Quilla frowned, considering. “I don’t agree.”
“You don’t have to,” replied Florentine. “I’ll still think the same.”
Quilla laughed just as the bell for the parlor rang. “They’re calling you.”
“Not me.” Florentine rolled her eyes. “They’re calling for a maid. Which one shall I send?”
“Whose turn is it?”
Florentine heaved herself up from the table and went to the door leading to the small room where the maids and houseboys waited when not actively serving. “You act as though ’tis a hardship for them to go. They’ll argue over who gets to go to see the ladies’ dresses. Catch a whiff of fine perfume. ’Tis their job to do this.”
“Then perhaps the question I must ask is which has displeased you the least today?”
The bell on the wall jangled again just as Florentine reached the doorway. “Oh, hold your knickers up with one hand while you diddle with the other. Lolly! You!”
A beaming Lolly scuttled out of the room, her cheeks pink. She smoothed her dress. “And shall I take the tea with me?”
Florentine made a long-suffering sigh. “Of course you should, Miss Feathers-for-Thoughts. They’re not ringing because they want to look at your pretty face.”
“I’ll help.” Quilla stood and pulled a tray from its slot in the cupboard. “The water is hot and the scones already baked. You just put a crock of butter and some jam on the tray, there, and I’ll get the napkins.”
Florentine grumbled. “See? Taking over my duties.”
Quilla laughed. “Sit down and relax a moment.”
The bell jangled again, longer this time.
“Ah, Invisible Mother,” Florentine cried. “Go, girl! Go!”
She helped Lolly load the tray onto the small service lift. With an exasperated sigh, she pulled out a ball of twine and a wooden sword. “The young master’s been playing in the lift again I see. I’ll make it go, you run up the stairs.”
Florentine tugged the pull rope to lift the tray to the second floor, then peered up the shaft. “Looks like she got it,” she said, satisfied, and came back to the table. “What do you say we play some cards, ourselves?”
It was infinitely better than sitting in her room alone, even if she did borrow one of Gabriel’s books to read. The cozy fire, the hot tea, and the scent of baking bread made the kitchen a much nicer place to be. And the company wasn’t terrible, either, Quilla thought with a smile as Florentine got out the deck of cards without waiting for Quilla’s answer.
“What’s that for?” Florentine dealt the cards. “That grin makes you look like a rat what’s escaped the trap with the cheese.”
“Thank you,” Quilla answered impulsively.
Florentine’s look showed she thought Quilla was bent. “For what?”
“For being my friend.”
Florentine burst into a guffaw that seemed to rattle the teacups on the table. “I’m not your friend.”
Quilla took up her cards, arranging them in order of suit. “Protest if you like, but you are.”
“I’d just as soon dump you in yonder fishpond as look at you sideways.”
“You see?” answered Quilla serenely, putting down her first trick. “You are my friend.”
They played for hours, while the bells sometimes jangled, and the maids and footmen came and went. Florentine had prepared a midnight supper with finger breads and sweets, and by the time the serving of that was done, Quilla was yawning.
“I must seek my bed, Florentine.”
“Go, go.” Florentine flapped her apron. “My only solace with these late affairs is that I can guarantee they’ll not want to be fed until the midmorning.”
“Not my lord Gabriel,” Quilla said. “He’ll be up at dawn’s blush, same as always.”
“Which means you will be, too. You get to your bed.”
Quilla bid the chatelaine good night and climbed the stairs toward her room. She made it to the landing on the second floor, where she needed to leave the stairwell and seek the other set. The stairs leading to the third floor and her garret room were tucked into a small alcove at the far end of the hall, past the point it turned. There were only two doors at the corridor’s end, one on each side facing the alcove. One led to a storage room for the maid’s cleaning supplies and the other, larger, an unused guest room. Tucked away as it was at the back of the house, it was not the most fashionable place to put guests who would otherwise wish to be closer to their peers and have a better view and nicer amenities.
