Chapter Five
“Ye’re marrying a Blackchurch trainer? God love ye, lass!”
The congratulations came from a wench who served at The Black Cock, a busty woman with frizzy hair she tried to tame by tying it up with a kerchief.
She smiled a good deal with her yellowed teeth and had been kind to Ophelia after her mother settled her in a small, rented chamber and ordered her a bath.
Randa wanted her daughter to wash off the dust of the road and be clean when she met her future husband, so the wench, a woman who went by the name of Greenie, had brought hot water and a copper tub with a stool in it so Ophelia could sit whilst she bathed.
So far, it had been a vigorous affair.
“Aye, I’m marrying a Blackchurch trainer,” Ophelia said as Greenie scrubbed her neck rather strongly with a rag and a bar of lumpy soap that smelled of rosemary. “Did my mother tell you that?”
Greenie took her bathing duties seriously as she scrubbed Ophelia’s shoulders. “Aye,” she said. “She told me that I’m to shine ye up like a new gold piece. She wants ye clean and smelling sweet.”
Ophelia was rather embarrassed that her mother had told the woman why she was here.
A servant she didn’t even know was now aware of her private business.
It was bad enough that she was being forced to bathe with an attendant, something she didn’t normally do, but now she was to be trotted out like a prized mare.
She was starting to feel sick again.
“What did my mother select for me to wear?” she asked. “Or did she tell you?”
Greenie looked behind her, at the bed where some garments were strewn across the mattress. “There’s a brown silk on the bed, I think,” she said. “And a shift.”
Ophelia sighed. “That’s what she wants me to wear,” she said. “She says the brown matches my eyes.”
Greenie came around to the front of her, studying her face. “Ye have a fine face, m’lady,” she said. “I know the Blackchurch lads. They like pretty women. Which one are ye to marry?”
What a lovely thought, Ophelia pondered morosely. Men who like pretty girls. More than one? Or a different one every night? Is Blackchurch nothing but a stable of oversexed men?
“De Royans,” she said glumly. “Creston is his name, I think.”
Greenie stopped and looked at her, evidently with some surprise. “Sir Creston?” she repeated. “Have ye never met him, lass?”
“Never.”
Greenie resumed her scrubbing. “Then ye’ll not be disappointed,” she said. “He’s one of the more comely lads of the group. Quite comely, I’d say.”
That didn’t create more interest for Ophelia than she already had. If anything, it might have made it worse.
“Comely,” she muttered. “I would assume he knows it?”
Greenie shrugged as she lifted Ophelia’s arm and began to wash it. “No more than any other man,” she said. “He deserves a pretty wife and ye’ll do fine. He’ll be pleased.”
Ophelia didn’t really care if the man was pleased or not. They were both being forced into this, so it didn’t matter what they felt. Duty came first. But she was starting to feel sicker, and a little shaky as well, so her thoughts shifted from Creston de Royans to her stomach.
She needed food.
“Greenie, if I asked you to help me, would you?” she said.
Greenie paused, looking at her. “Of course, lass,” she said. “What do ye need?”
Ophelia was careful in how she proceeded. “My grandfather,” she said. “He… he believes a woman should be frail and pale in appearance and he has not given me much food to eat.”
Greenie frowned. “What do ye mean?”
Ophelia sighed heavily. “I mean that he wants me to be frail and pale when I meet my betrothed,” she said. “My grandfather believes that is what makes a woman beautiful. The weaker, the better. But the truth is that he has starved me.”
Now Greenie was starting to understand. “He did that?” she said, aghast. “Ridiculous!”
Ophelia could see she had support. Reaching out, she grasped the woman’s wrist. “Greenie, I’m so very hungry,” she said softly.
“Could you bring me some food and not tell my grandfather or my mother? She lets him starve me, so she mustn’t know.
I have a little money. I will pay for the food, but could you bring me some and not let anyone see? ”
Greenie dropped the rag into the copper pot. “Of course, I will,” she said, clearly outraged. “I’ll get ye something myself. Stay here and I’ll return.”
Ophelia felt more hope and relief than she had since this entire nightmare had started.
