Count On Me

by Abigail Graham

  “Why aren’t you fat?”

  I blink a few times. “What?”

  “Uncle Manfred says American girls are all fat. Do you know how to twerk?”

  “What has he been telling you?”

  For that matter, how the hell does she know what twerking is?

  “I don’t know how to twerk,” I say sharply.

  Actually I can’t. You have to have more, uh, padding to pull that off and that’s not me. Moving on.

  “The what do you know?”

  I sigh.

  What do I know? I’m no teacher. I have no idea where to start with this kid.

  “I know biology.”

  “What’s that?”

  “The study of life. Chemistry mostly, but…”

  “Animals?”

  “Yes,” I say.

  I was going to be a vet, so I have some knowledge of animals. I wanted to work with them all my life, actually. I like animals. I had a lot of pets until my mother passed away and my father forbade them.

  “I love animals!” Nina bellows, almost too loud.

  She bounces in her seat, excited.

  “Me too,” I say.

  Well, that’s a start. I still have no idea what to do with it.

  “Do you know how to catch animals? There’s a mouse that comes in here and I’ve been trying to feed him, but he won’t take my food.”

  I bite my lip.

  We need books, or something.

  “Let’s go see your dad.”

  I offer my hand, and she takes it without thinking. The servants are still in fear of her, but I lead her down to the yard, looking for her father.

  “He’s in the great hall,” Saska says when she passes by.

  I follow her with my eyes. Maybe I’m paranoid, but she seems to be around a lot, doesn’t she?

  We find him there, sitting in front of his throne. That’s all I can think of to call the massive, carved chair. He has stacks of papers and he’s making notes with a fountain pen, occasionally stopping to blot the ink.

  He looks up and his lip quivers into a smirk.

  “What do you mean to harry me with now?”

  I snort. “We need books.”

  “Adrian!” he calls.

  My heart sinks a little. I wanted him to help out personally, you know.

  “I’ll call on you later,” he says, “just as soon as I’ve finished this.”

  Adrian marches into the room.

  “We need books,” I tell him.

  “Then you’d best get to the library,” he says. “I’ll show you.”

  He turns and motions me forward. It strikes me as a little odd that there’s a library and Nina doesn’t know where it is, but it doesn’t totally surprise me, either.

  The library is on the third floor of the keep. When Adrian opens the heavy doors for us, I taste dust on the air. It’s dark inside, until he touches the candle he carries to another one that’s sat so long I’m surprised it lights. I take that one and go about lighting the rest. There are candelabras on the three huge reading tables. Each one is flanked by tall carved chairs. The walls are covered, floor to ceiling, with stout oak shelves loaded down with books. Half of them look too delicate to even touch. The air tastes of age, of paper and dry leather.

  Nina stands in the middle of the room and huffs, arms folded.

  “Adrian, will you help find some books?”

  He shrugs. “Certainly. What are we looking for?”

  “Animals,” I tell him.

  With no idea how this is place is organized, I start at random. The oldest books have no titles on the spines, so I just pass them by. Some hundred-year-old German treatise on equine anatomy or whatever isn’t going to do me much good; I need something a kid would read.

  As I feared, there’s no rhyme or reason to how these books are arranged. I find a paperback copy of Dune next to a volume so old I don’t dare pull it off the shelf to see what’s in it, and next to that is a long row of old paperback romance novels, bodice rippers with longhaired, barrel-chested models painted in lurid colors as a lady in a floofy dress swoons in their arms.

  I glance down at my own dress and cough.

  “What is it?” Adrian says.

  “Nothing,” I say.

  Nina, clearly bored, is banging a poker in the fireplace.

  The sound is oddly hollow, echoing too loudly. Pausing, I blink a few times and turn toward her. Why is it making that noise?

  It’s like she’s hitting something hollow.

  “Will this do?” Adrian says, approaching.

