She’ll get over it.
I’m sorry I didn’t sense… I mean, I wasn’t trying to sense people in the hallway. I was focused on—
Me, I know. I like you focused on me when we’re in bed, Trip. Don’t worry about this. I’ll smooth things over.
Should I have gone to ask your father if—
No. This is not the pre-industrial age, and I’m not a child. I’ll let them know.
All right.
Come back later. Or do you want me to come to your room later? I intend to have wild and vigorous sex with you tonight. One way or another. Rysha smiled as her mother stopped sighing at the ceiling and looked over at her.
“Please put some clothes on, love,” Mom said.
Uh, you could come to my room. It’s doubtful any family members are on their way to visit.
Are you sure? Rysha picked up her shirt and tugged it on, lamenting that she had to redo the buttons far too soon. What if your grandfather walked in?
I think he’d pat me on the shoulder and say, “Good going, boy.”
Men are much different from women.
Indeed.
“What brings you here, Mother?” Rysha asked. “I wasn’t expecting you.”
“Clearly,” Aunt Tadelay said from the hall.
Rysha wondered if she would come back in or if she was too busy being mortally aggrieved by viewing… beets.
“We heard you graduated your military training school,” Mom said.
“You came for the ceremony?” Rysha asked, stunned.
“We came to talk you out of the insanity of becoming a soldier in such a dangerous unit,” Aunt Tadelay said, striding back into the room. “Putting aside the fact that it’s completely improper for young women to fling themselves over walls and through mud puddles before shooting people, have you seen the newspapers lately?” She produced a recent issue of the Pinoth Gazette that Rysha hadn’t read yet—she had been too busy. “Dragons are killing people all over the country. By the hundreds. And right at home, we had to suffer an attack. You were there for your grandmother’s funeral. I can’t think of a more appalling way to die.”
Rysha thought of how she’d almost died from giant tarantula venom. That had been moderately appalling.
“You must give up this army nonsense immediately—if you enter that dreadful combat unit, they’re sure to send you out to die. On a daily basis. And what is this in the newspapers about you cavorting with dragons? Even flying on one?”
She slapped the page on which Rysha could just make out a photograph of a dragon. It didn’t look like Bhrava Saruth or Shulina Arya, but the dragon had posed for long enough for a photographer to capture it on film, so it had to be one of Iskandia’s allies.
“That’s completely unacceptable,” Aunt Tadelay went on, shaking the newspaper for emphasis. “It’s suicidal. You’ll fall off. Or be eaten. Dragons eat people.”
“Shulina Arya is more interested in eating tarts.”
Aunt Tadelay sputtered.
“Calm down, Tadelay,” Mom said, patting her sister’s arm. “We’re here to be reasonable, remember? She’s not going to come home with us if we yell at her.”
“I was reasonable until I saw my niece in bed with some mongrel from the stables.”
“Trip is a pilot,” Rysha said, trying to tamp down the irritation rising inside of her. It was hard. Somehow, their rejection of Trip wasn’t as bad as the notion that they hadn’t come here to congratulate her; they’d come to try to get her to quit. Again. “He works in the sky.”
Her mother took a deep breath and waved her hand, as if to dismiss this lesser issue. “Honey, it’s too dangerous to remain in the military right now. If you’re not sent to battle dragons, you’ll be sent out into the countryside to deal with our own people. Angry and fearful people. The Iskandian populace is afraid and acting like it. People are hoarding goods. Others are openly stealing from their neighbors to ensure they have enough to survive if trade lines are cut, and there isn’t enough food to supply the hungry of the country. Why, someone even broke into the manor and attempted to steal our silver just last week.”
Rysha blinked, some of her irritation fading. “Is everyone all right?”
“Yes, your father and uncle and Butler Tohomas were there and drove the would-be thieves off. They dropped their stolen goods in the courtyard—our silverware and candlesticks all stuffed into a bag, if you can imagine. Nobody was hurt, but honey, this is only the beginning. There’s unrest in the countryside, and I’m sure it will grow even more problematic in the city. You’ll be as likely to be sent to fight our own people rioting as you will dragons.” Mother waved to the crinkled newspaper Aunt Tadelay still held. “If it’s a fight you want, you can help your family strengthen its own defenses and stand ready to drive dragons and miscreants off the land.”
“Assuming we keep the land,” Aunt Tadelay muttered.
“What do you mean?” Rysha asked.
“Nothing.” Mother waved her sister to silence. “My husband isn’t going to sell his ancestral land. There’s no need to worry her about that.”
“He looked speculative, if you ask me,” Aunt Tadelay said, oozing disapproval anew.
A knot of anxiety formed in Rysha’s stomach. What had she missed going on back at home when she’d been off on missions and busy training for her test?
“We’re going to shop for a few necessities for the manor while we’re here in the capital,” Mom said, “but then we’re heading back tomorrow afternoon. We invite you to join us. Take a leave of absence from the army if you won’t quit completely. Just until the unrest settles and these dragons go back to where they came from.”
Rysha sighed. “They can’t go back.”
With the portal destroyed, that wasn’t an option, even if there had been some way to trick the dragons into leaving again. Which seemed unlikely. Every dragon willing to speak to humans had been quick to point out that the world they had been stuck in hadn’t been a pleasant one.
“And my ceremony is tomorrow. Mother, Aunt Tadelay, I’m only the second woman in the history of the Iskandian army to qualify for the elite troops. Won’t you come to see me awarded and officially initiated into the unit?”
They pursed their lips, the expressions very similar as their eyes met.
“I told you she wouldn’t come,” Mother said.
“We need her at home, not throwing her life away here. Your other daughter saw our logic and is leaving her teaching position to come home. I can’t understand why Rysha can’t see the necessity.”
“Because she’s stubborn. Like her mother.” Mother smiled faintly at Rysha.
“A dreadful disease.”
“At least let us take you to dinner,” Mother told Rysha. “I understand the New Merchants’ Quarter is still relatively safe and unaffected by disgruntled subjects.”