- But I don't want to. I'm tired and I want to get some sleep... so if you'll excuse us, Kris and I are leaving.
Ben took my hand and headed to the bottom of the boat while Cael's cold eyes were accusing us.
- Ignore him, Kris!
- It won't be easy when I will be with him in the carriage...
- I'll tell you one more time... just ignore him and tell him what he wants to hear.
- I'll keep that in mind...
- No... you will remember tonight with the captain! - He mocked me.
- I would like to not have to even experience tonight- I replied thinking of the chills of fear that were roamed my body.
- I'm sorry, for the indelicacy - Ben apologized noticing the waves of my fear running through my body.
- No problem, I understand you... you were just trying to make me laugh.
- In a completely the wrong way...
- Maybe...
- Do you know if Eleonor's okay? She's an old friend...
- She... - I brake my tongue before I to be betrayed by my desire to tell Benjamin everything that was happening.
"Confidences... were too many confidences and secrets for a first talk with a new acquaintance" I said to myself.
- Eleanor is very well...
- Did the breakout work?
- What breakout? - I lied while my heart was beating faster. How did he know about that?
- Ilyada sent me a message a few days ago... she told me that she was leaving the Cael's house yesterday... Cael lost his mind. Didn't he?
- Yes... in fact he was unrecognizable...
The images of Cael entering the breakfast room at the day before appeared in my mind and made me experience again tje amazement and fear that passed through my heart that day.
- I'm sorry about that. I'm sure none of them knew that he would get so pissed off.
- How do you know he got out of control?
- Because he arrived very early at the Muddy Port and he spared no energy to attack me... So I think he got out of control... Maybe... like this. - Ben pulled his index finger and left thumb in a small space between them to illustrate ironically the Cael's lack of control.
For some reason I laughed at that gesture. Perhaps it was the irony of his voice or maliciously smile on his lips... I never could tell for sure.
- Why don't you have a First Lady? What happened to.
- What happened with me and Eleanor? It was a brief love story... how all the good love stories she came to an end but I still love her as if she'd be my sister... I want her to be safe.
- She will be! As you told... Ilyada warned you that she would run away! They must be safe right now... I heard she picked up several things from the main house...
- Yes...
- Did she tell you how the breakout happens? How did she plan that?
- No... She has her secrets and her own way of working things out when there are no more alternatives... The only thing I know it's about Cael and Emperor Aurelius... they were planning something and they wanted to involve Eleonor and another pallaki...
- Liliene...
- Who?
- No one ... I was thinking loud... remembering a name actually...
- Pallakis and their secrets...
- It's not a secret... it's the name of a friend that I made when I arrived at Cael's house.
- Do you miss her?
- Yes... Talking to her was much better than to live with Cael's momentary stress...
- Don't confuse momentary stress with personality... Don't be naive... you know very well what you saw in him.
- You know him very well...
- His family owed favors to my father... so our parents met many times and in all those times he and I were left in the garden to play... then we went to same boarding school, we graduated from the school of Iudexes together and today we work in the same sanhedrin...
- That's a long time...
- Yes and every year he became like what he is today... this talk about other people is getting boring... ask me five questions about me! It's boring to talk about other people I'm also interesting! Don't you think so?
- No! I don't think so.- I replied laughing at the convinced way he expressed himself.
- Okay! I'll leave you alone in this creepy hallway with those scary lights! Excuse me, Madame Kristma!
Because my answer and expressing deep disappointment he started walking in large steps down the hall, distancing himself from me during that process.
- Hey! Wait for me! - I screamed while I was running towards him holding the long, winding skirts of my dress.
- Ask me the five questions... please... Madame Kristma!
- All right!
Benjamin slowed down his steps allowing me to accompany him during the time we spent moving toward our rooms.
- Question number one madame Kristma!
- What is your activity within your caste?
- Great question... smart and strategic... I liked your question dear Kris... And my function within the caste of Iudexes is to judge the cases of theft of property of the most varied species...
- Have you ever judged a hard case?
- Several times... the most difficult cases are the animated property or the theft of...
Benjamin stopped for a moment as if he wanted to choose better the words and the way to utter them.
- Kris... - He started again with sweetness - When I chose this occupation within my caste I had a very different thought than I have today. I was an extremely different person than I'm today...
- Everyone has a past, Ben...
- I'm glad you understand that...
- No problem...
- Okay... Kris the theft of animated property is the theft of first ladies, pallakis and pornes that often happens in this region... The Empire sees all women as exclusive properties of her Masters and colonies... even if a pallaki wants run away from her Master we are obliged to take it back to its owner...
