Fic: Andrea Reloaded
Just posting what I've written over the past could of weeks, since I haven't succeeded in adding to my word count the past few days. Enjoy.
140
“Master, what am I doing here?” Andrea asked, sitting in Master Tez’s carriage as they and the line of carts filled with goods behind them bounced along the road. They had passed through the Barrier a week before, then headed back onto the road east, towards the human kingdoms.
“As I told you before, Andrea, now that the old human king’s family line has finally had the grace to die out, we’re reopening merchant ties,” her master patiently explained, sitting on the bench across from her.
“I know that, but you still haven’t explained why I’m here with you.” She tugged at her leash, the other end clipped to a convenient ring on the back of her bench. It was a familiar weight, used by her master when he took her for rare journeys into elven communities, but he rarely bothered with it otherwise. For some reason wearing it out here, beyond the Barrier, in the human kingdoms that she had long ago fled from, it disturbed her in a way that it hadn’t back home.
“You are a skilled artisan, Andrea. I will expect you to demonstrate to the people we meet what you are capable of producing.”
“If you’re gathering commissions you could have just brought along a few of my display pieces. There’s no reason drag me out here.”
“That would display the wares, not your skill. I expect you to demonstrate your skill while we are here, so the merchants I speak to will know who is providing their products.”
“Master, I really don’t care to be here.” She stared out the window of the carriage. After nearly a hundred and fifty years, the whole landscape had changed. Where once there had been farmer fields and small hamlets, war, plague and proximity to the Elven Domain had depopulated the land, allowing tall stands of pine, oak and diamond wood to reclaim the area. “There’s nothing for me here now.”
“There’s opportunity for profit. I won’t be denying you your percentage, Andrea.”
“To be gained from people who once did their best to kill me for having the wrong father. No thank you, Master.”
“Those individuals are long dead. Holding grudges against their descendants will only give you stomach ulcers. I speak from experience on this subject.”
The thought gave her pause. Odd to consider that all the folk who had once tormented her, cold, distant Matron, the other children in the orphanage, the gang that had chased her into that alley and into poor Arthur’s hands, that they were all dead, some for likely over a century. I still don’t want to be here. “As you will, Master,” she said instead.
She kept silent as the trees gave way to orchards and tended fields, small stone and wattle farmhouses at their corners. By the evening they were on the outskirts of a sizable town, holding perhaps a thousand people all told. It took her a moment to realize that it was the same town Master Tez had rescued her from so long ago. None of the buildings looked the same, fire and wear taking their toll. The only recognizable landmark was an old stone fountain in the central square, serving as the sole source of potable water for its citizens. Everything else was new, or at least new to her, the buildings were actually aged and weathered, decades old at least and not subject to the elven skills of preservation.
The carriage halted and Master Tez negotiated briefly with a town burgher as to where his train of carts might be parked on the outside of town and the horses tended. At his call she unhooked her leash and stepped out, handing it over to him. Standing beside her master was an overweight and a bit florid human, dressed in what would have called “rough and uncouth” clothing, but on this side of the Barrier was an indication of landed prosperity.
“This is the merchant Veritelli, Andrea. Veritelli, this is my slave, Andrea the Halfbred.”
“Milord.” Andrea curtseyed politely.
Meanwhile Veritelli opened his mouth then closed it again, apparently biting back the first thing he’d intended to say. Finally he came out with, “I didn’t know that you were bringing slaves with you, Merchant Tez. I was aware it was practiced over there, but…”
“And I am aware that it is no longer practiced over here. One must make accommodations for one’s guests though, as I’m sure you’ll agree.” Master Tez smiled politely, Andrea smiled blankly, and Veritelli was just blank for a moment before his manners reasserted themselves and he invited Master Tez to his home in a walled off neighborhood of the town, lit in warm orange and shadows as the evening sun began to set. As such things went it was relatively spacious, able to accommodate the merchant’s extended family and several servants, with a small garden in the back. Tez was given a guest room and Andrea, after a moment of hesitation on Veritelli’s part as he tried to figure out the status of a slave of one of the mysterious Elves of the Barrier, was saved from making that decision by Tez informing him that her place would be in his room.
“Oh, good, he’s going to think I’m your concubine,” Andrea noted with annoyance when Veritelli wasn’t listening.
“Technically speaking, you are my concubine,” Master Tez replied.
“We haven’t made love to each other for over fifty years.” Their physical relationship had lasted a few decades, but eventually, even with Tez’s remarkable ideas, their explorations of each other had taken on the aspect of rote action rather than pleasure, and it had ended by their mutual agreement before it descended into hurt feelings. They remained friends though, she liked to think, even if they were master and slave above all else.
