138

Soon she found herself below deck waiting for her eyes to adjust to the lantern light. Since she was guided she continued to walked not needed to see exactly where she was going. Malina breather deeply through her nose and inhaled the sent of the ship that she had lived on for the last six moons. The scent of the wood, sea, men, lanterns was as familiar as the scent of the eldwine blossoms just after the melt.

"This way Empress." The nameless soldier said guiding her on. The generals took great care in ensuring that Malina had no contact with any person that she might know. Nameless soldier after nameless soldier had guided her in and out of her cell or fed her her meals. Most she didn't see longer then a day or two, a fast rotation. Or they want me on display. Knock me down to the level of a common soldier so that none are impressed by me.

Most of the soldiers only grunted in response to Malina's questions or when they brought her food. She suspected that this was also part of their instructions. They knew that Malina had training in the courtly arts and didn't trust the soldiers. What the generals didn't know, she thought, was how deep of a blow her imprisonment was to that training. What appeared to her to be a complete reversal of her fortunes, and the disloyalty of her entire army questioned everything that she had ever thought and everything that she had ever been taught. Her education on the courtly arts hadn't provided her with the ability to see through the faces of those that she trusted to see the deceit beneath.