Page 77 of Stardust Child

The man himself appeared in the door of the storehouse a little after sunset, and Mionet was so surprised when he burst through the door, she almost dropped her armload of gowns.

“Ophele?” he asked, his black eyes narrowing in the dim light, and as the duchess hurried to his side, Mionet had to take a moment to gather herself. Stars, they spoke often enough of Remin Grimjaw in Segoile, but they only blathered on about Supreme Sword this and Valleth that and had he really needed quite such a bloody conclusion to the war. Why hadn’t anyone mentioned that the man was spectacular? While masculine beauty was no virtue to Mionet Verr, it would have been nice to be warned.

Rising, she set the gowns aside and waited to be introduced.

“…helping with my gowns,” the duchess was explaining. “Your Grace, this is Lady Verr. She arrived today.”

“Your Grace,” Mionet murmured, sinking into a flawless curtsy.

“Lady Verr.” His hand flicked an order to rise. “I am pleased by such diligence. You will serve Her Grace well.”

Mionet heard the unspokenor else.

“It will be my pleasure,” she said, eying him. He looked quite forbidding, and it would likely be exceedingly dangerous to get on his bad side, but unless she was much mistaken… “The duchess was showing me her wardrobe,” Mionet explained, moving a few paces into the light and deliberately smoothing the skirt of her silk gown, which was finer by far than anything the duchess owned. “There is a tailor named Tiffen on the way to the valley?”

“Yes. There has been little need for finery,” he said with a flash of those opaque black eyes. “But she will be as well-dressed as any woman in the Empire.”

It was all there, so clearly it might as well have been written down. Under Remin Grimjaw’s regard, the duchess bloomed into startlingbeauty, all that anxiety vanishing as if it had never been. And though his face did not alter in its stern lines, there was no mistaking the look in his eyes when he looked down at her. Between them, almost hidden by the lady’s skirts, Mionet spied their fingers touching.

“Yes, Your Grace,” she said, bowing her head to hide a smile. “Her Grace is quite lovely. It will be a pleasure to see her more so.”

How very interesting.

* * *

“That is a Rose of Segoile,” Remin said later that night as they came home from supper. He did not sound especially pleased about it.

“Is it a bad thing, to be one?” Ophele followed him into the cottage, subdued. Watching Lady Verr at supper had been a painful experience. Even Lady Hurrell could not compare to Lady Verr’s manners and polish, and though no one said anything, Ophele knew how much she suffered by comparison. The fact that Remin had bolted down his own meal and departed immediately with the excuse of the busy day tomorrow could only mean he thought the same.

“I don’t want that here,” Remin said bluntly, crouching before the hearth to lay a fire. “I didn’t like Segoile. I don’t want their nonsense in my land. I wonder why the duchess sent her.”

“She didn’t seem that bad,” Ophele replied, startled and perversely defensive. “She was very nice about my…gowns.”

“That’s what she’s supposed to do, and I want you to tell me if she is not,” he replied, striking flint and steel together a little harder than necessary. “I wanted someone to be a companion for you, wife, and to help you with your things, but I don’t want you learning her manners. This is not Segoile, we’ll do things our own way in our own home. Blast it.”

He shook out his fingers, which had gotten between the flint and the steel.

“She seemed very elegant to me,” Ophele said, low.

“I like you the way you are,” Remin retorted. He very nearly snapped it. Then he sighed and turned to face her. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what I mean. I embarrassed you again tonight and I’m sorry for it. When Tiffen gets here, you’ll have a hundred gowns, with cloth-of-gold and Bhumi silk if that’s what you like. I should have told Miche to fetch yourgowns from Aldeburke.”

Guilt smote her at the thought that her Aldeburke gowns were even shabbier than her Tresingale gowns. And hehadtried to get her nice things in Granholme, but she had refused, so determined not to be a burden that she had become an embarrassment. It hadn’t seemed to matter before, but now that other women had come to the valley, Ophele found she cared very much. She would like a champagne-colored gown that made her look like a sunset. She would like to dazzle Remin, like Lady Verr said.

“I didn’t think of it, either,” she admitted. “You did offer to buy me more. I want to look nice for you.”

“Then don’t take Lady Verr as your model, I beg,” he said wryly. “I asked Tiffen to come because Lady Belleme said he doesn’t hold with all that fashionable foolishness. He had some trouble over it, actually. I want you to be comfortable as well as pretty, wife. Wool in the summer, no wonder ladies come over faint all the time.”

“I like my silk dress, the green one,” Ophele agreed. “It is so much better with only two layers.”

“Then tell Tiffen that. And tell Lady Verr, too, if she tries to talk you into a lot of nonsense. You are my duchess, not her.”

He said it so easily. He wasn’t even looking at her when he said it, and it was more grumble than compliment, but it warmed her to her toes. Even worse than supper had been those first moments in the warehouse, when Ophele had looked up to see Remin’s eyes on the exquisite Lady Verr, gowned and jeweled and looking far more like a princess than Ophele ever had. For the first time, she had realized it was possible that he might prefer another lady to herself. He hadn’tchosenher, after all.

“If I must dress as a lady, then you must dress as a lord,” she said, trying to shake these thoughts away. “You’re the Duke of Andelin.”

“Suppose I will,” he agreed, and came to stand behind her, dropping a kiss on top of her head. “Never mind all that now. Hurry with your letter, I’ll put a kettle on.”

The letter had arrived with Lady Verr and a great many gifts from Ereguil, and was the first letter from Duchess Ereguil that had been addressed directly to Ophele. Most of the accompanying items had been sent to the manor to be opened later, but there was one parcel sitting onthe table to be opened tonight. Both of them already knew what was in it.

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