Chapter 4
CHAPTER FOUR
ROSAMUND
Once more, I’m locked up in my room. My sanctuary. My self-made cage. Thankfully, Della has lit the fireplace, and it’s warm inside.
Tearing the silk moths and flower pins from my hair, leaving a trail behind me, I flop onto my four-posted bed, lie on my back, and kick off my shoes, letting them thud to the floor.
Staring up at the dark canopy that’s stitched with silver flowers and stars, my head spinning, I wonder if today’s events actually happened. It doesn’t feel real. The flowers and stars spin, too, a drunken sky mirroring the chaos inside my head.
Instinct has me checking that my knife is under my pillow, where I always keep it, a habit I formed after the werewolves’ attack.
Tonight’s assault, though, was insidious. As if leaving my home to marry a stranger wasn’t stressful and frightening enough, now this… affront. Onslaught. Insanity.
Tomorrow, I decide. Tomorrow I will clarify this with Stepfather.
He has no right to impose this creature on me.
Surely, it was meant as a jest. A joke in bad taste, but a joke nonetheless.
He has no grounds on which to wish me harm.
I’m leaving anyway. He even announced it tonight. I’ll be out of his hair soon.
He has to see reason.
The music from the great hall filters through my door.
Shrieks of laughter, yelling, and a drum.
Bagpipes. Mandolins and dulcimers. A male voice singing.
It has to be Eriard, I think, the bard my stepfather usually employs for his banquets.
I wonder if he’s singing of the end of King Rouen and the reign of the fae, but that would be impolite, considering tonight’s guests of honor.
The House of Fireflies. What debt did they owe my stepfather? A big one, for sure, to require an act of madness, such as entering dark fae territory and kidnapping one of the beasts themselves.
What did Stepfather do for them? Since when is he so chummy with the fae?
He has traded and met with them, same as every other human noble, but he never expressed any sympathy for their kind.
I grew up in a household that has always kept the fae in subtle contempt, and it suited my own trauma and rage against their wild kind just fine.
I doze on and off as the night wears on, eventually managing to unlace my corset, undress, and burrow under the covers. Dreams torment me, taking me back to my captivity days and the claws raking over my flesh, only this time I’m inside a cage, snarling and transforming into a wolf myself.
I come awake to loud knocking on my door. I lift my head, disoriented and drenched in cold sweat, gritting my teeth so hard my head throbs.
The knocking returns, and it’s like a hot poker pushing into my skull.
It’s still dark outside my narrow windows. The wind whistles through the cracks. The music has gone silent, as have the voices and laughter.
“Who’s there?” I carefully sit up, wincing at the pounding behind my eyes, and realize I’m only in my long chemise. Quickly, I slip out of bed and grab my blue dressing gown from a chair. “I said, who’s there?”
“My lady!” a vaguely familiar male voice says. “This is Jos, his Lordship’s steward. I apologize for bothering you so early in the morning.”
Morning? It’s not even dawn. I approach the door warily. “What do you want?”
“My lady, your stepfather has ordered me to deliver the… the bodyguard to your room.”
“What? Here? You’re bringing that abomination here?”
He clears his throat, clearly uncomfortable with this mess. “He’s to be your bodyguard, my lady. He’s supposed to be here with you. At least, outside your door.”
“He can’t!” I take a step back, even though the door is closed, a childish fear rising in me that the wolf will break through it and come for me.
“Your stepfather has ordered me to bring him here. I… apologize.” He pauses. “The fae has shifted back to his human fae form. If that helps.”
“Does it?” I shake my head. “He’s not coming in here.”
“My lady.” Another pause. “I’ll leave him outside, then.”
“Just leave him outside my door, unleashed? Are you all crazy?” I feel like I might throw up. “How will I get out in the morning?”
“Do you want me to chain him up?”
“Yes!”
“Of course.” He clears his throat. “As you wish.”
My breaths are coming hard and fast. “In fact, no. Take him away. Put him back in his cage.”
“I can’t. The cage has been removed from the manor, and I… I’m following orders.”
My hands clench in helpless anger. “What else has my stepfather ordered of me?”
“My lady…”
“Is the creature going to be following me around day and night? Am I to hold his hand as I stroll in the gardens? What about when I’m taking a bath? Will he be there, too?”
Another clearing of his throat. “He did say you are expected to be with him whenever it’s appropriate. Not during bath time, obviously.”
My nails bite into my palms. “You’re not serious. This can’t be serious.”
“To get accustomed to him, he said.”
Accustomed to a monster that’s meant to be bound to me, want it or not.
Tomorrow, I think as I back away from the door. Tomorrow I’ll clear this up and unshackle myself from this new horror.