“Former concubine then.”
“I thought I was here as your leather artisan.”
“One shouldn’t limit one’s potential roles. Quiet now.” She shut up as another man entered the room. This one was a relatively young man in his early thirties, she guessed, physically if not chronologically as old as Andrea herself. He had dark blue eyes and a long nose, and his hair was dark blond and kept in a short queue that disappeared under the collar of his bright blue tunic.
“Ah, this is my nephew, Jonathan. My sister’s youngest,” Veritelli said. “Jonathan, this is Tez, the elf merchant that I told you we were going to be doing business with. Tez, my nephew and apprentice, Jonathan Mayweather.”
Jonathan’s eyes tracked over from Master Tez’s face to Andrea’s, then down a bit to focus on her collar, following the chain that ran from the ring at her neck to her master’s hand. “Master Tez,” he greeted, giving him a polite bow. “Miss… ah?”
“Andrea Halfbred, Master Tez’s leather artisan,” she replied, curtseying again.
“Why are you… why are you wearing that thing around your neck?”
“Because she is my slave,” Master Tez said.
“I’m sorry, slave?”
“Slave,” He repeated blandly. Master Tez handed her leash back to her and ordered, “Have my luggage moved up to my room, Andrea. Then get yourself some dinner.”
“Yes, Master,” she replied and scurried off to round up the coachman. After helping the man move Master Tez’s trunks and her own baggage with her spare clothing and tools up to the guest room, she came back down to scare up some bread and cheese from the kitchen in the basement.. Then it was back upstairs to sit in an overstuffed armchair and fiddle with some piecework while her master finished his own dinner and began negotiations with Veritelli for moving goods across the Barrier.
Trade had only recently began to cross again, as relations between the human and elven nations thawed with the assurances that the sort of slaughter that had perpetuated over a century ago would not be repeated by this generation of humans. Master Tez, having grown bored with the elves’ isolation, had finally been persuaded by Rider Kavin to take out the first truly substantial wagon train across to open full trade for profit, as opposed to symbolism.
The room seemed terribly dim by the light of her lamp, and she ended up spreading out the elven glow jewels she was going to use for one of her commissions out so she could have enough light to work by. The lack of proper mage lights gave the world beyond the Barrier a very dark place, almost beyond the ability of a simple oil lamp to dispel.
It was nearly midnight before Master Tez came upstairs, yawning and stretching as he entered.
“Did things go well, Master?” she asked, putting her work aside and putting the glow jewels into a green felt purse.
“We haven’t even been here a full day, Andrea. Dinner was just the usual tedious feeling out of intentions and personalities,” he said, stripping his shirt and boots off unselfconsciously. He stretched and, long cooled relationship or not, she enjoyed watching the play of muscles across his stomach and chest as he clasped his palms over his head briefly. “I see no particular complications however. I’ll let Veritelli have a below average price for my goods, and let him think he was clever enough to out-negotiate an elf. It’ll be good for his pride and it will allow me to establish a relationship with his family for a few decades before I begin to raise up my prices to a more profitable level.”
“How long do you think it’s going to take?”
“As long as it takes, Andrea. Are you in such a terrible hurry to go back across the Barrier again?”
“No.” Yes. This wasn’t home anymore, she knew that for certain now. She just wanted to get back to her workshop and bury herself in commissions and the occasional book.
“Good. For now, we should both get some sleep. No doubt Veritelli will want me to meet with all the burghers and take a tour of this miserable place to show it off to me and to show me off to his patrons.” He pulled off his trouser and pulled back the covers, while Andrea peeled out of her dress and laid it across the back of a chair. When she got ready to lay down in the bed, Master Tez surprised her by holding up a restraining palm. “There’s bedroll and comforter in the wardrobe, or so I was told. You’re to sleep on the floor.”
She looked at him askance. “I thought I was playing concubine for you?”
“You are playing Master Tez’s Slave, which is what you are. Which means while you’re here you will sleep on the floor at the foot of the bed. Get the bedroll please.”
“Yes, Master.” Still more than a little confused and irritated, she pulled out the bedroll and comforter, rolling them out and laying down. Then to her further surprise he took her leash, which had been dangling from her collar ever since she’d been dismissed for dinner, and wrapped it around the bedpost knob, locking it in place. “What’s that for, Master? I’m not running away!”
“That’s not to prevent escape, but to prevent theft.”
“Veritelli is no slaver, you saw how he looked at me.”
“Veritelli is not the thief I’m worried about. Go to sleep, Andrea.”
“But then who are you--?”
“Go to sleep, Andrea. That’s an order.”
“Yes, Master,” she answered meekly.
