Page 26 of Trial of Bronze and Blood
Dru continues her perusal of her living quarters. Half a dozen unlit lanterns hang on metal hooks on the warm terra cotta walls. Her attention floats up to the high coffered ceiling, the solid wood beams leading to a mural which stretches across the entire wall opposite the bed.
She’s almost certain it’s a depiction of the Durevolian goddess of war and the underworld, Laran. A gold dress clings to her soft curves, black smoky tendrils slipping through her caged fingers poised on either side of her hips. A golden helmet, split by one long black plume along the center, sits snug atop her head, trapping her curled, ebony locks beneath it. They frame her gilded eyes, alight with fire.
Something’s different about her arms and neck…Dru squints, finding her exposed skin covered in what appear to be faint tattoos, slightly darker than her golden-ochre skin.
She takes another step inside to get a better look, but Sabina places a hand on her arm. Instinctually, Dru looks down, finding an empty square bathtub sunk into the floor.A true luxury.
Sabina speaks for the first time since the courtyard. “Is there anything you need?”
“No, you can go. In fact, I won’t be needing your services at all while I’m here—I can take care of myself.”
Panic widens her eyes. “Are you dismissing me?”
Dru furrows her brow; she thought the girl would be pleased. “And if I was?”
“Then Cato—the king—would have no use for me.” She takes a step forward, gaze pleading, her voice softening. “Please don’t make me go back home, back to my brother.”
Her stomach drops.Deodamnatus.Dru has no idea what Sabina’s brother has done to make her act this desperate to keep her job as a servant, and she’s not going to ask. But she can speculate at the sordid history, one she’s never experienced herself but has metplenty of women in her travels who have. Sabina’s fear and pain, lodged deep in her gilded gaze, can’t be ignored.
“You can stay, but I won’t require much?—”
Brightening, she interrupts, “I’ll be back with more linens.” She leans in and sniffs. “You need a bath.”
Dru stands open-mouthed as the girl hurries out of the chamber.
Once she’s gone, Dru sniffs herself, her nose wrinkling.She’s not wrong. Untying her cloak, she tosses it onto the bed, then takes a closer look at the bath. More modest ones like these occupy the homes of the Phaedran senators and their families, but there are some ten times this size that grace the bath houses scattered throughout the most affluent cities in the Imperium. She found herself in one once while spying on a particularly conniving diplomat.
Given how ancient Anziano is, though, how could they already have this technology? The Imperium introduced it no more than ten years ago.
Crouching down, she turns the bronze knob to the right. Water immediately gushes out of the spigot, hot steam billowing up while the bath fills rapidly.
“I see you’ve started without me,” Sabina notes from the doorway, laden with linens, as promised—though she seems to have already forgotten about their agreement, where Dru can do most things on her own.Like filling my own bath.
Letting it go, she asks, “How does the palace get hot water like this?”
Sabina sets the linens down. “From a nearby hot spring, pumped through our sewer system.”
Just like the Phaedrans.
“How could you possibly have a new Imperium bath system, inside a palace that must be centuries old?”
Sabina smiles sadly, turning the knob off before the bath can overflow. “This has been our way for hundreds of years. The Imperium stole it from us and called it theirs.”
Dru closes her eyes for a moment.Of course, they did.
“I should’ve known,” she admits.
“Don’t be hard on yourself; you’ve spent too much time in the Imperium, where they revel in retelling other people’s history as their own.” She inspects Dru from head to toe. “Now, undress, before the water gets cold.”
Glad to be doing her own disrobing at least, she undoes the ties of her sandals first, loosening the laces until they slip off unimpeded. The impressions of the leather straps have sunk into her skin, leaving their mark of her journey. She unfastens her belt next and places it carefully on the ground beside the bath so her dagger can be within reach. Finally, she pulls her tunic over her head, standing in nothing but her undergarments. The promise of hot water hurries her hands as she strips them off.
Without slowing to test the water, she steps into the bath and plunges her entire body under. It’s a touch too hot to stay beneath the surface for long, but it feels too good not to. She closes her eyes, basking in the warmth.
Coming up for air, she finds Sabina setting down a glass flask, a scraper of some sort, and a small clay jar.
Dru points at the glass flask first. “What’s this?”
“Olive oil mixed with the ashes of mulberry bark. I also brought you araschiettomade from reeds to scrape off the filth. And the jar is for your cut cheek. It looks awful.”
