“I didn’t mention it, I only printed it,” said Rael angrily, “and he’s my brother and I’ll talk about him if I want to! Ruyven, Ruyven, Ruyven – so there!”
“Hush, hush, Rael,” said Calinda, “We all-” she broke off, thinking better of what she had begun to say, but Romilly heard it with her new senses, as clearly as if Calinda had said, We all miss Ruyven. More gently, Calinda said, “Put your book away, and run along to your riding-lesson, Rael.”
Rael slammed his primer into his desk and raced for the door. Romilly watched her brother enviously, scowling at the wrinkled stitchery in her hand. After a minute Calinda sighed and said, “It is hard for a child to understand. Your brother Darren will be home at Midsummer, and I am glad – Rael needs his brother, I think. Here, Romilly, watch my fingers – wrap the thread so, three times around the needle, and pull it through – see, you can do it neatly enough when you try.”
“A knot-stitch is easy,” said Mallina complacently, looking up from her smooth panel of bleached linen, where a brilliant flower bloomed under her needle.
“Aren’t you ashamed, Romilly? Why, Mallina has already embroidered a dozen cushion-covers for her marriage-chest, and now she is working on her wedding sheets.”
“Well,” said Romilly, driven to the wall, “What do I need of embroidered cushion-covers? A cushion is to sit on, not to show fancy stitching. And I hope, if I have a husband, he will be looking at me, and not the embroidered flowers on our wedding sheets!”
Mallina giggled and blushed, and Calinda said, “Oh, hush, Romilly, what a thing to say!” But she was smiling. “When you have your own house, you will be proud to have beautiful things to adorn it.”
I doubt that very much, Romilly thought, but she picked up the stitchery-piece with resignation and thrust the needle through it. Mallina bent over the quilt she was making, delicately appliqued with white starflowers on blue, and began to set tiny stitches into the frame.
Yes, it was pretty, Romilly thought, but why did it matter so much? A plain one would keep her just as warm at night, and so would a saddle-blanket! She would not have minded, if she could have made something sensible, like a riding-cloak, or a hood for a hawk, but this stupid flower-pattern, designed to show off the fancy stitching she hated! Grimly she bent over her work, needle clutched awkwardly in her fist, as the governess looked over the paper of sums she had done that morning.
“You have gone past my teaching in this, Romilly,” the governess said at last, “I will speak to Dom Mikhail, and ask if the steward can give you lessons in keeping account-books and ciphering. It would be a pity to waste an intelligence as keen as yours.”
“Lessons from the steward?” said a voice from the doorway. “Nonsense, mestra; Romilly is too old to have lessons from a man, it would be scandalous. And what need has a lady, to keep account-books?” Romilly raised her head from the tangle of threads, to see her stepmother Luciella corning into the room.
“If I could keep my own accounts, foster-mother,” Romilly said, “I need never be afraid I would be cheated by a dishonest steward.”
Luciella smiled kindly. She was a small plump woman, her hair carefully curled, as meticulously dressed as if she were about to entertain the Queen at a garden-party. She said, “I think we can find you a husband good enough that he will see to all that for you, foster-daughter.” She bent to kiss Mallina on the cheek, patted Romilly’s head. “Has Rael gone already to his riding-lesson? I hope the sun will not be too strong for him, he is still not entirely recovered.” She frowned at the tangled threads and drunken line of colored stitching. “Oh, dear, dear, this will never do! Give me the needle, child, you hold it as if it were a currycomb! Look, hold it like this. See? Now the knot is neat – isn’t that easier, when you hold it so?”
Grudgingly, Romilly nodded. Domna Luciella had never been anything but kind to her; it was only that she could not imagine why Romilly was not exactly like Mallina, only more so, being older.