Inara hesitated, her lips parted. “Where is your brother?” she asked, hoping to turn the girl’s interest to something else.
“Sulking,” Adilandra said simply.
“Ah.” Inara stood up and took her daughter by the hand. “Come on. Let’s see what needs to be done.”
After leaving the chamber, it wasn’t long before something else caught Adilandra’s attention and saw her run off in a different direction. Inara instructed one of the servants to go after her and ensure she found her way to the banquet. Striding down the west wing, a pair of Guardians were waiting for her, easily recognised by their red cloaks and swords strapped to their back. Of course, Inara knew them by name. There wasn’t a Guardian of the Realm who hadn’t been personally trained by her in some way or other.
“Natharei. Givain.” Inara didn’t stop and so the two warriors simply fell in beside her.
“Commander,” Givain began, “we have that report you asked for regarding the smugglers in Calmardra.”
“Very good,” Inara praised, taking the parchment from the man. She ran a cursory eye over the details. “This is excellent work, both of you. Your next move?” she enquired, her tone suggesting it was a test.
“We follow the smugglers, Commander,” Natharei said confidently. “They are not the priority, but the slave traders they are providing resources for are.”
“Agreed,” Inara replied. “And once you find the slave traders?”
“We burn their world,” Givain directed.
The queen raised an eyebrow. “You may bring down their enterprise any way you deem fit, Givain. But not before you have apprehended Palin Barbosi.”
Now it was Givain’s turn to raise an eyebrow. “The slave master?”
“The well-connected slave master,” Inara specified. “I have it on good authority that he is in contact with the Broker.”
Natharei turned a concerned expression on the queen. “The same Broker who is selling dark relics, Commander?”
“The same,” Inara confirmed. “I suspect he or she is either a surviving member of The Black Hand or an old affiliate. Whoever they are, they have access to Black Hand stores and are supplying bad people with bad things. I want them found.”
“We will question Palin Barbosi,” Givain assured. “He will give us a name, Commander.”
“No,” the queen corrected. “Bring him to me. I wish to oversee the matter myself. I will be joining you on whatever hunt follows our investigation.”
“It would be an honour,” Natharei said with a short bow of the head.
Inara stopped at the next junction to face the Guardians. “I’m sure the honour will be mine. Now, if you will forgive me, today is quite the day and it’s only just begun.”
“Of course, Commander,” the warriors said in unison. “Give our best wishes to Queen Gwenyfer,” Natharei added.
“I will,” Inara promised. “Safe journey.”
Before the Guardians had even left the passage, the queen was faced by Isold, the master of servants, and a number of his staff.
“Your Grace,” Isold greeted with a hurried bow.
“You look flustered, Isold,” Inara observed, continuing her meaningful stride. “You would think we were having hundreds of guests in the keep today,” she added with a touch of humour. For any who had seen a battlefield, Isold would be described as delicate.
“Very witty, your Grace,” the master of servants complimented. “But, about those hundreds of guests…”
“Yes, Isold, out with it.”
“They’re here,” he said with some trepidation.
“I know they’re here, Isold. Our guests have been arriving for days now.”
“No, your Grace,” the master of servants fretted. “They’re here, in the throne room! They were supposed to wait and be announced one party at a time before greeting you.”
“I see,” Inara replied, already bored of a problem that wasn’t really a problem. “Protocol has been broken,” she said drearily.
“Yes, your Grace. It was the dwarves, you see. There was no stopping King Doran - he said he could smell pig. Well, your Grace, once he stormed in there was no stopping the others.”
Inara came to a sudden halt, causing some of the servants to bump into each other. “Where is my husband?” she asked Isold.
The master of servants paused and turned his ear to one of his staff. “The king is with Queen Gwenyfer and Master Thorn, your Grace,” he quickly reported.
“When the hall is full and our guests are accounted for, announce us all together. Until then, whatever you do, don’t come between King Doran and the pig.”
The master of servants clearly had more he wished to discuss, but the queen had endured her fill of trivial dilemmas. She, instead, turned her attention to one whose dilemmas were never trivial in her eyes. Coming to a stop outside her son’s chamber, Inara knocked lightly on the door. The response was muffled and so she made her way inside, there to determine the truth.
Her first born, and only son, was sitting on the end of the bed, his head bowed so his dark hair concealed his face. Inara perched on the bed beside him, unable to pierce the veil of his hair. Without seeing his face, he could easily have been Vighon when he was seventeen years old. They had the same hair, build, and they even sulked in the same manner.
He had celebrated his seventeenth birthday the previous week and was considered a man by most now. But, to Inara, he would always be her boy.
“Athis,” she said gently, placing one hand on his back.
The young man finally lifted his head to reveal blotchy red skin around his eyes. “I don’t want her to leave,” he groaned.
“I know,” Inara said softly, meeting her son’s blue eyes with her own. “We all knew this day would come. But that doesn’t make it any easier.”
“Gwenyfer doesn’t want to leave either,” Athis blurted. “She shouldn’t have to go!”
“You two have become close,” Inara commented, having seen something of Vighon and herself in the young pair.
“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” he complained.
The queen took a breath and nodded her head in memory. “Your father and I were close at your age. Very close. And then, one day,
