“Come.” His voice sounded like it had when he spoke to Tom. Of course he would misinterpret her smiling at him. She must force herself to behave like a servant. Servants don’t smile at their masters, she scolded herself. Though it seemed the lord despised her before she’d even arrived. But why? The fact that her family hadn’t done their required labor didn’t seem like reason enough.
She kept a safe distance behind him as he led her to a section of the field where three young girls were slicing the barley stalks at a slower pace than the older women. He gave her a roll of twine, then he bent and gathered an armful of the cut grain. He used his mangled left hand to hold the stalks against his chest while he gathered with his right. His dark brown hair and beard glowed in the sun as he wrapped the twine tightly around the stalks and tied it, leaving the sheaf standing in the field to dry.
He met her eyes, scowled, and seemed to be waiting for a response.
She gave him a curt nod and started gathering the spears of grain awkwardly in the crook of her arm, trying to mimic his movements.
As she finished tying her first sheaf, she glanced up and saw that he was striding away. She sighed in relief, glad he wasn’t watching her.
She continued gathering the barley, still tasting her fear like copper in the back of her throat, and still hearing the threat in the bailiff’s voice. Thank you, God, that Lord le Wyse came when he did. It was almost as if he realized Bailiff Tom was threatening her. God had sent an angry lord to protect her from a lecherous bailiff. But she was grateful.
Thankful to have a task she could do, she worked steadily. It didn’t take long for her shoulders to grow hot under the relentless heat of the sun, which had burned off the fog of early morning. Her back and shoulders ached from bending over, and her arms felt like two boulders as she lifted and tied, lifted and tied. Her hands burned from the rough twine and prickly stalks. She paused in her work to wipe the sweat from her brow with the back of her hand, watching the girls ahead of her mow the barley with expert strokes. They often flicked their gazes around to make sure they weren’t being observed before stopping to whisper to each other and giggle. Annabel was thankful for the girls’ lack of enthusiasm for their work, since it prevented her from getting too far behind them, and she even allowed herself to hope that the girls might one day accept her as a friend. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d whispered and giggled with a girlfriend. Perhaps now that she was working as a servant, the rest of the village girls would accept her.
Glancing up, she saw a familiar form bending over the barley stalks. Edward was working not far away, also gathering and binding sheaves. He straightened, stopping his work to press a hand to his lower back. Annabel quickly looked down, hoping her brother didn’t see her.
“You just couldn’t go along with my plan, could you?” Edward hissed the words at her, coming to stand beside her.
Annabel pretended to ignore him.
“You couldn’t do this one thing for your family, could you?” He sounded angry, and the ridiculousness of his attitude hit her.
“You’re the one who tried to force your only sister to marry an appalling man she had no wish to marry. I am helping the family by serving Lord le Wyse.” She continued with her work while she spoke, not even looking up, too aware that Lord le Wyse might be nearby watching them. “And even if I had married Bailiff Tom, he wouldn’t have saved you from your share of the work. He wasn’t planning to pay your censum at all. He would have let you be indentured to Lord le Wyse.”
“That’s a lie!”
“If I were you, I’d lower my voice and get back to work. Lord le Wyse doesn’t tolerate people who won’t do their share.”
Edward huffed and stomped away from her. Annabel couldn’t help but chuckle inwardly at her brother’s discomfiture. At the same time, her heart ached to think that her own brother didn’t care about her. Father would never have let him treat her this way.
Annabel again focused on the stalks, though her stomach growled intermittently all morning. Soon her head ached from the sun’s heat, and her mouth was so dry it was as if she’d been chewing a ball of wax.
She tied off yet another bundle of barley. When she looked up, a young boy with green eyes and a dirt-streaked face stood beside her with a bucket and a ladle.
“Water?”
“Thank you.” Annabel took the proffered ladle and drank. As she handed it back to him, she noticed a cut on the boy’s upper arm, oozing fresh blood. “What happened to your arm?” She bent lower to get a better look.
“Got too close to a scythe.” He stared at her with big eyes.
