Chapter 13
Captain Marcel led the contingent that accompanied my small party to Rennes. Upon depositing us, our guards would return to Volodane Hall directly.
In Rennes, we’d have no need of guards.
Of course, I brought Miriam. I also brought Betty and Cora. I’d not wanted to deprive Sebastian of Ester, but when I made offers to Betty and Cora, they’d both jumped at the chance to come with me.
It was nearly a day’s ride to Rennes, and upon arriving, we found ourselves entering a small city. I’d never been here.
We passed through the gates into a large open-air market, and I immediately had a good feeling about our new home. The streets were clean and as we headed deeper into the city, we passed a mix of shops with brightly colored awnings and well-maintained dwellings.
Seven blocks in, Captain Marcel turned north. Two blocks later he stopped in front of a large house constructed of light-toned stone. The house boasted latticed windows with whitewashed shutters. A mix of ivy vines and white roses climbed up and around the entire front. It reminded me of a smaller version of Chaumont Manor.
“Here we are, my lady,” the captain said.
I wasn’t certain I’d heard him correctly. “This is the house?”
“Yes.”
I dismounted and stood looking up at the windows. I don’t know what I’d expected, but this was . . . more.
Miriam, Cora, and Betty climbed from the back of a wagon that carried our trunks and gazed up as well.
“This is your house, my lady?” Miriam asked.
“No,” I answered firmly. “This is our house, and no one can take it from us.”
* * * *
We settled in quickly, a household of women.
Miriam no longer functioned as my maid, and she lived as my friend. Cora did the cooking, and Betty did the laundry. Miriam and I helped with the cleaning. The house had a lovely front parlor, and the four of us gathered there in the evenings to sew or read aloud to each other.
Even though Sebastian had been generous with the sum he gave me, we lived simply for the most part. I’d never known the joy of living completely under my own power before. I had lived on the whims of my parents, and then I’d lived to try and please Sebastian.
Now I lived for myself.
Miriam and I learned of a group of women who organized food for the poor, and we joined them so that we might be of help. This made us feel useful, but it also offered us a chance to make new friends.
My father was appalled when he heard of my new living arrangements, and he wrote me an angry letter telling me to go home and beg Sebastian to forgive me—as of course I must be the one at fault. I assumed he feared that under the present circumstances, he’d never see another copper penny from Sebastian.
He was probably right.
A few months after I’d settled into my life in Rennes, Sebastian wrote a chatty letter with news from the hall. Although at first I’d been hesitant to open it, I found I enjoyed reading his rather caustic writing style. Time and distance had helped quell my anger toward him. I wrote back to tell him all our news.
Following this, we wrote without fail once a month.
After a year, I was even able to ask after Daveed.
Happiness has a healing effect, and I was happy. I controlled every aspect of my own life, and this suited me well.
Another year passed. I was not yet twenty-one.
Kai had written to me occasionally over the past two years. He’d been promoted to captain, and he led a small team of scouts who rooted out smugglers. At the start of the third year in my own home, a short note arrived from him to let me know he was on leave and would be passing through Rennes and wanted to stop over for several days.
We flew into a flurry of cooking and baking.
The day he arrived, Miriam and I both ran out front to greet him with an unabashed welcome.
For some reason, I’d expected to find the same Kai who’d ridden from the Volodane courtyard two and a half years ago, but he had changed. For one, his hair was cut very short, and he now wore the light blue and yellow tabard of the king’s army.
He hadn’t shaved for several days, so his face bore a stubble.
But he smiled at the sight of us. “Megan. Miriam.”
We each took an arm.
“Prepare to be petted and spoiled,” Miriam said. “You are entering a house of women.”
“After the past few months, you’ll get no complaint from me. I could use a little petting and spoiling.”
He even sounded different, more self-assured.
“How long can you stay?” I asked.
“Three days.”
We made the most of those three days, feeding him stews, fish pie, cakes, and tarts. We took him shopping at the market. One night, a group of players came through the city, and we went to see them perform. The other evenings, he told us stories of his adventures with his scouts, and how he had even once infiltrated a group of smugglers in order to catch them outright.
Cora and Betty listened on the edge of their seats, lost in the novelty of a masculine presence.
On his last night, when everyone had gone up to bed but him and myself, the two of us sat by the fire sipping small glasses of brandy.
Out of the blue, he asked, “Do you remember that letter I wrote? The long one, when you still lived at the hall?”
He’d not asked me why I left, and I hadn’t offered to tell him, but I’d never forget that letter.
“Yes, I remember.”
“There was more I wanted to say, a good deal more.” He hesitated. “I wanted to tell you how sorry I was for the way I treated you when you first came. I thought you looked down on us, and it made me angry.”
“You don’t have to apologize.”
“I do. Before my family ever visited Chaumont Manor, we’d been told all about Helena. I expected to see someone tall and proud with red hair, but we rode into your courtyard, and I saw you standing there in that yellow dress, so small and terrified. Then I saw your house, and I knew we’d never be good enough. That night at dinner, I was desperate for you to pick me and yet so afraid you’d pick me, the lesser of three evils, someone you didn’t want.”
I breathed quietly, listening to him, knowing that he needed to talk of these things but wishing he would stop.
“You picked Sebastian,” he finished.
“Yes, I picked Sebastian.”
“I wasn’t angry in the way that Rolf was,” he said. “I just thought you didn’t want us, any of us, and I’m sorry.”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“It does to me.”
In the old days at the hall, I might have grasped his hand to comfort him, but now I didn’t touch him.
The next day, we saw him off and made him promise to come back as soon as possible.
Cora sighed as he rode away. “It was nice having him here.”
“It was,” I agreed.
But I was glad to go back to the normal rhythms of our life.
* * * *
The years passed.
Miriam and I became more influential in our charity work, sometimes hosting meetings at the house.
She took up painting, and I bought a harp.
Each day was full, and we lived as we pleased.
I answered to no one.
* * * *
The world around me vanished, and I found myself standing once again in the storage room of my parents’ manor, in front of the three-tiered mirror.
As before, I fought to breathe, thinking on all that I had just seen.
But the dark-haired woman was now looking out from the left-side panel.
“That would be the outcome of the second choice,” she said. “Now you’ll go back to the beginning, to the wedding day once again, to live out the third choice.”
“Wait!” I begged. “Give me a moment.”
I needed to think.
“To the beginning once more,” she said. “To live out the third choice.”
My mind went blank, and the storage room vanished.
I found myself back in my family’s dining hall. It was my wedding day.
Chairs had been set up in rows, and guests were seated in them. I wore a gown of pale ivory and held my father’s arm as he walked me past the guests toward the far end of the hall.
Flowers in tall vases graced that same end, and a local magistrate stood there with a book in his hands.
Beside the magistrate stood Kai. I had chosen him.
As he stared back at me, I could feel his anger.
The Third Choice
Kai