She slept that night, but uneasily, the chain tugging at her throat.
140
“Master, what am I doing here?” Andrea asked, sitting in Master Tez’s carriage as they and the line of carts filled with goods behind them bounced along the road. They had passed through the Barrier a week before, then headed back onto the road east, towards the human kingdoms.
“As I told you before, Andrea, now that the old human king’s family line has finally had the grace to die out, we’re reopening merchant ties,” her master patiently explained, sitting on the bench across from her.
“I know that, but you still haven’t explained why I’m here with you.” She tugged at her leash, the other end clipped to a convenient ring on the back of her bench. It was a familiar weight, used by her master when he took her for rare journeys into elven communities, but he rarely bothered with it otherwise. For some reason wearing it out here, beyond the Barrier, in the human kingdoms that she had long ago fled from, it disturbed her in a way that it hadn’t back home.
“You are a skilled artisan, Andrea. I will expect you to demonstrate to the people we meet what you are capable of producing.”
“If you’re gathering commissions you could have just brought along a few of my display pieces. There’s no reason drag me out here.”
“That would display the wares, not your skill. I expect you to demonstrate your skill while we are here, so the merchants I speak to will know who is providing their products.”
“Master, I really don’t care to be here.” She stared out the window of the carriage. After nearly a hundred and fifty years, the whole landscape had changed. Where once there had been farmer fields and small hamlets, war, plague and proximity to the Elven Domain had depopulated the land, allowing tall stands of pine, oak and diamond wood to reclaim the area. “There’s nothing for me here now.”
“There’s opportunity for profit. I won’t be denying you your percentage, Andrea.”
“To be gained from people who once did their best to kill me for having the wrong father. No thank you, Master.”
“Those individuals are long dead. Holding grudges against their descendants will only give you stomach ulcers. I speak from experience on this subject.”
The thought gave her pause. Odd to consider that all the folk who had once tormented her, cold, distant Matron, the other children in the orphanage, the gang that had chased her into that alley and into poor Arthur’s hands, that they were all dead, some for likely over a century. I still don’t want to be here. “As you will, Master,” she said instead.
She kept silent as the trees gave way to orchards and tended fields, small stone and wattle farmhouses at their corners. By the evening they were on the outskirts of a sizable town, holding perhaps a thousand people all told. It took her a moment to realize that it was the same town Master Tez had rescued her from so long ago. None of the buildings looked the same, fire and wear taking their toll. The only recognizable landmark was an old stone fountain in the central square, serving as the sole source of potable water for its citizens. Everything else was new, or at least new to her, the buildings were actually aged and weathered, decades old at least and not subject to the elven skills of preservation.
The carriage halted and Master Tez negotiated briefly with a town burgher as to where his train of carts might be parked on the outside of town and the horses tended. At his call she unhooked her leash and stepped out, handing it over to him. Standing beside her master was an overweight and a bit florid human, dressed in what would have called “rough and uncouth” clothing, but on this side of the Barrier was an indication of landed prosperity.
“This is the merchant Veritelli, Andrea. Veritelli, this is my slave, Andrea the Halfbred.”
“Milord.” Andrea curtseyed politely.
Meanwhile Veritelli opened his mouth then closed it again, apparently biting back the first thing he’d intended to say. Finally he came out with, “I didn’t know that you were bringing slaves with you, Merchant Tez. I was aware it was practiced over there, but…”
“And I am aware that it is no longer practiced over here. One must make accommodations for one’s guests though, as I’m sure you’ll agree.” Master Tez smiled politely, Andrea smiled blankly, and Veritelli was just blank for a moment before his manners reasserted themselves and he invited Master Tez to his home in a walled off neighborhood of the town, lit in warm orange and shadows as the evening sun began to set. As such things went it was relatively spacious, able to accommodate the merchant’s extended family and several servants, with a small garden in the back. Tez was given a guest room and Andrea, after a moment of hesitation on Veritelli’s part as he tried to figure out the status of a slave of one of the mysterious Elves of the Barrier, was saved from making that decision by Tez informing him that her place would be in his room.
“Oh, good, he’s going to think I’m your concubine,” Andrea noted with annoyance when Veritelli wasn’t listening.
“Technically speaking, you are my concubine,” Master Tez replied.
“We haven’t made love to each other for over fifty years.” Their physical relationship had lasted a few decades, but eventually, even with Tez’s remarkable ideas, their explorations of each other had taken on the aspect of rote action rather than pleasure, and it had ended by their mutual agreement before it descended into hurt feelings. They remained friends though, she liked to think, even if they were master and slave above all else.
“Former concubine then.”
