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Now I looked like someone who only cared about the money. Nothing could be further from the truth. I wished I could tell him the real reason I needed the money but I couldn’t take the risk. I bit my tongue.
“Thank you,” I said.
“See Waev,” Traes said. “He’ll take you to your room.”
He bent over his paperwork and continued to read documents with letters so tiny he needed a microscope to see them.
“Okay,” I said. “Right.”
I got up and moved for the door. I looked back once at the huge desk and Traes who scratched at the paperwork behind it. He cut the loneliest figure I’d ever seen. A lone soul in that big old house, behind his big desk covered with piles of boring paperwork.
And now I had become just another one of his many employees. I felt sad as I shut the door behind me.
Waev was surprised to find I had no other luggage besides the S’mauggai leather bag. Still, he insisted on carrying it for me as we ascended the stairs to my room.
“As governess, you aren’t a traditional part of the household staff,” he said. “Your rank is roughly the same as that of the head of the household.”
“Which is you, right?” I said.
He nodded with a smile.
“I run everything inside the house,” he said. “If you have any issues or problems, please don’t hesitate to speak with me directly. I’m most often on the first floor or in the garden.”
We turned a corner and walked in silence. It occurred to me that Waev would know Traes better than anyone else in the house. He might be able to shed some light on the situation I found myself in.
“Traes is Cleb’s uncle?” I said.
“That’s’ right,” Waev said. “He’s also his godfather. In case anything happened to his sister and his brother-in-law, Cleb would pass to him to take care of.”
“How long has he been here?”
“Almost three months now.”
“What’s their relationship like?” I said.
It was a personal question and not one I expected to get a straight answer to, so it came as a surprise when Waev looked me in the eye and said, “Not good. Traes is stuck in his ways and is too used to working. Cleb needs someone to play with, someone to care for him the same way his parents used to. The staff and I do our best but we’re not blood relatives. It’s not the same.”
“Traes works hard?” I said.
“Very hard. He built the company from the ground. No pun intended.”
I didn’t understand what the joke was.
“He owns a large mining company,” he said.
I chuckled despite myself.
“From the ground up,” I said. “That’s pretty good. Awful, but good.”
“Traes is used to taking care of people, but they’re his employees. There are thousands of them. They’re at a distance and don’t live in the same house. He ensures they always have enough work but he doesn’t have to spend time with them on a daily basis or develop personal relationships.”
“That’s where I come in,” I said.
“It does indeed,” Waev said. “Right. Here we are.”
He pushed an ornate set of doors open. The room took my breath away. It looked like something from Downton Abbey—a TV series I was addicted to for a while. The colors were plush and vibrant and rich, meshing together in a gorgeous, luxurious mix.
“These are the governess’s usual rooms?” I said.
