by Megan Hart
Quilla sat on the bed, her arm aching. “I’ve had worse.”
He crossed to stand over her. “I plead your mercy. I didn’t realize. I had Florentine make the arrangements.”
Quilla shook her head. “All you are required to provide is a place for me to sleep and bathe, clothes sufficient for the climate and my duties, and nourishment. You’ve done all that.”
Gabriel crossed his arms over his chest, his frown deepening. “And yet you’ve taken it upon yourself to clean my rooms, provide me with a new teakettle, organize my books . . . polish and scrub and turn what used to be a cold and uncomfortable place into something warm and welcoming.”
She nodded. “All part of what I do.”
“And yet you don’t wish for the same? This room doesn’t even have a carpet!”
She lay back against the pillows and pulled the covers up around her with a sigh. “Of course I would like a carpet. The floor is cold. But if you do not see fit to provide me—”
“Think you I am so ungenerous as to deny you a carpet to protect your feet from the cold stones?” He seemed outraged, but something else, too. He seemed . . . hurt.
Quilla settled against the pillows, her former weariness coming back, exacerbated by the attack in the kitchen. She stifled a yawn. “It’s not my place to ask of you, remember?”
His eyes narrowed. “How can you be so complacent?”
She sighed. “It’s what I am. That’s part of being a Handmaiden, but more importantly, it’s part of being me. If you wish to provide me with a carpet, I shall be glad to have one.”
“Of course I want you to have a carpet! I am not a monster!”
“I would not think so.”
He made a noise that was almost a growl. “And anything else you need, you shall have. I’m not a miser.”
“I would not think that, either.”
He glowered, arms crossed, and sat down in the small wooden chair next to the bed. “Are you afraid of me?”
She shook her head, turning on her side a bit to look at him. “No.”
That seemed to mollify him. “And yet you truly would not ask me for something so simple as a rug to keep your feet from the cold?”
“I have stockings which can do the same, and which you have already provided,” she pointed out.
“You should rest now. I don’t expect you to be there when I wake tomorrow, do you understand?”
She nodded with a small smile. “But you understand I will be, anyway?”
He sighed as though her answer pained him. “If I told you it would please me for you to stay abed tomorrow, to not wait on me at all, would that keep you here?”
“I suppose it would.” Quilla snuggled down farther into the blankets. “But I would find my day overwhelmingly dull if I had nothing to do but stay here.”
He nodded, as though thinking. “And yet I would not have you risk your health by using that arm for at least a day.”
“My lord, you are kind.” The compliment was sincere, and for a moment something flashed in his eyes. Pleasure, perhaps. Or surprise. It faded into a scowl.
“I don’t want to have to explain to the Order how I damaged one of their Handmaidens.”
He got up and moved toward the door, saying over his shoulder, “I’ll send some things to you tomorrow to make this less of a cell.”
“You did not damage me, Gabriel,” Quilla said quietly to his back.
He paused in the doorway. “You are my Handmaiden. You are my responsibility. If it’s your duty to care for me, then it’s as much my duty to care for you in return. To provide you with what you need to be able to give me what you do. Allowing my lady wife to attack you . . . was unthinkable.”
“You did not allow it. It happened beyond your control.”
He glanced over his shoulder at her. “There is nothing in this house which is beyond my control, Handmaiden. I make certain of that.”
He closed the door with a click behind him.
Chapter 11
The next day, Quilla was grateful Gabriel had told her to stay abed, for when she opened her eyes it was to a rap on the door and the sun streaming through the window. She’d slept, actually slept, and much better than she’d expected to. She sat up to the sound of the gentle knocking.
“Come in.”
Bertram peeked his head around the door, a grin on his freckled face. “Delivery for you, mistress.”
Quilla sat up, expecting her arm to be stiff but finding it more pliable than she’d thought. It twinged when she bent it, but the bandages weren’t any further stained and she had a good range of motion. She wouldn’t need to stay in bed the entire day, after all.
