And then I couldn’t fight it anymore. Darkness descended, and I fell into something between sleep and a faint.
Chapter Four
A knock at the door roused me some unknown time later. I blinked slowly into gray dimness, eyelids like lead weights. Another knock startled me up onto my elbows.
“My lord?” The door slightly muffled the male voice. I managed a sort of groan in response, and after a moment the door opened. “Are you well, my lord?”
I collapsed again, laughing helplessly despite myself at the absurdity of the question. Only a little bit of twilight still filtered in through the bedroom’s big windows; clearly I’d slept the whole day away, and the disorientation of that would probably linger until tomorrow.
The servant standing in the doorway and peering at me had brought an alchemical candle, and its warm orange light illuminated a young face, marred with pockmarks on the cheeks but with a pleasant expression. He wasn’t in the same livery as the footmen I’d seen downstairs, instead wearing the simple black garb of a personal manservant.
“I beg your pardon, my lord,” he said. “But we thought downstairs that you might be wanting your dinner.” He looked up at the ceiling, seemingly fascinated by its shadows. “Lord Stefan has gone out, my lord.” Ah. And he’d been chosen as the lucky bearer of the humiliating news that my newlywed husband hadn’t only fled my bedroom, but his own house, in order to avoid me. “So we thought you might like a tray here. Since you’re probably very tired. The dining room’s, ah…”
Inconvenient and embarrassing to set for only one person who’d been commanded to remain here and not cause any trouble, in any case. He didn’t need to say it to set my cheeks burning and the pit of my stomach clenching up tight.
But it wasn’t his fault. If anything, it seemed as if he and the other servants had conspired, without any orders from their master, to be as kind to me as possible.
“It’s too formal for me when I’m this tired,” I offered, giving us both a polite excuse to get away from this hideous topic.
His eyes flicked back to me, and he smiled and nodded. “Yes! Yes, my lord, that’s it. I’ll lay your meal in the sitting room, just through there. I beg your pardon. I’m Aldrich, my lord. I’ll be seeing to you, if you don’t prefer someone else. Only I’m an assistant to Lord Stefan’s valet, and so I’m more trained to see to a gentleman than the footmen are.”
Somehow it didn’t surprise me that Lord Stefan had a bevy of valets. Itdidsurprise me that he could spare one of them from the petting and cossetting of his silk breeches to wait on me.
Should I tell earnest Aldrich that I’d never had a valet, and would have far less idea of what a gentleman required than those footmen? He’d find out soon enough when he saw my clothes.
Speaking of which…no, the few possessions I’d had before my wedding hadn’t somehow materialized, and I had nothing but the crumpled, awful clothing I’d lain down in. My potions had been the only truly valuable item I’d possessed, but the thought of my old cassocks being left behind and taken out with the trash to be burned caused me a shockingly sharp pang of homesickness.
If Aldrich wanted to burn this jacket, though, I wouldn’t argue with him.
“You can start by finding out what happened to my bag, if it wouldn’t be any trouble,” I said. “And a change of clothes of any kind, if not.”
Aldrich’s eyes widened. “Oh!” he said, on a note of shocked dismay. In this household, the misplacement of clothing probably qualified as a sackable offense. “I’ll find out at once, my lord, on my way down to tell the kitchens to prepare your tray. I hope you fancy roast chicken and new potatoes? And perhaps a lemon tart, and a few cheeses? And you’ll need to tell us what wines you favor, my lord. Lord Stefan’s steward will add them to his orders.”
The steward and the cook both sounded delightful. Why hadn’t the Lord Chancellor married me off to one of them? Frightened or not, I’d willingly spread my legs for a man who could roast a chicken and pair it with a wine.
Gods. Lemon tart.Cheeses, plural.
For six years, along with every other soul in that abbey, I’d been limited to only one kind of cheese, and it had been hard, over-aged, and bland. And since leaving the island, I’d been seasick, terrified, and nauseated in one combination or another.
Well, fuck the Lord Chancellor, and fuck Lord Stefan, and fuck Ser Prendian, and fuck everyone but Aldrich and his fellow servants, who were clearly all far too good for their master.
I’d eat my cheese and crispy roasted chicken skin and lemon tart in solitary splendor in my own sitting room, and I’d decide what to do about everything else tomorrow.
“Could you show me the bath?” I said. “And then bring me all of the cheese, if you don’t mind.”
Aldrich laughed and then coughed to cover it, but he was still smiling as he led the way to the bathroom, where he produced a stack of fresh towels and the heartening news that the house had piped hot water—another luxury the abbot had considered unnecessary for his flock.
For the first time since I’d seen Ser Prendian in the abbot’s study, I was able to draw a deep breath and let out a bit of the tension. An assistant valet didn’t stack up particularly well against the Lord Chancellor and his Lord Prick of a son, but having someone who spoke to me kindly and who didn’t just want to use me was a luxury no money could buy.
The three quiet days that followed felt comfortingly like being back at the abbey, where contemplation and silence had been encouraged—except that my bed boasted the softest of down pillows, and every meal that Aldrich brought me included some delicacy I hadn’t so much as smelled or seen in years.
Housemaids came in and out to clean and tidy, and they were as pleasant as Aldrich, their offhand remarks about the rest of the household indicating a well-ordered home.
In fact, despite his reputation as a connoisseur of beauty, pleasure, and vice, and his unkindness to me, Lord Stefan seemed to maintain a respectable house no different from any other gentleman’s. The orderliness of it soothed some of my panic.
But I couldn’t forget the looming appointment with the Lord Chancellor and his lady, or the looming necessity of consummating my marriage, or the threat to my sister, and dread brewed in my belly and poisoned all my attempts at optimism.
On the evening of the third day, Aldrich came upstairs to assist me in dressing. I tried to choke down a cup of tea to steady my nerves as he stood in front of the open wardrobe and frowned at its meager contents. He’d found my luggage, such as it was, and also scavenged a few clean shirts and other odds and ends to keep me decent over the last few days, but none of itcould possibly be worn to a formal dinner party with my noble in-laws.
