Chapter 8: Complications and Comforts
Merlin was wearily glad to see the lights of Emmett's Creek emerge out of the twilight gray.
The trip had been almost boringly uneventful - in spite of the tension of remaining alert while traveling and making camp with a prisoner in custody who might do anything to escape; the memory of what he'd done himself in escaping from Arthur - but he'd pushed himself, coming back.
"Glad to see you got back in one piece," Elyan said, delaying his departure from the stable until Merlin was through bedding down the gelding.
He answered without thinking, "Well, I learned one or two things from Agent Arthur."
Elyan snorted, and Merlin looked up to see that Freya was standing in the doorway, flooded with lamplight. Whether she'd been watching for him from the tavern, or whether she'd noticed his arrival by happenstance, the expression on her face made his heart leap into his throat.
He'd missed her. He crossed to her, wishing he was brave enough to take her in his arms, again. But said only, "Hello."
"You're all right," she said, and it wasn't really a question. "Are you hungry?"
He shrugged. Not really; but maybe it was better for them to spend an hour or two in public company, rather than in private. Better for her peace of mind – getting used to having him back, after the week's absence; they'd not been apart more than a day's time since they married – better for his, too.
As they crossed the street, he wished he could reassure her. But there would be gossip, and not much gossip was ever kindly meant. He wanted to convince her she was strong enough to face it, to face anything. He wanted to remind her to keep her chin up.
He wanted to tell her he loved her.
The thought took him like a deputy's club from behind. Hard, fast, dizzying. Completely unexpected, and completely unwelcome.
He almost tripped, stepping up to the walkway outside the tavern, and she gave him a questioningly look. He squared his shoulders, not wanting her to think he might have been injured, after all.
That was the last thing she wanted to hear from him – would it make her laugh? It was the last thing he needed on his mind as new as he was to his job. It was a good thing he hadn't thought that before he'd taken the stranger to Stack's Corner.
Leon was the first person they saw in the tavern, turning from the table by the door he shared with his wife and two young sons. He didn't looked pleased, exactly, to see Merlin; the rancher said, "You shouldn't have taken a prisoner to Stack's Corner by yourself without a deputy, Reeve."
Merlin spread his arms silently. Here he was, proof that the trip had gone without mishap. And he wasn't about to start asking anyone's advice on how to do his job; Leon might as well realize that now as later.
Leon's eyes darted over Merlin's body as if seeking an expected injury, then over to Freya, who said nothing. His wife leaned across the table to twitch at his shirtsleeve, and he backed off with a muttered, "Well, then…."
Merlin perched tensely on the corner stool, noting other greetings with only part of his attention. Noting Percival, and Shasta, and the dinner set before him on the bar. There were too many things on his mind that needed time and attention. He felt stretched, exhausted – and wondered if it wouldn't have been better, after all, to simply go home and drop.
As he ate mechanically, tasting none of it, he wished he could reverse his realization. He could provide for her, protect her, patiently wait for her to reach the comfort-level of friendship again. Working hard, focusing on the creature comforts of hot meals and dark nights of sound sleep. But not with – this. Not with love trying to enter his life, his heart.
His mind felt a silt-filled pool, stirred and churned, all the dark things at the bottom swirling up to the light, where they didn't belong. All the reasons he didn't deserve love, didn't want to admit something that he'd only end up losing, sooner or later – and the longer he had it, the more it would hurt to lose.
Inside his memory he was straining to hear the words of a conversation, though a door blocked by her body. She hadn't been afraid of him, though he'd almost killed her with her own knife… Was that why she didn't like to wear the one Merlin had bought for her?
She hadn't been afraid of Merlin himself then, either. So what, he asked himself again, the hell had happened?
"What happened, Reeve?" someone said.
Merlin looked up, only vaguely aware that most of the tavern-goers had left the room, the hour late. Freya sat quietly beside him, hands in her lap, but turned so that she was facing him, waiting. Percival and Shasta occupied but not busy, cleaning up.
It was Cedric who'd addressed him; the pig farmer grinned, and it wasn't overly friendly. "You falling asleep after your long trip taking a prisoner in by yourself? Or do you plan to sit here all night?"
