“ C’mon, girl! Get yourself movin’ now! Them fires in the kitchen won’t make themselves. Cook’ll want ‘em nice and hot before she comes down.”
Jelena groaned out loud as she reluctantly left the bubble of warmth created by the flames and made a show of stomping to her chest to pull out her day clothes.
Claudia chuckled affectionately as she pulled on her robe and slippers. “Off to the necess’ry,” she announced, and slipped out of the room, closing the door softly behind her.
Jelena preferred to use the chamber pot early in the morning; she found it infinitely better than sitting over a malodorous hole while a freezing draft chilled her backside. After relieving herself, she washed her face and hands in an old ceramic wash basin, then donned a coarse cotton smock with a rust brown overdress of linen. Very fine embroidery decorated the dress at the neck and hem, but it was old and worn from hard use. It was not something an average servant girl would wear, but then, Jelena was not an average servant. She had acquired the dress as a castoff from her cousin, the Lady Thessalina.
Lastly, she pulled on gray cotton stockings and slipped a pair of sturdy leather sandals onto her feet, then turned her attention to her hair.
She gazed at herself in the small square mirror nailed to the wall next to the door and sighed. With a boar bristle brush in one hand and a wooden comb in the other, she attacked the tightly coiled, recalcitrant mass of mahogany curls that sprang from her head with a vengeance born of years of frustration. All her life, she had envied girls like Thessalina who had been blessed with shining waves of luxuriant hair that fell gracefully down their backs. Hers, by contrast, stood out from her head in a great bushy shock, refusing to be tamed by comb, pin, or hair grease.
During Jelena’s babyhood, Claudia had often tried in vain to cajole some semblance of order from her foster daughter’s chaotic tresses. “A gift from your mam,” Claudia would ruefully say as she tugged and twisted and smoothed. In the end, both child and nurse had grown weary of the struggle, and so Jelena’s hair had finally been allowed to do what it would with little interference, save an occasional trim.
On her eighteenth birthday, just two months past, Jelena had taken shears to her locks, and now had only a shoulder-length tangle to deal with. She would have cut it man-short, except then she would no longer have been able to hide her ears.
With a final tug, she finished the daily battle, securing the sides with a pair of ivory combs. These combs were her most cherished possessions, for they had belonged to her mother.
Jelena might have her mother’s hair, but the rest of her features bore the unmistakable stamp of her father’s elven blood, from the slightly upturned eyebrows and gently pointed ear tips, to the slender build of her body.
Because of the undeniable fact of her mixed human-elven parentage, she had lived her entire life on the margins of castle society, the barely tolerated bastard offspring of the duke’s late sister, Drucilla. The duke could not accept her as a full member of his family, but neither could he turn his back completely on his sister’s child, so the infant Jelena had been given at birth to Claudia so that she could be raised in the servants’ quarters.
Claudia’s face had been the loving visage floating above Jelena’s cradle; her voice crooned lullabies when sleep would not come. Claudia’s ample bosom had given shelter and comfort to her little girl, so hurt and tormented mercilessly by both castle children and adults alike. Claudia was Jelena’s heart-mother, the dearest person in her universe.
The older woman returned just as Jelena finished tying her work apron on over her dress. “What? Still here? You better get goin’ or Cook’ll be yellin’ for sure,” she said as she pulled her voluminous nightdress up over her head. She shook out the garment and carefully folded it before tucking it away in her chest.
“ I’m going, I’m going,” Jelena replied. She gave Claudia’s seamed cheek a quick peck, then dashed from the room and down the stairs to the door leading out into the yard. A blast of fresh cool air hit her as she pulled open the heavy oak door. A ray of golden, new morning sunlight dazzled her eyes. Somewhere, a cock crowed.
She hurried across the yard, still shrouded in cool shadows, heading toward the kitchen. She reached the door and paused just long enough to chirp a greeting to the small pride of castle felines that had congregated on the threshold. They responded by raising a raucous chorus of hungry meows, patting at her skirt hem with insistent paws and twining around her legs in an attempt to cajole from her their morning feeding. Jelena laughed at their antics, and bid them be patient. Just as she pushed through the half opened kitchen door, a great shout rang out.
