My Useless Tamer Skill Tamed the Emperor novel · Chapter 3 of 24

Chapter 3: Noon Demonstration

Before the whole court Hinata makes the beast sit, lie down and shake a paw while the Hero sneers; at dusk the Emperor pulls her into the tower and asks her to give him one thing he will remember.

By noon, half the court had come to watch a girl get eaten.

They sat along a stone gallery above the training yard, in silk and furs, with servants fanning them.

The Regent had the center seat, turning his rings.

Hinata stood on the sand below with a rice ball in her pocket and a silver chain in her hand.

At the other end of the chain was the Black One.

He walked beside her with his head low and his tail swinging, so big that his shoulder brushed her hip.

Every lord in the gallery leaned back an inch.

"Is it a trick?" someone whispered. "Is it drugged?"

"It's a cat," said Hinata, not quite quietly. "A very large, very sore cat. Please don't shout."

The gallery went silent.

She turned to the panther and crouched.

"Sit," she said.

He looked at her.

His gold eyes were bright and a little amused.

"Sit," she said again, and held out the rice ball.

The panther sat down on the sand.

A gasp went round the stands.

"Down."

He lay down.

"Paw."

A huge black paw lifted and landed in her palm, with the claws politely sheathed.

Somebody in the gallery began, helplessly, to laugh.

Then somebody else began to clap.

Hinata unwrapped the rice ball and offered it on her flat hand.

The panther sniffed the salmon, wrinkled his whole nose and ate it anyway, delicately, one bite, from her fingers.

She scratched behind his ear.

The rumble in his chest was loud enough to be heard in the back row.

"That is the thing that ate three keepers?" asked a lady with a fan.

"It's the thing that was in a pen with a poisoned neck and nobody to talk to it," said Hinata. "Three keepers walked in scared and carried a stick. I walked in with some wine and a clean cloth."

She stood.

"Next time, somebody could bring a vet."

"What is a vet?" said the lady.

"Someone who's good at not getting bitten."

The Regent had stopped turning his rings.

"Remarkable," he said smoothly. "Lady Koyama, your skill is perhaps not so useless as the stone said."

"I'm glad you think so, Your Grace."

"Is it truly bonded?"

"Yes."

"Then show us how well." The Regent folded his hands. "Hero Takeshita, would you step forward?"

Daichi jumped down from the gallery onto the sand.

He had on the white tabard with the gold sword, and he rolled his shoulders as he walked.

He looked at Hinata, and at the panther, and he grinned too wide.

"Relax, Koyama. I won't hurt your pet. I just want to pat it."

"Don't," said Hinata.

"It's a cat. Cats like me." He raised his hand and reached for the black head. "Good kitty. Good, good, sit, oh, you stupid..."

The panther got up.

He took one lazy step.

Then he sat down again, and he sat down directly on Daichi's right foot.

All six hundred pounds of him.

"Ow!" shouted the Sword Saint. "Ow! Get it off, get it off, it's on my foot!"

"He doesn't like being called stupid," said Hinata.

"I didn't say that to the cat!"

"He heard it."

The gallery roared.

Daichi hopped, red to the ears, trying to pull his boot free.

The panther looked up at Hinata with enormous innocent gold eyes.

She pressed her lips together very hard.

"Sumi," she said. "Up."

He rose, delicately, and stepped aside.

Daichi staggered back and glared at her.

"You think that's funny?" he hissed. "You think you won?"

"I think you should have your foot looked at."

The Regent rose from his chair, and everyone in the gallery rose with him.

"A charming demonstration," he said. "Lady Koyama, you will present the beast to the court again at noon, every seventh day."

"Of course."

"And if it fails to behave, even once, I will have it put down." He smiled softly. "That is only prudent."

Hinata's hand tightened on the chain.

The panther pressed against her leg.

"He won't fail," she said.

"We shall see."

The long afternoon crawled by.

She fed him raw chicken from the kitchens, and re-wrapped his neck, and kept a bucket of cold water by the gate in case the guards came looking.

She talked to him the whole time in her flat sensible voice.

She told him about Nagoya, and the clinic, and a one-eyed cat named Dumpling who bit her every day for three years.

The panther listened with his chin on her knee, and sometimes his tail thumped the straw.

At last the red light crept up the wall.

"Here it comes," Hinata said under her breath, and she pulled him into the tower and shut the door.

The fur ran.

When she looked up, Valdemar was kneeling on her cot, naked and shaking, with the collar bright at his throat.

"What did I do?" he said hoarsely.

She told him.

She told him the whole of it, start to finish.

By the end he was laughing so hard he had to put his hand over his face.

"I sat on the Sword Saint," he said. "I would give a province to remember it."

"I'll tell it again tomorrow."

He lowered his hand and looked at her.

His gold eyes were dark now, and not amused at all.

"Hinata," said Valdemar. "Eight months, I have woken up with nothing. You gave me an afternoon."

"It's only a story."

"Then let me give you something in return." He reached for the silver chain where it lay across his chest, and he put the end of it into her hand. "Something I will remember."

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