“I thought I was here as your leather artisan.”
“One shouldn’t limit one’s potential roles. Quiet now.” She shut up as another man entered the room. This one was a relatively young man in his early thirties, she guessed, physically if not chronologically as old as Andrea herself. He had dark blue eyes and a long nose, and his hair was dark blond and kept in a short queue that disappeared under the collar of his bright blue tunic.
“Ah, this is my nephew, Jonathan. My sister’s youngest,” Veritelli said. “Jonathan, this is Tez, the elf merchant that I told you we were going to be doing business with. Tez, my nephew and apprentice, Jonathan Mayweather.”
Jonathan’s eyes tracked over from Master Tez’s face to Andrea’s, then down a bit to focus on her collar, following the chain that ran from the ring at her neck to her master’s hand. “Master Tez,” he greeted, giving him a polite bow. “Miss… ah?”
“Andrea Halfbred, Master Tez’s leather artisan,” she replied, curtseying again.
“Why are you… why are you wearing that thing around your neck?”
“Because she is my slave,” Master Tez said.
“I’m sorry, slave?”
“Slave,” He repeated blandly. Master Tez handed her leash back to her and ordered, “Have my luggage moved up to my room, Andrea. Then get yourself some dinner.”
“Yes, Master,” she replied and scurried off to round up the coachman. After helping the man move Master Tez’s trunks and her own baggage with her spare clothing and tools up to the guest room, she came back down to scare up some bread and cheese from the kitchen in the basement.. Then it was back upstairs to sit in an overstuffed armchair and fiddle with some piecework while her master finished his own dinner and began negotiations with Veritelli for moving goods across the Barrier.
Trade had only recently began to cross again, as relations between the human and elven nations thawed with the assurances that the sort of slaughter that had perpetuated over a century ago would not be repeated by this generation of humans. Master Tez, having grown bored with the elves’ isolation, had finally been persuaded by Rider Kavin to take out the first truly substantial wagon train across to open full trade for profit, as opposed to symbolism.
The room seemed terribly dim by the light of her lamp, and she ended up spreading out the elven glow jewels she was going to use for one of her commissions out so she could have enough light to work by. The lack of proper mage lights gave the world beyond the Barrier a very dark place, almost beyond the ability of a simple oil lamp to dispel.
It was nearly midnight before Master Tez came upstairs, yawning and stretching as he entered.
“Did things go well, Master?” she asked, putting her work aside and putting the glow jewels into a green felt purse.
“We haven’t even been here a full day, Andrea. Dinner was just the usual tedious feeling out of intentions and personalities,” he said, stripping his shirt and boots off unselfconsciously. He stretched and, long cooled relationship or not, she enjoyed watching the play of muscles across his stomach and chest as he clasped his palms over his head briefly. “I see no particular complications however. I’ll let Veritelli have a below average price for my goods, and let him think he was clever enough to out-negotiate an elf. It’ll be good for his pride and it will allow me to establish a relationship with his family for a few decades before I begin to raise up my prices to a more profitable level.”
“How long do you think it’s going to take?”
“As long as it takes, Andrea. Are you in such a terrible hurry to go back across the Barrier again?”
“No.” Yes. This wasn’t home anymore, she knew that for certain now. She just wanted to get back to her workshop and bury herself in commissions and the occasional book.
“Good. For now, we should both get some sleep. No doubt Veritelli will want me to meet with all the burghers and take a tour of this miserable place to show it off to me and to show me off to his patrons.” He pulled off his trouser and pulled back the covers, while Andrea peeled out of her dress and laid it across the back of a chair. When she got ready to lay down in the bed, Master Tez surprised her by holding up a restraining palm. “There’s bedroll and comforter in the wardrobe, or so I was told. You’re to sleep on the floor.”
She looked at him askance. “I thought I was playing concubine for you?”
“You are playing Master Tez’s Slave, which is what you are. Which means while you’re here you will sleep on the floor at the foot of the bed. Get the bedroll please.”
“Yes, Master.” Still more than a little confused and irritated, she pulled out the bedroll and comforter, rolling them out and laying down. Then to her further surprise he took her leash, which had been dangling from her collar ever since she’d been dismissed for dinner, and wrapped it around the bedpost knob, locking it in place. “What’s that for, Master? I’m not running away!”
“That’s not to prevent escape, but to prevent theft.”
“Veritelli is no slaver, you saw how he looked at me.”
“Veritelli is not the thief I’m worried about. Go to sleep, Andrea.”
“But then who are you--?”
“Go to sleep, Andrea. That’s an order.”
“Yes, Master,” she answered meekly.
She slept that night, but uneasily, the chain tugging at her throat.