The Mansions of Idumea (Book 3 Forest at the Edge series)

by Trish Mercer

  “And keep it in the stables,” Perrin had suggested.

  As Mahrree watched the dozen young cadets from Command School trouping delicately around the house that morning, she cringed in sympathy. She clutched her personal pages of notes and listened as Joriana ordered the young men about as if they were her personal servants which, for the day, they were.

  “Yes, all those long rugs along the Grand Hall must be rolled up. How else will everyone dance? Into the back cottage with them. Roll them tighter, cadet, or they’ll be too big. You over there—see those sprigs of blossoms in the crate? You’re on blossom detail. Into the vases in the back gathering room with them, and artfully, soldier. That’s a candlestick, cadet—not a long knife! Hold that more respectfully. And you will be rubbing those fingerprints off, correct? The rest of you: all this furniture—out! All those chairs waiting outside—in!”

  Mahrree rubbed her temple—a soothing technique she mastered on her husband a few nights before—and smiled gratefully at a sulking soldier who carried a large crate of snipped yellow blossoms past her. It was almost over.

  Tomorrow night, then never again. Maybe.

  For the past several days Mahrree had been introduced to every key official, shop owner, caterer, and musician. Judging by her mother-in-law’s enthusiasm, she began to wonder if Joriana hadn’t also ordered the land tremor as well, just to have the opportunity to train her daughter-in-law.

  Each night she compared notes with Perrin and found he’d been meeting with every officer, Administrator, and Idumean official. The High General had insisted on returning to the garrison for full days of work, but naturally needed his son’s accompaniment in every meeting and briefing. Perrin, too, began to suspect he was being groomed for a takeover.

  At least Jaytsy and Peto had been enjoying themselves, Mahrree considered as she glanced around before remembering they were nowhere in sight.

  For the past few days Peto had been spending his mornings in the back garden with the new ball his grandfather gave him, kicking it between two tall trees, and he filled his afternoons watching the professional kickball practices at the arena, accompanied by two corporals who served as more-than-willing guards.

  Jaytsy had enjoyed her time with one of the maid’s nieces who was happy to show her every last shop within a two mile radius of the general’s mansion, escorted, of course, by two older and rather homely sergeants hand-picked by her father.

  But today Jaytsy was out with Kindiri visiting all the caterers with reminders of what time they should deliver their creations to the mansion tomorrow and, Mahrree hoped, not hearing how certain foods reminded Kindiri of Lieutenant Riplak. Peto was helping soldiers unload chairs from wagons brought in to seat the more than three hundred guests expected to arrive.

  Mahrree broke out in a cold sweat when she thought about so many Idumeans. She was Edgy, and as each day passed she felt she understood this place even less.

  The last straw was when Kuman’s gown arrived that morning. Mahrree took one look at the Smoldering Something with turtle necklines on bodices and intentional wrinkles and who knew what else—and realized she could never bring it back to Edge. No one would know what to do with her in it, Mahrree most especially.

  “Mahrree! Candlestick placement!” Joriana clapped her hands officiously and pointed to the hapless soldiers trying to understand the proper way to hold candlesticks. Maybe it meant using only three fingers, with pinkies extended in miniature salutes.

  “Yes, Mother Shin! Of course. This way, men.”

  Later that afternoon, with chairs and tables set up, and blossoms arranged and rearranged with alternating candlesticks to coordinate with differing heights, colors, and scents, Perrin and his weary father stumbled into the wide back doors of the gathering room and made their way to the Grand Hall. Perrin’s mouth dropped open at the dramatic changes, but Relf just chuckled.

  “And you wondered if I should’ve stayed at home and rested instead.”

  “You are tomorrow,” Joriana told him as she gave him a peck on the cheek. “You need to rest up. And you,” she pointed at her son, “will not leave these grounds. I will not risk you suddenly becoming lost, Perrin Shin!”

  Perrin pursed his lips as if plan number one had just been quashed.

  “It’s a big house,” he murmured to Mahrree as his mother helped his father to a soft chair. “There are many places where I know she’ll never think to look.”

  “So why didn’t you tell me about any of them?” she demanded.

