Elizabeth of Donatello Bend (The Colplatschki Chronicles Book 2)

by Alma Boykin

  She caught herself. “Forgive me, Godown, for my lack of charity,” she pled. While Olympia Sarmas-to had brought her fate onto herself, Elizabeth had to admit that if she’d had her mother’s looks and ambitions, she might very well have done the same things. Having a face that made horses look like beauty queens, pale muddy green eyes, and hair the color of a mouse floating in dirty wash water had made all the difference in their fates, Elizabeth reminded herself. As much as I like to think that I’m too smart to sleep my way through life, if Godown had made me differently, who is to say that I would not have become someone’s mistress? Well, she wasn’t, and wouldn’t be, and given her calling, it was quite possible that she wouldn’t live long enough to worry about marriage. And Emperor Rudolph and Queen Margaretha needed to keep the archdukes as available for alliance marriages as they did their own offspring. The imperial couple’s own morality also put a damper on the wilder aspects of court life, or so Elizabeth gathered from rumor and servant talk.

  “Well, Mother, I’m certainly not in a position to send you anything until after the taxes are paid,” she told the page in her hand. “And if I don’t get some sleep, I’m going to be useless when the account calculator comes tomorrow.”

  Elizabeth almost forgot the account calculator when she saw what else arrived from Vindobona the next afternoon. “Oh, no, that’s not,” she gasped, eyes wide. The dark brown horse with black tail and feathered feet snorted and posed. She approached the animal with an overwhelming sense of trepidation.

  “Lady Elizabeth?” The older man with the horse asked.

  “Yes, Master?”

  “Wetzl McAvoy, my lady. Major Wyler sent me to train both of you,” and he handed Elizabeth a letter. “You won’t break him,” the wiry man laughed as she reached a tentative hand towards the beast’s nose, so he could sniff her.

  Introductions would have to wait. She tucked the letter into her sash and turned to the portly man waiting patiently beside an equally patient looking mule. “Lady Elizabeth, I am Alehandro Smith. His grace Archduke Gerald Kazmer sends his greetings and says I am to look at the estate records.”

  “Welcome, Master Smith. I believe you will have quite a lot to look at. We have found two sets of accounts, two years of the official accounts are missing, and I have some grave suspicions about where certain of the estate’s revenue has gone.”

  The round man held up one hand, stopping her. “Your pardon, my lady, but I prefer to work without prejudice until I see what the numbers can tell me.”

  “Very well, Master Smith.” She turned to Ann Starland, who had come to see the new arrivals for herself. “Ann, if you could see about quarters for Master Smith and Master McAvoy, and whoever else is staying. I will apologize in advance if there are few staff to assist you, gentlemen, but every spare body is trying to get the harvest in and the last hay and fodder stored before winter, or securing buildings and houses before the bad weather comes.”

  “Just show me the stables, my lady, and I’ll see about taking care of Ricardo and Rowen,” McAvoy said. That must be Rowen, Elizabeth decided, noticing a striking blood bay horse behind the pack string.

  “Very good.” She got out of the way as Ann took over, directing McAvoy to where Andrew Sims stood all but worshipping the new stable guests, and telling one of the maidservants to take Master Smith to his chamber and then show him the library.

  Elizabeth decided that it would be better for the new horses to get settled for a few hours before she drooled over them. Instead she went to the chapel to see how the repairs were going. First had come an exorcism and blessing, followed by floor to ceiling cleaning, turning the room back into an airy, light-filled space. The clean windows let sunlight flood the room once more. She breathed deep, smiling at the warm, woody smell that had replaced the earlier stench of desecration. The lumber stacked in one corner would become frames for the stained glass windows and the new altar platform. A few of the benches had been found intact, and after a good scrubbing the wood glowed in the afternoon light. To whom should the chapel be dedicated? She bowed to the still-empty candle niche and sat, thinking. She favored St. Gerald, of course, and this was a royal property so he would be an appropriate patron. Godown, lord of all saints, guide me, please, and show me Your will. No ideas spring into her mind, but she did sense that someone other than St. Gerald would be a better patron. And that a side chapel or small niche for St. Jenna would not be amiss. Some people did take Jenna as a secondary patron, after all. Didn’t I hear whispers that Lazlo looks to St. Jenna as well as Kiara? Yes, I think I’ll ask about a side altar to St. Jenna. If not here, then perhaps a small shrine in that clearing off the river road. She bowed again and left the soothing quiet of the small room.

