Eadgith cringed momentarily when a knock came at her door, but she relaxed when it was followed by her father’s voice calling, “Where’s my baby hiding?”
“I’m here,” she said. She laid down her needlework and came out from behind the wooden screen as he came into the room.
“You truly were hiding in there,” he laughed. “You like your little room within your room, don’t you?” He sat on the couch and held out a hand to her. She took it with a smile, and he pulled her down next to him. “I am happy that your room pleases you, but I am sorry to see you so much alone.”
“I like to be alone.”
“I know you do. I don’t mind to see you out walking or riding alone, but I don’t like to see you shut up in here like a little nun.”
“It’s raining, though.”
“I know it’s raining, baby,” he said, pinching her arm playfully. “Isn’t that why my mane is all wet? I mean you ought to spend time with other women. I’ve never known a girl who spent all her time locked away as you are.”
“How could you have?”
He laughed. “You have me there. I suppose I should rather see you alone here than alone in the woods: at least here I know there aren’t any young men hanging around. But I doubt any of the young men in the environs would so risk my wrath. Although,” he said thoughtfully, leaning back to get a better look at her, “I might have thought you worth it at that age. It’s a wonder that an ugly old ogre such as I could ever have made a beauty such as you. It’s enough to make me doubt your mother’s fidelity, though I fail to see how she could have procured herself a more handsome man than I.”
Eadgith looked away. Neither was supposed to speak of the other to her, according to the King’s request, but it didn’t stop either of them.
“I am sorry I haven’t any girls your age around for you. I wonder where I could get some? Do you think they sell them in town, or shall I have to plant some? Oh, but they do take a long time to ripen, don’t they?” he chuckled, pinching her again to make her blush. “I had hoped you could be friends with Leila, but perhaps a wife and mother has other preoccupations than a little maid. Do you suppose?”
“Leila is very good and kind to me.”
“You sing very well together, in any event. I forgot to thank you for your song last night,” he said, awkwardly stroking her hair.
It was, she thought, the closest he would come to an apology. She only nodded.
“I should try to get Hilda out here,” he said, “before Sigefrith returns home to forbid it. She likes the old man, at least.”
“Oh, no,” she murmured without thinking.
“Hmm, don’t like your sister, do you? Well, I suppose you have little in common. She’s a scamp – company more fit for my vulgar self than for my innocent lamb. What will become of you when you have to go live in her house, my baby? What will she make of you?”
“I don’t know.”
“I don’t like to think of it. Do you?”
“No.”
“Well, perhaps you won’t have to go after all, if only you stay with your mother. I certainly cannot believe that she will ever be pried out of that castle.”
“Why not?”
Eadgith herself sometimes wondered how her mother, who often acted as hostess at the castle due to the Queen’s instability, would like being relegated to a pensioner at her daughter-in-law’s estate. She thought, somewhat guiltily, that she would like to hear her father’s opinion on the matter, but she was not expecting the opinion he gave, which was on another matter entirely.
“Because she won’t be separated from her beloved cousin, that’s why not!” he laughed. “Son of a serpent! If she only knew how ridiculous she is. She has been panting for Sigefrith ever since she was a girl. And I’ll be damned if he ever noticed she was a woman at all. Sigefrith has only ever had eyes for one kind of woman, and that Maud is the very type of them: dark hair, dark eyes, creamy skin, and a sort of sick or languishing look that makes you want to put them straight to bed. Which may be the point, mind you. And your mother is the very opposite of them: light hair, blue eyes, freckled skin, and you simply pray to God that they will fall sick so they will shut the hell up and leave you in peace. But they never do,” he laughed. “Give me a quiet little brown beauty like my Leila any day.”
He sighed and smiled up at the ceiling for a moment, and then he seemed to remember that she was there – and that she looked very much like the sort of woman he had just criticized on behalf of the King.
“Mind,” he said suddenly, “there’s nothing wrong with a little light-haired, blue-eyed, freckled-faced girl if she’s as sweet and as quiet as you are, my baby. Provided she has dimples like yours,” he grinned and tapped her cheek, although she doubted her dimples were all that evident just then.
Chapters
Good gracious I dislike that man...