‘Fred would be good for the building,’ Henry agreed. ‘And Danny’s good in the fields. If you’ve the coin for both, they’d be worth it.’
‘Then we’ll have them both,’ Thorn agreed. ‘The countess and I will inspect our lands over the next few days, and tend to the pigs. We’ll hire our new people, and go from there. As for the rest… Perhaps we could meet weekly, see where we stand, and what we need?’ The two other men looked to each other, confounded again, before shrugging and nodding. ‘Excellent. In the meantime, Langton, we’ll trust you to keep us all fed as you have, and Henry, the house is yours until further notice.’
‘Very well, my lord,’ Henry said.
‘Thank you,’ Langton added, Henry nodding in agreement.
‘Well then, I think that’s enough of a plan for one night, and we all need some rest before we begin again tomorrow. So thank you, both of you, and I hope… I hope we can all make Gadmin Hall into something we can be proud of.’ The others nodded, and Hypatia and Thorn rose, Thorn gesturing the others to sitand finish their meal or conversation, which they did reluctantly. ‘Good night, all.’
‘Good night, my lord, my lady,’ they both said, half bowing awkwardly as they remained seated.
Hypatia smiled, then grabbed a candle and set it in a holder before lighting it, and followed Thorn as he made his way out, though he stopped just outside the doorway.
‘I’ve just realised, I’ve no idea where I’m to be laying my head tonight,’ he chuckled.
‘I’ll show you to your room.’
‘Well, here it is,’ Hypatia said, opening the door to Thorn’s room, and going to light the two candles she’d left in here—one by his bedside, the other on the mantel—so he could see it for all it was, and wasn’t.
He wandered in slowly, his eyes flitting over the moth-eaten curtains, antique four-poster bed set up with the best of what linens and pillows there were, moth and time-eaten rug, and small jug and basin set on a miniscule table.
She’d done her best to make it comfortable, and she was glad to see his bag had been brought up, his clothes set out in the trunk at the foot of the bed, but she wondered if perhaps he was disappointed to find her summation of their diminished state not so off the mark.
‘I can light a fire,’ she offered, as he wandered to the bed, and brushed his hands over the sprig of rosemary and lavender she’d left on his pillow. ‘I’ve been comfortable without, but there is a draught, especially if the winds pick up tonight.’
‘I’ll be comfortable, I’m sure,’ he said gently, looking over at her. ‘If not, I am very capable of lighting a fire myself.’
‘I’m just next door. You’ve what was a dressing room or study through the other door,’ she added, nodding towards the one tothe right of his bed. ‘But there’s nothing in it, I fear, not even the spiders and other beasties we found, we did clear them out before you arrived.’
‘Company I shall certainly not miss.’ Hypatia smiled, and so did he, nodding absent-mindedly before sitting on his bed. She was about ready to go find her own when he spoke again. ‘If I did not say it earlier, you astonish me, Hypatia,’ he said quietly, before looking over at her, again as if trying to decipher her; a look she knew very well, though it didn’t feel so horrid when Thorn looked at her thus, rather than strangers, acquaintances, or even family. ‘And I want to give you another chance, as downstairs, before the others, you might not have dared to make another choice. You left a life of forced labour, or forced care, and now I’m asking you to do the same, in a different, but extremely demanding manner. I offered you escape, not to become a pig farmer.’
‘Thank you, Thorn. I do…appreciate your offer. But as I said before, I’m not going anywhere. And there are worse things than to become a pig farmer.’
‘Not most people’s dream, I suspect.’
‘Perhaps not, but then I never had many dreams, beyond escape.’
He frowned slightly, as if that revelation again gave him another piece of the seeming puzzle she presented, then nodded, not ignoring it, but storing it away for later—or never—perhaps.
‘How do you know so much about all of this anyway?’ he asked. ‘Pig-shelters, and crops, and all the rest… I’ve been trying to get a handle on it since I was told what I was to become, and only understand perhaps half.’
‘A house is a house, and a farm, well, I had no notion really, but I read some books after I agreed to marry you. Brought more with me, and there were a few hidden about here.’ He quirked his head, smiling a smile she couldn’t quite decipher. ‘I didn’teven have a chance to ask,’ she said, changing the subject for the moment felt a little unsettling for her liking. ‘How your farewells were. If you managed to sort whatever business you had to.’
A slight shadow passed across his face, and it wasn’t due to one of those nasty draughts slipping through the still open door, and moving the flame beside him.
‘In all honesty, I thought it would be harder,’ he told her. ‘Maybe I was just ready to start afresh.’
‘Did you have many friends? Or perhaps a sweetheart? I didn’t even ask that either,’ she realised, frowning slightly.
‘I was rather a solitary creature,’ he said, with a sad huff of a laugh. ‘I had a good apprentice, who became a friend, and I knew people, only I never…created ties, I suppose, despite living in the same cottage where I was born, and being around the same people I was all my life. Strange, isn’t it?’ he asked, and she nodded, knowing that feeling very well. ‘As for a sweetheart… Once, there was a woman. But that is a long tale, and not one for a night when we’re both barely still holding on our feet.’
‘I’ll leave you then,’ she said, moving towards the door. ‘Good night, Thorn.’
‘Is there anything that scares you, Hypatia?’ he asked blindingly clearly, and frustratingly simply, before she could fully depart, and close the door.
She thought about giving him a non-answer, or not answering at all. But then she thought, they had a chance, the two of them, that not many had; the chance an odd sort of instinctive safety between them provided, to be honest, to the extent that their own strength allowed them.
‘To be trapped in a cage so long it moulds my flesh and soul. Of never taking chances, of waiting any longer, and never becoming.’
