TFT 01 Beauty and the Beast (15 page)

“Do you like animals?”

Elle blinked. “Pardon?”

“Do you like animals, like horses and cats?” Severin asked, staring at his wine cup.

“I do. Not so much goats. My sister’s goats ate all the buttons off my best dress the last time I visited home, but I enjoy viewing and riding horses,” Elle said.

Severin nodded and sipped his wine.

Elle waited to see if he said anything else, but he didn’t. “Good night, Your Highness,” Elle said.

Severin nodded, staring intently at his wine cup as he sank deeper in thought.

The serving maids nudged each other as they took away platters and dishes and the manservants beamed behind the prince’s back as they tended to the candles and fireplace.

“A stable?” Elle said, batting Emele away when the ladies maid tried to adjust the scarf hanging from Elle’s neck.

“Yes,” Severin said, fiddling with a cuff of his waistcoat. “Oliver and the grooms are not ornamental staff members,” he dryly said.

“How many horses?” Elle asked, eagerly drawing her hood.

“A dozen. There is my riding horse, several carriage horses, and the work horses,” Severin said, watching Emele help Elle struggle into her suede mittens.

“Are there any dogs? Besides Jock I mean.”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“There used to be a kennel, but the dogs snarled whenever they scented me and the kennel master could not control them as aptly as he used to since he lacks a voice,” Severin wryly said. “Stay behind me,” he added.

“What’s wrong—,” Elle’s breath was knocked from her lungs when Severin opened the doors. The wind howled and blew, stinging Elle’s bare skin with frigid temperatures.

Severin stepped out of the castle and turned around to pull Elle after him. He shut the door as Elle tried to hold her wildly blowing cloak against her.

“Hold on,” Severin said before he picked Elle up and perched her on his back, the same way he carried her when fleeing Bernadine.

“Emele would kill you if she knew this is how I’m getting to the stables,” Elle shouted above the howling wind.

Severin didn’t reply—even when Elle pressed her face against the warm fur leaking out of the back collar of his waistcoat. He picked up her crutches and hustled across the courtyard, entering the stable with a bang.

Elle slipped from Severin’s back and leaned against a stall while Severin wrestled the door shut. The stable was solid and warm. It smelled like hay and wood shavings, and several horses hung their heads over the stall doors, looking at Elle with bright eyes.

“They are beautiful animals,” Elle said, drawing closer to the nearest horse. It was a coal black Percheron, a draft horse used for farm work.

The horse sniffed Elle’s gloved hand, hoping for treats. He blew on her, puffing warm, sweet smelling air.

Elle smiled until the horse drew back, pinning its ears against its head. It retreated to the back of its stall and placed its butt in her direction.

Elle frowned and glanced up at Severin, who had joined her at the stall door. “Animals do not much care for me in this figure,” Severin said.

“Which one is yours?” Elle asked.

“The only one that does not shy away,” Severin said, leading the way down the aisle.

Wherever Severin passed horses shied or snarled, striking their stall doors with hooves and flattening their ears. The more docile tempered work horses retreated to the back of their stalls, but a team of matched carriage horses all lunged against their doors.

At the far end of the stable a tall horse hung his head over a stall door and nickered. He had mouse colored fur and a dark colored mane and tail. His muzzle was sooty black—as if he had rubbed his face in fireplace ashes, and when Severin opened the stall door Elle could see the same sooty black color crawled up his legs.

“He’s very fine looking,” Elle said as Severin slipped the gelding a treat from his pocket.

“He was my charger when I was a field commander,” Severin said.

“You kept him when you were named commanding general?” Elle asked, tugging one of her mittens off to pet the charming horse.

“I did. He was too old be used in battles, so he was retired to my personal stables to be retained as a riding horse,” Severin said.

Elle turned to look at the other horses housed in the cheerful stables. “He’s the only horse that is not afraid of you?”

“Yes.”

“That is depressing.”

“Their dislike is natural. I smell and have the appearance of a predator,” Severin said, placing a clawed hand on his horse’s neck.

“What is his name?” Elle asked.

“Fidele,” Severin said.

The mouse colored horse brushed his whiskery muzzle against Elle’s palm. “You are a brave and loyal mount,” Elle told the horse as Severin exited the stall and shut the door. “He’s quite furry,” Elle called as Severin climbed a ladder to the hayloft.

“Winter is almost here. All the horses grow thicker coats then. Do you ride?” Severin asked, pitching hay down to the stalls.

“A little. I am proficient enough that I won’t fall, and I can put a horse through the paces. I’ve never owned one, though, and I haven’t ever cared for one either,” Elle said as Fidele left her to investigate his hay.

“Not even when your father was a merchant?”

“No, we lived in a river port city. He conducted most of his business by ship,” Elle said, plopping down on a bag of grain. A tiger striped barn cat shyly watched her from a stall partition.

The draft horses copied Fidele and chewed on their hay, but the hot tempered carriage horses snorted and tossed their heads when Severin climbed down from the loft.

Severin took a wooden bucket of brushes and carried it to Fidele’s stall. He set about grooming the gelding while Elle coaxed the barn cat to her side.

“There is something comforting in being with animals,” Elle said. “It might be that they do not try to
boss
you, like so many people are prone to doing.”

