Chapter 4 Dragon-root

Ayla spent half of the morning in bed, reading until, to her shock, a maid brought her the breakfast. When she asked about King Rhobart or Milton, the maid said that Ayla has the entire day to rest and that the King will see her that evening, at dinner.

The thought of dining with the King filled her with anxiety. But who said anything about her *eating* with the King. The maid said that Ayla will see King Rhobart at dinner. Most certainly to serve him. After all, Ayla wasn’t sick anymore and she *is* his slave. So if she must serve the cruel King, then that’s what she would do.

Ayla was so nervous that she decided to skip breakfast and lunch. She was sure that if she ate anything she would end up throwing up. Now she wished she hadn’t eaten that fruit earlier.

She tried reading to calm herself but she often found herself reading the same paragraph four or five times in a row. In the end, Ayla gave up reading entirely. Instead, she started pacing around the room. She felt like a trapped animal. If she was entirely honest with herself she was. Trapped, that is.

Kerra looked at Ayla like she was a madman. Woman. *Woman*. Maybe she had gone crazy.

Suddenly she stopped in front of Kerra, “Don’t look at me like that! I bet you would be as nervous as me if you would have to serve the man that killed your father and took you as a slave!”

Not that she regretted that her father was dead. He could rot in the Eternal Darkness forever. For eternity and then some.

Kerra made a sound that was something between a snort and a hiss.

Ayla sighed and sat next to the snowcat and stroked her fur.

When even Kerra’s purrs stopped calming her nerves, Ayla went in front of the mirror and started brushing her long hair. It was custom for Myrthana’s women to keep their hair long. Hers almost reached her lower back. When she was done she braided it.

It was later afternoon when two maids entered Ayla’s room. One of them carried a blue dress. Both looked at Ayla like she was a deer and they were shadowbeasts.

Kerra darted out of the room a second before the door got closed. The black tips of her tails almost got caught in the process.

‘Leaving me alone with the enemy?’ Ayla thought when she found herself alone with the maids.

The women bowed in front of Ayla and one of them talked to her, “We are here to assist you with your bath and get ready for dinner.”

Ayla blinked once, twice. A slave that gets to be helped by maids? She has never seen or heard of such a thing. The slaves from her father’s castle were the ones to help everyone else. And even if for Myrthana’s slaves bathing was a must, good food or medicine or a beautiful room was not something that a slave enjoyed. What made the King of Nordmar treat his slaves differently?

Ayla knew that if she would have been sick while being a slave in her father’s castle, now her brother’s castle, she would have died. But instead of being dead, she was about to get special treatment.

“I get ready by myself. You don’t need to bother with me. I am sure you have a lot to do,” Ayla said.

“We have been ordered by the King to assist you. Don’t make this hard for us,” one of them said in a cold tone.

Ayla clenched her teeth, thought ‘He really wants to show off his new slave,’ and nodded.

One of the maids rushed into the bathroom and started preparing the bath while the other started unbraiding Ayla´s hair.

“You have soft and long hair,” she said. “Too bad it looks so unhealthy. By the time I will finish with you, your hair will look amazing.”

Ayla inhaled deeply and let the maids do their job.

When the bath was ready, the maids washed and scrubbed every inch of Ayla’s body using oils and herbs until her skin felt like that of a newborn and her hair was shinning and healthy once again.

When the maids finally let Ayla out of the bath, they made her stand in front of a wall that had some set of pipes. One of the maids pushed some buttons and warm air blew out of the pipes, drying Ayla from head to toes.

Ayla was fascinated by those pipes. She had never seen something like that before. The whole bathroom was amazing. The stone floor was warm beneath her feet; in a corner, there was a bench, and under the bench, there were some magical stones. She wondered what those stones did. And there was the bathtub. By Adanoss, that bathtub. It was bigger than the one she had in Myrthana and it had magical stones on the edges, that sent vibrations into her body helping her muscles relax.

The maids lead her back into the room. They helped her put on clean undergarments and soft long socks, that reached her calves. The last was the blue dress and a white belt around her waist. A long cape was attached to her shoulder. She touched the fabric of the dress – it was so soft and warm.

“Made from the wool of a woolly rhino. Or several of them,” a maid said.

Once dressed, Ayla was forced to sit on a chair while the maids worked on her hair. She never had a maid before to help her style her hair. It was her mother that taught Ayla how to braid and do her hair. After her mother’s death, her father said that she doesn’t need a maid and that was that.

The hair was divided into three sections and then braided once again. Ayla saw the maids' hair, they also kept it braided. Even the men, from what she could observe on the journey kept their hair in different types on braids. Some even dyed the braids, or used oil and herbs. Maybe Nordmarians had a thing for braids and hair. Myrthanians had a thing for silks. Not that she had silk clothes before. Her mother did tho. She could still remember how her mother's dresses felt under her fingers. She doubted she would ever touch something as soft as those dresses ever again.

Once the hair was done some light makeup was applied on her face, to hide the dark circles and some pink in her cheeks to distract from her pale sink, which ended the maids' task.

