Her early years living on the plain fare of the slaves, together with
her experiences in the spice tent, had engendered in her a natural
awareness of how the vices of the rich could lead directly to one's
personal destruction. Having preferred from earliest memory not to
adopt the superior airs and affectations of Sorpiala and her clique,
who haughtily deemed themselves to be above their fellow beings,
Si'Wren did not see fit to change her humble and unassuming ways as a
Royal Officer of the Court.
In his endless daily instructional sessions with her, Ibi had developed
a fierce vicarious pride in the proper and dutiful studies of Si'Wren,
and developed a habit of grilling her relentlessly, so that the poor
girl spent her days perpetually neigh unto exhaustion from unrelenting
fatigue.
In view of these and other considerations, and especially for moral
reasons, Si'Wren deliberately avoided the many royal orgies of
banqueting, and worse, open to her, choosing instead to spend much time
cloistered alone in her personal chambers, there to catch up on her
work assignments and neglected slumbers unmolested. She still slept on
a mat of rushes, by choice, whereas the others in the palace all
preferred more luxurious accommodations such as straw or down
mattresses.
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