I gripped my temper.
Don’t just accept that from him. Turn and face him down now. This was not advice from Verity, but a command. I set the tray down atop a small table carefully. I took a breath and turned to face Wallace. “Have you a dislike of me?” I asked directly.
He took a step back but tried to keep his sneer in place. “A dislike? Why should I, a healer, mind if someone comes to disturb an ill man when he is finally resting?”
“This room reeks of Smoke. Why?”
Smoke?
An herb they use in the Mountains. Seldom for medicine, save pains nothing else will halt. But more often the burning fumes are breathed for pleasure. Much as we use carris seed at Springfest. Your brother has a liking for it.
As did his mother. If it is the same herb. She called it mirthleaf.
Almost the same leaf, but the Mountain plant grows taller with fleshier leaves. And thicker smoke.
My exchange with Verity had taken less than a blink of an eye. One can Skill information as fast as one can think it. Wallace was still pursing his lips over my question. “Are you claiming to be a healer?” he demanded.
“No. But I’ve a working knowledge of herbs, one that suggests Smoke is not appropriate to a sick man’s chambers.”
Wallace was still a moment as he formulated an answer. “Well. A King’s pleasures are not his healer’s area of concern.”
“Perhaps they are mine, then,” I offered, and turned away from him. I picked up the tray and pushed open the door to the King’s dimly lit bedchamber.
The reek of Smoke was heavier here, the air thick and cloying with it. Too hot a fire was burning, making the room close and stuffy. The air was still and stale as if no fresh wind had blown through the room for weeks. My own breath seemed heavy in my lungs. The King lay still, breathing stertorously beneath a mound of feather quilts. I looked about for a place to set down the tray of pastries. The small table close to his bed was littered. There was a censer for Smoke, the drifting ash thick on its top, but the burner was out and cold. Beside it was a goblet of lukewarm red wine, and a bowl with some nasty gray gruel in it. I set the vessels on the floor and brushed the table clean with my shirtsleeve before setting the tray down. As I approached the King’s bed there was a fusty, fetid smell that became even stronger as I leaned over the King.