Page 28

Jacot of Caillmar was right.

The Brede was cold.

It was nearly evening by the time it was safe to take the princess out of the icy river.

Remin thought she was finally cooler; the pink flush had faded from her skin and she had stopped saying that it was too hot, but he was so cold himself, it was hard to tell for sure.

“Better, aye,”

said Genon, wading knee-deep into the water to check her.

His masses of silver-pink scar tissue made him too sensitive to temperature to take a turn in the river himself.

“Breathing’s finally slowed down, heart’s beating regular.

I think we can take her home.”

“She’s going to be all right?”

The words had to be squeezed through a throat so tight, Remin wondered that he hadn’t strangled.

“I think so.”

Genon lifted his fingers from the pulse point of her neck.

“We won’t know for sure until she wakes up.”

Remin nodded.

He felt numb.

Numb with cold, numb with shock, numb with fear.

He knew how to shut himself down when he had to, when he couldn’t afford to think or feel, but in this case there was nothing to fight, no action he could take, nothing he could do but endure.

He had spent the longest day of his life in the icy river.

“I can’t swim,”

she had kept crying, confused pleas he would never be able to forget.

“Let me out, I can’t swim, I’m fine, it’s just so hot…”

“It’s all right.”

In waist-deep water, Remin held her away from him so he wouldn’t warm her, her soaked chemise drifting around her body and her long hair streaming in clouds around her head.

“Ophele, it’s all right.

Didn’t I tell you I’d teach you to swim? This is the first lesson.

I’ve got you, all you have to do is float.”

She was trying to listen.

Her huge, soft eyes tried to focus on his face, on the trees shifting against the sky, seeing everything but understanding nothing, so bewildered that he couldn’t stand it.

Remin knew sun sickness.

During summer campaigns in the Andelin Valley, sometimes sun sickness felled more men than the battle.

Everything her body was doing was working against her, from her racing heart to those panting breaths.

In the icy water, she shivered violently, her body’s perverse attempt to warm her when she was already burning up inside.

“It’s all right,”

he said again.

“Wife, I’m here.

Shh, shh.

Breathe, a good breath, deep and slow…”

Hadn’t he said that, on their wedding night? And then she had trusted him, and they had breathed together.

But Remin knew he was no comfort to her now.

A white-faced Miche was waiting when he finally brought her out of the river, and Remin gave her to him for the length of time it took to bring his horse around and mount up.

All of the workers on the bridge had kept their distance, mindful of their lady’s modesty, but Miche hadn’t budged from the riverbank all afternoon.

“She’s cooler, thank the stars,”

he said as Remin nudged Lancer over and reached out for her.

His eyes were red.

“Rem.

She’s been working for you.

She’s meant to be the mother of your children.

You have to take care of her. Swear it.”

“I will,”

Remin promised through numb lips, as Miche carefully surrendered her.

In their cottage, he pulled off her wet chemise and tossed it aside, laying her naked on the bed.

Sun sickness was caused by an imbalance of fire.

The cooling elements of air and water had to touch as much of her body as possible.

Was she warmer? He couldn’t tell, his own body was still icy from the river.

Remin soaked a towel in cold water from the well, sponging her with it.

Water and air, cool water that would evaporate on her skin.

The thought that she might die…

It could not be thought.

He wouldn’t let it happen.

How had he let this happen? What business did she have, laboring day after day in the merciless summer heat? When she woke up, he would never let her lift a finger again.

If she woke up.

She would.

Remin bent beside her, his face drawn into stark, forbidding lines, his chest so tight he could barely breathe. What was wrong with him? He was never like this. For some reason he couldn’t find the usual icy calm he felt in a crisis, and his thoughts kept scattering.

She was going to be so embarrassed when she woke up.

He could already imagine the look on her face.

Fainting in front of half the men on the wall, Miche cutting her dress off, and now she was naked in front of Genon.

Why did these things keep happening? He never intended to embarrass her, but he failed to prevent it, over and over.

“Going to be dark soon.”

Genon grunted as he crouched beside the bed, taking the princess’s wrist between his fingers.

“If I thought there was the slightest danger, I’d stay, but I think she’ll live.

Miche saved her life, getting her down to the river as fast as he did.”

“Will she be all right otherwise?”

Remin made himself ask.

He had lost many people dear to him over the years, but he had never felt anything like this horrible, hollow helplessness.

“I don’t know.”

Genon never lied about things like this.

“It took a long time to cool her down.”

“That one soldier, at Creussen.

How long did we keep him in the bath?”

Remin couldn’t remember.

“It’s not the same, Rem.

He was older, and it was almost two hours before we got him into a cold bath.”

That man had been unconscious for two days and awakened an idiot.

A drooling simpleton.

The Hurrells had tried to convince him she was simple back in Aldeburke, but all it had taken was one good look into her eyes and Remin had known it was a lie.

