“It does sound tempting . . .” my father mused.
“Indeed.”
This last comment came from my mother, who sat at the far end of the dinner table with an almost-empty sake glass. At the other end, my father and Christine Dana sat with their heads bowed in conversation, hands clasped together. Christine had become a fixture in our house these past few months since David joined the army, present for every meal, my father’s constant companion. She did all but sleep here, and that was because my father stole away most nights to stay at her penthouse. With Christine for company, and me safely at Landry Park and not at the university, Father seemed happier, more relaxed. Once or twice, a smile ghosted across his face. Yesterday he had hummed as we took a turn in the snowbound gardens together.
Hummed.
I enjoyed his recent pleasant moods, but not the toll they took on Mother. Mistresses were commonplace in our city. In fact, in many families I knew, the mistress actually lived on the estate while the wife had her own loft in the skyline. But I realized now that Mother loved Father, loved him like I loved David, and the feeling drew me to her. All these years that she had indulged in clothes and parties, I had never thought to question why. But now I couldn’t help but wonder if she had wanted to distract herself from her cold and unloving husband.
Surprisingly, Addison had risen to the occasion. Bored of Cara’s newfound reclusiveness, she turned to Mother for companionship, and spent her days shopping with her, soothing her and spreading malicious rumors about Christine. If not for Addison, my mother might have dissipated entirely, becoming nothing more than a revenant with a bottle.
Christine touched my father’s hand again. This time, Mother stood up suddenly, chair scraping the floor. “I’m going to bed,” she said.
They didn’t notice. Wrapped up in their own world, they didn’t notice when I left either.
• • •
The drive to the Lodge was long and snowy. Several times the caravan of gentry cars stopped so snowdrifts could be cleared. Luckily, we’d sent word of our stay a week in advance, so the Lodge had plenty of time to stock up on supplies and servants. I thought dreamily of a warm bed and an open kitchen, eating warm soup and soft bread by the fire, watching the snow fall on the northern Missouri forest outside. I would not think of the guest of honor. Not yet, when he wasn’t scheduled to arrive for another week.
The full name of the Lodge was Victory Lodge, and, fittingly, it had been built by the losing poor following the War. My ancestors wanted an immense country getaway, with hunting in the forest, fishing in the nearby river, and enough space to entertain hundreds. The sprawling building and the surrounding complex of stables, kennels, and barns spread across half a mile of snow-laden hills, nestled against the forest on one side and rich farmland on the other. I could see the welcoming windows of the second story as we pulled onto the long winding drive.
My soup and fire wish fulfilled, I slept peacefully and woke the next morning, determined to stay as out of the way as possible. With my father giving me this time at the Lodge free of estate work, I had unlimited time to read and relax. I didn’t particularly wish to waste it playing whist with fifty-year-old women and hanging around the fringes, waiting for David to show up.
I went downstairs to the kitchen to see if Martha needed any help. The other servants seemed a little aghast at my being down there, but Martha was used to my habit of hiding from large groups. She was an extremely efficient woman and not of the mind to turn down help when it was proffered, no matter where it came from.
Thirty apple pies were on order for that night’s dessert, and I set to paring and cutting the apples, and was soon flushed from the heat and dusted with flour, which flew in great puffs from the cook’s giant mixing bowls.
Then I saw him, standing in the doorway, looking for me.
“Madeline!” David yelled over the din. He pushed his way past the servants, dodging the gusts of flour, smiling. Snow still flecked his navy peacoat and frosted his hair, melting even as he came up beside me.
“I thought you weren’t coming until next week,” I said, struggling to keep the shock out of my voice. I kept my eyes on the apples I was slicing—now with a dangerously unsteady hand—willing all the conflicting thoughts at bay.
“I escaped early, before I could get pulled into another battle,” he said. He ran his fingers along the countertop, his eyes fixed on my knife. “So are you happy to see me?”
