by Meg Cowley
“Are yeh accosting my girl?” shouted Tam from across the bar, leaning over it to peer into the dim corner. “Yeh wouldn’t leave me without a hand now, would yeh?”
“I’ll leave you without those two hands,” said Old Robson, leering at Harper, who hastily turned away. “I bet they make short work of my—”
“All right, all right. That’s enough,” Tam called as raucous laughter erupted from the similarly inebriated patrons he drank with.
Harper’s cheeks burned as she stepped away, longing to curse the lot of them, but she needed the work more than that.
“Are you all right?” asked Tam. His eyes roamed over her, but not in the same manner as Old Robson’s. He was a better man than that. He liked to make sure his staff was not accosted, though not out of kindness. It was bad for business. Harper appreciated it all the same.
“Fine,” she muttered, slipping past him to dunk the empty tankards into the pail of water in the kitchen out of sight of the patrons.
She dropped to her knees to scrub them, using a sticky hand to push a strand of uncurled hair out of her face, immediately regretting it. Now she probably had a smear of goodness knows what on her face. Her eyes stung from the long day and the smoke curling in the air, but she resisted trying to clear them with the back of her hand.
In the dark corner of the kitchen, she allowed herself to pause for a long moment. Her eyes slipped shut in exhaustion. She breathed deeply through her mouth if only to avoid, for just one breath, the rank stench of spilled ale, sweat, and worse that hung heavy on the damp air.
Harper dunked her hands into the bucket and scrubbed furiously at the skin the old man had touched, but the ghostly feeling of his fingers still seemed clamped there, despite her best efforts. With her eyes closed, she could pretend she washed with clean water. By that time of night, it was usually more beer than water, but Harper wasn’t about to dodge through the crowd again to go fetch a fresh pail.
She could not block out the din from the next room, which pounded in her ears until she felt dizzy with it. The silence of home was always golden after each shift.
Not long now. Her head thumped dully with the thought of each word.
Hearing a clatter behind her, she rushed to appear busy, nearly slopping half the pail onto the floor with her sudden movement. Tam appeared, seeming not to have noticed.
“You could appease them, you know. Earn a bit of extra coin.”
She whipped around to face him, mortified. “You mean...”
“Well, yeah.” Tam shrugged. “There’s no shame in it.”
Harper bared her teeth at him and turned away, scrubbing at the tankards furiously, as though she could take out her anger on them. “How dare you. I’m not whoring myself out to them.”
“What?” She heard the creak as he leaned against the slanting door frame. “It’s not like you have anything to lose. You won’t find a husband as you are anyway, so you might as well do better for yourself than that shack of yours. If you take on a few jobs, I reckon it would only be a few months before you might be able to afford a nice little cottage or something.”
I want a whole lot more than that, she thought, though she dared not say it. And that won’t be the way I get it, thank you very much. She looked into the pail. Though neither will this.
At her silence, Tam straightened and shrugged. “It’s your choice. Just my suggestion. Pride don’t keep a bed warm or a belly full. And you don’t have to take all business. You’re pretty enough to catch a decent fellow’s eye. Not like him.” Tam jerked his head in the direction of the bar. “It could be fun, too.”
Harper shuddered openly. Tam chuckled. “Yeah. He’s not much of a catch. Besides, his coin is gone by way of my coffers.”
“Thank goodness. You’re welcome to it,” she dared to say.
He laughed. “It’s a shame you don’t come with a dowry. With spirit like that, I’d have kept you for myself.” He grinned, pausing, as though he expected a thank you for the compliment.
Indignation rose in her, but she said nothing. Is that all I am to these dolts? A piece of meat?
Tam shrugged and sauntered out to the bar to call last orders, unaware of his offense. It was only when he had gone that Harper allowed the stiffness in her shoulders to ease.