Just as she passed it, however, the doorknob turned. Startled, for the hour was, indeed, late, she ducked into the alcove and hid herself in the shadows.
A soft, feminine giggle caught her ear, and she looked at the door. Two figures broke the gloom, shadowed forms just a bit darker than the dimness surrounding them.
The smaller was the giggler. “Shh. Don’t wake anyone.”
It did not take a scholar to figure out what they’d been doing. But who were they? In the dark it was impossible to tell. The shorter figure giggled again. The figures joined, became one, before separating again and slipping off down the hall.
One of the Fiene girls, perhaps? Or Genevieve Somerholde? It could even have been one of the maids, meeting Bertram or Billy for a liaison.
Whoever it was, the concern was not hers. Right now, Quilla’s only thought was the softness of her bed. And moments later, eyes already closing, she found it.
My father says I am to be an alchemist like he is.” Dane arranged the biscuits on his plate in solemn formation.
“And why would you wish to do that?” Florentine poured him a cup of milk, her hand hovering over his hair as though she wished to ruffle it but had withheld the urge.
“My father says Alchemy is a noble profession and that it takes a great mind to know it.” Dane bit into a biscuit, the crumbs dotting his pink lips. “I should like to think I have a great mind.”
“I’m sure you do.” Quilla watched the boy with amusement, and something else. He was adorable. What would it be like to have a child? The thought sobered her expression. It was not her place to be a mother; she knew that when she entered the Order. Just as a Handmaiden could not expect to marry or maintain a long-term lover, so was motherhood an unattainable goal.
“My father says I need to put more attention into my studies and less into my games.”
“Your father don’t know enough about the value of playtime,” Florentine grouched and added another cocao biscuit to Dane’s plate. “Have another bikky, love.”
“Save one or two of those for me, please.” Quilla pointed at the tray she was preparing for Gabriel. “I’m about ready to take this upstairs.”
“Ooh, let me ride with it! Please!” Dane gave her a cocao-smeared grin.
“There is not enough room on the lift for you and the tray.” Quilla shook a gentle finger. “You’ll spill the cream.”
“I won’t! I’ll sit ever so still!” Dane clasped small hands together, his blue eyes pleading.
“Absolutely not,” said Jorja Pinsky. “You came down to the kitchen for breakfast, not a ride on the service lift.”
“And what a fine breakfast he’s been provided,” said Quilla as she arranged the last of the items on the tray. “Cocao biscuits.”
Jorja frowned. “ ’Tis what he wanted.”
“And do you think children should always have what they want?” Quilla paused. “Rather than what they need?”
“I need cocao biscuits,” replied Dane smartly, licking the white milk mustache on his upper lip. “Because Florentine makes them the best!”
Quilla had to smile at him, but she shrugged toward Jorja. “His lord father wouldn’t care to know he’s been eating cocao for breakfast.”
“Why not?” Jorja pointed at Quilla’s tray. “He does it himself.”
Quilla laughed. “Ah, but he is a grown man and able to make those decisions for himself. And besides, ’tis not his whole meal.”
Jorja fro
wned further, looking at Dane. “The lady mistress did tell me I should give the young master what he likes.”
Florentine gave a loud sniff, though she’d been as instrumental in loading the child with cocao as the nursemaid. “The lady mistress has little concept of controlling one’s urges.”
That was harsh criticism from the cook, especially in front of the child, though Dane seemed not to notice. He looked happy to chomp away on the treat, cramming more biscuits in his mouth as though afraid they’d now be taken away.
“Besides,” said Jorja defensively, “when he wakes so early, he’s ready for a proper breakfast by the time ’tis served, anyway.”
“I’m the boy who eats two breakfasts,” Dane said promptly, as though reciting a lesson. He grinned, showing cocao-smeared teeth. “Don’t be cross, Quilla.”
“I’m not cross. But you’ll have your lord father to answer to, should he discover what you’ve been about.”
