Fantasyland 04 Broken Dove (77 page)

“I think…” Christophe shook his head but then kept talking. “I think she was so sad because she thought you were sending her away.”

“You think correctly.”

He rubbed his lips together some more before he noted, “She’s nice to Élan.”

“She cares for her deeply.”

Christophe looked back at his quill and kept his attention there when he spoke on. “You were angry with her for looking for me.”

“I was,” Apollo confirmed.

“I got her into trouble,” Chris whispered to his quill and Apollo’s gut tightened with hope.

“She and I have spoken, Chris,” he said gently. “And that is past. She will not do something so foolish again, even if moved to do it through her concern for you and Élan, and I will not lose my temper with her in the manner I did.”

Christophe said nothing, simply contemplated his quill.

Apollo decided he’d had enough.

So he changed the subject by asking softly, “Are you done with your studies, son?”

Christophe looked to him and nodded.

“I have not tested you with your sword in some time,” Apollo remarked and watched his son’s eyes light. He smiled at him and turned to the door, ordering, “Get our swords. I’ll meet you outside.”

“But, it’s gone dark, Papa,” Christophe called to his back.

At the door, Apollo turned back to his son.

“Then it’s good we have torches. But not every swordfight is fought in the sun, Chris. To be prepared, you must be prepared for anything.”

Christophe nodded enthusiastically.

“Swords,” Apollo prompted.

Down went the quill and up went his son out of his seat.

He dashed to his wardrobe.

Apollo drew in a breath and let it out as he walked out of the room.

It was only when he was well down the hall that he allowed himself to smile.

* * * * *

“And at that, Princess Arianna stepped onto the cloud…”

Apollo stopped reading and looked down at his daughter.

She was asleep.

Then again, she always fell asleep at that part the third time he read it.

He closed the book softly and laid it on her nightstand. Carefully disengaging her from his arm around her, he rolled her to her side and exited her bed. He pulled the covers up high over her and tucked her in before he bent deep to brush a kiss on her temple. He then straightened, turned out the lamps and walked out of the room, keeping the door open an inch as she liked it.

He moved to Christophe’s room and saw his door opened an inch.

As he liked it.

He pushed it open further and moved through the darkened room toward his son’s bed. The light from the hall barely illuminated the space. Therefore Apollo gave it time for his eyes to adjust before he bent over his boy, pulled the covers to his neck and carefully tucked him in.

Awake, he was too old for it.

Asleep, Apollo could do as he liked.

So he brushed his fingers across his son’s brow, sweeping the hair away from his skin. Then he bent and touched his lips to that hair before he straightened and moved away.

He was halfway across the room when he heard a sleepy, “Papa.”

He turned and softly replied, “I woke you.”

“No.”

Apollo said nothing.

Christophe didn’t either.

When this lasted some time, Apollo asked, “Do you need something, Chris?”

There was a long hesitation before Christophe answered, “No…I just…” Another hesitation before, “I just wanted to say goodnight.”

Apollo strode back to the bed, bent in and wrapped his hand around the side of his son’s neck.

“Goodnight, my son,” he whispered.

“’Night, Papa,” Chris whispered back.

Apollo gave his neck a squeeze then moved back to the door. He pulled it to almost closed behind him but kept it open an inch, as Christophe liked it.

He then moved to his room, grabbed the cloak that was lying across the foot of his bed and exited his room swinging it on.

He found Torment as he requested, blanketed and saddled, waiting for him at the foot of the steps at the front of Karsvall.

He mounted his horse and kicked in his heels.

Torment burst into a gallop across the snow.

He made the dower house quickly and noted when he did that there were lights streaming around the curtains from more windows than normal. The front sitting room. Maddie’s upstairs bedroom. From the side where the kitchen was. From the back where her maids stayed.

He rode Torment to the stables, made short work of settling him in for the night and as he left, he made certain to secure the door against the chill.

Instead of moving to the front of the house as he would normally do, with the light coming from the kitchen, thinking perhaps Maddie sat with her friends there for an evening natter, he approached the side door.

He opened it and closed it swiftly to limit the draught he allowed in. Once he’d dropped the bar to lock it for the night, he turned to the kitchen to see only Cristiana sitting in a tufted chair by the fire, feet up on a small padded stool, shawl around her shoulders, knitting in her lap.

Her head was turned to him and her face was expressionless when she greeted him much less enthusiastically than normally.

“Lord Apollo.”

“Cristiana,” he returned. “Where’s Maddie?”

She turned her attention back to her knitting, saying, “Sitting room.”

Apollo began to move that way before he stopped and looked back at the woman.

“Don’t you have a husband to look after?”

Her lips quirked as her eyes came back to him. “I’d hope, by this time and with his age, he’s able to look after himself.” Sharpness entered her gaze when she finished, “I also have a girl to look after.”

Her loyalty to Madeleine was welcome.

Her inference was not.

He said nothing.

He just dipped his chin and moved from the room.

He found Cristiana was correct. Maddie was in the sitting room, and he had a sense of foreboding when he saw her not reclining on the sofa reading, or chatting with Loretta and Meeta, but at the window. She’d pulled a curtain slightly back and was staring out into the night, her expression unreadable.

He’d seen her like that before, the night Franka Drakkar had said words that tore into her soul.