  She changed into boots and went to the stables. “My lady,” Andrew Sims nodded, not breaking his rhythm as he handed sacks of fodder chops up a ladder to two of the stable hands, who emptied the sacks into a large, rodent-resistant bin.

  “The stalls next to Snowy?”

  “Yes, my lady. St. Michael be praised, they don’t have your beast’s temper, beggin’ your pardon, and I hope they don’t learn it.”

  She laughed at the vehement declaration. “Andrew, if all equines had Snowy’s temper, we’d walk everywhere and pull our own plows.” She left him to his work, dug three reject apples out of the bin, then went to look at the new arrivals. But first she gave Snowy his tribute. “Have you been a good mule?” she inquired as he devoured his apple in two bites. She did not really want to know the answer to her question.

  “If by good do you mean has he not eaten or kicked anyone since I arrived, then yes, my lady,” Master McAvoy told her. “I’m pleased to see that for once the rumors are true.”

  “His grace Archduke Gerald Kazmer swears that when Snowy was made, he broke his own mold out of spite.”

  The small man nodded, then bent to pick something off the floor, revealing a bare pate surrounded by a fringe of black hair. “Ah, he’s a mule then. You’ll find that Ricardo is a different beast entirely.”

  Yes. If something happens to Snowy, I won’t be paying the crown for the rest of my life, she thought, looking at the beautiful stallion. And I don’t have to worry about Snowy smashing himself on a fence, either. She assumed Ricardo would be put out to stud as well as whatever else he was to do. The dark brown horse whuffed her outstretched hand, and accepted the apple in a thoughtful sort of way. She reached up to pet him and he jerked back, eyes rolling. “Sensitive about ears?”

  “Ay. We’re to break him of that. He gets into trouble among trees, and doesn’t like running water. He’s four,” Master McAvoy told her. “He’s broken but not trained. That’s our job.”

  “And the other, Rowen?”

  McAvoy led her to the other stall. Rowen eyed her suspiciously from the back of his stall. When Elizabeth did not try and eat him, the gelding took one step forward, then another, until he came close enough to snatch the apple from her hand. She stayed still as he ate and then sniffed her palm before retreating again. “This lad needs a woman’s hand, my lady. The late owner of this place bought him for his fire and flash, then mistreated him. He’s not dangerous but he needs to learn to trust people again, if he can.”

  “Cart horse or riding beast?”

  “He was used in a dog cart, my lady, so you’d best start just riding him.”

  She wondered where she was supposed to find time. Well, make time. Set up a schedule just as you had from Sr. Amalthea and go by that.

  The pack animals stayed in a separate paddock, away from the local stock. They’d leave in two days with the crown share of the wool comb, along with fruit, cherry preserves, and enough grain to get them back to Vindobona. Once winter set in, they’d send the rest of the grain to Vindobona on sledges, unless it was to go elsewhere. She suspected elsewhere. There had been a general information letter in the package from the court. Things looked “less good than could be hoped for” in the Duchy of Tivolia and the lands to the south and east o
f the empire.

  Or the grain could stay here, as part of the supplies for the men who would be building the foundry. She’d gotten initial approval to start work setting a location for the cannon works. The news both pleased and worried her. It pleased her because it would be a boon for the estate. It worried her because it suggested that Duke Grantholm’s efforts to keep the roads open between the Bergenland facilities and the inner empire were not working as well as they once had. Or it could be that the crown wants the revenue, no matter what is going on in the Bergenlands.

