Chapter Fourteen #2
So Maximilian was in the keep, nosing around in the solar.
Her solar. She hadn’t seen him when she crossed the mural stair landing, which had a clear view to the entry below.
His presence in the keep simply meant she would bolt her door to her chamber, the same thing she’d done too many times to count. She returned to her eyebrows.
“I am rather hungry,” she said. “Will you please bring me some food?”
Aline put the last of the linen away. “With pleasure, my lady,” she said, moving out of the alcove. “Cook has made boiled beef with gravy, carrots, pea pottage, and your favorite—candied apples.”
Emmeline stopped tweezing again and looked at her. “If she gives the candied apples to anyone but me, I shall be greatly disappointed.”
Aline chuckled. “She knows,” she said. “But we could smell them all afternoon as she made them. I’m surprised you did not smell them, too. Honey and butter and cinnamon covering slices of apple. Delicious!”
Emmeline sniffed the air just in case there were remnants of the smell of cinnamon, which was her favorite. “I think I can smell them after all,” she said, grinning as she set her tweezers down. “Bring me a good deal of food. The babe is hungry this night.”
Aline looked at her mistress’s rounded belly, made little happy sounds, and rushed out of the chamber as fast as she could go.
Emmeline had to chuckle because she was certain that Aline was more excited about the child than she was.
The woman had already fashioned little clothes for the infant, and several of the servants had made things like blankets and caps.
It seemed that an impending child was reason for everyone to be happy.
Especially when Alston had historically been a place with little happiness.
Feeling lighter of spirit than she had in a very long time, Emmeline went to the door and bolted it, leaning against it as she thought of the baby and of Addax.
Two things that, indeed, made her very happy.
But her smile faded as she thought of Maximilian down in her solar, undoubtedly poking around and ruining her organization. Making a nuisance of himself.
He was good at that.
With a sigh, she came away from the door and went over to the hearth, where a chair and a footstool sat, warmed by the flames.
She sat down in the chair, putting her feet up on the stool and wondering where Addax was.
If Maximilian was in the solar, then Addax must be nearby, because he rarely let Maximilian out of his sight when he was at Alston.
Maximilian prowled and Addax prowled after him.
But they also had guests on this night, so Emmeline’s guess was that Addax might be in the great hall with Bretherdale and the Scots, perhaps trying to be a good host, since Maximilian clearly wasn’t present.
It did puzzle her as to why Maximilian would be in the solar, however.
Perhaps, after she’d eaten, she’d go downstairs to see what trouble he’d caused.
And she’d take her fire poker with her.
*
He’d found an extra stash of coins.
Maximilian knew that Emmeline kept little sacks of coins all over the solar, and in digging around, he’d found a small bag tucked behind a book on the shelf.
There were, perhaps, two hundred pence in the bag, but it was enough for him.
Enough for him to leave this night and come back later.
He had to leave because he was about to do something, and he needed to establish an alibi somewhere else. Anywhere but Alston.
His wife was going to have an accident.
Wife. He snorted at the word as it rolled through his mind. Overlord was more like it. Jailor, governess… She controlled the purse strings and therefore controlled him. Well, no more. He’d made that decision earlier in the day. She’d challenged him one too many times.
It was time to do something about it.
He spent another half-hour poking around in the solar looking for another sack of money, but found nothing.
Through the open door, he’d seen Lady de Grey’s maid go up to her chamber and then come back down again.
He didn’t know where Emmeline was, but logic told him that she was more than likely in her chamber, because that was where she usually was at this time of night.
She didn’t oversee the meals like some women did, but rather left that up to the cook, who was quite adept at her job.
Maximilian could smell the savory scent of roasting beef on the air, but he wasn’t hungry.
His father, the Scots, and, most importantly, Addax were in the great hall as the meal was being prepared, and that was where Maximilian wanted them.
Most especially, he wanted Addax there.
A man who had once been his friend.
Perhaps that was one of the most difficult things of all about his marriage to Emmeline.
Addax had been there from the beginning, first as an advisor and support to him, but that gradually transitioned into him being support and advisor to Emmeline.
That all started back in Berwick, and it only got worse once they reached Alston.
The more difficult Emmeline would become, and the more Maximilian would fight against her, the more Addax would try to be neutral about it and salvage the situation, but he always ended up siding with Emmeline.
