it you would do things differently?" she said.

Sphal started to raise his arms and for one terrifying moment, she thought he might embrace her before he seemed to check himself.  Her heart pounded frantically and the room seemed to grow dim.

"Had I taken a woman such as you to wife, I would make it my life's purpose to see you begin each day with a smile.  I would kiss away any tear or frown that might threaten to cloud your beauty and I would bask every evening in your radiance."

Charissa tried to utter a skeptical laugh, but it caught in her throat and came out more of a sob.  She turned her back to him and squeezed her eyes shut, willing the tears not to come.  Part of her waited in breathless anticipation, hoping he would take her in his arms, but in the empty stillness between thought and action, the door flew open and the stench of Apaidia's rich perfume wafted in.

"Move aside oaf!  You won't be needed in here.  Wait in the hall.  You shouldn't allow her to trick you!"

Charissa's cheeks, which had blushed warmly, suddenly chilled to an icy frostiness.  Her heart contracted into a stone as it sank into her chest and she let out a weary sigh.  "What are you doing here Apaidia?  I don't believe I sent for you."

 "No, Mahd," she smiled widely with a false cheeriness.  "Your husband," here she lingered on the word as if rubbing in the well-known fact that she was sleeping with him, "has asked that Garanth be prepared for dinner."

"Amantis wants Garanth to dine with him?"

"Your husband," here she paused with a most patronizing politeness, "is having a feast in honor of his son's birthday."

Charissa scowled trying to discern what new insult this request signified.

"Oh you needn't worry," Apaidia added in mock surprise, "you are invited as well, though you are not required to be there if you do not wish."  She smiled and with an airy wave of her hand, she left.

 -=====|==

Apaidia had positioned Charissa's couch at the far end of the table where she had an intimate view of everyone's feet.  Garanth sat at the head of the table on the edge of Amantis' couch, delighting in the attention of the wealthiest and most powerful men of Nur, whose wives took turns popping sweetmeats into his laughing mouth.  Apaidia reclined next to him, sweeping the guests with a proprietary smile as if she were the lady of the house and Garanth were her child.  When her gaze fell on Charissa, her shapeless face glowed with malicious glee.

Charissa should have been outraged at the carefully crafted insult.  Instead, as she stared into the long shadow of the future Apaidia showed her, a future without her husband or child, without even a family, cast adrift in a foreign land, she felt only growing despair.

Refusing to recline at the table, Charissa sat on the edge of her couch, staring at her food and ignoring the boorish comments of the fishing merchant on the right as well as the flatulence of the old vegetable merchant on her left.  As she sat squeezing a torn lump of bread back into dough, Ctonos rushed in breathlessly and whispered in Amantis' ear.  Charissa caught the words "beastmen", "caught" and "wiped-out" from across the table.

Amantis sat upright, blinking in surprise.  He fumbled at his belt and mumbled "...have to consult..." as he rose and stepped back into a shadowed corner of the room.  He put his face to the pouch containing his stone and stood still for a moment.

That accursed stone, Charissa thought.  Someone should toss it out into the street or, as he feared, expose it to the sun.

The dinner guests exchanged curious glances, and then all eyes darted to Amantis as he began laughing.  Amantis carefully closed the pouch and returned to the table.  His laughter held a nervous brittle edge.  "If our beastmen are no longer authentic enough, then we'll give them some real monsters."  He clapped a hand on Ctonos shoulder.  "After dinner, send me three of your biggest, boldest and most loyal men.  Tell them I want to drink to my son's health.  Then send me up a cask of that "bronze cleaner" stuff you guys drink, the strongest you can find."

"Yes dra."  Ctonos hurried off.

Amantis dropped on his couch chuckling.  Garanth laughed along with him.

Charissa shivered.  Every time Amantis consulted the stone, some new atrocity followed.

 -=====|==

Charissa walked back to her room, clutching herself, wrapping her arms around herself and squeezing as tightly as she could, for fear her body might shiver apart.  When she had excused herself from the table, Amantis, in front of his guests, had asked her to let him keep Garanth with him as he wanted to spend more time with his son.  She had been too shocked to say no, but now as she walked the expensively remodeled stone corridors of Amantis' cancerous house, she could feel the weight of doom hanging over her head and wondered if it were not already falling toward her.  Would he return her son to her in the morning or would he send one of his spears to cast her out?