“ Girrrl! Why aren’t them fires made yet?! I’ve got a feast to get on! I need m’ fires now!”
Cook, a great she-bear of a woman, had the disposition to match her formidable bulk. She stood now, hands on hips, glaring at Jelena from beside the main hearth.
“ I’m sorry, Cook. I was a little slow this morning. I’ll get right to it,” Jelena apologized in her most deferential tone of voice. Her hands shook a little as she got busy. When Cook’s temper flared, she was fierce indeed. Jelena had often heard rumors that she had once been a soldier in the Imperial Army. Jelena had never doubted those stories.
Cook harrumphed and stalked away. Jelena soon had the main hearth fire going and had just finished the lighting of the big oven when the rest of the kitchen staff began to straggle in. Save for a cursory acknowledgment of her presence, most of them didn’t speak to her; in fact, she had worked beside some of these people for years, and had barely exchanged a handful of civil words with any of them. Now that she was older and strong enough to defend herself, the more persistent bullies limited themselves to verbal abuse, or they simply ignored her. Jelena didn’t mind; she had grown used to the solitude imposed on her by the pervasive bigotry of the castle’s residents, and it no longer bothered her.
The kitchen soon bustled with activity. The breakfast needed making for the family and the staff, and the enormous task of preparing the festival feast had to be started. After Jelena had finished lighting the fires, Cook put her to work chopping vegetables.
The Festival of Sansa was one of the most important holidays on the Soldaran solar calendar, celebrated during the month of Dul when winter’s harsh grip on the land began to ease. The people offered prayers to San, Goddess of Spring, and asked for her blessing on the new growing season. It was also a traditional time for matchmaking; an important part of every Sansa celebration was the marriage market, to be hosted this year by the Duchy, thus insuring a much larger crowd than usual for the castle’s public feast.
In addition to the public meal, the duke would be holding a private feast for his neighbors. Several nobles from afar were also expected to attend. The most senior members of the kitchen staff were to prepare this very special meal, including a spectacular Sansa cake made entirely by Cook herself-her night’s masterpiece.
Jelena had no expectations that she would be allowed to celebrate the holiday with the family this year. She had never been invited before, despite the protestations of her cousin Magnes, so this year should be no different. This also no longer bothered her much. She was content to spend the holiday with Claudia, as she always had. The two of them would celebrate by eating their own little Sansa cake together.
Magnes was Duke Teodorus’s eldest child, future Duke of Amsara, and the only member of the Preseren clan who treated her like family. Magnes had been her only friend and playmate during their childhood. Three years her senior and by virtue of his station, he suffered no adverse consequences by befriending her. When they were together, his mantle of protection shielded her, and the worst of the bullying ceased.
Magnes had taught her to read and write, to ride a horse, and to shoot a bow, which she now did with great skill. Jelena loved him dearly, as much as she loved Claudia.
Break time arrived, and Jelena stopped work to get her breakfast along with the rest of the kitchen staff- oatmeal with dried apples, mild yellow cheese, and fresh bread, hot from the oven. Jelena collected her food, and with a mug of honey-sweetened tea to wash it all down, settled into a corner to eat and wait for Claudia.
The older woman soon appeared, and after getting her food and having a few words with some of the other staff, she waved to Jelena and sat at the kitchen’s long trestle table, which ran along the back wall. Jelena almost never sat at the table with the others unless Claudia sat with her. She rose from her corner and went to join her foster mother.
Since both of the duke’s children were now adults, Claudia’s services as a nurse were no longer needed by the family. She had therefore been put in charge of the castle’s laundry. She still acted as the castle midwife and informal healer for the staff, dispensing advice and herbal remedies. She also served as liaison between the staff and the duke if a serious health problem requiring the services of the district physician arose.
