A sound came at the door. Crale’s voice, low and irritable. “I would speak with my wife.”
Every muscle in Amelia’s body locked.
Dame Margaret turned toward the door. Her voice changed completely, becoming brisk as a gate slammed in someone’s face.
“You will not.”
“I have rights.”
“You may discuss them with Sir Roger in the hall.”
“She is my wife.”
“She is in my chamber corridor.”
“I demand?—”
The door opened two inches. Dame Margaret stood in the gap, filling it with keys, fur, and the terrifying confidence of a woman who had managed stores, servants, and men’s stupidity for years.
“You demand loudly,” she said. “That does not make you important.”
Crale muttered something Amelia did not catch.
Dame Margaret stepped out, pulled the door behind her, and Amelia heard the click of the latch.
Voices murmured in the corridor. Crale’s rising, then Belmaine’s smooth intervention, then footsteps retreating.
The room seemed smaller once the lock had clicked into place. The bed curtains sagged like tired theatre drapes. The fire snapped. Beyond the window, dusk pressed against the horn panes, blue and damp, turning the orchard into bars of branch and shadow.
She set the cup down before she dropped it.
This was bad. No, bad was too small a word. This was a beautifully organized disaster with legal stationery. A kidnapping wearing church shoes. Belmaine had found her weak spot with horrifying precision. No papers. No family. No provable past. No way to explain that her real life began seven centuries in the future without earning herself a cell, a priest, or a bonfire.
And Thomas had let her go. The thought hit so hard she had to sit. The stool wobbled beneath her. She pressed both hands over her mouth and stared at the floorboards, at the small black crescent of dirt caught near one nail. Her eyes burned.
He had known she was telling the truth. She had seen it in him. He knew Crale was a liar. He knew Belmaine was a snake in a fur-lined cloak. He knew she was scared. And still, he had stood there.
No, that wasn’t fair. She sniffed. Fair could go choke on a rushlight.
Thomas had stood between her and Belmaine for weeks. He had guarded Ashcombe with his body and his pride and all the battered pieces of his honor. Belmaine had not beaten him. Belmaine had cornered him with the one weapon Thomas couldn’t fight without costing everyone else dearly.
The law. The king’s displeasure.
Amelia wiped beneath her eyes with the heel of her hand, angry that there was anything to wipe.
“You’re not crying,” she told the room.
The room, being furniture, didn’t argue. A softer scrape came from the other side of the door.
“My lady?”
The voice was female.
Amelia stood. “Who is it?”
“Joan, my lady. I’ve brought warm water.”
A key turned. The door opened, and a maid slipped in carrying a steaming ewer and folded linen over one arm. She had a round face, brown hair escaping from beneath a plain coif, and eyes so wide with curiosity they practically needed their own chair.