“Hello, Bertram. What did you bring me?”
“Bring it in,” he said to someone behind him.
The door opened and Bertram entered, followed by the stable hands Luke and Perrin, carrying a rolled-up carpet. Behind them were Pipp and Took, all carrying crates and boxes. And yet behind them were Lolly, Kirie, and Rossi, also loaded with packages and boxes.
“What’s all this?”
“My lord Delessan sent it. Says he wants this room to look like a palace and not a prison!” Bertram motioned to the men to put the rug down.
They unrolled it, and Quilla gasped, sitting up higher in bed. The colors were gorgeous: purples, greens, reds, and golds, with threads of deep blue around the border. She’d been in enough fine homes to know the quality of this rug meant it was expensive. Far too costly to be shoved into a garret room like this.
“There must be some mistake.”
Bertram tugged at his cap. “No mistake, miss. Lord Delessan had it tooken out of his own chambers, he did. The one he doesn’t use no more.”
For a moment, Bertram shared a glance with the clearly disapproving housemaids, and his freckled cheeks blushed pink. “Not that I’m in any place to be saying, you understand. He just told us to bring it up here, and so we did.”
Lolly held up a basket full of what looked to be wall hangings. “Should we go to put thesen up, mistress?”
Quilla looked at the fabrics, then at the bare stone walls. The hangings matched the rug. “Did these also come from his chamber?”
“Ahyuh.” Lolly nodded.
“Did he order you to strip the place bare?”
Lolly giggled. “Ahyuh. If the furniture’d fit up here, he’d have had us bring that, too.”
Quilla felt a little overwhelmed with his generosity. She’d been given many gifts, but no patron had stripped his own quarters, even ones he no longer used, to provide her with comfort. She swung her legs out over the edge of the bed, but Rossi waved her back.
The tall girl was imposing enough to keep Quilla in her place. “You sit back, mistress. The master, him gave orders, us. You weren’t to help us a lick.”
“I need to use the necessary,” Quilla said with a smile. “Am I allowed to do that, at least?”
For one moment, she was certain Rossi, intent on keeping the master’s order intact, would deny her the privilege. That could have been awkward, indeed. But the housemaid nodded and stepped out of the way so Quilla could get out of bed.
In the tiny washroom, Quilla stripped out of the nightgown and ran some water in the basin, splashing her face and rinsing her body. She took off the crusted bandage, and though it pulled a bit at the wound, the few drops of blood that leaked out were negligible. She looked at the cut. It would leave a scar. She redressed it, tying a fresh cloth around it and tying it tight to prevent the ends from unraveling. Then she brushed and braided her hair, tucking the end close to the nape of her neck to keep it from getting in the way. Pulling a gown from the back of the door, she slipped it and some fresh undergarments on, then went back out into her bedroom.
It had been transformed. The floor, now covered by the exquisite rug. The walls, draped with fabric. Baskets had been stacked in the corners to create shelves, upon which more cloths had been draped. Even a few plants had been hung from the ceiling, pretty green things wit
h trailing vines that created a lovely pattern in shadow against the wall hangings.
“Invisible Mother,” Quilla breathed, taken aback by the change in the room.
She hadn’t minded the way it was before. It was better than some and not so nice as others she’d had. But now . . . now the room was, indeed, a palace.
She loved it. She looked around, moved by another sight. Books. He’d given her books, an entire bookshelf, floor to ceiling. She moved toward them, but the housemaids took her and forced her with gentle scolding back into bed to rest while they worked. By the time they finished, Quilla would not have known this room from any other in Glad Tidings.
He had done more than give her his hand-me-downs. He had given her as much consideration as he would have any of his guests. He had made her room into a haven.
“You’ll be all right, then, mistress?”
“Yes, Kirie, I shall be fine.” Quilla held up the book she’d had Bertram pluck from its place and bring her. “With this to keep me occupied, I shall be well.”
