~Kindness Firtree, Meditations on the Precepts
Chapter 9
The man focused his gaze on Repentance and shot from his chair. "What have you done?" he shouted.
At Lord Carrull's fierce glare, Repentance stepped back and crossed her arms in front of her chest.
He wore the same clothes he had worn at the slave market, but he didn't look like the same man. He wasn't giggling, for one thing. His face was red with rage. "What is this about, Dagg?"
"It's not my fault." Dagg started frantically patting Repentance's hair back into place.
She ducked out from under his hands. He was no rescuer. He was a kidnapper, delivering her to the lecherous Lord Carrull.
"She ran away from the troopers," he said. "Ran back to the slave market! Like a demon. I almost didn't get her at all. But she's fine. Just looks a bit rough. Nothing a bath and a new gown won't cure."
"Not her! Not her!" Lord Carrull yelled. "You weren't supposed to bring her."
"You told me to bring her. The girl in the robe."
"Scarlet, I said. Are you color blind? This girl is wearing maroon."
The rescuer, or rather the kidnapper, studied her robe, a confused look on his face. "But you never even looked at the other girl. This one here is the one you liked."
Anger burned in Lord Carrull's eyes. "You do not show a great interest in the object you plan to steal. Not if you have a trickle of sense."
Dagg worked his jaw, but no sound came out.
Repentance took the opportunity to jump into the conversation. "Since I'm not the one you want, I'll leave you to your business."
"You stay where you are." Lord Carrull sank into his chair. Then, looking at Dagg, he said, "Go see Compassion in the kitchen. Tell her to feed you. I need time to think."
Nodding and bobbing apologetically, Dagg scuttled out.
Lord Carrull turned toward the fire, leaned over, and rested his head in his hands.
Repentance took a couple of silent steps backward toward the door.
"Sit down and let me think for a minute," Lord Carrull said, patting the seat beside him.
"I'm comfortable where I am." She would sooner sit next to a muckback snake that hadn't eaten in two weeks.
"Sit!"
She jumped.
And she sat.
In the chair farthest from him.
She looked at the rich furnishings. A wooden table in a city that had no trees. And flowers. It must have cost a bucket of beads to have them brought up the mountain. So, if Lord Carrull was so rich, why would he steal slave girls? But Madam Cawrocc had intimated that he didn't have much money.
"When did you last eat?"
She jerked at his question. "Not counting the potato water they gave me this morning, it's been two days."
"I'll have dinner brought."
"I'd rather join Compassion and Dagg in the kitchen, if you don't mind," Repentance said.
"Stay where you are." His voice was firm—gone was the silly man who had stood on the slave dock a few hours earlier. This man was not one to simper and be led around by the likes of Madam Cawrocc.
A few minutes later, Compassion set a dinner plate on the small table beside Repentance. Lord Carrull brushed her off when she asked if he'd like a dish, too. He stared moodily into the fire while Repentance ate. There was some kind of meat she'd never eaten before. It tasted something like lizard—brown and tender and juicy. A mound of boiled potatoes and gravy snuggled up to the meat on her plate but not for long. She ate with gusto, washing the lot down with the same cold, milky beverage the slavers had given her on the trip up the mountain.
When she was done, Compassion took her dinner plate and set a steaming berry brick in its place. "Fresh from the oven," she said, as she slathered thick cream over the flaky crust.
Rich. Ripe. Really, really good. The sweet berries slid down like fruity velvet.
Repentance finished and sat back sipping from a cup of hot coffee, satisfied, for the moment, to stare into the fire and wait for Lord Carrull to explain himself. There was nothing else to do at present. She might as well enjoy her full stomach.
She wasn't greedy. She didn't need riches. She didn't need power or beads or clothes or jewels. She would be content with a good meal every now and again. Was it such an evil thing for her to think she deserved to eat as well as the overlord masters?
The back of her neck prickled and the fine hair there stood up. She looked over to find Lord Carrull studying her.
"You've had enough?" he asked.
"Yes, thank you."
He raised his eyebrows in surprise. "Such manners."
She shrugged. "My future is no more grim than three hours ago, and my stomach is full, which is more than I ever expected. So, yes, I thank you. We lowborns know how to give thanks when it is due, unlike you overlords who take what is not yours and offer no thanks for it at all."
Lord Carrull sighed. "A fine speech. I do hope you learn to shut up, though. Else you'll not live long here on the mountain. And you're wrong, of course, to think your future is not more grim than a few hours ago. Your situation is quite grave."
Her heart skipped a beat, then set to rat-a-tat-tatting like a woodpecker. "If you let me go I'll run away, and the prince will never know you took me. I'm not going back to tell on you."
"You belong to Jadin, and I have to return you. There is no other way."
Repentance thought of what waited for her
