Chapter Fifteen #2
Jane, however, had proven to be the real challenge.
She had been so conditioned by Madame Madonna that it had been difficult to break through.
Both Caledonia and Thor tried, but she was still quite wary of her mother.
Darius even tried because she seemed to like him quite a bit, and he was under the impression that the child had been so frightened by Madam Madonna and her doom-and-gloom message that she was torn between wanting to disbelieve what she’d been told and terrified of what would happen if she did.
It was heartbreaking for Caledonia to not be able to break through to her own child, but they were all working on it and trying to help the little girl understand that her mother was not a devil and that Madam Madonna had been lying to her.
Nicola spent time with Jane in an attempt to break through to her, and out of all of them, she probably had the best chance because she was young and slightly immature and seemed to be able to understand Jane better than the rest. She had more patience with her, and Jane was starting to respond to that.
Slowly as it was.
In all, Thor and Caledonia felt as if their thirteen days at Stafford Castle had been productive and eye opening.
Everyone was learning what their new role at the castle would be, and when Caledonia wasn’t with her daughters, she was learning the ins and outs of how the castle was run.
She caught on quickly. One of the biggest problems at Stafford was the filth factor—it was everywhere because no one had taken decent care of the keep in years—so several days ago, Caledonia had instructed the house servants to start scrubbing floors and cleaning out cobwebs.
It was a major task that was still going on, even today.
In fact, that was where she was heading when she had been sidetracked with her magnificent husband.
Not that either one of them minded.
That was what Thor thought as he gazed at Caledonia’s profile. Reflecting over the past thirteen days made him smile. It was as if he’d been thrust into another world, one where he was wildly happy. Happier than he’d ever been with a woman he’d never wanted to marry.
There was a hell of a lot of irony in that.
“Are you truly happy, Callie?” he asked softly. He’d long since softened his stance on only calling her by her full name. “Honestly?”
She turned her face so that she was looking at him as they lay there, side by side. “Of course I am,” she murmured. “Can you not tell?”
He reached out, gently stroking her cheek. “I can,” he said. “I just need to hear it. I do not know about you, but I feel as if this entire marriage has been something of a dream.”
She smiled weakly. “It feels like that to me, too,” she said. “But a very happy dream. I’m here, with you, and I am coming to know my daughters. There is nothing that could make me happier.”
He smiled in response, gently rubbing her chin with his thumb. She had an enormous dimple in it, and he loved that. “I was thinking of something,” he said. “Something that may shock you.”
“What is it?”
“Let me ask you a question first,” he said, propping himself up on one elbow. “You are the last de Wylde, correct?”
“Aye,” she said. “For the Tamworth branch of the family. There are others, but they are not nearly as important socially as my father was. I am the last of the Ceowulf branch of the House of de Wylde.”
“A very old and very prestigious name.”
“It is,” she said. “But that happens sometimes. Old families die out, or at least the males who bear the name do. My daughters are de Tosni, but they bear de Wylde blood.”
“What would you say if I wanted to take the de Wylde name?”
She looked him in shock. “What?” she gasped, sitting up. “Why would you do that?”
He sat up alongside her. “It is not unusual for a man, from a family of lesser nobility, to take the name of his wife if she is of a higher social station,” he said.
“It has happened before, many times. If I take the de Wylde name, our sons will be de Wylde. The line will continue through them. Tamworth has belonged to de Wylde for hundreds of years until now. Until me. I do not wish to break that continuity.”
She could see that he was very serious, and it touched her deeply. “Oh… Thor,” she breathed, reaching out to cup his face. “What a remarkable thing for you to consider. But what on earth will your father say?”
He shrugged. “My father married my mother to inherit the Ashington earldom, you recall,” he said.
“I do not know why he did not take on the de Thorington name, but he named me after the family. I am the last vestige of a great line. My brother, Brian, will inherit the earldom, as you know, and I have four other brothers who will carry on the de Reyne name. But there is no one to carry on the de Wylde name. Your great bloodlines must not be diminished, Callie. I am willing to take your name and continue the de Wylde tradition. Become a de Wylde knight, as it were.”
