Once Upon a Romance 02 - As The Last Petal Falls (13 page)

“Marlplot! Blast yer fool’s eyes, what’s the meanin’ of all the racket?”

“Sorry, Connelly.” The young giant hung his head and blushed. “I came to get Mistress Belle, and I didn’t want to just walk in.”

“Of course ye shouldna just waltz in, laddie, but that dinna mean ye should wake us at such an infernal hour, either. Why’re ye fetchin’ the lass so early?”

“Well, MacTíre—”

Vivienne threw back the covers on her pallet. “MacTíre! What does that ill-bred mountain troll want now? ! “

“Nothing, Mistress.” Marlplot let his eyes hang at a point just to the left of Vivienne’s face, as though he were reluctant to look at her. “Last night he told me that, in the morning, I should come find you and help you clean your room.”

“Hmph. And I suppose the lout didn’t think to tell you to wait until a decent hour of the morning, did he?” Vivienne put softness into her testy words. Despite his huge size, the boy was obviously both very shy and not all that bright. It wasn’t his fault he’d followed MacTíre’s orders rather too well.

Connelly cast her an approving look, and then turned back to Marlplot. “Is that it, lad?” When he got a nod in response, he went on. “Then I forgive ye, but next time wait til the sun is up, will ye?”

“Well, all right. But the sun isn’t coming up today, Connelly. Look outside.”

Both Vivienne and Connelly squinted through the window cracks, and saw that Marlplot was right. Giant grey clouds hugged the mountain tops that surrounded the valley, and chill winds blew the bare tree branches in a wild dance. It was clear that another storm was coming.

“I best be off, then, ta snatch the last winter berries afore the storm shuts me in. Lass, I leave ye ta the gentle care o’ Marlplot. He’s a good lad, so be nice.” Connelly flashed her a broad grin and was out the door before she could say goodbye. When she was alone with her cleaning assistant, she looked up at him. Way, way up.

“What’s your given name, Marlplot?”

“John, Mistress.”

“Well, John, show me to my room, and let’s start cleaning. The sooner I have a spot of my own, the better.”

Cleaning the room was a hard, filthy task. For all that she was still mad at him, Vivienne was grateful that MacTíre had thought to send John along to help her. He brought bucket after bucket of water up to the room, while she slowly fetched a few logs of wood from the inner bailey. Once they had a respectable fire going, John found a copper kettle in the kitchen and started heating water. The giant steaming kettle was so heavy that Vivienne couldn’t lift it with one hand. Instead she let John lift it, pouring the boiling water over the thick cotton mattress that they had stuffed into an old, wooden hip bath. She used a wooden laundry paddle to move the mattress around in the boiling water as best she could, trying to make sure that every surface was thoroughly cleaned. Then they drained the tub and did it all over again, only this time Vivienne cast some dried lavender petals she’d gotten from Connelly into the steaming water.

While the mattress soaked they swept and scrubbed the walls and floors. Generations of spiders were dislodged from the ceiling and unceremoniously tossed out the window to make their way in the wide world. Even with the fire blazing away the room was cold, so once it had been cleaned and aired, Vivienne made a trip to the laundry room and poked around in the rag bag until she found enough scraps to plug the cracks in her window shutters. John was immensely helpful in her weatherproofing. He could reach the top of the window without a stepstool, and he happily plugged the cracks that she couldn’t reach.

While they worked, Vivi asked questions.

“How did you come to serve with Master MacTíre, John?”

“He helped me out, Mistress. Seemed the right thing to do.”

“Helped you how?”

“Oh, I shouldn’t say, Miss Belle. Sean Kelly says Master MacTíre gets real embarrassed when we talk about how he’s helped us.”

“So he’s modest?”

“I dunno what modest means, Mistress, but he sure does help a lot of people.” Vivienne smiled at John’s sincerity. It was a relief to know Fain was a good man, even if she didn’t know the particulars. “ I mean, without him, most all of us fellas would be in jail. “

“What?” Relief fled, replaced by worry. “Why?”

Marlplot clapped his hands to his mouth in alarm. “I forgot. I forgot. I promised I wouldn’t forget. Don’t tell anyone, okay?” The young giant was so unhappy Vivi felt compelled to agree, but she brooded as John went back to work.

In jail for what?

Once everything was as clean as Vivienne knew how to make it, John went and asked the Shapherd brothers to help him wring out the mattress and spread it to dry. The three men lugged the heavy tub out to the courtyard and drained it, then spent almost half an hour cheerfully abusing each other and the mattress as they attempted to squeeze the water out. The thick, padded cotton was still sodden when they hauled it back up and laid it out on the rope frame. Marlplot gazed at it mournfully.