"No," Merlin returned evenly, refusing to be baited. Not here, not today, and not by this man. "And no."
Cedric hung on to the smile, but when Merlin said nothing further, and he couldn't find another jibe, he moved past to the door.
Merlin took a deep breath, stopped his hand from reaching to rub at his scar. Freya opened her mouth, hesitated, then changed her mind. He would bet money she'd intended to ask if he was all right, and he was glad she hadn't said the words.
"Merlin, Freya." Gaius was close behind Cedric. The old physician's presence in the tavern in the evening was unusual, but maybe someone had mentioned in passing his office that the reeve was back in town. "I am glad to see you back. I don't mind saying, I worried more than a bit when I heard you took a man to Stack's Corner on your own." His eyes moved from Merlin to Freya, and he could see the questions there.
Is he all right.
He felt burned out. The fire and drive and focus of aiming his whole being toward revenge was long gone. The momentum – the responsibilities of a cadet, the agreement of escort, the assignment of agent, the journey to assume another oath - was gone. The purpose of his life had turned like a weathercock in a windstorm the past year – one way, then another, nowhere long. He was reeve now, and husband to a girl who deserved better than him, but for how long? Would it last? Would he fail here, again?
Would he lose her? As he'd lost his family, or maybe as Old Matt had lost his?
Let the physician ask whatever was on his mind. Let her answer what she would.
Merlin stood and left the tavern for the cool dark night, the settled dust of the road leading away. He'd just got back; it would take his instincts, his senses, a while to settle back from full alert, day and night. The drain of emotion and energy following danger, that he should be used to, by now.
Tomorrow things would look better. Normal. Life in Emmett's Creek would capture his full attention and he could ignore these ideas of love and loss and home and family.
It was mere moments before he heard the sound of the tavern door closing, the rush of her boots in the dirt of the road, the swish of her skirts. She fell in beside him, glancing at him without speaking, and as they returned to their rooms over the reeve's office, they regained and resumed the comfortable silence he was used to.
See? Nothing had been fundamentally changed by his absence, or this trip.
The sun clearing the horizon in rising, the next morning, found Merlin shaving by candlelight, as he always did.
Early morning or late, the one window over the kitchen table wasn't enough to light the bedroom sufficiently, and not for the first time he contemplated the work and cost involved with putting in a window in the bedroom. He'd have to check with Mike to see how much of his agent's pay would be left after settling the mercantile's account and setting a bit aside for future need.
In the bed behind him, Freya stirred and rolled over. He shifted so he could see her in the small oval mirror with gilt-edged frame she had hung over the commode. Her black hair fanned across the pillow behind her, her cheeks flushed with the warmth of sleep and summer lingering in the nights.
He was usually gone by the time she woke, but his memory was good for the times he'd remained. He had three seconds left to watch her before her eyes opened, and as she was lying facing him, he'd be the first thing she'd see when–
Merlin scraped the last patch of stubble from the side of his neck as she bolted upright with a startled sound.
"Good morning," he said only.
"Morning," she murmured behind him.
She watched him, he could feel her eyes on his back, taking in his activity, harmless and innocuous as it was, before she relaxed, reassured. At least she'd slept the night through; he supposed it was progress that she trusted him in her sleep. Or maybe just her level of exhaustion.
He kept his back to her, pretending he wasn't finished, while she slid out of bed, mattress rustling under her weight, and wrapped her robe around herself. He wondered how she could stand it; wearing only his trousers he was too warm, and didn't relish the thought of dressing fully.
She edged past him into the kitchen, checking to see if the fire and coffee had been readied for the day. He thought it must be habit for her, because he'd already done those chores already, same as every other day the first week they'd lived in the reeve's quarters. She said nothing to him, asking no questions – he'd spoken briefly to Percival about the trip with the prisoner while she'd sat listening beside him – but he had thought she might have other questions to ask than the bartender had.
Merlin pulled the towel from his shoulder to wipe flecks of soap from his chin and throat as she returned silently, and took half a step back so she would have to pass him more closely on her way to the wardrobe – that or climb over the bed. Crowd her, even, he reminded himself from Clary's advice. He repressed an involuntary shiver as the lace on the sleeve of her robe brushed across his back.