“I—”
“Never mind,” David interrupted. “There is someone I want you to meet.” He turned back to the doorway where a broad-shouldered man in a military uniform was politely squeezing past the servants, ducking underneath the copper pots that hung from the ceiling.
As soon as his head lifted, I knew him. Jude MacAvery. His face had been all over the wall screens and news bulletins, his voice reverberating in speakers across the city. His speeches replayed on countless tablets, including my own.
He stood before me, with his flint eyes and wavy hair, medals glinting in the swinging kitchen lights, and I felt the world tilt on its axis, like a ship unsteady on the sea. I had the strangest feeling of connection, of knowing Jude even though we were strangers.
I extended my hand. “Madeline Landry.”
Instead of shaking it, Jude leaned down and gallantly brushed my apple-stained hand with his lips. “Miss Landry, it is a pleasure to make your acquaintance. I’m Captain MacAvery.” He continued holding onto my hand.
“Dinner will be soon,” David said.
“Yes, of course,” Jude murmured. His gaze burned into mine.
David put a hand on Jude’s shoulder. “You’ll probably want to change out of your uniform.”
Jude smiled ruefully. “How right you are.” He bowed—not the shallow bow of an afternoon tea or fencing match, but the deep bow of the ballroom, of a dinner party introduction. “I’m looking forward to more thoroughly making your acquaintance, Miss Landry. Promise you’ll sit next to me at dinner. I can’t wait to meet the girl David has talked so much about.”
• • •
David and I left the kitchen as well. On the way upstairs, I turned to take stock of the person I’d thought ceaselessly of for the past six months. Pictures of him—ash-dusted and scratched, his blue eyes fierce in a face covered with mud—had circulated on the wall screens and tablets after the battle, but it was nothing like seeing him here, in person. His shoulders were slightly broader, his arms and back more muscular than they were before, but he was still more slender than strapping, and still wore his clothes with a vain and elegant fastidiousness. The white-blond hair was still silken and longish, and his gait as twitchy and energetic as before. But the quick grin that used to tug at David’s mouth was gone, buried under mountain dirt and the bodies of fallen friends.
“Would you like some tea?” I asked, trying to bury my desire to be with him under the pretense of being a good hostess.
“Sounds perfect,” he said.
I led him to the library, where we sat on a leather couch, close but not too close to the crackling fire. A maid brought in hot green tea, and I sipped it slowly. Jude had said that David talked about me, and I hoped that meant that he thought about me as often as I thought about him.
It was impossible to tell what he was thinking about at the moment, however, because the tea and fire animated him once more. He was back in one of his livelier moods, talking rapidly about the army and all the things he’d seen and done.
“The army is mostly dull, but the mountains are beautiful and the men are all good men, very brave. Lots of landless gentry boys like myself. And Jude—he is amazing, Madeline,” he said, and started pacing the length of the Persian rug. “You should see him fight. Hand to hand, shooting, fencing; he can do it all. Most of the brass in the army can barely get out of their chairs to pour another brandy, much less lead the men in drills and training exercises.”
“Is that why everybody in the army is so taken with him?”
“
And everyone out of the army,” David said.
I flushed. Did David care what I thought about Jude?
“Are you okay? You seem a little dazed.”
“I’m fine,” I replied quietly. “Just listening to you.”
David knelt in front of the couch, his eyes searching mine. “You aren’t mad at me, are you? For not answering your letter?”
“I hadn’t even thought about it,” I said, trying to sound confident, and set the hand-painted china back on the silver tray with a faint clink.
He smiled a small smile. “I see.”
The fire spat sparks. I wanted to touch him, speak with him, tell him how much I’d missed him. I wanted to tell him how much I’d thought about him and how many nights I’d lain awake whispering prayers to stars and supernovas that he was safe from the East, that the mountains wouldn’t fail to protect him.
I opened my mouth, but David spoke first, other thoughts on his mind. “How are they? I haven’t spoken with Jack since the day I was there with you.”
