“Alexander?” Corinna asked. She looked about the table, but none would meet her eyes. “Is that the name of the master of the house or the do you have a pet?” Shedding?
“Forget what I said. It was insensitive,” Belle said, shaking her head and trying to laugh it off.
“I am in charge of the stables,” Gavin spoke up, diverting the conversation. “I keep the horses fed, watered, and in good fitness for whenever someone decides to come out and ride them. I also tend to the yard and flowers – oh, but not the rose garden. That’s out of my line of chores.”
“Oh, then do you tend to the roses?” Corinna asked, looking at Veronica with a curious smile. She didn’t know if she’d thank the youngest servant or begrudge her if she was the one growing roses three times as beautiful as her own. But Veronica shook her head and saved Corinna the need to decide.
“I scrub the floors and wash the windows… and polish everything,” she said, voice quiet but stable.
“Everything?” Corinna gasped. “But this house is huge! That must take you all day!”
“Not really,” she murmured, giving a small smile.
“She’s right,” Belle spoke up. “Since there’s not a lot of traffic, cleaning doesn’t take long. She mostly cleans the higher traffic areas, like the staircase and this dining room. We all only check the other rooms once every two weeks or so.”
“So there could be a family of owls living in one of the spare bedrooms and you’d all never know?” Corinna asked. The idea was amusing to her and she couldn’t help but smile a bit.
“Pretty much,” Belle said, a grin infecting her face as well. “But let’s hope that doesn’t happen. Home repair has never been my specialty.”
“Well it’s a good thing I moved in then,” Corinna teased. Belle laughed softly and looked down at her food, blushing lightly. Gavin seemed nonchalant about it, but Corinna noticed the small look thrown her way as if asking how the conversation had managed to elicit a blush from the girl of his interests.
There was light clinking as they all ate their meats and drank their water. It was delicious, and Corinna told Belle so, which earned her another blushing thank you and a shocked look from Gavin as though the other man couldn’t figure out how Corinna kept making her do that. Gavin was becoming rather amusing, and then he smiled brilliantly, and Corinna knew they’d become friends if given the chance.
“So you said it wasn’t you, Gavin, but then who takes care of the roses?” Corinna asked several moments later.
Belle almost dropped her fork, muttered an apology, but no one said anything outright. There was a long silence, in which Corinna didn’t touch her food anymore but everyone else seemed preoccupied with it – with the exception of Veronica who always seemed preoccupied with it. Gavin cleared his throat and shrugged.
“Just Morgana,” he said. He smiled. “She doesn’t eat with us. I think she makes her own food. We don’t see her much, but she is the one who takes care of the flowers. You may have noticed the candles in your room were lit. Morgana’s magic causes them to catch fire at night and then go out at dawn. She keeps the gate shut and protected as well. She’s really quite helpful.”
“Where I come from,” Corinna began. “Morgana is like a myth. No one’s really sure she even exists. But my uncle said he met her here… so I’m both angry at her and a bit curious about her. Does she do anything with you all where I’d get to meet her?”
“Morgana? Not really,” Belle said. She ate the last of her pork and set her fork down. “She comes inside to speak with our lord sometimes, but usually he goes out there to see her. I usually just notice her in the garden when I go to hang the laundry outside, but sometimes I can’t find her anywhere. I’m not even sure where she sleeps.”
“Sounds like she’s almost a legend even in her own house,” Corinna said, voice a bit dark. She couldn’t bring herself to like Morgana much, no matter how good she was for the lifestyle here. If it wasn’t for her, the threat to Corinna’s family would be gone save for a deranged prince. “So should I go into the garden to meet her, then?”
“Oh, speaking of legends,” Belle spoke up in a slightly high pitched voice. “Gavin, what happened to your cheek?”
Corinna blushed and lowered her head. Belle started to cast her gaze over to examine the motion, but Gavin quickly raised his fingers to the swollen spot and touched it gingerly.
“Nothing. I had an accident in the stables,” he said. “One of the horses got a bit scared when I was cleaning out its hooves.”
“Oh my!” Belle gasped, scooting closer to him to inspect the spot without touching it. “You’re lucky it didn’t kick your head off!”
“Yes. Quite lucky,” Gavin agreed with a small laugh. “Honestly, Isabelle, I’m fine.”
Gavin gave Corinna a reassuring smile, which Corinna replied to with a thankful one. She didn’t know why Gavin would lie for her like that, but she didn’t much care. Gavin was saving her the humiliation of having to relive her horrible first impression with everyone else. They’d adopt it as her first impression with them as well and ruin thier relationships from the beginning. Corinna was just happy to see Gavin had apparently no problem with making himself the fool instead. She’d have to find a way to repay the man later.
“We don’t really go into the garden,” Veronica spoke up while Belle scolded Gavin about being reckless. “Our lord… Well he recommends we stay out of it. It’s Morgana’s area.”