  “Cut off her right hand right before The Dinner? Are you kidding? No one wants to disappoint Joriana Shin.”

  “You just remember that, Colonel!”

  But by midday meal the next day, Mahrree began to wear just as tight an expression as her mother-in-law. The food was arriving, and in fantastic amounts and displays. Hycymum would’ve been astounded at the creations, a few of them from Gizzada’s. The mansion looked near to perfect on the inside, and outside the servant-soldiers were busy on the surprisingly warm breezy day sweeping, pulling a few early weeds, and setting up temporary stables for extra horses and carriages, while also keeping an eye out for one missing colonel.

  Mahrree fumed that somehow he’d managed to give her the slip. She thought marriages meant couples were united in everything, and it wasn’t even her mother he was avoiding. It was his own, one that frequently passed Mahrree with directions, instructions, and snippy inquiries as to where her “horrible” son had run off to.

  Two hours before the guests were to arrive, she finally found him. Peto had tipped her off, and then ran off to take his bath as if knowing Mahrree would start yelling because Peto had known for hours where his father had been hiding. The only way to redeem himself was to bathe voluntarily.

  “Oh, very clever, Perrin!” Mahrree growled as she recognized his hulking shape wielding a pitchfork and spreading hay. She stepped carefully into the stables to avoid anything warm and squishy.

  He looked up sheepishly, and the several other groomsmen hired for the evening stared. It was obvious they didn’t know that the man laboring by their side for the afternoon in dusty old clothes was also the host.

  “Just lending a hand, Mahrree,” he said innocently, his big dark eyes almost sincere. “That’s what my mother told me to do—help out.”

  Mahrree clenched her teeth. “She’s been looking for you all afternoon!”

  “But she never comes to the stables,” he smiled not so guilelessly.

  She put her hands on her hips and glared.

  He stood up straight and gulped.

  “Your bath has been drawn and is waiting,” she said in a steady but cold tone. “Unless you want your mother to come out here, dunk you in a watering trough and bathe you herself, I recommend you get in and get ready now!”

  He glanced apologetically at the groomsmen and handed one of them his pitchfork. “Sorry, boys. But um—”

  “Unnerstand, Colonel,” one of them drawled. “When the jenny brays, best be on yer way.”

  Perrin snorted.

  “When the jenny—?” Mahrree began, but Perrin took her by the elbow and led her out.

  “They have a variety of interesting metaphors. That was the tamest I’ve heard all afternoon. There’s a reason my mother stays away from the stables.”

  “Your dress uniform is in our bedroom,” she told him. “A new jacket and everything, so you best be in it very soon.”

  “Yes ma’am!”

  But he wasn’t. An hour before the guests were to arrive, Joriana sent Mahrree to her bedroom to get ready.

  “He hasn’t shown up since bathing,” she told her daughter-in-law. “Even Peto was more cooperative!”

  “Mother Shin, I’ll go find him first—”

  “Oh, no you won’t,” Joriana said in a tone that could slice stone. “You get yourself ready. I will deal with my son.”

  Mahrree swallowed. It didn’t help that Joriana had her hand on a carving knife.

  ---

&n
bsp; Perrin felt the wave of it coming, the unnatural stilling of the air, the sudden dreadful calm. Even the pressure of the atmosphere took on a different mood, as if Nature itself was crying out, “Duck!”

  But he was trapped.

  He knew it wasn’t the best hiding place, but he’d run out of options since the mansion was now swarming with hired hands.

  “What in the world are you doing?” Joriana’s voice suddenly stabbed him like an icicle. “In the second larder?”

  “Mother! Just checking on . . . supplies,” he said smooth as butter. “Counting jars, for you. Forty-eight, forty-nine . . . oh, I don’t think that’s right. I best start again. One, two—”

  “You’re not dressed,” she seethed.

  He quickly looked down at himself. “Phew! For a minute there I thought I had forgotten to put on my clothing again. Then again, had I been less dressed, I’m sure half a dozen of those caterers out there would have made more than a peep—”

  “You know what I mean,” she snarled, and outside a stray cat arched its back and hissed before running for cover. “You promised you’d be civilized tonight, right? But you haven’t learned a single dance step! There’s still time, you know. I can call for Kuman immediately.”