  A week later she had more to worry about. The pack trains had left, relieving some of the pressure on the paddocks, and Elizabeth was reviewing a few of Lazlo’s ideas about using the paddocks for training the new militia. She also studied a plan for developing a defense in depth of Donatello Bend, focused on attacks from the north. We need to settle people here, on the northern edge, and then use the manor fortress as a hinge. Or should I key on the barns, turn them into small redoubts so we can fall back to the manor, and then to the river? Of course, if it gets to that, I’d be better off pivoting and defending the road, except that leaves the way south over the Donatello bridge open and I don’t think Count Peilov will appreciate that. Since he still had not responded to any of her invitations to meet and discuss matters of mutual interest, including planning for bridge repairs in the spring, perhaps she should assume he intended to let her hang and make her own preperations accordingly. As she made notes to that effect, Annie Lei burst into the library. “My lady, my lady, something is wrong in Master Smith’s workroom.”

  Elizabeth jumped to her feet and barely caught the chair as it tried to fall over. She grabbed handfuls of her skirts and trotted out of the room. “What do you mean?”

  “I went to take away his dinner dishes and all at once he shouted, ‘ureeka, ureeka’ and began waving a piece of paper. I think he’s gone mad, my lady.”

  Elizabeth hiked her skirts higher and sped up the stairs to the guest rooms. She almost collided with Alehandro Smith, who was running down the hall toward her. “My lady, I found it,” he called. “Good news, my lady, the estate is only eight thousand thalers behind on the taxes.”

  The hallway seemed to spin as the words penetrated. Eight— Thousand— Thalers?

  She woke up to see the ceiling and a very worried Annie energetically wielding a large lady’s fan. Elizabeth heard Alehandro’s voice saying, “Why did she faint? I thought it was going to be much worse.”

  3. Vindobona and Spring

  “And again,” Master McAvoy called. Elizabeth cued Ricardo into a tight trot, then shifted her weight and brushed his flanks with her lower legs. He exploded into a flying kick, then landed and trotted on. “Good! Let him relax and then dismount, my lady.” She did as ordered, scratching the brown crest and praising the stallion. He blew and flipped his tail, very pleased with himself, as well he should be.

  “I’ve never read of a four-year-old who could do that,” Elizabeth said as she and the trainer walked up the hill to the manor, leading Ricardo. The ice caulks on his shoes threw sparks from some of the stones in the pavement.

  “He’s not ready to do it under a war saddle and armored rider, my lady, not for a few more years, but I wanted to encourage him.” Ricardo seemed almost as intelligent as Snowy, in his own way, and Wetzl McAvoy and Elizabeth worked hard to keep him challenged and out of mischief.

  “Speaking of being under saddle, I’m returning to Vindobona next week. I’d planned on taking Snowy and Rowen, plus the usual. From what you’ve seen, is Rowen ready to return to the city?”

  The wiry, balding man hawked and spat into the dirty snow beside the gate. “You are staying in the traitor’s former house, my lady?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then no, my lady. Leave Rowen here. We can put him in the paddock with the loafing shed, so he can get out of weather, and I’ll leave word that he’s not to be touched unless it is an emergency.”

  “Very well.” She was not entirely upset. She’d rather not be training a shy horse in bad weather in the traffic of Vindobona.

  And since Ann Starland had decided to stay at Donatello Bend, she did not have to worry about finding space for her, or asking to have part of Starland House opened up. Aquila’s last letter mentioned that he’d be staying in Starheart with Lady Marie and the newest Starland, if at all possible. Godown bless him, he spends enough time away as it is. St. Kiara, grant Marie clear sight into Quill’s heart, so that she can see how much he respects and depends on her. Archduke Lewis had generously offered to lend her some of his staff to open part of Donatello House (as it was now known).

  After taking care of Ricardo and giving Snowy a placating pat, Elizabeth went to her room to thaw out and review the latest update from Alehandro Smith. The good news was, as he had said a month ago, that the estate owed only eight thousand thalers to the crown. But he could not find the missing funds, which amounted to almost ten thousand thalers. The numbers made Elizabeth’s head ache. A skilled craftsman earned two hundred thalers a year, in a very prosperous year. Full sets of armor from the finest smith in the empire, for herself as well as for both Snowy and Ricardo, would cost her five hundred thalers. When she asked the portly accounts calculator if Windthorst could have buried the currency somewhere on the property, he’d shrugged. “My lady, anything is possible, but I believe that your suspicions were correct, and the money went east, or to buy silence. How much might the tapestries you destroyed have been worth? And how much does,” he’d shuddered as he spoke the name, “Selkow the Cursed demand of her followers?”

