Page 29 of A Dark and Stormy Knight (A Knight’s Tale #3)
C ara made her way back into the great hall, which was more crowded than before.
She wasn’t even sure where to start.
People stood in groups, trying to out talk each other, and it looked like alcohol flowed freely.
She made her way around the edge of the crowd, and spotted Gillian talking to two other ladies.
Gillian noticed her weaving her way toward them, and was quick to raise a hand. “Over here!”
Cara joined them, listening to the conversation and doing her best to join in. They were talking about the wedding tomorrow, the clothes, and complementing Cara on her skill with hair and makeup.
Gillian finally excused them both, and pushed her in the opposite direction.
“Any news?” Gillian asked in a quiet voice as they slowly made their way out of the great hall.
“No, you?”
Gillian shook her head. “I’m so sorry about all of this. What’s the plan?”
“Still the same. Everyone thinks I should network with the queen, get her to talk to the king, and get him to reinstate the joust I interrupted.”
Gillian shot her a worried look and didn’t speak until they made their way out of the hall. She dragged her outside, so they could have a little privacy. “She’s really happy with your ability to do hair and makeup. She’s been talking about it while you’ve been gone. I guess we could join everyone around the queen, but it’s so loud, I don’t see how it’ll make a difference. I think we need to get her alone somehow.”
Bitterness tightened Cara’s lips. She just felt so helpless.
Gillian placed a hand on her shoulder. “Kellen is out talking to some of the other men, and I know he’ll do what he can to help. But with the king, these things take time and finesse.”
Cara nodded. “I wish I had some facial cream or beauty mask gel, or something. Actresses love to have alone time with me, if they think it’ll improve their skin, and give them an edge. I might be able to talk the queen into beauty treatments if I had anything to work with.”
Gillian’s face brightened. “That’s a really good idea. What could we use?”
They were walking side-by-side, as much as possible with the crowd spilling outside, and Cara couldn’t help that her gaze was drawn toward the dungeon.
Not wanting to dwell on it, she looked around for plants, but there was nothing in the courtyard, just some stray grass grown up around some of the buildings. “If we were in a desert, we could use the aloe vera plant, or an avocado, and maybe even some lemon juice.”
Gillian shook her head. “There’s nothing like that around here. What about fruits and vegetables? My mother-in-law has been showing me some of the plants that have medicinal benefits indigenous to England. Kellen’s stepmom, actually. Besides that, I brought a book about it, as well.”
She shot Cara a quick glance. “It’s at Marshall Keep, however.”
“Of course, it is.”
“They may have some things in the garden I’ll recognize if we go take a look.”
Gillian waved down the servants walking by. “Which way to the gardens?”
The young lad, about fourteen or so, showed them the way, and they headed around some outbuildings, and found a massive garden on the other side. It was bordered by tents, and Gillian quickly scooped up a bucket that was off to one side.
Unfortunately, it looked as if the garden had been recently harvested, and while there were some vegetables still growing, there was not much in the way of anything they could use as a beauty treatment.
“This looks like lavender,” Cara said, plucking up some of the spiked grass tipped with purple flowers. She sniffed some, definitely lavender, and put the grass in the bucket and plucked some more.
“Maybe we could find something in the kitchen,” Gillian said.
Cara considered products that were put into beauty masks. “What about honey? Oil? Something like that?”
As she glanced across the field, she saw a patch that had more greenery than the others and headed that way. “Strawberries! We could mash them and use them as antioxidants.” As Cara plucked some juicy berries she said, “What about red wine, or clay?” starting to feel a bit of hope and excitement. She could work with this.
Gillian shook her head. “We could probably find clay, but if we get caught digging up dirt to put on the queen’s face, we might be drawn and quartered.”
Cara laughed, glad to have Gillian at her side, so she wasn’t alone in all of this.
“How about oats?” Gillian looked like she was getting caught up in it too. “There are plenty of oats to be had.”
Cara nodded, “Yes! That could work out really well.”
“Oak trees are common here. Could we use acorns?”
“Too hard to grind, and they might end up scratchy on the face,” Cara looked around, hoping for something more.
Gillian took the bucket and placed a cucumber inside, hauling it off as she looked at some vegetables a few rows away.
“Lady Marshall? Do you and your companion wish for any help?”
Two young men wandered over to see what they were doing. One, tall and sandy-haired, the other shorter with dark hair, both looking amused and interested.
Cara waved a hand. “Sorry boys, were gathering ingredients for a secret recipe.”
Gillian laughed at that. “It’s for making women look younger,” she said archly.
“Oh. Really?” The bolder one said, looking them both over. “You two beauties need no such help.”
“I’m fifty-five years old,” Cara said with a straight face.
They both glanced at her, brows rising, as if she was serious, and she laughed.
They caught the joke, and both grinned broadly.
“Anyway, if we told you our secret recipe, we’d have to kill you.”
The two men were still laughing at that when a much larger man came up behind them, said, “Off with you,” and he cuffed the slower man for good measure.
Without a backward glance, they took off, leaving only Kellen, hands on hips, glowering at the two of them. He looked at the bucket in Gillian’s hand, and arched a brow. “May I ask what the two of you are doing?”
Gillian gave a nonchalant shrug. “The things we women do for beauty, you have no idea.”
He looked at the bucket, incredulous. “I don’t want you eating any of that, you’ve the babe to think of.”
Gillian laughed while Cara tried not to, but oh, my gosh, his expression!
Gillian shook her head. “Don’t worry, we’re not eating it, we’re putting it on our faces.”
He gave her another look that asked, are you serious right now? And they couldn’t help it, both girls laughed again.
Head tilted, brow furrowed, Kellen looked at his wife intently, and it hit Cara that the big guy was really, hand to heart, sweet on her friend.
It was cute.
It had her missing Wallace.
As if she read her mind, Gillian glanced at Cara and asked Kellen in a more subdued tone, “Any word yet?”
He shook his head. “The king is unmoved.”
Cara’s mood darkened. “What happens if the king can’t be dissuaded?”
From his expression, and the shake of his head, it would be nothing good.
“All right, Kellen, that’s enough, we’re busy now.”
His brow rose. “I am to leave?”
Gillian nodded. “Yes, I’ll see you later.”
With a fulminating look at both of them, her husband stomped off, muttering about the ‘thankless task of bearing bad news.’
Gillian hugged Cara. “Don’t worry, we’ll figure this out.”
She looked at their dismal bucket of plants. “How? Wallace has nothing to offer the king. Everything has already been taken from him. The king could just let him rot and be done with it, no skin off his nose.”
Cara considered her ideas to bust him loose once again. She ought to just hire some mercenaries, but with what? She didn’t even have her necklace anymore.
“I want you to know that you can live with me if anything happens, you’re not to worry about that.”
Her gloom and doom didn’t lift. “And Kellen would be okay with that, would he?”
“If he’s not, then he can dang well cough up my ring, can’t he?”
Cara looked down at her little bucket of fruit and vegetables and remembered Kellen’s incredulous face, and her heart sank again.
If this was what their entire plan consisted of, was Wallace already as good as dead?