Chapter 5
Ash
Ash waited in the hall as Agnes went to fetch her sister to chaperone them, as it would be improper for them to tour the grounds alone. This was good sense, and besides: he needed to apologise to her.
He was surprised, then, when Agnes returned from the upper floor looking red-faced and flustered and completely alone.
Muriel had gone. She had left while Agnes had been speaking to Ash, vanished without a word. The grooms confirmed it: she had taken her guards and fled.
‘I … am sorry, my Lady,’ Ash hazarded, unsure what else he could say.
Agnes appeared more frustrated than distraught. ‘As I said …’ She took a deep breath. ‘We have had some disagreements these past few weeks. Perhaps it is for the best.’
It would not behove him to pry. Instead, he was introduced to Sara, Anges’s lady’s companion. She was straight-backed and serious, with dark skin and darker eyes. He wondered where her family hailed from. She eyed him closely and critically.
‘My Lord.’
Ash bowed to her in greeting. She did not seem impressed.
Agnes also sent for her hound: the beast from the woods.
When the kennel master brought her in, she sat in perfect poise at Agnes’s side, clearly waiting for a command.
By contrast, Litillwitte had plodded into the hall beside Ash and was now doing his very best impression of a dead sheep at Ash’s feet.
‘Shall we start with the grounds?’ Agnes said.
The la Cleve grounds were nowhere near as fine as those around Dunlyn, but they provided ample space for hunting. As they reached the expansive gorse that edged the keep, Agnes looked down at the hound at her feet.
‘Go on, then.’ She gave a sharp whistle. ‘Away, Qwippe!’
The dog, who had been calm and still until that moment, dashed into the undergrowth in a blur of white.
‘Good God,’ Ash muttered.
Beside him, Agnes smiled. ‘She is a wonderful creature. Marvellous hunter. She’ll run around in there for a while, flush out a few hares, then spend the rest of the day asleep beside the fire.’
There was another white blur as Qwippe emerged from a thicket of heather before vanishing again.
Ash could not help but watch as the beast ran, born for the hunt.
A grouse suddenly burst from the bushes, shuddering up into the sky and up and over their heads.
Agnes watched, looking pleased, shielding her eyes from the sun.
‘I should have brought my bow,’ she said to Sara thoughtfully.
Ash looked down at Litillwitte. ‘Do you not wish to go and join her?’ he said.
The beast tilted his head to one side, then sat unceremoniously on Ash’s foot.
‘I shall assume that means no,’ he said. Beside him, he was sure he heard Agnes snigger.
It was some time before Qwippe emerged, her pristine fur full of twigs and the limp body of an enormous hare between her teeth. Agnes greeted her effusively, praising her skill and passing her a scrap of meat from the pouch at her hip.
‘I shall have to take the hare to the kitchens,’ she said. ‘I am sure they’ll have use for it, even if it’s only for feeding the dogs.’ She paused. She seemed uncertain, and Ash realised she was not used to having to entertain. ‘Do you wish to join me,’ she asked, ‘or remain out here?’
Ash peered around. It was bright and clear, and the walk had done him good, although he was loath to admit it. But he was not here for nature walks. He was here to wed.
‘I think I’ll join you,’ he said. ‘Come, Litillwitte.’
Litillwitte gave him a long look. Then rolled onto his back, tongue lolling obscenely from his mouth.
‘He is a curious thing,’ Agnes said, watching him.
Ash laughed sharply. ‘He’s a damn idiot,’ he said. ‘Father named him Litillwitte, but frankly I doubt that he has any wit at all. He’s a good hunter, if you’d believe it.’ They watched the dog roll in the dirt. ‘When he wants to be.’
Agnes’s hound was observing Litillwitte from a careful distance. Ash had never seen such a look of disdain on an animal’s face before.
‘He attached himself to me when Father died,’ Ash continued. ‘Now I cannot be rid of him.’
‘He seems very … loyal,’ Agnes said.
Ash snorted. ‘That is certainly one way to describe him. Come on, you beast, or I shall leave you out here.’
Litillwitte only looked at him. Ash sighed, keen not to admit defeat to a dog.
‘Here.’
Agnes was offering him one of the scraps of meat she had used to reward Qwippe.
‘Oh. Thank you.’
Ash took it from her gently. Their fingers brushed. The meat had been warmed by her hand, soft beneath his fingertips.
He held it out towards Litillwitte. At the prospect of food, he sat up, sniffing.
‘Oh no,’ Ash said. ‘Come. You come. And then you may have this.’
He held the scrap of meat higher. It seemed to work – with a huge sigh, Litillwitte heaved himself to his feet and came to stand at Ash’s side.