“I doubt you lack that particular trait—otherwise you would not buck heads with Emele as often as you do,” Severin said. He stopped brushing his horse for a moment and raised his eyes to the hay loft.

Elle scratched the cat under the throat. “Perhaps, but it doesn’t mean I don’t find the quietness of animals to be soothing.”

When Severin left Fidele’s stall and stopped in front of the grain bag she sat on, Elle raised her eyebrows at him.

Severin shook his head at her before he raised a thick finger to his cat muzzle.

The barn cat sniffed Severin’s leg before growling. It hissed and retreated to the stall partition, flattening its ears as it watched Severin.

Severin grabbed a pitchfork and crept to the hayloft ladder. His ears flicked as he held the pitchfork like a javelin. After a few heartbeats he thrust it into the hay.

Oliver leaped out from under a cover of hay, casting strands of dried grass everywhere. He lost his balance and tipped over the side of the loft. Severin caught him midair and deposited him on the ground, holding the stable boy by his coat collar.

“Oliver? What were you doing up there?” Elle blinked.

“Emele or Bernadine?” Severin growled.

Oliver hung from his collar for a moment before making his eyes wide behind his mask and batting his eyelashes. He set one hand over his heart and girlishly fanned his face with his other hand.

“Emele,” Severin said, releasing Oliver.

Elle looked back and forth between Oliver and Severin. “What about Emele?”

“She charged Oliver with spying on us,” Severin said. “That woman is nosey beyond her years. I am surprised she has not left my services to open up an intelligence agency.”

“But that would mean she would have to leave Marc.”

“It has not escaped my notice that you seem fixated on the interpersonal relationships of my staff,” Severin said as Oliver shifted his eyes between Severin and Elle.

“It’s amusing. Emele bullies me into doing whatever she wants, but she goes helpless at the first sign of Marc,” Elle said.

“Must all your sources of amusement involve pushing your nose into business that is not your own?”

“Mostly, or it wouldn’t be half as fun.”

“In any case,” Severin said, once again grasping Oliver by the scruff of his coat when the stable boy tried to slip off unnoticed. “The relationship between your ladies maid and my chief gardener is of no concern at this moment.”

“What are you going to do to Oliver?”

“I haven’t yet decided,” Severin said, looking down at topic of discussion.

The groom uncomfortably swallowed.

“Let him go,” Elle said. “No harm was done.”

“That is hardly the point, nor is it at all satisfying.”

“I don’t see the use in punishing Oliver when Emele is the real root of discontent,” Elle said.

“Does Bernadine know you were sent to watch?” Severin asked the mute stable boy.

Oliver shook his head.

Severin’s lips pulled back in a toothy, frightening smile. “In that case you will inform her of the task Emele gave you.”

Oliver gulped but bowed when Severin released him. He hung his head as he plodded to the stable door, slipping out into the howling wind.

“Bernadine will be mad?” Elle asked.

“Bernadine does not get mad, she gets cross. She will be cross that she hadn’t thought of the idea first, and then feel that it is her duty as the chateau dictator to lecture Emele for impeding on us,” Severin said.

“All parties involved are thus punished, and Oliver will be unlikely to make himself available for future spying missions. An admirable job as usual, Your Highness.”

“You are a quick study, Intruder,” Severin said with a fanged grin that was less toothy than the sly one he had given Oliver.

Elle smiled as Severin returned to Fidele’s stall. It was funny how a title Severin previously used to draw a line of separation between Elle and everyone else was now almost a term of endearment.

Chapter 8

A Discussion of Princes

Severin frowned in the gloom of his study as he read the latest missive from Lucien. His half brother mostly wrote of court antics and the newest laws their father had passed. Ranger reports were too delicate to discuss through courier. That intelligence had to be discussed in person.

To Severin’s relief, Lucien had refrained from bringing up a pending war. His brother seemed taken with the idea of marching against Arcainia, which was troubling. Even though Arcainia was smaller with a less extensive army, it would not reflect well on Loire to attack an ally that had done nothing wrong.

Severin’s thoughts were interrupted by a knock at the door. “Enter,” he said, gratefully pushing his paperwork aside. It was too late for it to be Elle—she had just left not an hour ago, intending to retire for the evening—but any distraction would be welcome.

Duval shuffled into the study. He was smiling, but the gesture was wane and his movements were hesitant.

“Good evening, Duval,” Severin said.

The barber-physician bowed and handed his slate to Severin.
I have just come from Mademoiselle Elle’s room. Her leg is healing wonderfully.

Severin nodded. “And?”

Duval took back his slate, wiped it clean, and thought for a moment before writing.
In two to three weeks she will be able to try walking without her crutches.

Severin blinked. “She will be healed enough to survive a carriage ride home without additional injury?”

Yes
.

“Does she know?”

No.

“I see. Thank you, Duval.” Severin slouched in his chair, deep in thought.

Duval bowed and took his leave, turning around to watch Severin as he closed the study door.

Severin frowned at the leafy green twigs shoved in a vase that Elle had brought him that day. She had run out of flowers, and instead resorted to clipping branches from bushes. Severin could see the flattened leaves the maddening girl had no doubt rubbed. Severin heaved his shoulders up before returning his attention to his work.

It would do no good to think about Elle leaving yet.

“Why do we always meet on the most wretched days of the month?” Lucien complained, glaring at the wall of the abandoned lodge.