Chapter 5
Chapter Five
The pitchfork Una had yet to master slid through her sweaty hands, and spilled onto her boots the mound of filthy straw she’d been attempting to place in the barrow.
That made the two stable lads passing her snicker, but she ignored them as she gathered the soiled mess up again on the tines.
She had risen before dawn to attend to the stalls, which the enchantment had ceased cleaning at dawn just after she had been sent to work in the stables.
When the attack had come she’d gone with the lads into the old root cellar that the stable master used as a retreat.
There she’d been pinched a few times in the dark, but she ignored the sly touches.
During her time as a kitchen maid she’d never been treated thus, but she tried not to think of those days, for that made her weep.
Often Una wondered if the magic that held them imprisoned here had a special hatred for her, not that it should surprise her if it did.
Since becoming trapped with the clan she’d wished countless times that she’d never come to work at Dun Talamh, and sulked daily over her lot.
Now she only gave her attention to the work demanded of her.
If she kept working without complaint then the stable master would permit her the time to go and bathe before the morning meal.
She couldn’t bring herself to eat in the great hall stinking of muck, and Doon would not permit her to have her meals in the kitchens because of the smell. Whining meant going hungry.
That was just one of the many hard lessons she’d learned since being disgraced and exiled from the stronghold.
After weeks of weeping and wailing into her pillow each night, Una had at last accepted her fate.
It had been her own fault for not appreciating her status as a kitchen maid and believing she deserved better.
Since she had so offended Lady Olivia with a careless remark she knew that the war master’s wife would never again permit her to return to her duties in the stronghold.
How could she not have seen how fortunate she had been, simply to serve indoors?
All she could hope for now was to someday be forgiven, and perhaps assigned to the laundry.
The work was just as malodorous there, but at least she wouldn’t go about smelling of a horse’s arse.
She glanced in the direction of the stronghold.
Perhaps other of the enchantment’s cleaning or renewing had gone awry indoors as well.
Though troubling, it might prove something no one else would want to do.
“You’ve no talent for mucking, lass,” the stable master said as he appeared by her side and took the pitchfork from her. An older man whose gruff nature hid a kindly heart, he had treated her more gently than she’d expected. “’Tis good then that you’re needed elsewhere.”
She pushed the tangle of hair out of her eyes and tried to look willing. “What do you need me do, then, Master, bring down more hay from the loft? Or shall I fill the water troughs for the beasts?”
He made a casual gesture toward the stronghold. “Tidy yourself and report to the kitchens. You’re wanted there.”
Una waited for a moment to be sure he wasn’t jesting with her, and then hurried to her room in the back of the stalls.
Her raw, red fingers shook as she poured cold water into the cracked bowl that served as her wash basin, and yanked off her blotched, stained leather apron before she scrubbed her face and hands clean.
Could she had been forgiven? Or was this yet another punishment, to deceive her into believing so?
I cannae bear another trick.
Tears burned in Una’s eyes, but she blinked them away.
Just after she’d been cast out a maid came to the stables and told her she was needed to work in the gardens.
She’d tripped over her muck-crusted boots rushing to old Eachann, who then told her he hadn’t sent for her.
When she begged him to take her on, he’d told her he couldn’t defy Lady Ava’s order, and it was best that she not ask that of anyone.
As Una walked back to the stables, she’d heard the sound of giggles, and looked up at the maid and other vassals watching her from a window slit.
Each had been someone she’d treated harshly in the past.
That had been the first time she’d been taunted and tormented, but not the last.
Una wondered if the laird’s wife realized she was the only lass working at the stables.
Once they had lost their fear of her, the stable lads began coming into her room without warning before dawn or just after dusk.
At first they used clumsy excuses as to why they intruded, and then Una realized they were trying to catch her dressing or undressing.
Once they saw she was not going to be recalled to service in the kitchens, several boldly offered to share her pallet and keep her warm.
It made her recall that only the handsomest of them had wives, and the rest could only obtain one through the lottery.
Stable lads were considered the lowest males among all the vassals at Dun Talamh.
