Falcon's Crown: Kidnapped - Chapter Two

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The saga continues:

Chapter Two: Kitchen Wench. 

I turned to watch Marta ride away, but she was already hidden from sight by the grassy hillocks that characterize that area. We rode on, passing through the village that had grown up around the castle; small shops, smaller dwellings, a stream that rushed down the slope, providing fresh water for those who made this their home. And we passed grubby, boldly-curious children. As we passed, people bowed or fell into an unpracticed curtsey. They certainly were not bowing to me. I stuffed all these observations into a mental cabinet. They were pieces of a puzzle. 

A drawbridge allowed us to pass over a defensive ditch, under the portcullis and through the gatehouse into the outer courtyard. Robert pulled me off my pony. Someone took the reins. A bulky man with a belly made big by ale but whose arms were thick with muscle greeted Robert. With mock surprise, he said, “And what is this?” He wrinkled his nose. I felt insulted rather than teased. I’m not a ‘this.’ 

“This is the Princess Falcon, Baroness of Fens and Forest,” Robert said. 

“Pardon my saying so, your Highness, but whatever she may be, she stinks.” I did stink. I was covered with mud and goo of questionable origin. One should not find insult in truth, no matter how ill put. 

Robert led me around the castle to a pair of large, arching doors, wide open and funneling heat to the outside. I was certain this led to the King’s torture chamber. Robert’s gentle shove moved me forward. It wasn’t a torture chamber. Not even close. It was the castle kitchen, immense, hot, with three large bread ovens and seven fire pits where oxen and deer turned on spits. “Sit,” he said, and I sat on a rough-hewn bench while he whispered to a tall, stout woman. Her white hair was streaked with the golden of the Old Race. I relaxed some; she at least was one of my own kind. 

It seemed a grand time to escape. I could simply walk out the doors and attach myself to the traffic exiting the courtyard. That idea went up in smoke when Fitzroi sat across from me. He winked insolently, shaking his head as if he knew what I was thinking. I rested my head on my hand and pretended he wasn’t there. One of the kitchen wenches slid a bowl of venison stew in front of me. I thanked her, which seemed to surprise her. I was half starved and savored every bite. When I finished she brought another. 

“I’m Mikel,” she said.  

She was much taller than I am, but then everyone is. At eleven I was the size of an eight or nine-year-old. She had a pleasant smile. I smiled back. 

“I’m Tabitha. This is delicious.”

 “Can I touch that?”

 “Touch what?” I was a bit doubtful about touching of any sort. 

“Your mark,” she said. “Here is mine.” She held out her wrist. 

When we’re eight years old, the children of the old nobility are given their mark, an ancient practice. Hers was a Falcon perched on a long sword, the mark of a junior branch of the old Royal Family. I let her touch mine. Mine is the Falcon descending, talons outstretched, a crown above, a sword below. The Falcon King’s arms. 

She touched it gingerly, as if doing so would hurt me or rub it off. 

“Help me escape,” I whispered. 

“How?” she asked. 

I shrugged. Fitzroi lounged against the outer door talking to a serving girl. He was distracted, but he would surely see me if I tried to walk out. There was the door into the Great Hall. Servants came and went, but no one would notice me. Where I would go after passing through it was an uncertainty. But it was a chance ... . My plans ended when one of the kitchen women shooed Mikel off to her duties.

 “And you?” She was accusatory. “Hasn’t anyone given you work to do?” 

I shook my head. After all it had come down to this. They intended to subject the Falcon ‘pretender’ to more injury – the insult of living out her days as a kitchen slave.

 She pointed to baskets of radishes piled next to a long trough of dirty water. “Wash those,” she said.

 I obliged. I may be Baroness of Fens and Forest, but at home I helped in the kitchen. There was just Old Aunt and myself and whatever help the Fens chieftains sent.

 Six radish bunches into this chore and I was soaking wet and no longer under anyone’s watchful eye. I shook the water off my hands, finding a dirty rag on which to wipe them. Picking up a basket, I headed for the Great Hall. If I couldn’t find an easy out, I’d hide until sunset and attach myself to a merchant’s wagon. The guards would wave us through the main gate, and I’d be well on my way home by dawn.

