“Yes, my lord,” the servant bowed and then went off to do his master’s bidding.

About Jonah’s neck he wore a chain from which hung a milky-white oval jewel. It was a sorcerous means of transporting its owner from one place to another, given to him by the great Shadow Prince Kaliq. It had been magically imprinted with Jonah’s essence and would not obey anyone else’s command. This way he might come and go between Hetar and Terah easily. Jonah took the gem between his fingers and rubbed it gently. “The City, my rooms,” he said, and was instantly transported to his own apartments within the palace.

A serving woman cleaning in his bedchamber gave a startled cry as he appeared.

Waving his hand impatiently he left her and hurried to find Gaius Prospero, who was having his morning meal in his own dayroom. The emperor looked tired but he had a distinct air of contentment. Remembering his night with Vilia, Jonah almost smiled but managed to restrain himself. “Good morning, my lord,” he greeted the emperor, bowing politely.

“Where have you been?” Gaius Prospero demanded. “I sent for you yesterday and you were not to be found. Were you in Terah?”

“I was in the Outlands at my vineyards,” Jonah answered. “I needed to confer with my winemaker, for the growing season is upon us.”

“Be careful, Jonah, or you will become a rustic.” The emperor chuckled. “Did you see my wife while you were there?”

“Nay, but which one is there now?” Jonah said pleasantly.

“Vilia. She is a most thoughtful woman and went off to allow me the leisure to enjoy my new slave, Shifra. Anora, of course, stayed. She is so fiercely jealous. Once I found it charming and amusing. I am not so certain I feel that way any longer,” Gaius Prospero grumbled. “However I was told she has developed a most disgusting rash and has been forced to keep to her own rooms.”

“Then you have been free to dally with your new slave girl, my lord. I can see it has done you good,” Jonah told him. “You appear more at ease than you have in many months. Your responsibilities weigh heavily upon you, I know. I am delighted that you have someone with whom you can enjoy life, my lord.”

“Jonah, it is a miracle. I am once again able to enjoy taking pleasures with a woman! You know that ever since I had that dream where that wretched faerie woman cursed me, I have not been able to do so. Anora’s whips could arouse my manhood but even her most skillful abuse could not cause me to enjoy pleasures. But with Shifra it is all different! Ah, Jonah,” the emperor gushed, “she is beautiful and kind and sweet, yet she is intelligent. She seems to exist merely to please me and make me happy. Over these last few days I have offered her whatever she wanted to show my satisfaction with her but she refuses to take anything from me. She asks only to be allowed to be with me. How different is that from my two wives? Both are always eager for some new acquisition. And what one wants the other must have or I am allowed no peace in my own house.”

“But the lady Vilia is the mother of your children, my lord, and she has always had your best interests at heart,” Jonah murmured. “And you loved the lady Anora enough to ask the lady Vilia’s permission to marry her.”

“I don’t want either of them any longer!” the emperor declared forcefully. “What can I do, Jonah, to get rid of them without the people thinking badly of me? I want to free my sweet Shifra and marry her. I want to make her my empress! Think, Jonah! Think!”

“My lord, this is a serious decision that you propose making,” Jonah said softly. “With the lady Anora, while she will protest mightily, the solution is a simple one. I believe she would be content owning her own Pleasure House in The City. If you can arrange that along with the license to operate it in her name, if you will settle an outrageous amount of gold upon her, if she may keep her villa with its farm in the Outlands province, along with all the jewels and other luxuries you have settled upon her and if she may take her servants and slaves with her, I believe she could be persuaded to allow a divorce especially if no fault in the matter was laid at her door.

“And while I have always been respectful of the lady, I have also felt she was your bête noire, my lord. You will lose naught by ridding yourself of her. But the matter of the lady Vilia is another thing altogether, my lord. She is the mother of your children and is greatly respected among the people. You must think on this most carefully before you decide to move forward,” Jonah advised.

“She has always preferred the country to The City,” Gaius Prospero said slowly. “Even when we had that little farm in the Midlands where we would go to escape The City’s heat in the summer. And with our daughters wed and Aubin grown, she seems to spend more and more time at that villa of hers in the Outlands.”

