disgusted by the way the woman had let herself be manipulated, geas or not. The human was intelligent, she
saw
what was happening, and Alara guessed that she had come very close to breaking her own geas a time or two. Yet nothing of what she saw mattered to her, only her own well-being, her luxurious life. Perhaps at one time she would have felt
something
—but that time had vanished with her childhood.
Even
freedom
didn’t matter to her. Only pleasure.
I
really should just abandon her here to die
, Alara thought, feeling as if she had bitten into something rotten. She didn’t owe the woman anything. She wasn’t of the Kin. She wasn’t even worth saving. Alara could almost agree with the elvenkind about these humans, how base they were, how much they really deserved to be slaves. She could at least agree with Dyran’s faction, anyway.
Alara had often discussed politics in her guise as a low-ranking elven lord, or had them discussed in her presence as a human slave. Having served as an elven page for several Council sessions, and eavesdropped in many ways and many forms on others, Alara knew considerably more about elven politics than Serina had ever learned, especially where the treatment of humans was concerned. Oddly enough, for all his cruelty, Dyran was one of the better masters. The Council faction he headed held that humans were something—slightly—more than brute beasts. He allowed his human slaves to rise as high as overseer, as he had Serina’s father. He obviously believed what his party used as their platform: that one could despise, or even pity one’s human slaves, but that there was potential there to be exploited. So long as human greed and elven magic held, humans could be allowed a bit of freedom on their leashes, and permitted to make decisions on their own. Such freedom was profitable to the master, after all—it meant that he needed fewer elven subordinates, whose loyalty night be in question, and whose interests were undeniably their own. The humans owed everything to their lords; the elves might well decide to seek greener pastures. Humans were simple in their greed; elven emotions were more complex and harder to manipulate, even for a master like Dyran.
From what Alara had gleaned, Dyran’s faction was slightly in the minority. The majority of the Council were of the other party; the party that felt that the humans were dangerous, near-rabid creatures, unpredictable and uncontrollable. That
every
human should be kept under guard, with the strictest kind of supervision; coerced into their duties, with that coercion aided by magic whenever possible. And that those humans that showed any signs of independent thought must be destroyed before they contaminated the rest.
Predictably enough, Dyran’s faction contained most of the younger elves, who looked upon the survivors of the Wizard War as reactionary old fools, frightened by an uprising that could never recur into watching their very shadows.
But Dyran knew something that Alara was fairly certain he had
not
told the others, who had been born after the Wizard War. She
knew
he knew this little fact, because he himself had brought up the subject, more than once, in Council.
Human magic was still cropping up in the race. And the elves had no idea how or why.
Most of the younger elven lords thought that human magic had vanished after the last of the halfbreeds had been killed and the human “mages” had been identified and destroyed. That simply wasn’t true, as this woman Serina proved so clearly. Though untrained, she had been strong enough to trap Alara’s mind with her own. Granted, that was largely because of the strength of her fear and hatred, since this “natural magic” was fueled by the power of emotion. Still, Alara was a shaman of the Kin, and it took a powerful force to trap and hold her for even an instant.
The elves had been trying to breed the “mind-magic” out of their humans for centuries, yet the ability kept
saw
what was happening, and Alara guessed that she had come very close to breaking her own geas a time or two. Yet nothing of what she saw mattered to her, only her own well-being, her luxurious life. Perhaps at one time she would have felt
something
—but that time had vanished with her childhood.
Even
freedom
didn’t matter to her. Only pleasure.
I
really should just abandon her here to die
, Alara thought, feeling as if she had bitten into something rotten. She didn’t owe the woman anything. She wasn’t of the Kin. She wasn’t even worth saving. Alara could almost agree with the elvenkind about these humans, how base they were, how much they really deserved to be slaves. She could at least agree with Dyran’s faction, anyway.
Alara had often discussed politics in her guise as a low-ranking elven lord, or had them discussed in her presence as a human slave. Having served as an elven page for several Council sessions, and eavesdropped in many ways and many forms on others, Alara knew considerably more about elven politics than Serina had ever learned, especially where the treatment of humans was concerned. Oddly enough, for all his cruelty, Dyran was one of the better masters. The Council faction he headed held that humans were something—slightly—more than brute beasts. He allowed his human slaves to rise as high as overseer, as he had Serina’s father. He obviously believed what his party used as their platform: that one could despise, or even pity one’s human slaves, but that there was potential there to be exploited. So long as human greed and elven magic held, humans could be allowed a bit of freedom on their leashes, and permitted to make decisions on their own. Such freedom was profitable to the master, after all—it meant that he needed fewer elven subordinates, whose loyalty night be in question, and whose interests were undeniably their own. The humans owed everything to their lords; the elves might well decide to seek greener pastures. Humans were simple in their greed; elven emotions were more complex and harder to manipulate, even for a master like Dyran.
From what Alara had gleaned, Dyran’s faction was slightly in the minority. The majority of the Council were of the other party; the party that felt that the humans were dangerous, near-rabid creatures, unpredictable and uncontrollable. That
every
human should be kept under guard, with the strictest kind of supervision; coerced into their duties, with that coercion aided by magic whenever possible. And that those humans that showed any signs of independent thought must be destroyed before they contaminated the rest.
Predictably enough, Dyran’s faction contained most of the younger elves, who looked upon the survivors of the Wizard War as reactionary old fools, frightened by an uprising that could never recur into watching their very shadows.
But Dyran knew something that Alara was fairly certain he had
not
told the others, who had been born after the Wizard War. She
knew
he knew this little fact, because he himself had brought up the subject, more than once, in Council.
Human magic was still cropping up in the race. And the elves had no idea how or why.
Most of the younger elven lords thought that human magic had vanished after the last of the halfbreeds had been killed and the human “mages” had been identified and destroyed. That simply wasn’t true, as this woman Serina proved so clearly. Though untrained, she had been strong enough to trap Alara’s mind with her own. Granted, that was largely because of the strength of her fear and hatred, since this “natural magic” was fueled by the power of emotion. Still, Alara was a shaman of the Kin, and it took a powerful force to trap and hold her for even an instant.
The elves had been trying to breed the “mind-magic” out of their humans for centuries, yet the ability kept
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