Terms of a #3
“We did. Rest assured, the deed to Thorfell Manor is almost entirely settled. We merely await Dagfinn’s signature.
” Percival reaches up to his throat and adjusts the high collar of his dark, finely embroidered robe.
His hair is slicked nearly away from his face, not a strand out of place, as though he spent a considerable amount of time making himself look respectable, just for this moment.
“This is not that deed though. This is something else I had hoped you might look over.”
Kelda’s eyes rove over the document.
The rest of the room waits on a knife’s edge.
Euphemia can feel herself trying to peer over the top of the parchment, even though it would be impossible to read from this angle. Asvald inches closer too, though his gaze seers into the side of Percival’s face.
Percival’s eyes flick briefly over him, noticeably tracing over the tattoos carved across Asvald’s face and wrapping around his skull. His mouth tightens before he returns his attention to Kelda.
Kelda starts muttering, reading random lines from the document aloud, “A yearly allowance of forty shillings…use of the Ironwycke house and garden…income from the northern meadow…marriage to be sanctified before the spring equinox—”
The air in the great hall becomes caustic.
Asvald’s fists tighten as Kelda tears her gaze away to glare up at Percival. She shakes the document at him. “What is the meaning of this?”
“Why, I’d like to think of it as the start of a prosperous union.” He actually has the gall to look surprised by her outrage.
“You are proposing I remarry? You?” She shoves the parchment into his chest.
He fumbles for the paperwork like it’s the most precious thing in the world to him. Once it’s under his control again, he throws his shoulders back, refusing to deflate.
“It’s not an entirely preposterous idea. You can see here—” Percival points somewhere near the middle. “I would contribute many respectable assets…”
Euphemia’s stomach tightens. He speaks of marriage as though he were presenting a ledger.
Percival is still droning on “—a home. A business. Land. And all I’d ask in return—”
“In return.” Kelda hisses like a boiling tea kettle. She twists around so her back is turned toward him.
It’s the first time Euphemia sees the muscle in his pointed jaw twitch.
A short, taut laugh, escapes him like the snap of a bowstring.
“I only meant that I see this as equally beneficial to both of us. It’s no secret that Thorfell is suffering.
Already, you’ve been forced to sell your belongings just to get by.
Forgive me for saying as such, but the manor is in a poor state. It could use a lord who—”
“It already has one!”
Kelda shoots to her feet so swiftly that her chair crashes back. She shoves Percival against the wall, knife pressed against his throat, and Euphemia is ashamed to admit that there is a small part of her that feels pride. This woman is rash and reckless, but she is fierce in her loyalty.
It is also not lost on Euphemia that this time when Kelda attacks, Asvald is not intervening.
Offense, confusion, and outrage battle Percival’s features. But he holds his hands up in surrender, frightened eyes darting to Asvald and Euphemia as if either of them can do anything.
“I am not interested in remarrying. Not now. Not ever.” Finally, Kelda relents.
Leaving Percival where he stands, she grabs her chair and sets it right before taking her seat at the table again.
Euphemia is not new to men vying for a widow’s attention.
Ever since her father’s disappearance, that’s all the men in her town have done.
They make their empty promises and declarations, and when Andriana denies them all, they threaten her.
They charge her more at the next market.
Call the constable on her for one petty complaint or another.
Try to steal her property. Her animals. Her business.
With each encounter, Euphemia’s mother hunches more and more, the weight of social expectation and fear slowly crumpling her.
But sitting across from Euphemia now, Kelda has never looked stronger. Never carried herself with more certainty and purpose.
Percival flattens his hands down the front of his robe. As he catches his breath, he glances around the room between the three of them before his gaze finally settles on Euphemia again. But the concern in his voice is conjured for Kelda and Kelda alone.
“The people have begun to talk about Dagfinn’s absence.”
Kelda flicks her wrist. “Let them talk.”
The urgency in his tone heightens. “I won’t be able to hold them off for much longer. Even if he miraculously pulls through—and I do hope he does—the people have started to question his authority. They claim your family is the reason for their plights.”
“My family?” Kelda scoffs. “We’re not the ones battling our own brothers. We’ve stayed out of the civil war.”
“Precisely!” Percival’s eyes take on a crazed look as his arms flap once at his sides. “You’ve stayed out of the war because you have no blood in it. It’s not your people fighting, it’s them. The English.”
“What would you have me do? Send our own people to fight? Declare ourselves loyal to one noble house, only for them to be defeated in the next battle, our people sacrificed to loyalties unearned?”
Percival turns a sneering eye upon Asvald. “I would trust your advisor to counsel you on matters of peace and war. I am merely relaying the message that the people of Thorfell Crag are growing uneasy. They’ve watched as you’ve isolated yourselves, thereby isolating them—”
“Dagfinn will fix this when he awakens.”