I bit my lip.
Jack. The Rootless. I would have to tell him that I didn’t know how they were, that I’d abandoned Jack in favor of ledgers and the promise of more love from my father.
No, it’s because you disagree with their alliance to the East. And you know you could help more with more money and resources. That’s all.
But I had also promised to find a way to force Cara to confess to the events of the night she was assaulted, and I hadn’t done that either.
“I wish Jack would’ve told me the East was planning an attack,” David said slowly, after I didn’t answer. He turned to look out of the window, where snow piled unevenly on the sill. “As soon as our scouts came back saying that there was movement on the other side of the mountain, I knew it had to be the East. And I knew it had to be tied to the Rootless. I realize that Jack didn’t know what fort I was at or even how to communicate with me safely . . . I just wish he could have warned me that something like this would happen.”
“Did it feel strange to fight them?” I asked hesitantly. “Knowing they were allied with Jack?”
His jaw tightened. “I didn’t care who they were allied with. All they want is to control us. They’re intent on that one goal. And,” he took a deep breath, “they are brutal.”
“They showed us pictures of battles at the academy, but to know it was actually happening, on our own soil, just a few hundred miles away, it was different. Scary.”
He twisted his mouth. “Try being there. It’s much scarier than watching it on a wall screen.” There was a darkness to his voice.
“I’m sorry. That was thoughtless of me to say.” I wanted to stop, I could tell David wanted me to stop, but a mordant curiosity pressed me forward. “Was it terrible?”
He stood and walked away from me. “It doesn’t matter.”
“It does to me.”
“Does it?” His voice was so heartbreakingly casual, as if he didn’t care what my answer was, that I couldn’t think of an answer that would preserve my dignity or his. The specter of Cara and our misbegotten kiss drifted between us.
I moved toward the door. “I should go.”
“What? Why?”
“I’m tired.”
“So rest in here with me. If it means that much to you, I’ll tell you all about what it’s like to watch the man next to you blown to bits and to see your friend’s hand shot off by an armor-piercing round and to have a mouth so full of char and dirt that you can’t taste food for weeks.”
“David . . .”
He sighed. “Sorry.”
“It’s completely understandable,” I told him. But I had no other words to offer—I’d never been in battle. I had nothing that could assuage his pain.
He threw himself into a nearby chair and stared at the fire. I moved toward him, not sure what I wanted to do—if I wanted to take his hand or embrace him or kiss him. Instead, I touched his hair, still damp from the melting snow, but still soft, still impossibly fine.
Without looking, he reached up and caught my hand. “You should get ready for dinner,” he said, but didn’t let go.
I nodded, which was pointless, because he couldn’t see me nod, and also because I didn’t want to leave. I wanted to stand next to this chair forever, listening to the fire pop and spit, feeling my hand inside David’s. But then he did let go.
“I’ll see you later,” I said.
He nodded, still gazing into the fireplace.
• • •
Later that night, I begged off dinner, claiming I had a headache from the heat of the kitchen. But it was really because I had seen the Westoff car pull into the drive as Elinor had helped me wash away the flour and apple scent from earlier. I thought of David and Cara together and I felt sick. I couldn’t go down and watch them together. Not yet. Instead, I buried myself in blankets, and, with Morgana warm at my feet, I traced the swirling patterns on my canopy until my breathing slowed and my thoughts with it.
As I drifted gently between sleep and wakefulness, half dreams crept over my eyelids. Kings and queens, knights and princesses. Morgause and King Arthur, locked in an incestuous embrace. Burning castles and knights choking on their own blood.
Most everyone went on a sleigh ride the next day, but I stayed at the Lodge, curled up in a window seat with a battered copy of Le Morte D’Arthur, rereading the part about the marriage of Guinevere to Arthur.
Jude knocked once on the open door, and then entered. “Hello, Miss Landry.”
I set the book down. “You can call me Madeline.”
