Chapter 7
Fay managed to keep from seeing Sir Tristan for a whole week, or rather, she’d kept him from seeing her. She’d found out Anne’s window overlooked the courtyard where the knights and squires did their workouts, so she’d actually been keeping a close eye on him. Right now, he was showing one of Sir Walter’s pages how to use a sword and she was having a hard time not thinking it was adorable.
She’d grown a little more used to the everyday violence of castle life and stopped thinking the practicing at killing one another was barbaric. According to Batty, they were in almost constant danger of being raided by someone. While Sir Walter was retired, she found out he still lorded over an entire army, which included Sir Tristan and his men. It would have been nice to go down and see the ceremony where he actually plighted his troth, or gave his oath of fealty or whatever it was that sealed the deal, but she hadn’t quite gotten over her extreme embarrassment yet.
Now Anne was completely well again and wouldn’t hear of missing another supper, so she was out of excuses. She would have to face him again tonight. She’d come to think of the thudding, clanging, and grunting as a soothing sort of background music as she whiled away the days hiding in Anne’s room. She knew it wasn’t getting her any closer to her goal of falling in love. But whenever she thought she was ready to face him, every little detail of that horrible/amazing episode came rushing back at her.
She still couldn’t figure out what exactly hurt the most. His dismissing her as a trollop or his just plain dismissing her. Even while she simmered with rage at his treatment, she couldn’t help think about how his firm, warm skin had felt under her fingertips. The way his lips had felt against hers for those few glorious/terrible moments. And she couldn’t even talk to Anne about it.
“Fay, dear, I asked what color you thought I should use here.”
She dragged her eyes away from the window and blinked owlishly at Anne, who was bent over her weaving. At first, she was going to point to whichever color was closest, but then she really took a good look at the work in progress.
“Wow, that’s really beautiful,” she said. It was a pastoral scene, as so many of them were, with people milling about in front of some hills. The sun, however, was coming up over the hill, and the colors Anne had used would have put any real sunrise to shame. “How do you get such colors?” she asked. “And why can’t we get them for our gowns?”
She’d been joking about the last part, but Anne nodded seriously. “That would be nice, wouldn’t it? To have a dress this color?” She pointed to a flashy red-orange. “But the dyes are so very expensive as it is, I feel grateful to have them even in such small quantities for my weaving.” She paused and looked hard at Fay. “I’ll be glad to finally get out of this room,” she said. “Haven’t you missed seeing all the festivities? You shouldn’t have stayed away because of me.”
Fay heard a little rebuke. She knew she should have represented as acting lady of the house, but she’d been a coward, plain and simple.
“I was too worried about you,” she said, which was also true. The coughing fits had stayed away for a full two days now, but Anne was thinner than before. A plague victim would have been concerned about her. “You’re all I’ve got.”
Her voice cracked on the last bit. She adored Batty. Her maid was fun and perfect for getting quick answers to things, but she didn’t know what she’d do if she was stuck here without Anne’s gentle guidance.
“Nonsense,” Anne said. “You needn’t worry a bit. If you cared at all about me, you wouldn’t make me suffer by thinking I’ve kept you from what you want to do. I haven’t seen you crack open the pages of a book since I first fell ill.”
Fay scowled. Apparently the original sister, or whoever she’d replaced due to the curse, had loved reading. And it wasn’t as if Fay didn’t enjoy a good romance or mystery novel, it was just that the books at the castle were all written in impossible to read old English, or French, or Latin. The only thing she had that she could read was the odd instruction book that was in front of her when she first arrived.
She scowled some more. She’d given up on that book, hiding it in her closet. After the initial few descriptions, it turned out to be full of negativity and complaining. She knew curiosity would eventually drive her back to it but, for now, she wanted to believe she wasn’t destined to join the ranks of those bitter failures. Especially since the consequences for failure were so steep. And even more especially since she didn’t have a love prospect in sight.
Things were bleak enough without reading the words of the ones who’d come before her, knowing the only reason she was here was because they’d given up. Died. If she thought about it too long, she got so angry she wanted to punch the stone walls. Then there were other times like now that she felt almost content, as if she weren’t under a curse at all.
Love. How hard could it be to find someone? A loud clanging rang up from the courtyard below and she turned away from Anne, pushed aside her dark thoughts, and ran to look out the window.
“Ooh, little Sam has finally taken down young Adam,” she said.
She tilted her head to the side, watching the looming figure of Sir Tristan, huge even from that distance, come and help the fallen lad back to his feet. Adorable. He clapped the young champion on the shoulder, nearly sending the kid to his knees. Even more adorable.
