“Would you like me to send a few of my men out to her home to see to her situation?”
She looked at him for a moment, puzzlement in her expression, as if she wanted to say something but wasn’t sure how to go about it. When she spoke, it was haltingly.
“Forgive me, but… but why should you want to do anything for me?” she said. “I am not your responsibility. Your offer is kind, but I would feel very odd accepting.”
He cocked an eyebrow. “You’re wrong,” he said. “About your not being my responsibility, that is. You serve here, at The Feast, and you are indispensable. Surely Uncle Chester thought so, also, and your loyalty to my uncle affords you privileges when it comes to me. I am more than willing to help someone who has been so devoted to my uncle.”
She broke into a grin, shyly. “You are most kind to offer,” she said. “I will think on it, I promise.”
He smiled in return. “Good,” he said. “Now, will you eat something with me? Aidric was supposed to have something sent up, but it is not here yet and I am famished. Will you show me the kitchens? I can get my own food.”
Her smile turned genuine and she stood up. “That is not necessary,” she said. “I can fetch it for you.”
“You are not a servant.”
“Neither are you.”
His expression suggested that he saw her point. “True,” he said. “But let’s go down to the kitchens, regardless. There were some good things there yesterday. Mayhap there are more good things to eat today.”
Desdra began to head from the chamber with Jareth following. “We can certainly find out,” she said. “Did you speak with the cook yesterday?”
Jareth shook his head. “I was still trying to reconcile this place in my mind,” he said. “So, nay, I did not speak with him at all.”
“He’s an interesting man,” she said. “He used to be a priest.”
“A priest who is now a cook?”
She giggled. “And a very good one,” she said. “A terrible priest, but a wonderful cook.”
Jareth liked seeing her smile. Given the day she’d experienced, he was glad that she seemed to be feeling better. Perhaps he’d contributed to that, just a little.
He hoped so.
The cook, who, Jareth discovered, was named Gustave, didn’t look like either a priest or a cook. Jareth hadn’t noticed him much yesterday, but today, he did. The man looked like an ancient Roman wrestler, with a shiny, shaved head, muscular arms, and a beard that was long and braided. He seemed pleased that Jareth made the effort to visit him again and gave him a bowl of stew with cream and salt, peas, and cured meat in it. It was positively delicious. Jareth and Desdra ended up sitting at a table in the kitchen, stuffing themselves with the rich stew, and listening to Gustave tell adventurous tales about his life as a priest.
Jareth was fairly certain most of it was fabrication, especially when Gustave explained how he once saved an entire village from an old church that had collapsed on them, but Gustave told the stories so well that he didn’t care. More and more, he was starting to agree with what everyone in the know had told him.
Aphrodite’s Feast wasn’tjusta brothel.
It was more than he could have imagined.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Ridlaw Manor
“As I toldyou when you arrived home from Bristol a few days ago, the fact that your son was killed does not interest me. What does concern me is my money.”
The words came from King Dagda. They weren’t spoken, but growled. Like a preying beast, King Dagda had uttered those words, the same words he’d been uttering since Ciaran returned from Bristol and walked straight into an ambush, only now King Dagda seemed to be tired of uttering them. He’d spent a few hours knocking Ciaran around and stolen his horse as part of the debt owed, but there was literally nothing else of value in the manor, so his frustration was getting the better of him.
But no one was more frustrated than Ciaran.
The beating he’d taken the first two hours of King Dagda’s visit had rendered him nearly unable to talk. He’d had six teeth knocked out, and a broken one in his mouth was slicing into his cheek. He’d told King Dagda about Benedict’s unfortunate death, but that hadn’t made an impact. Ciaran had been trying to use Benedict’s death to hold off King Dagda’s demands or, at thevery least, delay them, but that hadn’t happened. It still wasn’t happening.
King Dagda wanted his money and he wanted it now.
That put Ciaran in a bind.
He was going to have to get creative.
