“Private quarters?”
“You will have your own room—”
“But—”
“His Lordship will visit you when he wishes to mate. There will be no need for you to share a room.”
“Sweet.” I had not expected that. Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad after all.
I ran my hand along the wood-paneled walls as we walked. They were smooth, framed by intricate carvings—stories being told in decorative works of art, wasted where no one would ever care to observe them, as if they were placed here to insult the artist—and unlike the warm redwood panels in the entrance, these were dark and aged, suffocating the mansion.
When we reached a wide staircase, which looked more like a main entrance staircase should—unlike the one I saw when I first entered, as if maybe this was once the front of the mansion—I followed the curve and up to the next floor, where a very long corridor and many doors greeted me. Theowulf walked in companionable silence until we reached a pair of heavy wooden doors with iron hinges.
“Each wife has her own room,” he instructed, taking a heavy key off his belt. “And each wife is to keep to her own room.”
“How many wives are left?” I asked, looking nervously at what I suspected were the doors to the mansion tower, and possibly a stone room with iron bars on the windows. “No one ever said.”
“It’s not for me to say. Or anyone, for that matter.”
“How many children does he have?” I added, half stalling and half curious. “Where are they?” Considering this was a puppy mill, I was surprised not to see children’s toys, or at least one or two of them running past me.
“The children live out on the farming estate.”
“They what?” I stood in front of him as he went to put the key in the giant keyhole. “But you said the wives have rooms here.”
“Wives do not raise their sons, Red,” he said almost routinely, with only a slight hint of regret. “On the sixth day after their birth, they are taken to a well-guarded facility and raised to adulthood there, until they are sent to join the army.”
“So…” I felt my brow pull tight, felt it age a little and wrinkle in place. “You just take away our children?”
“They will not be your children. They are his children and yes…” he pushed me aside to unlock the door, “you will live apart from them.”
That hit me like a hard blow. I wouldn’t tolerate that. At all. Things would need to be discussed with Luther if he thought for a second that I would take that lying down.
“So what about you?” I put my hand on the door to stop him opening it. “You’re one of his sons. Were you raised by your mother?”
“I was. For a time.”
“And what happened?”
“As you well know, as all wolves know, she died.”
“Actually, we don’t know anything about her except that she died, but I don’t know how old you were when that happened.”
“I was ten.” He picked up my hand and moved it off the door, a cold look in his eye. “Now if you don’t mind, I would like silence.”
He got silence, but only because I started doing the math. If Luther was immortal and all his sons were too, and each wife gave him between five and thirteen sons, then he must have hundreds of children running around that were born only in the last century, each somewhere between infancy and adulthood. So if we didn’t get to raise them, who did? And where?
How had I never asked the right questions about this?
How had I been so complacent that I never got curious about the alpha and all his business?
Then again, most wolves didn’t care about this world much until after they turned for the first time, and even then, we were taught in school that the business of the alpha was never discussed. He was just this overlord that we all bowed to, but no one ever said why. Kind of like monarchs nowadays. I just grew up knowing Luther was like our king, and never questioned it. I wasn’t sure I would ever have questioned it, any of it, if it weren’t for Alex.
I moved my hand to the wolf-head dagger inside my dress as the bulky lock clicked and the hinges released the door, finding comfort knowing Alex was with me.
“This is your room.” Theowulf pushed it open and the stone mask of fear on my face turned to surprise. “You will take meals in here, and all your daily activities will be done in here. You may wander the gardens, but if you are caught in any other room of this mansion without permission from His Lordship, you will be flogged. Clear?”
“Clear,” I said, not sure I just heard that correctly. Cold, weak, and tired from a long, emotionally taxing day, I practically tripped into the room. It was wide and long, rounded where the tower protruded out from the greater mansion, but as high as the tower was the ceiling in here wasn’t that high. It was grand high, but not evil tower high, and white, with soft downlights, kind of like a hotel room. Pastel colored walls and handcrafted furnishings gave it a regency feel, and I knew that when daylight broke, floods of natural light would spill over the giant four-poster bed where I’d soak it all up.
“It’s not what I expected,” I noted, running my fingers over the marble top dining table and then pulling out a chair, admiring the silky pattern on the seat cushion. I was never a big fan of Jane Austen, but my mom was, and I knew she’d love this room. If I ever got to show her.
“You will be happy here,” Theowulf said, but something in his tone made me look over at him. “And I do apologize, but His Lordship requires all new wives be locked in on the first night.”
“In case we try to escape?”
“It wouldn’t be the first time.”
That sent a chill down my spine.
“Supper will be sent up shortly,” he finished. The door slammed shut behind Theowulf, and I heard it lock into place. It didn’t bother me though. Nothing could bother me tonight. I had just inherited this massive room and a whole two weeks without worrying about Luther’s ancient hands on me. And who knows, maybe if I didn’t ovulate at all, ever, he might not ever want to ‘visit my bed’.
With a little squeal of relief and happiness, I stripped off my red cape and took a giant leap onto the bed, sinking into the feathers. It was perfect. If I had to suck it up and accept my life, at least it was cozy. If not a little cold.
