Islands in the Sky

4.6

After her practice, after the mock-melee, Cassa had gone back to her chambers and found Willem sitting on a chair, at her table, eating bread and sliced apple for breakfast.

Eating, while two of her maids watched him, silently.

They were watching, staring, probably making Willem nervous. Cassa assumed they were making him nervous. It would make her nervous to be stared at like that, and she had known both of these maids half her life. As well, she had a horrible feeling they were both about to start giggling again too, now that she was back in the room. She didn’t want that. She didn’t want to have to explain it to Willem.

“Go,” she said to the maids, “Leave us in peace,” and chased them out before they could embarrass her.

She sat down at the table, across from Willem. She sat close on purpose, deciding she didn’t mind if he smelled her from where he was sitting. Stinking of sweat might help dissuade any lingering interest he had, she thought, and she wasn’t entirely sure she wished to undress and wash while he was still here either, even with a closed door between them.

She sat down, and looked at him for a moment, thinking. It was getting later in the morning, and he was awake and had eaten. He had eaten. He had slept. It was time he left, she thought, and got on with his life away from her.

She wondered how best to hint at that.

She looked at him for a moment, and then said, “Good morning, husband.”

It was an odd thing to say, she thought. It was odd, but it almost made her smile. Now that they had their understanding, the idea of being married wasn’t such a threat to her, and so it wasn’t quite as unpleasant to think about. She was becoming more certain of Willem, she supposed. More certain of his intention to behave, but also of her ability to compel him if she needed to. She had a knife up her sleeve, and another on her belt, and there was a third on the table, beside the sliced apple, close enough she could lunge forward and grab it. She felt safer about Willem, given all those knives nearby. And she also felt safer because she had got to know him a little too.

She felt safer, and because of that she was starting to actually like Willem, and to accept their situation better as well.

“Good morning, husband,” Cassa said, and Willem seemed to understand she was half-teasing, but also half-not.

“Good morning wife,” he said, solemnly, but he smiled, too.

They looked at each other for a while. Cassa wasn’t sure what to say next. She was trying to decide whether to just ask him to leave, or whether that would just be thoughtlessly insulting.

She decided to wait a little and see if he went away on his own.

She was hungry, though, and Willem didn’t seem to be eating any more of his apple. She reached over and took a piece of it, and ate it, while he watched. He didn’t object, so she took another.

Willem smiled, and pushed the plate over, and Cassa grinned, and ate the rest.

Then she picked up his glass, and drank the water from that, and Willem just watched that too, still smiling a little.

“What?” Cassa said.

Willem shook his head.

Cassa drank, and then put the glass down. “I wanted to thank you for being courteous last night,” she said.

“Of course,” Willem said, seeming surprised.

“Thank you for not making me kill you,” Cassa said.

Willem just looked at her.

“I mean it,” Cassa said.

“That you would kill me?”

“Oh, obviously that. But I meant thank you for not making me. It would be a nuisance, explaining to everyone, and it’s tricky to get blood out of the sheets.”

Willem grinned, and didn’t answer. He kept sitting there, looking at Cassa. He didn’t seem to be intending to excuse himself and leave.

“Well,” Cassa said, after a moment. “What do you have planned for today?”

“Very little, to be truthful. As usual.”

“Oh,” Cassa said. “That’s a shame. Are you bored with your dull life?”

“Not bored, just…”

Cassa waited.

“A little bored,” Willem said. “I suppose.”

“Such a shame, as I say,” Cassa said. “How very sad for you. Spending the day bored.”

“Indeed,” Willem said, a little hesitantly, as if he wasn’t sure quite what point she was making.

Cassa grinned, and reached over, and took the crust of bread from Willem’s plate. She bit into it, and began chewing on that too.

“So tell me,” she said. “Where do you plan to do it, this entire day of empty boredom of yours?”

“Where?” Willem said, as if confused.

“Yes, where.”

“Where shall I be being bored?”

“Indeed.”

Willem looked at her for a moment, then seemed to understand. “Oh,” he said, and started to smile again. “Perhaps somewhere else, not here?”

“What a good idea,” Cassa said. “Perfect. Why don’t you go and do that?”

Willem grinned. “Now?”

“Now,” Cassa said. “Please.”

She smiled, too, to make this gentler. She wasn’t meaning to be cruel, but simply to explain, to establish clear patterns, to make him understand how she needed this marriage to be.