Since the day that Cecil had decided to leave her at the altar and her life was turned upside down, nothing had gone her way.
No sympathy, no kindness, no love. None at all.
Now, one kind person’s agreeing to help her, bringing her something as simple as food, was enough to drive her to tears.
As Greenie fled the chamber and shut the door, Ophelia climbed out of the tub and bolted the door behind her.
She didn’t want anyone coming in, surprising her.
She’d had bathed in her shift, refusing to strip naked in front of someone she didn’t know, so now that Greenie was out of the chamber, she pulled off the shift and sat down in the copper tub, finishing what Greenie had started.
Using the soap she’d brought, she scrubbed the rest of her body, her face, and behind her ears.
Greenie had washed her hair the very first thing, rinsing it with stale ale and then winding it on top of her head and pinning it with big iron pins.
When every inch of her body was washed, feet included, she quickly climbed out of the tub and dried off with a long piece of linen that was embroidered around the edges.
She and her mother shared it because it was a valuable piece, but it dried her quickly and she pulled a clean shift over her head just as someone knocked on the door.
“Who comes?” she demanded.
“Me, m’lady!”
Quickly, Ophelia rushed to the door and admitted Greenie, who had a small tray in her hands, covered with a cloth.
Ophelia followed her like a loyal dog, eagerly, as the servant took the tray over to the small table in the chamber and then uncovered it to reveal a bowl of stew and a hunk of bread.
There was also a small bowl of stewed apples with cinnamon and a cup of wine.
Ophelia could smell everything. Starving, she sat down and began to stuff her mouth with the mutton stew as Greenie pulled the pins out of her hair and let the damp strands fall.
“I saw yer mother out in the common room,” Greenie said. “I don’t know if she’ll be coming to see ye any time soon, so ye’d better hurry and eat.”
Ophelia was eating as fast as she could without it coming back up again. Greenie went back over to the chamber door and threw the bolt so there would be no unexpected visitors.
“You have my undying gratitude,” Ophelia said, mouth full. “I will not forget this, I swear it.”
Greenie found a comb in Ophelia’s smaller satchel and began to comb through her hair. It was long and soft, with a slight wave to it, drying quickly in the warmth of the chamber.
“Not to worry, m’lady,” Greenie said. “I cannot believe yer grandfather would starve ye simply for presentation. He expects ye to look like death on your wedding day?”
Ophelia gulped down the small cup of wine.
“He thinks women should be fragile creatures, seen and not heard,” she said, which was sort of the truth.
He didn’t like a woman with an opinion, but the part about fragility wasn’t exactly true.
Her grandfather simply didn’t want her to gain weight and look as if she were pregnant.
“He is a man of strong views when it comes to women. He makes it difficult sometimes.”
She plowed back into the stew as Greenie continued to brush her hair, fluffing it, drying it.
The servant couldn’t help but think that in spite of the young woman’s wealth—and it was clear, from the fine slippers she wore to the milled soap used for her bath, that she came from money—she seemed to lead a rather unpleasant existence.
Greenie couldn’t even fathom a man starving a woman simply so she’d look thin and frail.
She knew for a fact that Creston de Royans wasn’t going to like that.
She knew Creston better than she let on.
He frequented The Black Cock with his close friend, Cruz, probably more than the other trainers did.
For Creston, it seemed to be a release of sorts—he would drink and play card games with Cruz or the owner of The Black Cock, Hobbes, and sometimes he even played with Hobbes’ wife, Margit.
They were an older couple who had taken ownership of the tavern from Hobbes’ father long ago, and they were childless, so the Blackchurch trainers filled a void for them.
They treated the men like family, fed them at no cost, mostly let them drink at no cost—though the trainers insisted on paying—and, in turn for the kindness, the trainers were the security for the tavern.
In the wilds of Devon, a place like The Black Cock could attract all kinds of dangerous men, and the Blackchurch trainers were always there to ensure the tavern was a safe place for all.
Creston always seemed to be at the forefront of any action in defense of the tavern.
That was how Greenie knew he wasn’t going to like someone trying to starve a lady.
He was a chivalrous man.