Her eyes were down, her cheeks scarlet.
Tossing the towel across the bar on the commode, he stepped to the doorway of the bedroom, then paused. He was a beggar for punishment, he reflected ruefully. But her nervous rejection had become so familiar to him that he had missed it the past week; it was almost amusing to provoke. In some odd way it made her his, or maybe it made him hers, he wasn't sure.
So he turned and stepped silently around the bed, following her.
She thought he'd gone to the kitchen, he knew that from the quick careless way she shrugged from the robe and began unbuttoning the front of her nightgown with one hand as she flipped open the wardrobe door to make her choice with the other.
Merlin dodged the dress she tossed backward onto the bed, but when she drew her arms inside the nightgown in preparing to lift it over her head, he figured he better turn and retreat, or make his presence known. He didn't know what she wore beneath the gown, if anything - now there was a thought guaranteed to keep him feeling too warm – but knew she probably wouldn't want him to know, anyway.
He cleared his throat and followed it up with a polite, "Excuse me."
Her feet might have cleared the floor as she jumped and spun, but as he hadn't been looking at her feet, he couldn't be sure. But with her arms trapped inside the unbuttoned nightgown, already pulled up to her knees, she didn't have much of a chance for balance. He caught her with an arm around her shoulder-blades, savoring the indrawn breath and the trembling, before he set her gently on the edge of the bed to recover.
Then turned to the wardrobe before she could see the wry smile that threatened his composure. He chose a clean work-shirt and pulled it over his arms, turning back as he began to button it. Briefly he considered matching them up improperly to see if she might take over and button them for him, but couldn't decide if he could do it naturally enough to keep her from suspecting his intent. Or maybe she'd let him go the whole day mismatched to avoid touching him or pointing out the mistake.
She was staring at him – or rather his body – wide brown eyes flicked to his face uncertainly before she dropped her gaze to her toes, drawn up to the hem of the nightgown on the edge of the bed. She was hugging herself under the enveloping fabric.
He kept his eyes on the buttons as he quitted the bedroom for the kitchen, and almost felt sorry when he heard her flying through her interrupted morning routine. And when she'd worked up the courage to join him in that room, she barely sat still for two minutes together, pretending to eat the breakfast she fixed for them both.
Part of pushing the filly to accustom herself to him, Clary had said, was knowing when to retreat for the time being. And Merlin could only push himself, or her, so far, before there was no longer any enjoyment, little patience, and mostly the ache of longing and the loneliness of misunderstanding.
And the one word that had occurred to him, the previous night, the small simple single word that contained a world of potential – pain and bliss – that he acknowledged in his attempt to deny, made her reaction to him at once sweeter, and harder to bear.
I love no one. I may not be capable of it any longer.
He could laugh at the irony.
"Ah, Reeve Merlin! Good morning!" Mike's hearty greeting came before Merlin's eyes had completely adjusted from outside brightness and reflected glare. "Bet you're here for that rug your wife bought a week ago."
Rug? Merlin followed Mike to the corner of the store where he kept his household-textile merchandise, but stopped when the storekeeper indicated half a dozen rolled-up rugs.
"She didn't say which one," Merlin said.
"Must have slipped her mind," Mike said agreeably, making conversation without criticism. "Completely understandable, what you were doing this past week."
Merlin remembered the scattered packages, Freya's alarm at the rude intrusion of the stranger, his own sudden and familiar fear for her when he saw the other man at his door. He leaned the rolled rug Mike specified against the counter and began to stroll around the store, making mental notes.
He'd started this task the day after his inauguration, and hoped it wouldn't take too many weeks – taking stock of each citizen's taxable belongings and property. He had no idea if another tax farmer had purchased the rights to the region from Uther, and it wasn't his responsibility to collect those taxes unless Uther's agents notified him of significant delinquencies in his shire, but if there was a new collector, Merlin was determined that the taxes be charged fairly. And as Morgana had taught him, knowledge was the first and most important weapon.
