excerpt from " Seusea and the Savage Heiress"

[esercito sconfitto]

A blood-curdling scream shot through the manor and the hairs on Seusea’s neck stood on end. Again, she wished she was a long way from there, preferably with a cool drink at hand. Even the smoked-filled chaos of the Saint’s Kitchen was more welcoming than this place of death. In her heart, she knew this manse to be a charnel house most foul.

And things were going to get much worse, there was no doubt in Seusea’s mind about that.

Worse things happened immediately. She barely had time to conceal herself when the two men she saw before came into the fest-hall followed by three bowed shapes wearing long cotton robes that hid all of their features. One of the men barked an order and straight away, the three began to clear the tables and tidy the room. Seusea remained crouched behind a sculpture, dreading the prospect of capture.

To her relief, the two men left, with two of the cloaked figures following on their heels. The remaining figure was absorbed in its scullery tasks. Seusea waited one tense minute and then acted. Swiftly, she came up behind the unsuspecting figure and struck it across the back of the head with the hilt of her poniard. It collapsed into her arms. Seusea dragged it down the stairs and into the cellar. The katean was still making a row, which she blithely ignored. Let the beast rant and rave.

The figure under the robe was a woman, or maybe a girl. Her long black hair and tawny skin hinted she was from Port Diales, a trading city a week’s journey to the west. The jade bracelet she wore confirmed it – Dialesians (as they were known) held jade to be a sacred mineral and wore it much the way Societors wore fetishes on their hips.

Seusea took the robe off the girl, whom she estimated was no older than eighteen. Underneath, she wore a translucent slip which failed to hide the curves of her young body. Seusea stripped out of her own clothes and from a watertight pouch around her waist, brought out a thin long-sleeved black blouse and knee-length pants. She put these on, placing her old clothes back in the pouch. Over the top, she put on the girl’s robe. With that done, she bound and gagged the girl and laid her beside the trapdoor.

Lastly, she produced a small jar of ointment from the pouch, and she applied this liberally to her face, hands and arms. She would no longer smell of the sewer




link to the novel

http://petergreenwell.com/my-fiction/se ... e-heiress/