My head turned to the fireplace with a mantle as high as my shoulders and a large mirror set over the top. In the corner beside it was one of those old-fashioned writing cabinets with the drop-down desk, like something I might find in Alex’s house.
I got up and pressed the button by the fireplace, igniting it into a roaring flame, and sat down at the desk. This was my new life. And while I missed Alex and my mom, and I would never live my newly discovered dream of running a dog shelter, I could at least make up worlds. That was something no time, or place, or circumstance could take away from me.
Pen set to paper under my determination then, and “The Strange and Remarkable Worlds of George and Alex Plain” sprung to life under it, taking me home again.
***
Two days passed. On the first day I received three square meals, a high tea, and a lesson on cross-stitch, followed by a new wardrobe that had been plucked right out of 1811—corset and all.
On the second day, despite the time-hop of day one, I was given a laptop and Wi-Fi access. But when I tried to join Facebook, it was blocked. It seemed I had access to news, books and movies, and oddly, YouTube, and that was all. But it was enough, for now. I was just happy to escape Regency Britain for five minutes.
Day three started the same as one and two: a skinny young ‘slave’, as she called herself—dressed in a worn beige dress with a clean white apron and bonnet—entered my room at six and woke me with breakfast. I was then dressed into a pretty floral yard of fabric atop a tight corset and weird long knickerbockers, then left alone again as the slave took my breakfast tray and my bathroom bin on the way out the door. I wondered for two days why she took that bin when another slave took my paper bin and cleaned my room.
Today, I finally asked.
She looked shocked, as though she didn’t know what to say, and I thought maybe she was taking my used tampons and eating them or something, based on the look on her face. As bad as that idea might have been, her response made my whole face burn hot with mortification.
“He has someone monitor my cycles?” I repeated.
“Yes, Miss.” She bowed her head a little, not making eye contact. I wondered if she was embarrassed too, or if she just wasn’t allowed to look me in the eye, considering she never actually had. “His Lordship needs to know when your cycle starts, ends, and when you ovulate.”
I sat down hard on the bed, reminded cruelly by the corset that I couldn’t slouch. This truly was a puppy mill. I wasn’t here as a wife, to talk with him and keep him company; it was as I’d suspected: I was here purely to breed with. And yet I would never be allowed to raise my children. Then there was the issue of the baby girls; I’d been told once that Luther only had sons, but statistically, that was impossible. Which begged the question: where were they? And if I did have girls, and they weren’t allowed to be soldiers, would I get to keep them? And if wives kept their daughters, there must be hundreds of them running around here somewhere. But the lack of noise or presence of children creeped me out.
When my servant left, I decided to investigate.
My door creaked as if it hadn’t been opened in a week. I tensed at the noise, poking my head out into the cold corridor to check if anyone was around. As usual, this mansion was wrapped in total silence, with only pale, musty light coming from two windows at the ends of a T-junction somewhere down the corridor. When a shadow changed the light for a moment, I popped back into my room, heart in my throat as I waited a second before poking my head out again.
Coast clear, my silk slippers making me light-footed, my Emmy-worthy dress lifted so I wouldn’t trip on it, I ventured out into the unknown for the first time. Last time I saw this corridor it was dark, and the oil lanterns on the wall were lit, giving little light to see by. Now, in the grainy light of day, this mansion revealed itself as the perfectly preserved piece of history it was. I walked with my chin angled to the sky, taking in the high walls, the gilded mirrors and the intricate carvings around each square wall panel, lost in a state of awe.
Eventually my meandering led me to the Great Hall, an open space with exposed beams across the ceiling and a thick wooden table running the length of the room, large enough to seat a hundred people. Heavy-framed paintings of various sizes and crafted of different wood were hung in a disorganized pattern on every wall, like the way Alex hung his posters, and each woman in them had the same sadness in her eyes, even the ones that were forcing a smile. They were all dark-haired and slender, like me, wearing the same iron ring that was resting right now on my ring finger. And it occurred to me: they were the wives.
With that realization, I did a turn on the spot and looked for the oldest portrait. The girl from the story—the hooded girl—would have lived here too. Her portrait might be on the walls. I was interested to see her. But all my searching led to nothing, unless she was the child in the oval-shaped frame in the middle of the longest wall. It was a tiny portrait, and she looked way too young to be a wife, but thinking of the fact that she married Luther young, there was a possibility that it was her. I really hoped not. I know times had changed but… ew. I don’t think I could bring myself to do anything physical with him if he really did marry a girl that young.
Toward the head of the hall I noticed a large chair, carved out of what seemed like a single block of wood, with intricately detailed wolves as the knobs, howling at the centered moon. It was a beautiful chair, overlooking a grand layout of gold cutlery and sparkling crystal glasses, everything so shiny and fancy as if there was a party on soon. I so badly wanted to attend a party, but to do that I would have to be in Luther’s ‘favor’. And to be in his favor, I’d have to spend time with him. But how could I spend time with him if I never saw him? This whole stupid situation was frustrating.