 I resisted breaking into a run. It was a certain way to attract attention. Two steps from the door, I turned around to see if anyone watched and backed into someone. She was tall, dressed in a white, hooded robe that fell to her ankles. The contact smeared dirt across that immaculate whiteness. I turned. Looked up. And Robert asked, “What, exactly, are you doing?” 

“I was washing radishes,” I said, hoping to avoid the more obvious, “I’m escaping.” 

The Lady’s face seemed to hold a faint smile. That was hopeful. 

“Who told you to wash ...” Robert never finished his sentence. 

“It would have been better if you had washed yourself,” the woman said. 

 “Yes, I’m filthy dirty,” I said. “It’s his fault.” I pointed at Robert. “I was chasing Old Aunt’s pig. She raises one for market each year. We sell them because we are a poor fief. And it got away, and I was chasing it and fell in mud and goo, and he kidnapped me ...” Words flooded out until they failed me.

 She nodded. “Please sit,” she said. And I found a place on a bench.

 Except for activity at the bread ovens, the kitchen commotion stopped. Some of the women curtsied. Some gaped. A few were fearful. Mikel and the head cook, obviously her mother, approached and managed a creditable curtsy.

 Before the cook could speak, The Lady asked, “Has she been fed? She looks as if she hasn’t eaten in a week.”

 Mikel spoke: “Yes, Your Majesty. Two large bowls of venison stew and a buttered, hard roll.”

 “I was hungry,” I said, feeling the need to apologize. 

So, this was the queen. I’d never seen her before. She was tall, even compared to the kitchen women. And yellow-haired. She could be taken for someone of the Old Race, certainly not someone from an Invader family. 

“I am, if you haven’t guessed, Queen Tyra. I was born princess of the Small Isles and Coast. That makes us relatives – distantly. Perhaps my son should have been ...” – She sought a word – “less insistent. But would you have come?” 

I shook my head emphatically. “No! And I want to go home.” 

“Let me explain why you’re here, and then we’ll talk about that.” 

And so we did. I was there by the King’s orders. I would be safer there than in the Fens. They would honor me and watch out for my welfare. I would have clothes and attendants and finery. I was in danger in the Fens. There were bandits there, and the kingdom was in turmoil. I was important, connected in some way. (The Outlawed and Bandits, many unfairly treated, exiled nobles, made their home in the Forest. But most were loyal to my family, which at this point meant loyal to me. But I didn’t explain this.) I was an orphan. The King could provide protection here, she said. The King would explain more thoroughly when he returned. 

I resisted retorting that I was an orphan because the King had ordered my parents murdered. It was all very doubtful. I said so. I wasn’t very tactful; I was used to rough and tumble play with children of the fens and forest. If one of them called me a name, I called them one more pointed.

 “Be patient,” Queen Tyra said. “Listen to His Majesty when he comes. Give us time, say a year? Then the choice to stay or go is up to you.”

 I shook my head. 

“Six months then.” 

I really had no choice. If I stayed or returned home depended on people I did not trust. People who, even after three hundred years in our land, acted like occupiers instead of native born. 

“Six months,” I said. “But if you break your word to me, even in a small matter, I will leave.” 

“Agreed,” she said, extending her hand palm up as if she were a merchant with whom I struck a bargain. I spit into my palm and slapped hers. Mikel laughed and then blushed. 

“First things first,” Tyra said. “You need ladies in waiting and you need a really good bath.” 

Friends among the fens and forest children I had aplenty, but I’d never had a lady attendant of any sort. 

“Can Mikel be it?”

 Mikel did a little hop – excitement I suppose, though I couldn’t see that being my attendant was at all thrilling. The queen nodded. “Mikel it is for a start. ... Now both of you off to the baths. ... Not the common baths. The Royal and Noble Baths. ... Robert, find Baron Threadneedle. They’ll need clothing.”