The Countess' Captive (The Fairytale Keeper Book 2) (5 page)

“He gave them what he had and whatever he could get together, and the three went away with it. It was enough for the rest of their lives, but they would rather have had their own proper organs.

“And that there is the tale of the three army surgeons.” He gives a wave of his hand and a tip of his head.

“Told like a true storyteller.” I raise my mug. He raises his, and we both drink.

“You’ll have to remember it now for one of these days when you have children of your own.”

It is a sweet sentiment that sinks in my heart like lead, for there is only one man whom I can imagine having children by, and he is in the gravest of danger because of me. Worst of all, I haven’t any way to warn him.

I nod, force a smile, and swallow hard. “I’ll have to tell it before then, lest I forget it.”

“Just write it down and put it away for safe–keeping,” he says, and I nod.

The man and I share stories for a bit as I slowly drain my ale. My eyelids grow heavy. I thank the man for his generosity and excuse myself.

I tiptoe up the creaky steps and slip the key into its hole, turning it slowly to avoid any loud click when the lock releases. I take Mama’s stone and tunic, kneel at the foot of the bed, and pray for her and for Ivo until I cannot hold my head up any longer.

The morning light and the noisy streets of Oppenheim made for restless sleep, keeping me between wake and anxious dreams. But a light knocking on the door coaxes me from slumber. I roll over with a groan. My face cracks against the wall. Sharp pain stabs at my forehead. I snap up and reach for the hardened knot on my head. The pain dulls to an angry throb. The knocker raps a little harder, and I curse beneath my breath.

“Adelaide…” Galadriel calls. I rise and throw open the door. “Oh, there you are.”

“Where else would I be?” The dig in my question fades as I look her up and down. She’s traded her velvet for home–spun cloth, her golden hair for an opaque shroud. “Why are you dressed like a peasant’s widow?”

The welcoming warmth on her face quickly cools. “I was wondering if you’d like to see Oppenheim with us.”

Us
. Now they are an
us
? My flickering annoyance ignites, kindling rage. No, I should like to shout. No, I don’t care to see Oppenheim with you, you usurping traitor. I’ll never play daughter to you.

She knows this. She knows I haven’t the patience to bite my tongue. Surely she’d quite like me to go along with them and say something unpleasant, to put myself one step closer to a convent.

If only I could bite my tongue. I swallow hard.

Truly, I should go. Who else shall keep them from enjoying the day too much, from forming warm, bonding memories? Only I can do this, even in silence. I serve as a reminder of the life Father thinks he’s lost, though it isn’t utterly lost. He has abandoned it.

I resign with a sigh. I haven’t the will to stay silent.

“My head pounds, and the wound swells still.” I reach for the tender lump on my head. “I think it best that I rest for the day so I am ready for tomorrow’s travels.”

She reaches for the wound.

I recoil. “Don’t touch it.”

She purses her lips. “Perhaps, I should send for a doctor.”

“There is nothing they can do for it. It shall heal in time.”

“They could make a poultice for the swelling perhaps.”

“Don’t waste your coin.”

She gives a little laugh. “Wasting coin is something I
rarely
worry about.” She knits her brow and tilts her head. “Ansel should have a look at you at least.” She turns, and I grab her by the arm.

“No!” I cry out. Truthfully, I do not want him to see the wound. That would only remind him of yesterday’s defiance and make him think of sending me away. Galadriel looks down to my hand, and I release her. “I’d rather not worry him. If I could just rest—”

Doubt flickers in her gaze. She grips my arm and moves in close, her voice barely a whisper. “If I were you, I’d be sure that resting was all that I did. Last night, your father asked me if there were any convents near Bitsch.”

I draw up. She drops my arm and turns again. “Perhaps, you are right,” I say through a dry throat. “He should come to see me, to check the wound.”

“I’ll tell him you wish to see him.”

“Where is he?”

“Breaking his fast in the tavern.”

Breaking his fast.
My stomach rumbles. It is Sunday, the only day in Lent when we can not only eat meat but can eat it thrice a day if we like. “I’ll go to him.”

“Then he shall think you well enough to come with us.” She sighs. “I shall tell him that you are exhausted from travels and that you need to rest for tomorrow. I shall send for a doctor to place a poultice on that wound to help it heal faster. Tonight you shall join us for supper and be a cheerful, obedient daughter. Do that, and perhaps he’ll forget about the convent.”

Her advice takes me aback. “Why are you helping me?”

She laughs. “It’s not out of any fondness for you.” Her face saddens for a moment but quickly hardens. “I know you hate me…”

“You bedded my father a week after my mother’s death. You were her cousin!”

“It was not planned, you know.” She looks away. “We had so much drink. I doubt we even knew…”

“Doubt you even knew what?
What
you were doing, or
who
you were with?” I give a short, wry laugh. “Well, I do not doubt that he hadn’t any idea of that either.”

Her slap falls hard on my cheek. She draws back, and for a heartbeat, she eyes the hand that slapped me with shock. One of my hands darts to my smarted cheek, the other curls into a fist as we stand in heated silence. Her countess mask returns as quickly as it had faltered.

“What’s done is done, Adelaide, and I cannot undo it.” Her voice is distant, almost sad. “I have tried to be kind to you. I came all the way back to Cologne to save you. I saved Gregor from you. I gave you a home when you had none, and I give you one still.” A shadow darkens her fair face. “But if you want me to be a villain like the ones from your Mama’s tales, I will gladly rise to your expectations.”

