Chapter 9 – Dangerous Creatures #5
“What did happen with the boy?” she asked when he returned, handing her an oilskin to keep the rain off and stretching out beside her in his usual lazy sprawl of limbs. She didn’t believe Sir Miche had really thrown him back in the river.
“Sent him up to Rem. Not that I want to reward bad behavior,” he drawled meaningfully, rolling his hazel eyes toward her, “but we do need pages, and squires. Dozens of them. But no nobleman is going to send his precious spawn to the Andelin right now, even if it is for the Knights of the Brede.”
That thought was sobering.
“Is it really so dangerous?”
“Not for you,” he assured her. “I’m not just saying it to make you feel better, my lady.
Your cottage is near the southernmost bend of the river, any Andelin devil that goes that far has gone through an awful lot of people to get there.
Not that you should take it lightly,” he added.
“There’s more this year than we’ve ever seen before, and it’s a worry. ”
“I just wish there was something I could do,” she said, low. “His Grace keeps saying it’s safe, but I hear them and I don’t know where they are and…”
Her throat closed and she cut off the rest of the sentence.
It felt like whining to complain about being afraid when she knew she was better protected than anyone else in the valley, and especially in front of Sir Miche.
He always listened with every sign of sympathy, but he was a knight and a hero and he must have seen so many terrible things, her fears could only seem trifling and cowardly.
That was what she told herself, when she was tired and so worn out from working that it seemed like she couldn’t walk another step. The duke and his men had surely been more tired than this. More frightened. More lonely.
“Would you have rather stayed in Aldeburke?” Sir Miche asked quietly, and her eyes flew open in surprise. It was a dangerous question. But the downpour was kindly and muffled their conversation. “I’m not blind. I know you’re unhappy here.”
“I was unhappy there.” She wrapped her arms around her knees and propped her chin on them.
It didn’t matter what she wanted. In her short life she had already learned that there was nothing to be gained from imagining things she couldn’t have.
So instead, she pondered his question as a hypothetical.
It was all very well, after she had been trapped into her marriage, to rationalize it as destiny and a chance to atone for the crimes of her parents.
Would she have preferred to stay in Aldeburke with the possibility of one day escaping, instead of marrying the duke, even if it meant that the crimes of her parents against him and his whole extinct House were never paid for?
It was impossible not to think of everything they had done when she could see the scars of it on his body.
Every day when he stood at the wash basin, she could see the evidence of his suffering: sharp, straight lines from stabbings, curving slices from glancing blows, divots from arrows, and multiple dark and ugly gouges where whole chunks of flesh had been torn away.
Even her fertile imagination couldn’t guess what might have made those.
But she had seen an assassin come through the window in the dark of night to try to kill him.
Her parents had done that to him.
Didn’t she owe him something for it? If she had had a choice, would she have voluntarily delivered herself into bondage, to make it right?
“There must be some parts of it you miss,” Sir Miche said gently. “The connection with your mother. Do you remember her much?”
“A little bit,” she said, grateful that he hadn’t pressed her. Grateful that someone, anyone, cared about her even a little. “I always think of her in the library, and in the woods. We would go walking when it was nice out, and she showed me what things were safe to eat, and how to climb trees.”
“Unusual pastimes, for a noblewoman.”
“She said that that was what she used to do, back home,” Ophele explained.
There was a flickering of a memory in the trees, the sensation of being lifted up onto a branch and cuddled in a green bower.
“At…Murewood? I think. She said she ran wild there when she was a little girl, and her mother always had to come hunting for her for lessons. But after…everything, the Emperor dissolved their House and took back their lands.”
“And so she taught you to run wild at Aldeburke.”
“I guess so.” She smiled to herself. She had mostly been hiding from the Hurrells, but it was nice to think that something of her mother lived on.
“I am sorry for that, though,” she added.
“Making all of you look for me. I didn’t know who you were, and last time…
well, I was afraid…I wasn’t trying to embarrass His Grace,” she finished lamely.
“I wanted to tell him that, before. But I could never find the right time.”
“I knew that. I found your fire,” he replied, making her eyes widen.
“Did you? I thought I’d hidden it.”