As the only female working among them, she had even less status.
If ’tis another jest, then I shall behave as if such doesnae matter to me.
Una had no other apron to wear, nor comb or rose water to use on her tangled locks, so she smoothed down her skirts and tucked the snarls of her hair under her muslin cap.
To walk out of the stables and through the gardens to the entry to the kitchens required all of her spine, for everyone she passed eyed her.
She knew she still smelled of the horses, for the stable master permitted her to wash her gown only once in sevenday, and after a few weeks no amount of scrubbing could remove the animal scent from her garments.
No one looked upon her with kindness, but that was nothing new.
What if Doon had summoned her only to give her another tongue-lashing and send her back?
The kitchen maids would tell everyone in the household that she had been too putrid to be permitted near food.
Just before she went inside Una hesitated, suddenly unsure if she could endure more cruelty from the other vassals.
If she lost hope then she truly would have nothing left.
I’m no’ a coward.
Her punishment wasn’t yet over, Una guessed as she entered the kitchens and saw how the other maids reacted to her with varying degrees of contempt and amusement.
She had fallen so far that there was nothing worse that could be done to her now, so she kept her head high as she went to Doon and curtseyed.
If she was to be punished again, then she would accept that, too.
“You summoned me, Mistress?” she said, keeping her eyes downcast.
The big woman frowned at her. “Why should I? Nasty piece like you doesnae deserve to work beside my fine lassies. Begone with you.”
“I sent for you, lass,” a calm voice said from the archway.
Una darted a glance at Elspeth, the head chambermaid, who had never been her friend, and then hastily curtseyed to her. Had she married? If so she would no longer be considered a mistress but a lady wife. Una’s outcast state included not knowing anything that was happening among the other vassals.
I should just assume she’s wed. It hurt her throat to summon words, but at last she asked, “How may I serve, ah, my lady?”
Nearly all of the kitchen maids tittered behind their hands.
“I’m no’ married. Come along with me.” The dark-skinned woman gestured for Una to follow, and then walked out.
Slowly trailing after her, Una grew almost afraid of what Elspeth had planned for her.
What she had threatened to do to the head chambermaid had been worse than the careless remark she’d made about Lady Grace.
The latter had gotten her exiled to the stables, but no one had ever mentioned what she’d tried to do to Elspeth before she’d been cast out.
“Do you mean to punish me?” Una finally asked as they walked into the laird’s bed chamber.
Elspeth’s brows arched. “Do you reckon you deserve such?”
“I did you wrong. Aye, and ’twas a terrible thing, just as what I said about Lady Grace.” She never imagined she would ever stoop to apologize to the head chambermaid, but to her surprise the words came from her mouth with ease. “I hope someday you both shall forgive me, if ’tis within your heart.”
“I cannae say. I’ve never liked you.” The chambermaid went and began to strip the linens for the bed. “You’re petty and mean, and in the past you’ve ever shirked your work when you could. You tried to use me to improve your situation, aye, and you’ve treated others among us badly.”
That was truth, although it hurt to nod in agreement. “I dinnae shirk my work anymore, if ’tis a comfort to you.”
“After Lady Ava sent you to the stables I forgave you, for ’twasnae worth my time to hate you,” Elspeth told her.
“Several lads have mentioned you’ve changed since being forced to work there.
You’re no longer too proud to do anything, and you’re finally earning your keep without complaint. What’s changed you, then?”
“I’m much as I was, Mistress, only I dinnae complain aloud anymore.
” Una held up her hands, which had many new scars on them from her work.
“As you see, I cannae scrub all the dirt from under my fingernails. My horsehair pallet, ’tis as hard as if they filled the ticking with rocks.
The lads, they laugh at me when I’m clumsy—and I’m ever and always that.
You saw how the other maids regard me. They laugh and make fun of me whenever I’m seen, the lads say.
” She would not cry because of any of them, but the last of her confessions made her come close.
“No one wishes to talk with me anymore, or sit by me during meals. Only the stable master and the horses tolerate me.”