Page 17 of Stardust Child

“Yes. If we’re going to hunt devils, we need to think about what we’re facing,” he said, in utter seriousness. “Maybe you can find answers to those questions you were asking. And you will spare my men the attentions of scholars,” he added, though that seemed a less likely threat, at present. The Tower had received Edemir’s latest invitation, but seemed in no great hurry to answer it.

“They can’t bethatbad.” Her lips curved in a smile, and for a moment their fingers coiled together in a most stimulating fashion until Remin forced himself to let go and leave her to her task.

It made him more determined than ever to do his best for her. In the training yard of the barracks, Remin looked over the assembled men and wondered who he could possibly trust.

The Army of the Andelin had numbered nearly 90,000 men, at its peak. Most of them had returned home with their lords at the end of the war, but thousands had sworn their loyalty to Remin and elected to stay. The bulk stood guard at the walls and border fortresses, but after Remin’s adjustments to his forces in the past few months, five hundred remained in Tresingale. Knights, squires, pages, and common soldiers, they had survived years of war, which made them not just skilled and ferocious, but clever, and lucky.

Remin watched them training all afternoon, marking the best swordsmen, making a mental list of qualifications. He wasn’t pleased at the prospect of relying on other men to guard his wife. It was one thing when it was Miche or Juste; he trusted them implicitly. From the beginning, Miche had regarded her with the protective and slightly overzealous eye of an older brother, and Juste was a monk at heart.

Ophele would have these guards for the rest of her life. She was the Duchess of Andelin; she would never be safe while her father lived. Andhe needed to trust them with more than just her physical safety, Remin thought, angered anew at Jacot for sullying her ears with such a filthy word. Her guards would protect her dignity and her innocence.

As Sousten so often reminded him, the House of Andelin would be creating their own traditions.

“Juste,” he said as training was ending for the day, and his knights stood panting in their armor, satisfied with their work. “Miche. A word.”

* * *

“Where are we going?” Ophele asked a few days later, when Remin turned south instead of north leaving the cookhouse. Usually, they went straight to the stables, but there was a certain air of excitement around Remin that she was learning to recognize as he headed toward the river.

“You’ll see.” The corner of his mouth kept turning up, and Ophele eyed him as she bit into an apple.

“It’s another surprise?” she asked, crunching.

“Mmm-hmm.” He turned down the lane heading west, matching his long strides to her shorter ones, a dirt road rutted with cart wheels. Ophele had noticed an increase in traffic on this road, usually small groups of men in the mornings and evenings, but there was so much activity everywhere that she hadn’t paid particular attention.

“The sanitation buildings?” she asked quizzically.

“One of them is for you.” Remin was enjoying the mystery like a boy. “A belated birthday present. No need to hurry, we can finish our breakfast first.”

From the outside, neither building looked like much. The pair of long, low structures sat so close to the river that the further one was supported on its far side by massive wooden piers, with a tangle of pipes rising from the water to the back of both buildings. Both were surrounded by high wooden walls, but these were no rough palisades; the smooth boards were laid horizontally and lacquered black along the edges, neat and elegant.

“Oh, this is nice,” she said as they passed through the gates of the nearer building, looking from the diamond-shaped green tiles on the roof to the wooden walkway underfoot; more of those sanded boards, with black lacquered posts supporting them so they floated a foot above the garden. Dangling from the eaves of the roof were many strings of smallgolden bells, tinkling as musically as the fountains. The sound of water was a clue. “Sanitation buildings…is this abath?”she asked abruptly, whirling toward Remin. “These are bathhouses?”

“I think we can all agree that the population of this valley needs some bathing,” he said, his black eyes twinkling, and caught her as she leaped on him rapturously. “Do you like it?”

“Yes! Oh, a real bath!” she exclaimed, wrapping her arms around his neck and kissing him soundly. Remin liked petting as much as she did. “Thank you.”

“You suffered with the cauldron long enough.” He held her easily, her toes dangling, his dark head bent as he murmured, “Though I’d be more pleased if we could bathe toge—”

“Noble lord,” said a woman’s voice, polite and strangely accented, and both noble lord and lady turned to see a quartet of black-haired women approaching on the wooden walkway, bright and curious as birds.

Remin set her down instantly.

“Madam Sanai,” he said, wiping the gentleness from his face as if it had never been there, and Ophele tried to follow his lead, though her own ears felt hot. “Wife, this is Madam Imari Sanai, lately of Benkki Desa. I asked her to come and run the women’s bath. Madam, this is my wife Ophele, the Duchess of Andelin.”

“Welcome to the valley,” she managed, combatting a surge of shyness. Her experience with Auber’s relations had not helped her nervousness with strangers. “I h-hope the journey wasn’t too difficult.”

“We do not complain, noble lady,” said Madam Sanai, extending a polished wooden staff before her as she bowed. Ophele had read that the women of Benkki Desa were called fatal lilies, tall and willowy, with black hair and skin like perfect, unblemished ivory. Her eyes were so dark a violet as to be nearly black. “Noble lord, we must ask you step no further. This place is forbidden men.”

“I read your rules,” he replied, unsurprised. “I’ll inform the men tonight and send out warnings through the camp. You’re sure you don’t want guards?”

“No, noble lord. Men are forbidden,” she repeated. “We will guard our own place. Please say to your men, we will remove profaners forcefully.”

They looked capable of carrying out that threat, each of them armed with an iron-shod wooden staff and a black whip coiled at their hips. Ophele tried not to stare. She had never seen women like this before. They were dressed simply in sleeveless embroidered tunics and light trousers, scandalous attire by Imperial standards, even more shocking than their weapons.

“I’ll warn them. You’ll likely have to teach a few of them a lesson before the rest get the message,” he cautioned, and looked down at Ophele. “No harm will come to you with Madam Sanai and her ladies, wife. You can ask about their staffs if you want to know why. Do you want to bathe today, or come back another time?”

He must have seen the unease in her face. Part of her wished he could stay. It was easy to be brave with Remin beside her, but the Hurrells had spent the better part of a decade making her wary of strangers, and her old maid Nenot had made bathing a singularly unpleasant experience. Would they be so polite, once he was gone?

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