When she opened her eyes, if she opened her eyes, what was he going to see now?

Ruthlessly, he cut that thought off.

“Someone should get Eugene.

The donkey.”

He lifted his head.

“Can you check? Make sure someone took him to the stable.”

“I will,”

Genon promised.

“I know she’s fond of the beast.”

“Yes.”

Miche said the donkey followed her everywhere, with or without a lead rope.

“I set out some medicine on the table.”

Genon laid her hand on the bed.

“The powder on the left if her head hurts, the elixir in the middle if she’s nauseous, and the one on the right she should take regardless, to cool her blood.

Mix them with water and have her sip slowly.

When someone brings your supper, I’ll have Wen send honey to mix with the medicine.

She needs sugar and salt.

Lots of water, but slowly.”

Remin nodded.

He was familiar with these measures; he had nursed many sunstruck men when he was a squire.

“I’ll let Tounot know not to expect you on watch tonight.

We’ll manage well enough, just you focus on your wife.”

Genon heaved himself to his feet and began to pack his bag, rolling up the long, felt case that contained his tools and medicines.

“If you had to guess.”

Remin couldn’t bite the words back.

“If you had to make a bet…”

“I don’t believe she’ll die.

We’ll know more when she wakes up.

I’ll be back at first light to check on you.”

The herbman paused at the door, gripping the handle.

“She’s too thin, Rem.

At least a stone underweight.

You didn’t notice?”

Remin shook his head.

The door closed and latched.

It sounded like a condemnation.

* * *

Color faded with the daylight, and Remin never took his eyes from her.

All this time, he had been trying so hard not to see her.

Forcing his eyes to go past her, pushing her to the furthest periphery of his life.

That had been a mistake.

Perhaps it was the reason why he was so wrongfooted every time she appeared.

He had never been able to shake her out of his mind.

But in this one, crucial area, he had succeeded very well.

Stretched out on the bed, it was impossible not to see it, now.

He could see how terribly prominent her ribs were, the jut of her hip bones, even the knobby little protrusions of her wrists.

And he knew what she was supposed to look like.

Remin remembered every moment of their nights together, how her body had felt in his hands, against his lips, under his tongue.

He had kissed those ribs, he had felt those fragile bones jerk as she gasped with pleasure.

He had tried so hard to forget, but he never could.

Remin washed one thin arm, noting the bruises dotting her fine white skin, the scratches and scrapes, the stringy, starveling muscle from months of heavy labor.

Her hands shocked him.

New blisters layered on top of old, ragged fingernails.

Those were not the hands of a lady.

This was not what he had intended.

If someone had returned a horse to him in this condition, he would have had them whipped.

And this was his wife.

An Imperial wife, a daughter of the stars, a princess of the House of Agnephus.

He had gone through fire and blood to be sure his new House would be built on bedrock, on the divine blood of the Emperor himself, so it could never again be taken away.

And for seven years he had imagined the spoiled, pampered princess he would marry, growing up with every kind of luxury, while he starved and worked and fought and froze.

And the whole time he had thought: he was going to make the Emperor’s daughter work.

He was going to show her what deprivation was like.

Let her go wailing to her father about the harshness of the world. Let the Emperor gnash his teeth. Let him taste bile. Let him feel helpless.

From the day he met Ophele—no, from the instant they met—Remin had been trying to force her to play this part.

And she had never complained. Not once.

Not when he took her from her home without so much as a chance to pack a bag.

Not when he forced her to marry him.

Not when he hurt her on their wedding night and dragged her straight into the saddle the next morning.

Not when, fresh from their lovemaking, he had all but accused her of trying to have him assassinated.

Not even after he gave her too much wine and she had been so sick, sobbing into the blankets until Remin wished someone would take him off and hang him.

She had endured it all without a word of protest.

Why? Why would anyone do that? Was it just because she was timid? Was she that afraid of him?

Outside, it grew dark, and he rose to light a lamp and set it on the trunk beside the bed, illuminating the sleeping girl.

Her delicate face, the eyes that saw and showed so much.

He remembered every cruel word he had spoken, every time he had snapped at her, every time he had driven her into flinching, bewildered retreat.

All those times she had fallen silent, her words trailing away inaudibly.

More times than he could count.

This was not pointless self-flagellation.

Remin was thinking.

He had done nothing to earn her loyalty, and a great deal to make her hate him.

That had not been his objective, but it didn’t matter.

The more he thought about it, the more he thought he wouldn’t blame her if she did try to have him killed.

“Rem,”

said a voice outside, and he opened the door to find Miche with his supper and a small pot of honey.

“Gen said she would live?”

“Looks that way.”

Miche closed his eyes.

“Thank the stars.

The masons brought Master Eugene up to the stable.

When she wakes up, she’ll likely ask.