SOON AFTER TAM HAD tossed the last of the patrons onto the street, the worst of them still lying in puddles of mud and their own vomit, Harper made her way out. She paused by the door to accept her wage for the week, eyeing the full bag of coin Tam kept as he counted out a meagre handful of coppers for her.
Is that it? she thought, as per usual, but she had long given up questioning it. After Tam’s deductions for taxes to the Lord of County Denholme, almost half of her coin, and a bit more for the supper he always docked from her pay, there was barely enough to scrape by. Certainly none to save. Her hand closed around the coppers. They were so small against her palm it still felt empty.
“See you tomorrow,” Tam said. He stepped aside so she could cross the threshold.
“Hmm.”
Harper threw the hood up on her cloak and tucked it tightly around her. The wind bit into her skin as it brought the chilled sea air inland. There was nothing but black as she looked out at the bay. Only darkness lay out there, the stars obscured by steely grey storm clouds, the ocean an inky void.
She often wondered what misfortune had landed her in this bleak and unforgiving corner of Caledan, alone, but there was no time to do so that night, for fingers of icy wind pulled her cloak aside, stealing what little warmth she had in her moment of stillness. Without delay, she ducked into an alley for shelter, and to take the less trodden way home.
Outside the village, the woods swallowed her up, the night blacker under the canopy. Harper did not dally. Wolves, and worse, prowled at night.
She let out a breath when she saw the small candlelight through her sole window...if it could be called that. A shard of salvaged glass, far from transparent, that she had built into the woodwork of what Tam had called her “shack”, though she had fonder feelings toward it. It had been the only home she had known for as long as she could remember.
The rising howl of the gale and the dark shadows of the night vanished as she shut and barred the door behind her, glad for the peace and stillness of her home. Still, her ears rang with the noise of the tavern. She would be back tomorrow, and the day after that, and seemingly all the days after that, but for now, her time was her own.
Harper shrugged off her cloak and hung it on the crooked iron nail that served as a hanging peg near the fire, then knelt to coax life into the embers. The floor was hard-packed earth that oozed cold, but for the sheepskin rug she had put down the winter before. It was old, tattered, and nicked with holes from poor skinning, the only reason she had been able to afford it in the first place, but it did the job of sheltering her from rising damp, and the matted wool was a rough comfort on her knees.
Harper moved with practised silence, not disturbing the prone form huddled on one of the two pallets. Betta’s wheezy breathing had started getting worse, she noted. The drawing in of winter would see Betta suffer this year. Harper stoked the fire again, prodding it into life. At the very least, she could keep Betta warm and fed, as the woman had done for her in winters past.
The fire flickered to life, soon roaring before her, flooding the small space with heat quickly. She consumed the warmth greedily, basking in the light, so much purer than the murky light of the tavern, and breathed in the clean, fresh scent of the pine boughs as they burnt. Still chilled to the bone, she dared to put an extra ration of wood on it.
Over a beaker of hot brewed roots made from whatever she could throw together, Harper examined her hoard, kept in a wooden trinket box under the head of the pallet where the slept. Two silver marks and fifteen coppers. She added one of her coppers from that week. She couldn’t afford to put in more. Even that would send them close enough to starvation. More than likely, she would end up taking out the copper, and more
besides, to buy food for Betta, as she always did.
One day... One day I’ll have enough to leave.
As usual, it was too hard to think about when that might be, endlessly and impossibly far away, or where she would go. No family. No friends. No ties calling her anywhere.
Harper tugged her other treasure from the hiding place. The leather cover was tatty and worn, but she caressed it as though it was the most precious treasure. The spine cracked as she opened it, the amber light of the fire barely illuminating the handwritten sheafs. Harper strained her eyes to read them anyway.
This was why she saved. Out there, beyond the woods, the sea, and the black sky, lay better lands, better places. Gallant knights, beautiful ladies, terrifying dragons, clever elves...adventure.
