Mercedes Lackey - Elvenblood

And they all played host to elves who were too low in rank and status to have estates, manor houses, and concubines of their own—or young elves, leashed and collared by their lord fathers, who likewise had nothing of the sort as their own. This—and the taverns like it, in this city and the other four trade-cities—was where the "legacies," the supervisors, the seneschals and trainers, came to forget the petty insults heaped upon them by their liege lords. This was where the "extra" sons and the disregarded heirs came, to forget that there was nothing that they would ever see or touch that was truly theirs.

This was where the former concubines, or young girls and boys too delicate to serve in the fields, but not comely enough to grace a harem or work as house slaves, also came. It was difficult to imagine a worse life than that of a field hand, but surely this was it. Especially for the traumatized, abused creatures waiting in those upper rooms. Lorryn tried not to think too hard about them; he was already doing what he could to change their fates.

Lorryn provided a sympathetic ear, and more important, a ready purse. (Many of them were kept on meager allowances by those so-careful lord fathers, generally an amount that was less than the cost of a good dog or a field hand.) He offered his wine and murmurs of understanding. That was common enough; they all shared their grievances, those who came here. What was uncommon was that he also provided a remedy.

Word of that remedy was spreading.

He had learned something fascinating during the hours he had spent in these places, where the air was scented with perfume to cover the odor of spilled wine, and the light was dim to hide the stains on the velvets and satins of the upholstery, the serving girls, and the clientele. His worst fear had been that one or more of the seemingly disgruntled would prove to be an informant, and that the game would be uncovered be fore it began. And surely one or more had been an informant—

But whether they informed out of fear or out of greed, when he actually gave them a way to even the odds with the Great Lords, when he showed them how ineffective magic was against his "talismanic" jewelry, they all turned. Each and every one of them turned against the lord they had been working for, passed over the gold, hid the necklace, headband, and armbands in the breast of his tunic, and walked out without a word.

Except, perhaps, to "inform" to someone else who had a lord as cruel, as indifferent, as sadistic as his own.

He had always known that the Great Lords were cruel to their underlings, but he had never, in all of his planning, guessed that they were so cruel that their liegemen would turn against them at the first opportunity. He had seen the gilded facade of their world, as he walked through it as Lord Tylar's son and heir. Beneath the languid manners, the pretty magics, the idle games, was a cruelty that was all the darker for being so completely casual, a cruelty that used up and disposed of humans and elves alike as if they were toys meant only to amuse an idle hour.

He sipped his wine, and sat in his back-corner booth, and waited for them to find him.

There had been a young lord—he must be a younger son, for he did not wear livery, and his clothing was of too high a quality to be an underling—sitting at a table nearby, drinking steadily, and watching him for the past hour. Now, finally, he rose to his feet, wove his way through the tables with surprising grace (considering the quantity of drink he'd been putting away), and settled himself onto the bench across from Lorryn, empty cup still in hand. He helped himself to the wine in Lorryn's pitcher without a by-your-leave, which further argued for a high position.

Lorryn simply nodded, and pushed the pitcher of wine closer to his new drinking companion.

The stranger took that as an open invitation, downed his cup in a single gulp, and poured it full afresh.

"Fathers," he said at last, sneering, and making the word a curse. 'Tell you how important you are from the time you can walk, give you ev-everything you ask for right up until you co-come of age. Then what?"

"You tell me," Lorryn said blandly.

"Nothing, that's what!" The stranger emptied the cup again; this time Lorryn refilled it. "You come of age, and nothing changes! You're still 'the boy,' still have to come and go as you're bid! You want to ha-have a little fun, bring in some friends, and next thing you know, he's got you hauled up in front of him like you were stealing from his money chest!"

"Ah," Lorryn replied wisely. "I know. You want to have a little manor of your own, a few slave-girls, you ask for it, and hoy! He acts like you'd spit on the names of your Ancestors!"

"Oh, aye!" the stranger agreed. "And just try and walk off the path, just a bit, just for a lark! He's on you, he's using his power on you as if you were his slave, his property! Bad enough he crushes you down to the ground, worse that he lays the Will-Lash on you! Next thing you know, he's threatening the Change on you, to make you mind!"

'To unmake your mind, you mean," Lorryn said, in a grim voice. Ah, so that's what's set this one off. Not that I blame him, not after what Rena told me. "Make you into some kind of puppet, dancing to his tune!"

"That's ex-exactly what he said!" the young elven lord said in surprise. " 'You dance to my tune, boy, with the Change or without it, so put your mind to it!" And next thing I know, he's got me betrothed to some whining, milk-faced girl who can't walk across a room without having vapors, who can't say three sensible words in a row, who—Ancestors, help me!—faints whenever she sees a man with his shirt off! What's she going to do when she sees more than that? And I'm stuck with her!"

"And if you choose to leave her in the bower, and find some fun elsewhere?" Lorryn prompted.

The young lord snarled. "It'll be the Change for me, my lad. I'm to do my duty by her, like a proper er-Lord, that's what!" He poured another cup of wine, but this time he didn't drink it. Instead he leaned over the table and said, in a far different tone, "But I've heard there's a remedy for that situation."

Lorryn made patterns on the tabletop with his finger and a bit of spilled wine. Filigree patterns. "There might be—so I've heard," he said casually.

"I've heard there's a bit of jewelry that can keep someone from—having magic worked on him against his will." The er-Lord looked up through his long, pale eyelashes expectantly—and a little desperately.

"There might be. I've heard that." Lorryn completed his lacy pattern. "I've also heard there's something of a craze for patterned silver necklaces, armbands, headbands. Very popular among the young lords these days, I'm told. You might begin to wonder if the cure for your troubles is in that jewelry, eh?"

The stranger nodded eagerly. "You wouldn't know where I could find a dealer for some of that—would you? A man's got to keep up with the fashions."

Lorryn pretended to think about it. "You know, I might have a bit of that with me now," he replied. "I'd bought it for a friend, but I could let you have it right now for the same price. I can go find the maker again, easily enough, but he's a hard man for a stranger to find."

"And what would that price be?" Now the er-Lord was leaning forward so eagerly that Lorryn almost spoiled the entire deal by laughing out loud. He named the price, and the stranger pulled a purse off his belt and shoved it across the table.

"There's twice that in gold there," he said, his fingers twitching, as if he could not wait to get his hands on the jewelry. "Take it, take it all!" The desperation in his eyes overwhelmed the wine. Then again, who wouldn't be desperate, threatened with the Change?

Lorryn did not touch the purse; he carefully took a purse of his own from his belt, one containing silk-wrapped, silver plated ironwork from the hands of Diric's people, and slid it across the table. The er-Lord snatched it up, hiding it in the breast of his tunic, and only then did Lorryn take the purse of gold.