Chapter 13 – Greater than Fear #2
There were the guards, for one thing. Folk still went cautiously in the dark, and no one ever went anywhere alone after nightfall, just in case.
But for the most part the standing guard in town was gone, except around the cottage.
Every night, Yvain and Dol came to stand at their posts on the front and back of the house, and Ophele had finally realized they weren’t there just for her benefit.
The Duke of Andelin slept there. And it wasn’t safe for him to sleep without guards.
And then there was an incident at the cookhouse one afternoon, when she had arrived a little late for the noon meal and caught Master Wen flaying a newly arrived builder alive.
To that point, Ophele had privately thought that Master Wen yelled just because he liked to yell, and maybe he didn’t really mean it.
But that day there was no doubt that he was deadly serious.
“…something wrong with your ears, ye lackwit? I told ye to stay on that side of the line. That line, on the floor, it’s white and it’s there for a fucking purpose. Cross it again and I’ll gut ye.”
His victim made some reply, which Ophele couldn’t hear from ten feet outside the door.
“No, this is my kitchen and His Grace’s fucking food, and if ye move one inch nearer to it, I’ll shove a spit up your ass and roast ye for supper.
What ye see in that cupboard is what ye get, and ye let me watch your blooming hands while ye take it.
Slow. Now ye’ve got your biscuit, get the fuck out and never do that again or ye can go hunt devils for your dinner. ”
It was the angriest she had ever heard him, and for a while, she didn’t understand why.
She had written off the periodic explosions from the kitchen as Master Wen’s unique way of expressing himself.
But he had said, His Grace’s food. The duke was fed from that kitchen.
Master Wen rigidly controlled all access to the food he ate, and was ferocious as a mastiff to anyone that tried to get near it.
And then she remembered that even in Aldeburke, they had heard about Remin getting poisoned. More than once. The Emperor had been outraged, outraged that someone would attack a noble-born boy, but nothing ever came of the investigations.
That thought would have shamed her before, but now it made her furious.
How dared someone do that? All this time, she had been trying to repay her blood debt on principle, but suddenly she felt a fierce urge to protect him.
It was a ridiculous idea, considering he was three times her size and the greatest knight in the known world.
He had never been unhorsed. He had never been defeated in combat.
The only way anyone could get to him was with sneaky, despicable things like poison.
Again, she remembered that morning months ago, when he had so nearly struck her. She had been frightened at the time, but she had learned to read his face better now, and it was not because he had been angry. Those widened eyes, the careful way he had stepped backward, hands up…
If it had been anyone else, she would have said he was afraid.
Remin. Every day she was learning something new about him, unraveling some mystery, discovering virtues he hardly seemed aware of himself.
He wasn’t modest so much as adorably oblivious, as if he really didn’t know he was one of the most handsome men in the Empire.
Sometimes just looking at him made her feel flustered.
And other times, it made her worry. His black eyes were as opaque and unreadable as ever, but sometimes when she looked into them, she had to fight the inexplicable impulse to lay a hand on his forehead, to see if he was well.
He did look tired. He never looked tired.
Was that it? Was that why she had the strange sense that something was wrong?
“What’s this?” he asked when he came home one evening, to find a steaming cup of tea waiting for him at the table.
“Tea.” The town’s first merchant had arrived, and claimed that this blend was good for calming and promoted sleep. “Mr. Guian had a dozen tins of it and I asked him to save one for me. There’s even a little honey or sugar, if you like it sweet.”
“Where did you get the money?” he looked at the tea with an unreadable expression as he stirred half a spoon of sugar into it.
“I had something put by.” Ophele’s eyes slid away from his. She had sold one of her books. “I can get milk next time, if you take your tea that way. Master Wen says if I want milk, I have to get it from the cow myself.”
“This is fine.” The corner of his mouth twitched, the nearest Remin Grimjaw ever came to a smile. “Is something else different?”
“Maybe.” Ophele watched him, nervous and excited.
She had never surprised anyone with presents before.
There had never been anyone to surprise.