He sat in a nearby chair. “When I heard you were not going on the sleigh ride, I thought I would decline, too. I missed you at dinner.”
“I didn’t feel well,” I said.
“Ah.”
We sat in silence for a moment.
He reached out to brush a lock of hair off my face. His fingers were calloused, but the touch felt as familiar as my own hand. I was surprised by the presumptuousness of the gesture, but it felt nice, too. Comforting.
“Would you like a tour of the Lodge?” I heard myself asking.
He smiled. “Very much.”
We walked through the halls and galleries, filled with hunting portraits and the glass-eyed heads of unlucky game. Despite the hard work of the servants, a slightly musty smell hung about the place, giving it the uneasy atmosphere of an abandoned attic. Jude said little as we strolled, but I filled the silence, mentioning ancestral names and dates, indicating a particularly prized vase or painting—all the while surprised at my own loquacity. Jude sincerely seemed to want to hear everything I had to say.
“Tell me about Landry Park,” he requested. “David has told me a little, but I would love to know more.”
I never needed urging to talk about my home. So I told him about the long, verdant lawns and English gardens, the constant spray of fountains and the secret mausoleum in the maze. The copper-domed observatory with the largest family-owned telescope in the country, and the sapphire glow when—once a year, on the anniversary of the day the Last War had ended—we turned off all the lights in and around the house and filled every corner and hung every tree with Cherenkov lanterns.
I noticed Jude’s eyes lingering on my lips as I spoke. The thought of it sent a not unpleasant shiver down my spine, but then I quickly felt guilty, like I had betrayed my feelings for David.
“Why didn’t David stay in as well?” I asked. We were in the front hall now, overlooked by a massive mounted bear. It reared on its hind legs, sharp claws outstretched.
Jude reached out and fingered the bear’s fur. “A certain young woman was very insistent that he come sleighing with her. I can’t recall her name at the moment.”
“Cara,” I whispered. “Cara Westoff.” Suddenly, the need to be alone pressed on me. Wrapped up in this happy hour with Jude, I’d forgotten to torture myself with images of Cara and David together—nestled under heavy furs, with warm kisses on cold fingers and shared mugs of cider.
<
br /> Jude looked at me with something like pity.
“How did you and David meet?” I asked hurriedly, wanting to change the subject.
“Ah,” he smiled. “He punched me in the jaw.”
I hadn’t expected that. “He did what?”
“The colonel in charge was one of those old boys who thought that if you came from a good family, you were in the army to make a good living and have a nice uniform. The dangerous parts—patrols, scouting—that was for the poor boys who had joined so they could eat and have a place to sleep.
“David was itching to go on a patrol and get his hands dirty. There had been some misbehaving going on and he had heard the old major saying to someone that, officer or not, the next boy to get himself into trouble was going on an extended patrol. So he waited until we were all in formation the next morning and hit the guy closest to him.” Jude sighed. “Me.”
“And then?”
“We went on the patrol together. I suppose the major thought I must have done something to provoke a bald attack like that, so to be on the safe side, he punished us both.” He paused, staring up at the bear’s glittering eyes. “We were out there for a week.”
Jude kept staring at the bear. I stared at him. He and David were so different externally—one dark and quiet, the other fair and wild—but there was something alike about them, a soldier-like quality of someone who knew their own strength, who would fight to the death to defend what they believed in.
Both our thoughts were interrupted by the jingling of bells and merry voices. The sleighs had come back. I watched out the window as David helped Cara out of the sleigh, fascinated by the band of skin that appeared between David’s slacks and his jacket as he reached into the sleigh bed.
“Is something wrong?” Jude asked, coming up next to me. “You look upset.”
My throat squeezed as I watched David help Cara tramp through the snow. “I just wish now I would have gone sleighing,” I said.
“If you don’t mind me asking,” he said carefully, “I was curious as to the nature of the relationship between you and David. It seems he’s attached to Miss Westoff, but I know appearances can be deceiving.”
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