Page 97

Wark Castle

“W here is everyone, Hilde?”

The German nurse was picking up a few haphazardly thrown articles of clothing from the floor of Adelaide’s bower at Wark Castle.

The lavish chamber, with the old blood smears on the bed curtains, and the stink of the apple bark wrapped around horse dung that Adelaide burned constantly.

An apothecary from the village of Kyloe had told her that the smell would ward off evil spirits and ensure that only the good would remain, so Adelaide had taken that to mean it would keep Thomas in good spirits, good enough to like her and want to marry her.

But, so far, it hadn’t worked. The more it didn’t work, the more she burned it.

All it did was stink up the entire keep and drive Thomas away.

“Sir Thomas escorted his parents home, my lady,” the nurse said steadily. “He told you this.”

Irritated, Adelaide turned to scowl at the woman. Spread out over her bed, she was restless and bored, and had been since Thomas had left the day before.

“I know that, you insipid sow,” she snapped. “But why is he gone so long? And why did he not invite me to go?”

Hilde, the nurse from a small village in Saxony that had been sacked by the Northmen, didn’t want to have this conversation with her again, mostly because the last time they’d had it, Adelaide had resorted to throwing a cup at her head, which had hit her.

She still had the welt. But that wasn’t unusual with Adelaide, who treated her servants abominably.

Even those who had raised her since birth.

The manners and propriety Hilde had tried to instill in the young girl, Edmund de Vauden and his spoiled tactics had bled right out of her.

“He did not invite you to go because of the reivers that killed your father,” Hilde said as she put the clothing away in the wardrobe. “Sir Thomas had enough to worry over with escorting his parents safely home. There was no need for you to be exposed to such danger.”

That actually made some sense to Adelaide, who sat up on her bed. “Do you really think so?”

“I do.”

She thought on that a moment. “But he is so nasty to me at times,” she said, muttering.

“Nasty and cruel. Don’t you think so? And he seems to have no respect for my claims of being a tempestarii .

Do you think I should try something more to convince him that we are meant for each other?

It has been six months and trying to convince him that I control the weather has not worked. ”

Hilde didn’t answer right away, mostly because she knew Adelaide didn’t want to hear what she had to say. Adelaide wanted people to confirm her own wants and opinions, not give her their own.

“I think that if you are kind to him, he will be kind in return,” Hilde said steadily. “Mayhap, you should stop trying to convince him you are a storm witch. Clearly, he does not care. Mayhap, you should simply be kind and obedient.”

As she knew, Adelaide didn’t like that answer. She frowned. “Is that why has he not returned?” she said. “Because I am not kind and obedient?”

“You saw how he responded to Lady Bowlin, who was kind to everyone.”

That was definitely not something Adelaide wanted to hear or be reminded of. “A Beguine,” she scoffed. “A mindless chit whose only desire in life is to tend foundlings. What a bore. Is that why Thomas has not returned to Wark? Because I am not like Lady Bowlin and he does not wish to return to me?”

Hilde was careful in her reply. She was still in the wardrobe, looking at the very expensive pieces of clothing, some of which needed mending, and trying hard not to enrage her young charge with the conversation.

But it was a difficult task.

“He probably remained at Castle Questing to see his family for a day or two,” she said. “You must not worry, my lady. He will return soon enough.”

Adelaide sat on her bed, pondering the situation.

Truth be told, she’d been worrying about all of this since the de Wolfes had departed yesterday.

It had been an abrupt departure and a cold one.

Lord and Lady de Wolfe didn’t even bid her a farewell.

Standing up, Adelaide went over to the lancet windows that overlooked the river beyond the walls.

“They left rather quickly,” she said thoughtfully.

“Don’t you think they left rather quickly?

I wonder why. I thought Lord and Lady de Wolfe were planning on remaining until the wedding.

And my father… he is still in the vault.

Why would Thomas go off and leave my father in the vault and not take him home, as I wished? ”

Hilde pulled out a shift that needed mending in the hem. “I am sure he will return soon and do just that,” she said. “You told him that you wish to return home, didn’t you? He will take you home.”

“And he will stay,” Adelaide said firmly. “Kyloe Castle will be his and he shall remain there with me. Wark is nothing compared to Kyloe. The House of de Wolfe is nothing compared to Northumbria. Won’t Thomas make a magnificent earl?”

“He will, my lady.”

Now, Adelaide was smiling as she looked from the window, the warm rays from the sun touching her cheek as she dreamed of her future as the Countess of Northumbria.

“He will make the best earl,” she said. “The most handsome in the north. I will be the envy of everyone with Thomas de Wolfe as my husband. He was destined to be the earl, Hilde. I had to ensure he became the earl. Everything my father and I have worked so hard for is so close that I can almost taste it. When Thomas returns, we shall be married immediately. Has the priest from Kelso arrived yet? I sent word to him yesterday, you know.”

“No one has arrived, my lady,” Hilde said.

Adelaide sighed sharply. “Not yet,” she muttered, turning away from the window.

