Chapter 20 #3
“You should go back to your rooms for the night,” a familiar deep voice says.
I startle and stumble back. Hands curl around my shoulders, steadying me. Alaris.
I want to sag into his touch. But I resist the urge to lean into it. My legs and feet ache, but I force myself to pull back, standing on my own to face him.
“Not yet.” Maids and footmen have begun setting up tents, filling the courtyard. “The work isn’t done.”
He narrows his eyes at me. “Am I no longer the lord of this house? I swear I told you to return to the aviary when I saw you hours ago…and yet here you stand. Openly defying me. Again.”
I purse my lips, unable to deny that I intentionally ignored Alaris’s orders when I saw him earlier. In trying to act more like a servant, capable of pulling my own weight, I’ve ended up acting less like one.
He reaches toward me, and I still. One ringed finger alights on the jar in my grasp. “Yet, the families of Culdridge will forever be grateful that you did. Thank you for this.”
“It was nothing.” I hold it out. “Here, take the rest.”
He shakes his head, using that finger to press the glass gently to my stomach. “Keep it for your use.” I think he is going to say something else, perhaps ask more about how I came by such powerful healing magic. But he drops his hand. “Now go to sleep.”
I open my mouth again to argue, but a single head tilt and that look in his eyes has me closing it.
Servants don’t argue with nobility. Right.
I resolve to save the rest of the ointment, in case anyone else needs it.
Now that I’ve accepted the idea of resting, it’s like I can’t stand another minute. I sag into a wobbling curtsy. “My lord.”
I rise out of the curtsy, but it’s painful. Alaris’s brows lower and his hand twitches toward me. Before he can see even more evidence of my exhaustion, I spin and hobble away.
The night air is icy. Families are being ushered into tents as fast as the staff can raise them, the rest waiting in the chill, huddled in blankets. The courtyard is a sea of weary faces.
My eyes bounce off them, seeking the familiar silhouette of the stranger I fear, seeking his mask and hood.
I’ve been focused all day on helping, adrenaline spiked by the crises before me, instead of thinking about all the strangers who just entered the castle.
I skirt the edges so I don’t get too close to anyone.
But no mask surfaces in the crowd. All I see are strained faces and curled shoulders. Nearby, a woman presses her lips to the forehead of a sleeping boy, her fingers shaking as she tucks his jacket tighter around him.
It’s too cold out here to be without shelter.
I spot a footman who seems to be counting heads, a pad of paper on a board in his hands. “Are there any rooms left inside?”
“The serviceable sleeping quarters are full. We’ve got three families to a chamber as it is.”
“What about the hallways?”
He shakes his head. “Only if the temperature drops further. We need to keep the halls clear to move food and supplies. We have to house these people for a few days, at least.”
I glance one more time at the woman and the boy. “I’ll be back.”
I go to my room, rinse my hands and face, and change out of my dirty, bloodied clothes. I repack the travel bag I came with, tucking the lightened jar of ointment and my jewelry in the bottom. With my cloak on and one of the blankets from my bed in hand, I march back outside to the footman.
“I’ve cleared my room,” I tell him as soon as his head comes up from his board. “It’s the third room down, on the second floor. There is a bed with linens, plus plenty of floor space.”
“I know the one.” He pauses, taking in the bag and blanket in my hand. “It will be a while before you get a tent.”
I shrug my bag higher on my shoulder. “I don’t need one. I have somewhere else I can stay.”
He quickly rights himself, scanning his list and then the crowd. “Tardiff family and Scall family? I have a room for you.”
Two groups shuffle forward: a bearded man and a woman clutching a bundle to her chest, and a wizened woman holding the hand of a small child with a gangly boy who can’t be more than sixteen trailing after.
I watch them follow the footman, my heart swelling that a few more people are escaping the cold.
It takes the last of my strength to trudge to the aviary. The scent of hay and feathers washes over me, a familiar relief after a day filled with the smell of blood and sweat and fear. The hawks rustle on their perches as I make my way to the bench under the overhang.
I’m a little more worried about the masked man tonight, given all the strangers on the grounds. But at least no one would think to find me sleeping here in this stone turret. Plus, I always feel a little safer under the watchful eyes of the hawks.
Maybe I should sleep here more often.
But it’s not comfortable. The aviary walls block the wind but provide little insulation, and the bench is hard and cold. I pull my cloak tight around me, and wrap myself in the blanket, jaw clacking.
But I will have to shiver through it. I barely muster the energy to tuck the pack under my head as a pillow before I fall asleep.