Chapter 22 -Unexpected Guests

We worked quietly next to each other until my curiosity bubbled up again. "How much time does Lizbeth spend with her books" She sighed. "If we are not careful she would be willing to spend every the whole day reading. Not that being curious is bad quite the opposite but I do hope that she will find a friend of her age." She picked up one of the leftovers that didn't fit on the plates and eat it quickly. "I mean so far her options where only the maids or the people at her old school. But no matter what the maids are simple not able to keep up with her inquisitive nature and well those that help out in the harem are usually older too. And from her school to my knowledge there is only one person who generally writes to her from time to time." She shook her head. "I do wonder what might have happened there I definitely will take a closer look at them since they are now my responsibility too."

She nodded then opened the kitchen door. "Well shall we?" We had prepared 5 plates in total. And where going to place them around the rooms. One of the reasons why they were so good was that you could leave them out in the open for 3 days or so before they started to taste bland. Well unless you put them somewhere wet, but the palace was nicely cooled and dry because of the heavy stone and gardens. One of the plates was for me and the others in the office. One for the servants and other three would be put around where the harem would be.

We went directly towards Lizbeth, only placing one plate on the table in the big central room. She was still in the same chair the book being her whole world at this moment. When I got a bit closer I noticed that Uru was eyeing us curiously. The little critter seemed to have not moved at all. Suha closed the door gently. "Hi dearie sorry to distract you but we just wanted to put these here. Misra showed me some of her family dishes and well these here will last for a while so feel free to snack on them." She carefully placed the plate on the desk. I could actually see it click behind Lizbeth eyes when she inspected us both. She nodded only once silently. Before looking at the plate. "We will leave you be now. These other need to be shared." She chuckled and we both left the room.

Just when I left I could see her try one of them. We will see if they will help of course but it was good to see that she was willing to try. "Well then let us get this one to my cuties." Suha went straight towards the classroom and went in with only a short knock. This room was not like any school I had ever seen. It had a giant pillow seating area with semitransparent curtains. A wall full of books. Large windows that looked out over the outside garden of the harem and boxes with toys and other things like blankets. In all it felt more like a playroom then a school room. However in the center sitting on one of the pillows was Gabrielle her glasses on her nose her face serious while she was reading a story about a dragon slaying princess? It sounded quite interesting. She noticed us and waved us closer but didn't stopped her reading until she had found a good place to make a cut.

"... and there she was standing with her sword drawn and shield hold up high ready to defeat the mighty beast." She put a book mark in and closed the book gently. "And you will hear the rest later after we had entertained our guests." Both of the cuties started to protest until they noticed the small plate. I smiled gently and placed them in the center of the table. "We just wanted to drop by and deliver some snacks." Gabrielle raised her eyebrow then shrugged slightly meanwhile Sabi was the first to grab one. The snack looked way bigger in her tinny hand but she still ate it with one bite smiling big. "Thank you" she mumbled with full mouth. I chuckled. "You are welcome princess but please finish eating first before talking."

Madi was the next to try them. She didn't bother with a thank you but was clearly enjoying the snack. "What do we say when we get something sweetheart?" Gabrielle asked gently from behind her. The tiny one blushed and murmured a shy. "thank you." I smiled widely and just said. "You are quite welcome. Now I sadly will have to take my leave for now. Before I forget it. Is it ok to join you two with the tailor later on?" I looked towards Suha I could see a slight twitch in her eyes. Maybe this was not the right place to ask her for this. But then after a short while she nodded. "That will help to get a better gasps on your behavior with outsiders and allow us to prevent any ... unwise choices being made in regards to style."