“Well, Mistress,” he said, “the room’s clean, but you won’t be sleeping here tonight. That mattress will take days to dry.”

Sadly, he was right. Vivienne spent both that night and the next with Connelly, trying to sleep through the racket. In between, she spent her hours in the kitchen, helping little Billy Notter scrub down the great tables and acting as a one-handed scullery maid for the Shapherds.

“Thanks for the help, Mistress Belle.”

“I fear I’m not much assistance, Billy. I don’t really know what I’m doing.”

“Naw, but you’re awful jolly, and I don’t mind wiping your tables over again.”

It wouldn’t have been so bad, but she was practically dropping from exhaustion, and she got the impression that her unskilled attempts at cleaning, made worse by only having one useful arm, were amusing to the two capable Shapherd brothers.

“I suppose you two strapping men have never been injured, or had to learn a new task?”

“On the contrary.” Matt told her. “We were both hurt when we first stumbled through the doors of this keep. I could hardly keep my feet under me.”

“More importantly,” Marcus broke in, “he could hardly keep his feet under
me
. I couldn’t walk at all by that point. I was still cracking jokes, though.”

“You’d have to be dead to stop cracking jokes.” Matt rolled his eyes at his brother.

“Still might not stop me.”

“How were you hurt?” Vivienne was intrigued.

“Oh, just a minor skirmish over some sheep.”

“Were you… Were you stealing them?”

“Oh, no. We were trying to keep them.”

“A minor skirmish with sheep stealers left you wounded to the point where you couldn’t walk?”

“I’ve a very delicate constitution.”

“Ah, Belle?” Matt broke into his brother’s teasing. “You’ll need to have another try at cleaning these plates. There’s still gravy on them.”

She ground her teeth as she went to wash the plates for the third time. She hated being incompetent. Her lack of aptitude helped as she met the keep’s other inhabitants, though. Most of them passed through the kitchen each day, and they allowed themselves to be introduced to Vivi with varying degrees of reservation.

Nate Tucker was one of the worst. He was all smiles and greetings with Marcus Shapherd, but his face became cold and closed when he looked at her.

“And you’d be the lost lady, then?”

“Yes, I’m Isabelle Wellesley.” Vivienne straightened up from shoveling hearth coals. She knew she had streaks of ash all down her cheeks, but she smiled as though she were dressed in silk and presiding over afternoon tea. “I don’t believe I’ve had the pleasure of an introduction, sir.”

“Name’s Tucker. Nathaniel Tucker.”

“I’m so pleased to meet you, Master Tucker. I hope you don’t find me rude, but I fear I must get back to this fire. I haven’t mastered the trick of lighting them yet.”

He looked at her askance as she awkwardly crumbled dried moss on the hearth, and then piled twigs on top. Fetching a taper, she lit it cautiously off one of the torches along the wall, and then shuffled back to the fireplace, trying to keep the taper carefully sheltered with her body. Predictably, the small wick blew out as soon as she leaned down to touch it to the kindling.

“Is she daft, Marcus?” Tucker spoke directly to Marcus Shapherd, as though Vivi weren’t even there. She gritted her teeth and headed back to the torch.

“Be fair, Nate. It’s only her third fire.”

“Bah. She’s not even building it properly.”

“Perhaps you could show me, Master Tucker?” Vivienne was all innocence. “I really could use some instruction. John Marlplot tried to teach me how to make a fire, but I fear I didn’t quite follow his instructions.”

“Well, no wonder! I mean,” he amended hastily, “he’s a fine lad, and we do our best to do right by him, but…” he petered out, then shouldered her gently aside. “First, you need a sight more kindling than you’ve put here.”

Vivienne watched Tucker pile a double fistful of moss on the hearth, and then carefully stack the twigs in a small pyramid around it. When he looked back to make sure she was paying attention, she gazed at him guilelessly. “But how do you put on the big sticks—”

“Logs.”

“The big logs, without crushing that?”

“You stack ’em around, like so.” The man busied himself at the hearth. Vivi took a moment to wink outrageously at Marcus, who grinned broadly back, and then they both watched soberly as Nate carefully stacked logs in an open square around the kindling, until he could place the last four across the top. Really, it was a very well built fire. “Now light it, lass.”

“How do I keep the taper from blowing out in the draft?”

