Alys came inside, a basket of laundry in her hands. Mistress Helmsley was in the kitchen alone, which was unusual at this hour, nursing a cup of ale, her swollen feet up on a stool.
“I don’t need ye anymore today, Alys,” she said. “Fold and put away the linens and ye may go.”
“I don’t have to serve at table?” Alys asked, vastly relieved. Since the incident of the spilled wine, she’d dreaded having to serve at supper, terrified that she’d once again do something to anger Lady Marjorie and unwittingly come between husband and wife.
“The mistress took some broth in her room, and his lordship doesn’t wish to dine.”
“He’s back?” Alys asked, embarrassed by the hopeful note in her voice.
“About an hour since.”
Lord Lockwood had been away for nearly a fortnight. Some said he’d gone to Chesterfield, while others thought he was in Bolsover, working out a possible plan of escape should the Scots come this far south. The king’s army had been defeated, the Scots already in Northumberland and marching on. Others thought Lord Lockwood might have gone to York to meet with his brother John. Master Robson was sure to know, but Alys wasn’t about to ask.
“And Mistress Ashcombe?” Alys asked, eager to change the subject.
“She took to her bed. She seems to have caught a chill, the poor woman,” Mistress Helmsley said.
Alys nodded. She felt sorry for the older woman, who was much kinder than her daughter, but Alys was glad to be finished for the day. She was exhausted, and with Millie off to nurse her ailing mother in Ashopton, they were a pair of hands short. Having put away the linens, Alys climbed the steep stairs to the servants’ rooms and entered the room she shared with Millie. She set her candle on the stool between the two beds and sat down heavily, jumping up with a shriek as soon as her backside touched the blanket. There was something in her bed.
Carefully peeling away the woolen blanket, Alys realized that it wasn’t some animal as she’d first suspected. It was a muslin-wrapped parcel tied with string. She untied the string and unwrapped the cloth, taking out a sapphire-blue cloak lined with fur. The fur was gray and felt soft and supple beneath her hand. She’d never seen anything so fine. Not even Lady Marjorie had a cloak this magnificent, since she favored dark, serviceable garments. Alys ran her fingers along the fur. She wasn’t sure what it was. Maybe vair or maybe even rabbit. She was sorely tempted to try it on but would only feel worse for not being able to keep it.
Alys folded the cloak and wrapped it in the muslin before going back downstairs. With both mother and daughter in their rooms, she wasn’t too worried about being seen. She approached the study, hoping to see a sliver of light beneath the door, but the room was in darkness. She tried the library. Jeremy and Master Robson sometimes stayed up after supper, enjoying their brandy. But the library was empty, the hearth cold. Jeremy must have gone up to his room.
Alys sighed deeply. She had no wish to visit Jeremy in his bedchamber, but what choice did she have? She could hardly wait until morning and confront him then, when anyone might overhear. Having made up her mind, she headed for the stairs, her breath coming in gasps as she approached the door. Knocking softly, she waited to be admitted, her heart galloping with anxiety.
“Come,” Jeremy called out.
Alys pushed open the door and was gratified by the smile that lit up his face.
“Alys,” he said, her name floating on his breath like an exhalation of joy.
“I can’t accept this,” she blurted out, shoving the parcel into his hands.
“Don’t you like it?” he asked, his disappointment obvious.
“It’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen, but to wear this would be to invite all sorts of speculation, especially from Lady Marjorie and Mistress Ashcombe.”
Jeremy’s face fell as the truth of her words made him recognize the magnitude of his miscalculation. “I’m sorry. I should have thought. I so wanted to give you something beautiful, something that would take your breath away.”
“It did,” Alys confessed.
Jeremy set the parcel aside and took her gently by the shoulders, his face shadowed since his wide shoulders blocked the light from the single candle by the bed. “Alys, I have tried and tried to put you from my mind, but you are the first person I think of when I wake and the last person in my thoughts before I fall asleep. When there’s something on my mind, I want to talk it through with you. I want to look after you and make you happy. I want to love you.” His voice was hoarse with longing, his gaze desperate.
“Ye have a wife,” Alys whispered, taking a step back to put some distance between them.
“Yes,” he replied, all his disappointment right there in that one word. “Alys, Lady Marjorie is my wife and will continue to be. I can’t change that, and I completely understand if you want to have nothing to do with me. I will never make things uncomfortable for you if you choose to keep your distance.”
“Choose?” Alys asked, her breath coming fast now. “What choice do I have? Ye are master here; ye can do what ye wish, but my life is not as simple. I can either remain a servant, working from dawn till well past dusk, or marry a man of my brother’s choosing, a man I will almost certainly not love but have to obey until my dying day. I’m not yet twenty, but I feel like my life is over before it has begun. I may as well be dead for