Caledonia was stunned. It was the most selfless thing she’d ever heard of. “I… I do not know what to say,” she said. “That you should give more thought to your wife’s bloodlines than your own… Thor, that is incredibly generous.”
He smiled faintly. “We do not have to decide today,” he said. “But I wanted you to know what I was thinking. I want to discuss it with my father, too. I think he will approve.”
“Aye, you must discuss it with your father,” Caledonia said firmly. “You must have his blessing.”
Thor nodded. “I will,” he said.
Then he heard shouts floating in from the bailey outside and stood up, pulling up his breeches as he went and peered from the window.
“Darius has some returning Stafford soldiers out there,” he said. “He says they are hardly trained at all. We are going to have to start running a training school for those men. I cannot have soldiers who have no idea what to do in battle.”
Caledonia was up, pushing her skirts down and pulling up the top of her bodice, including the torn shift. “As I recall, Robert never worked with his army, and I do not think the de Luceras ever trained them,” she said. “I cannot remember ever seeing any organized teaching.”
He straightened out the top of her bodice, waggling his eyebrows apologetically when he saw where he tore it. “That is about to change,” he said. “And you and your sweetness have made me late. I must go.”
With that, he bent down and kissed her before heading for the chamber door. Caledonia scooted after him, collecting her slippers and pulling them on as she tried to walk.
“I must speak to you about the meat stores,” she said. “Evidently, there is very little, as we have discovered the servants and soldiers were being fed gruel. We must discuss what we are to do about bulking up the meat. I have some ideas, if you will listen.”
He paused at the door, his hand on the latch. “Of course I will,” he said. “But let me see to my duties this morning and I will meet you in the solar in the early afternoon if you wish.”
She smiled. “Good,” she said. “Thank you.”
He winked at her. “Thank you.”
With that, he opened the door, only to find two young children standing there. Thor nearly tripped on them. Janet and Joan gazed up at him with their bottomless eyes.
“What are you two doing out here?” he asked after he caught himself on the doorjamb. “I thought you were with Lady Nicola?”
They had been dressed by Nicola, that was clear.
They were clad in adorable dresses made from the fine shifts left behind by Madam Madonna, garments that Caledonia and Nicola had worked hard on altering.
Their hair was braided and tied back with a strip of the same material of their dresses.
Nicola had been taking great delight in brushing and braiding their hair, so it was obvious his sister had been involved with them at some point that morning.
“I want to bring my chicken inside and Lady Nicola says no,” Janet said seriously. “My chicken is lonely outside.”
The chicken again, Thor thought. They’d been dealing with that damn chicken since the moment they arrived, an enormous black hen that Janet claimed as a pet.
The thing was as big as she was and surely weighed as much, but she carried it around from time to time, or it followed her around mostly.
Several times, they’d found it in the bedroom that the girls now shared, the big bedchamber that had once belonged to Madam Madonna.
Those three little mattresses in the alcove had been burned and now Jane slept on her own small bed that Darius had made for her, while Janet and Joan slept on the big bed Madam Madonna used to occupy.
Sometimes that chicken ended up between the girls in the bed.
But Thor tried to be patient about it.
“I do not think your chicken is lonely,” he told Janet, stepping out into the landing while the girls followed him. “She has friends in the kitchen yard to keep him company. Why not go down and see her?”
Janet frowned, looking a good deal like her mother in that gesture. “Her name is Mary,” she said flatly. “Mary is obedient. Why can’t she come inside?”
“Because she is a chicken,” Thor said patiently. “Chickens do not live inside. People do.”
“But she is my friend.”
“I understand. But she is still a chicken.”
He’d told her that a dozen times, but still, she continued to ask.
He was fairly certain that she was trying to wear him down, hoping he’d give permission because he was either annoyed or finally took pity on her.
Truth be told, it was difficult to look into that little face and not want to give in, but Caledonia most emphatically didn’t want a chicken in the bedchambers, so Janet was going to have to accept it.
In fact, as Thor stood there and tried to reason with her, Caledonia emerged from their bedchamber.