Page 105 of Last of His Blood
How had winter flown by so quickly?
It seemed simultaneously fleeting and endless, for Ophele’s days were busy ones, from the moment she opened her eyes. A deluge of information from a dozen sources and still there was always more, twelve years of Imperial education compressed into four months. And outside the windows the snow fell and drifted in great white walls, until she forgot there was any other color in the world.
The people of Ferrede arrived between storms and were welcomed, feted, and installed in the North Gate cottages, with very grudging gratitude. They were not happy to have been taken from their homes.
“Elder Brodrim.” In the warm confines of the solar, Ophele greeted Ferrede’s headman, a bearded old man who was a little hard of hearing. “Thank you for coming all this way. I am glad you arrived safely.”
“Thank you, my lady,” he said loudly. “I hoped to offer you the hospitality of Ferrede, rather than the other way around. I hope it will not be long before we can honor our lady in our home.”
“We share that hope,” Remin said beside her, with a rumble of warning in his voice. “Once it is safe.”
“Yes, Your Grace.” Elder Brodrim bowed. Rollon’s quick wits had saved Ferrede from the horrors Remin’s other villages had endured, but Remin was right; best to put them with the other refugees and let them hear the tales for themselves.
Jaose offered a hand to help the old man kneel, and twenty or so members of his villages knelt behind him to make their oaths.
“In the light of the stars and before all here assembled, I swear my fealty and homage to House Andelin, His Grace Duke Remin, and Her Sacred Grace the Duchess Ophele. If I shouldever violate this oath, or fail in their trust, then may my life be forfeit…”
Ophele had heard these words many times by now, but she still felt a fraud, accepting them.
“I will come and see all of you soon,” she promised when they were done, wishing there was time to ask their names and occupations. She liked placing everyone into her mental map of town, and often thought with secret delight of who she would introduce to each other, trying to match affinities, like Mionet said. “If you have any troubles, please ask after Sir Auber. Or the Mistresses Conbour. Amise and Lisset will be happy to help you.”
Most duchesses must be very standoffish, if everyone was always so surprised when she said that. Ophele smiled, trying to look reassuring and harmless, and then puffed out a breath and slumped back in her chair, once the door closed behind them. It was always frightening to have so many people looking at her.
“Well, we didn’t expect them to thank us,” observed Davi, slouching against the wall with his lanky legs crossed.
“I will be just as pleased to send them back.” Remin brushed a hand over Ophele’s head and pushed out of his chair. “Wife, have you company for luncheon today?”
“No?” Ophele glanced at Lady Verr for confirmation.
“I am always the last to have the attention of the Duchess of Andelin,” he complained. “It seems everyone else in the valley was invited to your salon first.”
“Will I have you and your knights to tea?” Ophele asked, tickled by the idea. “It’s been so long since we had supper together, hasn’t it? Why don’t we have everyone here?”
“I would like that,” Remin agreed, nodding for Leonin to take the other end of the long table to drag it back to its usual place. “A farewell banquet, before we leave.”
That departure seemed much closer on this side of winter.
Even as Ophele’s days went by in a flurry, Remin was working late every day, and Ophele did not think it was Valleth or the devils that kept him at the Court of War so early, or making him jerk awake in the wee hours of the morning. Was it good that he was planning so carefully? Or worrying that he must?
Close as she was to the rhythms of the town, Ophele could not help noticing the alterations. She knew who came and went from her solar, and yet Tounot was no longer among them, and his lute was left behind in her keeping. It was hard to miss the massive form of Jinmin at the North Gate, but when was the last time she had seen him there? Two weeks? Three? Justenin said they were building ports further downriver, but would they really do that inFebruary?
And despite all this activity, Davi and Leonin were both sporting black eyes again, and Remin was so bruised and welted, it hurt just to look at him. They were back at practice, even more ferociously than they had been before the fever.
“I will leave you with Lady Verr today,” Justenin told her at breakfast the next morning, spooning up porridge with his left hand. His right was unbound now, used only with greatest care, and yet he had a brand new welt purpling on his cheek.
“Oh?” Ophele said politely. Remin had forbidden him to practice with his sword, so what had Juste been doing?
“Yes, I must speak to Guisse about the road down to the harbor. It’s going to erode rapidly if we’re not careful, between the wagon traffic and the spring rains…”
The harbor road was a matter dear to his heart. But it was interesting that they all seemed to go to the harbor so much when all the ferries were supposed to be docked for the winter…
Ophele glanced at Remin, who was halfway through his second platter of food and paying close attention to business. She could not bring herself to worry him with her suspicions, butthe only other person who might have explained it was nowhere to be found. Sir Miche had all but vanished from the manor over the last week, and she found herself missing him dreadfully: that tilt of his head that encouraged her to try again, or the way he had of unraveling whole puzzles for her with a single word.
That left Mionet, and Ophele could hardly bring herself to look in that direction.
It was only that morning that she had finally presented Ophele with the forbidden article, a scandalous object that made Ophele’s heart palpitate and her face flush hot and cold. It was currently buried in the back of her wardrobe, with all the guilt and suspense of a corpse they had murdered together.
And tonight, she was meant to bring it out.
