Chapter 12 – The Wrong Kind of Quiet #3
She was buried six deep in orders when the scholars appeared, and Sir Justenin had to clear his throat to make her look up .
“Oh. Sir Justenin,” she said, blinking to find herself surrounded by green robes. Her ink-stained fingers went anxiously to her dress as she began to rise, only to sink back down at a warning flick of Justenin’s eyes, pinning her in place as effectively as if he’d nailed her down.
“Your Grace,” he said, inclining his head. “May I present Master Hayas Forgess of the Tower of Scholars, and his journeymen?”
She felt a little trapped with four tall men looming over her, and surely they must be disappointed, as if they had been prepared for a queen and found themselves presented to a milkmaid. But she could not think of her own feelings. She was Remin’s duchess and must protect his dignity.
She must not blush.
She must not stammer.
“Hello,” she said. “Sir Justenin said you wished to speak to me?”
“Yes, Your Grace.” Master Forgess bowed his head.
“On my own behalf, as it was my loud mouth that you heard. There’s a certain process for these things in the Tower, but I know the devils don’t care for it any more than a cow does.
I will beg pardon for my words. I was hasty, and intemperate.
On further examination, we found much merit in your proposals.
But even if we didn’t, it would still be unforgivably rude.
I beg you to forget it. I wish I had not spoken so. ”
From the look on Sir Justenin’s face, she just bet he did.
Was any of that true? She wished she could send everyone away so she could ask, but Leonin and Davi would never agree to go.
And judging by the nervous glances the journeymen were shooting that way, she could just imagine the expression on Davi’s face.
Even if he wasn’t actually mouthing the words die die die, the spirit was certainly there.
“I accept your apology,” she said, with all the dignity she could muster. “I hope the work is…useful.”
The journeymen relaxed. Master Forgess glared.
“Useful,” he said, and jerked his head when Sir Justenin leveled him with a cold stare. “Yes, my lady, thank you. You are very gracious.”
Everyone else fell all over themselves to agree.
They bowed. They apologized again, complimenting her work for its thoroughness, its interesting construction, its novel ideas.
And after a few more excruciating courtesies, Sir Justenin finally ushered them away, with Master Forgess all but chewing his own tongue.
He looked as if he had wanted to say something else very badly.
It was only as they were shuffling out the door that Ophele realized what had been missing.
“Why did Master Torigne not come?” she wondered aloud, once the door shut behind them.
“He left, my lady,” replied Sir Leonin, and Ophele spun around to face him, her heart contracting.
“He left?”
“Yesterday. He went back to the capital,” Sir Leonin explained, and Ophele sank back into her chair as the weight of everything that meant descended on her shoulders.
* * *
“Noble lady.”
The four women of Benkki Desa bowed a greeting, and as the doors of the bathhouse slid open, the warm, sweet air wafted forth like the gentle breath of exotic lilies.
“Thank you,” said Ophele, stepping out of her shoes and into the warm waters of the pebble stream.
A dreadful afternoon yesterday and a sleepless night last night had left her with a thundering headache, and Lady Verr had—in the politest and most deferential way possible—offered a choice between a visit to the baths or a visit from Genon Hengest. “I would like to bathe separately, please.”
Any other day, she would have felt guilty for the request, especially when Lady Verr had walked all the way down to the bathhouse with her. But bathing was a communal activity in Tresingale, and the last thing Ophele wanted was to be examined without her clothes on.
“As you wish,” said Madam Sanai, waving to Bilaki and Huvara, and Lady Verr offered a small curtsy before she was escorted in the opposite direction. Madam Sanai insisted on serving Ophele herself, and always seconded Pili, who had a light touch and cheerful manner.
“The Grace’s hands are healing,” Madam Sanai noted as Pili deftly removed Ophele’s gown and chemise, lifting one hand gently and turning it over to look at her palm. The callouses she had acquired over the summer were slowly fading. “Though this is new. From your work? ”
“Yes.” Ophele automatically twitched her hand away, though she was not as ashamed of the indentation from her quill. “I was re-reading what I wrote, and I wanted to…tidy it up a bit.”
“About the devils?” Pili was particularly fascinated by the subject.
“Yes. Sir Edemir ordered more books for me, and I have learned so much—thank you,” Ophele added as they slipped a light robe over her shoulders and shepherded her toward her bathing room, the one with the lovely pink carp on the wall. “Doesn’t Benkki Desa have a great many devils?”
