Page 74 of The Consolation Prize

“Is no one else yet up?” Armand asked, glancing about with surprise.

Otho shook his head. “Just you and I.”

Armand eyed him speculatively as he loaded fish onto his plate. “You prepared this meal?” Otho assented. “Why are you up so early?”

Otho set down the loaf and poured two cups of weak ale. “Couldn’t sleep,” he admitted, just as Armand had given up all expectation of a reply.

“Why?” Armand asked, glad of a distraction from his own worries. As soon as he asked, he realized his mistake. Of course, Otho was worried about the approach of suspicions Northerners. Hearing that would only serve in making Armand feel even guiltier for not focusing on their real concerns right now. He scowled.

“I … er … had to speak to Rose yesterday,” Otho admitted, avoiding his gaze. Armand’s eyes widened. He took a bite of bread and butter. The fact he made no verbal reply seemed to unnerve Otho into speaking further. “I may have been a bit too harsh,” he continued in a voice that rasped.

“She’s still chasing after you, then?” Armand asked shrewdly.

Otho colored furiously. “Of course not!” A telltale flush was spreading right up his neck. Una’s brother wasn’t very good at lying, Armand thought wryly. “She’s not that sort of girl. She just—she doesn’t know what she’s about, that’s all!”

“She does seem a bit backward,” Armand agreed.

Otho’s eyes shot daggers back at him. “What do you mean by that?”

“Well …” Armand shrugged. “Just that she lives in a bit of a dream.”

Otho’s shoulders relaxed. “Precisely,” he rapped out, but he still looked deeply uncomfortable, and after pushing his food around his plate a moment, thrust it away from him uneaten.

“Has Una ever been betrothed to anyone but me,” Armand asked heavily, before he could change his mind or Otho fling off in another mood.

Otho looked startled. “What? Why?”

“Answer the question.”

Otho scratched his close-shorn head and Armand wondered not for the first time why he wore it like that. He wasn’t a pilgrim, so was he performing some kind of penance? “There was some talk of pledging her hand to some prince of the Western Isles,” he said slowly. “But that was years ago, when she was just a girl.”

“No one since?” Armand asked quickly.

Otho shook his head. “Once we embarked on war, there was precious little time to devote to royal alliances,” he said with a shrug. “Our father had other worries on his mind.”

“What about unofficially?”

“How do you mean?”

“You know, champions, admirers, that sort of thing.”

Otho snorted. “You’re thinking of the Southern court,” he said flatly. “We had no fripperies like that on our battlefields. My father jealously guarded his heir in any case. None of his generals were permitted to grow too close to her. Her personal guard was rotated every seventh day.”

Armand considered Otho’s words suspiciously. Their side had been losing, he supposed, but he still thought Una’s brother rather naive if he thought a man still wouldn’t notice an attractive woman, even in the midst of battle. Armand knew he would notice. Well, if it was Una he would. Besides, there was a general she had been close to. The one who had told her about the hidden treasure troves. “What was the name of your father’s general killed at Kettelbrooke?” he asked, recalling suddenly where Una said the man had fallen.

“General Brunold,” said Otho in startled tones.

“What was he like?” Armand demanded. “Young? Handsome?”

Otho stared at him. “He had a hunched back and was sixty-five if he was a day.”

“I must be thinking of someone else,” Armand mumbled. Yes, jealousy definitely needed adding to his ever-growing list of faults as a husband. “Una’s not fond of that housekeeper you hired,” he said, in a swift change of subject.

“I know,” Otho answered glumly. “She’s made no secret of the fact. Hasn’t liked her from the start.” He looked pained. “That might have been my fault too.”

“How so?”

“I didn’t consult her,” Otho admitted. “She felt I went over her head and left her out of the decision-making.”