Accolon thinks he won't be tempted in Ch 11/Sc 1a of RAGING SEA by @KimHeadlee #DaylightSavingTime

Graphic overlay c2016 by Kim Headlee.

I'm not ready for Daylight Saving Time to go into effect yet. Are you? 

Used to be, when I was a kid half a million years ago, I always knew when to "fall back" and "spring forward" because the time changes fell on the weekends closest to my birthday and half birthday, respectively. Now it's all over the freaking map, and this year the change is the earliest I can ever remember!

Why? God knows. Certainly nobody else does. This is sheer madness and it HAS TO STOP!!!!!

There. I feel better now. Thanks for letting me vent. :)

Accolon, in today's excerpt of Raging Sea, also is confronted with a situation that's sheer madness, though it has nothing whatsoever to do with altering his sundial.

Previous excerpts of Raging Sea 
Chapters 1–6 in Raging Sea: Reckonings

 Chapter 7: Sc 1 | Sc 2 | Sc 3 | Sc 4 | Sc 5a | Sc 5b |
Chapter 8: Sc 1a | Sc 1b | Sc 2 | Sc 3a | Sc 3b |
Chapter 9: Sc 1a | Sc 1b | Sc 1c | Sc 1d | Sc 1e |
Chapter 10: Sc 1a | Sc 1b | Sc 2a | Sc 2b | Sc 3a | Sc 3b | Sc 3c |

Raging Sea Chapter 11, Scene 1a

©2016 by Kim Headlee

All rights reserved.

ACCOLON approached Morghe’s workroom, fighting to bury his resentment. His being the chieftain’s advisor did not give the chieftain’s wife the right to put Accolon at her beck and call, especially when that meant having to expose his bad shoulder—the one that had been wounded last year while conducting a covert mission for Urien—to the infernally damp and cold morning mist.

He shook his head to clear it, rubbing the shoulder under his cloak, and quickened his pace past the great hall. Of course she had every right to order him around now; his best friend had ceded that right to her. And, Accolon had to admit, she was proving herself to be as apt a ruler as she had promised Urien she would be. Her soaring popularity with the people as she dispensed wisdom and justice in settling their petty disputes, freeing her husband to concentrate upon the clan’s weightier matters, was but one example.

Her workroom was another.

Accolon reached the door and pushed it open; she had insisted from the first day to everyone, noble and commoner alike, that knocking was not required here.

Unlike Urien, who had established his workroom near his—and Morghe’s, Accolon reminded himself—sleeping chambers at the heart of Dunadd, she had commandeered a storage building near the kitchens. Now fitted with a hearth and chimney, and rare glazed windows thanks to some of the Clan Cwrnwyll wealth she had brought to her marriage, the building still housed the herbs, cooking oil, lard, salt, and other goods for which it had been built, but in a far more organized fashion.

The liberated space she had filled with tables for grinding herbs, mixing salves, and rolling bandages, and she had added several plain but sturdy chairs for visitors as well as a tall-backed, cushioned seat for herself. Dunadd already possessed a physician and infirmary, of course, but no one gainsaid the establishment of a second facility so close to the kitchens, where many of the daily mishaps occurred.

One of the visitors’ chairs was occupied as Accolon stepped into the chamber. Morghe was bending over the trembling hand of a kitchen maid, first slathering a cut fingertip with salve and then binding it.

She glanced up at Accolon, nodded a welcome, and returned her attention to the lass.

“You are excused from your duties until tomorrow,” she told her. “See me first to have your wound checked and redressed. It should be fine in another day or two, but stay away from the knives for at least a week.”

The lass rose and dipped a curtsey. “Aye, my lady. Thank’ee, my lady!” She turned and all but bumped into Accolon. “Oh! So sorry, my lord!”

Accolon stepped aside with a smile and a sweep of his arm. “The fault was mine, good woman, for being so near. Heal yourself, and enjoy the rest of your day.”

That seemed to fluster her more than a reprimand would have; she bobbed another curtsey, stammered out more thanks, and fled the workroom. The door banged shut behind her.

“Practicing your diplomacy, I see.”

Accolon turned. Morghe was wiping her hands on a cloth and grinning. She dropped the cloth onto the table and stepped around it to within arm’s length of him. Dressed in the plain-spun garb she favored while working inside this chamber, she looked more like a nun than the chieftainess of the most powerful clan of Brydein—and yet that only heightened her allure.

To rein in his emotions, he tried to picture her in the former environment, on her knees with hands folded and head bowed. It didn’t help much.

***

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