Raising a Hero

Chapter 73

Winter came on like a rain of bricks. Very cold bricks.

Gus and I adjusted to our new home, though since we still went over to the inn on most weekends it was like being the child of divorced parents...that's a little too negative. Maybe it was like being a college student who had moved out, but still went back home to help out? Yeah. That sounded better.

As I worked at the side of Dr. Mustache, I came to know the people who worked at the city ducal estate and, occasionally, their families. Everyone got sick or hurt at one point, and with only me and the old man on hand, we were never without work. I even got to take care of some babies! Dream come true! Pediatrics without the ten plus years of school, for the win!

Most of the people who worked at the estate were actually ducal knights, who served the area as a sort of national guard. I was told that usually there weren't so many, but since the ducal had been ordered to give their share towards ending the war efforts, they were preparing to leave in the Spring, meaning more than usual were gathering in to the city estate as well as the main estate some distance north. The city guard were more than happy to have the help, though winter tended to be a quiet time for crime, since the cold tended to chase everyone inside.

And cold it got. Maybe it was because I'd been raised in a world with central heating, but holy darn freaking crap, was it cold. My hands even ended up drying up and cracking from the stove in the doctor's office and all the fires throughout the mansion sucking up the moisture. I ended up having to work a few days with my hands bandaged up again, which just gave me unwanted attention as that one delicate flower.

Not wanting even more attention, and since Roman could be pushy and persuasive when he wanted to be, I canceled our lunchtime tea time with him until the bandages came off with the excuse that I was busy with an influx of the flu, which wasn't a lie, persay. A cold front that brought in an few days of extra freezing temperatures brought in an array of soldiers with frostbite and a dozen children with terrible coughs. All the smoke from the fires keeping them warm and in doors must have had something to do with the respiratory health as well, and I tried to encourage the women who brought in their children to clear out the air in their homes for at least ten minutes a day, even if it meant they'd have to warm up the place again.

"Lots of blankets," I said. "And you can use coals in bedpans," which were actually these double frying pan thingies you'd fill with fire coals and put at the end of someone's bed.

Dr. Mustache did the same, nearly clearing his stores of herbs to make cough syrup.

Some of the knights had brought their families to live in the dormitories attached to the barracks. Many of the families who lived in the dormitories, however, were those of the permanent staff, such as the maids, footmen, cooks, and so on. The knights who hadn't brought their families often had their own homes and plots of lands attached to villages throughout the territory. They often mentioned them to me whenever they came in to get their wounds tended to or some other ailment.

Then there were those who had no families and were, essentially, single and menaces to society.

If they insisted on talking flirty to me, I refused to treat them.

Because of that, I'd gained a reputation pretty quickly of being beautiful, but cold. Which I didn't think was fair at all, because I was plenty warm. It was because I was warm that I didn't want to run the chance of hurting feelings when I wasn't ready to think about getting involved with anyone. Not to mention I had enough stress with those trying their way with me as it is, under the guise of friendship or not.

"He likes you," said Gus bluntly on more than one occasion. "You need to shut him down now if you're not interested. Nobles don't take no for an answer."