The Duke's Bed Warmer

Alina’s hand moved instinctively as she stitched a uniform collar the next morning. Around her, the sewing circle hummed with quiet conversations. But her mind still churned through the same questions over and over again until someone called her name.

"Miss Ashworth."

Alina looked up. A young kitchen maid stood there looking nervous, her eyes darting around before leaning closer.

"Maren wants to see you."

Alina set down her needle and stood up instantly. She walked through the empty corridors and knocked her door twice. It opened.

Alina entered, and Maren began speaking without wasting any time.

"My agents have confirmed the information," Maren said. "It connects to the Voss network’s western communication line."

Alina’s gaze shifted to the map on the wall where Maren had marked the village.

"Is this proof enough?" Alina asked.

"This is enough for me," Maren sat behind her desk. "For Austin, we need something undeniable. What we have is strong circumstantial evidence. But Audrey will deny it. She’ll say Garrett carried personal letters and happened to stop at a village."

"Then what do we do?"

Maren pulled out a folded document from her drawer.

"I’ve got the document that the courier carried. The handwriting is disguised. Whoever wrote this, used their non-dominant hand intentionally," Maren said.

"But they forgot the pattern remains the same and it matches with the samples from Audrey’s household letters. Also the document has a watermark which belongs to Audrey’s personal stationery items."

Alina looked at the document. The watermark was faint, but she could see it: a lion and crown.

"I want to show this to His Grace myself," Alina said.

Maren thought for a moment, then nodded.

"He is in his study. I’ll be outside the door."

Alina entered his study without knocking. Austin looked up and was slightly startled. She hadn’t come to him in days. She walked to his desk and put all the documents on his desk one by one.

"Audrey’s maid saw us go to the restricted corridor. She reported it to Audrey’s household, in the afternoon, Audrey’s courier Garrett rode south and stopped at a waypoint village that Maren has had flagged for two years as a Voss network communication point. He was there for an hour."

Austin read every document carefully.

"The watermark..."

"Lion and crown which belongs to Audrey’s personal stationery. The handwriting is disguised, but Maren’s analysis shows pattern is similar to Audrey’s household."

He looked at her with an unreadable expression.

"You did all this yourself?"

"Yes. Because you wouldn’t listen," she replied, looking into his eyes. "I did it with the help of my friends and the skills you told Maren I had."

At that moment, the door opened and Maren stepped inside. She placed the final verification report on the desk delivered by her agent. Everything pointed to Audrey’s household.

"I recommend the long game. Don’t confront her. Let her think she won and investigate quietly to gather more evidence," Maren said.

Austin looked at the evidence then at Alina and made a decision.

"Maren. Send word that I want the entire castle present at the evening address."

Alina frowned.

"Why?"

He stood up.

"To do what I should have done from the beginning," he looked at her. "Being your shield."

Alina froze.

"You...don’t have to..."

"The damage was public," he said quietly. "So I need to fix it publicly too. Maren can run her investigation quietly but the court needs to see something loud first."

In the evening, as ordered, the great hall was packed with courtiers. Austin had called a formal address, which happened rarely enough that the entire court was buzzing. Whispers had filled the hall long before Austin arrived, curiousity rippling through every corner.

Austin entered and stood in the center of the hall. The room fell silent immediately.

"Four days ago, classified intelligence was leaked. I believed the breach came from someone I had recently trusted with sensitive information," he began. "But I was wrong."

Shock rippled through the room. The duke was admitting his mistake in front of the entire castle. It hadn’t ever happened before.

"The investigation conducted by the very person I accused has revealed that the breach was originated from within the household office."

He didn’t need to say Audrey’s name but every person in the hall knew who controlled the household office. Every eye turned to Audrey.

Audrey stood perfectly still, her expression calm and unreadable.

"Miss Ashworth was wrongfully accused," Austin continued. "For four days she endured the consequences of my mistake. But instead of defending herself with words she conducted her own investigation using her own resources and presented her findings to my intelligence officer, who has independently verified her conclusions."

His gaze then drifted to Alina.

"Miss Ashworth... I owe you an apology."

The hall seemed to hold its breath. No one could believe that the duke was publicly apologizing to his bed warmer.

He then walked to Alina and put his hand on her waist. The court exhaled.

He walked her to the table and seated her three places from his own. He pulled out her chair himself. The duke pulling out a chair for someone was a gesture he had never made for anyone except visiting royalty.

She sat. He returned to his seat the head of the table. He gestured for the others to sit as well. Everyone obeyed, still in shock.

Audrey sat, sipped her wine as if nothing was wrong.

But every person in the hall had watched the duke publicly humiliate his fiancée’s household, apologize to his bed warmer, and seat her closer to him than she had ever been.

Emeric caught Alina’s eye from across the hall.

"Umbrellas," he whispered.

She laughed softly, picked up her wine glass, and tasted her victory.

At night when he came to his room, she was at the desk working on something. She stopped and looked at him.

"You just accused Audrey in front of everyone. She won’t let it go."

"She deserved that for framing you."

"You think an apology, a waist touch and pulling out my chair will make everything fine?" she said. "You accused me of treason. A speech in the great hall doesn’t erase that."

"Then what does? Tell me."

"You can’t expect me to tell you how to fix what you broke," she said. "Figure it out yourself. Like I did to prove my innocence."