And, as if that explained everything, she went back to her food, eating the last pieces as though she had all the time in the world. Belle and Gavin finished first, taking the plates into the kitchen together so they could get some more ice for Gavin’s eye. Veronica seemed to eat at a pace that let her finish right as Corinna did so that neither of them would be left to eat by themselves. And then, after Belle walked Corinna back to her room, Corinna was alone again. And she supposed that really was supposed to explain everything, even though it explained almost nothing at all.
Chapter 6 – Late Night Discovery
Late. Corinna sighed as she found herself unable to sleep that night because of her lengthy nap earlier. She sat up on the couch, staring into the small fire set before her. It cast almost no warmth into the room, or none that she felt and was uncomfortable with in the summer night. It was dark at this hour, so dark that the only light came from her fireplace. The curtains on her windows had been shut and so even the stars could not wink down at her. For over an hour, Corinna sat up on the couch, watching the fire and the way it made shadow puppets on the wall, shifting and enticing her eyes.
She knew there was probably little chance of her getting to sleep, so she stood up and started to pace. It would be a long night like this, restless and bored in three large, empty rooms. Corinna grunted and looked around for something to entertain herself with. Something glinted in the corner of the room, catching and throwing the light of the fire into her eyes.
It was the little oil lamp on one of the corner tables. Corinna walked over and dragged her fingers over it. It looked brand new but also like an antique, although she wasn’t sure how old an oil lamp could be. She wiped some dust from the outside and smiled into the reflective surface. She had a devious, adventurous idea. She was awake and alone – the only moving thing in the house. Gavin had suggested she explore, hadn’t he? And the stupid prince wouldn’t be awake right now. It was the perfect time to look around.
Corinna grabbed the lamp and checked how much oil it had in it. Completely full. She looked around for something to light the wick with and saw the writing desk across the room. In the top drawer she found some matches and lit her portable light. It cast almost as much light as the whole fireplace. That was good. At least Corinna wouldn’t be left stumbling around and stubbing her toes with a ruddy candle stick.
The door handle felt clammy and cold to her touch, but she knew that was just her hand. The idea was invigorating and yet it felt illegal, like she wasn’t meant to wander at night. She opened her door carefully, doing
her best not to make any noise. The hall was wide and open. It seemed almost dangerous in the dark, and when the door shut behind Corinna, she suddenly became aware of how small she was in the large and empty area. She walked carefully to the edge of the hall and looked down two levels to the ground floor. It was an awfully long way to fall. Good thing there was a railing.
Corinna took a deep breath and let it out as she backed up from the edge. What had Gavin said? The prince lived on the left side of the third floor. Corinna looked across the open air to the other side of the house. She couldn’t make out the door, but she could see the railing shining in the light from the moon. Oh. Corinna turned her head to the side and saw the upper wall of the back of the house was nothing but stained glass. It was edged in normal, clear glass, letting the moon glint off of shiny surfaces. It was beautiful.
The farmer’s daughter shook her head and returned her thoughts to the prince sleeping so close and yet so far away. She should avoid that side. Even Gavin had said to keep away from those rooms. It was best not to disturb the prince, he’d said. Well that wasn’t a problem, because Corinna didn’t want to bother him anyway. She looked down the hall to the start of the stairs and the other doors in her own hall. Gavin hadn’t mentioned them, but they were probably just other bedrooms. She would start with places she’d probably go to during the day.
Corinna walked quickly and silently, trying to keep her noise to a minimum but still causing a slight tap to sound out with every tentative step. She didn’t want to wake anyone up by walking too heavily. The stairs didn’t even creak, which Corinna counted as a shocking blessing. If this were a normal peasant home, there would be squeaks and cries from the wood all over the place. Down one floor, Corinna stopped. Should she go down to the bottom floor or continue on the second floor? She’d take it one step at a time.
Gavin had said the left side was for the multipurpose rooms and the right side was for servant quarters. Corinna turned and went to the right. She tried the first door, but it wouldn’t open. The light of her lamp glinted off the door handle and she could see the bar of the lock in the small crack between the door and the wall.
Holding her lamp high, Corinna walked down the entire right side. The first three rooms were locked up tight, but the five remaining rooms were open and available. Corinna looked back at the first three. Those were probably Gavin, Isabelle, and Veronica’s rooms. Corinna chose the third unlocked room to explore so she wouldn’t disturb her potential friends.
The room was about half the size of Corinna’s sitting room. It was painted blue and slightly faded from the years. The color eased Corinna’s nerves. There was a table like one of the ones sitting in the corners of Corinna’s sitting room and a bed. A small dresser, about half the size of the one Corinna had seen in her bedroom, sat across from the bed. The bed was simple and wooden. It had no canopy, not like the one beckoning for Corinna upstairs. This bed had simple light gray sheets, no dye added to offset the natural color of the fabric. She wondered if all the rooms were like this or if the occupied rooms had more personal effects and colored sheets. This room was bland and unwelcoming save for the color and the small window in the far wall. Well, it was small compared to the windows in Corinna’s room or in the main hall. It reminded Corinna of her home windows and she temporarily debated moving her stuff down into one of these vacant rooms to feel more at home.
