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Orlando tried to keep me mentally occupied while Tru and the others were gone. I kept fretting about Tru and worrying about his safety. Not that I didn't worry about the others. I did, but Tru kept dominating my thoughts all morning. So much so that my attention to my lessons wandered a lot and I kept messing up the spells I was supposed to work on. Orlando was very patient with me. Even Aunt Trysta, who came over after the children were taking their naps, tried to help, evaluate my problems, and was also stymied.

The interesting thing is that I tried to 'see' Tru to see how he was doing, but that vision would not come as easily as the vision of Count Torfen did. But visions, even the most benign attempts, did not happen. Aunt Trysta postulated that perhaps my personal powers had not regenerated enough to allow me to use them so quickly. She did state that pregnant female magic users tend to transfer their powers into baby making and that the farther along she was, the less available powers she might have than normal. Being seven months along was the probable cause for my recalcitrant powers. But neither of them would allow me to use my crown to boost my powers just to see what Tru was doing. They impressed upon me that casual usage of magic came at a price also. One had to consider carefully every instance.

So it was that I felt the greatest of relief when Tru, Haral and the others returned to the compound. It took all my willpower to refrain from running to greet him at the compound gates when they returned in the late afternoon. But once he had entered the house with Haral not far behind, I threw myself into his arms and began to passionately kiss him. “Oh, I was so worried about you, Tru! You were gone so long, I was afraid something might have happened to you! Oh, but you are back!! You are safe and alive!”

Tru chuckled. “Yes, my dearest, I am fine! I am very much alive. I don't think that I have ever had such a warm, passionate welcome home before. I rather like it.” Tru looked down at me with a grin. He sat down on a chair and took me onto his lap. “Please, my dear, tell me how much you missed me again?” We began to kiss once more and I soon began to feel where he wanted this to end.

“A-hem!!” Haral announced his presence. “I am sorry to break up your lovemaking, brother, but we need to talk.”

Tru sighed. “My dearest, would you mind leaving us for a moment? Haral and I have some business to discuss. I promise not to be too long. We can finish later what we have just started.”

“Why Tru? I want to know what you have done today also. I think I have just as much right to hear your news as Haral does. Why must I be treated like a child or some delicate flower?”

“Yes, brother. I would like to hear your explanation also. Because if it is too horrible or graphic for Patra to hear, perhaps it is too much for me to hear also?” Haral looked sharply at his older brother.

Tru sighed again. “Don't blame me if you dislike what you have heard, my dear. I have warned you....” He set me back on my feet. He then got up and paced the floor.

“We left here and went directly to the house I let Su Wei use. When we got there, only her maids were there. They claimed that they didn't know where she was. When I asked about the other servants that I had hired for them [the cook, the gardener, the housemaids], the women told me that Su Wei had dismissed them, because she didn't trust them. If she had just dismissed them, they would have come to me and informed me of this. I would have found them employment elsewhere. But I have not seen any of them, nor have any of my agents in the city. It isn't likely for them to just disappear. I have known their families for years. But just in case, I have Captain Quinton currently looking for them.

“The women were very loyal to Su Wei and, at first, refused to say anything. But when I separated them, Izshaq and I started to play mind games with them. It took a while and I had to threaten not only their lives, but also the lives of their families in Shiangkau, before they started to talk with me. Fortunately, they knew my reputation and the influence that I had with the Emperor of Shiangkau. While they were very loyal to their mistress, they were even more so to their own families. It took me a couple of hours, but I finally found where that inn was where Patra saw Torfen and Su Wei. We left the women bound at the house and left several guards to watch them and to watch the house in case Torfen and Su Wei showed up there.

“We arrived at the inn not long afterwards. They and what was left of their loyalists were still there and not paying much attention to security, that is for sure. We caught them with their pants down, almost literally. I am amazed they had not been found out earlier. However, they scattered quickly, just like cockroaches, just as soon as we showed up. Su Wei stayed behind to delay their capture. That was her mistake, because we weren't there to capture Torfen. We were there to capture her. She put up a pretty reasonable fight. Either Izshaq and I would have eventually defeated her, but we didn't play gentlemen. All of us attacked her at once. She succumbed a whole lot faster that way. Once we had her down, we bound her and left the inn quickly. We returned briefly to the house and added the maids to our captives.”

Tru stopped speaking for a while. He and Haral exchanged glances. “So what did you do with them, Tru?” I asked. “Did you kill them?”

