“Congratulations,” Alvilda said softly to Master Tailor as we passed by him. She patted him on the back with her free hand. Master Tailor turned briefly and nodded. I thought I could hear him weeping, but the sound was hollow beneath the owl mask.
We walked around Elweard and stood behind my father. He saw us coming and pointedly turned back toward the jubilant crowd, digging into his front coat pocket and pulling out a small bottle. Before the bottle could quite reach his lips, Alvilda let me go and moved her hands to block it.
“Come, Gideon,” she said. “Come and speak now with your daughter.”
Father sighed and slid the bottle back into his pocket. The cheering crowd began to make its way toward us and the village.
“Let’s go,” said Alvilda, taking hold of Father and me, one in each arm. “We can talk at my place. We can pay our respects to the happy coupling later.”
We headed down the hill and toward the village. The specters in the distance stirred and jumped atop the carriage.
***
“Tea?” asked Alvilda, already pouring the hot water into the mugs she’d placed before Father and me. She put down the kettle and went back to her cupboard. As she rummaged around for leaves, Father snuck a sip of ale out of his bottle. Alvilda dropped the tea leaves into the water and took a seat at her sawdust-covered table between us. She looked from one of us to the other. I grabbed hold of my mug.
“Gideon,” said Alvilda, when no other voice was forthcoming. “I think it’s time you have a heart-to-heart with Noll. It’s actually high past time.”
Father sighed and began fumbling at the outside of his coat pocket. “What does she know?”
I felt the heat of the tea almost singe my palm through the mug. “I know that my father is so ashamed to face me that he won’t even speak directly to me.”
Father wiped a tired hand across his gray and black hairline. “I’m sorry, Noll. When I saw you’d showed for the wedding … I just didn’t know what to say.”
“You should have started by asking how Mother was doing.”
Alvilda gasped. Father’s eyes widened. “She’s well, then?”
I slapped my palms atop the table. Sawdust went flying, probably landing in my tea. “I can’t say how well she’s doing, fast asleep in the care of a monster!”
Father pulled his ale bottle out of his pocket and took a swig. Alvilda didn’t stop him.
“I knew he had her,” said Father at last. “I didn’t know for certain if she was still living. I thought I’d feel it if she … well. I couldn’t be sure.”
My eyes couldn’t meet his, couldn’t stare into the budding ember of flame I knew I’d find there.
Alvilda looked from one of us to the next. “So you’ve seen her, Noll?”
I shifted in my seat uncomfortably. “Just once. My first night there, he took me to see her in a guarded room, sleeping. She didn’t wake. And he made sure that I knew the consequences of abusing my power over him: Her death.”
“The cheat!” Alvilda banged her hands across the table.
“That evening when you were gone, Aubree took a turn for the worse.” Father gulped the ale for a moment, slamming down the empty bottle. “She was breathing so heavily. She could barely speak, but she couldn’t stop moaning. Sweat poured off her like she’d just come in from a torrent of rain. Then she stopped moaning. That was scarier than when she was moaning. She was still breathing, but barely.”
Father drummed the shaky fingers of his free hand on the table. “I heard a sound outdoors. I thought it might be you or Elfriede come home at first, but it was louder than that. The door burst open. It was the lord’s servants.”
He picked up the bottle and tried to take another sip. When he came up empty, he leered at the bottle and put it back down. “I told them you weren’t there, to be on their way to find you, that I had a dying wife to worry about. Then they came to the bed and picked her up, carried her right out the door without so much as a word to me. I jumped in and followed. ‘This was all I wanted from Noll,’ I told myself. Just to ask the man. Ask him if he could help us. Since he’d do anything for you.”
“I did ask him. That same night. You wouldn’t believe me. But that’s probably why he finally sent for her.”
Father shook his head. “The lord greeted us in the entryway to the castle, wearing his black veil and hat. I dropped right down to my knees, even as the pale servants lay Aubree on the floor before me. ‘Have mercy, my lord,’ I said. ‘Do what you can to spare my wife. I’ll do anything.’ ‘And where is Olivière?’ he asked. ‘Why has she not come with you?’ Well, I wanted to say it was just that Noll is such a—” Father stopped suddenly, held the empty bottle to his lips and spat. He wagged a finger at me. “She’s a stubborn girl, but I thought better than to insult a man’s goddess right in front of him, so I said nothing.”