As if in answer to her thoughts, a bird squawked loudly and almost flew into the window. Corinna stumbled back away from it and took it as a sign. It was time to move on.
She returned to the hall and padded gently across the stairwell to the left side hall. It looked pretty much the same except that there were hooks on the walls as though portraits had once hung there. Deciding to start at one end and work her way down, Corinna headed to the front of the house. She opened the first door and was surprised to find it unlocked. Inside, she found a library, a great collection of books. Corinna gasped and nearly dropped her lamp.
She’d never seen so many books! Not even in the book shop in town. The bookcases ran floor to ceiling, and the ceiling was a good twenty feet. All the rooms had high ceilings, but the way the books filled the shelves really showed off the height of the room and the masses of books collected here. Corinna bet that the king himself didn’t have such a library, but then she remembered this was the house of the prince and decided that maybe the king did have all of these books in his castle.
Corinna set her lamp down on a table near the shelves and scanned the spines of the books. There were two shelves on diplomacy, rhetoric, and politics; and a whole shelf dedicated to the history of the kings and queens and nobles in Paesaggia and all surrounding lands. Corinna picked up her lamp and moved along, reading the spines. There was a section for cooking, for gardening, fighting, animal care, art, language, science, philosophy, religion, and psychology. The prince had everything he could ever need here! And there - a whole bookshelf full of fiction pieces and biographies. Corinna could spend her whole life in this room and never finish it all. She went back to the gardening section and dragged her fingers over the spines. Perhaps one of these would reveal the secret to the rose garden’s beauty. If it did, then she could bottle up the knowledge inside and use it when she managed to return home.
She grabbed a book on roses specifically and then left the room. She would be back, she knew it, but she wanted to finish her brief tour of the rooms before sunrise.
The second room was a study and a music room. There was a large desk set before a window second in size only to the large stain glass window in the main hall. The curtains didn’t manage to cover it all the way. Set up around the room were a few instruments, from an ivory piano to a violin, a cello to a sitar. Corinna strummed the strings of the cello as she passed it and went to the piano. Here she set her lamp on the body of the instrument and opened the keys. Trying to be quiet about it, she pressed a key slowly. No sound came out. A frown formed on her face. Was it broken? She pressed the key, harder this time, faster. A half note made its way out of the body, only slightly muffled by the fact that it was closed. Corinna smiled and hit the key a bit faster and a full note came out. It was a lower note, though, and her heart raced at the image of the prince hearing it through the floor and coming to investigate.
So without looking around that room any longer, Corinna hurried out of it and down to the next room. She stepped in and almost immediately wished she hadn’t. It was an armory. Well, sort of. There were three suits of armor standing in three different corners of the room. Swords stood, gleaming in their stand, and Corinna wondered if they were part of the ‘everything’ that Veronica polished. On the wall, Corinna took note of four shields, all with varying symbols of Paesaggia. It was like a mini-history of the kingdom. The knight had once been plain and barely recognizable beyond a blob of gold paint. The second shield had the knight with discernable limbs and clothing. The third gave it details like a sword and chainmail. The fourth, and most recent, was the one Corinna recognized. It had details on the armor and a beady gem for its eyes. It had an outlined scabbard that hadn’t been noticeable in the previous ones. Corinna liked the new one best, but that could be because it was the one she had grown up seeing.
There were several weapons hanging between the shields; a javelin, a mace, and a hammer being some of them. There was even one great lance hanging high on the wall above everything else, held up by two large hooks. The room was more foreign to Corinna than her fancy living rooms. She’d never been around weapons before, not beyond a sword. The most practice she had with weapons was when Alastar had once brought over his own personal swords and had taught Corinna the basics of defense. A Necessity for a woman in the world these days, he’d said.
Corinna didn’t like weapons. Not only did she not understand them, but Alastar had told her way too many stories about his father as a knight of nobility in one of the wars. Weapons were dangerous and unreliable. The second you learned how to handle one, someone would come along to challenge you.
Then you’re dead, and what was all that training for?
Not bothering to explore that room anymore, Corinna left and wished she could lock it from the outside. No one in this house needed to get in that room. Corinna raised her lamp and looked down the hall. It was possible one of the last two rooms also contained weapons, but she doubted it. She took two steps, coming even with the staircase, when she heard it.
It was music, a piano, but it wasn’t coming from the music room. Corinna looked around and strained her ears. It was coming from the first floor. Corinna walked as quickly as she could while still keeping quiet. Who would be awake at this hour besides her? And who could play the piano so gracefully? The servants didn’t seem the types to know how to play.
When she reached the bottom floor, she stopped again. It was coming from the right. Corinna went around behind the staircase, toward the rooms that supported the back of the house until they were cut off by the stairs. There was the dining room, and to its right the kitchen, and to the kitchen’s right was a room Corinna hadn’t been in yet. She was certain the music was coming from the echoing room behind the last door. It was the ballroom, right? He supposed there could be a piano in the ballroom. That would make sense, wouldn’t it?
The Rose Chateau Page 6