“Ridding yourself of her will cost you dearly, my lord,” Jonah said. “You cannot free and wed your slave girl and then make her your empress if you are still wed to the lady Vilia. The people would not stand for it. But first the lady Anora.”

“Anora would cost me less if she just died,” Gaius Prospero said softly.

“Indeed, my lord, she would,” Jonah agreed, “and as you say, she has been ill these past few days. If you truly mean to rid yourself of her this might be a most convenient time,” he suggested.

“I have paid little attention to her since she grew sick,” the emperor noted. “Perhaps I should send her some special treat. She has developed a taste for Razi of late, the peach-flavored in particular.”

“Will you allow me to send her some from one of my Razi kiosks, my lord?” Jonah suggested. “In your name, of course.”

“It will be a most special blend of Razi, will it not?” Gaius Prospero asked. “It must be the best for I will have only the best for my dearest Anora.” He lowered his voice so that only Jonah might hear it. “It should be quick. There ought not be any suffering to draw attention to the sad event, Jonah. This illness she has been suffering must be blamed for her untimely end. She is not well-known among the people. A small period of official mourning to show respect should suffice.”

“It will be just as you wish, my lord, and a short public mourning will more than suffice,” Jonah told Gaius Prospero. “But let us now consider the rest of the matter, my lord. The slave girl is yours and she is going nowhere. You must move slowly and carefully in the matter of the lady Vilia. In another month at the Spring Festival, free Shifra in public gratitude for Anora’s life and service to you. The girl then becomes your private Pleasure Woman. The people begin to know her and are happy for their emperor who is so obviously content and happy himself.

“Then you will speak with the lady Vilia about dissolving your union. And over the following months we will work out the agreement between you with all its many details. You will be very, very generous, both with your fortune and with your words. At no time will you show disrespect, my lord, to either your lady wife or the children she has borne you. While your offspring are grown you must nonetheless make provisions for them. This will please the lady Vilia and reassure her that you mean her children no ill will. And by year’s end the lady Vilia will no longer be your wife, and you may do what you will with your beloved,” Jonah concluded softly.

“Jonah, as always you voice my very thoughts so succinctly,” the emperor said.

“I have learned much from you in your service, my lord,” Jonah murmured with a small bow. “If you will permit me I shall now go and arrange for that gift to be delivered to the lady Anora so all of your plans may be set into motion.” And he quickly withdrew, leaving Gaius Prospero chortling with delight.

A discreet and clever man, the emperor’s right hand left the Golden District on foot and found his way into the Quarter. He was well cloaked, for he wanted no one to recognize him. He sought out one of his own Razi kiosks and purchased a full skin of the beverage, a mixture of frine and several herbs that gave the drinker dreams. Razi had become very popular in The City, especially among the poor who used it to quell the effects of their poverty. But the well-to-do also found it pleasant to drink when they sought to escape the tedium of their own world.

Returning to the Golden District, the wineskin concealed beneath his garments, Jonah sought out his own apartments. Within, there was a small interior chamber where he kept certain items. Carefully emptying the skin of Razi into a magnificent cut-crystal pitcher with a engraved gold lid, he then poured a small vial of clear, odorless liquid into the Razi and mixed it about. Then he personally carried the pitcher to the lady Anora’s apartments and knocked.

The door opened just a small crack and a servant’s head came into view. “Yes? What is it?” she asked. “Oh, it is you, Lord Jonah. I am sorry but my mistress is not well and will receive no one.”

“I have just come from the emperor who informed me of your mistress’s unfortunate illness. The emperor wished me to deliver this pitcher of peach Razi from one of my own kiosks, which as you know serve the best Razi in The City. He thought that as the lady Anora has been so indisposed she might enjoy this small treat. And he wished me to convey to the lady Anora that he has missed her good company and hopes she will soon be well enough to join him again.” Jonah handed the pitcher to the serving woman, then with a small nod of his head, turned and left her.

The door had barely closed when Anora was nagging at her servant to deliver her the Razi for she had been listening to the exchange. “Bring it here! Bring it here! And fetch me a goblet,” she said. “So, he is finally bored with his little slave girl and thinks to wheedle back into my good graces, does he? When this damnable rash finally recedes, his fat bottom will burn fire for his neglect of me, I promise you,” Anora said, licking her lips in anticipation of the whipping she planned to give her husband.