He checked his list again. “The invitation specifies only Miss Elin and her chaperone.”
Respectful demeanor and delicate gestures.“All the young women in this home are of eligible birth and age.”
“Madam,” the messenger said, with increasing irritation, “the only names invited at the household are those that I have already shared.”
“Surely,” I said with vehemence, forgetting Agatha and the long-ago lessons, “that is a mistake.”
“Mother,” Mathilde whispered behind me, as a warning.
“Mother,” Rosamund begged, as a plea.
“I can assure you,” the messenger said with finality, “the king does not make mistakes.”
It was not a point I dared to argue. I felt my heart racing, heard my girls murmuring as we went through the rote motions—thethank-yous andbid thee wells andsafe journeys—before Alice closed the door. All stood still and silent as we listened to the crunch of wheels on gravel and the rattle of the departing carriage.
I looked back toward the girls, my gray and yellow flowers, on the stairs. But when I turned, I saw that Elin—so pale I had half a mind to outline her in ink—also stood at the top of the steps, hand hovering above the banister.
I rubbed my temple, which had begun to throb. “When did you get here?”
In front of her, Rosamund collapsed in a heap of silk and tears. “Why,” she wailed, “have we not been invited?”
“I have not a clue,” I said stiffly, looking away from Elin. But it wasn’t true. I knew why.
And it had everything to do with Henry.
CHAPTER FOUR
I’d known of Henry’s family since I can remember. Growing up, the Tremaines were recognized in our township for their pack of boys—large—and their hunting lodge—larger—and above all else, their fortune (largest). Merchants made wealthy across generations, they spent most of their time in their primary manor hall, in the central part of the kingdom. But during the hunting season, they traveled to the territory I called home to pursue the waterfowl and game birds that proliferated on our lakes and moorlands. The Tremaines’ arrival—with a litany of carriages and horses and livestock, servants and staff, maids and cooks and luggage and barrels of wine and ale—was met with fascination, watched from fenceposts and through windows, and gossiped about at the market and in kitchens.
The people in my hamlet were not accustomed to fanfare. Most were thin and hungry. Meager crops had to be coaxed from windswept patches of dirt. Our land was pine filled and hilly and rock strewn. The Tremaines traveled with a decorative tent used for roadside lunches.
Besides the tent, and other whispered details of opulence—that their buttons were made from jewels, that their caravan traveled carryingglass windows with them because the old lodge was only fitted with parchment—they were also known for their birds. Each family member had a falcon. The raptors came in travel cases and compartments, and in a special carriage designed for their transport, covered in nets and screens.
Hawking demands equipment, money, time, and land. It wasn’t familiar to most of the people in our township. But when the falcons were flying high, we all knew: The Tremaines were home.
The first time Henry and I spoke, I was twelve and out gathering berries. I was wandering through the briars when a voice came from up high: “There’s more on the other side!”
Startled, I looked up, into the sky, and then at the branches of the tree. I could barely see through the sunlight, but there he was, sleeves rolled up, shinnying down along the trunk: a young boy, skinny and sandy-haired and brown-eyed, with a scraped elbow that indicated he had climbed plenty of trees before this, to varying degrees of success.
I recognized him right away as one of the Tremaine brothers. Henry—the tall one. A year older than I and the third of seven sons. Less lucky in his birth order but lucky in birth, for he had been born feet first and both he and his mother survived to tell it.
“I’ll show you,” he said, dropping the last several feet to the ground. “This way.”
I was not supposed to be alone with boys, but I followed behind him.
“Another few weeks and the bushes will be filled.” He held a branch back for me. “You don’t talk much, do you?”
I considered the question and then considered not answering. I said instead: “Only when I have something good to say,” which felt like a violation of the statement. I realized I was a little nervous—we were not only unchaperoned, but he was from an elevated social tier. “Or bad,” I added, confusing even myself.
He grinned indulgently. “What about everything that’s in between?”
I thought carefully. “There’s no point.”
He looked back over his shoulder as we continued onward. “Well, what’s your name?”
“Etheldreda Verity Isolde—”
“Etheldreda,” he repeated. “Is that good or bad?”
