“Of course, my queen. I should be pleased to.”
We left the garden, and I followed her to her chambers. I waited for more than a short time. When she emerged, her little maid Rosemary was behind her, insisting on carrying the scrolls for her. Kettricken had washed the soil from her hands. And changed her gown, and added scent and dressed her hair and was wearing the jewelry Verity had sent to her when she was pledged to him. She smiled at me cautiously as I looked at her. “My lady queen, I am dazzled,” I ventured.
“You flatter me as wildly as Regal does,” she proclaimed, and hastened away down the hall, but a blush warmed her cheeks.
She dresses so just to come to speak to me?
She dresses so to … attract you. How could a man so astute at reading men be so ignorant of women?
Perhaps he has had little time ever to learn much of their ways.
I clamped my mind shut on my thoughts and hastened after my queen. We arrived at Verity’s study just in time to see Charim leaving. He was carrying an armful of laundry. It seemed odd until we were admitted. Verity was wearing a soft shirt of pale blue linen, and the mingled scents of lavender and cedar were lively in the air. It reminded me of a clothes chest. His hair and beard were freshly smoothed; well I knew that his hair never stayed that way for more than a few minutes. As Kettricken advanced shyly to curtsy to her lord, I saw Verity as I had not for months. The summer of Skilling had wasted him again. The fine shirt belled about his shoulders, and the smoothed hair was as much gray as black now. There were lines, too, about his eyes and mouth that I had never noticed before.