ID 18618401 © Justin Black | Dreamstime.com
When the landlord closed the door behind him, hiding the Back Room from the mayhem of the harvest festival overflow happening in the front, Nigel jumped out of his seat and took a few steps over the Ashall woolen knotted carpet likely brought across the ocean on a Zeriff ship. “No, we should—”
“No?” Matthews firmly interrupted, pulling the younger man up short, like he was a squire again. “My lands, Sir.”
“Yes, your Grace.” Nigel froze his movement, perhaps for the first time since his horse arrived three hours ago, dropping his eyes to his boots in a short nod. “My apologies.”
“Apologies are only worth their weight in adjustment of behavior.”
“Yes, your Grace.” Nigel widened his stance, properly bowing his head and clasping his hands behind his back. Many a time he had heard those words, and he knew Matthews would accept only one response. “How may I amend my discourtesy?”
Waiting, the young man felt the stare on his head, like a sword across the neck, even though his old knight never rose from his chair. Behind him, he heard silks and cottons rustle. Heat rose up his neck, the blush fortunately hidden under his carvat and the high neck of this riding jacket. To be corrected in front of a peasant! Worse, to DESERVE to be corrected.
“Help the Mistress remove her boots.” Matthews ordered. “I know I taught you how to properly care for the boots and blisters of a hard march. Dismissed.”
Nigel flinched at the emotional emptiness of the last word. He hated that desolation of emotions while in the field at age ten, he hated it now, fourteen years later. And he hated himself for mastering the same tone shortly after he was knighted at seventeen when he needed the tent cleared and the men of his unit to be about their business. He had hoped his fighting years were behind him after he served the required ten years Jackel demanded, but with the recall to family lands, he knew family requirements would again burden his shoulders.
He spun neatly to see the woman had raised her skirts to her knees, the clay from the hems flaking off either side onto the towels laid out by the keep’s sons. The clay caked the boots over the foot laces and up to the third of four buckles on the calves. Streaks of mud disappeared into the fabric hiding her thighs. The Crew of Crew, Zeriff’shaZeriff, whatever her real name was, attempted with shaking fingers to unbuckle the top right buckle.
Her head tilted slightly up to glare at him. Daring him to come closer, the poison in her eyes hidden behind the veil. “Your Grace,” her travel roughened voice whispered from her precarious position, “I couldn’t … wouldn’t presume.”
“Please Mistress,” Matthews smooth voice gave no hint of shouting orders at troops for thirty years, before Jackel had let his uncle retire shortly after Nigel’s officer ceremony. “I assure you, my ex-ward is well-versed in bandaging wounded feet. If you are to get to Blackstone, you have another two days travel, four maybe even five if you rejoin your caravan, depending on how many gifts your country has sent for the royal wedding.”
Nigel watched her shoulders sag within the Kylar bodice; it lacked the shoulder padding found in the Mysentte fashion. He vastly preferred the Kylar fashion for the mobility allowed both men and women, and for the thinner tops in the warmer climate. Some fabric worn by the matriarchs was thin to the point of being translucent under the netted supporting bodice.
“Very well,” she said. For the first time, she turned her head completely to Nigel. “Thank you. Lesh modula ever.”
“Ma’ke.” Nigel responded as he sunk to his knees upon the towels. He moved the bowl of water aside, to better access the boots. Up close, as he worked the soaked and stretched buckles loose, he noticed how the boniness of her knees, the lack of imprint or dye painting on the boots, and the mud coating the underlayers of her skirts.
Had she hike the outer layers over her head, or removed them entirely until she had reached the outskirts of Climb’s Start.
When the fourth buckle gave way, he pulled the top apart, widening it, revealing a ring of blisters around the top of her calf where the wet leather had rested. Assessment of the layers of mud covering the laces on the bottom had him reaching for the top towel of the pile left by the keep’s family. After wetting it in the bowl, he started wiping the clay away.
Nigel felt remorse for judging the woman so harshly. No harrigan would have walked herself to blisters and her gloves to shreds to prevent her horse from getting a split hoof after it threw a shoe as she guided it through a foreign country. Lesson number a hundred and fifty on the subject of never make assumptions. Someday he will learn it.
He heard the innkeep come in with their food, the woman thanked the keep for the heated spiced wine and the small basket of broken bread and cheese as he placed it on the settee beside her. She nibbled small bits from the basket by burrowing a hand under her veil and getting the food to her mouth. She left the mulled wine on the table Matthews had been keeping his books. Over his head, once the food had arrived, the Zeriff asked Matthews what Blackstone was like and if he knew any of the wedding plans.
Did Matthews know about the wedding plans? Nigel snorted as the polite discussion continued. She sidestepped Matthews’ first questions about the largesse within the bride gifts her country was sending to the royal wedding. Surprise for the crown and safety for the travel were her excuses. Blackstone, being the winter castle for the kingdom had fewer visitors than Redstone, but still had few political secrets to hide, ended up being the least fraught topic they settled on. Searching questions about the gardens, mountain roads to there, and how the split of the castle worked for both guests and hosts for the genders, kept the conversation light, yet meaningful.
After clearing enough of the mud to untie the boot lacing across the top of the inset on both the boots and getting the left boot unbuckled, he slipped the left one off first since that was the one he had in hand, to find a not quite emaciated leg, much much thinner than legs of the court ladies Nigel had the pleasure being close enough to view. Rashes, ulcers, and blisters furthered marred his favorite body part to have wrapped around his waist. Arm hugs came a close second. A rolled down, scrunched sock, silk, not thick wool, dyed in a mix of dark and bright red liquid clung around her toes. The boot sloshed.
He poured the noxious mix of leather-spoiled water, sweat, blister fluid, and blood into the bucket, then worked the second boot off. Zeriff’shaZeriff panted quietly above him to hold back a moan.
Looking up, Nigel finally caught a clear view of her eyes. Bloodshot from pain, the brown held a golden undertone. Too much yellow to be anything but magic, but a woman powerful enough to travel on her own would be expected to hold some. Not a full green, as was the case of most of the females chosen for the Roadsky Queens, nor the gold of the most powerful witches, but enough undertones to lead a caravan of merchants delivering a bridal gift to a royal wedding from a pirate kingdom.
No man had yellow in his eyes, nor green. Nigel’s were pure blue, like his brothers and his father.
He wanted to paint those eyes and lost himself in the gradations of color, somehow enhanced rather than spoiled by the tired bloodshot color of what was normally white. His fingers twitched on leather, wanting a palette and brush instead.
“Add about half the tea leaves and marigold flowers, and a quarter of the salt to the water.”
“What, huh?”
The woman’s tired voice repeated instructions to prepare the water to cleanse wounds.
“Right.” Nigel said, setting aside the boot he had been holding.
(words 1,385; first published 2/13/2025)
The Back Room series
