These Gilded Seas

Chapter Sixteen: Research

The first few days slip by in a haze of routine and learning.

I wake up before the sun rises, eat dinner's leftovers as breakfast, and start on my chores. Madam Amaia wrote out a list of my daily tasks on the first morning—starting with having Eero's breakfast in his study before he wakes up. After that's done, it's cleaning, cleaning, and, you guessed it, cleaning.

None of the work is hard, per se. It just takes some getting used to. Since I'm so inexperienced, Madam Amaia works closely by my side.

Turns out, Eero doesn't like people being in his personal space. Madam Amaia was doing all the straightening up and laundry for him because she's one of the few people he can tolerate.

Or maybe it's that she's one of the few people who can tolerate him.

Either way, now that I'm on the job, he's gone. Disappeared. It's almost as if the last place he wants to be is wherever I am.

This only adds to the suspicion that he recognized me.

"Where does he go?" I ask one afternoon. We're sitting out in the servant's yard—the little nook behind the castle, nestled between the kitchen and the outer wall—scrubbing clothes on a washboard. After I lather the soap and give the cloth a good dragging across the stiff metal, Madam Amaia hangs it up on the long clothesline overhead.

"Training, mostly." She pulls two pins out of her apron pocket and drapes the pants over the line. Water drips from the legs, wetting her shoes. If she minds, she doesn't say anything.

"I haven't seen the training area yet, have I?"

"No, and hopefully you never will." She takes a shirt from me and I use the break to rest my hands. The water's ice cold by now, and the chill of it only worsens the bite of the washboard. Plus, the constant motion of scrubbing gives me hand cramps. After three days, I should be used to it, but I'm not. Every night, Madam Amaia applies salve to the cracked and aching joints.

"Why not?" I press.

As she turns to grab another article of clothing, she notices me rubbing circles in my palms. "Your hands hurting you again?" she asks. "Swap places with me. I'll scrub while you hang."

As I stand and shake out my skirt, I say, "Don't avoid the question."

Madam Amaia grins at me. Earlier in the week, I wouldn't have spoken to her like this. But when you spend nearly every waking moment with a person, you bond with them. The older woman is a little highlight in the monotony of palace life. I feel comfortable enough around her to joke and prod.

"You wouldn't let me if I wanted to!" She starts washing a new piece of clothing. While the simple act makes me sweat, Madam Amaia does it like it's her calling. "The training grounds are no place for women. Too many men in one place. The testosterone alone could smother you, but then there's the fighting as well. Prince Eero insists on 'real training,' as he calls it. No mock swords or dummies." She shakes her head. "It's a bloodbath as they all try to prove who's the biggest and toughest. Silly boys."

Well, that explains why Eero was so bloody the last time I saw him.

"Who does most of the winning?" I absentmindedly ask as I start to hang up clothes. It's easier work than washing; I can handle a bit of back pain.

Since Eero's made it his life's mission to run from us, I've taken it upon myself to learn everything I can about him. Why all the other maids have quit, why the palace staff talks about him in whispers, why he doesn't like people in his space... Papa would call this "researching your target."

Finn would call it a sick obsession.

In this case, I have to side with Papa. I refuse to admit or even consider that my interest in Eero is anything but research-driven.