  “I promise I’ll find a way to prove I am not a wild man,” he said, since he had no way of escaping except for climbing over his mother. “That’s all you can hope for. Now, teach me how to use a fork.”

  Joriana was not amused. “PERRIN! When are you going to get ready?”

  “As soon as I make sure everyone else is,” he promised. “But maybe you should tell me again: which is the spoon and which is the knife?”

  When his mother snatched up a butcher knife near one of the ten dressed pheasants and threatened to show him how to use it, he ran down the Grand Hall like a disobedient boy to Peto’s room.

  He knocked on the door and opened it. “Need help, son?”

  Peto squinted at him. “Haven’t needed help dressing myself for over ten years now, but how thoughtful of you to check on me, Father.” He was finishing buttoning the row of shining brass buttons that went all the way up to his throat. “So if this were in blue, it’d be a dress uniform?”

  Perrin smiled grimly. “Same wool, too. Your grandmother’s subtle attempt to demonstrate how handsome you look in ‘uniform.’ She did the same thing to me when I was your age.”

  Peto evaluated himself in the long mirror. “I like the kickball uniforms better. You should be getting dressed, Father. I have a feeling Grandmother won’t approve of those stable clothes for The Dinner.”

  “It’s getting bad,” Perrin muttered. “Now you’re even nagging me.”

  “And I don’t have to dance.” Peto batted his eyelashes.

  Perrin sighed. “I guess I better check on Jaytsy, then. She may be wanting a man’s opinion.” He cringed at his words.

  “Oh, she’s ready. She’s been floating up and down the Grand Hall staircase for the past ten minutes. Didn’t you see her? In that yellow she looks like a giant mutated hornet. Even got her hair all . . .” With his hands he gestured some bizarre arrangement over his head and shuddered.

  “That bad?” Perrin winced.

  “Yes! Some cousins of somebody’s have been doing her up all Idumea-ically. Rather hysterically, I think.”

  Perrin grinned. “Good. No one will want to dance with her then.”

  He stepped out of Peto’s room just in time to see the hornet fly by.

  But she wasn’t a hornet. She was much more a fantastic butterfly, having taken on human form. Even with her dark brown hair all piled up and hand-motiony, she was exquisite.

  Unfortunately.

  She stopped and twirled in front of her father, the full yellow skirt rising in a flutter of roundness. “Well? How do I look?”

  Perrin swallowed. He finally had to admit she was beautiful. And a young woman.

  “Very nice, Jaytsy,” he sighed. He’d be busy that night following around her admirers.

  “Ha!” she shouted at her brother’s door. “Told you! And if you make any more comments about my being a hornet, I’ll sting you good and hard.”

  Perrin relaxed, because if any of her would-be admirers heard her with her brother, there’d be no problems whatsoever.

  From behind Peto’s door came a buzzing sound, followed by the loud smack of a hand slapping the wood door. “Eww—hornet guts.”

  “You two just keep that up,” Perrin grinned, “and we’ll be run out of Idumea before dessert.”

  Jaytsy put her hands on her very dainty waist, the skirt flaring out below and down to her knees, and the figure-hugging silk rising up and over her shoulders. Perrin wondered again when her body turned so womanly, and why the silk couldn’t go any higher to encase her entire throat. While there was no cleavage, he felt there was still too much flesh of his daughter displayed for the roving eyes of young soldiers.

  “Shouldn’t you be getting ready, Colonel Shin?” Her mature tone woke him out of his private musings as to where he could find her a thick shawl. “You just missed Grandmother. She’s looking for you, and she’s got a vein bulging in her forehead.”

  “Really?”

  “She’s kind of scary right now.”

  “I believe you.”

  Jaytsy pointed authoritatively to his bedroom door. He shrugged obediently, only because his daughter’s stance had taken on the demanding quality of her grandmother, and whether out of duty or genuine fear, Perrin had been conditioned as a small boy to recognize that pose as the fifth and final warning.

