Free Heir of Iron (The Powers of Amur Book 1) by J.S. Bangs

knock on the posts.
    “Ah! The stars upon you, my friends!” he shouted. “Come up, come up. It has been a year, two years since you were here?”
    “Two,” Mandhi said. Their very first investigations of Navran brought them to Jaitha, where they had learned about the incredible culinary talents of Paidacha.
    “Too long! Did you find the one you were looking for?”
    Mandhi hesitated on the top step of the ladder. Taleg stood below her and gave a chagrined shrug. “We found him, but we lost him here in the city.”
    “Really? Terrible. Tell me, what was his name?”
    “Navran. Taleg is going to look for him,” Mandhi said. “He’s leaving immediately, but with Ulaur’s favor he’ll return later tonight.”
    “Oh.” Paidacha’s face fell. “Tonight’s dinner will be splendid. You chose a good night to come. But Taleg, you will miss it?”
    “Perhaps tomorrow?” Taleg said with a pained shrug.
    “Certainly.” Paidacha grinned. “I’ll come up with something special. Mandhi, you remember Kalishni my daughter? She’ll show you to your room. The largest chamber, Kalishni, and put up the curtains to provide Mandhi with her seclusion.”
    A little girl appeared at the edge of the doorway, and at her father’s command she took Mandhi’s hand.
    “Find him,” Mandhi said over her shoulder to Taleg as the girl led her into the house. “And come back quickly.” She didn’t add
I’ll miss you until you return
, since gossip from Jaitha could easily return to Virnas, but she hoped that Taleg understood that she meant it.
----
    Night settled over the city with the scent of woodsmoke and the boasting of frogs. Mandhi sat on a cushion near the front door of the guest-house, her belly full. She had eaten saffron-scented rice, roast duck stuffed with dates and mint, fish stew with leeks and coriander, and honeyed roti. The dining room in the center of the guest-house was packed, both with the guests and with others who had come just for one of Paidacha’s famous feasts. Most of them were Uluriya, and if the others knew or cared that the food was prepared under the law of Ulaur and blessed by a saghada, they gave no indication of it.
    The chatter continued in the dining room, but Mandhi had retired to the door and looked out into the darkness. Overhead, the stars gleamed in an inky blue sky, and the city imitated them with candles and fires flickering in windows. Mandhi’s food sat uneasy in her stomach. Taleg had not returned.
    If Navran was gone for good…. What would she tell her father?
    But isn’t this what you want?
    Yes, but not this way. Cauratha’s heart would break. He would not blame her, at least not openly. He was too gentle for that. But she would feel the recrimination every time they spoke.
    But weren’t you relieved, just a little, when you realized he was gone?
    No. Yes. I don’t know.
    Her thoughts chased themselves in that circle with the inevitability of the stars turning in the sky.
    There was a noise in the street. She stood and looked out, then fetched an oil lamp from the house and hoisted it. Someone was coming. Two someones.
    “Taleg?” she called out.
    His laughter echoed through the night air. “Am I late for dinner?”
    Two dim silhouettes emerged from the gloom into the light of the lamp. Taleg stood there grinning, his arm slung over the shoulder of a mute Navran. Navran looked up at her with a cold, inflexible expression.
    “Was he drunk?” she asked Taleg.
    “I wasn’t drunk.” Navran said.
    Mandhi made a noise of disgust. “Get up here.”
    Navran ascended the ladder with Taleg behind him. As soon as he stepped onto the deck Mandhi slapped him. “Do you have any idea what you’ve done?”
    He did not open his eyes in response to her slap. “What?”
    “What?
What?
”
    “Tell me, Mandhi. What
did
I do to rouse your anger?”
    Taleg got off of the ladder and loomed behind Navran. “Let’s talk quietly,” he said.
    Mandhi put the oil lamp down. Another