Gary Gygax: City of Hawks

“Here is your cloak, my lady,” the serving girl said happily. It was evident she shared the glory of her new mistress this night as she spoke. “There is a litter waiting outside too,” she gasped breathlessly, “with two linkboys and a guardsman!”

At that Meleena could no longer help herself. She smiled and hugged the thin girl, “Isn’t it wonderful?” she said with a little giggle. Then, recalling her new station, Meleena quickly released her servant and stepped back, once again a cold and important lady. “Sleep on the rug by the hearth, for if I happen to return late tonight I might need you.”

“Yes’m,” the girl replied as she opened the outer door for her mistress to depart. She was pleased at the prospect, for her usual bed-place had no warm fire to add comfort to the hard floor. After shutting and latching the door, the girl quickly tidied her new mistress’ bedchamber and went to her assigned place by the embers. Thinking that no one would notice, she added a few big chunks of coal to the fire and snuggled down on the thick rug.

She felt a bit guilty about using the coal, for she was a devout person and the deity she worshiped would not have condoned such an action. But she did, after all, deserve what little comfort she could procure for herself, so long as she did not hurt someone else in the process. She would be able to sleep for several hours, undisturbed and toasty. This was luxury indeed, she said to herself as she drifted off to sleep, clutching the symbol of her faith that she wore around her neck.

Meleena was thinking similar thoughts as the bearers carried her hooded chair along toward the fortress that was the governmental heart of Grey-hawk Before her great good fortune of the last few days, she had been merely one of the many maids-in-waiting amid the welter who served the oligarchs. As the orphaned daughter of a petty landowner and unsuccessful merchant, she had been fortunate to get even so lusterless a position as that.

Wanno, the Master of Magics to the Oligarchs of Greyhawk, had first seen her by chance at the Halls, when she had come to protest the annexation by the city of her father’s property upon his death. Initially Meleena had thought the weird old man was lusting after her, but the mage had not so much as laid a finger on her. Wanno had simply silenced her useless protests to the unsympathetic clerk, taken her to another building nearby, and informed the functionary there that he should give her immediate status as a waiting maid to the oligarchs. The fellow had done just that after Wanno had presented him with the mage’s own writ, and hied himself quickly to the task too. Spell-binders were not noted for their patience with petty bureaucrats.

Although he had spoken to her seldom over the next few months, Wanno had certainly kept track of her. This Meleena knew because of the little hints given to her by others in the same station within the Citadel. Like her, they were quartered in dreary lodgings in the Halls District and had to come to the fortress center of the city every day to await instructions as to their duties. Usually there was nothing to do save attending some oligarch’s wife, seeing to an important female visitor, or serving dainties at a feast or function. In truth, she and the others were nothing more than glorified serving wenches themselves, and but slight the glorification at that. Meleena flushed with indignation as she thought about how she had been ordered about, humiliated, and often degraded during that time.

Then, one day, Wanno had summoned her to his own quarters and questioned her at length. There were many bubbling retorts and smoking pots and braziers in the place. The fumes muzzied her. Meleena recalled, and the bloodshot eyes of Wanno had bored Into her brain.

Afterward the mage had been kinder still, and certainly friendlier. During this meeting, Wanno had informed Meleena that she was soon going to have to care for the little son of her deceased cousin Ermantrude. Try as she might, Meleena could not recall ever having heard of Ermantrude-nor, for that matter, of her mother’s sister, someone whom Wanno referred to as her Aunt Una. However, Wanno convinced Meleena that he had researched her family history, through means that only an accomplished mage such as he could command, and he had found that she was assuredly the infant’s only known relative. Meleena could hardly remember her own mother, who had died when she herself was a babe, so she scarcely wondered that she had trouble recalling her Aunt Una and her cousin Ermantrude. Once she had gotten over the surprise of hearing all this information for the first time, Meleena readily assented to taking charge of the child-and Wanno had been mightily pleased at that.

As part of his final preparations for Meleena’s assumption of her new responsibility, Wanno had sent word to another official in the Citadel, and soon she had been moved from a waiting maid to a position as Lady and Ward of the Lord Mayor. No more daily drudgery, only occasional summonses to official functions where Meleena would sit at table with those of rank and high station. This very night was her first such occasion-her coming-out, as it were.

Good things come in threes, it was said. Meleena was convinced that, for her, it was so-the babe, her newly exalted station, and the means to maintain and enjoy that status. And all of it revolved around the efforts of the kindly old mage. Wanno told her that he had taken the time and trouble to personally investigate the circumstances surrounding her cousin’s death, and the case was worse even than her own, where property rightfully hers had been taken by the powers that governed Greyhawk.

In Meleena’s own case, Wanno told her, he had come on the scene too late to help. But luckily, he had found out about Ermantrude’s demise in time to act swiftly. It seemed that the woman had been very wealthy. The officials of Hardby had meant to seize that wealth and make the Infant a ward of the state, but Wanno’s intervention had saved the situation. The mage, being one whose abilities and influence were respected even where his name was not known, demanded to be recognized as the infant’s official guardian, and could not be refused that right since he had come forth before any judgment had been rendered. To the dismay of the court officials. Wan-no’s status also carried with it the right to administer Ermantrude’s considerable fortune, so long as It was disbursed with the infant’s welfare in mind.

Fortunately for both Meleena and Wanno (whose life was not one that could easily accommodate the raising of a child), he was permitted to delegate the responsibility for the day-to-day care of the infant. Since he was later able to identify and then locate Meleena, the babe’s only relation, she became the logical-and from an ethical standpoint, the only-choice for a nursemaid.

Getting a chance to be a mother was wonderful enough in itself. Having her station in life elevated (in the interest of giving the babe a decent upbringing) was an exciting additional benefit. And there was more: As long as Meleena cared for her cousin’s infant son, she would receive a maintenance stipend-stipend, mind you, she thought to herself, was how Wanno put it-of five golden orbs each month!

As if that wasn’t enough, then the goodly old dweomercraefter had produced a chest filled with beautiful clothing and jewels-a part of the estate of her poor, dear cousin. Meleena regretted that she couldn’t recall anything about Ermantrude, for she must be… must have been… a very sweet and wonderful person.

“Please alight, m’lady. We are at the Grand Palace,” the guardsman said deferentially as he swept aside the heavy plush drape to enable Meleena to leave the sedan chair.

The sound and the motion snapped her back to the present. “Thank you, my man,” she said with a detached tone, emulating the women she had waited upon until recently. “This is for your services,” she added, drawing a silver coin from her purse and holding it out to the brawny man. “Please make certain that all is well until I return.”