Shield's Lady

standards, even if one occasionally found the clever little gadgets devised by the westerners useful or intriguing.
    It was amazing how little easterners knew about westerners, Sariana thought. Take this business of the west having created a whole new social class called Shields. It was a typical piece of western inventiveness. The original social philosophers would have been appalled.
    Sariana stared gloomily out the high arched windows that opened onto a garden of vivid flowers, wondering how she had gotten herself into such a predicament.
    She was still contemplating her fate when the door to her office swung open without any warning. Sariana didn’t swivel around in her chair to see who was standing in the doorway. Her instincts already told her. A ripple of awareness went through her nerve endings and she gritted her teeth.
    “The luck of the day to you, Gryph Chassyn,” she murmured. Ritualistic greetings and manners were useful to fall back on when one was faced with potential disaster, she decided. Above all else, she must maintain control of this situation.
    “Luck to you, lady,” Gryph said carelessly.
    He came silently into the room, the heels of his boots making absolutely no noise on the marble floor. It was a neat trick.
    “You might as well turn around and face me,” he added dryly. “I’ve come to talk business with you. Business is your specialty. I’m told. I believe we have a few matters to discuss before I undertake the task of finding the Avylyns’ precious prisma cutter. I decided it would be much easier if you and I talked about those matters without any Avylyns present.”
    Sariana took a firm grip on herself and bravely swung around to confront him. The morning light streaming through the large, arching windows did not alter the impressions she had gotten the night before. If anything the Shield appeared more formidable than he had the previous evening. Of course, she reminded herself, he was also no longer suffering from the effects of Aunt Perla’s hypnotic drug.
    “How are you feeling?” Sariana inquired politely.
    Gryph’s blue-green eyes flashed with an unreadable expression that was quickly veiled. “Like I’ve spent the night refighting the fire on board The Serendipity.” He smiled mockingly. “Kind of you to ask, lady. Especially considering the fact that you’re the one responsible for my condition last night.”
    That stung. “You very obligingly got drunk all on your own and made an attempt to pick up the first attractive woman who happened to sit down at your table,” Sariana said in clipped tones, telling herself sternly that she should not allow him to bait her this way. “The Avylyns and I merely took advantage of the situation.”
    “Is that right?” Gryph threw himself down onto a long, cushioned bench in front of one window. He sat with his back to the light, his legs spread apart, and leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. He regarded Sariana with an assessing gaze. “How did you know I’d be in that particular tavern at that particular time?”
    Sariana attempted a modest shrug. “I’ve had Bryer watching the most likely taverns on a regular basis for the past couple of weeks. Once we learned there was a real live Shield in town it wasn’t hard to find out where he was hanging out.”
    “I wasn’t trying to hide. Did it ever occur to you to try walking into that tavern yourself last night, sitting down across from me and making your offer in the normal fashion?”
    “Of course not. You had already turned down three polite invitations to do business. There was no reason to think you wouldn’t turn down the fourth,” she said. “I was forced to take desperate measures. It wasn’t as if there was a lot of choice. You Shields seem to have a monopoly on this sort of private mercenary work.”
    He gave her a brief, predatory grin. “No other social classes have shown any desire or ability to go into business against us.”
    “That I can believe. Even members of the town guards don’t take on private investigative assignments. Something tells me you Shields discourage competition.” Sariana sat forward, folding her elbows on the polished desk. “On the other hand, what respectable clan would want its sons growing up to be professional mercenaries? It wasn’t just your price that traumatized the Avylyns. They were actually afraid of you.”
    “A Shield’s reputation is his stock in trade,” Gryph said with patently false