An armed guard stood by the open tent flap, but Iuna paid him no heed as she entered. Dresses, shirts, and pants hung from hooks on the walls. Stuffed mannequins stood at various spots on the floor, modeling outfits. Iuna drifted from item to item, lifting hems and sleeves with feigned disinterest as Ythnel trailed behind. It wasn't long before an attendant soon joined them.
"Do you see something you like?" the young woman asked. She was just a few summers older than Iuna, perhaps the seamstress's apprentice.
"No, not really," Iuna sighed. "What about you, Ythnel?"
"Oh, I don't know. I never really had a need for this sort of thing back at the manor." As if to emphasize her lack of fashion sense, Ythnel plucked at the skirt of the dark linen dress she wore.
It was like a shark sensing blood in the water. The attendant swept Ythnel up and rushed her over to several gowns hanging on a section of the wall on the other side of the tent.
"Oh, I know just the thing. You're going to love this. Now tell me, what's the occasion?" she chattered excitedly.
Iuna backed toward the entrance of the tent. She halted as she drew parallel to the guard and looked up, suddenly afraid he might notice her guilty face. He just glanced at her briefly and grunted. To her, it was like the blast of a horn that signaled the start of an arena race. She bolted into the crowd.
Iuna couldn't contain her laughter as she charged ahead. Her father would have to send Ythnel away now. How could he not, if the woman was so irresponsible as to lose track of his daughter because she was too busy trying on something frilly. Iuna couldn't wait to see their faces when she finally showed up at the carriage, crying because Ythnel had abandoned her.
As Iuna rounded a corner, she decided to take a quick look behind to make sure Ythnel had not caught up. She was nowhere to be seen. Iuna turned back, a triumphant smirk growing on her face, and slammed into something hard. The force of the collision knocked her backward, and she fell to the ground, stunned.
As her vision came into focus, Iuna noticed that a wide circle had been cleared around her in the marketplace traffic. She turned her head slowly back toward the direction she had been running and saw a man leaning over her. He wore a suit of hardened leather under a fur-trimmed cloak. A white letter K with a burning branch above it was painted on his breast. His dark hair hung in waves that reached to his neck. A golden circlet held it off his forehead. And though he smiled down at her, his brown eyes were full of cruelty.
"Do you know who I am?" he asked. Iuna nodded frantically. Anyone who hadn't actually met Naeros Karanok had heard enough stories that they would recognize him. "Then you have me at a disadvantage. I don't like being at a disadvantage, so why don't you tell me who you are? Or did your parents forget to name you as well as teach you manners?"
Iuna opened her mouth to speak but managed only a croak.
"I'm afraid the girl has been knocked senseless," Naeros joked with his men, who Iuna now noticed were responsible for clearing the space around her and their lord.
"N-n-no, I'm all right," Iuna stammered. "M-m-my n-name is Iuna."
"Well, Iuna, don't you know it's very rude to run into people? What do you think we should do to rude young girls?" Suddenly, Naeros's smile was as cruel as his eyes.
Ythnel's head was spinning. The attendant talked incessantly, throwing dress after dress at her without missing a beat.
"Enough!" Ythnel dropped the pile of garments that had accumulated on her outstretched arms to the ground. The attendant's face paled at the outburst. "I think you've spent enough time on me," Ythnel continued, taking a deep breath to calm herself. "Why don't you show some outfits to Iuna?" She turned, scanning the tent for Iuna. The girl was gone.
"She must have stepped outside," the attendant meekly offered.
"Painbringer's touch," Ythnel cursed. She stormed out of the tent, pausing in the street to search the crowd in both directions for Iuna. Remembering the guard, she spun around to confront him.
"The little girl I came in with, did you see which way she went?" He peered down his nose at her, his arms folded across his puffed-out chest, and grunted. Ythnel's face became a mask of fury. Quicker than thought, she jabbed him in the gut with her right hand, just below the rib cage. The guard's eyes popped in surprise, and he doubled over.
"Which way?" Ythnel asked again through gritted teeth. Gasping for breath, the guard pointed down the lane past her. Ythnel raced off without another word.
Even with her height, it was hard to see through the sea of bobbing heads and shoulders, and the morass of moving bodies prevented Ythnel from maintaining the speed with which she had left the seamstress. Finally, she reached an intersection. She stood at the corner for a moment, desperately searching for a glimpse of Iuna's small figure weaving in and out of the crowd. There was none. Ythnel silently cursed the child. Iuna could be anywhere by now. This was going to cost Ythnel her job. Why was the girl acting like this? Couldn't she see that Ythnel was just trying to help her?
A shift in the movement of the crowd to Ythnel's right caught her attention, and she swung her head to investigate. Something was parting the traffic a few yards down the lane, creating a bottleneck as the throng tried to continue on its way.
Ythnel was sure Iuna was somehow involved.
With a resigned sigh, Ythnel shouldered her way through the press. She emerged to find herself within a cleared space in the middle of the lane. In the center of the circle, a dark-haired man towered over a trembling Iuna. Ythnel could read the threat of harm in his body language. As she took a step forward, Iuna turned toward her and pointed.
"She made me do it," the little girl shrieked. "She's a witch. She cast a spell over me and my father. I saw her do it in the middle of the night."
At the mention of a witch, the crowd froze and a few cries arose from some faint-hearted citizens. The dark-haired man's head snapped up, his gaze following Iuna's outstretched arm and locking onto Ythnel. He straightened but made no move toward her.
"Is this true?" The man's hand dropped casually to the hilt of the short sword hanging in a leather scabbard at his side. "Are you a witch, as the girl claims?"
In a city were the arcane was forbidden, Iuna's charge had turned the situation from a childish prank into a potentially deadly encounter. From the man's arrogant bearing, he was obviously nobility, which meant he also probably thought he was invincible. Ythnel had learned how to interact with such people from her years at the manor.
"I apologize, milord," she began, bowing slightly at the waist. "The truth of the matter is that I am this girl's governess. I'm afraid she is not very happy with the arrangement and has been making every attempt to ruin me. I assure you I will see to it personally that she is severely punished for this display."
The nobleman nodded thoughtfully at this. Ythnel walked toward Iuna, hoping the matter finished and she could drag the girl off.
"She's lying," Iuna blurted. "My father bought her as a slave from Thay. Everybody knows that Thay is full of wizards."
"Halt!" At the command, Ythnel stopped, watching the nobleman from the corner of her eye. He circled her slowly, examining her from head to foot. "Your height, skin tone, and shaved head all mark you as Thayan. And the tattoo, is it not also a custom for wizards of that land to wear such decorations?"
"Many who are not wizards also bear such decorations, milord, so as not to stand out." Ythnel noted that the nobleman's hand was now firmly wrapped around his sword hilt.