The banister was glass beneath her palm as she ran her hand up along its length. The stairs neither creaked nor marred with each step.
Henry's height allowed him to take the stairs two at a time.
Despite his never being to the castle before, Henry seemed to know where he was going. He guided Belle with little touches, occasionally nudging her shoulder or steering her around a suit of armor she had not noticed in the dark. The torches that burned along the corridors flared and then withdrew as they passed through their circles of light, and their footsteps seemed louder the thinner the hallways became.
Soon, they turned a corner that led into a more private sector of the castle and approached a doorway flanked by two guards in full livery. They stood with spears at their sides and somber looks upon their faces.
Instinctively, Belle knew that they had reached the laird's ailment room.
Glancing back over her shoulder, Belle was surprised to see the laird's wife still hovering at her back. She had not heard the woman's footsteps nor suspected she would wish to remain in her company but then... Belle could not deny that she would hardly be comfortable with a stranger wandering aroundherhome.
For that was what she was, Belle knew. Regardless of her sireage, she was a stranger to this place and to its people. The one person who was now no longer entirely alien to her was Munro. And even he refused to allow her to call him by name.
Still, as he reached to open the door, Belle was glad that he was with her.
When he paused, the door held wide and his eyes urging her to step forward, Belle shored up her courage, gave a calming exhale, and then led the small party into the room.
Unlike the rest of the castle, the laird's ailment room was brightly lit. A fire burned in its hearth, candles were placed upon every surface, and the drapes had been pulled back to allow the presence of fresh air and moonlight. As Belle stepped inside, the heat of the crackling firewood washed over her before the nightly breeze cooled her face. She breathed in, long and low.
Across the room, there stood a four-poster bed the size of the pen her mother kept their pigs in. Where a dozen snouted rugrats could happily snuffle into their adult years with space to spare, only a single man now claimed the space. He lay abed, half sitting upon a mountain of cushions and draped in a dozen layers of blankets.
For a moment, Belle was reminded of a fairy tale. Something about a princess that could not sleep no matter how many layers of bedclothes were brought to her. How the story ended, she could not recall.
Taking a step closer, Belle moved around the rug on the floor. It seemed too intricate and too expensive to step upon. Her path took her around the room, past a bookcase of leather-bound tomes, and by a chest with gold hinges that glowed in the light.
As she grew closer to the bed, she moved past a little table. Upon it was a cup still holding the dregs of herbal tonic, a round piece of glass she had seen rich men place over the eye when reading, a book that she could not read the title of, and a small, framed portrait. The picture was of a little girl, perhaps no more than ten years old, with unruly, wild hair the same color as Belle's. She had a squished sort of nose, big blue eyes, and a sweet little mouth. Freckles were spattered over the bridge of her nose, and there was a smudge of dirt on her cheek.
Curious,Belle thought.
Having never really known a portrait artist, she had always assumed that a subject would want to be captured at their best. Not half dirty and wild.
Belle was startled when she looked up from the little painting and found a pair of eyes watching her with an intensity that sent shivers down her spine.
The man in the bed, whom she had assumed to be asleep, had been watching her circumnavigate the room. He stared at her now from amidst the fine white of his night things. Unabashed, Belle stared back.
The laird was not exactly as she had expected. There was little grey in his hair and no wrinkles around his eyes. Likely no more than fifty years old, he somehow appeared both too young for his age and, at the same time, much older. His cheeks had sunk into his face, his brow bone protruded at his temples. His neck was thin, and the veins in his throat were clear beneath the skin.
A youthful person trapped in a middle-aged body that had succumbed to an old man's disease.
Despite knowing this man no more than she knew the king of England, Belle felt a wash of sympathy for him. No one deserved to die before their time.
When the laird tried to speak, the dryness of his lips prevented little more than a rasp. He licked them and tried again.
"You are...Arabelle," he finally said.
"Yes, sir." It did not sound like a question, but Belle felt the need to answer all the same. "I mean, my laird."
Had he been stronger, the laird might have shaken his head. His chin shifted back and forth.
"No 'laird,'" he told her.
Unsure what she might be able to call him, Arabelle moved a little closer to the edge of the bed. There was a long mound beneath the sheets that drew up to the laird's shoulders. His arm. Belle moved to the end of it, where she spotted the shape of his hand. She naturally reached out to rest her palm over it.
When everyone in the room drew a collective intake of breath, Belle snatched the offending hand away. She held it to her chest as if she'd been burned and looked around.
The laird's wife wore a scowl of disapproval. A guard that had been positioned in the far corner appeared simply shocked, and Henry Munro was watching her with an expression that was hard to read.
Like she was a puzzle he had yet to solve or an insect he had yet to categorize.
