The Prince and His Slave [REWRITTEN]

Chapter 16 - [Secret]

My eyes widened. Though I shouldn't have been too surprised by her sudden desire to want to help. Tabia had a strange affection for maids. She often treated them very kindly despite not having a need to do so.

So I smiled. "Thank you, Tabia."

"How did you get involved in this anyways? The maid came to you for help?"

"The maids friend did."

"Who?"

I jerked my chin in the direction of my washroom, where Chione was. I then lowered my voice even more. "The friend wanted Chione to kill the child. But I didn't let her go through with it."

"Good," Tabia said. "She does not seem like the kind of person who'd do that."

"Yeah," I sighed.

"Well, you finish up with your work then... I'll report back once I've gotten an answer from Khafirin."

Her sudden seriousness caught me off guard and so I simply nodded as she walked off and left.

But I felt relief now.

With Tabia's help I could surely help Chione by helping her friend, and for some reason that made me happy.

After a short while, I began to wonder what Chione was still doing in my bathing room. Usually, she would leave and come back with the water, but today she was still in there.

I walked in and was surprised to see her sitting in my large, round tub. She had a cloth in her hand and was scrubbing it. I raised my eyebrows and walked over to her. "You don't have to clean that, Chione," I said. "I have cleaning servant who will do that."

She looked up at me from the tub. "But it's dirty."

I placed my hands on the edge of the tub and looked down at her before I chuckled. "People bathe in the river on a daily basis. I'm sure that a little bit of sand isn't going to kill me."

I could see her embarrassment as she stood up, a little bit of red peeking in from under her copper cheeks. "Well... okay then."

I held out my hand to help her out of the tub and she only took it after a moment of hesitation. Then, holding my hand in one of hers and her dress in the other, she climbed up the short steps and out of the tub.

When she was out, she let go of my hand. "I'll have your bath ready for you shortly."

I smiled at her. "Have you practiced how to write your name?" I asked, finding that more important. "I told you you'd have to have that done by now."

Chione suddenly smiled proudly. "I have, actually."

I shouldn't have been surprised. "Show me," I said as I walked out of the room and towards my table. She followed. I grabbed some papyrus, unrolled it out for her and handed her a brush.

With only a little bit of hesitation, she started writing. She wrote her name first, and then mine.

I nodded my head as I watched her, a small smile on my face. "Impressive," I said.

When she finished, she handed me the brush. "There."

I chuckled. "There's one mistake though."

She looked at me in surprise and watched as I leaned forward and fixed one of the characters in her own name. She had written my name perfectly.

When I looked over at her, there was a slight disappointment on her face. "You did a good job," I said. "Now how about this..." I began to write down ten new, different characters onto the paper. When I was done, I pointed at each character and read the sound aloud. "Repeat after me," I said to her after I went through them once.