Slaying a Tyrant: Ancestors of Jaiya, #1

By Mel Dunay

Journey to the country of Jaiya, in a world not quite like ours. Here the humans wield magical powers and fight against an Empire which seeks to enslave them, but they share their world with insect people and trollfolk, and stranger things lurk in the shadows…

Vanti would be happy to spend her life in dance and choreography, but her family chooses her as their champion in a deadly gladiators' tournament. To save her country from enslavement, she must defeat King Obiar the Conqueror and his magical powers. But will the brooding trainer named Gurion be her guide in the battle to come…or a dangerously handsome distraction?

Note: Tyrant is meant as a standalone with a "happily ever after" ending. However, the heroes in the later books in this series are descended from Vanti and Gurion, who are also the ancestors of some of the characters in the original Jaiya series. The romance is on the sweet side, but there is some violence due to the villains' actions and the tournament in which the main characters fight.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Mel Dunay
• Release date: Oct 25, 2019
• ISBN: 9781393592815

Book preview

CHAPTER ONE

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King Obiar of Tarishan, called the Conqueror, reclined on his throne, an oblong couch of carved and gilded wood, piled high with silk-covered cushions stuffed with the downy inner feathers of swans. Hogru Stoneblade, the royal champion, stood to the right of the throne, staring grimly down into the great hall.  Out of the corner of his eye, Hogru could see Ambassador Pulington squatting awkwardly on a straw-stuffed cushion to the left of the throne, and a little in front of it.

I could snap his neck with one hand, Hogru thought, and yet, that little Imperial is the real power behind Obiar’s throne. Without the money from the Imperials, Obiar wouldn’t be able to pay me and my trollfolk to fight for him. Without my troops, Obiar would be no conqueror. Without the evil magic the Imperials gave him to enhance his Oldblood abilities, he might not even be King.

Hogru snorted in irritation, trying to get the hashish smell from Obiar’s water-pipe out of his nostrils. Obiar was watching a troupe of women dance. They had spent half their teenaged years and all their adulthood in the Sisters Dancing, trained to dance only for the eyes of the Creator and their fellow sisters.

Thrust before a male audience for the first time since they joined the Sisters, they were nervous and frightened, and made mistakes. This one fell out of time with the music, that one almost collided with another Sister because neither of them were in their proper places. Each time they fumbled, Obiar responded with a cold smile.

At his side, Hogru watched with disapproval. He did not blame the Sisters for breaking their vows and dancing in public-after all, Obiar had arrested and held hostage the Eldest Sister of their shrine, who was the leader of their troupe and an extremely popular one.

Born to a troll mother and human father, mostly raised among his mother’s people, Hogru worshiped the Creator after the trollfolk’s fashion, and held that showing fear or incompetence before an enemy was a greater sin than being made to break one’s word in order to protect an ally.

So, what plans have been made for your next tournament, Your Highness?  Pulington asked. 

He speaks the languages of North Jaiya well enough, Hogru thought, but the Imperial still has that shrill, annoying accent. The accent struck a weird note in the room, even weirder than Pulington’s skin.  In a court mostly filled of humans with gold or bronze or mahogany skins and trollfolk with green or gray, the Imperial had skin of a sickly pink, that turned bright red in the sun.

Obiar chuckled deep in his throat, and stroked the short, curved ceremonial sword at his hip as if it had been a woman. He looked the part of a conqueror: a square-faced, square-shouldered man on the tall side of average, with a bulky, muscular physique.

His official portraits made him look handsome, and his several wives seemed to think he was as well, but Hogru’s wife, Santur Firesong, had once said, when they were well outside Obiar’s hearing, that neither a human or a troll looked good with such small, empty-looking eyes such as the Conqueror had. Pig-eyes, she had called them.

I plan to target the south of Jaiya, so I have convoked the Republic of Ionappu, the Stetemo Hive, the Kingdom of Rivertown, and others to fight in the next tournament, Obiar said.

Where will it be held? Pulington asked eagerly.

I have told Ionappu that one of its noble houses will host either my tournament or my army, Obiar said. And of course, if they or another of the groups involved refuse to send champions to the tournament, they will also host my army. He chuckled again.

Is this a half-tournament or a whole tournament?  Pulington asked eagerly.

The Imperial had a great interest in the ancient practice of single-combat warfare, which the troll clans disdained but most of the other powers in Jaiya at least paid lip service to. Apparently the Empire and its rival in the west, the Citadel, had held to similar customs once upon a time, but had largely abandoned them, and Pulington was forever trying to convince Obiar to conduct his tournaments in the old Imperial fashion.

It is a whole tournament-each state must send both a champion from the noble caste and one from the warrior caste.  And no, Pulington, for the last time, nobody is fighting on horseback with spears, or however your ancestors did it. Obiar said.

Hogru heard a small note of defiance in Obiar’s voice; the Emperor did not like to be reminded that he was a puppet of the Imperial Trade Company.

Your Highness will be fighting as a representative of the Tarishan nobility, no doubt, Pulington said. But what of the champion from the warrior caste?

Obiar grinned broadly. I paid them an insult that they will find hard to swallow. I named Hogru.