"Can I help you find something else?" Mike asked.
"Maybe." Merlin ducked his head through an open doorway for a swift glance around the storeroom. "You have an attic on this place?" he asked.
"Nope. What you see is what you get."
Merlin made a thoughtful noise, finished his private inventory. "Ax handles?" he said, looking back to the counter where Mike waited.
"In the short barrel, there." Mike followed Merlin to the hardware side of the store, watching him test the handles for weight, balance, strength and line with a bemused expression. "You need the head to go with it?" the storekeeper offered.
"Not today. Could you write me a bill for what I owe you, and I'll settle by the end of the week."
Mike obligingly wrote out a fairly detailed list of items purchased, which Merlin didn't care about so much as the total. He glanced at it before tucking it into his shirt pocket, surprised that Freya had spent relatively little, and pleased also, but letting none of it show to Mike. He tucked the ax handle behind his belt and shouldered the rolled rug.
"Let me get the door for you," Mike offered, and Merlin nodded his thanks.
His own door was locked when he got to the top of the stairs – Freya had gone out, then. Not to the mercantile, obviously, which mean she'd probably gone to the tavern, or maybe to Gaius' office to talk, if he wasn't busy.
It took him a moment longer than usual to pick the lock one-handed, but once in, it took even less time for him to cut the twine binding the rug, and spread it on the floor, moving the table and one chair to do so. She'd be pleased to see it when she returned; he hoped she wouldn't feel badly about forgetting. Or maybe she hadn't forgotten, she just hadn't wanted to ask Percival or anyone else to help with the rug – which made him wonder if she was embarrassed for some reason to have anyone else see their living quarters.
Which brought him back to his second errand in town that morning. He took the ax handle from behind his belt as he left his assigned quarters; Elyan was the man for this job.
…..*….. …..*….. …..*….. …..*….. …..*…..
Freya had a dilemma. She sat on the kitchen chair that had been tacitly assigned to her by Merlin's dislike of sitting with his back to the door, and stared down at her dilemma. She hadn't meant the rug for the kitchen.
For the past four days she'd been nervous about spilling on it as she prepared meals for herself – only herself, as it turned out. All week Merlin had been leaving in the pre-dawn cool, returned long past an accepted dinnertime, quietly and politely refusing the plate she kept warm for him. As he'd done his first week as reeve, before he'd been gone to Stack's Corner.
She could move the rug out from under the table and chair quite easily, and had, the first day she'd walked in to find it laid out already. However, moving the commode was much more difficult, and lifting the bedframe to tuck the rug underneath its feet impossible.
And Merlin was now sleeping on bare boards.
After Freya had purchased the new green-and-blue quilt and white cotton sheets, she'd returned Shasta's borrowed bedding. Then Merlin had refused to put the new quilt down on the floor.
So she had to ask him to move the rug. Or ask someone else – and maybe have to explain why the rug was meant for the bedroom. Or she had to buy a second rug – cringing at the thought of the extra expense. Or she had to resign herself to letting Merlin sleep so uncomfortably night after night.
Or she had to ask him to share the bed.
Freya smoothed the section of skirt over her knees that her fingers had crumpled, and kept listening in vain for noises from the office downstairs. She'd heard the door almost an hour ago; this was the closest she'd been to Merlin in daylight hours since the day of his inauguration. Either that, or someone was robbing the place very quietly – in which case it was probably her duty to alert someone, though the stove and desk were too heavy to steal, and there was nothing else except coffeepot and mugs, one chair that didn't match the desk, and the key to the cell on a ring in the wall.
She stood finally, picking up the covered dish of roast beef, potatoes, and beans from Shasta's garden, now cold and congealed in the gravy because she was afraid to talk to her husband.
Please, just ask, he'd said. Asking him to move a rug should be easy.
She carried his dinner down the stairs, around the corner, glancing in the window to be sure he was still there, and alone, before entering.
Merlin sat at the open writing desk, moved away from the wall to face the door and windows, hat hung on the wall hook by the cell key. He bent over a sheet of paper, inkstand at the corner of the desk surface, his left hand clutching a handful of his black hair.