“I suppose it’s difficult to shield with only one hand. Very well, give me the blasted taper.” He took the wick and, with a practiced ease, lit the pile of moss. It blazed up merrily, lighting the small sticks, and before long the top logs were starting to ignite.

“What a wonderful fire! “ Vivienne raved. “Thank you so much, Master Tucker.”

“Think nothing of it, Miss Wellesley.” Tucker was almost blushing. “Happy to lend a hand.” The man made his way out of the kitchen with the supplies he had come for, and Matt Shapherd turned to Vivienne.

“You know you’ll have to light one yourself eventually.”

“We’ll see,” she answered smugly. “Now what’s next on the list?”

“Drawing water to fill the kitchen barrel.”

“Then let’s go.” She picked up the small wooden bucket used for the task. “I think Alan is in the courtyard right now, and he hates to see me trying to lug the heavy bucket with only one good arm.”

The laughter of both brothers followed her down the hallway.

The more men she met around the keep, the more clear it became that these were
not
soldiers, as she had first assumed. They lacked the discipline that even the most slapdash militia kept, and they had no clear chain of command, aside from the obvious fact that Fain was their leader. An outpost of this kind should have a number of Sergeants, several Lieutenants, and possibly a Captain under the Commanding Officer. It was clear that Connelly ran the infirmary, and the Shapherds ran the kitchen, and a fellow named Eric Tully made up the guard schedules, but none of them held any rank she could discern, or any authority outside their given stations. The men all called each other by name when they weren’t using some profane nickname instead, never by a title or designation. And no matter how obliquely she tried to ask, every man in the keep seemed bent on dodging her questions about what, exactly, they were doing out here.

If they weren’t soldiers—and every passing day made Vivienne more convinced that they were not—then what was going on?

Her mind offered her all sorts of unsavory options. They could be thieves, or escaped criminals, or madmen… although really, they didn’t seem much like madmen. Most of them seemed like good, honest fellows. A bit rough around the edges, perhaps, but Vivienne had a hard time accepting that they were hardened criminals. She spent her meals sitting quietly by the hearth, watching the men around her, trying to think her way through this puzzle. It was maddening, to
know
there was a mystery, and be unable to solve it. Who
were
these men? And, by extension, who was Fain?

She was picking at the hard, brown oat bread, trying to find an explanation that suited her, when she felt a large body settle next to her. For a moment her heart beat faster, thinking Fain had finally sought her out. Then an unfamiliar voice spoke, and her spirits plummeted.

“I don’t think we’ve met. I’m Simon Legrey.”

Vivi lifted her head to meet pale blue eyes, far too close to her own. “I’m Isabelle Wellesley.” She made a sort of curtsy with her upper body, using the movement to slide a bit farther away from him on the bench, but he followed, keeping their hips pressed together.

“I know who you are, Miss Wellesley; I’d say the whole keep knows.” Vivienne didn’t know how to respond, so she gave a cool nod. “After all, it isn’t as though we get many
ladies
here.”

The way Legrey said “ladies” made Vivi think of women for hire, and she drew back in distaste from his overly intimate tone. “I can’t imagine why; after all,
most
of the men I’ve met seem like perfect gentlemen.” Her expression left no doubt that she was
not
including Legrey in that estimation, and she expected that to be an end to this interchange. She was shocked, then, to feel his arm creeping around her back.

“Ah, but then, most of these worthy gentlemen wouldn’t really know what to do with a lady if they had one. I, on the other hand,” he pulled himself close enough to whisper in her ear, “am ready to serve, Miss Wellesley.”

That was
quite
enough. Vivi leapt to her feet, vigorously rubbing her ear, as though she could get his insinuations out if only she scrubbed hard enough. “I am sure I could have no use for
your
kind of service, Master Legrey.” Her strident tones drew the attention of several men dining nearby. “After all, I am neither a dog in heat, nor a strumpet so jaded that she cares not for the quality of her lovers, only the quality of their coin.” The hall was growing silent, as almost everyone became aware of the altercation. “Pray, do not address me again. Rather, keep all such intimacies between yourself and your right hand, which I am sure has suffered many assaults of a like nature since you became a man.” A few snickers sounded through the hall, followed by more as the men caught the meaning of Vivienne’s jibe. “Should I find myself growing restless in the future, be sure that I have only to think of your face, and it will be as though ice water were flowing through my veins. Thank you, sir, for your generous contribution to my continuing chastity.” And with that, Vivi spun on her heel and stalked off, as the hall erupted into uproarious laughter.