Chapter Twelve #4
At least she wasn’t running from her. That realization nearly brought tears again. “Aye,” Caledonia said softly. “I am your mother. And you have grown very big since the last I saw you.”
Janet was looking at her with open curiosity. She walked up to her mother, looked at her fine dress, the way her hair was pulled back, and even lifted up the hem of her gown to inspect her shoes. Scrutiny complete, she simply stared at her mother expectantly.
Caledonia wasn’t sure what to say to her.
Janet wasn’t fleeing, but she wasn’t welcoming, either.
Caledonia crouched down to bring herself more to Janet’s level when she noticed that someone had joined them.
The youngest child, with dirt in her mouth, and all over her face and body, had wandered up and was looking at her as if she had no idea who she was.
There was simply naked curiosity and nothing more.
Caledonia forced a smile at the child who had turned three years of age this month.
“Greetings, Joan,” she said, looking at the filthy, angelic child. “You have grown just like your sisters. You have become a big girl.”
Joan uttered a sound, possibly a word, but it was difficult to tell with the dirt still in her mouth.
She reached out to touch her mother’s hair, getting dirt on it, but Caledonia didn’t care.
At least the child was showing some interest in her.
In fact, Caledonia thought that it was a rather magical moment, but she couldn’t understand a thing the child was saying.
“My apologies,” she said. “I cannot understand. What did you say?”
“She always talks like that,” Janet said. “She has her own words.”
Caledonia looked at her. “Her own words for what?”
Janet took her little sister by the hand and pointed at the pond. “Blake,” she said. “Blakey? What’s that?”
Joan looked at the water. “Boty!”
Janet looked at Caledonia. “See?” she said. “She calls water ‘boty.’”
Caledonia’s brow furrowed. “But why?”
Janet shrugged. “She screamed too much when she was a baby,” she said. “Madam Madonna told us not to talk to her until she stopped screaming. She still screams, but she cannot talk.”
Caledonia was horrified to hear that. “She cannot talk… at all?”
Janet shook her head. “Madam Madonna said she had too much of our mother in her and we weren’t to talk to her until she learned to be obedient.”
The child didn’t even seem to care that she was telling her own mother what Madam Madonna said about her. She was speaking very matter-of-factly.
Caledonia’s horror was only intensified.
“But… but she’s only a baby,” she said, looking at the dirty child. “How is she to learn words if no one speaks to her?”
Janet shrugged. That was as much as she knew.
Caledonia felt so much sorrow that she lowered her head so the children wouldn’t see the tears in her eyes.
She’d known that coming to Stafford would be difficult, and this was as bad as she had feared.
Probably worse. As she wiped at her eyes, she caught sight of Darius’ legs in her periphery.
Turning in his direction, she could see him over by the yard gate along with two royal soldiers.
By the expression on his face, she could see that he’d heard everything.
“Go about your duties, Darius,” she said quietly. “There is no need for you to remain here.”
Darius nodded but didn’t move. “Would… would you like me to remain, my lady?” he said. “Mayhap I can… help.”
Caledonia shook her head. “Thank you, but nay,” she said. “Please go about your duties.”
Darius and the soldiers left the yard without another word. When they were gone and the gate was secured, Caledonia returned her attention to the two moppets in front of her.
For a moment, she simply looked at them.
Janet was more like Robert. Her hair was pale, like her mother’s, but she had blue eyes like Robert had.
She had his height, too. She was tall. The youngest, Joan, was more like her, but Caledonia thought she saw a bit of her mother in the child.
Honestly, it was difficult to tell what she looked like because she was covered with filth.
It was truly baffling.
“What were you and your sisters doing out here?” she asked Janet. “Do you not have lessons? Or tasks to complete?”
That meant nothing to Janet. “What tasks?”
Caledonia shrugged. “I do not know,” she said. “Helping in the keep? Learning to sew? What does Madam Madonna tell you to do?”
“Nothing,” Janet said as her sister stuck a dirty finger up her nose. “She tells us to go to bed and when to wake up, but then she goes away.”
Caledonia frowned. “What do you mean by that? Where does she go?”
Janet shrugged. Then she yawned and looked around the yard as if uninterested in the question. “She just goes,” she said.
“But who feeds you? Who conducts your lessons?”
“We do not have lessons,” Janet said. “If we want food, we go to the cook. Sometimes she gives us bread in the morning, but sometimes she has none. Blakey eats the dirt because she is hungry. My chicken lays eggs for us to suck, but not always. At night, when the men are feasting, sometimes we are given a bowl with food. We share it.”
Caledonia’s horror reached new heights as she heard of her children’s daily life. “But… but no one takes care of you?” she asked.
Janet didn’t even know what that meant, so there was no answer to give. Caledonia was so overwhelmed that she didn’t even know what to say. Her children were pale, thin, dressed in rags, and eating dirt.
A mother’s worst nightmare.
She was precluded by asking further questions when Thor made an appearance.
He came through the yard gate, from the bailey, and Caledonia immediately saw him.
She rose from her crouched position, where she had been speaking to her younger children, watching him approach her.
