After her first week in Vagren, Raya had set up a few appointments. She had Urvin send some letters for her, asking lords of Royal Houses to speak with her or to consider Olston’s plight. She was no more skilled at penmanship and persuasive reasoning than she was confident that Olston should become indebted to the Royal House of a slaver city such as Vagren. As it was, slavers left alone the town as it, and many others, were protected by the Free Hold Policy, one of the few documents that all of the Royal Houses had signed to allow towns of enough size to function with their own governments. The incentive to the Houses was the production and trade merit of leaving such towns unincorporated to a competitive House. When wealth bought power in Vagren, the free public kept the standard from too great of an inflation.
Her father had explained all of this to her, when she was younger. She could only recall his words when she went to meet with the first, House Threjar. In her thinking, if they owed a House too great a debt, they might claim the price in literal manpower. Why would the other Houses intervene to uphold a law that did not demand the House aid a needing town.
The estate of House Threjar was built on one of the highest slopes in Vagren, though it was a small rise compared to any hill near Olston. Urvin sent Benn along with her, to ensure her safety in the city’s streets. He talked a lot, about what was going on at the inn, and how another inn was stealing a lot of their regulars. He said that the other drinking house used slaves to run the business and keep the clients happy. Raya was glad that Urvin didn’t. They wandered up the slope through narrow streets. Twice, Benn told her to follow her into a side street while a troop of plate-armoured men marched by with a cart of bound and gagged slaves.
One of these times, she had to break her silence. “Why doesn’t anyone do anything about it?” Raya asked. “All these refugees coming from Elpan… isn’t there enough lower class to say ‘enough’?”
Benn grimaced. “The Houses are wise,” he said. “Slavery isn’t going anywhere, you see. They don’t hog their wealth. They spend it, so the slave owners are numerous enough, and their Freed Blades loyal enough.”
“Freed Blades?” Raya asked, watching another troop pass them.
Benn nodded. “Their soldiers aren’t slaves. There’s plenty of soldiers in the city that are slaves, but the soldiers who work in the slave trade, the ones who protect the slavers, all of the ones that matter—they aren’t owned. They are paid.”
Raya shook her head, and followed Benn up the next winding street. He had two brass earrings that he wore today, and a blue silk cloak to formalize his appearance. Raya had donned the fancy clothes she had brought from home, a white blouse with red buttons, two string necklaces, and a pair of soft, woolen pants. She still wore her knife though, to show she wouldn’t be taken advantage of. She’d never used it on a person, and didn’t intend to.
Soon, they reached the Threjar mansion, where a pair of men in painted wooden armour bowed to them. “You’re expected, Miss Ganner. Go ahead in and speak with Master Alvar in the main hall.”
Though they acted like she was in charge, Benn led her to the great hall, a longhouse with massive cornerstones and arched teak roof beams. Two men with brass collars and circular brands let them in, opening the doors with the massive wooden poles that handled them. The brands displayed a number and their owner’s tag, in this case, the claw and flame mark of Threjar.
Raya stepped past them into a splendorous throne room. There was no other name for it, though two wooden tables for feasts ran on either side of the marble walkway that separated two wooden floors. The walkway, thoroughly polished and mixed with a blue etching, led beneath hanging orbs of light to the head table. There, an assortment of people waited on the lord and his wife. They had children—Benn had told her—but none were present. There were servants and slaves galore, all wearing the same, simple waist cloth and sheer veiled robe; two held enormous pitchers of wine, one for each of their masters. Others were fanning them with huge linen sails, and others writing whatever was spoken as though it was of a religious nature.
“Greetings, Mistress Ganner,” a short man said, nearby. He bowed to Raya and stopped her when she was halfway through the longhouse. She glanced at Benn and he gave her a reassuring smile. The man wore a small cloth cap full of small white leaves, and had a decoration of brooches and embroidered wording upon his clothes. He didn’t appear to be a slave, but in the Radregar fashion, slaves brands were always placed between the shoulder blades. Slaves were expected to present their backs first, as a sign of submission before being granted the right perceive a free person’s profile.
The decorated man who had stopped Raya stooped low until she said, “Yes?”