“No, my dear, I did not.” Tru replied. “I would left her at the inn, if I had killed her. No, Patra dearest, I did not kill them.

“Instead, we took the three women to a man I had heard of, who lives in Bogtown. He had the reputation in certain circles for being the agent of one of the most notorious slave traffickers in the world. I took the women to him and sold them to him, with many provisos. To whit: that they be sold into permanent slavery without the possibility of manumission; that they be sold to someone with a reputation for extreme security for their slaves, like a brothel or a salt mine; that they be sold separately; and, finally, that they be sold somewhere very far away from Alfaria. I warned him about Su Wei's abilities, but that made him even more interested in her.” Tru brought out a large bag of gold coins and put them in front of Haral. “Please distribute this money to the families of Torfen's victims.”

“Tru?” I asked incredulously, “You sold Su Wei into slavery? Why? How could you?”

“Because Su Wei isn't the innocent young girl you seem to think that she is. I think that she killed off the servants that I hired for her. She is, in part, as responsible as Torfen is for the rapes of the girls you helped rescue. According to her maids, she started up with Torfen around the end of autumn, so she is also partly responsible for the murders, rapes and tortures of the girls they killed on Grąža night.

“I suppose that I should have given her into the hands of the authorities, but with the king protecting his son, I have no belief that she would be properly punished for her mis-deeds. I could have handed her over to the mob who are seeking justice for their murdered relatives. They would probably have gang-raped her, brutalized her and executed her. But either course of action would have brought ouot her connection to me and the family. Under no circumstances will I permit someone like Su Wei to sully the reputation that I and my family have worked decades to achieve. No, Su Wei needed to leave Alfaria, as well as being punished for her crimes. This seemed to be the best solution.”

'But Tru ... What if Su Wei escapes this ... person's captivity? As you have said yourself, there are only a few who can defeat her. What is to keep her from rejoining Torfen?” I inquired.

“I doubt that Su Wei will be capable of walking or fighting very affectively for several months. She should be far away by the time she heals.”

“What did you do to her? Cripple her?”

“Not permanently. Her injuries came as the result of her poor choices and unwillingmess to give up. None of them were caused deliberately. Things happen during battle. Her bones and tendons will eventually heal. Patra, dear, you cannot possibly want Su Wei to go unpunished?”

“No. No, I don't. I dislike the concept of slavery. Having experienced it myself, I know how humiliating it is and how dehumanizing it is. I wish that it could be abolished forever.

“But, in the case of Su Wei, I suppose that this is a better punishment than death or rotting the rest of her life in the horrors they call prisons ...”

After long minutes of silence, Haral finally broke it and said, “My news is that although the City Guard did eventually find the inn, they arrived after you and your men left with Su Wei. Probably not long afterwards. Even as we speak, the City Guards, the Royal Army and the Royal Guards are in hot pursuit of Torfen. Although they haven't captured him yet, they have sometimes just missed him by minutes. Sometimes they have found hot food on tables where he found refuge, but he fled quickly to elude capture. He must be constantly on the run. His followers are being arrested in droves, as are any who wittingly or unwittingly give him shelter. I hope and pray that he will find him soon. Once he is, the city and the country can relax and find peace once more. Otherwise, I think that the king is treading on slippery rocks. One mis-step and there might be revolution. The people's trust in their leaders is at an all time low.

“I agree with you, brother, that keeping any connection with that monster under cover is a wise thing. I feel sorry for the girl, but, as you say, she is an adult and has to take responsibility for her own actions. Just not at the cost of innocent people's reputations.”

Several weeks later, Count Torfen still had not been captured. Tru had ordered all of our guards on heightened alert. Every possible hiding place on the estate's grounds were frequently checked. Tru didn't want the vastness of the property to shelter the fugitive even for a second.

Also, at that time, Tru had sent servants to the house where Su Wei lived to remove all of her clothes and furniture. He wanted any signs of her removed before he put the house up for sale. Because the gardens had also been neglected, Tru sent a team of gardeners to make the place look more habitable. It was during the renovation of the gardens in the back of the property that the graves of the missing servants were found. Tru reported the findings to the constables, who immediately issued a warrent for the arrest of Su Wei. At least their families were able to stop wondering what happened to them. Even though money could not replace the loss of a loved one, Tru made sure that all the families were taken care of financially.