Broken Dove (Fantasyland 4)

“Everyone has time for courtesy,” I returned and added, “Achilles said please.” Thinking on it, I included, “So did Remi. As did Derrik, after, of course, I mentioned it to him.”

This last was true. Way back in Fleuridia, I’d had to give Derrik a talking to.

That got another eye flash and the annoyed response of, “Well, I’m not Achilles, Remi or Derrik.”

“I’m well aware of that,” I replied.

“And none of them are Heads of Houses,” he noted.

“So the Head of a House has carte blanche to be discourteous and bossy?” I asked.

His eyes narrowed and he asked back, “Am I to be treated to your surly disposition the entirety of our journey?”

“Probably,” I retorted.

“When you’re not pretending I don’t exist, of course,” he continued.

“Of course,” I agreed flippantly.

“Excellent,” he muttered and threw back a healthy gulp of wine before putting his glass on the table. He looked back to me and spoke on, but his face belied his words. “Please continue. It amuses me.”

“I aim to please,” I murmured.

“I doubt that,” he returned.

Suddenly, I wished I’d never said anything and just ignored him completely. So we slept in the same bed. So what? We’d done it before. I would be asleep. I could ignore him there too.

“Perhaps we can stop talking,” I requested.

“Excellent idea,” he agreed and instantly moved to the door. “If you’d like dinner, meet me downstairs after you’ve had a moment to refresh.”

I was hungry and I needed to eat and to do that I needed him and his money so it was exasperating but I had to say, “I’ll be down in a few minutes.”

He said nothing. Just opened the door, went through it, turned, dipped his chin at me and closed it behind him.

I stared at the door thinking that maybe I should have sucked it up and went to Karsvall.

Imaginary children’s laughter peeled through my brain.

No, I wouldn’t have been able to suck it up and go to Karsvall.

I took another sip of my wine and when I was done, I muttered, sounding like a spoiled child, “Stupid malevolent witches and deposed rulers, ruining everything.”

But they damn well had.

My plans for me and my future.

My brief but brilliant feeling of freedom.

Now, I was back where I started, my life not my own but controlled by a rich and powerful man.

There was a knock at the door so I called, “Come in.”

The girl came in carrying a pitcher with what thankfully looked like clean drying cloths folded over her forearm.

She moved directly to the nightstand and set it down.

And as she left, I was sure to thank her.

* * * * *

Dinner was not the greatest.

We went to a pub down the street and the not-the-greatest-part wasn’t the food.

Unsurprisingly, without asking me my preference, Apollo ordered by stating, “Wine, red. And patty pie for the both of us.”

I had no clue what patty pie was but it didn’t sound all that great.

And during my time with the guys, they always asked the waiters to explain my choices so that I could make them.

Not Apollo.

Oh no.

After our to-do at the inn, I wisely decided to let this go, and luckily patty pie turned out to be us each receiving our own small casserole dish filled with fluffy mashed potatoes topped with melted cheese that looked really good. Under this I discovered corn, carrots and peas in a thick delicious brown gravy. This was poured over a patty of ground beef flavored with onion. In other words, a sort of shepherd’s pie but with a meat crust.

I dug in, finding it was way yummy, and I did this ignoring Apollo and also ignoring the looks we were getting.

This also happened in the less fine establishments when I was with the boys. My guess was that it mostly had to do with the fact that, even though our clothing was travel-worn, it was all better quality than what most of the populace was wearing.

In other words, no matter what country you were in, we could just say that in this world there was definitely a line between the have and have-nots.

Here, this included Apollo wearing a dark brown thick wool turtleneck sweater that was knit exquisitely and fit his broad shoulders and wide chest perfectly. This topped tight-fitting dark brown wool breeches and (mostly) shined, obviously fine-quality boots. The cloak he unbuckled and tossed carelessly on an unused chair at our table had, on the outside, a dark-tanned hide, and the inside was a silky lustrous dark-brown-to-black fur.

I was wearing a soft green cashmere to-the-floor dress that skimmed my figure perfectly, had a scooped neckline and bell sleeves (which were kind of annoying when trying to eat, but lovely besides), the edges of both having very pretty, delicate pointelle stitching. It also had a thin belt knitted of the same cashmere but with silver threads in that I’d tied so it hung low on my hips.

On my feet, I had on low-heeled but high-rising (to the mid-thigh) buff-colored suede boots lined in cream fur. My cape had a high collar, the hide on the outside a fawn color, the fur on the inside thick luscious cream. I’d taken my cape off, too, but I’d been more careful placing it beside Apollo’s on the chair.

It must be said, of all my clothes in this world, the ones for Lunwyn were the best.

But as we silently drank our wine and ate our food, me avoiding Apollo’s eyes, him, I didn’t know since I wasn’t looking at him, I noticed that here, the attention we were getting wasn’t the fact that we were of the obviously-rare-in-these-parts upper-crust.

No.

As I surreptitiously glanced around, I realized it was something else.

When I caught eyes on me, before they looked away, I saw surprise in some faces. Extreme curiosity in others. Unease in a few.

And I knew.

We were a day away from her home, but I had a not-vague feeling that they knew who Apollo was, and worse, they’d seen him with the other Ilsa. An Ilsa who was supposed to be dead.

An Ilsa who looked exactly like me.

I had not noticed this on the way into Lunwyn. Then again, the men kept me sheltered and there were so many of them about, all of them big, it would have been difficult to note looks like this.

Or maybe I was so engaged with them, I just didn’t notice.

But with both Apollo and I giving each other the silent treatment, I had nothing to do but notice.

My meal finished, I saw his hand raise the wine bottle to my glass and he poured.

I took in a deep breath, and with it calm and control. Only then did I lift my eyes to Apollo.