“Will you tell him?” Dane looked dismayed.
“No. ’Tis not for me to tell him of your actions.”
“Unless it pleases him to be told,” put in Florentine under her breath.
Quilla ignored that comment and lifted the tray.
“Do you want to marry my father, Quilla Caden?”
The question, posed in Dane’s childish voice but with Florentine’s inflection, stopped her. She settled the tray onto the lift and turned.
“No, young master Delessan. Why do you ask?”
He shrugged. “Because Robie Vassermidst says his mother prepares his father’s breakfast every day, even though they have a cook to do it. Robie Vassermidst says his mother takes care of his father’s clothes, too, instead of a valet. Robie Vassermidst says—”
“Robie Vassermidst has a tongue that wags at both ends,” said Florentine.
Dane looked stunned. “He doesn’t! I’ve seen his tongue! It’s hooked inside his mouth, just like mine is!”
He turned to Quilla. “And you do those things for my father, Quilla Caden. So I wondered if you wanted to marry him. Because if you did, then you would be my mother. Wouldn’t you like that? To be my mama?”
His simple question made her throat close suddenly with emotion. “You already have a mother who loves you very much, Dane.”
Dane nodded, his attention turning back to the last cocao biscuit on his plate. “Robie Vassermidst said his mother makes him eat porridge for breakfast.”
Quilla shared a laugh with Florentine while Jorja smiled uncertainly. “Porridge is not so awful.”
“No.” Dane shrugged with a child’s steady acceptance. “But not as nice as cocao biscuits.”
“Very little is.” Quilla closed the door to the lift and headed for the stairs. “I don’t suppose I could convince you to have this waiting for me when I get up there, could I?”
Florentine acted as though Quilla had asked her to cut off both her hands and poke out her eyes. “As though ’twould kill you to pull the rope yourself ?”
“Thank you, you’re a dear,” replied Quilla with a smile.
“I’m not!” came Florentine’s shout up the stairs after her. “Quit trying to slander me!”
“It’s not slander if it’s true!” Quilla called back.
Since the day after the dinner party, her patron had done little more than give her brusque and sometimes biting orders. Aside from brief, one-word answers, he barely spoke to her. More telling, he did not look at her. At least, not when he believed she could see him.
It made for very frustrating days. Though he did not tell her not to, when she Waited he often ignored her. It had become something of a battle of wills. Quilla, who’d had long practice in Waiting, always won, because no matter how long she Waited, he always ended up being the one to speak first.
He did not tell her not to be with him but he did not encourage it. He asked nothing of her and though her training meant she should have been able to anticipate his needs before he asked, she found herself unable to do even that.
The man didn’t appear to need anything.
He entered the room each morning, drank his tea, and ate whatever she had put before him. He stood still while she brushed the crumbs from his jacket front, his eyes locked at a point above her head, moving away without even a nod to acknowledge her efforts—not that she needed praise, she reminded herself sternly, turning down another of the neatly kept paths toward the pond, where the houseguests were ice-skating.
She did not need praise, but she would have liked him to speak to her. To look at her. To smile. And yes, she admitted to herself, to notice her.
It wasn’t a Handmaiden’s purpose or place to crave attention. Indeed, the ultimate goal was to provide such seamless service that the patron could not notice it, to become such an invisible but necessary part of the patron’s life that only the Handmaiden’s absence could be noted.
This had never bothered her; in fact, it was a point of pride, a goal to strive for and one she had upon occasion reached. But this was different. Gabriel Delessan was not simply not noticing her.
He was ignoring her.
The sound of laughter met Quilla’s ears as she rounded the path. The guests were having a sledding party. She could see them gathered on the small, sloping hill just beyond the pond. The pond itself had been swept free of snow, to allow for ice-skating. The plank dock leading to the gazebo in the pond’s center had been sprinkled with salt, and a nice fire burned in a barrel to provide warmth for hands gone numb with cold.
