“Time for me to get back,” Simon said stiffly. “You do not have to accompany me and pretend you are my friend any longer.”
The turn of his attitude bothered me. Had he tread too lightly on his oath and now regretted it? Maybe. Was he concerned or disappointed in my demand for such a valuable favor in return for the small deed I’d done for him? Perhaps. Still, he had reason to hold his head high because he had answered honorably. It proved to me again that a favor owed can be a valuable asset—or burden.
The second part of my task was easier. Before entering the old wing, I’d stopped by the kitchen in the south wing and demanded, in Princess Elizabeth’s name, eight fruit tarts. I’d hoped for cherries, of course, because they are the best, but received plums, almost as good, and still warm. They also provided a pitcher of fresh milk.
After my quick visit to the kitchen on the ground floor, I walked with such light feet I might have skipped like a child all the way to the fourth floor. It was what we called the old wing, one of the few remaining portions of the original palace. Over five hundred years old, some said.
Old, yes. However, it stood more opulent than the newer areas. The ceilings were higher, the walls sheathed in slabs of nearly white granite cut from the Pearl Islands and sent here by ship. The floors were yellow oak planks thicker than my fist, even after several scrapings and refinishing over the years.
I’d always had an affinity for this part of the palace. The doors were the same yellow oak, thick and sturdy. The tapestries and the shape of the halls somehow absorbed sounds, or some said they shunted them away. Whatever may be correct, walking along the hallways in the old wing was a thing of quiet beauty.
Just before reaching the end of the hall, a single door beckoned. It stood beside a back stairway used only by the staff. Inside were tables for folding sheets and blankets that had been laundered on a floor below. After being cleaned, dried, and folded, they were placed on wide shelves, ready for use by visiting royalty.
There were three older chambermaids assigned to the royal rooms on this end of the floor. Men cleaned the hallways and stairs, but women too old to work at tasks requiring more physical activity were assigned to the bedding room as a reward for years of performing harder tasks. They cleaned spaces only when the guests were absent, which usually meant they worked from midday to supper if that.
Yes, the occupants of the royal suites were late sleepers, the lot of them. Not all were royals by any means, but there were royal handmaidens, wealthy merchants, owners of fleets of ships, high ranking army officers, priests, and even mages and sorceresses.
Inside the laundry room sat and gossiped the three women I’d wished to encounter with my gifts in hand. They were cranky, coarse, and more fun than most.
The cooks had wrapped the pastries in a white cloth and given me instructions on how to best carry them without spilling or crushing the tarts. The pitcher of milk was carried in my other hand. Inside the laundry room, the three women were near an open window where a breeze stirred the curtains. They turned at my entrance. Two smiled openly. One scowled, but she always did.
“Ladies.” My greeting encompassed them all while taking note of the scowl on the one face for future consideration.
“Damon, you haven’t been here to tell lies with us for ten days or more,” one said with a wide smile. “We’ve missed you. Have you gotten into trouble again with your princess and need a place to hide out?”
“No.” My grin widened. “But guess what came my way?” I placed the milk on the table and whisked the white cloth off the tarts as if a mage was making them appear from nothing.
The third maid, the one who scowled at me when entering said in a sour tone, “Eight? How do you suggest we evenly split them between the three of us?”
“Easy,” I laughed, ignoring her snide attitude, and again decided to follow up as to why she acted so rude. Even for her, the attitude was sour. “Two for each of you and two for me. I wished to share my good fortune with you, but if you insist, I’ll eat them all.”
Mugs appeared from somewhere, milk was poured, and the tarts were divided. The third woman still eyed me suspiciously. We joked us, recalled old rumors about royal families, and repeated a few harmless, but juicy stories without asking for anything in return.
The thing is, a question asked is almost as revealing as the answer. The laundry maids, or at least one of them, would then repeat the question to another gossip, who would pass the information on again, and again. Soon, the entire palace would know what I wished to know, and they all knew of my relationship with Elizabeth. My interest would quickly raise other inquiries, and every gossip, guttersnipe, and chinwag would wonder why my interest was in those people who had recently departed the palace.
I had observed on my way to the laundry room the small placards placed on the latches of the doors by the maids. Nearly half the rooms and suites were empty, cleaned, and ready for occupancy. At this time of the year, there were no parties or balls. Priests were off converting or preaching, officers directing wars, and merchants hunting for new buyers.
The warm breeze still flowed into the room from the open window, the tarts and milk were treats the maids tasted once or twice a year. We gobbled them down amid laughter and small talk. Finally, I wiped my mouth with my sleeve, a disgusting habit that told the servants I was one of them. Steering the conversation without asking a question is an art. “With all the empty rooms, it figures you’d all be sitting around here getting fat with nothing to do, so my good fortune with the tarts made me decided to contribute to your cause.”
They laughed and cackled together as only old women do. One said, “You can come by and bring milk and fruit tarts with you anytime.”
Another said, “With only nine rooms to clean, we have only three each. I could have bribed either of these two wenches to clean my three with just one of your tarts.”
Only nine rooms. Eight, if you subtract the one for the one mage called Twin, who still remained in the palace. Who else was gone? A stroll down the hall could eliminate a few because I knew the occupants. There was an apartment where a tall, cadaverous priest lived, and another where a bald sorceress lived who couldn’t seem to conjure up a spell to grow her hair again. She wore poorly made wigs and occupied a room at the very end of the hall, as she had for years, rarely leaving. That left only six rooms and the three mages we wanted to know about. Still, I wouldn’t and couldn’t dare mention the word, mage.
“Is that normal?” I asked peering out the window at nothing, as if not caring to hear the answer or not.
“No,” the first one said. “At this time of the year, we usually have five or six rooms for each of us to clean, which is still our slow time. When the mages return, we’ll be almost back to normal.”
There. What I needed had just fallen into my lap. Waiting had paid off. She said if the mages returned. That told me they were not here, verifying Elizabeth’s hunch. They were elsewhere. Probably in Mercia. However, confirmation of the meager information was what Elizabeth wanted, and the last thing I wished for was that third woman, the silent one who often scowled at me, to figure out where my interest lay. Without a doubt, she would run to tell of my interest, and a new rumor would take hold. Worse, Elizabeth would hear it and scold me for being careless. She used to do that a lot, and now had either learned to hold her tongue at my numerous failures, or I was becoming more skillful in my deceptions.