Kilian's Territory fell apart the moment its lord fled. Outside, guards and slave owners scattered in panic, some without even taking their "property."
The buildings were still burning fiercely. The smoke was visible for miles.
Illymoyas had no time for them. Having lost a good deal of her wealth in the fight, she stormed into the manor to plunder whatever Killian had failed to take with him.
The young maids in the manor huddled in a corner, their faces pale with fright.
Looking at their pretty faces, Joan muttered that Killian certainly knew how to enjoy himself. Then she told them, "Don't worry. As long as you don't run around or warn anyone, you won't be hurt."
Joan had realized that Illymoyas didn't actually eat people. She had eyes for only two things: treasure and more treasure.
"Do any of you know where my guard is being held?" she asked the maids.
The maids looked at one another. No one answered.
Just as Joan thought they didn't know either, a maid with delicate, faintly pink skin stepped forward and said she did.
"Take me there!"
Joan followed the maid through the manor's winding passages and found a hidden dungeon, with her guard locked inside.
He was alive and hadn't been tortured. He had only gone without food for a full day.
Joan found a huge ring of keys in the jailer's room. Not knowing which one opened her guard's cell, she brought them all over, and they tried them one by one.
The other prisoners had seen the jailer flee in a panic. When a girl strode in soon afterward and crouched before a cell to try the keys, they begged Joan to let them out, insisting they had been wrongfully imprisoned.
Joan couldn't tell truth from lies, but this