She forced herself to walk calmly into her empty room, Sphal following along behind.  The tears flowed silently as she trembled before her window.

"Lady?  Is there something I can do for you?"

She shook her head, not trusting herself to speak.  She heard him move closer and he gently laid a hand on her shoulder.

"Is something wrong?"

She turned and clung to him, bursting into sobs like a lost child. 

Sphal folded her into his strong arms and her knees buckled.  He caught her up, cradling her like a child for a moment then, after looking around as if for a place to put her, sat her on the edge of her bed.

Charissa pulled back, rubbing at her eyes, knowing how frightful she must look.  She peered up at Sphal, but saw only a fierce concern for her in his eyes.

"Whatever you need," he said, "you have only to name it and I will provide it.  I swear."

-=====|==

"To my son!" Amantis called out and his three reavers lifted their drinking bowls and slurred in unison."

"Your son!"

"The sun!"

"Sssson."

Amantis hefted the cask of the cheap but powerful drink the men called "bronze cleaner" and it sloshed emptily.  He poured the dregs into their bowls, neglecting his own.  He had stopped drinking hours ago, occasionally lifting his empty bowl in toasts to keep his men well sauced.

Apaidia had taken Garanth to her room and the other guests had left hours ago leaving Amantis and his men to drink late into the night.

"I think we're out," one of the men offered.  He was a tall good-looking man with a nasty puckered scar across his left cheek that ran back to his ear.

"We will need to get more," suggested the youngest of the three, an earnest, hardworking farm boy built like an ox.

"I have more in the cellar," Amantis assured them, though he had no intention of letting them drink the choice beer and wine he kept there.  "Perhaps we should all go get it."

"What about the women?"  The third spearman was an older man, nearing middle age, but still built like a rock.  "You promised us some, er, entertainment."

Amantis laughed along with the reavers and gave it a deliberate lascivious edge.  "I don't know....  I told Ctonos to send me some real men, but I don't know if you three up for it."

"Show me the women and I'll show you how much of a man I am," Scarface said, "I'm up for whatever woman you've got."

"Well, we'll see about that."  Amantis rose and picked up his keleos oil lamp.  "I've arranged a little test.  If you three each think you're man enough, follow me downstairs to where the beer and the females are."

The men rose chuckling, drained their drinking bowls and followed Amantis down the cellar stairs, leaning heavily against the walls as they swayed from side to side.

Amantis took them to the cellar and snatched up a skin of cheap wine, some downriver vintner's failed attempt at reproducing faeyn wine, which could have made Amantis even richer if it hadn't been so bad.  He crouched and scuttled through the shelves into the hidden space beyond.  He had to stick his head back through and gesture for the alcohol-befuddled men to follow him.  They tried to crouch, fell over, and crawled through on their hands and knees.  Once on the other side, they followed Amantis down the sloping tunnel, giggling at their own drunkenness.

"So, where are the women?" the older reaver asked, once they reached the chamber to which Amantis led them.

"You'll find the first female in that alcove." Amantis waved toward a shadowed recess where the chamber opened into another.  "So, who's going to be the first to take the manhood test?"  Amantis slapped the young one on the shoulder and the other men laughed.

"I'll do it," the young one said a little defensively.  He stepped forward fumbling at his waist and pulled off his small clothes.

Something moved in the alcove with the sound of hooves on stone and made a snuffling sound.

"What is this?"

Amantis laughed.  "I told you it was a test."

The snuffling ended in a deep series of grunts.

"Come on, let's see how much of a man you are," scar face laughed.

"It's not as if you haven't entertained yourself with animals like this before," the older man laughed.  "I know life gets lonely out there on the farm."

To Amantis' surprise, the farm boy actually blushed guiltily.

"Do it!" Scar face began to chant.

"Do it!" the other reaver chanted along.

The young man hesitated, then with a shrug, stepped into the alcove and knelt down.

The men laughed and cheered as they watched.

Amantis felt a growing satisfaction.  They wanted beastmen; he was going to give them real beastmen, a whole host of them.

The young man finished, rose and walked back beaming in drunken pride.  "Next!" he called.

"Oh, no!"  Amantis clapped Scarface on the shoulder.  "I don't want it said I don't provide for my men.  Your female is over there."  He pointed to an adjoining alcove.  Something low to the ground moved in the shadows with the click of talons and the rasp of scales over stone.