SN Chapter 16

'Nestor of Seacrag.'

Many people had witnessed the match. The reason trainees had not applied to serve under Rosaline all this time came down to a single shared assumption: she could not give them what they most wanted. What they wanted was an exceptional superior who would teach them swordsmanship. Application rates stayed high even for difficult senior knights, as long as the skill was there.

But the Rosaline everyone in the White Night Order knew was not, by any measure, a formidable knight. Diligent. Quiet. From a house at odds with Second Prince Rikardis. Female, and weak besides. Not one trainee had sought instruction from a woman the lower knights themselves looked down on. Then, yesterday, the shared assumption that had blanketed the entire White Night Order broke apart, piece by piece. Junior knight Nestor had been strong—cleanly, harmoniously strong, power and technique in proper balance. He was reputed to be the finest fighter in his age bracket among all the junior knights, and yet——

And yet——

He had lost his sword three seconds into the match. In the second round, he lost consciousness on the first strike. And he had been carried out tucked peacefully in the arms of an opponent who stood a full ten centimeters shorter than him and was considerably more slender. His exit had been as shocking as her victory was decisive.

"Which is why I've come. You'll need to make your selections, Dame Rosaline."

Raymond stood at the doorway with the trainee applications in hand while Rosaline ransacked her room.

She moved around busily for some time. Then she arranged three objects on the table—one fairy tale book, one ring bearing the Redwheel house crest, and the macaron set Raymond had just delivered—folded her arms, and frowned. She appeared to be in deep deliberation. Watching the crease settle between her brows, Raymond stepped in.

"What are you doing, Rosaline?"

"Sick visit."

There was only one person she planned to visit. Nestor of Seacrag, whom she had left in a state of near-death. That she had arrived at the conclusion one ought to visit the people one had injured—excellent moral progress. The items on the table were the problem.

Fairy tale book. Redwheel house ring. Macaron set.

Surely not.

"Those aren't...sick visit gifts, are they, Rosaline? Tell me quickly. Say no. Right now."

Raymond had made, without intending to, a very serious expression. Rosaline turned a placid face toward him and nodded.

They were.

"I read about it. When visiting the sick—flowers and gifts. To wish for a swift recovery, one brings something precious."

A fairy tale book and macarons qualified as precious items. Oh, what a darling! What a good girl! Raymond covered his mouth with one hand and laughed, then recovered his serious expression.

"You can't give him the ring. That means you want to marry him."

"Ah."

Rosaline picked up the ring and slid it onto her own necklace. She apparently did not wish to marry Nestor. She deliberated between the remaining two for a long moment and took the macarons. Admittedly, they were expensive pastries from a well-regarded confectioner's. Not the most obvious gift for a large male knight—but honestly, who cared. Whatever Rosaline gave him, he would receive it with both hands and a grateful bow.

"The glory of Idelabheim, cleaver of the Black Moon...the gift...thank...you, Dame Rosaline. Adjutant Raymond."

"Idelabheim's glory to you. How are you feeling?"

Nestor received the pastel-wrapped macaron set and a cluster of yellow wildflowers—pulled up roots and all—with hands that trembled slightly. What was this combination: a box tied with a pink lace ribbon, and a weed still dropping soil from its roots. Is this woman taking the piss? his expression said, plainly. Despite this conviction, his manner was impeccable. He received both with bowed head and two hands, as though being presented a gift by the crown.

"Thanks to your concern, I've recovered considerably."

He did not look it. His voice came out rough-edged and rasped, and a single night had hollowed out his face. The swagger and bright competitive confidence from the day before were nowhere in evidence.

"I was not concerned."

Rosaline's answer arrived immediately on the heels of his sentence. His expression crumpled all at once. Hers remained undisturbed. Raymond, standing behind her, covered his eyes.

The honesty was excessive. He would need to explain, once they were out of the sick room, that certain things were said as a matter of form and did not require strict accuracy——

Nestor was still processing.

"Ah, I see...well, of course..." His voice wandered in several directions at once. "It's better that way, really—worrying too much disturbs sleep, and sleep is important for one's health, and..."

He could not hold her gaze. When he kept dropping his eyes, Rosaline set two fingers under his chin and lifted his face level with hers. Both Nestor and Raymond, watching, went wide-eyed.

It was precisely the gesture of someone saying: now let me see.

