The shadow of the Citadel stretched over much of the city. That imposing tower was situated on the far side of the city, only a quarter mile from the fortified wall. It was a two-hundred-foot-tall structure of stone and wooden support shaped into a hexagon. The top was a peaked stone roof with open faces between the support pillars. I couldn’t see the base through the forest of city buildings, but the way there seemed to be a large gap in roofs around the foot made me think it occupied a lot of space.
“Why is the Citadel all the way over there?” I asked my guide.
“The city was smaller when it was built,” he explained as we made our way to the center and left of the metropolis. “Much has changed in the hundreds of years it was built.”
We meandered our way through the streets until the ground sloped upward toward a large, low plateau. The palace sat at the end of a hundred-yard driveway. There was a gatehouse at the top of the road, but no wall.
“Why isn’t there anything around the palace?” I inquired. “You know, like a wall or something like that?”
“My ancestors believed that the defense should be focused on the city, not on the palace, and opted for only a small contingent of guards to protect their family.”
We arrived at the gate where the men lined up and greeted us with low bows. Cassian nodded at them as we passed, and saluted the man with the tallest feather in his cap. “Good evening, Lucius. How hails all?”
The man nodded at the palace. “Nothing to report, Your Majesty, except that Lord Secundus awaits you.”
The palace itself was a picture of imperial columns, vaulted porches and balconies. The main body of the structure was three floors high and occupied an acre. The two above-ground floors each had a long gallery supported by the huge stone pillars. Tall doors led into the interior, which was brightly lit with the high windows.
The main body was flanked by an added wing on both sides, and they all surrounded an organized garden of flowerbeds and fruit trees with meandering walking paths between them. The east wing was the same design as the main body, but the west wing was a different beast altogether.
There were four floors instead of three, and the wing was nearly twice as wide as the other parts of the palace. The balcony was split by high walls that separated the parts like apartments.
I twisted my head around and nodded at the larger west wing. “Is that where your private quarters are?”
A strange smile slipped onto his lips. “Quite the contrary. That is where my guests live.”
There was something in his wording that caught my attention. “Live? Don’t you mean stay?”
“Unfortunately, no,” he revealed with a heavy sigh that rattled my back. “One of my ancestors was quite paranoid, so he demanded that the families of his wealthiest and least trustworthy subjects live in his palace. If they attempted in any way to overthrow him, he threatened to eliminate their line. His subjects thus were forced to remain in the palace, or at least to visit as frequently as they wished to see their families.”
“He thought they were going to kill him, so he put them up near where he slept?”
“‘Keep your foes closer than your friends,’ as the old saying goes.”
“So did it work?”
“In a way.”
I blinked at him. “What do you mean?”
“My ancestor became so paranoid that he ceased to trust anyone, even his cook. He prepared his own dishes and ended up choking to death on a fish bone he neglected to remove.”
I had to stifle a laugh. This was about the death of one of Cassian’s ancestors, after all. “And so the guests remained while the king fell?”
“Exactly. His son was not so paranoid, but he retained the custom as it suited his needs to have the wealthiest of his subjects at hand.”
“For brides?”
“As money lenders. He borrowed excessively for a few fruitless wars.”
“It sounds like your family’s had a lot of fun over the years.”
His wicked eyes looked me up and down. “So we have.”
I blushed under his double entendre and whipped my head around to face forward. “So how many ‘guests’ do you have staying here right now?”
“Currently three families, but unlike those olden days, they’re free to come and go as they wish, so long as they pay the rent for their rooms.”
“Rent?”
