This Is Why She's Obsessed #4
We finished morning roll call, ate breakfast, and dove straight into the morning drills.
I watched in open wonder as Helena directed every stage of it herself. I had already seen how formidable her swordsmanship was, but the blade she swung today had an entirely different flavor. Yesterday she had driven the knights like a starving beast. Today she flowed through them like the wind, letting every strike slip past her as if it were nothing.
“She’s really something else.”
The sight of her striding through the ranks—those heavy curves of hers packed tight and held firm by leather armor—was nothing short of spectacular. I could have stood there forever, work forgotten, just watching. Unfortunately I was still a page. Putting off my duties was not an option.
My mistress might have let it slide with a generous smile, but a brand-new attendant who started slacking this early would only make trouble for himself. So I spun on my heel, hurried into Helena’s tent, gathered the laundry she had stripped off the day before, and headed back to the washing place by the stream.
Keeping yourself as clean as usual while training—washing clothes and scrubbing down between drills—was next to impossible. Even though it was only practice, the air felt close enough to real combat that no one had the luxury. It had been the same when I myself was being trained, so I needed no further explanation. The one exception was Helena, and that exception existed solely because she was both the duke and the absolute head of this training ground. The privilege was not granted because she was a woman; it was granted because she was strong.
That did not mean the other knights spent every hour in sweat-soaked clothes. Most of them had brought spare sets, and during personal maintenance time a few even did their own laundry. Still, none of them could wash anything in the middle of drills.
“Whoa…”
I settled by the stream and let out an involuntary gasp of admiration. Helena’s undergarment—the chest binding that doubled as her underwear—was even larger than I had imagined. The whole thing was black, trimmed with lace, and packed with every detail designed to fire a man’s instincts.
“Honestly, something this big and this blatant? You could rub your face in it and still walk free.”
Suddenly I understood why her face had gone red when she handed her clothes over. On the outside she kept up a polished façade, yet the underwear she was forced to entrust to me was so shamelessly vulgar that even she must have felt awkward about it.
None of that changed my job. Like a diligent page I carefully worked in the plant-based soap, scrubbing out the grime with care, then rinsed just as carefully. Compared with the ordinary dunk-and-dry laundry most people did, the treatment was almost luxurious. Naturally I did not lean in for a sniff.
I folded the outer garments onto a broad wooden board that looked like a chopping block, laid the underthings in the remaining space, and left the riverside in a hurry. Advertising her underwear to the entire camp was not an option. Right behind Helena’s tent the forest began; no one ever came that way, so it was perfect for drying clothes. Before I left for the laundry I had already set up a simple rack. I hung everything neatly and left it to the sun. We were only at the edge of the trees, so the dense leaf canopy could not block the light.
“Haaah…”
Once the laundry ordeal was over, a long breath of relief slipped out on its own. Next came cleaning the tent, but Helena kept the place tidy to begin with; a light once-over was enough. That cut the remaining work dramatically.
Which meant the next task was helping with lunch.
“Lord Zion, what brings you here at this hour?”
When I stepped into the mess tent, Bart looked up from the busy prep work and tilted his head in confusion. He had people chopping and measuring everywhere; I felt a twinge of guilt for interrupting, so I went straight to the point.
“This is lunch for Lady Helena and all the knights. I’d like to lend a hand, even if it’s only a little… Would that be all right?”
“What? You yourself, my lord? No—no matter that you’re a page, I can’t dump this kind of hard labor on you.”
Kitchen work always welcomes another pair of hands, yet Bart was still sizing me up as a noble and treading carefully. He seemed to worry that letting me cross into their territory might itself become a nuisance. I understood the feeling well enough. The higher a person’s rank, the better it usually is if they simply stay in their seat; when they start poking around under the banner of “inspection,” everyone ends up exhausted. I was nowhere near that lofty, and I had no such intention, but I was still a noble, so of course he fretted.
Even so—
“In the big picture I’m in the same position as you and everyone else here, Bart. So stop refusing and just put me to work.”
With those final words I slipped in among the crew prepping the soup base and started chopping. Looking at the mountain of ingredients piled behind the counter, it was clearly beef stew rather than simple soup.
“Ah… uh… well…”
Bart was still frozen in place, but I simply sat myself in front of a crate of tomatoes and began peeling. My knife work in a kitchen was something I would put against even Helena’s; the pace was blistering.
“Bart. Give the orders already. The senior man can’t just stand there staring.”
I flashed him a grin that made it clear I had no intention of backing down. Only then did Bart let out a huge sigh of resignation and start bellowing at the top of his lungs. He had been frozen for only a few seconds, yet he cracked the whip over the mess crew with ferocious energy.
“If you don’t want to be called a pack of useless bastards, move! You’re all healthy and you’re still dragging your feet?!”
“Yes, sir!”
I felt a twinge of guilt for having forced him into shouting, but I kept a calm heart and emptied an entire crate of tomatoes. Judging by pure speed I might as well have been a blender. I’m really sorry about this. In return—though it’s hardly enough—I’ll work my ass off and lighten the load.
“Whoa. Nobles know how to do this kind of thing?”
One of the mess hands who had been about to tackle the onions stared at me with eyes the size of saucers. I had just carried a basin of water over to the onion crate.
