“I saw a man in the hideout once,” said eight-year-old Valentin, looking from Juste to Remin, worried. “Was he a bad man? I didn’t know.”
“What’s the hideout?” asked Remin.
“We have a fort, but we can’t go there when it’s cold, and a tree fell on it anyway,” Valentin explained. “Back there, behind the big practice yard? We cut the bushes all up in summer, we used to hide from Barnabe there, he got so mad. But one day, I went there, and there was a man and he said wasn’t I supposed to be with the other boys, and I said this was our secret fort and he said he wouldn’t say anything if I didn’t. And so I didn’t,” he confessed, with tears filling his big brown eyes. “Was he the bad man that hurt Mr. Wen?”
“We don’t know, but it’s good you’re telling us now,” Remin said, squeezing the boy’s shoulder and giving him a little shake. “Do you remember what he looked like?”
It might be nothing. A soldier wandering into the trees for a break, playing hooky just as Valentin had. And the man Valentin described could have been one of hundreds in the valley: shorter than Juste but taller than Jacot, dark hair, plain clothes, and no visible scars or tattoos. The man had been intheir fort back in autumn, before it got too cold for the boys to be sneaking off outside.
“He won’t hurt Her Grace, will he?” Valentin asked miserably, after he had completed this description.
“No one will,” Remin promised. “You did a good job, Valentin. Keep your eyes open and tell me if you see anything else.”
“I will, Your Grace,” he promised, his face filled with boyish determination.
Juste departed with the child in tow and a promise to see what the other boys might know. And while there was no reason forReminto question Valentin—Juste could have done so easily, and he would be the one to investigate anyway—it was a little easier to concentrate, when he was gone.
There was still plenty of other work to do. Orders to be issued. Practice with Leonin and Davi, who left Tounot to guard Ophele for a few hours. The hunt for an assassin did not mean everything else stopped. It just added one more item to the list.
It was a very late night and Remin had nothing to show for the day but a headache when he finally came home, inspecting the faces of every guard on the way in and taking comfort in the massive Rendevan locks on his doors. No one could come in without his hearing it. He had guards inside and outside his home, and he knew every one of them personally. His windows were twenty-three feet off the ground.
They were safe. They were safe. They were safe.
His stomach was tied in knots.
“Wife,” he said as he entered the bedchamber, looking automatically to Davi and Leonin, seated beside her by the fire.
“Remin.” She rose at once to come to him, her eyes anxious. “Did you find anything? Is everyone all right? Tounot said Wen was hurt.”
“Everyone’s fine,” Remin soothed, cupping her cheek gently. “Davi, Leonin, give me a few minutes to get settled and then we’ll lock up.”
“Of course, my lord,” Leonin replied.
Remin would not leave Ophele alone even for the length of time it took him to wash up and change for bed. It was only when he was certain they would need nothing else for the night that he thanked the guards and locked the doors, then picked up his wife and buried his face in her hair.
“What happened?” she whispered, her hands stroking his back. “No one would tell me anything. Someone really tried to kill Wen?”
“Yes.” Remin was trying to keep his outright lies to a minimum. “Someone stabbed him. But it will be all right,” he added quickly. “Wen will be fine in a while, and no one else was hurt. These things…happen, sometimes.”
“Because of my father,” she said, pushing back against his chest to look at him. “He’s trying to get to you, isn’t he?”
“Maybe. It’s fine.” Remin set her down and sat in his chair, rubbing his head. “Well, not fine, but it’s not the first time and it won’t be the last. I don’t blame you, little owl. It’s nothing to do with you at all.”
“Just myfather,”she repeated savagely. “Whoever it was, they’re here because he ordered it, aren’t they?”
“Probably.”
“Didn’t anyone see anything?” She filled a kettle and set it over the fire with sharp, angry motions. “Did Wen hear anything?”
“No. No, it’s all right, I don’t want anything,” Remin added, waving away the supper she had saved for him. He couldn’t blame her for asking, but he did not want to talk about this. He should have thrown Juste in the door first to take the worst of the mauling.
“What if we tried to trap them somehow?” she wanted to know. “Could we lure them out? If we made it look like you were unguarded…”
She had read far too many books.
“It doesn’t work that way,” he answered, trying to be patient. “Don’t worry. In some ways it’s good to see where they struck, and who; it gives us a gauge of their capabilities. They’ve probably been watching us for a while, looking for an opportunity, and we’re doing well if this is the best one they found. And it’s not just because it’s me, every duchy in the Empire probably has a few of his spies…”
But the harder he tried to reassure her, the angrier she became.