She entered and closed the door behind her, approached the desk. He didn't look up, but she was content to wait, to put off her awkward request, just to watch him. She'd never seen him write so, not even when he was compiling reports for Turad's council. The pen flew, his knuckles white with the effort of the speed, til he blew the ink dry and set the filled page facedown onto a handful of similar sheets. Then he set the pen back in the inkwell and sat back in the chair, sighing as he rubbed both hands over his face.
He looked tired, she thought. He looked thin.
"I wish this was still hot - I'm sorry," she said, moving forward to set the dish down before him. "Are you very busy?"
He looked at her for a moment, faint dark smudges under his eyes. "Only by my own choice," he said. He tapped his fingers on the cover of the dish, but she could tell his thoughts were elsewhere, and she wondered why he was making himself busy. Then he said, as if making an effort to remember her, "Have you arranged the rooms to your liking?"
Her cheeks warmed. "Well, I was hoping I could talk to you – about that – for a minute?"
If she asked him to move the rug, would it upset him to think she planned for their sleeping arrangements to remain unchanged for the near and far future? She hoped he would understand she only wanted him to be as comfortable as possible, as many nights as he spent on the floor.
Was it by his choice, or hers, that they slept apart?
It was a disconcerting question. She wasn't sure she could answer it, even if he wasn't focusing undivided attention on her. It flustered her; she was far more comfortable watching him do something else.
"We can change anything you're unhappy with," he prompted gently. Patiently.
"Not unhappy," she hedged.
The door of the office opened behind her, startling her; it was Elyan's oldest son, with a brown-paper-wrapped package almost as long as his arm. He grinned at her before she turned back to see that Merlin's eyes were still on her.
They stayed on her, deep and unfathomable, as the boy said cheerily, "Howdy, Reeve, ma'am. My dad sent me with this for you." The paper crackled in his grip.
Freya said to Merlin, "I can go if you need to–"
"You can stay," he said, then turned his gaze to the boy, standing and coming around the desk to take the package. "Tell Elyan thanks, I'll be by later to pay him."
"Well, he told me to tell you not to bother," the boy said. "He said to owe him one - he'll ask you a favor sometime, too."
Freya saw a sharp look of wariness edge into Merlin's blue eyes. "I'll want the option of re-negotiating at a later time," he said, "if I agree."
The boy's grin flashed, white teeth against dark skin. "Dad said you'd want conditions, and he don't mind, says he trusts you."
"Fine."
The wariness wasn't entirely gone, but Freya would swear it had been tempered by a flash of humor, if only for a moment. The boy nodded to her again as he backed out the door.
Merlin said to her, "What do you want to change?"
"What?" she asked, blushing over her absent-minded curiosity to know what was in the oddly-shaped package.
He repeated himself, and added, "The rooms you're – not unhappy with?" When she didn't immediately answer, he guessed with a faint crooked smile, "You want me to build you a fireplace like Shasta's?" She shook her head, smiling at the absurdity of the size and weight of Shasta's fireplace in their small second-floor kitchen. He went on, "You want me to dig you a second well?"
She kept shaking her head, smiling more widely because it was such a nice and novel thing to have Merlin tease her.
"You want me to knock down the partition? You want me to put a window in the bedroom?"
She stopped, surprised at the last suggestion. Surprised because suddenly her answer was yes – it would be nice to have a window in the bedroom. "You could do that?" she said hesitantly. "You would do that?"
His lips curved a little more. "But that's not what you came to ask me."
After his absurd guesses, she found it easier to say, "Do you mind moving the rug to the bedroom instead of the kitchen?"
He crossed to the door, held it open til she came through too, but she didn't realize his intent til she was halfway up the stairs, following him.
"You don't have to do it now," she called, aghast that he'd interrupted his work for her request.
He might not have heard her protest, for all the good it did. She stood on the landing as he moved the kitchen furniture, dragged the thick heavy rug through the doorway between the two rooms.
"In front of the wardrobe?" he said, preparing to take his burden around the foot of the bed.
There was barely a foot of space between the wardrobe door when it was open and the edge of the mattress; more than half the rug would be hidden under the bed. Why would he think that – oh. He thought she wanted the rug for her feet when she stepped out of bed.
