I never called for a doctor; I had seen bloodless bodies before.
I tried not to imagine what had happened while I slept.Tried not to picture death’s shadow falling upon the bed.Tried not to wonder what might have happened if I had only opened my eyes.
Father welcomed me home before the stench of burning hair could settle and said no more of Yann.Turns out there were worse things that could haunt your daughter’s bed than an unwed baker.He still wrote letter after letter to lords in regions I had never heard of, and Johanna whispered to me that he had doubled his offer.But no one ever replied.
Father never warmed to Yann, but on the day his sister died, he made me a promise.If he couldn’t find me a better match before my twenty-fifth birthday, he would grant Yann his blessing.And so I greeted spinsterhood with open arms, while Father turned a blind eye to our dalliances, which is how we managed to find these secluded snatches of time to further ruin my marriage prospects.
Afterwards we lay together, his fingers trailing the length of my arm.I nestled into him, waiting for him to speak, hoping I knew what he had to say.
‘Wouldn’t it be so much nicer not to have to steal away like this?’he said at last.‘Imagine if we could lie like this in a proper bed, without caring if someone found us.’
I hummed.‘You’d have to marry me for that.’
Yann stared at me a moment, then fell back into the weeds, covering his face with both hands.‘Johanna told you.’He groaned.
‘Sorry,’ I said.‘Should I pretend to be surprised?’
Yann picked himself back up.‘No, that would be worse.’He rummaged in the basket again and produced a small glinting object.I recognised it immediately as the ring his mother used to wear.She’d died not long after the prince took my own mother, with so little blood left in her that the holes in her throat were barely damp.Unlike my father, who had shut his mouth and channelled his grief into keeping Orlfen alive, Yann’s had gathered a group of men to traipse up the hill to Castle Rostenburg and prove what we all suspected.And perhaps, in a way, they did.When their bloodless bodies were found strung up in the town square the following morning, we all knew who was responsible.
‘Clara.’Yann took both of my hands in his.‘I had a speech prepared, but I can see from your face that you’re not going to let me say it all.So let me say this much.’He took a breath.‘I have loved you for as long as I have known what it means to love, and you know I would have asked you this years ago if I could.’
I couldn’t stop smiling, though his face was blurred through my tears.
‘Marry me, Clara.’
‘Of course I will,’ I cried, throwing my arms around him.He held me while I sobbed into the crook of his neck, gently teasing me for my girlish emotions until I pushed him away and kissed him.
My fiancé.
My husband to be.
We lay in the glen for hours, dreaming of the future we would share.Assuming Father conceded my dowry to Yann, we could use the money to buy a house in Salzburg.Yann would find anapprenticeship with a proper pâtissier and we would eat nothing but cakes and sweetmeats until we were so fat we could barely stand.The thought left us giggling.
We knew there was no guarantee we would live long beyond the wedding – no guarantee we would survive until the wedding itself.I tried to push that thought away.The day belonged to us, nothim.Even so, my eyes strayed to where Castle Rostenburg clung to the eastern peak.
Yann followed my gaze to the castle, then tilted my chin to face him once more.‘There’s still plenty of time before nightfall.’
But the shadows were already growing long around us, and it wouldn’t be safe to linger in the woods much longer.There were worse things than wolves waiting in the dark.
Yann helped me to my feet.We trailed back to Orlfen along the dried riverbed, so slowly that the shadow of the western peak threatened to overtake us.My nerves had set in, and even when Yann squeezed my hand to draw me back to him, I couldn’t unfurl the knot in my stomach.
‘Have you spoken to anyone else about this?’I had been so focused on reaching twenty-five unwed, I never stopped to think about the old traditions.As a child I’d seen lovers petition their neighbours for marriage, but weddings were few and far between these days.
‘Only Grandfather.’Yann kicked at a pebble.It bounced hard through the dust, lodging itself in a nest of gnarled twigs that had once been a bush.‘I thought we could ask everyone else tomorrow.Today is a day for celebration.’
‘What if somebody objects?’
‘Why would they?’
‘Because everyone loves you,’ I said.‘And they all know Orlfen would be better off without me.’
‘You’re being ridiculous.’He intertwined our fingers, then kissed mine softly.‘No one thinks that.’
Yann could say what he wanted to placate me, but these weren’t baseless anxieties.No one bothered to hush their voices when I entered the room.Why should the mayor’s unskilled daughter get to eat when their children were dead?I couldn’t hem a skirt or sow a field.Thanks to my mother’s library, the only real skill I had was that I could read in three languages, but Orlfen was yet to encounter a crisis that could be solved by translating English into German.Every time someone failed to wake from starvation or blood loss or both, I knew it should have been me.I was Orlfen’s greatest burden.
Father was waiting for us when we finally reached my house.He stood stiffly by the door, surveying first me, then Yann for confirmation of what he dreaded.
‘I said yes,’ I told him.