She felt her face about to burst from the smile he’d brought to it. If she wasn’t going to end up like those bitter Betties who’d brought her here, she needed to toughen up, get back on the proverbial horse and try again.
“What should we wear tonight, Sister?” she asked Anne. “I’m in the mood to look especially fine.”
*
Fay twirled in her dark wine-colored dress, the pale blue sleeves almost touching the floor. Her hair was a masterpiece of plaits, her neck weighted down with a big, fat pearl.
“Locked and loaded,” she muttered to herself as she peered into the somewhat cloudy and distorted mirror in Anne’s chamber. Sir Tristan didn’t stand a chance. In fact, she was going to keep her options open. The castle was full of men, ripe for falling in love with.
“Lady Fay, which slippers?” Batty asked, running from Fay’s chamber with her arms laden with shoes.
She was getting ready in Anne’s room, slumber party style, partly because she still wasn’t sure what looked nice, partly because Anne had the mirror. And they were having fun. She only wished once that she had her phone so they could play music, but with Batty’s near constant chatter, she hardly missed it.
“Which shoes do you think, Anne?” she asked.
Anne took the selection very seriously, as she took everything, choosing a gold-embroidered pair. “Don’t we all look like summer birds?” she asked, pinching her cheeks for the tenth time. Even with her rouge, she still looked pale, still had slight dark circles under her eyes, but her spirits seemed high.
“We look amazing,” Fay agreed. “You, too, Batty,” she said, feeling bad for leaving Marjorie out. Anne’s maid hadn’t done anything special to her appearance, despite their beauty party, but Batty had gone all out with her best gown and twisted silk ribbons in her hair. Marjorie acted like she didn’t hear or care, same as usual, and kept combing Anne’s hair.
“Brom’s going to be singing tonight,” Batty said shyly. “I’m eager to hear it.”
“Who’s Brom?” Fay asked. The name was familiar to her.
Batty blushed. “Sir Tristan’s squire. His most trusted squire. I stitched up his arm when he first arrived and he’s been very kind to me since.”
Fay clapped her hands together, remembering how she knew the name. It was in the book, right at the front. She saw it clearly in her mind’s eye. Brom—likes Batty. Not much of a description, but the important information was there.
“He likes you,” she said.
Batty blushed harder and Anne shook her head disapprovingly. Fay wanted to stick out her tongue. Was there a no fraternizing rule amongst servants or something? Who else were they supposed to get with? She had a sudden, interesting thought. According to the curse she had to prove true love existed, but did it have to be her who fell in love? What if she could prove it with someone else, like sweet Batty and the singing squire Brom?
That would probably be way too easy, but she decided to keep an eye on things with those two. She needed any ray of sunshine she could get in this new, stressful existence. She almost laughed. She’d been waited on hand and foot since she got here, got to watch live action knight fights during the day, and had all this fun girl time with her new friends (and one sister). Sometimes, she forgot why she would suddenly be overcome with nausea inducing anxiety.
Oh, right. The curse. That was certainly something she needed to be serious about but, just like in her own time, she was positive she would eventually fall in love. She just needed to be patient.
She realized Batty and Marjorie were in the middle of a heated argument and she turned to Anne. “What did I miss?” she asked.
Anne smiled. “Oh Fay, off in your own world again, were you? I wish I could do that, but I’m always stuck here.” She shook her head at the girls, but didn’t intervene. “Marjorie said all knights, including their squires, were filthy animals, and Batty’s hotly disputing it.”
“Filthy degenerates,” Marjorie corrected, making a medieval talk-to-the-hand gesture at Batty.
“I’ll have you know you’re speaking of our lord Sir Walter when you say such things,” Batty hissed. “He’s never been a thing but kind and generous to us.”
“Excellent point, Batty,” Anne said, putting an end to it with a simple lift of her brow. “We must remember that our lives are the way they are because others choose to protect and care for us, at the expense of their own comfort and safety.”
“Seriously, Anne, sometimes I just want to applaud when you’re done speaking,” Fay said, getting choked up.
Anne snorted a laugh. “Goose.” She took her turn in front of the mirror and pinched her cheeks again. “Now, let’s go make them want to lay siege to something.”
Batty and Fay exchanged slack-jawed looks at that, while even Marjorie had to cover her mouth to hide her shock. Then they all burst into uncontrollable giggles and went down to supper. Fay only hoped she could make Sir Tristan speak to her, let alone lay siege to anything.