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she’d done it to those who tortured her husband and wouldn’t hesitate to do the same a second time.
    She twisted his clean hair into a heavy rope, ignoring his accusation that she was trying to scalp him. His protests changed to wordless hums of approval when she soaped his back, her slippery hands gliding over the curve where neck met shoulder and the deep valley where his spine bisected the hard slopes of his back.
    His protests started anew when she passed him the soap and a cloth. “You can finish the rest while I fill a plate for you and pour more wine.”
    “But you said you’d play lady’s maid to me.”
    “Sinhue does not bathe me all over.”
    Brishen grunted. “Wasted opportunity that.”  He coated the cloth in soap and began scrubbing, his frown forbidding at her chortle.
    It was her turn to frown when he stood up from the tub and reached for the drying cloth she held out to him. The movement made him pivot into profile, and Ildiko got her first glance of the ugly indigo bruise stamped on the back of his thigh.
    She held back the cloth and drew closer, gaze on the bruise. “What is this?”
    Wet and shivering, Brishen glanced down at himself, still semi-erect. The faint smirk reappeared. “Proof of my consuming passion for mollusk.”
    Ildiko scowled, her fingertips dancing lightly along the bruise’s dark edge. “Not that. This.”
    He shrugged. “Gift from an annoyed cow. I’m a better fighter than a drover. Felt like someone hit me in the leg with a hammer.”  Taking advantage of her distraction, he snatched the drying cloth out of her hand.
    “You should summon a healer.”  A part of her recognized she was being unduly concerned. Many a night Brishen had returned from the training field patterned in purple bruises from knee to neck. Still, she couldn’t help her overprotective response.
    As if recognizing the source of her fear, his voice gentled, and he twined her still damp braid through his fingers. “There’s nothing one can do that I didn’t already take care of on the road, Ildiko. It’s a small thing and will heal soon enough.
    “You still should have sought out a healer.”
    He wrapped the towel around his middle and took the second one she handed him to dry his limbs. “I was in too much of a hurry to return home. I had a wife waiting. And food.”  He flashed a fanged grin at her. “Not one and the same of course.”
    She swatted him lightly on the arm before scampering away on a screech when he returned the gesture with a hand to her buttock.
    They caught up with each other’s week as they ate. Brishen’s foray sounded miserable, complete with rain, fighting and bad-tempered cattle. He was on his third plate of food when he mentioned the barge carrying trade goods to Escariel’s docks. “We saw the barge as we traveled back to Saggara. I expected it to be much further down the Absu. Was it delayed?”
    Ildiko leaned back in her chair, twirling the stem of her goblet slowly between thumb and fingers. “You could say that. Someone in Gaur decided it might be amusing to list the weights and measures of the cargo in Gauri Old Form.”  She described the visit from the messenger and her anger at seeing the manifest completed in temple script as well as the long hours at the dock completing translations.
    Brishen’s dismay made her own irritation over the entire affair flare once more. “You’re an excellent helpmeet, Ildiko, but it’s disappointing this happened. I’d hoped the actual trade exchanges wouldn’t start out so contentious.”
    She caressed his forearm where it rested on the table’s surface. “I as well, though I suspect we won’t see much more of that in future shipments. This was someone testing the waters.”
    He shook his head. “You’d think they’d find better ways to waste their time and ours.”  He finished the rest of his wine and helped her stand. His undamaged eye was at drowsy half mast, and he’d tossed aside the patch earlier