He’s been fed and I brushed him out myself.

Is there anything I can do?”

“No.”

Remin forced himself to meet the other man’s eyes.

Miche had warned him, again and again.

“But thank you.”

“I’ll be here,”

Miche assured him, gripping his shoulder.

“Right outside.

All you have to do is call.

It’s all right.

You can make this right.”

“I can. I know.”

Remin took it in like air.

Of course, Miche would be there.

Miche had always been there, since Remin was ten.

No matter what, Miche was always there.

Closing the door, Remin put the food on the table and forgot about it.

He heard the shrieking cackle of a strangler in the distance, a sound that made the hair on the back of his neck stand on end.

In her sleep, the princess twitched, and he sat down beside the bed, gripping her small hand.

He was doing sums.

For example: how many miles had she been walking every day, this girl who had never gone further than the gates of Aldeburke? How many thousands of pounds of water had she hauled from the wells? Just one barrel was two hundred and fifty pounds, almost triple her weight.

A ton of water.

Per day.

By herself.

He touched the blisters on her palms, blisters she had hidden under gloves, because he certainly would have seen them otherwise.

Wouldn’t he?

If he had taken even a moment to think about it, he would never have let her do it.

It was hard work, hauling water.

At first, it hadn’t been too much; the well was nearby and the work crew small.

But no one had thought, when they gave her a donkey and a wagon, that it was still one undersized woman filling all those barrels.

He would have hesitated to put one of his squires to the task, and they were training to be knights.

“I don’t understand you,”

he said aloud, to cover the noise of the devils outside.

“I don’t understand why you did it.

You owe me nothing.

What has it been? Four months…”

No matter how he turned it around in his mind, it didn’t make sense.

Why would anyone work so hard, without a single word of complaint, for someone who neglected them so? What possible scheme could involve silently working until she dropped? Even if she wasn’t a pawn of the Emperor, it made no sense.

Unless her plan was to drop dead beside Eugene and let it be known to the world that Remin Grimjaw could not be trusted with a wife.

Which wasn’t a bad idea, in terms of lasting vengeance; Remin would never forgive himself if she died.

But that was a rather costly victory from her point of view.

“Prin—Ophele,”

he whispered.

The name felt strange on his tongue.

All this time, he had called her Princess so he would never forget whose daughter she was.

But Wen was right.

She wasn’t a princess anymore.

She was a duchess, his duchess, and had been since the day they were married. He ran the wet cloth over her breasts, tracing the shameful hollow of her belly. “Ophele. Wife. You’re nothing like what I expected. I thought you’d be a noble lady like I saw in the capital, but you’ve never even been there, have you? For some reason, I keep thinking you have.”

He could hear the sounds of ghouls outside, and the distant hunting howl of a demon wolf, and kept talking, hoping a human voice would be better than the noises of devils, even if it was his.

“They call them the Roses of Segoile,”

he murmured.

“Because of the thorns.

I never had much to do with women.

They made me a squire when I was twelve, and sent me off to war with Valleth.

Sometimes I went back to Ereguil for a few months, here and there, and I liked the duchess, and the ladies in the castle and the…the girls in the village.”

His mind shied away from that.

“But I didn’t really talk to women until the war was over, and I went to Segoile.

I don’t know what to say.

I keep upsetting you, even when I don’t mean to.

I’m sorry for that.

I don’t always know what I’m doing wrong, or how to fix it.”

His voice went on, circling, wondering, trying to understand how it had gone this badly wrong.

He could only hope that she could hear him, that the sound of his voice would make her think, fill her eyes with thoughts.

This time, he would ask what they were.

He had always wanted to know.

“And those women were terrifying,”

he said, trying to lighten his tone.

“Not like you at all.

Miche and Tounot had to teach me how to dodge, or I’d probably still be fighting marriage duels for outraging the honor of some woman I never even met.

Duchess Ereguil said that in Dulcia and Capricia, the challenge is getting your daughter married off by the end of the season.

But in Segoile it’s all a man can do to get out of it alive.”

He had to remember to tell her that again, when she woke up.

She wouldn’t know that, would she? She wouldn’t know anything about the capital at all.

“That’s what I thought you’d be like.

I kept trying to treat you as if you were, but you aren’t.”

Crossing his arms on the mattress, Remin rested his head on them, brushing her hair back from her face with his fingertips.

He had tried over and over to paint the Emperor’s features onto that small face, but she looked nothing like her father.

“I keep looking for thorns,”

he whispered.

“And there just aren’t any.”

Her skin was cool.

He was afraid to touch her beyond that, afraid that even the warm pads of his fingertips might do her some harm.

Instead, he ran his fingers through her river of hair, still damp from the Brede.

“When you wake up, we’ll start fattening you up.

Pudding, if you want it, no matter what Wen says.