As the fire died down and the night turned to day, she lost herself in the tales. No matter that she had read them so many times before. No matter that she ought to have slept instead. This was a chance to leave her lonely, poor life behind. To go somewhere she would be rich, respected, and powerful enough to decide her own fate.
Someday, drunk patrons would not paw her as she served them. Harper clung to that.
Three
Dimitri buttoned his collar with two fingers using expert precision, whilst his other hand cupped Rosella’s chin for a fleeting second before his lingering fingertips slipped away.
She huffed in annoyance, fluttering her long lashes and pouting as she propped herself on her elbows atop the plump, silken cushions.
“Are you sure you have to leave, Dimitri?” she asked, cocking her head to one side so he could see the slender, pale, perfect fall of her neck below her pointed ears that, not too long ago, he had kissed his way down. He gazed at it, his lips twitching in a suppressed smirk.
She lay on her belly, nude and flushed on the rumpled sheets, unashamed, making no attempt to cover herself. Rosella was the supposedly innocent youngest daughter of the king, his last and adopted child, some said his illegitimate daughter by another she-elf. But Dimitri was no longer fooled. Rosella knew exactly what she was doing.
“Your father requires my attendance at the council, Princess, and I am already late due to your last request for me to remain just a little longer.”
“But it was worth it, wasn’t it?”
He could not disagree. She had made it worth his while.
Rosella sighed and rolled onto her back, exposing two perfect breasts as temptation. Her golden hair pooled around her, glowing in the candlelight. How she loved when he ran his fingers through it. He clasped his hands firmly behind his back and lowered in a bow.
“My lady...”
“Fine,” she huffed, rolling away to snag a silken dressing gown. He caught the flash of genuine annoyance.
“I’ll return soon, as always.”
“Yes, yes. When business allows,” she snapped.
Pressing his lips together, he suppressed a retort and strode forward to catch her wrists as she stood. Dimitri drew her close, sliding his hands down her sides and placing the ghost of a kiss upon her lips, then one on her neck. She melted into his touch. He retreated before she could ensnare him again.
Her last glimpse of him was his usual wolfish grin and a wink before he vanished from her chambers, his cockiness undiminished as he swaggered past her attendants, each one more disdainful than the last.
Dimitri straightened his clothes as he strode toward the great hall. It would not do to turn up at a council meeting late and ruffled. After all, he could only push his usual reputation so far. It was a careful line. He allowed himself a smirk. It was a rather fun line.
Storm clouds chased him across the courtyard. The shivers across his skin had little to do with the weather, though. He vigorously rubbed his arms as he approached the doors, glad for the long sleeves that hid the goosebumps. Great dragons hewn of oak, the emblems of the Royal House, guarded the way.
Dimitri schooled his expression into careful blandness as the guards heaved open the ornate doors. In he strode, his steps quiet on the polished marble floor that stretched across the huge, vaulted space. Before him, council members sat or stood on the chequered marble floor, like game pieces upon a playing board. Standing in front of them all, upon whom their attention all centred, was the King of Pelenor himself, commanding their collective attention.
A few heads twisted toward Dimitri, then swiftly turned away when they realised who it was. He did not grace any of them with his attention, not even his own father, though he noted the customary disgust in his father’s curled lip and the curt shake of his head before he turned his gaze back to the king.
That was nothing new.
Dimitri had long given up on his father’s gratitude. His family’s current fortunes were entirely Dimitri’s doing, however accidental, but no appreciation ever came. No one ever thanked the bastard son.
“...no concern of ours,” the king said, not stopping speaking at his entrance. Dimitri huffed in silent relief. His lateness had most certainly been noted by the elven king, whose ears were as sharp as his own, but Toroth had deigned to ignore him. Dimitri preferred it to be so.
“Your Majesty, if I may,” a councillor interjected.
Toroth ceased speaking and fixed him with a stern gaze. He did not like being interrupted.