She turned his head slightly this way, slightly that way, scanning the damage with an unhurried eye.

"You're bruised."

"Yes! That's because Dame Rosaline—I mean—it's because I was weak—"

"Bruises hurt."

"What? Yes, bruises do hurt—"

"Take care."

Was that a threat—start something and she'd do it again? The two men froze in silent alarm.

Then Rosaline shifted the hand that had been steadying his chin, and brushed back the hair falling across his bruised face. It had been bothering her to look at. Her hand moved before the thought was complete. Nestor—who had been bracing for impact—went very still at the unexpected gentleness. His expression went blank.

"I'll worry, then. Get well soon."

Raymond stared at her.

A silence had settled over the room. Something strange had taken shape between a blunt knight and one thoroughly disarmed man. Starlight was descending into Nestor's eyes. Through the open window came a breeze carrying the faint scent of flowers. Raymond stood in the middle of all this like a forgotten sack of barley, watching the bruised red creep steadily across Nestor's face. The man produced a thank-you through what appeared to be a significant structural effort.

Raymond shook his head.

He knew perfectly well she had done all of it without any particular feeling attached. Even so. Viewed from outside, that sequence—chin lifted, bruises examined, hair brushed aside, quiet I'll worry—resembled nothing so much as the scene in a novel where a dashing knight works his unhurried charm on a naive country girl. Nestor, filling the role of naive country girl in question, watched Rosaline with undivided devotion until she walked out the door.

The patient had spent the visit tending the visitor. He had spread a handkerchief over the small chair for her, arranged her soil-trailing wildflowers in a vase, and peeled and carefully cut the fine fruit his fellow knights had brought as gifts to set before her in neat slices. Rosaline had accepted all of this as the natural order of things. Nestor had smiled with untroubled pleasure the entire time.

Both hands full of sick visit gifts he had pressed on her as she was leaving, Rosaline emerged from the ward looking gratified and announced that sick visits were a wonderful thing.

Raymond asked, in a tired voice:

"Earlier—what was that, Rosaline? With your hand—to Nestor's face—all the..." He gestured vaguely. "That."

"I conveyed wishes for his recovery."

Raymond closed his eyes for a moment and opened them again.

He desperately missed Kallix, with whom he was not even particularly close.

The trainees who had applied to serve under Rosaline had gathered in a cluster at one end of the training yard. They had been drilling with their swords when they spotted two figures approaching in the distance and snapped to attention.

Rosaline. And beside her, Raymond, adjutant to the vice-captain and her closest companion in the Order.

"The glory of Idelabheim, cleaver of the Black Moon!"

Fifteen voices raised in unison filled the space with a ringing echo. Most of the trainees' eyes were bright with anticipation. Watching those eager faces, Raymond felt a small private smile rise somewhere inside him.

Rosaline as his own trainee crossed his mind briefly—younger then, shorter-haired, and—smarter, something supplied, before he could stop it.

'No. We're not going there.'

Raymond marshaled himself and lowered his voice to carry.

"Idelabheim's glory to you. Is everyone present?"

"Yes, Adjutant Raymond."

The fifteen fell into a line. Most were male, though two were women. Raymond handed the applications to Rosaline. As she turned through them page by page, he leaned in from behind to murmur identifications—that one's this person, that's the second from the left—matching the written names to actual faces. Each application contained a range of details: house, reasons for applying, areas of specialty, hobbies.

None of which was, for Rosaline, particularly useful.

She had not spent long among humans. But even that brief span had been enough to establish one thing: a single sheet of paper could not contain everything there was to know about a person. Rosaline handed the applications back.

She scanned the row of tense, waiting faces and came to stand before the knight at the far left—someone whose name and house she did not know, having not reached his portion of the stack. She looked at him quietly.

One second. Two. Three. Ten. Thirty. Sixty.

The trainee under her gaze felt, as the seconds accumulated, a burning dryness climbing his throat. Her eyes were a shaded green—the color of things that grow in shadow—as dark as the deepest point of a lake. Something moved in their depths. He wondered distantly whether he had made an error in his application. He was desperate for any response at all; a scolding would have been welcome.

Some time later. Rosaline moved to stand before the second trainee in line.

The first candidate exhaled in a brief, quiet rush of relief and sent a silent prayer toward the colleague now standing in his place. But contrary to his expectation, Dame Rosaline gave the second trainee a single measured glance—and moved on to the third.