Mother Knows Best #2
“Of course not, but it’s the only explanation we can give for you not being at court for a while. Most of the young ladies go abroad once they enter court, so she will not think twice about it.”
“Did you also say she has spoken to you about me being wed to the prince? Which prince?”
“Prince Gavin, of course,” Mother sniffed.
Before I could address this further, Father cut in.
“Dear, don’t you think this is a little much? I mean, lying to the queen could be considered treason, especially if she is being considered. What if someone sees her here at home and not abroad?”
“She will be locked in her room. No one will see her, and I’ve already explained to the staff that they will be dismissed if they breathe a word of her still being here,” Mother said simply. “Besides, she won’t want to be seen in the bridle anyway. That will guarantee to keep her out of sight.”
As if in reflex, I shot out of my chair and gaped at my mother. “You can’t intend to use that vile thing on me again. I haven’t done anything in years to deserve that kind of punishment.”
“You know very well what you have done, and until you no longer recognize your pair-bond to that abomination, you will stay locked up. Am I clear? Unless you need me to up the punishment?” she said coolly, piercing me with her steady gaze.
“There is nothing I can do to change the fact I am pair-bonded with Vasin. It’s a lifelong deal. Not something I can just wish away because you ask me to,” I shot back and then turned to look at my father for help.
He looked down as soon as I caught his gaze, bending to my mother’s orders.
I was on my own—no one was going to help me out of this situation.
I turned sharply on my heel and fled the dining room before I made things worse.
An hour later, my mother walked into my room with my humiliation in her hands.
I could feel my body burn with anger at her doing this to me.
One of our stablehands was also with her, holding a thin riding crop.
“Are you going to make this easy?” Mother asked.
I lifted my chin and squared my shoulders.
Mother sighed, held out her hand for the crop, and nodded her head to the stablehand.
He grabbed me around the waist and tossed me on my bed, then wrapped me tightly in a blanket.
The man held onto me as Mother bolted the leather harness over my face.
It fit snugly, the leather covering my mouth keeping me from opening my jaw.
I fought to keep still as she started the second part of my punishment.
The first sting of the crop on my bare feet made me cry out.
With the bridle on, my cries were muffled and contained in this one room.
The lashes continued, and I lost count of how many Mother slashed across my feet, but I knew they would be bleeding.
She planned this to make sure I couldn’t walk on them for days after. It would be one of the only things that would keep me from trying to run.
When she was done, the stablehand released me, my face buried in the bedding. I felt Mother brush a hand down my head before she left the room, leaving me to my humiliation.
The following days seemed to drag on forever with no end in sight.
I was kept in the bridle for five days solid, unable to eat, drink, or speak to anyone around me.
After I was freed from that, I was still locked in my room and only let out for evening meals, the only meal I was consistently allowed to eat.
Throughout the day, I had class after class in every area that my mother felt I was lacking in.
That turned out to be all of them—etiquette, dancing, poetry, needlepoint, painting, and memorizing the most prominent families in the kingdom down to the second cousin.
Only now when I didn’t get things right, I was whipped with a switch on the palms of my hands or the back of my legs.
By the end of the second week, I felt like I was almost at my breaking point. If I had to practice my curtsies one more time or write another sonnet, I was going to go mad. My only solace in all of this was that my father insisted I keep up my education with him.
The library had become my lifeline. As soon as I entered the dim, oil lamp-lit room, I could breathe a sigh of relief.
Slowly, I developed a plan to get out of here, but my plans to be free of this life of drudgery and abuse were thwarted at every turn.
Each time I finally managed to get a maid or teacher on my side, they were dismissed the next day.
I could never figure out how my mother knew, but she always found out.
Even Father was tight-lipped and unwavering in the situation.
She even went so far as to place male servants by the two exits at night to keep me from running away.
As much as I needed to run away from home, I didn’t know the first thing about surviving alone out in the world.
I’d lived a sheltered life and had no skills that would be of any use in keeping myself alive.
I read tons of books about how to live off the land and how to hunt and fish, but mental knowledge was not what I needed.
Day after day, a sense of defeat built as each glimmer of hope was crushed. The punishments became more frequent since I had given up caring about anything. The hollow ache in my chest of missing Vasin was the only reminder of why I needed to stay alive.
One night, unable to fall asleep after three weeks of being trapped in my room, I threw back the covers and started to pace.
I was surprised I had the energy, having had my food portions cut in half the past week.
When stalking the length of my room didn’t help, I decided to see if reading would calm my mind.
Silently, I slipped past Becka—who made a show of locking me in my room each night before stealthily unlocking my door—and padded down the hall, then down the servants’ stairway to the first floor.
Creeping past the servants’ sleeping quarters next to the kitchen, I raced down the short hall and into the library.
I sighed, proud that I’d made it with no one the wiser.
Taking one of my favorite books off the shelf, I huddled in a corner near the window to read by moonlight.
At some point, I must have dozed off because the next thing I knew, I was awoken by the sound of the window next to me opening.
I curled up into a little ball, thankful my dressing gown was a dark navy blue and wouldn’t be easily seen.
I kept as silent as I could as four men dressed in all black entered the library through the window.
They looked like liquid shadows as they arranged themselves around the room. Only one of them seemed to stay out in the open as if waiting for something to happen. Then a few moments later, the library door opened, and Father walked in holding a shrouded candle.
What was going on?