She comes close. Her voice lowers to a whisper. “You think me a fool, but you have no idea what you are up against with me. I know why you ran from the carriage. You had to warn your little peasant boy. Is there someone else besides us who knows he burned Cologne’s cathedral to the ground?”

Her words knock the air from my chest. “Ivo would never do such a thing,” I lie.

She laughs. “Oh, if Konrad ever got his hands on you again! Your face paints quite the picture, you know. Are you always so easily read or only when it has to do with the peasant boy?”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Oh, but I do.” Her voice is ice. “That night, I sat staring out the window as your Father slept off his drunken stupor. I had nothing else to do. And then I saw him. Your Ivo, he ran right below my window, panicked and covered in soot.

“So back to why I am helping you. I love your father, and he loves you. I know the pain of losing a child, and I wish to keep him from that. If you summon him this morning, it shall upset him. Seeing the welt on your head shall remind him of yesterday. Besides that, it is obvious you are well enough to join us. He will suspect you’re causing trouble again, and that may seal his decision to send you away. It would break his heart to do that, and his heart hasn’t yet mended from its last wound.

“I have offered you kindness, and you won’t take it.” The soft, feminine angles of her features sharpen. “Now I offer you a warning. Keep up with your defiance against your father, and he will send you away, but if you defy me in the walls of my home, I swear I will write a letter to Konrad, telling him you confessed to me a horrific secret about how your little villein burned the great cathedral of Cologne.”

“You’re wrong,” I say, withholding welling tears.

“And so what if I am? I am a countess, and he is a nobody. Who would Konrad believe?” She whirls around, heading down the hall, and adds without turning: “I think I shall have the letter written and kept in a safe place with a trusted person, just in case anything should happen to me.”

I dash into the hall after her. “You’d see him burned at the stake, burned like your sister?”

She stops, recoiling from the hit. She turns slowly and with all the coolness she embodies replies, “That, Adelaide, is up to you.” She turns again, sauntering toward the stairs.

I storm back into my room, slamming the door. My blood boils. Swarms of malicious bubbles dart frantically through my veins, desperate for escape. I pace the room, wearing a path into the old wooden floors as my mind races.

I could slit her throat in her sleep. I could steal a horse and ride home, warn Ivo before she can even have a letter written.

Every plan that I muster, each scheme that I create ends with the same thought: What if it all goes wrong? What if she makes good on her threat? What if she has Ivo burned at the stake?

A giggling from the streets below steals my attention. A young couple of burghers stroll up the thoroughfare, arm–in–arm. The girl raven–haired like me and the boy fair–haired like Ivo. My lip curls. The girl rests her head on her suitor’s shoulder. I huff.

What a torrid thing to do in the streets, I think God’s teeth, what a trollop!

Scornful thoughts and ill–wishes for the brazen, young couple push aside my plans of escape. And then I realize…
I’m jealous
.

This girl doesn’t squander her Sundays like I did. She makes the most of these coveted hours between mass and Sunday supper when children are neither worked nor watched.

Ivo hinted at his affections, and I looked away, thinking what we had was somehow better than love.
I shake my head. We could be married now if I hadn’t been so stupid. This Sunday would be so much better had I been a smart, torrid trollop like that girl in the street.

I plop onto the bed and lie back, indulging thoughts of what this Sunday could have been. A delicious ache rises in my stomach.

A hard knocking on the door frightens me, tears me from the fantasy with a cry. My hands rush to my flushed cheeks.

”Hello?” creaks an old voice.

I inch toward the door. “Who’s there?”

“I am a physician. I was sent for…to look at the wound on your head.”

I rush into my chainse and surcote before opening the door a crack. A towering, square–faced old man looks back at me through milky, silver eyes.

“Ooh, you did have quite a fall.” He eyes my forehead, and I reach for the lump. “May I come in?”

I open the door and step aside. The man shuffles into the room, places his leather satchel upon the desk, and holds an arm out to the seat before him, gesturing for me to sit. He places his thumbs upon my forehead, tilting my face up. “It’s not too bad…though there is little I can do for it. You should rest if you can. The swelling shall go down in time.”

I sigh. “That’s what I told the woman who sent for you.”

“But for now…” The man reaches into his satchel and pulls out a small bowl. He sprinkles a pinch of dried herbs, a bit of powder, and drizzles the concoction with oil, before pulling a stone from his satchel, and mashing the mixture into a paste. “Here we are now.” He places his thumb in the paste and anoints the knot on my head. I wince at his touch. “That should bring the swelling down a bit faster. Now where is that girl?”

Just as the words roll off his tongue, a petite, blond kitchen maid enters with a mug, sets it upon the desk, and scurries out. The physician reaches in his bag once more for another blend of herbs, placing them in the drink.

“Drink this. It shall ease the pain and help you sleep.”

I eye him suspiciously.

“Or do not drink it. It is up to you.” He turns to place his tools back in his bag and leaves.

I eye the drink.

Did Galadriel hire this man to poison me?

She could blame my death on yesterday’s fall, and since she has been nothing but kind to me in front of Father, he would not suspect her.

My head pounds dully with a tolerable, yet irritating pain. Some form of distraction would make it more bearable, but I haven’t any. A cold burn blazes around the knot and relief tempts me to try the potion.

I trace the brim of the mug.

Would she
really
poison me?

Well, there are only two ways to find out, and one of those I am not nearly stupid enough to try.

When Father and Galadriel return, I am sitting at a table set for supper in the tavern.