The queen hummed in appreciation. Bee wisdom was limited.
“I may trade some of your honey for hedge roots so you’ll have your own fortress. Blackthorn, maybe, they’ll provide lovely flowers in spring and we can make gin from the fruit. I think we’ll be happy here.” She added the last part for herself.
It was hard to be completely happy when others suffered, but at least now that she was free, she could plan. While she’d been trapped, she had only been able to suffer along with everyone else.
She wished she had someone more knowledgeable to plan with. Girls’ boarding schools did not teach law.
With his treasure-promising artifact in his pocket, Gerard rode the well-worn paths of his estate. The cultivated fields were easily studied. He’d already been told it had been a poor year for apples but a good year for sheep.
The medallion didn’t acknowledge field or orchard.
Wystan’s boundaries did not reach the Roman wall in the south. That seemed a more likely place to find soldiers’ loot then a rocky fell.
“I need a little more direction than just Wystan,” Gerard complained as he rode to the edge of the grain field and gazed glumly upon the rolling hills where the sheep fed.
Treasure is not always buried, the spirit in his head finally deigned to reply—with his usual world-weary cynicism.
“So you don’t know where it is!” Disgusted, mostly at himself, he turned his mount toward home. The sun was setting, and he was half starved. “I bet you were simply a common foot soldier guarding the wall and thought this old keep looked wealthy and welcoming.”
You would lose.
Gerard imagined he heard amusement in the spirit’s voice. Sometimes, he thought he imagined it all. He’d like proof that his gift was useful and not insane.
Not insane, the spirit voice said wearily. Stulti et caeca.
“Blind and stupid, thanks for that.” Gerard had plenty of proof that he wasn’t stupid. He’d studied law to better understand the exalted position he’d one day inherit. He’d spent his youthful summers learning agriculture from his father’s estate agents. He could read contracts and calculate profits better than most solicitors—which made him his father’s unpaid errand boy.
Stupid, the voice muttered.
“I can shove you in a box,” Gerard muttered back.
A dog’s barking and a woman’s shout had him spurring his mount into a gallop, heading downhill at a breakneck pace. The action felt good. The reason for it—was probably stupid. Dogs barked. Women yelled.
But he couldn’t erase the image of the slender beekeeper weeping over a fallen hive. Women should be safe at Wystan.
Galloping into the courtyard, Gerard recognized the screams as fury. The damned beast was leaping on the beekeeper, attempting to reach the pails she held above her head. The dog probably weighed more than she did.
Women poured from the house, armed with their weapons of choice—knitting needles, scissors, rolling pins—none of which would hold off a determined animal. Sliding his stick from his saddle pack, Gerard spurred his horse into the fray.
The woman with the pails sensibly froze as he galloped close, swinging the stick at the animal’s haunches. The dog yelped and stood down long enough for Gerard to place his horse between the dog and the beekeeper.
Sending him an uninterpretable look, she scurried off to safety with her pails of honey. Her short gray skirt swayed, revealing trousers and boots and not ankles.
Gerard dismounted and regarded the stupid beast deprived of his treat. He almost sympathized. The beekeeper was a tempting morsel. “C’mon, hound, you’re mine now.”
He grabbed its collar and dragged the reluctant animal toward the stable. More mastiff than hound, Gerard concluded, wrestling with the animal. A stable lad ran out to take the reins of his gelding so he could employ both hands.
“Pen this beast up until I find a chain,” he told the next lad emerging from the stable. “He lacks proper training.”
Gerard had trained horses. He could probably train the dog. He would just have to stay longer than he’d anticipated.
“Miss Mike is good with animals,” the stable boy suggested.
Of course she was. An orphaned cousin, Mary Michaela hadn’t taken well to society—probably because she preferred women to men. She’d brought her maid to Wystan a decade ago and the two had settled in happily. Where would they go if he closed the castle?
“Have her train this creature to behave,” Gerard ordered, as if the lad wouldn’t have done so on his own. He wasn’t so stupid as to know when he wasn’t needed.
Blind, his spirit voice added.
Once in his rooms, Gerard threw the medallion on his desk. He’d add it to the other useless artifacts upstairs later. He stripped off his confining coat, and in waistcoat and leather riding breeches, sat down at his desk.
He’d finish going over the books in the morning, consult with Avery in the afternoon, and be gone the next day. Maybe he could sell his artifacts to a collector and stretch his income another year. He wasn’t stupidly searching for imaginary treasure any longer.
The bell rang before he could even open a book. “Damn it all to perdition.” Usually, his tenants left him alone unless it was important. He took the stairs down again.
A footman waited. “We have guests, my lord. The ladies request your presence at dinner.”
“Do they now? I don’t suppose they told you who the guests are?”
The footman held out a card. Rainford.
“Did he bring a retinue with him?” Gerard asked in resignation. A duke’s heir never traveled alone.
“Several gentlemen and their servants, my lord. They’re stabling the horses now.” The footman stood at attention like a good soldier.
“And the ladies are in more of a lather than the horses, I imagine. Very well. I’ll dress and be there shortly.”
The footman relaxed in relief and ran off to deliver his happy news.
What the hell was Rainford doing here? Wasn’t he supposed to be wooing a bride? It wasn’t as if this desolate outpost was on the path to anywhere, so the marquess had to be