He had hoped their earlier discussion had given her much to think on that would prove Franka’s words for what they were: intentionally malicious and utterly untrue.

It would appear it hadn’t.

“I hope, my dove, that Hans and Loretta aren’t out in this chill,” he quipped as he entered the room and her head whipped his way. “And if they are, I would hope Hans is keeping her warm. But if he is, I would guess it’s in a way that you should not be witnessing.”

“They’re not out there,” she told him and he stopped advancing to her, this placing him in the center of the room.

“Then what are you looking at, poppy?”

“I…” She looked to the window before she dropped the curtain and turned to him. “Nothing. I was thinking. I don’t know why I do that standing at a draughty window, but I guess it’s because it seems so serene out there. It helps me order my thoughts.” She shrugged. “There aren’t a lot of windows you can look out of in my world and witness complete stillness.”

“The other world,” he corrected.

“What?” she asked.

“This is your world, Maddie. It’s the
other
world that has limited stillness.”

Her teeth came out to worry her lip.

Apollo didn’t like that either but he continued to give her distance and asked quietly, “What were you thinking on, Maddie?”

“How’s Chris?” she asked immediately in return.

If he was told to guess what filled her thoughts that would be it.

“We talked,” he answered. “Considering the subject matter, there was not much I could share. This frustrates him for he’s nearly nine but he thinks he’s thirty-nine. However, we ended our talk by battling with wooden swords in the snow. So I think, for now, he’s fine.”

“You battled?” she asked, eyes wide.

“It’s play,” he explained. “Élan enjoys tea parties. Chris enjoys swordplay.”

“Oh,” she whispered, but said no more.

Therefore, he pressed, “Was Chris the only thing on your mind?”

“Not exactly,” she replied.

He felt his face go soft when he went on. “And what else was on your mind?”

“Well,” she began and threw out a hand. “The subject matter.”

“My father, my mother and Lady Ulfr,” he stated.

She nodded and Apollo didn’t delay in sharing what she clearly wished to know.

“As still happens today, my father’s marriage was arranged. He could have opposed it, but he did not. This was because, although she came from a much lesser House, his intended held great beauty.”

She nodded again as she leaned her weight into a hand on the back of the sofa, settling in for his story.

He didn’t like this for it meant she settled in away from him.

But he sensed she needed it, so he gave it to her and carried on.

“She was also a kind woman, if a quiet one. Unfortunately, it became clear early in their marriage that she could not provide him an heir. When this happens, the Head of a House can accept it and the next in line will inherit his role. My father could not know this for Achilles was born after me, but we know now that Achilles, who would have been the next in line, would have made a fine Head for the House of Ulfr. Though, he should have known it for my uncle was as fine a man as Achilles. But even if he could know it, the man he was, Father would still have made the decision he made. A decision that many Heads made then, before then and even now, should they find their wives unable to provide an heir. They find a surrogate so they can see to that task personally.”

He knew this information shocked her by the expression on her face.

But all she said was, “Okay.”

“My mother, however, was no surrogate,” he went on. “She too, had great beauty and my father held some affection for her. Thus, he installed her in this house, and if lore is true, fully enjoyed her being here.”

He witnessed her flinch but even so, he continued.

“She had me. As she was no surrogate arranged to provide an heir, although I believe she knew her place, she still expected to enjoy raising the son she bore for her lover. This didn’t happen. I was raised in Karsvall with my father and his wife. Although she lived quite close and I visited her regularly, it was not as regular as my mother would have liked. This caused her to protect against another pregnancy. Time passed and I was too young to know what occurred in that time or how those involved felt about it. I just know that many years after she had me, my father sent my mother away and I was raised fully here in Karsvall with him and his wife, seeing my mother only during short visits my father would allow.”

“That’s awful,” she whispered, the tone she said those words stating clear she felt it was exactly that.

“It is, yet it isn’t,” he replied. “I know the gossip but those who speak it don’t know either how those involved felt about what was happening. I only know that Patience Ulfr was a good woman who may not have showered me with adoration, but that simply wasn’t her nature. She was thoughtful. She was kind. But she was sad. Perhaps sad her marriage became what it became for I cannot know how they were before I came into this world, but they were very distant in the time I spent with them. Perhaps she was sad because I was not hers and she wished her own child. Perhaps sadness was simply part of her disposition. I cannot know. I never asked but even if I did, she was not the kind of woman to tell. Though, regardless of her consistent sadness, she never made me suffer for it.”

“And your mother?”

“Once I became old enough to decide how I would spend my time, I saw her far more frequently. After my father passed and Lady Patience returned to her own House, I moved my mother back to this one. She left this world a year after Ilsa died.”

When he stopped speaking, she studied him and said nothing.

He allowed this for some time before he stopped doing so.

“Now that I’ve shared that, my dove, may I ask why you’re so far away?”

She didn’t answer him.

She asked her own question.

“Is that why you seem to have an issue with me being in this house?”

“It is,” he confirmed. “I have many good memories of the times I shared with my mother in this house, both before my father died and after she returned. But you are not her. I don’t like you here not only because it reminds me of who she was to my father but also it reminds those around us of the same. And I do not want them to think of you in that way for you are not that to me. You are far more.”

He watched her features soften as she noted, “But now, with the way Chris is feeling, I can’t move.”