“I am Master Alvar. I have the permission of our shenshar Threjar to speak to him on your behalf,” the man said. His voice was quiet and calm, and almost feminine.
Raya tried to contain her disappointment. “I won’t be able to approach him myself?”
“Appreciated Mistress,” the man murmured. “Shenshar Threjar is one of the most powerful Houses in the City of Fate. If he is interested in your plight, he will invite you to speak to him in person.”
“Of course,” she said, trying to be polite.
“What shall I present to his Destined Shenshar?” he asked. The latter term was a word invented in Ith, to separate men of great powerful from common lords.
Raya smiled. She was a little irritated by the whole process. She stared up at the table on the stage, where the lord looked at his wife. He had two lines, one white and one orange, painted over his dark scalp, running straight back from a slight angle of his face, and wore a white robe. His wife had soft hair, delicately combed to either side of her breath-taking face, and only a set of small dots under her eyes, instead of the big artwork on her husband’s head. She stared right at Raya, expressionless. Raya felt chilled by the look, and turned to Alvar again. “Tell him that the refugees are a difficulty for everyone in Radregar—they require food, work, and shelter to be aided, and turning them away only leads to the power of free bandits in the countryside. In Olston, my town, we have plenty of work for them, but we need to afford food and shelter for them. The safety of our home is being challenged by bandits already, and we need an ally.”
“Of course, Mistress,” the serving man said, with a stern nod. He folded his hands and strode away, toward the Threjar’s table. Raya and Benn were left to wait in the middle of the long chamber for him to conduct their business, so Raya pulled one of the chairs out from the abandoned dining tables and sat down. Benn shortly followed suit.
Master Alvar bowed low and waited for his lord and, presumably, his employer to speak with him. When at last he was bade approach their dais, he spoke clearly and loudly for the whole hall to hear. “Our guest, Free Woman Raya Ganner, hails from the mining town of Olston. She comes to present her village’s plight in the Elpan refugee crisis. The Mistress made a point of suggesting that her village may provide these newcomers jobs, but cannot afford their shelter and food, nor their security.”
The lord replied, but his voice was too casual to hear from Raya’s distance.
Alvar spread his hands. “She spoke only of her need, Shenshar, not of payment.”
Again he replied, but this time Alvar turned and strode back toward Raya. He smiled, as he walked, and opened his hands when he spoke to her. “My Shenshar would like to speak with you. Please, follow me. Ah, only the Mistress.”
Alone, Raya followed Alvar down the rest of the marble walkway. Now, both Threjar and his wife were watching her, and the wife smiled when she saw that Raya was younger than anyone except the slaves. “Welcome,” the lord said. He had a long, narrow nose and a mouth that held a perpetual sneer. “Free Woman.”
Raya glanced beside her, but Alvar had stopped walking a few paces earlier. She turned back to the lord and his wife. “Thank you for speaking with me, Master Threjar,” she said.
“I want to understand your suggestion, Mistress,” Threjar said. He lifted his glass of wine, but didn’t look like he intended to drink from it. “You seek my aid managing the refugee scenario in your hometown, but you have no offer for me?”
“Our town would be indebted to you, of course,” Raya said. “I am not a councilwoman in Olston, but it would only seem fair to provide the profits or resources mined by our refugees to the House protecting them.”
“So I must name my price?” Threjar asked.
Raya nodded. “I will consider as many offers as I may in Vagren, before returning to the Olston council to decide.”
Threjar smiled. “You expect many offers? Obviously, a commoner from a free town comes in here under the safety of Free Hold Policy, a policy that any aid provided would be dangerous close to breaching. The Houses have a tense enough relationship as it. Return to me with a specific offer that I may consider as a business arrangement, so I am not tempted to breach the Policy of freedom in Olston.”
It was a sensible business request with an undertone ripe with threats. Raya bowed. “Of course, Master. Thank you for your time.”
Threjar nodded to her and took a drink of his wine. As Raya backed away, the lord and his wife looked back at each other and continued to talk quietly. No more consideration was given to Raya, save a friendly word from Alvar. Benn and she left the estate quietly, and returned to the Vagabond’s Rest inn empty handed.