Kirie nodded and pointed. “Fresh water to drink there. No bell for you to ring, so if you needs anywhat—”
“I’m sure I won’t.” Quilla smiled, propped up against the pillows like a grand lady and feeling more tired than she’d have admitted but an hour before.
Bertram and the stable lads vanished, leaving the housemaids to smooth her covers and fuss over her until she waved them away, laughing. “Go! Go, else Florentine will have your skins! Have you not the other guests to attend?”
The three girls exchanged looks. Quilla closed her novel and looked at each of them in turn. Rossi’s face remained impassive, but Kirie and Lolly, sisters, couldn’t hide their expressions of mixed consternation and glee.
“He’s sending them all away,” said Kirie after a moment. “Says he don’t care that they must travel through snow and ice, they’re to get gone from his house—”
“—and that Boone Somerholde is lucky our lord Delessan doesn’t call him out, as well,” finished Lolly. “And Persis Adamantane started the drink when he found out Lord Somerholde the younger was the one found with the lady Delessan, and he’s not stopped since!”
“Oh, my.” Quilla could think of nothing more to say on that matter. “And what of the Fienes? They had no part in any of it.”
“Madame Fiene told our lord Delessan he ought to be ashamed of himself for treating his lady wife so, and our lord Delessan did tell her she ought to mind her own business, as not everyone could be expected to turn a blind eye to the fact their wife was a harlot, though Lord Fiene had certainly years of practice at it, even if no man in his right mind would plow Madame Fiene’s furrow any longer since she contracted the oozing pox.”
Quilla’s jaw dropped. “Gabriel said all that to his guests?”
Rossi, who had busied herself straightening Quilla’s blankets while Lolly and Kirie told the story, broke into the conversation. “None of them’s his friends, mistress. They his lady wife’s friends, not his. He don’t care what they think, him.”
“No, I don’t suppose he does. And what of the other lord Delessan?”
“Master Jericho has been in his chambers since last night and nobody’s seen hide nor hair of him.” This came from Kirie, with a nod from Lolly to prove it true.
“Oh, my.” Quilla studied the leather cover of her book. “It sounds as though Glad Tidings has undergone a rough few hours this morning.”
“And the lady mistress—” Kirie stopped herself, as though speech would be disloyal.
Rossi had no such reservations. “His lady wife has been ranting against you since sunrise. Our lord Delessan has threatened to dose her with sleeping draught, but has not, yet. She’s screamed so loud she’s near lost her voice.”
“Oh, by the Arrow,” Quilla murmured. “And what of the lad? Who has been shielding Dane from all this?”
The three exchanged another look. “He’s with Jorja Pinsky.”
“But can he hear the shouting and what’s going on?”
This time, the look said they didn’t know. Quilla put her book aside. “No matter what the woman has done, she is the lad’s mother. And no matter what the rest of the household is doing, that little boy should be sheltered from such goings-on. Doesn’t anyone in this house have the sense in their heads to behave in front of children?”
Disgust colored her voice and made the maids look shamefaced. Quilla shook her head at them. “His father?”
“Busy in his workshop, him.”
“And Uncle Jericho locked away.” Quilla sighed, but there could be no getting up with the housemaids staring at her. Her heart panged for Dane, who might be spoiled and ill-behaved, but was still just a lad for all that.
They fussed over her a bit more until Bertram rapped on the door and said in an apologetic voice, “Begging your pardon, mistress, but Florentine is requiring the use of these three.”
So at last, they left her, and Quilla got out of bed and moved around the room, touching each object in wonder and shaking her head at some of the choices. A lamp in the shape of a lady’s shoe? A stone bust of some unidentified man wearing a hunting cap?
When she got to the polished wooden bookshelf, she stopped, her throat closed with an uncommon rush of emotion. He’d given her books. Volume upon volume, some bound in cheap paper with letters that smudged, and she’d have expected nothing of better quality. But some were hide-bound, pages printed with better ink and illustrations.
