“I meant free time to do what we’d like. If I wanted to ride, or practice archery, or read.”
“There is a time for riding in three days,” Mistress mac Lagan replied. “Twice a week we strengthen our legs that way. And we already did our reading today, and there will be more reading and reciting tomorrow. And of course there is no archery. You are not a child anymore.” Whatever she saw in Merida’s face made her clarify further. “I understand you are coming from DunBroch; you have been raised differently—children stay children longer in places like that, where it doesn’t matter as much.”
“Doesn’t…matter as much?”
“Yes, in little kingdoms like DunBroch, it is not so important how well you know the customs and how society behaves, because it’s not really a kingdom, it’s just a field with a castle in it. The stakes are different when the castle doesn’t have any power outside of that field. It’s all right, don’t look like that, you’ll catch up here soon enough. Here in Ardbarrach you will put that away and join society as a woman. Do you have any other questions?”
Merida’s cheeks burned, though she couldn’t pinpoint exactly why. Fury. Embarrassment. Was this how everyone saw DunBroch from the outside? She wondered if Hubert was getting a speech like this over in the barracks, too. She wondered if he believed it. “Can I see my brother?”
Brrrronnnng! Brrrronnnng! Brrrronnnng!
“No, that’s the bell for lights out,” Mistress mac Lagan said. She put her head on one side, then, studying Merida, and seemed to decide something. She directed Merida to a narrow window in the middle of the hall. It was just wide enough for an arrow or a fiendishly cold night to fit through. “Look.”
Merida put her cheek to the cold stone of the window’s side and looked out. Outside, a line of page boys filed neatly across the courtyard toward the barracks, silhouettes in the deep blue light. One of them was unmistakably Hubert; she saw the outline of his wild hair.
Merida called, “Hubert!”
The Hubert-silhouette stopped just long enough to peer in her direction. It waved cheerily at her and gave her a thumbs-up, barely visible in the dim space. Then he caught up with the other pages and disappeared into the shadow by the wall.
“Now I trust there will be no further disruption to the schedule tonight,” Mistress mac Lagan said. She didn’t say that shouting out of windows had been allowed only because of the special circumstances, but it was heavily implied. She patted Merida’s shoulder twice. Pat. Pat. Merida understood this was meant to be taken as compassion; she was meant to be grateful.
Merida didn’t feel grateful, but as Mistress mac Lagan brought her back to the room she’d shared with Leezie the night before, she said, “Thank you.”
Mistress mac Lagan looked embarrassed. She said brusquely, “You will grow to like this schedule.”
Leezie hurried up just then, out of breath, holding a stub of candle in one hand and a plate of their dinner in the other. Merida noticed that Leezie’s ridiculous embroidered dress was gone, and instead she was dressed in the neat gray dress of the rest of the servant girls.
“Do you have the princess’s dress?” asked Mistress mac Lagan.
Leezie lifted one of her arms, making the dinner plate tilt dangerously, demonstrating that she had a dark dress draped over it. Then she wordlessly moused into the room in front of Merida.
“No talking once the candle is out,” Mistress mac Lagan said.
The door shut.
Stuffing the bread into her mouth, Leezie collapsed into a relieved heap on her bed; Merida rescued the bit of candle just in time to keep her from setting the blanket afire. She lifted the dress from where it had fallen on the floor by the bed. It was a sharp, dark dress and crisp light veil that matched Mistress mac Lagan’s.
“Am I meant to wear this?” Merida asked.
“Mm.”
“What was your day like?”
“Mm?”
“Are you all right? Did you get enough to eat? Were they mean? Where is your dress?”
But Merida could tell Leezie was already properly asleep. She had begun producing a fluttery snore. With a sigh, Merida took off her dress and took her time to remove the personal effects she’d sewn into hems and tucked into pockets. A handful of coins. A brooch of her mother’s to prove her identity if needed. A hand-sized stuffed bear she’d brought for Hubert in case he lost courage during any part of the journey. She folded all of it up and tucked it away underneath her straw mattress. After a moment, she added her bow and quiver of arrows. She didn’t want to risk her things getting spirited away like Leezie’s dress.
Then she pulled on the dress Leezie had brought. She didn’t need a mirror to know that she now looked like all the other girls in the winter garden.
“Michty me,” she whispered softly.
A moment after that, the candle went out. The first Ardbarrach day had come to a close.
That was how it went for what seemed like innumerable days. At first, Merida didn’t think to tally them, and then, by the time she decided to, she couldn’t tell them apart. Every day felt like the same day:
Brrrronnnng! Brrrronnnng! Brrrronnnng!
The routine. The bells. Every day, the clockwork moving from task to task. Every evening, getting back just in time to scurry to the window in the hall in time to see Hubert’s wave and thumbs-up. Every night, Leezie falling asleep nearly before getting into bed.
Brrrronnnng! Brrrronnnng! Brrrronnnng!
“Can I talk to Hubert?” The pages are caring for the yearlings right now. “Can I talk to Hubert?” The pages have guard duty now. “Can I talk to Hubert?” The pages are scrubbing shields right now. “Can I talk to Hubert?”
She thought about asking Mistress mac Lagan if she would take the little bear to Hubert even if she herself wasn’t allowed the time to go see him, but she could just imagine Mistress mac Lagan saying that it was a backward, childish toy and destroying it “for their own good.” So it stayed hidden under the mattress like the rest of Merida’s DunBroch artifacts.
Brrrronnnng! Brrrronnnng! Brrrronnnng!
What had she expected to happen? She supposed she had expected to meet the lord of Ardbarrach. She had expected to picture herself here as a potential family member. But she supposed that was because she had been imagining other places would be more like DunBroch, who had folded Leezie in as one of their own. It was clear that was never going to be an option here. Her parents had been worried about writing a letter persuasive enough to encourage Ardbarrach to accept Merida, but it was obvious now that Ardbarrach would have never rejected her or any other newcomer. They had infinite places for new bodies, each slotted into their roles just as she and Hubert had been, but not for family.
Worst of all, she assumed Hubert was probably bored out of his mind but otherwise unchanged. He had to be. Nothing here changed. That was the Ardbarrach way; they were proud of it. Everything was the same, week in, week out. She wondered why Feradach hadn’t already razed this place to the ground.
Brrrronnnng! Brrrronnnng! Brrrronnnng!
Over and over, Merida made up reasons in her head for why they should just go back to DunBroch. Time was passing. Spring was coming. She had other brothers to change. Other journeys to make to satisfy the Dásachtach. They should go. They should go! But she kept hearing Feradach’s observation that some storms didn’t move roofs. Why, of all the things she’d forgotten in her life, was that phrase not one of them? She refused to let him be right about her. She wasn’t going to just give up because she was set in her ways and hated this place.
But then came the night she didn’t see Hubert in the line of pages.
Another mind-numbing day, another set of bells, another dashing down the hallway to peer out the window to catch a glimpse of him. But that night, Merida couldn’t see him. There was no silhouette of bushy red hair, just the other boys with their identical close-shaven haircuts.
Brrrronnnng! Brrrronnnng! Brrrronnnng!