  “Twenty percent. Ten percent for rituals and worship, and ten percent for war,” Elizabeth knew. “Which almost, almost, accounts for half of the earnings of the estate over the last ten years.” She wondered how much he’d spent on bribes, getting Turkowi into and out of the empire. There had to have been some: she’d greased a few palms on her way from Frankonia to the Empire. Someone always seemed willing to be bought if you looked carefully and did your best to seem generally harmless.

  She’d found ways to pay off some of the estate’s debts. Since defense costs could be deducted from taxes, she’d had Lazlo and Gary set the able-bodied men of the estate to cutting some of the problem trees and making staves for pikes and spears as well as firewood and lumber. They had begun drilling with the “weapons” a week ago, and if the men were not exactly eager to take up arms and obey Elizabeth, they did come to training three times a week. She’d had to wait until after the first snow, but the men would be in good shape to begin working with real edged weapons and coordinating with cavalry come spring. And the foundry would also help the estate revenue. But more came from what would have been her share of the revenue. So much for funding a convent and getting new wigs, she moped.

  Elizabeth’s party left Donatello Bend in the snow. Master Alehandro Smith, wrapped in every stitch of clothing he owned, rode with two of Elizabeth’s maids on top of a sledge full of grain sacks, his mule walking behind. Elizabeth rode Snowy, who took the snow as a personal insult. Her spare horse, a placid bay gelding she’s named Braun, clopped along beside another grain sledge. A third sledge carried the baggage, such as it was. Annie and the other female staff still could not believe how little Lady Elizabeth carried with her, and a few refused to touch her weapons and armor, although they themselves wielded sickles and even scythes and billhooks when the need arose. Lazlo Destefani rode beside Elizabeth, since Gary Alderson had lost the toss to stay at the estate. Although, Elizabeth smiled to herself, since he seemed quite interested in Annie Lei’s second daughter, staying might not be the hardship it seemed. Someone needed to oversee the defense of the livestock. Dardogs might attack the paddocks and pens, although Hans Maartin, the chief herder, swore that the packs only came close to the settlements in late winter. “Not till they’ve killed all the pseudo-boar and pseudo-deer, my lady. Even then you’d best not ride out without arms, beggin’ your pardon. Your mule would make a good meal for a pair of dardogs
.”

  Because of the weather, the group pushed as fast as they could to reach Donatello Crossing, a town thirty kilometers east of the estate. Lazlo nodded as they saw the walls appearing. “Good. And it looks to be clearing to the north, my lady.” She glanced that way and saw the strip of blue sky just above the horizon. “Cold in the morning.”

  “Yes. But we’ll have moonlight. I want to be out by five and on the road by six, Captain. I don’t trust the weather to hold long enough for us to reach Cally’s Bend without problems.” She had nightmares about being caught in a heavy snowstorm without shelter.

  He nodded. No one in their right mind enjoyed long-distance travel in the wet early part of winter. Elizabeth relaxed, as much as Snowy’s temper and her own caution would let her. Lazlo could deal with almost anything. They’d already discussed their route. They’d follow the main road east and a little north to Donatello Crossing, then turn due east, away from the river, through the empty country of the watershed between the Donatello and Cally Rivers. Cally River flowed into the Donau Novi upstream of Vindobona, and the group would join the larger riverside traffic flow south of Cally’s Bend. If it were not winter, and she were not encumbered with the sledges and staff, she’d go across country. Not with the grain and Master Smith and the others, Elizabeth thought, glancing back to see the other women huddled in their blankets, cloaks, coats and scarves. Would a carriage-sleigh be worth the cost? I’ll have to look into it. It would get the women out of the wind and snow, at least.

  A week later the group arrived at the gates of Vindobona. The Donau Novi looked cold under the low grey sky. A few chunks of ice floated in the river, and Lazlo made a blessing sign. “That’s not good, my lady. Too early in the season for the river to be freezing, or so I’ve been told.”