It had taken Maximilian six months to realize that he was mourning the loss of a friendship.
Addax hadn’t taken his side in anything since the day he married Emmeline.
Perhaps in little things he did, but never in anything that really mattered.
Maximilian couldn’t honestly say that he thought Addax was in love with Emmeline, because he truly didn’t think so.
The man was simply being chivalrous. The Addax he knew liked women but wasn’t a womanizer.
He had respect for the fairer sex, which was something Maximilian had never had.
There wasn’t anything that had come between them in the years they’d known one another, but the introduction of Emmeline was the start of the great divide.
Maximilian felt as if he’d lost a brother.
And that was why he needed Addax in the great hall, away from the keep, so Maximilian could do what he needed to do. Emmeline was the beginning of all the trouble, and with her, it would end. Maximilian had to take the initiative.
And it would be tonight.
So he busied himself in the solar. He pawed through Emmeline’s carefully organized boxes of vellum.
She was a meticulous record keeper, and Maximilian looked over a few of them to see how prosperous Alston really was.
He’d never paid any attention to it because he didn’t care.
As long as he had his money, he didn’t care how it was earned, but he could see that Emmeline controlled a very detailed operation.
She was helped by the two de Mora knights, men that Maximilian hadn’t bothered to get to know, and maybe the truth was that he felt like an outsider in his own empire.
He refused to admit that that was his own doing, so it was just easier to blame Emmeline for everything.
That helped him justify what he needed to do.
When Emmeline’s maid came back down the mural stairs, he called to the woman as she walked past the door and asked where Lady de Grey was.
The old maid told him that she was in her chamber and that the maid was going to fetch her supper, so Maximilian told her to bring him some food also.
When the old woman scurried away, that gave him time to think about how he needed to accomplish his task.
That old woman was always around his wife, so it was quite possible she would be caught up in what he intended should happen. He couldn’t have a witness.
And that gave him an idea.
When the old maid returned about twenty minutes later, she brought food into him, but he told her that he was going to eat his meal with his wife.
That brought a look of horror from the old maid, but she didn’t say anything.
She simply picked up the food and headed for the stairs with Maximilian behind her.
That was to be her fatal mistake.
The mural stairs of Alston were made of stone, wide but steep.
They led up to a landing on the level above that branched into two different directions.
The old maid was carrying a heavy tray at this point, with food for both her mistress and her mistress’s husband, and she was focused on not spilling anything as she came to the top of the stairs.
She wasn’t paying attention to Maximilian as he came up behind her, and just as she reached the top, he yanked on her hair.
Then he simply stood aside as she went tumbling back down the stairs, breaking her neck about halfway down.
She was dead before she hit the bottom.
There was no one in that part of the keep to hear or see anything at that time of night because even the house servants were helping in the kitchens, so Maximilian slipped into the entry to the visitors’ section of the keep, just enough so that Emmeline wouldn’t see him.
Then he started to shout.
“Help! My lady, hurry! There has been an accident!”
He called out several times until he heard movement up the flight of stairs to the family apartments. He heard a door open, and possibly hit the wall, and then he heard footsteps.
“What happened?” Emmeline called down the stairwell. “What is it?”
Maximilian didn’t want her to recognize his voice, so he screamed a high-pitched sort of wail.
Not enough for her to distinguish him. He heard her footsteps as she came down the stairs, and he sank back into the shadows, watching her as she came to the top of the mural stairs.
She’d only been puzzled until she looked at the bottom of those steeps stairs and saw her maid there, twisted oddly from the fall, with food scattered everywhere.
She screamed.
“My God!” she gasped. “Aline!”
She started to take the first step, heading down to help her maid, and that was when Maximilian came out of the shadows.
Emmeline caught movement out of the corner of her eye, turning to see him bearing down on her.
Unfortunately, she was two steps down already, with nothing to grab on to as he lashed out a boot and caught her in the hip.
“You have vexed me for the last time, you bitch,” he growled. “Die, and good riddance!”
Unable to stop her fall, Emmeline went down, face-first, screaming as she hit the stairs and began to tumble. But by the time she hit the bottom step, she wasn’t screaming anymore.
There was only silence.
Maximilian ran out of the keep through the servants’ entrance near the kitchen yard, out to the stable, and never looked back.