She had cleaned up the cottage as best she could, lit the lamps on either end of the mantle, and put out fresh bouquets of flowers, but there wasn’t much to work with.
She watched as his eyes drifted over the neatened shelves and tidy washstand, then landed on the mantle.
“Where did you find that?” His dark eyes fastened on the small glass bear, set prominently in the middle.
“I was looking for teacups in the storehouse and saw it,” she explained, hoping he wouldn’t be angry. It wasn’t pretty exactly, but there was something touching and a little melancholy about the bear, seated on its haunches with one paw outstretched. “Do you like it?”
“It looks good,” he said, with a nod that encompassed the whole of the cottage. “I always wondered why you asked for a bear.”
“I like bears.” Ophele felt her cheeks heat and looked down at her own teacup. “I took these cups from a set, I hope it’s all right.”
“It’s from the Duchess Ereguil. She sent a full tea service as soon as we settled here. I don’t think she understood what Tresingale was like last year.”
“Will they ever come to visit? The Duke and Duchess?” The prospect made her nervous because of course they would, one day.
The whole point of having a vast manor was to host guests, sometimes dozens of them at a time.
Ereguil was one of the great duchies of Argence, an ancient and noble family whose House was as old as the House of Agnephus, the House of the Emperor.
And the Duke and Duchess of Ereguil were the nearest thing to parents that he had.
“Next year, most likely. I’m hoping to have a respectable place for them to stay, and they both say they want to see the valley.
Maybe that was why she sent the tea service,” he added reflectively.
“She’s the greatest lady I know. If you decided to go and stay with them, they would bring you back when they visit. ”
The words were as sudden and shocking as a slap, and Ophele hastily lowered her eyes to hide her hurt.
He hadn’t mentioned the possibility of sending her away since her sun sickness, and she thought he had forgotten.
With the wall nearing completion, it didn’t seem there was any reason for her to leave.
Unless he didn’t want her here.
All this time, he had kept his word to take care of her. But maybe he still didn’t like her. Maybe he was just doing what he had to do to make sure she was healthy enough to bear his children. Maybe he would rather she was out of the way until she was strong enough to do so.
Strong enough for him to bed her, without love.
Her mind shied away from that thought as unbearable.
Before, she thought she could do it. As long as he didn’t actually strike her, he was an improvement over the Hurrells.
And she had given an oath to do it; the most important thing she could do was to secure his succession. But if he didn’t love her…
“Is that what you want?” he asked quietly.
It was the hardest thing she had ever had to say.
To screw up her courage to tell him the truth, especially when she didn’t know what would happen after she did.
But she didn’t want to go. She wanted to help him.
She wanted to be here for the building of his dream, which she had thought was becoming their dream.
Be brave, and don’t tell lies.
“No,” she whispered. “I want to help. Do…do you want me to go?”
“You have helped,” He replied softly, and his big fingers brushed hers, to make her look at him. “I hadn’t realized how much. But I want you to be safe. I don’t want you to be afraid anymore. I know this place is hard for you.”
“I don’t mind.”
“You should mind,” he said, and when his black eyes met hers, she felt the jolt to her heart. “You’re a lady. You’re a princess. And you deserve so much better, you should have everything, and I can’t—I thought, when you first came here, that you expected it, but Ophele, you’re just so…”
She was looking at his lips. Suddenly, he was so near that she would only have to turn her head a little, and he would kiss her.
She could see herself reflected in his eyes, and his voice was so deep and aching that she could hardly breathe.
She wanted him to say it, whatever it was.
She wanted it so badly, it was as if the fate of the world hung in the balance.
“What?” she whispered finally, and her hand reached for his all by itself.
“Nothing. Nothing,” he said, rising so abruptly his knees banged the table.
“Never mind. It’s just my foolishness. I should go and help on the wall, I meant to go earlier.
I’ll be back to fetch you for supper. Don’t go outside until it’s cooler, Juste thinks it will be another scorcher this afternoon… ”
He was pulling on his boots as he spoke, and Ophele watched, hurt and bewildered and for some reason unspeakably disappointed.