I was in choke for some seconds... I wasn't a person... I was just a property of someone...
- Have you ever tried such a case? - I asked trying make my fear disappear- If a pallaki or a first lady ran away from her Master and don't live with another man?
- Sometimes... my work is always painful... - Benjamin stopped speaking for a few seconds as if he remembered any episode in particular- Let's change the subject? I don't usually talk about it...
- I'm sorry... er... next question... Have you ever been in love?
I asked that question and immediately I regret it. Cael had tried to destabilize him earlier that morning with a question related to that same theme... love.
- Just once... it was magical... one of the best and most cruel experiences I've ever had the pleasure of experiencing...
- Do you want to know her name? If that it's not uncomfortable for you...
- It's not uncomfortable... it was one of the most beautiful parts of my life why would I be uncomfortable telling you about that?
- Because of the " cruel" you just said and 'cause what Cael told you earlier today about Eleanor... I know the tone he used to provoke you...
- Yes... but that is in the past! Like all the shit that exists in my past!
- Sometimes I wish be just like you... To have this facility to forget the past... - I confessed feeling a weight over me, the weight of the rancidity and the hurt that still resisted my command to withdraw definitively from my life.
- Everything it's a process Kris... I had my process to get here and you're starting yours. If you don't give up in the middle of your walk you'll get where you want...
- It's true...
- Now next question!
- That's right! What is your brief and tragic love story?
- It all started in late spring... Cael and I had just become Iudexes and the our families were practically forcing us to take one of the pallaki! Our families have always been very traditional so it was our obligation to become respectable Iudexes that honor the name of our families...
Then Cael and I began to contact the most renowned families of the Clarus and Dives castes to find a good pallaki that we could consecrate as our first ladies... So then we could have our circle of pallakis. If a Iudex loses his first lady automatically he loses all his pallakis...
- So that's why Cael was so upset when he heard about the Ilyada disappearance?
- Of course! According to the law he has one month to present a new first lady or he will be deemed unable to have another pallaki or a new first lady...
- But what about the law on theft of property animated? He can rescue Ilyada and then he won't lose nothing...
- But that's where things get more complicated... I can only try the case if he find the Ilyada, the possible culprit and the evidence to justify the guilt... As I know Ilyada she took all the care necessary for Cael won't find her...
- So I wont be Cael's pallaki forever!
- I Think so...
- Thank you old Gods!
- But backing to my story ... at the end of spring I managed to find the perfect candidate to be my first lady. She was the Eleonor of Anesi... the daughter of the most famous Clarus in Mor... he was a very sought-after cellist... that bastard played the bests songs in all over the Empire... I miss that guy... he died a quick death... sometimes I think it was even too fast. But anyway... when I first saw Eleonor I knew she was the girl! I didn't just want to do the pallaki ritual and then consecrate her as my first lady... I wanted more... I wanted to meet her and I wanted that her meet me so I started going every day to her colony with some present in her hands.
It lasted almost two whole seasons until we could have a good friendship and after that our love bloomed... she was the kindest person I knew, she always laughed at my jokes and did not bother when I would loudly praise myself... she was so intriguing at times, very intelligent and the generosity she had in her heart was greater than all the seas in Mor put together. Cael unlike me, he had already consecrated Ilyada as his first lady and was already looking for pallakis and some pornes for his harem on his family property. To my misfortune I told Cael about Eleonor and after that I don't know what happened but her father died and her pallakis rights were transferred to the her uncle... that guy was the problem... he didn't know me, he didn't even know that I was courting her. This man was very close to Cael and when I was going to ask for Eleonor's hand she was no longer in the colony...
- I'm sorry for that...
- I tried to get her back... I did everything to get Eleonor back but I couldn't... two weeks later he invited me to come on one of his trips aboard the Evening Flowers and there she was... beside him as one of his Pallakis... she was happy until I got close... I don't know what happened to her those two weeks but it was as if what we had lived didn't matter anymore... I spent the whole trip crying. I didn't want to leave the room, to eat or to drink nothing... but in the end she seemed happier with him at that moment... after much suffering I learned to accept all that. The fate wanted things to were that way there was nothing left to do and after that... the love that I felt for her became a vague and happy memory. That's why I told you she was a sister to me because at the end of all what I fell for her was this feeling that remained in me, the friendship for someone as kind and sweet as her.
-I don't know what to say...
- So don't say anything... you don't need to say nothing Kris. That was a long time ago I've already shed all the tears I had to shed... I just want her to be okay and to find someone good to her. My heart it's slowly opening up to meet my future first lady...
- Who knows what your future holds for you? - I said that and I was honest at every word.