“What are you doing in here?” The deep voice echoed through the room, making it feel empty in here.
I turned, my heart leaping when I saw my husband. “Am I not allowed to wander?” I asked, instead of saying, ‘Investigating, got a problem with it?’. It was hard, but after watching so much Jane Austen, I think I managed to sound older than I actually was—or from a different time than I actually was. He liked that, because he smiled softly and walked forward, saying nothing until the giant gap was closed.
In this setting, with old-fashioned clothes and a backdrop to match, he looked like he stepped out of a book himself. If I distanced myself from it all and looked at him as a reader might, he was, what Jane might say, dashing. My stomach fluttered when I put my eyes on him. Add that to his confident stride, his holier-than-though countenance and those steely but also kind eyes, and it was a recipe for a girl to lose herself quickly if the man in question was also a kind, warm man. Thank Carne he wasn’t.
“You are not a foolish girl,” he said, the stern tone contradicting the half smile. “You know the rules, so do not play me for a fool. Now, why are you walking around here by yourself?”
“Why aren’t I allowed to? Am I in danger?”
“Danger is not the issue, Miss Redwood—”
“Miss Redwood?” I scoffed, showing him the iron ring. “Aren’t we married? Shouldn’t I be Mrs. Reave of Ravenswood?”
“You will never be called by that name!” he growled, his voice husky and sharp.
“Father?” Theowulf spoke cautiously, paused there in the doorway. “You’re needed in the library.”
He gave me a cold look before he stalked away, waving his hand in the air at his son. “Talk to her! Teach her some respect.”
I shrunk as Theo came at me. He grabbed my arm hard enough to leave impressions and dragged me to the other end of the room. “What are you doing out here?”
“I was curious about my new home.”
“Curiosity gets you flogged, girl.” We stopped walking and his eyes flicked to the slave—the same one that came to my room every morning—as she stopped on the cusp of the Great Hall and bowed out quickly when she saw us, not turning her back until she was quite far away.
Theowulf looked back at me, drawing his hand off my arm as though he only just realized he was hurting me. “What are you curious about?”
“Do you care?”
“I care that it led you from your room. So please, let me ease your concerns and we shall have none of this wandering again.”
“Why did your father get so upset when I told him to call me Mrs. Reave?”
He sighed, bowing his head. “Because that was my mother’s name. Only my mother’s name.”
“So none of the other brides took his name?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because to share one’s name, it… well, it is an honor he reserves only for those he loves deeply.”
“Love?” I scoffed. “So he is capable of love?”
He arched a brow that said it all.
Good. There was hope for us all yet. “Who are all these women?” I motioned to the paintings. “Are they the wives?”
“Yes.”
“Why does he take so many? Is he trying to replace your mother?”
“No.”
“Then why?”
“Because he is a god, Red. Have your parents taught you nothing?”
“I know they all say he’s the son of Carne, but I don’t see why he needs so many wives and sons.”
“It is his right to be survived by many sons. It’s a badge of honor which, I suppose, if you were not born in his time, you might not understand.”
“Okay, so… many sons, that’s fine. But why so many wives?”
“Because they age and die.”
“Oh.” Well that made sense. Duh. But how sad? Each one of these women had become an incubator to grow his badge of honor. It didn’t matter that we had lives
, feelings, futures, before we came here. Once we arrived, we were nothing to him, and we clearly never would be. “How ’bout you?”
“Me?”
“Do you have this many wives?”
He gave a sweet smile. “No. I have no wives.”
“Why not?”
“My human wife died, and now I work hard to operate the pack—run things for my father. I haven’t had time.”
“No one has time for love,” I said, my cheeks spreading as a smile moved in. “It just happens. Are you telling me you haven’t been in love since your wife?”
“Have you ever been in love, Red?”
“Maybe.”
“Then you know it is not easy to fall in love, and it does not likely come around more than once in a lifetime.”
He had a point. “I guess.” I shrugged.
His hands came down on my shoulders and pressed them firmly. “Don’t do that.”
“Do what?”
“Shrug.” He removed his hands. “It’s an innocent gesture to you, but if my father sees it, he will slap you hard across your face. Take my word for it.”
My lip pulled into a half smile. “Lemme guess? You shrugged once?”
“Once,” he said with a breathy laugh. “Never again.”
I nodded, relaxing a bit then and placing my hands behind my back like Theowulf and Luther did, and I could see why they did it. It was pretty comfortable. I took in the room at my own pace then—the floods of pale light making rectangles on the floor and the polished gold cutlery on the table, going back in my mind to when I was a little girl and we came here for a party.
“Is there a party here tonight?” I asked.
“Yes.”
“Can I come?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Because you cannot be trusted yet.”
“Trusted? With what?”
“Red, we keep many secrets here. It is why you haven’t been allowed to send letters yet.”
“What secrets? I don’t know any secrets.”
“How about the fact that your sons will never be raised by you? If our people were to learn this, they would not put their daughters forward for Selection. There are things that cannot be said to others, and until you understand this, we cannot allow you to interact with anyone.”
Red: The Untold Story Page 11