“My lady, this way.” The boy, who must have been around eight, beckoned her towards the humble cottage, stopping to pat his friend on the shoulder. “All will be well, Eliza. Lady Blackford is here.”
Standing on the threshold, Lucy turned to the men.
“I don’t want any of you catching whatever they have. Keep clear of the house. I will meet you at the edge of the village when I’m ready to go.”
Thomas nodded. “As you wish, my lady.” They took Buttercup and left to wait for her.
“What has happened here?” Lucy asked gently. A man she recognized as the village thatcher replied solemnly, “the pox has come upon them.”
Lucy’s breath caught in her throat. She had heard tales of outbreaks in the larger cities, but never witnessed one herself. Thank goodness she’d been vaccinated as a child.
“I brought soup.” She held up the basket. “May I look in on them?”
The thatcher hesitated before nodding. “If that is your wish.”
Steeling herself, Lucy ducked inside the dim cottage, Eliza following her. The air smelled foul and sickly sweet. In the far corner, on dirty straw pallets, lay the girl’s parents and three siblings, skin covered in angry red spots.
Lucy had read about smallpox in school, but seeing it in person was far different. She searched her memory—fever, rash, lesions... it all fit the description. Combined with how rapidly the villagers said it had come upon them, she thought they were right. It was smallpox.
She turned to the daughter, Eliza, who looked at her with red-rimmed eyes. “I don’t want to lose my family,” she wept.
But Lucy knew it was a contagious disease that could easily spread throughout the village and to the castle.
She clasped the girl’s shoulder gently. “Boil rags to clean them. Try and get them to take a bit of the soup I brought.”
Leaving the cottage, Lucy blinked back tears, grateful she had been vaccinated against smallpox as a child even as it madeher feel powerless knowing she was protected while the villagers were not.
Outside, Lucy washed her hands with water from the well in the village, along with soap and rags she’d brought with her, then had her guardsmen do the same.
“We will return tomorrow with soap and more soup. I fear ’tis all we can do until this illness passes.”
The air rangwith the sound of swords crashing together and men’s shouts as William and the men sparred vigorously on the training field, trading insults. Not that he was showing off for his lady, rather he was allowing her to appreciate a fine bit of swordplay. The winds swept through the lists, carrying with it the scent of the sea, along with sweat and dust kicked up by the day’s practice.
His wife sat on the low stone bench as he strode over to her.
“Here to admire my form?”
She kissed him on the cheek. “You are a sight to behold. Grace and ruthlessness that none can compare,” she said with a grin.
He knew she liked to tease him. He hauled her to him, kissing her soundly as the men yelled out suggestions and insults.
“By twos then.” William bellowed as he deftly parried a flurry of strikes.
They circled each other, boots scuffing in the dirt, before Leo rushed forward as William side-stepped swiftly, allowing the blow to whisk mere inches from his shoulder. Off-balance, Leo stumbled forward, and William landed a blow on his back with the practice sword.
“Wee Jason could have done better,” shouted Rhys from the sidelines.
“Bloody hell, you almost lost your head.” Wymund, his captain, taunted the guardsman as others joined in, hurling insults that by now, William knew Lucy was used to hearing, although she would be vexed with him if Jason repeated some of the more inventive curses.
William cast a baleful eye over his men. “Womanly prattle, the lot of you. Now draw your blades.”
With a roar, Leo charged again, Benedict coming from behind as he matched each strike and blow with effortless grace, and if William glanced over to make sure his lady was watching, it was only to ensure she was admiring his visage, not that he cared what she thought of his swordplay.
The other knights looked on, scrutinizing his form and footwork for any small detail that might aid their own skills.
“Mind your balance, Godfrey!” he called as one knight nearly tripped over his own feet.
To another he warned, “Patience, Rhys. Wait for the right moment to strike or you’ll lose that pretty head and then serving wenches across the lands will weep into their cups.”