Though the hill on this side was gentle, it sloped off steeply on the other side, and there the gentlemen rode. Bertram and Billy had dragged the long, smooth-bottomed sleds from the stable and set them up at the top of the hill. The housemaids, clad in identical woolen cloaks, stood around a table laden with snacks, while another fire burned and a crock of mulled cider hung over top to keep warm.
“Quite the lovely party.”
Quilla turned to see Jericho. “Yes. Lovely.”
He gestured with his chin toward the group. “They all of them could be doing this at their own homes, but they wouldn’t. They only do it in packs. And on my brother’s coin.”
“You speak as though that bothers you.”
He shrugged and pulled the collar of his coat closer around his neck. A breeze kicked up and tossed his blond hair back from his forehead. “ ’Tis not really my place. And you’d know all about that. Wouldn’t you?”
Quilla turned to look at him. “Why have you such an issue with my place?”
He gave her a long look but said nothing at first. Then he turned back to stare up the hill at the laughing guests. “You know why.”
“Jericho . . .”
His head swiveled so he could stare at her again, lips thinning. “So it’s Jericho, is it, now? We’ve graduated to that?”
“Would you prefer me to not address you by your name?”
“Don’t you want to know if it would please me for you to address me by my name?”
Quilla looked out across the pond, where Dane was skating, arms pinwheeling as he turned in circles. “I am not required to please you.”
“And because you’re not required to, you don’t care to, is that the way it is for you?”
Anger wanted to sharpen her voice, but she softened it so as not to give him the satisfaction. “I care, Jericho. Just not in the way you’d wish me to.”
“No?” His voice dipped low, and he turned to shield her from the sight of the party guests. “And how do I wish you to? Can you answer me that?”
“I would rather not.”
He stared at her until she looked up at him, then asked her another question. “Are you happy in my brother’s service?”
Again, she replied as she always did when faced with a question she found inappropriate. “Why do you wish to know?”
“Curiosity.”
“Ah. And are you always so concerned about your brother’s affairs?”
Jericho touched a fingertip to his brow in acknowledgment.
“Point taken. However, in this instance, I think ’tis not my brother I’m concerned about.”
“Would you have me believe it’s me?”
“Aye.” Jericho had not turned his gaze from hers, and though Quilla now kept hers focused on the lake, she could feel his eyes burning into her.
“It would be my suggestion, then, that you find something else to occupy your thoughts.”
“How long will it take, do you think?”
She glanced at him, finding his eyes on her face as she’d suspected. “For what?”
“To soothe him.”
“As long as it takes,” was her reply.
“That answer is insufficient and also cowardly.”
Quilla’s small smile disappeared entirely, and she turned on him. “What are you about, my lesser lord Delessan? What purpose do you seek in trying to dissuade me from my job? I am here to perform a function, hired by your brother, which for the purpose of my job means I belong to your brother. I am his and no other’s. It’s not your concern my feelings on the matter, nor my thoughts. If I love it or hate it should not be any of your concern!”
His feathers seemed unruffled. A breeze had kicked up, making Quilla pull her cloak tighter around her throat, but Jericho didn’t seem to mind the chill. The breeze lifted the tips of his blond hair and tumbled it over his forehead in an untidy mess that nevertheless did not distract from the vivid blue of his eyes.
“Do you?” he asked simply. “Love it? Or hate it?”
The question, stated with such simple boldness, made her start to scowl, but she forced her face to smooth. “Neither.”
“I’ve made you angry. At least there’s that.”
Again, training and conscious effort kept her from goggling in surprise. “Were you trying to?”
“I’m trying to make you feel something, Quilla, and anger seemed the easiest way to breach the door.”
“Why?” She kept her voice pitched low, aware that the breeze could take her words and send them to ears not meant to hear them.
“Because if you won’t let me love you, the least you can do is allow me to be your friend.”