The Fecund's Melancholy Daughter - Brent Hayward [71]
The afternoon tryst with Octavia had taken an edge off the chatelaine and helped give her the fortitude to recover from the visit with her father, though his comments about a grandchild still stung. The castellan was hurtful, and the chatelaine was not sure why she insisted on treating him as anything but. Snippets of the conversation were impossible to ignore and these fragments disturbed her chances at more pleasant daydreams. Of course her pets were like children to her. Given the countless times and countless partners with which she’d had congress, she was quite positive that bearing children of her own was not possible. Her father should know that and show more sensitivity, especially on the day that one of her lovely pets had been stolen.
Maybe she and the kholic could raise a child together?
The chatelaine shook her head, almost laughing aloud; these thoughts were ridiculous. She lay down on her bed. Now that she had taken measures to replace the cherub—having sent Octavia in her stead—she found herself reconsidering her decision to grant the palatinate access to the entire palace. What were the chances that she would get robbed again? Did she really want Jesthe—and Nowy Solum, for that matter—to return to the grip of authority it had once been crushed in?
She sighed, imagining guards outside her room at night, scowling with disapproval while she lay in bed, spooning with the kholic.
Presently, the chatelaine heard the sounds of logs being added to her fireplace and the business of someone trying to light them; she realized she had dozed off. She sat up.
The women by the fireplace were not paying her the least attention.
“Thank you,” said the chatelaine, brushing herself off. She had spoken loudly and promptly to preempt any comments that might be made about her, if the women had not seen her asleep on the bed. They turned to watch her now before returning to their tasks. The chatelaine considered leaving her chambers so the servants would not see that she really had nothing to do, no tasks at this time of day, but instead she got up and lingered over by her cages, feeding her remaining pets pieces of dried bread from a basket she kept filled for such occasions.
She wondered how Octavia’s second encounter with the fecund had played out. By now, the girl had surely made her way from the kitchens to feed the creature prerequisite scraps. Each day Octavia would need to repeat this: the fecund, when pregnant, ate voraciously.
Each day, the monster would change.
Suddenly overcome by a mad urge to see her kholic lover again—who might possibly be the only person in existence ever to understand the chatelaine, she said, “You there, women by the fires.”
Both staff turned once more.
“I’m afraid I have forgotten your names.”
“Georgia,” said one.
“Thea,” said the other.
“Fine. Please fetch Lorichus when you are done, Georgia and, er, Thea, was it? I wish to get dressed.”
“Yes.”
The fire stoked, beginning to crackle, the two servants left. Shortly after, Lorichus arrived. The chatelaine commanded Lorichus to fetch her blue surcoat, the one with the yellow fur lining, and to find her green leggings. She believed this outfit to be her most flattering. Lorichus did as she was told and then helped the chatelaine get dressed, pulling on the hose while the chatelaine sat on the edge of the bed, attaching the garters, getting her feet into the slippers. Finally the servant arranged the chatelaine’s long hair so it was piled precariously atop her head.
“A special visitor?”
She searched the woman’s round red face for traces of irony or sarcasm but Lorichus, who was fussing with the pins in her hair, seemed sincere enough. “Of course, I have the quotidian assembly with Erricus, but for now I am going out.”
Perhaps recalling a previous outing, one that had ended rather unpleasantly, Lorichus paused, eyebrow lifted. “Outside of Jesthe?”
“No, no,” the chatelaine replied. Her answer evidently caused the servant more confusion, though the woman asked nothing further.
At last satisfied with