“You must have a bandage for that. Here, sit down.” Annabel’s dress was old and threadbare, and so she hoped would tear easily. She took hold of the hem, giving it a good yank until she felt it rip. Tearing off a long strip of material, she knelt beside the boy, who sat obediently on the ground. Carefully, she wrapped the cloth around the wound and tied it in place.
She gazed into his complacent eyes, and compassion welled up in her. “What’s your name?”
“Adam.”
“How old are you, Adam?”
“Eight years.”
“You be wary of flying scythes.” She pointed a finger at him but smiled to soften her words. “You wouldn’t want to lose an arm.”
He grinned and his eyes twinkled. He pointed behind her. “Over there’s my father. His name’s Gilbert Carpenter.”
She turned and spied a man who was talking to Lord le Wyse several feet away. Lord le Wyse was frowning at her but quickly turned away.
So he was watching her. She’d better get back to work. She bent to gather more barley stalks and the boy came closer.
“My father and I came here from Lincoln, to help the lord build his castle.”
“That’s a long way. Did your mother come too?”
“Nay. My mother’s dead. But my father says he’s looking for my new mother. You could be my mother.”
Annabel’s eyebrows went up in alarm, but her heart expanded at the hope in his eyes. Poor fellow. Every child needed a mother.
He flashed her another grin as he picked up his bucket. “I’ll bring my father to meet you.”
She scrambled for a suitable way to answer him. “But I’m too young to be your mother.” His face fell, his eyes wide with hurt. A pang of guilt assaulted her. “But I’m just right to be your sister, eh?”
His face brightened a little. “You’ll like my father. He’s the master mason.”
“Let’s get our work done first, and later we can talk.”
Adam moved on to take the water bucket to other laborers.
What would the boy say to his father? She imagined him declaring that he’d found a mother. She cringed. Her first day and already she’d gotten herself into an awkward predicament. More than one.
As the day wore on, a constant stream of sweat slipped from her hairline down her cheek. The thin shift underneath her dress plastered itself to her body. The work seemed endless, as the ripe barley stretched on and on across field after field. Over and over she bent to gather the stalks in the crook of her arm. Her elbow ached and her back felt as if it would break in two. Her hands were covered in dust and her shoes were filthy. She wondered if later in the evening there would be a safe, private place for her to bathe.
Annabel tried to keep her eyes down, for whenever she met the gaze of one of the other women she saw either hostility or amused curiosity. At least she’d seen no more of Bailiff Tom.
By the time the sun was no longer directly overhead, weariness snaked up her legs and into her arms. When were they supposed to take a rest? She longed to ask one of her fellow workers, but they were all keeping a distance of several feet. Her head felt light, and each time she raised herself from her stooping position, the world swayed and her eyes clouded. To faint now would show the villeins she was as useless as they imagined. They might even think she was pretending to faint to avoid doing her work.
They worked the
ir way to the edge of the field, near the bank of the river. She gathered another armload of barley stalks and began tying the twine. The stalks in the middle slipped through the sheaf, and then the whole bundle slid limply to the ground. Annabel bit her lip. Tears of pure exhaustion sprang to her eyes.
She took a deep breath, willing the tears away. She bent and started gathering the stalks again. When she stepped forward to reach the last ones, her toe struck a rock and she stumbled. Her legs gave way and she fell forward, landing on her hands and knees in the clump of weeds that grew beside the barley stalks at the edge of the field.
An intense stinging seized her hands and lower legs. She pushed herself up, but before she could stand, someone caught her under her arms and helped her up. When the person let go, Annabel swayed precariously and her eyes refused to focus.
When her surroundings gradually lost their blur, a young woman about her age stood beside her.
“That’s stinging nettle you just sat in. Don’t you know to stay away from that?” Wisps of light brown hair swayed against the girl’s cheeks.