The councillor cleared his throat and shuffled his feet, uncomfortable. “These are our own borders that are under threat, so would it not be prudent to–”
“No, Thaeus, it would not be prudent,” interrupted the king. “The goblins do not threaten our borders.” He glared around, daring anyone to contradict him. No one did, though a few cloaks rustled in unspoken disagreement. Shadows pooled around them, yet the king’s face was starkly contrasted in light and shade as he stared them all down.
“Their strife is with the dwarves, as ever it has been. It is Valtivar’s borders that are threatened, not Pelenor’s. If the goblin dissent grows, so must the response of the dwarves. I will not lose our men to their petty battles. If the dwarves cannot control their own homelands, if they cannot control the scourge of these pests, then frankly, they are unworthy allies. I will most certainly not commit the Winged Kingsguard to assist, as you earlier suggested. It is beneath their notice.”
But a rain of dragonfire and magic would be mighty bloody handy, thought Dimitri, though he did not voice it. The king was a law unto himself.
“My sources inform me that the goblin uprising is mostly confined to the eastern reaches of Valtivar,” continued Toroth.
Dimitri held back a scoff. My sources indeed. My sources, he means.
That was how the illegitimate son of a minor elven lord had built himself a standing of power and fortune in the elven court. By utilising his skills in trading truths and secrets. Over the years, he had found they were a currency beyond blood or money that held their own value. Not that the king liked to admit the wealth of his knowledge came from such a source of low standing.
“Remote holdings and abandoned outposts in Valtivar have been targeted, as though the goblins seek to build their own kingdom and cast down the dwarves.”
Dimitri’s lips thinned. Now he parroted him almost word for word. “The dwarven lords hold enough power in their armies to defeat any such uprising.”
The king turned toward Dimitri. His lip curled. “You have no business here. Out.”
Dimitri opened his mouth in indignation. He could not find a retort that would not land him in irons.
The king advanced a step. Councillors shrunk away from him. All heads turned to Dimitri. Now it seemed he was worthy of their attention...their full, undivided attention as they mirrored the king’s disgust.
Let’s play this fickle game again, shall we?
Dimitri stood taller, his face impassive, violet eyes meeting the king’s own. “Your Majesty?”
Come to me with smiles and bribes when you want something, then turn the other cheek when I no longer suit your company.
“Do not presume that because you defile my da
ughter you are permitted to attend such meetings.” The king flicked a ring-laden finger at him in dismissal and turned away to address the rest of the council once more.
That’s none of your business, you ungrateful old wretch. Be glad I’m bedding your daughter so you don’t have to put up with her petty, overpriced demands. Be glad I’m bringing you news about a goblin uprising so you have something better to do with your time than raise your tithes again. Dragon knows we all need a break from your Saradon-cursed penny-pinching.
Seeing the guards converging on him, Dimitri gave a low bow to the king – who ignored it entirely – shoved his hands into his pockets, and strolled out nonchalantly, even though his blood boiled.
Ungrateful old sod, he cursed silently. Vile dragon turd of an elf. So willing to take and never yield – at least to the likes of me.
His father’s gaze followed him out, but Damir made no move to support his son.
Cowardly ass, Dimitri added. Cold-hearted scoundrel.
He resented his father more than the rest of them combined, for no matter what, his efforts would never be enough. Dimitri had long ago given up trying to seek his approval. His father’s successes were entirely accidental, and certainly not wished for. Damir had wasted no time trading on Dimitri’s usefulness to the crown.
Would that this all fall on him less favourably. He deserves nothing for punishing me for my own existence all these years when it was his own damn fault I’m cursed to exist in the first place. At least I take precautions to never be so careless.
Dimitri had no children of his own, that he was aware of, and he would keep it that way. The illegitimate child of an illegitimate child would surely have no hope for a good life in a court where purity of blood was prized above all.
The king and his daughter were another matter. Rosella was a consenting female of age. Toroth had done nothing but grumble about her for years. In particular, her delight in spending his fortune, no matter that she was the sweetest and least conniving of all his children.