  He turns away so the dust won’t hit me when he blows it from the cover with a puff of breath. I take the children’s book, which is written in German (oh, great), and flip through it, puzzling out the meaning as best I can.

  It’ll work.

  “Nina!” I call.

  She drops the poker and it clangs loudly on the floor. Running toward us, she stops up short, little shoes skidding on the threadbare rug.

  Then it hits me.

  How often do you really look at the floor? I mean look at it.

  Spreading beneath my feet, woven into the carpet, is a battle scene like the tapestries that hang in the halls. I walk its length, studying it. The figures worked in the thread sweep together in a clash of battle, surrounding a duel between a woman in white and an antlered giant swinging a red sword.

  A shiver passes down my spine.

  Nina is already sitting down and reading.

  “We need to find her more books,” I say. “I think she’ll finish quickly.”

  Adrian gives me a quizzical look. I nod him to the other side of the library and fold my arms across my chest, hunching my shoulders.

  “We need to talk,” I whisper.

  He glances at his sister. “Oh?”

  “How much do you know about what goes on around here?”

  He stands straighter. “Father commanded me not to speak of this with you.”

  He knew I’d ask.

  “So what, I just stay in the dark?”

  Adrian sighs. “You’ll have to speak with him. He passed the same order to the entire castle. We are to treat you with respect but refuse to answer any questions.”

  I flinch back.

  “What? When was this?”

  Adrian looks uneasy.

  “I’d best not—”

  “Answer me,” I growl.

  “Two nights ago.”

  “Two? Two? Be specific. Not last night, but the night before?”

  “No, the night before that. I am sorry, I shouldn’t speak of this.”

  He slips away from me and toward his sister. He’s cheating; he knows I won’t attack him with questions while Nina is in earshot. I don’t know why but I feel a strong urge to hide what I’m thinking around the little girl.

  I end up lurking around the shelves while she reads. Adrian finds more books, and I start to feel like a fifth wheel. I don’t know why Conrad wants me spending so much time around his children.

  My attention comes back and back to that fireplace where Nina was banging the poker on the stones. I pick it up and give the stone a little tap.

  “I can send for some wood,” Adrian says.

  “No, that’s alright,” I murmur.

  Tap, tap. From the way the sound echoes, there’s something behind the stone floor of the fireplace. It’s hollow.

  While Nina reads to her brother, I circle the room, examining the books. Most of them are in other languages. I can puzzle out German if I try, but not an anatomy textbook. Italian is a little easier to read, but again, these books are very advanced.

  Some are handwritten. I feel like they should be older, more delicate, but they feel solid enough in my hands. The pages are bound and sewn tightly and the covers are in good shape, pigskin that feels like a football under my touch. I give up on trying to read a dusty book in Latin and stick it back on the shelf.

  There are plenty of new books, too. I draw one from the shelf and open it, cur
ious. A paperback titled Species of the Undead flops open in my hands. I snort when I check the copyright page. It has an ISBN and was printed in 1974. It’s not some eldritch tome. I flip randomly to the beginning of one of the chapters.

  Nosferatu, it reads, the un-dead. I start skimming the first paragraph then clap the book shut and almost shove it back in place. I do not need to read that right now.

  When I look up, Conrad has appeared in the library. Tucked under his right arm is a bundle of clothes. In his left hand, held by the cuffs, is a pair of tall but slim boots with high, stacked heels.

  “Father?” Adrian says.

  Nina looks up, too.

  “Take your sister back to her rooms,” Conrad orders.

  Adrian nods and neatly stacks the books on the library table in front of him before leading her out by the hand. Nina takes a long, puzzled look at the two of us.

  Conrad sets his bundle on my hands, and the boots on top of those.

  “Change,” he orders.

  My cheeks heat. “I hope you don’t mean right in front of you.”

  Conrad looks at me and my knees buckle. His gaze is like a physical force. I can feel his eyes peeling back the layers of my clothes, but then he looks me in the eye and I bite my lip, staring back.

