A Bankrupt Duke Jokingly Asks His Scullery Maid for Financial Advice — But When She Turns His Ledger Around and Reveals the One Route That Could Save His Dying Estate, He Realizes She Is No Ordinary Servant

PART 4 

The inn at Blackwood Crossing was the kind of place that existed for travelers who preferred not to be remembered — a low timber building with a sagging roofline, its windows shuttered against curious eyes.

Theren and Mave had spent the better part of two days arranging what could be arranged from a distance. Messages to trusted farmers along the inland route. Quiet instructions to the few household staff Theren trusted not to gossip. A thin story for anyone who asked why the Duke of Ravenstone had suddenly taken an interest in touring his northern tenant farms.

It would hold. Provided nothing forced Malachor’s attention their way too soon.

Now they sat in a private room above the tavern floor, a single lamp between them, waiting for word that the first shipment of raw silk had begun its journey toward the hidden dock at Oak Haven.

The wait had stretched long enough that Theren found himself watching Mave across the table rather than the door. Watching the way she’d unpinned her cap, let a few strands of dark hair fall loose. The way her fingers moved restlessly against the wood grain, as if she were still tracing river routes in her mind.

“We should settle the terms,” she said finally, breaking the quiet. “Before the shipment arrives. Before either of us gets swept up in whether this succeeds and forgets to decide what happens if it does.”

He raised an eyebrow. “You want to negotiate now.”

“There’s no better time, your grace. Once the barges move, we won’t have the luxury of sitting still long enough to argue over it.”

She folded her hands, and the softness he’d glimpsed at the riverbank vanished entirely, replaced by the same sharp clarity she’d shown that first night in his study.

“I’ve built this plan from nothing. My father’s routes, my knowledge of the charter, my name with men who’d never trust a duke’s word alone. That’s worth more than a maid’s wages, and I think you know it.”

“What are you asking for?”

“Forty percent,” she said without hesitation, “of all profits from the river trade, for as long as it continues. Not a bonus. Not a gift you can revoke when it suits you. A share formalized with your seal behind it.”

Theren sat back, arms crossed, though there was no real resistance in the gesture. “That’s a considerable sum for a scullery maid.”

“I haven’t been a scullery maid since the moment I corrected your ledger. We both know that. The only question is whether you’re willing to admit it in writing.”

He almost laughed — a short, surprised breath, because she wasn’t wrong, and pretending otherwise would have insulted them both.

“Forty percent,” he repeated slowly. “And what else?”

“Protection. Full legal protection and indemnity under your ducal authority. If this fails — if Malachor discovers what we’ve done before the routes are secured — I won’t be the one standing alone before a magistrate while you retreat behind your title. Whatever risk you take, I take equally. But whatever protection your name affords, I want equal claim to it as well.”

Theren studied her for a long moment. He thought of every servant who had ever curtsied to him out of obligation, every merchant who had bowed while secretly resenting the ease of his birth. He found none of that resentment in Mave’s expression. What he found instead was something closer to a woman stating a fact she’d already proven she was owed.

“Chief trade strategist,” he said at last. “That’s the title I’ll use. If anyone asks what role you hold in this arrangement — not maid, not assistant. Strategist.”

Something shifted in Mave’s face. Not quite surprise, but close to it, as if she’d expected to fight harder for this than she’d needed to.

“You agree, then?”

“I agree.”

He reached for the small traveling case he’d brought, drawing out a folded sheet of paper, ink, and the compact seal he carried for official documents. He wrote quickly, plainly, without the flourish his solicitors usually insisted on. A simple agreement. Forty percent of river trade profits to Mave Okavana. Full legal protection and indemnity under his name. Both their signatures binding it before witnesses could be found to make it more official later.

When he pressed the ducal seal into the wax, the small sound of it seemed louder than it should have in the quiet room.

“There.” He slid the paper across. “Chief trade strategist of Ravenstone’s River Venture. Try not to bankrupt me twice in one lifetime.”

Mave read the agreement carefully — twice, the way Theren imagined she read everything — before signing her name beneath his. For the first time since the study three nights ago, something like real relief crossed her features. Not triumph. Not yet. The particular relief of a woman who had waited years to be owed something and was finally, however cautiously, allowed to claim it.

“You should know,” she said, folding the paper and tucking it into her cloak. “My father would have found this arrangement deeply amusing. A duke, a maid, and a business contract signed above a tavern that smells of stale ale and river damp.”

“Your father sounds like a man of good taste.”

Below them, faintly, came the sound of a horse arriving at speed, then footsteps taking the stairs two at a time.

The messenger they’d been waiting for had finally come — and with him, the first true test of everything they’d agreed to.