Hogru kept his face as blank as always, after the fashion of his mother’s people, but on the inside he grimaced. He did not mind his new position; the money was good, the risk was less than in a conventional battle, and his wife was a maker of songs who enjoyed glorifying his exploits in single combat. But there was a downside, and he was feeling it now.

Pulington frowned. The trolls are outcaste, he said. Like most Imperials, he had grasped the idea of caste quickly, and was much more enthusiastic about enforcing it than anyone actually born to the country of Jaiya.

Obiar waved away the objection with a hand heavy with jeweled rings. Hogru’s family was warrior caste on the human side, he said. That is enough, that and my word that he is a warrior. Oh, how it will make them squirm, to accept an outcaste into the tournament!

But he said outcaste with as much of a sneer as Pulington did, and Hogru hated that, hated that this man felt that the trolls were inferior beings who received equality with the humans as a gift from Obiar’s allegedly superhuman hands.

One of Obiar’s administrators entered at the far end of the hall, and skirted around the perimeter, where courtiers and Imperials stood on sore feet, forbidden to sit in the presence of the King.

Ah, here comes the answer now, Obiar said. That man sent me a messenger earlier today, saying that our ambassador in Ionappu had sent a report with the Republic’s answer, and all he needed was time to decode it.

The administrator looked frightened, which surprised Hogru. The Republic of Ionappu had a good army, but not large enough to stand against Obiar’s forces, so they would more likely have agreed to take their chances at the tournament, and even if they refused to host it or participate in it, Obiar would have been content to crush them in open battle, and not taken it out on the messenger who informed him.

The administrator dropped to all fours before Obiar. Your Highness, he said. Ionappu has responded. They have agreed to host the tournament.

That’s good news, Obiar said. You may rise, man. Tell me: which of their great houses will host us? Do we know who they have chosen as a champion?

Your Highness, the man repeated. His shoulders shook visibly. They say that Clan Rusema will host the tournament.

Obiar and Pulington frowned at almost the same moment. Never heard of them, Obiar said. They must not be one of the greater houses.

Your Highness, they are not even part of the traditional nobility, the administrator said in a trembling voice. They are of the South Jaiyan caste called demi-nobles, one of those warrior clans who send their sons off to the army, and give their daughters as wives to the second sons of the old nobility.

Hogru had heard of the demi-noble caste. The women of one clan all lived in the clan-house they were born into, married or not, and the husbands they married were strongly encouraged to live with their wives rather than with the husbands’ birth families.

The men of these clans would usually spend most of their time at war, and their leave-time at the clan-house they had married into. People who knew about such things said that the high nobles in the South had invented this idea of a caste halfway between nobles and warriors long ago, so that the nobles would not have their second and third sons underfoot, plotting against their elder brothers.

And the oligarchs dare insult me by putting a hen-house in charge of the tournament! Obiar exploded in a long string of curses that brought the performance of the Sisters Dancing to a rigid, horrified halt. 

The demi-nobles of South Jaiya, like some of the warrior clans in North Jaiya, let their women run the day-to-day business of the clan, with only a couple of male elders to represent them in politics. They did this because most of the able-bodied men were away in whichever army they served. The only difference was that the demi-noble clans like Rusema traced their descent and property inheritance through the female line, and Hogru never could understand why that made such a vast difference to the humans. But apparently it was enough to infuriate Obiar.

This could get ugly, Hogru thought. He signaled to the guards to collect the Sisters and return them to their shrine.

They fear Your Highness, Pulington said with an indulgent smile.

Like most of the Imperial ruling class, he sniggered about about all matters reproductive and disdained the Creator, so the king's obscenities and blasphemies always seemed to amuse him.

He went on. The oligarchs have grown fat and lazy, and they cannot field a champion worthy of facing you...or of facing even the caliber of champion the other powers will send. So they farm out the task to their poor relations, who still study war.

Obiar turned his head towards Hogru. What do you think?

Hogru shrugged. It may be as the Imperial says, Your Highness.

But mostly likely they are returning insult for insult, he thought. He did not say it out loud however. He did not want to feed the king’s anger. When Obiar managed to work himself up into a proper rage in his own court, it generally led to unarmed bystanders getting killed, and Hogru detested violence against those who could not fight back.

It may be, Obiar allowed. His voice sounded calmer, but he still frowned. Have they named their champions yet?

Your Highness, the clan has discussed that in only very general terms, the administrator sounded as though he were about to faint. The demi-nobles intermarry with the warrior clans as well as the noble ones, and they believe that one of their sons-in-law from the warrior castes will serve as the lesser champion.

What of the greater champion? Obiar demanded. They had better provide one from their own bloodline!

Your Highness, that is the trouble. They say that all their sons are either underage or off defending Ionappu’s borders. They have not yet settled on a champion-noble, but they have said...

The administrator paused, gulped air, and spat out the rest of his news at lightning speed. They say they train their women to fight as well, and will assign one of those as champion-noble, whichever they deem most fit for combat.

Obiar rose to his feet with a scream of rage and drew his sword. The hilt was of silver with a pommel made from a single flawless emerald the size of a pigeon's egg, but the curved steel blade was sharp on both edges. He seemed to split apart into four men, each with a gleaming sword.  Before Hogru or Pulington could intervene, all four Obiars stabbed their blades into the administrator.

