A pair of maids were waiting inside, and they curtseyed to her, not Lara.

“These maids will be assigned to you while you’re a guest here,” Lara said, sliding her finger across a nearby surface to inspect it for dust. “If you have any further questions, Ida and Khloe can answer them.”

“Thank you for the company, Lady Lara,” Mydea said.

She nodded. “I’ll leave you to settle in then.”

Mydea waited for her to leave, then took a moment to take in the room. “What are your names again?” she asked.

“Ida, my lady,” answered the brunette.

“Khloe, my lady,” said the one with short, wavy hair.

Mydea nodded. “With me is Troia, my lady’s maid. When she speaks, she speaks for me.”

“Understood, my lady,” they said.

Mydea scanned the room, and narrowed her eyes at the vanity on the far side, and the wall-mounted mirror above it. There were poles along the ceiling where a drape should have hung from to enclose the space. She moved towards it swiftly, cognizant of the soft footfalls following her. “Is this mirror capable of scrying?” she asked, already knowing the answer.

“Yes, my lady,” the maids answered together.

Troia seemed to pick up on the implications as quickly as her, for she said, “Kindly arrange for a proper soundproof curtain as soon as possible.”

They hesitated, and that told Mydea more than enough.

“Were my instructions unclear?” Troia asked sternly from behind her.

“No, Miss Troia. It will be seen to,” Ida said.

Half a dozen heartbeats passed, before Troia added, “As soon as possible means now. The both of you, quickly!”

“But Lady Mydea has yet to unpack—”

Mydea turned around and cut her off with a sharp look. “Are palace maids in the habit of forgetting instructions seconds after I’ve said them? Troia speaks for me.” For them to keep questioning her handmaid was to question herself, and such insolence had to be nipped in the bud.

“No, my lady,” Ida said in an uneven voice. The maids curtseyed once more, then left the room to them.

Bribed without a doubt. This was the Seraglio, after all, where secrets sold highly. Scrying mirrors were a window to the world outside, but that worked both ways if one didn’t take precautions. Even the maids ought to have known that, and their hesitation meant someone had paid them to conveniently forget that fact while preparing her room. Although not all that much considering the poor acting on display just now.

Mydea stared at the mirror and sighed.

Allowing such an obvious means for someone to spy on her, in a place that was supposed to be hers, left her ill at ease.

Cutting off its connection to the mirrorplane was out of the question. She didn’t know what security measures were in place in the Seraglio, nor vain enough to test them her first day here. There was also her own deniability to consider. All the culprit knew so far was that she had requested for soundproof curtains, which might easily be to preserve her own privacy while scrying with others. It would be a leap for them to think she was worried about others using her mirror to spy on her, and meddling with the mirrorplane would confirm that.

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She didn’t want them to overestimate her capacity so early on. In the future, it might prove useful.

How to cover it though? Mydea’s eyes latched onto the canopy above her bed at first, before dismissing it quickly. Even if Troia had talent in wind, it’d still be a pain removing the translucent silk canopy from the bed only to reattach it when the curtains came.

Troia knew her thoughts, and had already found a solution. There was a changing screen tucked away to the side that Troia now brought out and set up in front of the mirror.

I’m an idiot, Mydea thought, resisting the urge to smack her forehead. It would leave a most unseemly mark. Here was a perfectly simple answer in front of her, and her mind had just skipped right past it for far more complex ones.

“Will this do?” Troia asked, stepping aside as she finished. The dressing screen didn’t quite obscure everything, but it would do the trick for now.

“Yes, thank you, Troia,” Mydea said. “You know how I like things.”

“Yes, my lady,” Troia said. Privacy reasonably secured, her handmaid went about unpacking. Mydea’s trunk had been deposited at the base of her bed already, and Troia fished out her bunny rabbit slippers.

Mydea sighed happily as she slipped her feet into those soft things, and took the time to inspect the kettle Troia presented before her. “This should be fine,” Mydea said after a while. One had to be mindful of poison in Aelisium. As Troia continued to unpack, Mydea walked over to the window overlooking the city.

Night had fallen, but an army of dancing lights kept the city illuminated everywhere she looked. Only in Aelisium could something as rare as bottled lightning be used by the strawborn for lighting. Even without them though, one would hardly be troubled seeing at night for at the highest point was the brightest light. The Starlight Tower was akin to a small sun; a beacon upon which the darkness broke.

“Isn’t it strange how things work out?” Mydea asked, turning back to Troia who was sorting Mydea’s dresses by color and category, before storing them in the wardrobe. “It wasn’t so long ago I asked if you would like to stay in Aelisium to visit your brother, and now fate has deposited us here for an even longer stay. I mean to give you some time off after we’ve settled in so you may go visit him.”

Troia’s face creased into a smile. “Thank you, my lady. That’s very kind of you. It’ll be good to speak with Pryam in person after so many years.”

“Do you know which master he’s apprenticing under?”

“Petros? Petra?” Troia said, as if sampling the names. Her face scrunched up. “Petey? His master’s name escapes me, but it shouldn’t be too hard to find once I ask around. How many master artificers could share his name in this city?”

“He’ll likely be along Runesteel Road or Artificer Alley, near the Imperial Athenaeum,” Mydea offered.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Troia said, glancing at the swinging pendulum of the room’s timepiece. It was more ostentatious than any of the ones they had at home, because of course it was. “Half an hour already? It shouldn’t be taking those girls this long to get a curtain. They’re not to be trusted.”

“I’m aware,” Mydea said, finishing her last cup of tea. She waved Troia away when she moved to fill it up. “Leave it for now.”

“Those maids ought to be dismissed then!”

Mydea shook her head and sat on the sofa. “That’s out of the question. This isn’t Kolchis.”

Troia frowned. “But my lady, this standard of service would be unacceptable anywhere. Surely Lady Lara wouldn’t begrudge you this?”

“Perhaps not, but who would replace them? We know these two to be dangers. With new ones, we cannot be sure,” Mydea said. “No, if I must suffer any spies, let them be bad spies.” Should I be insulted or relieved that I didn’t warrant better ones? she thought, before settling on the latter. She was still just the daughter of a weakened house external and hardly worthy of anyone’s attention. If this ploy was to take her measure, then let them take the wrong one.

“As you say, my lady,” Troia said, still disgruntled.

“That doesn’t mean I’ll be letting them off for this incompetence,” Mydea said. “There will be punishment.”

Troia’s grin was all teeth. “As you say, my lady.”

Though Troia might chastise them, a servant could not be punished by another, and so Mydea would have to be the one to issue it. She could let Lara handle it, but that wouldn’t make them respect her, and the High Stewardess might not think too kindly of her for being unable to discipline her own assigned servants. So long as it wasn’t anything extreme like death or mutilation, there shouldn’t be a problem.

Her grandfather, the military taskmaster that he was, would have had them whipped for their insolence or beat them with the flat of his sword.

Of course, just because Mydea could be harsh didn’t mean she should be. People often said it was better to be feared rather than loved, yet forgot the Sage’s whole truth: it was best to be both feared and loved, but hatred was to be avoided.

Harshness might very well alienate them, then they’d be lost to her evermore. That wouldn’t do.