Khenir pointed at Alec’s left earlobe. “You didn’t get that dragon bite in Skala.”

“I’ve been to Aurënen,” Alec admitted. “But my father was Tír.”

“Ah. Drink some more. You need it,” Khenir urged, placing the cup of broth in his hands. “I’ve never known Ilban to purchase a half-breed before. He’s usually so particular.”

“Why’s that?” Alec asked, between sips of broth. His belly growled, hungry for more substantial fare.

“The high-ranking men of Plenimar prefer pure blood in their slaves, just as they do with their horses and hunting dogs,” Khenir whispered, more resigned than bitter. “The ya’shel usually go to merchants’ households, or the brothels, or get sold off to the countryside as farm labor. You’re very lucky.”

That was a matter of opinion. “Are there others in the house? I saw a veiled woman.”

“A few. That’s Rhania, the children’s nurse.” He took the empty cup from Alec and gave him one filled with water. “You’re to drink this, and this.” He held up a wooden pitcher. “Ilban means you no harm, but his purifications can be a bit hard on the body.”

“Is that really all this is?” Alec fingered the amulet at his throat. Khenir’s collar was unadorned.

“Don’t worry. Ilban would never harm you.”

“Oh, really? Have a look at my feet.”

“That was just a beating. We’ve all had those. But Ilban is very kind, as masters go. Now let me tend your brands.”

Alec held out his arm and Khenir untied the bandage. The burn was healing clean, and quickly. There was hardly any redness around the scab. “I’m starving. Doesn’t Yhakobin ever give his slaves meat?”

Khenir gave him a warning look. “Even between the two of us, you must refer to Ilban by his title. What if someone were to overhear? As for meat?” Khenir shook his head. “You’re a slave, Alec, so you’d have to please Ilban a great deal to get any of that. I can’t think the last time I tasted any. They think it keeps us docile.”

Alec didn’t feel docile yet, just resentful and hungry.

Khenir dabbed an aromatic salve on the burn. “They have many ways of taming us, little brother. They’ve made an art of it. I hear it’s worst for those with manifested powers.”

“I’m safe, then. That slop pail has more magic to it than I do. I suppose I should be glad. A slave on the ship showed me the scars where he’d been whipped. And gelded. At least they didn’t do that to me.”

Khenir carefully worked the bandage away from Alec’s leg. This one had seeped and the wrappings had stuck to the scab. “Not yet,” he murmured.

“What do you mean, ‘not yet’? He told me he wouldn’t!”

Khenir shrugged. “Perhaps Ilban means to breed you, then, or sell you when he’s through with you. Intact young slaves often fetch a better price.”

Alec pondered that uneasily. “He said it’s my blood he wants.”

“Well, Ilban is an alchemist, after all. It must be something to do with that.”

He leaned forward to work at the soiled leg bandage and his tunic pulled back from one shoulder, revealing the faded white stripes of lash marks, just like the ones Alec had seen on the ’faie aboard the slaver ship.

“Did he do that to you?” asked Alec.

“Oh, no! Ilban is not my first master.”

“You fought back, too, didn’t you?”

“For all the good it did.”

“And did they-?” Still rocked by what Khenir had implied, he glanced down at the other man’s lap before he could help himself.

Khenir looked up sharply. “You never ask a slave that! Do you understand? Never!”

“I’m sorry. I spoke without thinking.”

Khenir sighed and went back to work. “You’re new to all this. Sometimes I forget what that’s like. I’ve been here a very long time, you see.”

“I’m sorry,” Alec said again, feeling miserable. Khenir’s reaction was answer enough.

“Drink your water.”

Neither spoke as Khenir finished with the bandaging and gathered up the soiled linen strips and empty cups.

“I didn’t mean to offend you,” Alec ventured, as Khenir stood and fastened the lace-trimmed veil across his face. “Do you have to go?”

The man leaned down and stroked his hair. Without thinking, Alec closed his eyes and leaned into the touch; it felt like years since anyone had touched him with anything like kindness.

Khenir smiled sadly and trailed his fingers down Alec’s cheek. “I’ll be back as soon as it’s allowed, I promise. Just do as you’re told. It will be better for you if you do, and perhaps Ilban will give you more freedom in the house.”

He went out and took the candle with him. Alec groped in the dark for the pitcher. The tincture had left him thirsty.

More freedom, eh? Alec pulled the quilts up to his chin. A little moonlight found its way through the grate, and he could see the white puff of his breath on the air.

He knew he shouldn’t get his hopes up too much, but Khenir had unwittingly given him a great deal of useful information. There were at least two others like him here, and if he could lull “Ilban” into giving him the run of the house, as Khenir and the nurse evidently had, then sooner or later he could find a way to escape. Given the very real possibility of having his balls cut off, sooner would be better. So, he reasoned, he’d play the good slave and take the tinctures, and use every opportunity he had to learn the layout of the house. But he’d have to be very careful. Yhakobin had made it clear that he knew too much of Alec’s past to be fooled easily.

Burrowing down into the deeper warmth of the quilts, he kissed his palm and pressed it to his heart. Keep well, talí, and don’t think I’ve forgotten you. I’ll get out of here and I’ll find you, no matter what it takes.

As he drifted off to sleep, hoping for dreams of Seregil, it occurred to him to wonder what had happened to the other slaves Khenir had alluded to, the ones their master preferred.

CHAPTER 17 Kind Words. Bad News.

“HABA?”

Cool fingers and Adzriel’s scent brought Seregil close to the surface of waking again. He dreamed of her face, sometimes smiling and kind as she almost always had been, during the years she’d raised him. But in other dreams he was a child again, standing before the judges at Sarikali with blood on his tunic, and she was weeping.

And always that pet name-Haba, “little black squirrel”-whispered close to his ear. Adzriel had called him that first, and then only the ones who loved him-his friends, Kheeta, his sisters…

Another, too.

Haba, come back to us.

Haba, wake up.

Wake…

“Are you awake at last? Open your eyes and show me.” A woman’s voice, speaking in Aurënfaie.

Seregil let out a soft groan as someone lightly slapped his cheek. “Mydri, don’t. Sick.”

“Wake up, now. You must drink something.”

Consciousness returned slowly. At first he was aware only of a tremendous heaviness, then that scent, and of how hard it was to open his eyes. Something cool and moist passed across his eyelids, then his brow and cheeks. Someone was washing his face.

“Adzriel?” It came out a faint, cracked whisper. His mouth was so dry, and his tongue felt thick. “Where-?”

He didn’t recall reaching Bôkthersa. Something had happened…

“Open your eyes, young son.”

Young son? It was said in the formal style, rather than familial. His gummy lids parted at last and he found himself in a curtained bed in a dimly lit room. A candle burned somewhere beyond the bed curtains and someone sat beside the bed, a dark shape, with no visible face. A scrap of memory stirred-a dark, faceless shape lurching at him, a horrid, rotting stench…

A dra’gorgos!

But there was nothing but the scent of wax here, and the faintest whiff of Adzriel’s perfume still lingering in the air. Too weak to reach out or even turn his head, he blinked up at the woman, needing to hear a friendly voice.