Training injuries? But they must have been training much harder than usual…
“Warm enough, my lady?” asked Davi when they were all aboard.
“Yes, thank you,” she said, and they were off, trotting down Eugene Street to the tentatively named Quay Way. Tounot had called it that one day and it looked like it might stick.
It was very cold on the river. The wind whipping off the Brede was strong enough to push the hood off her head and the water was dark as iron, swirling and eddying against the docks. It was a small delegation that had come to say farewell; Remin was trying not to draw attention to the departures.
As such, it was only Remin, Justenin, and herself that stood on the furthest dock on the quay, with a single-masted caravel bobbing on either side. It was obvious to her why Edemir should leave, and where he was to go. He was the son of a count and doubtless had many valuable social connections in the capital. For him, at least, she did not think she needed to fear.
“Look after Bendir,” Edemir told her when it was her turn to bid him farewell. “If you find any errors, don’t be afraid to tell him. I am relying on you for the accounts in particular, Your Grace. And do try to restrain His Grace’s spending. Mind the sens—”
“—and the sovs will mind themselves,” she finished for him. Remin was a fundamentally frugal man except in very specific, very expensive circumstances. “Will we see you, when we come to the capital?”
Ophele did not see Justenin behind her, lifting his head with sudden interest.
“I—yes, my lady,” said Edemir, surprised. “That is, I will hope so. I would enjoy showing you the city.”
It might not be so bad, if Edemir and Duchess Ereguil and Lady Verr were all there. It was Sir Bram’s errand that gave hermore misgivings. He was clad in rough black traveling clothes that bore no badge or device to mark him as Remin’s man, and he never troubled to hide the brands on the backs of his hands that marked him as a criminal. Remin had told her frankly that he had once been a mercenary.
“You will be careful?” She offered her hand and he bowed over it, touching his forehead to the back in the old gesture of fealty.
“I promise I will, my lady,” he replied, long black hair sweeping over his scarred cheeks as he straightened. “I hope you will look after yourself, and His Grace. If the stars are good, then we will all be home again, this time next year.”
“That’s such a long time.”
“Only when you are young,” he said philosophically, and gave a warbling whistle to the sailors, stepping back as they raised the gangplank.
When those two boats set off, it was not on a straight course to the other side of the Brede. Sir Edemir’s boat turned west, black sails billowing, sped by the current down the river in the direction of Segoile. But Sir Bram’s boat turned laboriously east, its double banks of oars propelling it over the dark surface of the river. Why would he be going that way?
“Wife,” said Remin, recalling her to the dock, and Ophele hurried over and let him warm her hands in his before they parted for the day.
Remin’s prediction had been right. After a week, no one thought there was anything strange about her lessons, including Ophele herself. Her hours with Lady Verr were pleasant, if sometimes difficult; the manners and courtesies did not come naturally, and sometimes the glittering capital she described sounded impossibly alien. But Ophele devoured grammar, mathematics, and the rules and history of the Court of Nobility in huge gulps, gratified that at least that much was easy.
“Is there anything you find you have…difficulty remembering, my lady?” Justenin asked after one of their discussions. He had that odd look on his face again.
“No…?” she said, a little puzzled.
“What is the fourth codicil to Article Six, Section Twenty-Two of the Laws of Inheritance?”
“That’s the one about minors who inherit leadership of their House needing a guardian until age seventeen,” she said promptly. “The codicil says if the House doesn’t appoint one, the Emperor will.”
“What’s the square root of 4,567?”
“Sixty-seven…point…five…seven…nine…” she said slowly as she worked out the decimals, perplexed but willing. This was like that strange quiz Remin had administered back in Aldeburke, the day they met.
“That is sufficient, thank you. How much do we pay for oats?”
“Sixteen copper sens per bag in the kitchen and eleven for the stables.” They were not at all the same oats.
“Thank you, my lady,” he said, and before she left that evening, he gave her a whole new set of mathematical texts and told her to go at them as fast as she liked.
Even at supper, the lessons continued. Most often, they dined at the cookhouse, and the high table had become very fine, with china and crystal and wine, for which Ophele was attempting to cultivate a palate. Sim and Jaose moved down the table to formally serve each course, though Wen himself was the only one allowed to bring Remin and Ophele their plates. Practice, to become accustomed to capital-style dining.
The night after Edemir and Bram’s departure, Justenin took his place at her side and Leonin and Tounot sat across the table, a gathering of Remin’s most skilled courtiers, with Lady Verr beside them to model her manners.
“Though I will not be so adept at transporting you to Segoile with my conversation,” Justenin apologized as he took his seat.
“It’s all right, I would rather go gradually than all at once,” Ophele replied, poking at a leek with her spoon. She should have thought about it, to frame her words in a more flowery form, but it was the end of the day and it was hard with all of them expecting her to talk all the time.