“I told you—I’m in the same position as all of you. I serve someone.”
“Still… even Lord Chess doesn’t know stuff like this, does he?”
“In theory he might. I’ve never asked him… Anyway, let’s get moving.”
The mess hand and I sat facing each other across the basin and dumped as many onions as we could into the water. That way the sharp compounds dissolved a little and the eyes stung less. When peeling, you cut the root end last; most of the heat concentrates there. Every one of those little tricks I had picked up in the miscellaneous library of the Divine Realm.
“Damn… you’re crazy fast.”
Pull an onion from the left crate, dunk it in the middle basin, finish it, stack it in the empty crate on the right. The little assembly line kept the efficiency respectable, and I earned genuine admiration from the mess hand.
“Is that guy really a noble?”
“Even if he’s Lord Chess’s son, this is ridiculous. Is there anything he can’t do?”
After the onions came carrots and potatoes; the peels flew off so quickly that whistles of amazement rose from every corner. Most of the praise came from the people kneading bread dough, the ones not tied to the stew prep.
Potatoes, carrots, onions, thyme, bay leaves… even the laurel. The only thing left was slicing the meat, and that was already finished. I had not been the only one working with both hands flying.
“Truly impressive. We’re done dirtier-fast than usual.”
Bart looked at me standing idle and his eyes sparkled. Every trace of the earlier worry had vanished; the trust he showed now was the kind reserved for a reliable colleague.
“That’s a relief. I’m really sorry about earlier.”
I bowed my head and apologized cleanly for having forced the issue. Bart waved both hands in frantic denial and raised his voice.
“Not at all! I’m the one who should be thanking you! Cooking time just got shorter, and now all that’s left is simmering the stew and letting the dough rest before baking—everything will be so much easier. As you well know, my lord, the prep is the real back-breaker.”
“Yeah, I know it well. I’ve lost count of how many times I wished someone would just sell the vegetables already peeled.”
“Exactly! But with freshness and all that, you just can’t…”
Bart was so delighted that someone understood his suffering that he turned into a complete chatterbox. I was hardly in a position to claim deep kitchen hardship, but I nodded along and played along as best I could. Truthfully I did understand a little.
“Oh, right. Would it be all right if I used a few ingredients myself? I need to make a snack for Lady Helena.”
“Of course! The Krauser duchy bought these ingredients, so using them for Lady Helena of Krauser is only natural. From now on don’t even ask—just take whatever you need.”
“Really? You’re sure?”
Bart was the master of this kitchen. Asking his permission to use ingredients was the proper way, yet I had never expected him to grant me free rein. I accepted the offer with gratitude and immediately began mixing cookie dough from the remaining supplies at the counter.
“Um… Lord Chess doesn’t cook himself, does he? Did you learn this in the kitchens of House Altram?”
“Ah… something like that.”
I had actually taught myself in Hypnos’s domain, not in Altram, but I let the story slide. Recounting the long, tedious tale that began with an over-prescribing quack’s medicine and my subsequent death was simply too exhausting. Even if I hadn’t been tired, I would not have told it; it would only have created more noise.
“There. That should do it. Once it rests I’ll just fry them in a pan and we’re finished.”
Helena’s house had an old brick oven, but out here there was nothing of the sort. I would have to use a skillet over low heat. I had done it yesterday, so it was no trouble. I wrapped the dough in a clean cloth, set it in a bowl, left the mess tent, and carried it back to Helena’s tent, tucking it somewhere cool. The mess crew would handle the rest of the cooking and serving; all I had to do was bake the cookies, exactly as I had yesterday.
“Haaah—roughly thirty minutes to an hour…”
With a little free time at last, I planted myself in a corner of the tent, closed my eyes, and dozed. A short nap to kill time and shave off a little fatigue. Thankfully the moment I regulated my breathing my consciousness cut out, and after that I slept a stretch that felt both long and short.
“Hn…?”
A rustling sound woke me. I wiped a thin trail of drool from the corner of my mouth with my sleeve. Probably just the tent canvas scraping the ground in the wind.
“Lunch still hasn’t started, I guess.”
Whenever Helena received her portion she came straight back to this tent. No matter how deeply the knights respected her, she was still their commander. If she sat among them, no one would be able to joke around freely while eating. Shoulders would tense whether they liked it or not. Eating alone was her way of looking out for them.
That thoughtfulness was exactly why I had decided to bake cookies and offer them as a small reward.
“Done yet?”
Cookies fried in a skillet needed a lid and a low flame. Without the lid the weak heat never circulated properly and they never cooked through; with too much heat they simply burned. I nodded in satisfaction at the freshly finished batch. Cookies didn’t need to be served hot, so I could make them ahead and simply bring them out later with tea. Still, a final taste check was necessary. I had seasoned the dough as I mixed it, but better safe than sorry.
“Mm. Still delicious—?!”
Perfect sweetness, perfect crunch. Just like yesterday, the cookies had baked beautifully. Nothing seemed wrong. Yet the instant I put one in my mouth, searing pain exploded from my throat. I could only choke and gurgle; I could not even scream properly. It felt as if every blood vessel in my body were being stabbed by needles.