A Charm for Draius: A Novel of the Broken Kaskea (The Broken Kaskea Series Book 1) Read Online Free Page A

contact.
    Jan turned to his wife last. “How was the patrol rotation?”
    “Fine.” Conscious of her chapped face and dirty clothes, she took a sip of beer and tried to concentrate on the flavor. She clenched her other hand, still lying in her lap.
    Jan’s angelic smile changed; he carefully balanced welcome with concern. “I’m glad you’re back. Peri’s been unhappy lately, having bad dreams.”
    Her eyes narrowed. From someone else, those simple sentences could be taken at face value. Jan had managed to convey accusation, as if it could only be her fault. I’m too tired to play “impress the audience.” She still had a few unbroken fingernails, and she dug them into her palm. “Not now, Jan. We can talk later.”
    “Certainly.” Jan’s tone and smile were vague. He was up to something, but she couldn’t summon the effort to care.
    Jan scanned the room for a seat, apparently not willing to sit in the open seat between Lornis and Draius. By the windows, market stall owners were whittling down their earnings by drinking and dicing. At the next table, a councilman notorious for his womanizing worked on his next conquest, a barmaid. Across the common room was a table of mixed guard members, both King and City. Meran-Kolme Erik, Officer in Charge of Investigation, was just sitting down with them. Erik was currently Draius’s commander, but not for much longer. If he preferred her husband as his deputy, then she would soon be re-assigned. Again.
    Jan said goodbye and like any politic bootlicker, headed straight for his new superior officer.
    “I should get home to Peri.” Draius started to stand up.
    Berin laid his large hand on her shoulder and gently pushed her back into her seat. “Now, now. Last I knew, there wasn’t a school-master alive that let his students out early on Fairday.” Berin pointed at the clock standing by the fireplace, which marked four hours past noon.
    Draius relaxed. Peri was still at afternoon lessons.
    “Honestly, Draius, he manipulates you like a puppet!” Berin tried to use a low tone, but everyone at the table heard him. Wendell and Lornis studied their empty glasses.
    She pressed her lips together tightly, hoping not to hear the same old refrain. When she was nineteen, her matriarch suggested a contract with the Serasa-Kolme, pairing her with the handsome Jan, of whom she knew very little. Did she have any objections? With her mother gone from the Fevers and her father barely interested in his daughter’s future, she turned to cousins and friends for opinions. Almost everyone approved of the Serasa-Kolme, a long-established lineage responsible for the construction of the original walls for Betarr Serin and Betarr Serasa.
    Berin, however, was ten years older than her and the lone dissenting voice. “Self-serving, controlling, and a political climber” had been the phrase he’d used to describe Jan. “You’re Meran-Viisi, King’s lineage, you can do better than him.” She went forward with the contract anyway, brushing off his warnings as over-protective.
    Berin’s refrain now added, “I warned you, didn’t I?” At this point, he thought she should petition Lady Anja for dissolution, but he didn’t know the depths that Jan’s revenge could go.
    “Finish your drink.” The big hand on her shoulder loosened and patted her back.
    So there wasn’t going to be a public scolding. Grateful for small favors, she sipped her beer and enjoyed one of her favorite pastimes: watching people. Unfortunately, she could hear Wendell whispering in the new lieutenant’s ear. “Another woman in the Guard… no comfort clause… matriarch’s his aunt…”
    By the Healing Horn, why don’t I just hire a crier? In a society of arranged marriages infidelity wasn’t unusual. What was unusual; she’d just brought a formal complaint against Jan before their matriarch, because no comfort clause was built into their contract. She and Jan had resisted such a clause, against his