And he was ready to provide her that luxury without question or critique.
For some reason, that realization made her want to cry.
"No," she whispered, and had to repeat herself more clearly. "I thought it should go here." Just behind the doorway, between the commode and bed, less than a foot of the edge of the rug under each.
He looked at her, then down at the patch of floor where he'd slept for almost a fortnight, before and after his trip to Stack's Corner. Then at the thick hooked rug gripped in his hands. And she wished she could tell what he was thinking – if he knew she was trying to be thoughtful and caring, that she hoped he would accept it, or if he was angry that she was assuming he wouldn't be sleeping in the bed anytime soon.
"Or… we could take it back to Mike's." Her voice trembled.
He knelt to lift the feet of the commode and slide the edge of the rug underneath, maneuvering so skillfully the pitcher never rattled in the basin.
"I've already settled our account with him," he answered, twisting to do the same with the feet of the bed, and she couldn't tell a thing from the even tone he used.
The muscles in his forearms stood out, his strength evident in his hands – the right one ink-stained from his writing in the office downstairs. She watched the top of his head, hair slightly disarrayed from where he'd rumpled it earlier, as he unfolded the opposite side of the rug into place, body braced trembling against the weight of the lifted bed. Then he stood and joined her in the doorway, so quickly she didn't have time to consider retreating – they were inches apart, the blue of his gaze intense but unoffended, as far as she could tell.
"I have something for you," he said, and though she was struck by the suspicion that he'd taken the rug as the gift for him she'd intended, there was no emphasis in his words, no implied also, or in that case.
Several other snatches of memory darted across her consciousness with dizzying rapidity and disconcerting variety – the smoothness of the bare skin in the hollow under his collarbone, the fierce light in his eyes when he fought, the way the calluses on his palms were just rough enough to feel when he touched her, the scent of him that lingered on his shirts before she submerged them in the laundry tub.
Then he was past her, picking up the mystery package from the table, slitting the knotted twine with his belt knife. The brown paper fell away to reveal a kitchen ax, with a shiny-sharp doubled-edged head.
She stared, swallowing. Why on earth did he intend this as a gift for her? He thought she should split her own firewood? She glanced automatically at the woodbox next to the iron stove – still mostly full.
Merlin noticed her confusion, but his expression remained patient. He observed neutrally, "You're not wearing the knife."
She wrapped her fingers around her wrist, wondering how he could tell that underneath her sleeve. "I didn't think I'd need it in Emmett's Creek," she said, the excuse sounding thin even to her. She tried again, "I'm not really in danger here."
His jaw tightened. "Your friends sent you to Turad this spring because they had a different opinion," he said to her, and she thought he was making an effort to hold his temper. He added, "Padlow's friend seemed – friendly."
Again, no inflection of scorn, no sarcasm, just a simple statement to remind her how far from friendly the situation with the stranger had been, and could have been worse. She wanted to explain, he wasn't Padlow's friend, he was only looking for work, but that would be the same as arguing with Merlin. And he was right, after all.
"You keep it right here by the door," Merlin said, gesturing. "Even someone who's armed and bent on trouble is going to have second thoughts if you have this in your hand." He flipped it without taking his eyes from her, and she couldn't help wincing at the thought of the injury to his hand if he miscalculated.
But now the handle of the thing was extended to her in clear invitation. She hesitated, unwilling, but his hand never wavered under the weight, his eyes never wavered. So she came to him, taking it, holding it in both hands, keeping her eyes on the solid polished head, tapering smoothly to a fine perfect edge.
"Have you chopped wood?" he said.
She nodded. Every winter she was with Padlow, at least twice a week; he hadn't been as conscientious as Merlin about keeping the woodbox supplied. And the year before that, when her mother was sick.
"If you have to swing, don't hesitate." She nodded, but didn't meet his eyes until he'd said her name twice. "I would much rather pay Gaius' bill for anyone else in this world, than for you." Tears blurred his face in her vision as she nodded again. "You understand me?" he persisted, startling her with the intensity in his voice. "You use this on anyone you feel threatened by. At least be safe in your own home."