It wasn’t the expense of the gift, which, really, was nothing since he’d given her items he already owned. But the thought behind the gift . . . that was something else entirely.
There was no way she could sit in her room all day now, though he’d provided for her entertainment. She had to go thank him. Quilla put on her stockings and slippers and left the room, walking with care to make certain she suffered no ill effects, but making no hesitation in her route.
The door swung open on oiled hinges and she entered. He stood at his table, lifting a beaker of some amber-colored liquid up to the shaft of early morning sunlight streaming in the window. The ray caught the liquid and suffused it with a warm glow that oozed over his face, casting it with honeyed shadows.
She entered the room on soft feet, but without turning to look at her he said, “You’re supposed to be in bed.”
Quilla went to him and stood in front of him, waiting until he’d put down the beaker. “Thank you.”
“It pleases you?”
She nodded, looking into his dark gray blue eyes. “It pleases me very much.”
A smile tugged the corners of his lips. “Would you like to tell me what pleased you the best?”
“I can put my vote to no one thing, my lord.”
He settled the beaker onto the table and moved a step closer to her. “But if it pleased me for you to choose?”
Whatever he’d been working with had given the room a scent like fruit gone overripe, but this close to him she could also smell his own scent. Something a bit spicier.
“The books,” she answered without hesitation. “I would choose the books.”
His smile widened. “I thought as much. The care you took with mine showed me you value them.”
“I came to thank you.”
“Even though you knew it was my wish for you to remain abed today?” He tilted his head to look at her, but didn’t seem angry. Instead, his gaze wandered over her face before returning to her eyes.
“I wanted to thank you for the gifts.” And I didn’t think I could stand to go a day without seeing you.
The realization surprised her with its sudden implications. Sudden, dangerous implications. Even so, her gaze didn’t drop from his.
“It was very kind of you,” she said.
His hand came up to stroke the length of her braid from the nape of her neck to where it fell over her shoulder, and when his fingers reached the curve of her jaw, they lingered to caress her cheek. “I’m not kind.”
She nodded, h
er gesture at odds with her words. “No.”
His hand moved back to cup the nape of her neck beneath the thickness of her braid. His fingers curled around her, warm on her skin. He pulled, and she followed, stepping forward until she had to tilt her head back to continue looking into his face.
“How fares your arm today?”
His fingers moved, gently caressing the sensitive skin at her nape.
“It will heal.”
“You must take care not to open the wound.”
He pulled her closer. Now her body brushed his. The hand at her nape slid slower, to the spot between her shoulder blades while his other went to her waist. Quilla put her hands on his chest, against the white front of his jacket, the material scratchy on her fingertips.
“I would be sorely discomposed if I should find myself without your services for yet another day.”
“And I sadly disappointed should I find myself unable to provide them.”
His arm tightened around her, and he tilted his head, leaning closer, his gaze on hers, dipping briefly lower to caress her mouth before returning to her eyes.
“That would not please me at all, Handmaiden.”
“And I am here to please you, my lord.”
But he did not kiss her. Instead, the hand at her hip came up to smooth the hair off her forehead and with a gentle but firm touch, he stepped away from her. “It would also please me to have some tea, if you feel capable of making it.”
She blinked and had to swallow hard before she could answer. “Of course, my lord.”
He turned back to his beakers and tubes, and Quilla made his tea, which he drank with perfunctory speed as though he had not, perhaps, truly wanted it at all.
It was her least favorite part of the day, late afternoon. The light began to fail and the lamps were lit, bringing with them the smell of fuel that sometimes made her head ache. But more than that, late afternoon, when the light began to fail, was the time when Gabriel dismissed her.
Sometimes, he did it with words. “You can go,” and on those days she went and unbuttoned and helped him out of his stained lab coat, brushed off his clothes, served him tea and cake or simplebread.