He looked at her, at the girls, and seemed almost apprehensive.
“Are these—?”
He was gesturing to the two young girls. Caledonia nodded. “They are,” she said, her voice trembling. “That is Janet and Joan.”
Thor smiled at the girls, who stared up at him without a reaction. He couldn’t help but notice how dirty and bony they were. His smile faded as he looked at his wife.
“They’re beautiful, like their mother,” he said softly. “But I just saw a young girl running wildly around the bailey screaming that the devil had appeared to her. That couldn’t be the eldest… could it?”
Caledonia nodded. “It is,” she said, looking sick. “I told you that Madam Madonna had poisoned my children. The younger two do not seem to be too terribly affected, but Jane… The moment I told her who I was, she accused me of being the devil and ran away.”
“Ah,” Thor said in understanding. His gaze inevitably moved to the small, malnourished children standing a few feet away.
“Madam Madonna is in the vault along with the de Lucera knights. The Stafford soldiers are being gathered and informed of the new command change as we speak. Therefore, the girls are yours, my love. Take them in hand. Take this entire keep in hand and let them know that the rightful chatelaine of Stafford has taken her place. I know you will excel at whatever you do.”
She looked at her as if the thought hadn’t occurred to her.
She was so focused on seeing her children that the thought of actually assuming control at Stafford—any kind of control—wasn’t something she’d contemplated.
She just stood there, looking uncertain, and Thor put his hand on her arm in a comforting gesture.
“What is it?” he said softly.
She blinked, trying to stave off the tears. “I… I am not sure,” she said. “I feel as if… You must understand that I was never permitted to take my rightful place here, so I feel as if I need permission in order to do anything at all.”
Thor smiled. “I am the Earl of Tamworth and Stafford,” he said gently. “You have my permission, Callie. You have my permission to do whatever you want, to whomever you wish, and however you wish. This is ours, my love. But at this moment, you need to make it yours.”
He was right. Caledonia had to shake off every doubt, every fear, every shred of uncertainty. She was strong. She knew she was.
But this was a monumental task.
“Every servant here was taught to disrespect me,” she said.
“Look at my children—they are filthy and starved. Madam Madonna evidently did not care for them at all. Janet told me that she simply let them do as they pleased, and they are hardly fed. Look at them, Thor. They are like wild animals. Joan cannot even speak because no one would teach her.”
Thor could hear the anguish in her voice.
It would have been one thing to come to Stafford to find her children well tended and educated.
At least her mind could be at least a little to know they were being cared for.
But that evidently hadn’t been the case.
Even Thor could see how dirty and skinny her children were, which he found quite disturbing.
He could only imagine how heartbreaking it was for her.
“Then your arrival is a sign from God,” he said. “He meant us to come here, at this moment, so you can save your children. I will find the eldest one, but you must take the little ones and tend to them. They are in desperate need, Callie.”
She nodded even before he finished speaking.
“I know,” she said, looking at them. Then she put her hand over her heart, her lower lip trembling.
“Is this what I left them to, Thor? Abuse? All the while I was in London, trying to forget about everything… here… Is this what was happening to my children?”
He could feel the guilt rolling off her in waves, like the pounding of the ocean, and he didn’t want to add to it even though he could very much understand her torment.
“You could not have known,” he said. “You were chased away by that wicked woman. Your spirit had been broken by Robert. You cannot blame yourself for staying away. You had to do what you felt best when there was nothing left but pain.”
She sniffled, looking at him. “Pain,” she murmured.
“My pain at being kept from my children. But I stayed away when the truth was that was that Robert was dead. I am the Lady of Stafford. I could have come here and sent Madam Madonna away. But… I didn’t.
Was my spirit so broken that I did not understand that my power had been returned to me with Robert’s death? ”
She was becoming distraught, and he leaned over and kissed her temple. “You will not think of that now,” he told her softly but firmly. “Do not think of yourself. Think of your children. Take those two inside and bathe them and feed them. I will find the eldest one.”
She returned her attention to the girls as she quickly wiped away her tears. “You are correct,” she said, squaring her shoulders and trying to shrug off that crushing guilt. “But I fear I need your help.”
“Anything you wish, my love.”
Her dark gaze moved to the keep. “The servants,” she said. “Will you gather the servants and tell them that I have returned and they are to obey me? I fear they will not listen to me, since Robert told them not to. As the new lord, you have that power.”
Thor nodded. “Of course,” he said. “I will do it immediately.”
“Thank you,” she said. “And I want the cook dismissed.”
“Why?”
“Because Janet told me that she would hardly feed them, even though she knew they were in distress.”
His jaw twitched faintly. “I will do what is necessary to ensure you are obeyed and comfortable in your own home,” he said. “I will send Nicola to you. She can help.”
“Thank you.”
“It is my pleasure,” Thor said with an encouraging smile. “I will return to you shortly.”
With that, he kissed her and left the kitchen yard, leaving Caledonia standing with two children she’d given birth to but who didn’t know her at all.
She was determined to change that.
God help her, she was.