“I’ll help,” he said softly. “We have some time. We stopped the lower-hierarchy demons from bringing you to the demons here. With you back and…how you’ll act toward me in public, they’ll be content to play with us for a while.”
I nodded and thought about leaning back into his warmth, but he’d already moved away, going to stand by the door.
“I’ll join you here tomorrow,” he said. “You can show me the proper way.” A ghost of a smile flitted across his lips. “I already gave the last batch to the hardest-hit village. I haven’t heard the results yet. We’ll put together small batches for the other villages to try. As soon as they request more, as they will, we can put together larger batches while they try to make it themselves. You might have to show them. I don’t have the patience to teach. Before you do, though, I want you looking…” His gaze slid over my body, and regret bled through the bond. “I want you looking the part.”
I was wearing his old clothes again because he’d ruined mine and I didn’t have anything else. Before, it had aggravated me to wear his things. Now…I kinda liked it. It brought a bit of comfort to my turbulent life.
“You’re going to try to put me in dresses?” I asked with a sinking heart.
“You don’t like dresses?”
“I like them just fine, but they have a time and a place. Working is not that time or place.”
“What is that time and place, then?”
I shrugged. “A nice dinner. A ball. A date, I don’t know. Things we don’t have anymore.”
“First, I didn’t mean put you in dresses, no. I meant that you should wear clothes actually made for you with a certain finery of fabric that the villages will expect from a representative of the royal court. You’ve already been measured; we just need them delivered and you wearing them. You’ll have to resign yourself to wearing my old training clothes just around the castle. Second, we can certainly plan a nice dinner. I get a least a night off a month. I’ll look forward to being your date.”
My belly flipped over as he left, the sun showering down on the white shirt spanning his broad shoulders. Talk about hot and cold.
I shook my head and looked around. He’d said he would help me tomorrow, but that didn’t mean I had to wait. Might as well get started.
By the time evening descended, I was sweaty and tired, having worked feverishly all afternoon. I’d hunted down some canisters that would work and prepared them for Nyfain’s evening departure. He found me almost as he’d left me, standing within the shed, staring.
“It’s time to go in,” he said in a dark tone, his gaze sliding across the workstation. His brow furrowed. “What is this?”
“So.” I unstuck my hair from my sweaty face. “I think I’ve solved our traveling issue. I’ve prepared and mashed the ingredients. Come here, I’ll show you.”
He glanced behind him, up at the sky. Without comment, he came around the table and stood beside me.
I took the pestle out of the mortar and held it up for him to smell. He leaned down and did so.
“Do you smell the difference between yours and mine?”
He nodded, straightening up.
“Okay. I’ve sectioned the prepared ingredients into these canisters. I’ve scratched a line on each one to indicate how much hot water should go in. All they have to do is fill it, mix it, wait until it cools enough to drink, distribute it into ten equal cups, and feed it to who needs it. It doesn’t matter how far along the person is in their sickness. This is safe for anyone to drink. It’ll be as potent as it gets if they just mix it themselves.”
Nyfain chuckled. “Incredible.”
“What?”
He shook his head. “The rate at which you problem-solve. This is perfect, and it’ll be much easier to carry. Thank you. The villages will thank you.”
“Yeah, and they’ll also witness firsthand what it’s supposed to look and smell like. That should make it easier for them to re-create it.”
“I am constantly wowed by your giving heart. Most people would become wealthy by selling or trading this elixir. There is no reason that your family should struggle.”
I put lids on the canisters and piled them up for him to take when he could. “People don’t have much in my village. It isn’t fair to profit from people who don’t have the money to pay when there are lives on the line. Living shouldn’t come with a price tag.”
“A sentiment not many people share.”
“That’s their problem, not mine.”
He stepped away and waited for me to follow.
I hesitated, uncomfortable with leaving a job unfinished. “I didn’t get a chance to do the demon draught.” I glanced at the dwindling day, the light leaching from the doorway. “I’ll get to it tomorrow, I guess.”