I come to her side, keeping my eyes demurely down. The dog follows me, nudging my fingers until I stroke her head. I do not look up until Lady Fliad sniffs.
“It seems your lineage has come calling, Cousin Iva. You’re leaving your kennels and stables for good.”
At that, my gaze finally whips up and I hope she can’t see how my heart feels like it’s sinking. I’m to be turned out. Where could I possibly go when every village, every croft, is just as desolate as this place? Only the nobility needs someone good with horses and dogs and those are my trades. Weaving baskets and sewing clothes are not enough to commend me. In the past, perhaps I could have married. There’s no one of marriageable age in the whole kingdom except those fighting on the front. There will be no luck from that direction.
Fliad smirks at me as if she has read my thoughts.
“My grandfather writes me to tell me that you are to be married. And I am to accompany you to the front to see it done.”
“Married?” I say and I don’t recognize my own voice. “To whom?”
“To a king,” Fliad says sourly. “Though why they choose my aunt’s illegitimate progeny,” she shoots a look at the knight with those words – if he didn’t know about my shameful roots, he does now – and then returns her raven’s gaze to me, “when there are ladies of blood to be had, I don’t know.”
She smiles tightly and her mother puts a consoling hand on her arm.
“We must make the best of it,” Lady Stepha says before coughing a long, aching bloody cough.
“Yes, Mother,” Lady Fliad agrees, and there’s a flicker of pain in her eyes. If she goes to the front, she will not see her mother again. We all know that.
“I … I …” I say feeling as if I’ve been knocked from the back of a horse at speed. “I’m not of noble blood.”
“Even diluted, king’s blood is worth something in these matters,” Lady Stepha says between coughs. She is never kind nor cruel, simply there being noble.
Fliad does not look like her, though I do. My mother must have been similar in face and form for we two are of the same brown skin, the same huge eyes, and waif-thin forms, though mine is hardened by work and scarred with marks of a life working with my hands while hers is so delicate a strong wind could blow her away. The rabbit fur of her collar makes her look like prey.
“Which king?” I ask. For what else is there to say. My fate is sealed, noble or not. The warmth of the kennel and stable exchanged for the coldness of a stranger’s bed.
Lady Fliad and her mother look away, and Lady Stepha’s cheeks flush hot but neither of them will answer me.
After a long moment, someone coughs and it’s the first time I hear the knight’s voice.
“Precatore of Iceheim,” he says, and it sounds like a curse.
5
HALDUR OAKENSEN
We ate.
We had bought food along the way here and had our first hot meal in weeks on the road but sitting in the kitchen – for the lady of the house did not invite us to her hall – and smelling the freshly baked bread as it came from the ovens and thick hot stew in the kettle over the fire was not like eating on the road. It is a kind of heaven all on its own.
I am not above closing my eyes and savoring every bite, the same as my vassals.
“Do you remember cook’s cranberry buns? At home?” Horace asks me in a whisper.
He almost looks his sixteen summers again. I offer a brief smile to honor that. It hurts to see him so happy – to see them all sated for once.
We’re given rooms in a drafty, unlived-in space in the castle. With the men all gone for years and years, the hearths are cold, and the hasty dusting is not enough to clean everything. We do not care. Most of the men are asleep the moment they roll their blankets across the beds. I do not set a watch. There is no need here and everyone should be allowed this one luxury – a night of peaceful sleep.
I wash from a bucket hastily. None of my clothing is clean, and there’s no chance to clean it unless I want to stay up all night. I, too, want the luxury of sleep. But I have responsibilities yet.
I must speak to the castle matron who takes the place usually filled by a steward. I wonder if Castle Tor has appointed a matron. I couldn’t even guess who they might choose. This one is a strong-bodied woman with a hard face. I like her immediately.
She nods approvingly when I explain what gear the two ladies will require and what limits we must place on weight and size. They must ride horseback with some haste, but it is winter, and we must keep them from freezing.
“You’ll take good care of our Iva?” she asks when I’m finished explaining. I’m surprised by her question, and it must show because she adds, “Of both of them?”
I nod my silent agreement.