She broke away from his gaze, a little frightened – or maybe awed was a better way to think of it – by how seriously he took the question of her safety. Padlow never cared for her one bit; Merlin seemed to prefer risking injury to himself to provide her with means of defense – however unwilling she was to participate. But to keep refusing had begun to feel like she wasn't allowing him to keep his vow to protect her. And she shouldn't insist on her preferences and inclinations above his wishes.
The wood of the handle was satin-smooth, and it felt lighter than she'd expected, lighter than it should. And here she stood with an ax in her hand, experiencing a new feeling. Her life was no longer limited to enduring whatever anyone chose to do to her, and having to heal and forgive afterwards. She had options, now. It was unfamiliar territory; she was unsure whether she could recognize right and wrong so clearly in this broader world.
It was the same, a little voice whispered, in her marriage. Padlow had left her little choice about anything at all; it was easy to be obedient and submissive when his requirements were so clear, and infractions of his absolute rule so swiftly and painfully punished.
Merlin gave her so much choice, so much freedom, it was almost confusing, hard to know what she should do. He watched her now, watched her hesitantly handle his gift.
She remembered Shasta's comment about weapons from Merlin being comparable to jewelry from anyone else. Something like this must be the equivalent of precious stones, maybe. And she was grateful for his thoughtfulness.
"Thank you," she said softly. What could she do in return?
He was still touchy about her doing his laundry, though they hadn't discussed it again. He hadn't caught her cleaning, mainly because he hadn't spent many waking hours in their rooms. And the cooking–
"Do you prefer Shasta's cooking to mine?" she blurted.
His brows furrowed slightly. "Why?
"It's all right if you do, I don't mind eating our meals there," she said, and shut her mouth against a rush of babbling about what Padlow had expected of her at meal-times, Morgana's smoothly-run kitchen, and her experiences helping Shasta at the tavern. She tried again, "It's nice to have someone to eat with. But I understand if you're busy–" She stopped, remembering that he'd said he'd chosen to be busy, and spun to the door, bending to put the ax away where he'd instructed.
"What do you know of Whatley's duties as reeve?" Merlin said behind her, and she turned. He'd shifted sideways to her, leaned back against the table, arms crossed over his chest, staring at his boots.
"When he wasn't drinking in the tavern," Freya said slowly, "he seemed to spend most of his time – talking."
Loitering was more accurate, that and intimidating people, on the streets and in the shops. Whatever visits he made to outlying citizens were to confront complainers rather than to address the complaint, the way she'd heard it in the tavern. But that was second-hand gossip about the dead, and she'd not repeat it.
"Taxes are a volatile subject in Emmett's Creek," he said, somewhat absently. He wasn't telling her anything she didn't know. "It's been years since they were calculated correctly or collected fairly. If and when we get a new tax farmer for the region, it will be helpful to know exactly what can be taxed, and how much to expect."
She stared at him. "You're updating Whatley's tax records?"
"Whatley kept no records." The corner of his mouth quirked.
She felt her mouth drop open. "You're writing the tax records for Emmett's Creek?" No wonder he'd been so busy.
"For the shire," he amended, then turned his head just enough to see her. "Only you and I know it, though."
She nodded, realizing she probably didn't fully grasp the significance of that. But she could guess if folks knew what he was doing, at the least he'd be inundated with false information and bribes, and maybe at the most there'd be threats and even attempts to steal paperwork.
And he'd told only her. She remembered him sitting on the stairway at Morgana's, saying to her, Yes I think I would trust my life in your hands. Well, he'd just done exactly that.
So why was it she couldn't make herself trust being in his hands?
"And," he added, apologetically, "I'm often invited to stop for dinner, wherever I'm at in the afternoon?"
"So then you're not hungry for dinner when you get home," she realized, with faintly disappointed embarrassment.
"I should have said." He frowned to himself.
"No, it…" She shook her head; it wasn't really logical to think he'd still want his dinner so late into the evening when he was more used to providing for himself than to having someone cook specifically for him. "It's not your fault. I'm just… glad I know."