I opened my mouth to answer when Sabi gently tugged on my trousers. I bend down to her and she whispered into my ear. "When mommy has that twitch it means you did something stupid. You better say sorry now or you will end in timeout again." She wasn't as quite as she hoped to be so Suha did raise her one eyebrow while looking sternly at us both. Gabrielle on the other hand fought hard not to show a big grin on her face. "Umm ... sorry." She kept her stern look and I could feel the sweat starting to gather. My ears did instinctively falter slightly while I was uncertain what exactly I had done wrong. "Its ok ... it would have helped to know about that yesterday so we could have plan more time with the tailor. Thankfully this one is willing to adjust to things like that. Still stuff like this will create the reputation of our house and with that how easy or hard it will be to gain the support of others. Because you can bet that many will ask her how the visit to our new house was. And while the tailor herself will not gain much by brake our trust, the same cant be said for all of her servants."

Her voice was calm but i knew instinctively that I better pay attention to her. She stared at me for a moment longer then looked to Gabrielle. "Well then excuse us we have to talk to madam Laferin to look how long the time is we booked with today." Gabrielle nodded and picked up her book again. I only barely noticed that she had someone already eaten at least one of the snacks. I bowed to the assembled beauties especially the little ones. "Then excuse me my lady's duty calls." The two little ones giggle and Gabrielle smiled. "Good luck then. We will see each other at the tailor. Now who can tell me where we did we stopped the book?" I could hear the gentle tease in her voice that didn't suit her serious look or posture at all when we stepped outside of the playroom. We grabbed the remaining plates and walked towards the entrance of the Harem. Well one off the entrances although there were apparently far less then I had assumed. "I am sorry if I have offended you Suha." I said after noticing that she still seemed to be a bit angry.

She chuckled suddenly. "Are you this easy to worry?" I shook my head with a soft smirk. "Not by everybody no." I was rewarded by yet another raised eyebrow. "So should I be offended or pleased that I can make you apologize so easily for causing me mild discomfort?" I made a courtly bow that I learned about from Marie. "Well I hope I don't offend you. But well ... you are a very intimidating woman. A beautiful intimidating whom I already start to respect and like a lot. So of course I try to not anger you." I could see a true smile spread on her elegant lips and she pondered for a moment. "I see ... well then don't let us waste our time here then." We continued to walk towards the exit.

I was surprised to notice that there was no lock or handle on this side and she had to knock to ask to be let out. The door on the right was opened by a young guard in the uniform of Laris, who eyed us like we were thieves until he was gently nudged in the side and opened wordlessly the door for us. He revealed an whit haired royal guardsman to the other side who bowed towards us. "Greetings your grace please forgive the young one he has yet to be trained in the art of guarding this important part." I smiled gently and bowed back.

"It isn't a problem kind sir. Thank you for your service here." He chuckled and saluted me with his fist on his plate. We nodded to the two guardsmen as we continued our way towards the office. Just as I was almost out of earshot I could hear the young guards confusion. "I tought that they where not allowed to ever leave the harem unless on the dukes order?" to which the old man replied. "That was the duke ..." I shook slightly my head. "I really need to get the guards sorted so they know who I am. I mean the royal guards know about me apparently but it seems my home guard are quite ... rough around the edges." Suha looked at me and nodded in agreement. "Well most of the guards left after their commander got arrested since he was the one who did the payroll for them. Those that stuck around are those that either just started the job. Where to lazy to look for a new one or have other interested in staying in the palace. Like a wife that works here too or such. As far as I know the royal guard did no stop them from leaving since less of them meant less of worry for them."

I sighed. "Yeah there is a lot of stuff I have to do some of it slipped my mind earlier. Sorry about that but thankfully so far we didn't have a palace revolt or something like that." I said with a lopsided smile. She shook her head and suddenly gave me her plate of snacks she was carrying. I took it confused and he clapped her hand two times. A maid one of those that I had not seen steeped out of a room nearby and bowed towards us. "How may I help you milady?" She smiled and gave her the larger of the remaining two plates. "Sorry to disturb your work my dear but can you please place these somewhere where it will be shared with the other servants? Just a small gift from the new duke and I, and can you please tell madam Laferin that we require her assistance at the main office?" The maid carefully dusted off her hands on her white skirt before taking it carefully with a wide smile.

