Page 19 of Brave Truth

Duncan snorted. “We’ve found it’s the best way to make sure she stays asleep until a reasonable hour. By which we mean about six, right now.”

“A consideration for your nanny,” Claudio agreed. Cammie was not particularly a morning person, nor a morning stoat. Duncan had the habits of anyone who’d survived the RAF. He could be awake in seconds when needed. But that made it a challenge at the other end of the day.

Both Cammie and Duncan kept demanding professional schedules, and they were both equally fierce about having time for each other, for Kenna, and for their friends before falling into bed. Though, admittedly, that ‘bed’ covered their own private amusements on a regular basis, not just sleep. Cammie was considerate about not rubbing her joys there in Claudio’s face, but she didn’t hide that she had them.

After about five minutes, it became obvious that Kenna was fading. Cammie came over in a couple of broad leaps before Duncan bent to offer her an arm up. She climbed up to perch with her front paws on his shoulder. Her rear legs settled in the crook of his elbow, so she was more or less on a level with Claudio. As she got into that position, Kenna made a plaintive “Up?” sound from Claudio’s knee. He picked her up carefully so she could be nose to nose with her mother. There was a brief moment of careful petting her mother on her furry head, then a more insistent “Down now.”

Claudio put Kenna down, and as her feet were steady, Cammie shifted back into human. She had the knack of doing it in motion, tidy as any magic he’d ever seen. She transformed in the process of landing on the ground, back to her husband, his arm around her waist. Cammie stood on tiptoe to kiss Claudio’s cheek. “Evening!” Her dark curls had come out of the bun at the back of her head, cascading everywhere around the edges of her hair.

“You remain exceedingly handsome in your fur. Though is your spring coat coming in?”

Claudio glanced at Duncan, who kissed his wife’s ear, then stepped sideways. “I’ll take her up to bed. Twenty minutes. Unless there’s A-N-O-T-H-E-R.” He spelled it out, then scooped Kenna up. Kenna claimed a kiss from her mother, then snuggled into her father’s arms, and he took her off through the door with no further complaints.

“She has been doing exceedingly well at learning her numbers. We’ve had to move to spelling longer words. I’d switch to French, but we actually wouldn’t mind her learning that.”

“Magyar,” Claudio suggested. “You could teach Duncan enough for the number of stories and time and such.” He didn’t bother to suggest German or Arabic, both of which Cammie was also fluent in.

“Mmm. Come inside? We’ve a decent supper. I got two rabbits at Fairlight Thursday after you left.” She did her hunting there. Trellech had, as she pointed out, both too much in the way of rat poison, and entirely too many people who would do the oddest things if confronted with an innocent stoat out hunting rodents.

As Orion had an entire country estate, a desire to avoid predators bothering the chickens, and agreements about what poisons were in use, it was vastly easier to find a rabbit there. Now she held the door open. They retreated into the sitting room, where she promptly poured drinks for both of them.

“Taking out your aggression on something? I didn’t think you were in quite that mood.” Their regular Thursday had been cut short on his end a little— he’d been yawning by the time they finished supper and hadn’t lingered.

“No, things are fine, honestly. But it felt good to be out and doing something active for a bit. The week’s had a lot of fiddly bits, and Giles had three meetings he needed to prep for.” Her primary focus these days was cryptography, both on her own considerable merits and assisting Giles, who had been her apprentice master and was still a dear friend.

He’d been blinded in the Great War, so Cammie did a lot of the reading of insignificant correspondence and rote prep when someone needed to do it. Then— because she could be painfully perceptive— she added, “You were thinking about something a lot. Orion noticed, of course, but he wasn’t going to push.”

“And he knew you’d ask me tonight.” Figured. Claudio shrugged. “It’s nothing in particular, but I had a question you’re best suited to answer.”

“Cryptography? Signals? Any of my many and varied languages? A now archaic form of braille? A bit of maths that Thesan wouldn’t do for you?” Cammie spread her hands, nearly spilling her drink.

“Your Schola year.” Claudio considered how to put this one last time before he said it. “Matthew Lawson, Boar House. Did I mention he’s taken over the weekly materia meeting?”

“You had.” Her eyes narrowed slightly. “I assume you’ve already looked up his bohort record.” He snorted, because of course that had been where he started, and she laughed. “Not loud and boisterous the way a lot of Boars are as students. Not cranky, like Orion can be. His fire’s banked well, a steady charge, not throwing his energy around foolishly. Which I am fairly sure is in the bohort notes several times over.”

Claudio nodded. “It is, actually. Both actual comments but also his style of play. He got things done, and I gathered that’s continued.”

“He was out of the country for an age. Just came back a few months ago.” Cammie raised an eyebrow at that, and Claudio nodded again, that he’d known it. “He’s kept up lightly with our year. An occasional comment by journal, a letter here or there. I don’t think he’s been close to anyone for a while.”

Claudio snorted and said, “I know you run signals on your year, as much as you ever did in the war. Define lightly?”

“Turns up every three or four weeks for something— Boar’s Head or a lecture. He makes it out to watch the apprentice league bohort more often, most weeks unless the weather is awful. Chats, is pleasant, but doesn’t come in with other people or leave with them. A lot of practice being ordinary and not attracting attention, actually.” Cammie shrugged. “Or so the analysis says. It’s not like I make a lot of that sort of thing.”

“Having your own occupation.” Though also, Cammie got plenty of gossip from her mother and step-father about who turned up on Schola Island. Her mother ran the bookshop there, and her step-father was head of Seal House and had been for years now. “Nothing more personal about his war?”

Cammie shrugged. “No. Just that he stayed in Germany. You know what he was doing, then?”

“The overview, I didn’t look for details. But administration work at Nuremberg. His name gets mentioned in a few of the white papers, if you dig past the first layer of sources. He was doing the sort of thing that’s deeply necessary and that most people would ignore. The fact that he was there so long suggests both competence and that he didn’t have anyone particular to come back for.”

Cammie pursed her lips. “No woman left behind, you’d have found out if he’d got married and it hadn’t come up.” She was fully aware of what the ordinary sort of information the Penelopes could lay hands on quickly included. “Actually. I wouldn’t be surprised if he either preferred men or didn’t care much about a relationship. Not sure which, but he was decidedly not grabby at Schola. Not with me, which just showed good sense, but not with anyone. He’s not awkward with women, like some people are. He also didn’t make the mistake of thinking he was more competent than I was.”

That made Claudio laugh. “Which is a sign of both intelligence and good manners, yes. Especially the first.”

She showed her teeth. “Why are you curious now, then?”

“He—” Claudio hesitated. “He had a bit of a bad turn on Tuesday, the sort of thing I noticed. I got him down to his usual pub, made sure he had food and something to drink. Some people he knew better came along, and it was obvious the publican knew his tastes.”

“Mmm. What’s he like in the meetings, then?” Cammie tucked her ankle up on her knee, the sort of entirely informal contortion that was absolutely not approved of by any of the older and more staid generation.