Annabel wanted to say that she hadn’t sat in it, she fell, and no, she didn’t know. But the painful stinging made her suck in an agonized breath through her clenched teeth. Her skirt must have flipped up just enough to expose her bare legs to the plant. Millions of tiny, likely poisonous needles seemed to have invaded her skin, but staring at her hands, Annabel could only see a few barely visible, hairlike thorns. She yanked a few of them out as the horrible stinging made its way up her legs and spread over her arms, into her cheeks, and along her scalp until her whole body tingled in misery. She closed her eyes, thinking death would be pleasant.
“You don’t look well. Are you apt to topple over again?”
“Nay, I am well.” Annabel opened her eyes, but her surroundings looked blurry again. She put out her hand to try to steady herself.
“Sit down before you fall again.” The young maiden’s voice seemed slightly amused as she grabbed Annabel’s arm. Annabel sank heavily to the ground.
She leaned away from the stinging nettle plant, wanting to get as far away from it as possible. Her head spun faster now, so she closed her eyes and tucked her chin to her chest. Breathe in. Breathe out. O God, don’t let me faint.
A child’s voice broke through her daze. “Miss Annabel?”
She looked up. Adam stood in front of her, this time holding a brown jug and a sack.
“Some bread and ale for Beatrice and Annabel.”
He handed the heavy jug to the maiden, whose name was Beatrice, apparently, then dug his hand into the sack and pulled out a small loaf of bread for each of them.
Annabel stared at the bread, and her trembling fingers slipped around it. Never had she been so grateful for bread. She carefully pinched off a small bite and put it in her mouth, hoping it would cure the weakness in her limbs and the rolling of her stomach. She chewed slowly, struggling to control a shudder.
Beatrice took a long drink of ale and smacked her lips. She wiped her sleeve across her mouth then handed the jug to Annabel.
She dropped the small loaf into her lap and grasped the ale jug with both hands. As with the bread, the sour beverage never tasted so good. After several swallows, she handed the jug back to Beatrice.
Adam moved away to deliver bread and ale to other workers, and Annabel and Beatrice ate in silence.
The agony in Annabel’s body never lessened as the prickly sensation swept over her arms and down her spine. She shivered. The bread had calmed her stomach, but the rest of her body felt as weak as a newborn lamb. She imagined herself pitching face forward again.
But everyone else was working and so would she. Falling into the harmless-looking nettle plant was no excuse to stop, no matter how bad the stinging that enveloped her whole body. The barley had to be harvested or the entire village would suffer lack this winter.
She placed one hand on the ground and the other on her knee and pushed herself up. With effort she bent over, picked up her ball of twine, and took a step toward the piles of barley on the ground. Though she swayed and her head began to spin, Annabel focused her eyes on a spot on the ground, willing herself to stay upright.
“Annabel? Beatrice?” Adam’s voice sounded near.
Carefully, Annabel turned to look at him.
“Lord le Wyse wants you to go back to the manor house and help Mistress Eustacia.”
Behind Adam, Lord le Wyse was scowling at her. No doubt he thought his new servant miserably lacking.
She thanked God anyway for her reprieve. A sigh of despair threatened to escape, however, when she turned toward the manor house and realized how far she would have to walk to get to it. The linden trees hid the building from view, and the field’s furrows stretched out long before her, littered with the dull shades of brown, white, and gray of the villagers’ clothing, the barley, and the dirt.
At least she saw no fiendish green nettle plants.
“Saints have mercy, how pale you look.” Mistress Eustacia stared at Annabel. “I told him you were none too sturdy, and he sending you out in the fields.” She clucked her tongue.
Beatrice offered, “It might be because she fell into a patch of stinging nettles.”
“Stinging nettles! Why, child, don’t you know to stay away from those? You’ll be stinging for hours, you will. Come, sit.” Eustacia pulled out a stool then addressed Beatrice. “Did you rub some fern on it? The underside of a fern leaf does some good, it does.”
“I didn’t see any.” Beatrice shrugged then walked toward the window and the basin of water at the end of the upper hall. “I’ll start on the churning.” She proceeded to scrub her hands and wrists with the water.
A fine red rash covered Annabel’s hands, and a chill crept over her face and along her arms.
Eustacia’s brows creased, her fists planted on her hips. “No more,” she said with a firm set of her ample jaw.