"It will be my pleasure milady. Is there anything else I might be able to help you with? Should I carry the other plate for your grace?" I shook my head with a smile. "That wont be necessary I think I will be able to carry it, thank you." Suha nodded with a smile of her own. "That would be all from my side as well my dear." She bowed again, keeping the plate carefully level, and left us with a "then please excuse me." Before disappearing into one of the hidden side corridors. "I do think you are on a good way of winning the heart of the palace maids at least. If the old duke would have offered them a plate full of snacks they would have just frowned and worried about what they had done wrong." I chuckled and shook my head while we finally reached the office.

I saw Marie. Deeply busy with the books, writing notes and carefully comparing those to some other ones. Johanna was sitting in one corner together with Elaina discussing something that seemed to have their complete attention. In the opposite corner of the room I saw Madam Tersou, the queens personal bodyguard, sitting on a chair her legs high on a trunk nearby.  She was reading a book but seemed to be only mildly interested in its content. I stepped towards her and smiled in greeting. "Hello my friend please forgive me for letting you wait, I didn't receive message that you where waiting here." She carefully placed a bookmark where she had been then looked up with a relaxed look. "All is well dear friend. I waved them of when they wanted to send you message about my arrival, it is not to time critical and I had spotted this most misleading novel that caught my interest. Sadly so far it has proven to be of a different topic then expected."

I chuckled and took a peek at the title that just said. "Garden of pleasure" I read the title out loudly. "Not enough garden in there?" She grimaced. "It is all about gardens, but I expected some more raunchy material to be happening inside them. And now I am suddenly all intrigued about the best way to keep a flowerbed healthy during the winter even trough, I life in a climate that never has a real winter ... I do wonder why the old duke had this here however?"She shook her head slightly turning it like a confusing tressure.

My laughter did echo trough the room. "I assume he kept it for the same reason he has some really awful poetry in his chambers. For the look alone. Oh but forgive me I still need to train my manners. Have you meet my wife?" I bowed slightly steeping out of the way so the two could see each other. Suha did raise her eyebrow at the whole exchange but kept a pleasant well trained smile the whole time while the lady just shook her head slightly. "My dear wife Suha umm." Deep red suddenly did spread over my cheeks. "Please forgive me I was never introduce to your full title. But um ... anyway, this is Madam Tersou the personal bodyguard of the queen."

Suha smile did not falter even a little bit but I could see the glint of anger and amusement in her eyes for a short moment. "Welcome to our home Madam. Stories about your exploits have even reached our secluded ears. I hope we find you well today. And my dear 'husband' you should be able find out the titles of all your wives with ease, should you not?" Her commands to the bodyguard where mild and kind while mine where full of tease and taunt. Making me blush once more. "Of course milady." I mumbled towards her.

The Bodyguard chuckled and stood up making a bow towards Suha. "It is a pleasure to meet you milady. And i am glad to see the dear Duke still in one piece ... knowing titles or not." Suha smirked on that enjoying the slight jab while i just shook my head slightly before taking a slight breath. During the week i had got to know her a bit, similar to Elaina she felt a bit guilty about letting the assassin escape and about the guards trying to arrest Johanna. Still it developed in a rough friendship. We didn't knew each other to well but it was good enough to address her as friend. "So i doubt that you came to read about new pleasurable garden technics. What can we do for you my friend? Did you just miss my charming personality?"

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Ok .... now .... this chapter is a bit shorter because it was a to nice point to do the cut ^^ I do have enough written for the next chapter altrough i do need to rewrite some of it .. as always ;) This however was delayed because well the guards before had a lot more dialoge ... then i had to restart my tablet and well ... it was gooone -.- however i think i would have removed it anyway since it didnt make to much sense ^^

Anyway i do hope you enjoyed it ^^ And i do think i will get the next one out before christmas ... maybe :p