“Come and look into the mirror,” one of them said.

When she did, Ayla almost didn’t recognize herself. She looked like a true princess. A slave-princess. But even if she looked lovely, even beautiful, her eyes were still haunted.

“You look absolutely gorgeous,” one maid said.

Ayla was still looking at her reflection when she saw that the maids were about to leave.

She spun fast, tripped with a rug, and lost her balance for a second but avoided the fall in the last second, “What I am supposed to do now?”

“Someone will come to escort you to the dining hall. Have a lovely evening.”

When the maids closed the door behind them Ayla snorted. Her evening will anything *but* lovely.

As seconds passed by, Ayla found herself biting her nails. It was a bad habit that she tried to break over and over again, but no matter how hard she tried, she would still find herself biting them.

“You are still doing that nasty habit of yours! You are worse than the slaves!” Ayla could still hear her father’s angry voice. “Galian, come here! This useless, nasty girl needs another punishment!” King Amul, her father said, looking at her older brother.

Galian would always be happy to help her father punish her. Galian was as cruel as her father had been. And her brother would always bring his favorite crop.

“Strech your hands. If you close your fingers you know what will happen,” her father said.

Ayla would do as instructed and stretch her arms. She would shake with fear but she would always refuse to scream. While Galian hit her fringers with the crop, Ayla would repeat, in her mind, names of herbs and their properties and what they are good for. When a scream threatened to escape her lips, Ayla would bite her tongue.

When her father was satisfied with the punishment he would tell Galian to stop.

“Who will ever marry someone with so nasty habits? When you are old enough I will have to bribe someone to marry you!”

Ayla never cried in front of her father. She already knew how much he despised weeping women.

“Go to Saturas to have those fingers fixed! I don’t want you to become crippled and have the other Kingdoms laugh behind my back because of you!”

So Ayla would rush to Saturas to get treatment.

“What did you do this time?” Saturas, the Water Mage from the castle, would ask with an accusatory tone. “Biting your nails again? It is a habit not fit for a Princess.”

No one ever understood her, so Ayla didn’t bother to explain why she would often bite her nails. Everyone commented and pointed her out. Well everyone except Drax – her childhood friend. Saturas’ novice. They became friends because both understood what pain and humiliation meant.

When Drex turned thirteen he became the only one to treat Ayla.

In time, the punishments became less frequent, because the war occupied all her father’s time. Instead, she became a prisoner of her room. She didn’t mind it so much, but she did miss Drax when too much time passed without seeing him.

Sometimes Drax would climb the wall that separated her garden and her room from the rest of the world. He would tell her about the war and rumors about King Rhobart. Drax would tell Ayla how people claimed that the King from Nordmar was soulless, cruel and a monster. Others claimed that he worshiped Beliar, and that’s why no one could ever wound him. Other rumors talked about Orcs and dragons and other creatures of Beliar that came into the night and aided Rhobart. And other rumors talked about Rhobart bathing in the blood of his enemies and eating their flesh.

She didn’t know if either of these rumors were to be true. And frankly, she didn’t want to think about it when she was about to serve his dinner.

A knock on the door snapped Ayla out of her thoughts.

“Come in!” she said and to her relief, Milton stepped inside.

“Look at you! The last time I saw you, you were a caterpillar and now you have transformed into a butterfly!”

Ayla blushed, not being used with complaints. She managed to say a ‘thank you’ in a shy voice.

“Ready?” Milton asked.

“To serve the King of Nordmar? Sure!”

Milton laughed, “You are a guest here, not a servant.”

“So I am free to go when I want?” Ayla asked, hoping for just one second.

Milton stopped laughing and because serious, “That’s not for me to say.”

Ayla didn’t know why she felt disappointed. She already knew the truth, but for just one damn second she had hoped to be free. To leave Nordmar and to travel around the continent. She would use her knowledge about plants and herbs to gain money while she would travel. And when Ayla visited each kingdom she would move on to the Southern Islands and beyond – to other continents. When she would grow old, she would settle in a small hut and tend to a garden, and sell remedies.

But dreams and hope were not for those like her.

“Let me grab my boots and we can leave,” Ayla said.

Once she had the boots on, Milton escorted her out of the room. It was the first time she saw the interior of the castle. She looked around the hallway expecting to see the signs of opulence and luxury. Instead, the furniture and decoration yet simple, made the space inviting and soothing. Glowing crystals illuminated the hallways.

But what shocked her the most what that the castle was warm. Even with her boots on, Ayla could feel that floor was warm.

“How come it is so warm?” Ayla asked while Milton and she headed to the dining hall.

“Magic-filled-crystals. They are part of the foundation of the castle. Once a year, twenty mages from the Monastery come down to fill them.”

Ayla started to think that Nordmar relayed a lot on the magic of the Fire Mages.

While Milon and Ayla walked towards the dining hall, she tried to memorize the halls and stairs they used.

When they stopped before two big doors and two guards opened them, Ayla touched her amulet before entering.