  “I did not,” he says, amused. “Meet me in the yard when you’re dressed.”

  He stands there while I walk off, his eyes on my back. I take a last glance at him before heading back down to my own room.

  There, I lay out the clothes.

  Pants. He gave me pants. I practically have to hop into them, they’re so tight. The shirt is looser. I make sure to lace it to my neck, and tug the boots on. They give me almost five inches in height, and I wobble a bit until I get used to them.

  When I get to the yard, Conrad leads two horses from the stables by their reins, and hands one set to me. The leather thongs are attached to the bridle of a big, shaggy gray horse dappled with dark spots and white on the head.

  “This is Gunpowder. She’s an old mare, and well mannered.”

  For someone who wanted to be a vet, I have only the most vague idea about horses. I pet the animal on her neck and she doesn’t seem particularly interested in me.

  The count’s mount is an even larger black horse, and probably a stallion. I think. I look down a little.

  Yep. Stallion.

  “What are you doing?” Conrad asks.

  “I don’t know how to ride,” I admit.

  “You’ll learn. Here.”

  I yelp when Conrad takes me by the waist and lifts me right up off the ground, boosting me up. I put one foot in the stirrup and swing the other over, lying on Gunpowder’s back as I awkwardly shuffle into place and struggle to get my other boot where it belongs. The bars in the stirrups fit against the stacked heels of my boots.

  When his hands leave my hips I feel like I’ve lost something. Sitting on horseback, I finally look down on him, but he’s no less commanding looking up at me than he was looking down, and his gaze is almost reverent. I feel like a statue on a pedestal.

  I hold on to the reins and take a deep breath.

  Conrad mounts gracefully, without the slightest hint of trouble. It’s like he’s born to it. He stands up in the stirrups for a moment and I can’t help it, I stare at his ass in his very tight riding trousers. I snap my gaze away just as he glances at me and I can’t tell if he caught me looking or not. My blush feels like my skin betraying me.

  He takes his reins and nods toward the gate. A little flick of his reins and he starts forward. Gunpowder follows, without my input.

  We’re going riding.

  7

  The Glen

  Roxanne

  Gunpowder trundles forward, and my butt is already getting sore from the saddle. How do people actually enjoy this? I knew a few girls in passing who were obsessed with horses. So far, I don’t get it. I don’t feel any freedom or anything. In fact, as I look down into the ravine that serves as a dry moat for the castle, I find myself feeling nothing but raw terror.

  I snap my head up and close my eyes until the thump-thump of hooves on wood changes to the clop-clop of hooves on dirt. When I open them again I’m already outside, and have exited the castle for the first time.

  Conrad slows his mount.

  “Use your heels. Drive her forward a bit.”

  I tap my heels against Gunpowder’s flanks. She doesn’t seem to notice. I push them in a little harder and wince, hoping I’m not hurting her. The horse snorts and speeds up, until I’m side by side with Conrad.

  There’s a curve in the high road coming up and I don’t know how to turn. My heart goes up into my throat.

  I don’t have to, apparently. Gunpowder just takes the curve.

  “Your hands are shaking,” Conrad says, glancing at my white-knuckle grip on the reins.

  Damn right they’re shaking. The descent on the mountain road is worse than the ascent. Looking down, it looks way too steep. Of course it is; the road has to switchback this way and that. I feel it pulling me down, ready to tumble all the way to the bottom and hit every rock on the way down.

  Conrad moves his horse closer. I don’t even know how he does it; he doesn’t seem to do anything. The animal just responds. He’s so close now our legs almost touch. He reaches over and rests his hand on my shaking fists, his large enough to close around both of mine.

  My breathing steadies, and I glance over at him. He’s touching me. Touching me! Part of me wants to giggle like a schoolgirl. Even in the saddle he’s so much taller than I am; I have to look up past his beefy shoulder to look him in the eye.

  He takes his hand away and I feel like I’ve lost something, but my grip is steadier, not so absurdly tight, as though some courage passed through his hand into mine.