––––––––

It was dawn of a Firstday morning, when Vanti led the teenaged girls and young ladies of clan in a prayer dance at the Rusema family shrine. Her quick, precise footsteps kept time with the drum thumped by the youngest and newest girl in the group. Vanti’s arms, only moving from the elbow down, swept left when her hips swayed right and then swept right when her hips swayed left.

This was the most ancient form of dance in Jaiya, closely related to the martial arts known across the country, and its purpose was to thank the Creator for the grace of health and a functioning body. 

Vanti also thanked the Creator for the end of the monsoon rains and the coolness of the morning. Here in the Republic of Ionappu, which lay close to the coast of South Jaiya and got two monsoon seasons a year, the trees and grass were always green and the air was always humid. Dancing in the heat of high noon was exhausting, and she went to a lot of trouble to make sure that she never had to do that.

The young men of the house would hold a similar dance at sundown on Secondday.  Except for the drummer keeping time, and an occasional visit from one of the Sisters Dancing (or the Priests Dancing, for the men’s Secondday performance), no one but the Creator and the guardian spirits was supposed to witness this style of dance.

It was a responsibility of the clans training for war, and a few special groups within the priestly caste, because the higher nobility held themselves to be too busy for such challenging forms of prayer, almost as busy as the farmers and the fishers and the housecleaners who worked from the dark of the morning to the dark of the night.

With each movement, Vanti breathed her gratitude for what she had been given, for she loved dance, and liked the martial training she had received, and she knew that she excelled at both, that she excelled at them because she trained in one or the other every day she was healthy, since she was five.

She was a tall, slim woman, twenty-nine years old, made almost too thin and wiry by twenty-five years of dancing and mock-fighting, with a strong jaw offset by rounded cheeks and full, smiling lips, a snub nose and dark eyes that tilted up slightly at the outer corners, giving her a playful look.

Her clear skin was the light reddish-brown color of a certain flavor of tea, diluted with plenty of water. The long braid of her hair swayed as she moved, but when she was standing still it would reach almost to her waist. But there was one ability she couldn’t bring herself to give thanks for: a dangerous Oldblood ability. Her mother had held the same power, and it had gotten her killed in battle.

The women completed their last circle, and the drumbeats stopped. Everyone bowed in unison to the shrine of the Creator, and then turned to go.  For privacy’s sake, the shrine was enclosed by a high, circular stone wall with a wrought iron gate at the other end.

The curls of iron had been shaped into a stylized version of the Tree of Choice, with the words yes and no duplicated many times and arranged like leaves on its spiky branches. Just outside the gate, a little girl of seven stood. Vanti wondered what this was about. This particular second cousin of hers was one of the more responsible children, and the clan elders often used her to run errands and carry messages. 

Vanti approached the gate, and peered through it.

Sorry to bother you, cousin, but Uncle Nebut wants you to meet him and the other elders right away in their council-room, the little girl said.

I’ll be right there, Vanti said.

––––––––

The Rusema clan-house was built on a square footprint with a square courtyard in the middle, and a rain cistern in the courtyard. The four oblong sections of the building were called blocks, and faced the four points of the compass.

The elders lived in the north block, which they shared with the clan’s infirmary. The other residents of the north block included the clan healer, his assistants, a couple of servants and two younger married couples who helped with the bookkeeping. The main council room was on the ground floor, just off the main courtyard.

Vanti walked in to find the place much the same as always. The polished wooden floor was covered with woven straw mats, and everyone sat on straw-stuffed cushions at low tables two or three feet off the ground.

There was that one woman Vanti had never been close to, sitting in a corner taking dictation from Aunt Enoli. Next to the younger woman sat her husband, a minor noble with a knack for clerical work who had settled at the Rusema clan-house because he was a fourth son and his family had no use for him. He was writing down a second copy of whatever Aunt Enoli was dictating.

In another corner, Aunt Tassi was going over an accounting ledger with her daughter Isena, who was about Vanti’s age.  In the center of the room was Uncle Nebut, who sat at his low desk with a pile of letters in front of him.

He was the second-youngest of Grandmother’s surviving children, after Aunt Tassan, but as the only one of Grandmother’s sons still alive, he was the face of the clan to the outside world in all political and property matters, although any major decision required him and his mother and sisters to vote on it before acting. He had a visiting marriage with a woman from another clan, meaning that when he wanted to see her or do business with her clan, he would go stay with her family, and the rest of the time he stayed at the Rusema clanhouse.

Vanti had always treated him with respect, but she could not quite like him. He had been a skilled mock-fighter when he was younger. But while his brothers and at least one of his sisters-Vanti’s mother-had actually mustered into Rusema Company, and served valiantly in the Republic’s army, he had made the case that his political and business contacts were more valuable than anything he could do in the military. 

Vanti had been four at the time. It had been around that time that Vanti had noticed that the dancers in the family were exempted from a lot of the drudge-work that went on just before a festival, and had volunteered to study dance.

But she had been four, and Uncle Nebut had