“There are a hundred kinds of devil in every country, noble lady,” Madam Sanai said, a rather grave and philosophical answer. “But in our home, we call such creatures itare and they are not all evil things. Dangerous, but not always malicious. Like a bear, so?”
“Are they magical creatures?” Ophele asked as she stepped into the deep wooden tub, hissing at the heat of the water.
It was always just at the edge of her endurance, but after a few moments resting against the smooth, flat stones in the bottom of the basin, it felt as if her bones were melting like wax.
“I am not sure,” Madam Sanai answered. She and Pili drew up their wooden stools on either side of the tub and the madam filled a bucket, pouring a stream of hot water over Ophele’s head.
“What the lady seems to mean by magic is not clear. It is true that the…energy of my homeland is weak in this valley, and I cannot weave it. I do not know if that is magic. In Benkki Desa, there are leopards we call Shibu who walk at night and vanish into the moonlight, but that is not accounted strange. Is it magic that makes your devils burn in the sun? The Grace says this means the devils are not of this world, but the Shibu have been with us always.”
“Maybe I don’t know what I mean, either,” Ophele replied, closing her eyes. What was magic? “The leopards really vanish in the moonlight?”
“They walk in places where moonlight touches,” Madam Sanai answered. “Dangerous, but not evil. Sometimes a Shibu comes in the form of a young man, perilously beautiful, followed always by two white leopards…”
She and Pili knew Ophele’s interests by now, and their conversation wandered freely from these legends to stories about Benkki Desa itself, a mountainous country of steep gorges and rushing rivers, where swinging rope bridges stitched cities together.
Their tales breathed life into the paintings on the walls: those were the landscapes of Madam Sanai’s home, expressed in stark silhouettes.
Between their talk of manipulating natural energies—which Ophele would certainly have called magic—and the uncanny creatures of the mountains, both Pili and Madam Sanai also gently noted the condition of Ophele’s energies and body, from small items like the scrape on her elbow to the more concerning fact that she had still not had her bleeding.
Madam Sanai had inquired about this on Ophele’s fifth visit, with such respectful interest that Ophele had found herself confessing the truth.
“It may be some time,” Pili agreed as they ushered her into the cooler bath, the water fizzing against her skin. “In Benkki Desa, when a woman wants a baby, there are many things to strengthen her. Hot baths in the morning, the red flower tea, and of course many offerings at the shrine of Teyyi…”
But Madam Sanai had a different opinion, and after the bathing was done and Ophele was stretched out on the cool white pallet in the massage chamber, the Benkki Desan woman traced a gentle pattern on her flat belly.
“I think the problem is not here,” she said, her eyes closed as if she were seeking something with her fingers rather than her eyes. “I think…here.”
“Oh,” Ophele said involuntarily, blinking as she rubbed her forehead. Madam Sanai’s fingers flicked again, lighter this time, against her temples.
“Pili is right,” Madam Sanai went on. “In Benkki Desa we say that serenity is the best cradle for a baby. Here,” she said, her hands cupping the bones of Ophele’s pelvis.
There were light cloths covering her breasts and hips, but this matter-of-fact touch was somehow not embarrassing.
“The cradle, so? But the Grace must seek it. Serenity. Quiet.”
No doubt this was true. But serenity had never felt farther from Ophele’s reach, and she was learning that quiet was a dangerous thing.
Every moment of every day, she was cramming new knowledge into her head, filled with quiet desperation that it was already too late, she could never catch up when she was so far behind.
Dreading the day that Remin realized it, as he certainly would now .
“It is very quiet, at home,” was all she said, closing her eyes to avoid meeting Madam Sanai’s penetrating purple gaze.
“Maybe the wrong kind of quiet,” the other woman said softly, but for a while her hands worked in silence, skilled manipulations that reminded Ophele of what Remin had said on the day of the tourney. Madam Sanai understood the body, joint and muscle and nerves, and knew how to search for the pain.
It was the thought of Remin that hurt most. No matter how busy she kept the forefront of her mind, Ophele was always aware of the dark and churning waters beneath the surface, the storm of anxiety that rose up to drown her every night.
Madam Sanai’s quiet sympathy was making those turbulent waters rise, and Ophele squeezed her eyes shut as tears leaked below her lids, streaking toward her hair.