Her gaze was on the chamber now, looking it over.

“This place holds nothing but misery for me. Why, in this very room, Lady de Wolfe told me to stop being so silly and selfish the day my father was killed. Can you believe that? She had the audacity to scold me. A Scots! As if she can tell me anything. She is nothing but a Scots rat.”

Hilde wasn’t paying much attention to her but pretending that she was.

Too much inattention and Adelaide would throw things.

She might even strike her, as she had before.

Hilde lived in fear of Adelaide and had ever since she’d been a young girl and stabbed her in the arm with a knife when Hilde said something to displease her.

That was the first instance of Adelaide’s violent nature, something that had only gotten worse with time.

The woman had no boundaries and therefore knew no fear when it came to expressing her anger or getting what she wanted. That included ridding herself of fine young men because she no longer wished to be betrothed to them. Like rubbish, she simply disposed of them.

That was Adelaide’s deep, dark secret.

“Lady de Wolfe is a powerful woman,” Hilde reminded her. “You would do well not to speak ill of her in her husband’s outpost.”

Adelaide looked at her. “I am not speaking ill of her,” she said. “I am simply stating a fact– she is an inferior Scots who happened to marry well. But she cannot tell me how to behave in my own home. This is my domain and my husband will be a more powerful earl than William de Wolfe.”

Still fumbling with the garment that needed to be mended, Hilde went on the hunt for the sewing kit to repair the torn shift.

“Have you not stopped to think that your husband is half-Scots?” she said. “That means your children shall have Scots blood in them. You should be careful how you speak of the Scots, my lady. You are about to be related to them.”

Adelaide looked at her as if taken aback…

but taken aback by what? The truth? The fact that Hilde had the impudence to say such things that were obvious to anyone else but Adelaide?

The old woman was in the wardrobe looking for the sewing kit and Adelaide marched over to her and slammed the wardrobe door against her head, clipping the old woman’s ear.

As Hilde gasped and fell back, Adelaide kicked her. Hilde ended up on her arse.

“Keep your stupid words to yourself,” Adelaide hissed, standing over her menacingly.

“I will hear no more from you about Scots or Lady de Wolfe, do you hear me? Thomas will marry me and we shall live at Kyloe. I will become his world and it is a world with no Scots and no old women telling me what to think. Do you understand me?”

Hand over her bruised ear, Hilde nodded quickly but she didn’t reply.

She was afraid to. However, Adelaide’s words struck fear into her heart– no old women telling me what to think .

To Hilde, that meant Adelaide meant to get rid of her.

She’d known the woman long enough to know that the meaning was clear.

Adelaide de Vauden was many things, but she was not one to make idle threats and, in that statement, she’d revealed her future intentions.

She could call it a slip of the tongue, or deny it altogether, but Hilde knew better.

She had seen many examples of the woman’s follow-through over the years.

She knew that Adelaide meant to kill her.

It was a shocking realization, but given who spoke the words, perhaps not so shocking. Hilde was quite sure that she was not being paranoid. Fear in her heart kept her quiet, but Adelaide was evidently looking for an answer because she kicked her again, her pointy toe against Hilde’s tender thigh.

“Well?” Adelaide demanded. “Do you understand me?”

Hilde kept her gaze averted. “I do, my lady.”

Adelaide’s gaze lingered on her for a moment before turning away.

As quickly as the storm had arisen, it had passed.

That was usual with Adelaide. It was a trait, just as she had the trait to seem rather mad but harmless to the world.

But that wasn’t Adelaide at all; she was anything but harmless and those who fell victim to her only discovered that too late.

Evil didn’t even begin to encompass what she was capable of.

Which was why Hilde had warned Thomas. While Edmund de Vauden was alive, there was nothing Hilde could do because Edmund was complicit in his daughter’s behavior.

She created the chaos and he cleaned up the mess.

She had killed two unsuspecting young knights from good families, and Edmund buried the bodies in secret and made excuses to the families.

So long as Edmund had been alive to clean up his daughter’s wickedness, Hilde had feared for her life should she speak out.

Adelaide would kill her and Edmund would make her disappear.

But with Edmund gone, there was no one to fill that void.

What Adelaide did would be laid open for the world to see.

And Thomas had to know.

“I want you to see what is taking the priest from Kelso so long,” Adelaide broke into Hilde’s panic-driven thoughts. “Go find de Ryes and find out what is taking so long. Mayhap he will know.”

Quickly, Hilde got up off the floor and straightened her wimple. “Aye, my lady.”

She nearly ran from the chamber, leaving her sewing kit scattered on the floor.

She waited until she was at the keep entry before allowing the tears to come, tears of pain and fear, tears she kept bottled up so Adelaide wouldn’t see them.

Adelaide fed off of fear and the torment of others, so Hilde was very careful not to show anything other than obedience around her.

But now that she knew what Adelaide’s intentions were, or at least suspected what they were, she wasn’t going to allow herself to fall victim to a madwoman. She had to plan her escape or die.

And she wasn’t ready to die yet.