“You might have, except that terrifying cook told me to look in the trees. Aside from the pines, there wasn’t much to the Aldeburke trees at the time.”
“Azelma,” she said fondly. “I miss Azelma. And her pastries. And her cookies. She cooked for my mother too, you know. I wonder if Sir Edemir could spare some paper so I could write to her. I know it’s dear.”
“We’ll see about it tonight.” He stood, offering her a hand up. “Looks like it’s clearing. We’d best get back to work. Though I wouldn’t like to see another appearance from the Lady of the Wall today.”
“I can’t help it if the men ask for her help,” Ophele said primly. “The good spirits always show up when you call.”
* * *
There wasn’t much leisure in Tresingale for contemplating the spirits, good or otherwise.
The last day of the week was sacred to the stars, a day of rest and contemplation during which believers gave thanks for the many bounties of the divine.
Remin tried dutifully to observe the religious holidays of the Empire, but more than a year after the end of the war, there was still no cleric in Tresingale.
The nearest thing they had to a representative of the Temple was the seventeen year-old illegitimate daughter of the Emperor, who looked utterly panicked at the prospect of leading a prayer.
In the Holy City of Jaen, there had been a prolonged struggle over whether to send anyone to Tresingale, or more specifically to the service of Remin Grimjaw.
It was a complicated problem. The Emperor was the Beloved of Stars, and Remin was definitely not beloved by the Emperor.
Edemir had sent a very polite letter pointing out the increasing number of believers/taxpayers in the valley, as well as the fact that the Duke of Andelin was already incomprehensibly wealthy and would only become more so in years to come.
Tresingale had planned to build a new temple, the most splendid temple in the Empire, but if no one from the Temple was coming…
A cleric had duly been dispatched.
In the meantime, on the last day of the week, most of the Andelin’s faithful contemplated their laundry.
“Princess.” Remin ducked his head under the low door of the cottage one Sunday afternoon, squinting to adjust to the comparative dimness. “Come with me. Grab some buckets.”
She didn’t ask questions. Silent as a ghost, she pulled on her small boots and followed him to the well and back, filling all the buckets and dragging out the cauldron without ever asking why.
As he put water over the fire to heat, she hovered behind him, so transparently nervous that Remin’s jaw clenched.
He didn’t know what there was to be nervous about.
He had barely spoken to her in weeks. He was tempted just to send her away and get on with her laundry himself, but he had no doubt there were oceans of mystery he had yet to fathom when it came to women’s clothing.
Mentally shrugging, he turned and waited for the kettle to heat, and then almost tripped over her as he turned to pour it into the cauldron.
“Careful,” he said sharply, jerking the kettle back.
She said something inaudible, retreating until she bumped against the wall.
“Speak up,” he repeated for the hundredth time. “You can go sit down. It doesn’t take two people to heat water.”
The way she hastily decamped to the other side of the cottage and hid behind her book made him wonder wearily what was wrong.
Why was she so nervous? Had he said something?
Mentally, he reviewed the last fifteen minutes and came up empty.
Was it because he told her to speak up? How else was he supposed to hear what she was saying?
Scowling ferociously at the teakettle, he waited in silence for it to boil.
“Bring your white clothes over here,” he said when the cauldron was half-full of steaming water.
It gave him another twinge to watch her rifle through her small trunk.
She had put a partition inside it to keep the dirty clothing from touching the clean, and it made him feel both guilty and irritated.
He hadn’t thought to wonder what she was doing with her clothing, but she hadn’t asked for help.
How many times had he told her to tell him if she needed something?
“I can do it,” she said as she approached, clutching the bundle of chemises and unmentionables. “If you tell me how…”
“Just put them in,” he said, waving her over. “What soap have you been using?”
“That,” she said, pointing to the washstand, where all her fragrant bath soaps were lined up neatly on a shelf.
“You have to use laundry soap, and lye for white clothing.” Automatically, he fell into the brisk, lecturing tone he took when he was teaching squires and pages, and tugged a small pouch from his belt to show her. “Not too much, or it will burn your hands. About this much for that much water, see?”
Her eyes flicked from the small mound of white powder in his palm to the cauldron, and she nodded.