  “Thank you,” I say softly. “So, um, where are we going?”

  “Down,” he says.

  “You have to go down to go up around here,” I quip.

  Conrad quirks an eyebrow at me.

  It doesn’t take us long to reach level ground, but when I look back up at the castle it seems like it’s so high it should be swallowed by clouds. The sun is going down, and my nerves start to fray.

  “Is it safe to be out after dark?”

  “Nothing could be safer,” he says, smirking at me. “You have me to protect you.”

  My heart flutters, and I want to punch myself in the jaw for it. When I realize I’m grinning I force myself to stop and turn straight ahead with an indignant I-don’t-need-no-man cough, but that only seems to amuse him further.

  “Well, that’s all well and good, but who’s going to protect you?”

  “I can handle myself.”

  “I’m sure you can.”

  He gives me a sneer, half amusement and half annoyance. I grin back at him. His sneer melts into a smile.

  “This way,” he says, suddenly veering off.

  By a combination of pulling on Gunpowder’s reins and jabbing her with my heels, I turn to follow him. I wish he would give me an actual riding lesson instead of assuming I can just do it, even though I don’t seem to be having all that much trouble.

  I thought we were heading for the village. It rests sleepily in the distance, light pouring from windows as smoke curls from chimneys, like a pastoral painting.

  The sun isn’t all the way down yet, but the moon has peeked out. I can see the faintest sliver of it glowing along the edge, the blackness of the rest of it not so dark tonight. I have to kick in my heels to catch up to Conrad again as we ride side by side down a narrow path that slopes through the farm fields.

  “Where are we going?” I ask again.

  “Are all American women so impatient?”

  “American women like to know where their, uh, friend is taking them.”

  “You don’t trust me.”

  “No,” I say darkly, “I don’t. You lied to me.”

  It hurts to say it. Conrad wilts ever so slightly.

  “I didn’t lie. I
omitted. I thought it would be overwhelming to learn all of it at once.”

  I snort. “Well, next time, don’t worry about overwhelming me. Whatever you’re sitting on, I can handle it.”

  He chews on that for a time. “Perhaps. When we return I’ll find you better quarters. I expected Marta to choose something with a window.”

  I sigh. “Lovely, thank you.”

  “I wanted to apologize. I shouldn’t have humiliated you at sparring.”

  My butt still stings a little from that, and the saddle isn’t helping. I glare at him.

  “You apologize now, but you were having a grand old time before, weren’t you?”

  He laughs. “Fair enough. The look on your face was priceless.”

  “What is this place?” I demand, turning to him.

  “A cornfield.”

  I blink a few times, until I remember that in Europe all grain is called corn sometimes.

  “That’s not what I meant and you know it. The castle, this place. There’s something weird going on here, and that’s before we get to the magic ‘no trespassing’ stones.”

  He winces. “I dislike that word.”

  “What word?”

  “Magic,” he grunts. “There’s no magic here.”

  “Yeah, uh, I’m calling you out on that. The crazy stuff I’ve seen since I’ve been here and you want to tell me there’s no…”

  “It’s too innocent a word,” he says. “I had thought to take you to the border and show you why you cannot cross, but I had something else in mind. It’s not far now.”

  Ahead, there’s a stand of trees. Conrad spurs forward and I kick in to follow him, easier now. I hold the reins in one hand, resting the other on my hip.

  We pass under the trees, and it grows dark from the branches overhead. About half of the leaves are down, crunching beneath hooves. Conrad reins up and I pull on mine. Gunpowder stops obediently.

  He ties off his horse, while Gunpowder thumps the ground with her hoof. Conrad takes my reins and ties them to a tree trunk, then without asking grabs me just above the hips and lifts me right off the horse, holding me over his head as if I weigh nothing at all. My stomach shoots through my throat and my heart pounds until he sets me down. I’m grinning like an idiot.

  Stop that, Roxanne.