As the sky lightens outside the windows, I pace my room, striving for calm. By the time the birds wake up and sing an ode to the day, I’m exhausted and shaking.
This can’t be happening. I won’t let it. He can’t make me.
No.
It’s quiet outside my door, but fear has sunk its cold claws into my bones. Savage animals, predators, they are like that. They creep up on you from the shadows when you least expect it, grabbing you—
“My lady?” A soft knock, a sweet, feminine voice. “May I enter?”
“Della!” I approach the door. Hesitate. “Are you alone?”
“Yes, my lady.”
I cautiously unlock the door and open it a crack. “And the wolf—?”
He’s right there, seated on the floor, his back to the wall, face obscured by the fall of his too-long silver hair, those pointed ears poking out, marking him as a fae even in the dimness of the corridor.
“Quickly, get inside!” I hiss, opening the door wider and grabbing her wrist. I drag her into my room, slam the door shut, and lock it again, then lean against it, trying to catch my breath.
“My lady.” Della is pale, chewing on her lower lip, almost drawing blood. “I am so sorry.”
“Yeah. I know.”
“I am to dress you for breakfast. Everyone will be there, and your presence is expected. My lady…”
I stop and press the heels of my palms into my eyes. “I need to speak to Stepfather. I need to stop this farce.”
“Of course. Let me help you wash and dress.” She sets about mechanically gathering my clothes and ornaments. “Then you can make your case.”
After long moments, I nod and shrug off my dressing gown, letting her guide me to the wash basin. She pours water and helps me clean myself up, then helps me put my corset back on and a fresh dress.
I feel like a puppet fighting against its puppeteer.
It will be fine, I tell myself. I’ll clear this up. Surely he’s not serious. Surely it will all be over by the time breakfast is done.
Della gets me into a pale pink dress and pulls my hair up. I’m barely paying any attention, my mind set on fixing this mess and on the beast lurking right outside.
“He didn’t try to attack you, did he?” I blurt out when my thoughts become impossible to contain anymore.
“The werewolf?” She keeps her eyes on the pins she’s pushing into my hair. “No, my lady. He’s chained up pretty heavily, to tell you the truth, and he has been bleeding all over the floor. He must be weakened.”
“He’s wounded? Oh, good.” I’m still grinding my teeth and do my best to stop. “Very good. I hope he bleeds out.”
“I don’t understand why they brought that animal in here,” she blurts out, “knowing what his accursed kind did to you, knowing…” Her mouth trembles. “It’s cruel.”
Restless, I go look for my shoes. “The world is a cruel place, Della.”
“It’s also crazy to expect you to go along with it!”
“A cruel and mad place. But I will fight this, be certain of it.” Locating my shoes, I slide my stockinged feet inside, and Della kneels to button them up. “This is beyond the pale. I’m leaving the beast here.”
She looks up. I didn’t think it possible, but her face pales more. “There is a… leash.”
Her words make no sense. “What?”
“They put a collar on him, and here I have the leash. For you.”
For long moments, I remain speechless. “So what am I supposed to do, take him for a walk? Play fetch?”
A giggle bursts from her lips, and she claps her hand over her mouth. “Apologies. It just sounds…”
“Ridiculous. I know. And…” I shudder. “And fatal. He’ll disembowel me the moment I come near him. What was Stepfather thinking? I’m not doing this.” I shake my head so hard something wrenches in my neck. “I can’t.”
Della is silent for long moments, chewing on her already raw lip.
“Your stepfather sent orders through me that you have to take him with you. Everywhere you go. I’m not…
” She bows her head. “I have worked here, at the manor, for long years, and I don’t think he has ever been… violent toward you. Has he?”
“Violent? No.”
But harsh? Yes. Limiting. Sending me to my room if he’s displeased with anything about my behavior.
Always taking—with yesterday’s notable exception—his wife’s and daughter’s sides.
Spending fortunes on their clothes and jewelry, telling me I have enough gowns and frivolous things already, when my clothes have started falling apart.
Conveniently forgetting about me when they go out on carriage rides or visiting other towns.
I’m not bitter. I seriously have accepted his behavior. But I’d say violence can exist in neglect and dismissal, too.
“Well, if you must live under this roof for a while longer,” Della says, “let’s bend his rules a little. Let me call two manservants, my lady. They can accompany you to the hall, and then once you make your case, the beast will be placed back in his cage, and you will be free.”
“Yes.” I chew on the inside of my cheek. “Yes. Good idea.”
Then I’ll be free. Free to obey another man, my future husband. If you can call that freedom.
But what other path is there for me?