Annabel stared at her.
“I don’t care what the master says, you’re not working in the fields anymore. I have need of you here in the kitchen.” She bent over and yanked up Annabel’s skirts.
Annabel gasped, scrambling to push her skirt back down. The same angry red rash covered her legs.
Eustacia scrunched her face disapprovingly and turned in Beatrice’s direction. “That butter can wait. Take Annabel down to the river to wash, then put some mud on this rash.” Facing Annabel again, she said, “Lots of mud. Smear it on these legs and hands and sit on the bank until it dries. But before you go …” Eustacia pulled out a small table from the wall, laid out with a chunk of cheese, some bread, and two pitchers. “Eat.”
Both girls sat and Beatrice quickly sliced the cheese. More tears pricked Annabel’s eyes. This time they were tears of gratitude.
After a cooling dip in the river, Annabel’s legs and hands still stung, but the discomfort ebbed after she washed off the mud. Another relief came as the villagers went home at midafternoon, finished with their fieldwork for the day. Work at the manor fell into a rhythm as Beatrice began her duties in the dairy while Annabel helped Eustacia prepare supper for the servants and the workers building Ranulf le Wyse’s new home.
Though careful to stay out of her lord’s way, she glimpsed the plans for the new house as she brought the food into the upper hall. The plans were laid out on the trestle table while Lord le Wyse discussed them with his master mason.
House was not a strong enough word for what the lord had planned. It was to be a castle with many rooms and three towers, one rising up a full two stories higher than the rest of the building. Annabel was one of the few villagers who had traveled outside the demesne, and the only place she had ever seen anything as grand as this was in London.
The grand house was at least two years from completion, although she overheard that a portion of it would be livable in several weeks.
To prepare for the meal, the servants set up trestle tables end to end down the middle of the upper hall floor to accommodate all t
he servants now living at the manor. Despite the crowd, Tom atte Water managed to sit across the table from her. She stared down at her plate, the table, anywhere but at him, knowing he was probably leering at her. When he spoke to her, she pretended not to hear.
After long, uncomfortable minutes of trying to ignore him, she heard him scrape his chair back to leave. She breathed a sigh of relief to see him leave with the rest of the men after the meal and leapt to help the other maidservants clean up, clearing tables and tossing the excess food into the slop bucket.
By the time the room was back in order, her legs trembled with fatigue. All the maids began to scatter and she wondered where she would sleep. Annabel looked for Beatrice, hoping the girl could provide answers, but she realized the dairymaid had been strangely absent since dinner ended.
Eustacia was busy giving instructions to a serving girl about what to purchase at the market the next day, so Annabel retrieved her bag from behind the small screen and stood nearby. She prayed Mistress Eustacia would notice her soon and tell her where she might sleep. She hoped she didn’t look as exhausted as she felt, not wanting to draw attention to the fact that she wasn’t accustomed to such hard work.
Feeling nearly invisible in her shadowed corner, Annabel watched Lord le Wyse cross the room and address Gilbert Carpenter, the master mason and foreman over the skilled craftsmen working on the castle.
Lord le Wyse was almost a head taller than his foreman. In the dim twilight of the upper hall, he looked darker than he had in the fields. His hair lay in a heavy swath across his forehead, grazing his black eyebrows. His shoulders were massive next to the much-smaller Gilbert. But while comparing him to Lord le Wyse, she realized Gilbert’s features were perfect and symmetrical. He had a well-formed nose, light-colored eyes, and light brown hair. He looked to be no more than thirty years old and was quite handsome.
Lord le Wyse’s looks were harder to sort out. One side of his face, the side with the leather patch, was thrown into shadow, giving a soft glow to his good eye and strong, prominent cheekbone. He would have been considered handsome before his face had been scarred and he’d lost his eye. Annabel watched as he gestured with his right hand while keeping his left arm tucked against his midsection. She’d heard someone say he was only five and twenty years old. It was hard to tell, as his face was obscured by the patch and the beard. He held his head and shoulders at a commanding angle, the posture of a powerful man.
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