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Because of course he was.
Soon there was only one hound left, and when Declan chopped off its ear with his axe, it limped back to wherever it had come from with its tail between its legs.
Declan laughed back at Archie, like it had been nothing but another hunting competition. “Looks like I got that one on you, Ogre.”
But even after the dogs had been routed, screams and soft wailing carried with the breeze. Declan went quiet. And while the princess hadn’t been allowed to join in the fighting, Archie wasn’t surprised to see her helping to gather up the wounded.
“Did either of you get hurt? Archie? Declan?”
Archie shook his head, but Declan immediately took a step back, holding his arm and protesting before the princess could even properly corner him. And for once, the young lord didn’t look the least bit cocky. “Don’t fuss. I’ll be fine.”
Archie blinked. Declan had been bitten. When had that happened?
And did dog bites usually make grown men slur and sway?
Ainsley caught hold of him and found the bite on his left forearm. “Declan, it’s turning green. It looks like . . .” She didn’t say what it looked like, but Archie had caught the smell of rotten fruit and could already guess. Ainsley steeled her face. “We have to find a healer, and then we have to show my father. Archie, can you . . . ?”
Archie immediately helped to steady Declan, but he already knew a healer would not be enough. They might have defeated the immediate threat, but if the feral hounds had been infected by the same plague as the rats, then any wound they left behind would be fatal.
Chapter 22
Pussyfooting Around
It had taken a few weeks after the festival for things to settle and for Castletown to readjust to its new reality—both good and bad. None of the castle hunting hounds were infected. The feral hounds were strangers to the village, simply taking advantage of the open gates. No one knew where the creatures had come from—it had always been rats who spread the illness before—but most of them had been killed quickly. Fifteen people—including guards and villagers of all ages—had been bitten and were receiving treatment at the castle.
In the meantime, most people were sticking to their own houses and their own kind, but more out of habit than actual command. Hounds were larger and more frightening than rats, but they couldn’t hide their numbers or breed so quickly. Once they were gone, they were gone.
Or at least, that was all Archie or any other average citizen seemed to know.
Sophie sat on the Charity House’s kitchen counter, swinging her feet and watching Archie work. “Matron Granny Thatcher said the princess is coming to see us today,” she said in a teasing sing-song voice that wasn’t at all subtle. “Are you going to come out and read stories with us?”
“I don’t think so, Sophie,” Archie said, keeping his head down.
The girl looked scandalized, like he had just said the sun wouldn’t be shining outside. “But you’re Anderdolf.”
Archie shook his head. He didn’t know how to tell Sophie that he didn’t want to be Anderdolf anymore. That real life wasn’t like a faerie story, and his father might have been right all along. The fantasy had become too much, and all he wanted was something real.
After officially being disinherited and leaving the mill, Archie only had one place to go. The matrons’ Charity House. He was an orphan now, strictly speaking. He was even underage—at least for a few more months. And the matrons liked him well enough. Or at least they knew he could earn his keep—baking, cleaning, or picking up anything heavy. It wasn’t a long-term solution; he might still end up hitching his muscles to another man’s cart and taking some apprenticeship like he could have had with the bakers, but at least it would be a cart of his own choosing, without his brother, a cat, or even a princess meddling.
Archie kept working, and when the princess came and Sophie left to meet her, he stayed in his place in the kitchen.
He didn’t even open the door.
Though he couldn’t say he was entirely surprised or even disappointed when the princess came and opened the door herself. It seemed he still wanted her near, even if he feared their relationship might have become an unhealthy one.
But he kept his back to her, letting her voice wash over him.
“Archie,” she said, her words tentative and a little sad. “I’ve missed you. I know I’ve been busy at the castle these past few weeks, but I sent for you at the mill. You never answered. I had to hear from the children that you came to stay here. And I might have thought—if you needed a place to stay—you could have come to me. That we could have found you someplace better.”
Archie couldn’t imagine allowing the princess to grant him another grand favor like that. He would never feel like he belonged. He never went out with his bow anymore, even when the cat glared at him like he was no better than a coughed-up hairball. And any time he thought of answering one of the princess’s royal summonses to join her in her work at the castle—he just couldn’t do it anymore.
He wanted to help his people recover from the festival attack, but he didn’t want to pretend.
There was plenty of work to do at the Charity House, and no one expected him to be anything other than a miller’s son.
This wasn’t the sort of conversation he wanted to have in full view of Ainsley’s guards, the matrons, or even the cat, but it seemed he wasn’t being given a choice in the matter. “I’ve heard stories of you too, princess. So perhaps you could tell me how Declan’s doing?”
“He’s . . . becoming insufferable,” Ainsley said carefully, somehow still managing to keep her composure with what must have been courtly grace. She didn’t seem offended or defensive. And really, she had no reason to be. The fact that she had been helping tend to the wounded at the castle shouldn’t have been a fault, even if Archie had tried to make it into one. “I’ve heard tell that there should be something romantic about tending to a fallen hero, but he’s still Declan. Which probably means he’s healing, and we can send him home soon.”