A dozen puddings a day.

Don’t ladies like sweet things? My mother’s favorite was pudding with custard and strawberries.

It’ll be different when you wake up, I promise.”

But the thought of different made his mouth go dry, and Remin fell silent.

He had been pushing her away for a reason.

She was one of the Emperor’s poisoned gifts.

The sweetest and most beguiling poison, a poison so seductive that it was almost enough to make him forget all the hard lessons he had learned and just gulp it down.

Let it happen, whatever it was.

Give up. Give in. Drown. The sweetness would be worth it.

“It’ll be different,”

he repeated, trying to ignore the painful thumping of his heart.

“I’ll take care of you from now on.

No more work, you’ve done en—”

“But…I want to help…”

The words were so soft, at first he thought his ears were playing tricks on him.

Remin looked up to find her eyes were slitted open, the faintest glint of tawny hazel gleaming under her thick lashes.

Her face was turned toward him.

“Why?”

he whispered back, so relieved that his hand shook as he reached to touch her cool forehead.

“My father…”

The words made his blood run cold.

She licked her lips.

“…my father.

Because of what he did.

Your House.

Your family…”

“You want to help because of what your father did?”

he repeated stupidly.

She nodded, tears sliding from the corners of her eyes.

“Sorry.

I wanted to tell you…so many times.

And Sir Justenin.

His family, too…I know.

And Tressin.

That’s why Tresingale, right? I know your family was innocent. My mother told me. I wanted to help. I wanted to give it all back.”

Sweet poison.

Such sweet poison.

It hurt so much to hear it, words that he would have given anything to hear over the years.

To the rest of the Empire, his parents were traitors, deserving of their public execution.

She was the last person he ever would have expected to say unequivocally that she knew they had been innocent.

Could he believe her? Could it really be true? For a long moment, they just looked at each other, and it seemed as if everything that had passed between them could be forgotten, for a time, in the forgiving shadows.

“That’s why you said you wanted to work,”

he said quietly.

“You never argued.

You never complained.”

“Yes.”

Her eyes squinted against the faint light, a crease between her eyebrows that reminded him of his duty.

“You have to take medicine.”

He sprang up and went to mix the honey and water and bitter powders.

It looked as if her head was hurting her.

He had to help her sit up, and Remin sat on the bed beside her and propped her against his body.

“Sip. Slowly.”

It was too much to take in.

He was having to apply this new knowledge to everything he knew of her, to every single interaction they’d ever had.

Suddenly he was thinking of questions he should have asked long ago, going all the way back to that first day in Aldeburke.

Miche, finding the remains of a fire under a pine tree.

But why had she been there in the first place? Why did a princess know how to make and conceal a campfire? How had House Hurrell dared to openly conspire against the Emperor’s sacred child? What did it say about her father’s protection, that they did?

And the wedding.

Who let their daughter walk down the aisle by herself? What sort of father couldn’t be bothered to send a representative to ensure she was treated with honor? A man who valued the loyalty of his child did not abandon her that way.

And Ophele had said it herself, the first time Remin had given her wine and loosened her tongue: she’d never had so much as a message from the Emperor.

Not even on her birthday.

“I’m sorry,”

he said as she sipped at her medicine.

“Wife, I am so sorry.

I have wronged you.”

He had not yet begun to calculate the magnitude of the apology he owed her.

“I’m the Emperor’s daughter.”

She turned her face away from the cup.

“No more.”

“It doesn’t matter.”

Remin was really beginning to believe that.

There was just no evidence, none, to prove otherwise.

Turning, he laid her on the bed, brushing her hair back to coil on the pillows.

Her face was faintly green.

“Do you feel sick?”

“A little.”

Her arms crept up to hide her breasts.

“And…clothes?”

Even half-dead from sun sickness, color still rose to her cheeks.

Remin squeezed her hand and turned away, fighting to master himself.

He had known nothing.

He understood nothing.

He had refused to learn or understand, and he had almost lost her, all her blushes and her soft voice and those extraordinary searching eyes.

He had tried to blind himself to her because everything he saw only made him like her more.

“You had sun sickness,”

he said gruffly as he opened her trunk and pulled out a fresh chemise.

“We had to keep you cool.

If you start to feel warm again, then we’ll have to take it back off.

Sometimes it can take a while for the fire in your body to bal—”

She was asleep.

“—lance,”

he finished.

He set the chemise aside and sank down beside the bed, controlling himself only with a colossal effort.

It was too much.

His breath was squeezed too tight in his chest and he didn’t know what to do.

Stars, that had happened, hadn’t it? She had awakened, and she had spoken.

He would be so careful with her now.

Everything she needed, anything she wanted.

He wouldn’t wake her up to dress.

Her skin needed air and water, as much as it could get.

Food, and rest, and then…

He didn’t know.

He didn’t know anything.