  Reluctantly he made his way down to his bedroom, purposely ignoring the details that had gone into making the Grand Hall even grander, and knocked once at his bedroom door as a warning.

  “That better be you, Perrin!” Mahrree called.

  He opened the door slowly, peered in, and raised his eyebrows.

  “I know, I know,” Mahrree said hurriedly, brushing down the full gown that fit his ‘coverage’ specifications—over her shoulders, down her arms to the elbows, and with no cleavage in sight.

  He smiled in approval. Some views were his alone.

  “Yes, it is silk,” she confessed with some embarrassment. “It is gray—not my favorite color. Smokey something or the other with something sleepy. Your mother chose it, Kuman made it . . . I would have been happy in something more like cotton, but—”

  “But nothing.” Perrin smiled broader as he closed the door and walked over to her, his eyes traveling up and down. She was more stunning than his daughter could ever hope to be. Her hair pinned up emphasized her smooth neck and her perfect shape, which the gray silk hugged down to her waist where it flared out just like Jaytsy’s dress, but almost to the floor.

  “You wear it beautifully. I couldn’t imagine how you could look more wonderful for tonight.” He winked at her, and the worried tension released from her face.

  “You really think so?” she breathed.

  “Absolutely,” he assured her. “My wife covered in gray bug vomit. What I’ve always dreamed of.” He tried to keep a straight face, but he couldn’t hide his smile.

  Mahrree turned pink. “I rather expected you to say something like, ‘Just wear what you wore down here,’ but this is actually more comfortable than I imagined. I mean, even though it’s so form fitting—”

  “Yes, it is,” he said, running his hands over her form in appreciation.

  “Perrin!” she chided, and slapped his hand away.

  But she’d have to hit him a lot harder than that to be effective. “What’s this called?”

  “The bodice,” she said, torn between fighting him and enjoying him.

  “Bod-iss,” he said slowly with a wicked grin.

  “Don’t say it like that! Someone might hear you! This mansion is packed with strangers.”

  “I’m just learning the ways of Idumea. But what I meant was, what’s the little knotted string over the bod-iss?”

  She squirmed when she saw the look growing in
his eyes, but she couldn’t help but smile. “It’s called lace. Cro-shayed. Kind of like knitting, but thinner and with a hooked needle.”

  Perrin shook his head as he pretended to inspect it closely. “What kind of torturous insanity requires a person to sit and make tiny knots in a string, with a needle of all things, just to cover something else with it? I bet if I unhooked this part, right here—”

  “PERRIN! We’re running out of time—”

  “Oh, there’s always time.” He raised his eyebrows in smoldering suggestion as his large fingers fumbled with the first tiny clasp designed for nothing larger than raccoon hands. “We can easily argue about just how much—”

  She smacked his hand hard enough that he instinctively drew it back from the impossible clasp that would have taken him an hour to undo. Maybe that was why they were made so tiny.

  “Your mother said she’d be by again in five minutes to check on you, and that was about four minutes ago!”

  “Hmm,” he mused. “That would be cutting things a little close—”

  “She’s very irritated with you,” Mahrree warned. “She fully expected you to change after you bathed, but obviously you didn’t.” She fingered the collar of the worn work shirt. “Perrin, it’s time.”

  He winked at her and started to pull his ratty shirttails out of his stained trousers. “Knew you’d realize we have time—”

  “For YOU TO GET READY!”

  He hesitated and shrank a little under her volume.

  “Perrin, please!” She gestured to his dress uniform lying on the bed, the medals polished and the dark wool brushed. “You’re doing it again, being not the husband I remember. Right now Idumea has reverted you back to a man less than half your age.”

  He had one or two good comebacks for that, about how he was always as robust as a man less than half his age, but instead sensibly elected to keep his mouth shut because . . .

  . . . because the worst moment for any officer was to recognize when he was defeated.

  He sighed and sat next to the uniform, laid out and patiently waiting. It was another brand new jacket, courtesy of his mother, woven of the highest quality dark blue wool. Some poor servant or despised junior officer had been tasked to transfer all of his medals from his old dress uniform to his new one, and even shined them up brighter than he’d ever seen them.