‘Good boy.’ He dropped the scrap of meat into Litillwitte’s mouth.
Wiping his hand on his cloak, Ash looked up. He caught Agnes looking quickly away as he did.
‘No,’ Ash looked down at the chequered board on the table in front of Agnes. ‘No, absolutely not.’
‘Afraid I will beat you, Barden?’
‘I know you will beat me.’
As the morning had melded into afternoon, thick clouds had rolled in, and the ensuing rain had forced them all indoors.
Sara had settled herself beside the fire with some embroidery, Ash’s steward was poring over account books, and Agnes had set up a game of chess.
She smiled at him, that fox-like expression back.
If he were at home, he would refuse. He hated chess, if only because he was so bad at it.
But he was not at home. Thankful that he had a mug of ale to soothe him through the process, he sat opposite Agnes and gestured for her to begin.
‘I warn you,’ he said, ‘I am very bad.’
Agnes rolled her eyes at him and made the first move.
Barely any time had passed before she leaned back in her chair, arms folded across her chest.
Ash glanced at her, the mug upon his lips. ‘What?’
‘I am trying to decide,’ she said slowly, ‘if you truly are this poor at chess, or if you are simply pretending to ensure I do not ask you to play again.’
He spluttered on the ale.
‘Ah,’ she said. ‘Not pretending, then.’
‘I told you I was poor at this.’
‘Yes, but not this poor.’
Ash glowered.
‘I could teach you.’
He looked up. He was expecting her to be mocking him, but her expression was sincere.
‘What?’
‘Surely you get bored of dice and draughts?’
‘Well …’
‘You truly are afraid,’ she said mockingly. ‘At least try.’
She was challenging him. His resolve snapped, and he was suddenly on his feet. The table wobbled. Even Sara stopped her embroidery to look at him, the dogs curled at their feet raising their heads in surprise.
Ash’s mouth opened and shut stupidly. Then he whistled towards Litillwitte and strode from the room.
That had been a stupid thing to do.
Ash stood beside the gorse in the rain, feeling unutterably foolish. At his side, Litillwitte looked up at him wetly.
‘Stop it,’ Ash said. The dog did not look away. ‘I know!’ he shouted, startling a bird from the nearest hedge. ‘I know.’
He needed to get a grip on himself. Agnes didn’t need to be his friend, but she had to at least tolerate him, and she never would if he continued walking this path.
He sighed, running his hand through his wet hair.
If he returned now, he would look even more foolish. But more foolish still would be to remain out here, in the rain, cursing the world and himself. There was no going back to what had been. There was only now.
He wiped droplets from his eyelashes, turned heel, and headed back towards the shape of the keep.
He returned to find Agnes making her way across the courtyard, wrapped in a thick wool cloak. She eyed him, waiting for him to come to her.
‘It is raining,’ she said.
Ash shivered. ‘I now realise that.’
She gave him another of those assessing looks. ‘Go and change. I’ll have the cook warm some wine.’
When Ash returned in fresh clothes, his hair dried as much as he could manage, he found Agnes sat at a table in the side chamber she’d met him in on the day of his arrival. Beside the fireplace sat a pair of steaming wooden mugs on a small table, and in front of her, a chessboard, ready to play.
Ash sat and took one of the mugs.
‘Show me, then.’
The days in la Cleve Castle passed with surprising swiftness. Ash still hated chess, but it kept him busy.
He needed to keep busy. Much of their time was for them alone – what Penn had called, all cheek, the courting period. Ash was not very adept at courting. Olly had just happened, as easy and as unstoppable as falling.
He was trying not to compare the two circumstances. Olly had been want, and passion, and love. This was nothing like that. Yet still the thought of Olly crowded him when he and Agnes were together. This would have been so easy, were it him.
After that first day and his pointless tantrum, Ash was learning that Agnes was the sort of person he could get along with.
The sort of person his family would get along with, too.
She had absolutely no tolerance whatsoever of his moods, but neither was she cruel – just firm, with little patience for his sourness.
When she laughed at his cynicism or along with his boorish jokes, his chest tightened to realise he had pleased her.
He found that he liked her, and that alone was enough to leave him perturbed. Neither of them had confirmed the match, but he had promised that the visit to la Cleve Castle would only last a week at most. His time was running out.
He thought on it that evening during supper – roasted pheasant, caught that morning.
The food was good, and as Ash picked tender meat from the bone he wondered if Joan, Dunlyn’s cook, would resent having another in her kitchen.
She almost certainly would: she resented having him in her kitchen, and he could only imagine the sort of war that could be waged by two cooks battling for space.