“That’s right,” she chastised. “You’d have done the same thing, and you know it. So hush. Hope got us a lead on Sarah. Thanks to her, we have something to go on. Good job, Hope.” She saluted me with her cup and took a long, thoughtful draught.
Collum grabbed my shoulders and stared at me intently. “Still,” he said, “from now on, you will listen to me, stay near me, and follow my rules, understood? You could’ve been attacked or robbed or.” His jaw worked. “Or worse.”
My teeth started to chatter at the thought of what nearly did happen. I set the cup down quickly before he could notice, and glanced around desperately for some way to hide my shaking hands. A basket of raw, cottony wool sat on the floor beside me. A thin, rounded stalk of wood with a circular base lay on top of the fluff. I picked it up, tied a piece of the wool to the top of the stick, and began rolling it between my palms. A slim strand of attached wool stretched out of the raw material. I twisted. The thick warp of wool began to thin. My hands moved faster and faster as the events of the day blurred in my head.
Never let your hands lay idle, child. A soft, comforting voice filled my mind, bringing with it an odd sense of nostalgia. Not too quickly, or you shall tangle it.
“Hope!” Phoebe’s voice jerked me back to the smoky room.
I blinked to see her and Collum both gaping at me. No, not at me. At the bundle of wool thread now wrapped around the stalk of wood in my hands. Somehow, I’d turned the messy wad into a lumpy strand of undyed yarn.
“That’s brilliant,” Phoebe gasped. “You know how to spin wool in the old way? Even Gran can’t do that. Sarah taught you, then?”
I stared down at the objects in my lap. My heart was beating too fast as I hurled the spindle, with its untidy new thread, back into the basket. “N-no,” I spluttered. “I’ve never . . . I mean, she didn’t . . .”
A door banged open on the far side of the hall. A dumpy woman with apple cheeks and a wide apron waddled toward us, grizzled gray hair peeking from beneath a white cap. She would’ve looked like the kindly old grandma in a storybook but for the sneer curling her nearly toothless mouth. A skinny girl of eleven or twelve with a long brown braid over each shoulder trotted in her wake, toting a packed tray.
The woman’s piggy eyes matched the muddy color of her serving dress. They flicked over us and landed on me. “That her, then?” she said to Collum. “The sister you was looking for?” Hilde paused to drop a perfunctory curtsy before adding, “Milord.”
I tensed as Collum’s gaze pinned me to the chair. “Aye. Our sister.” He made a vague gesture in the woman’s direction. “Hope, this is Hilde, the housekeeper. The girl is her granddaughter, Alice.”
Hilde took in my stained skirts and bandaged head. “Supper was served long ago. Old Mab has gone to her bed.”
I lifted eyebrows at Phoebe, who mouthed, The cook.
“Oh, that’s okay,” I replied, “I can fix my own—”
Hilde cut me off. “No one messes about in Mab’s kitchen. Alice, serve the bread and cod.” She barely glanced at the girl, who struggled with the heavy tray. “Cold, mind you. I know the archbishop has granted an indulgence to eat meat during the week of the king’s coronation. But this house will not break the holy Advent fast for the sake of frivolity.”
I rose and hurried over to the girl, attempting to take the wobbling tray before it crashed to the floor. Hilde intercepted me and snatched it from the girl’s hands. “Get back and scour them pots, girl. Praise be the saints, you ain’t got the sense God gave a goose.”
As the girl scuttled past, Hilde cuffed her on the side of the head. The girl whimpered. Phoebe shot to her feet at the same time as I rounded on the old woman.
Collum moved to block the two of us, though his eyes narrowed on the hateful woman. “That will do, Hilde. Good night.”
The housekeeper’s jaw moved, as though chewing a nugget of undigested food. Oh, how I wanted to smack her.
“This household attends early mass,” she said sourly as she slammed the tray onto the table. “We do not break our fast until after.” She turned, speaking only to Collum. “I suggest you take your sister to hand, milord. You’d do well to get a tighter rein on her from now on. There are unclean elements roaming this city, and I hear the new king invites even more of them. Until the Godless Jews are scourged from this land, decent Christian folk are not safe.”
With a harrumph, the odious little woman stomped from the room.
Phoebe looked at me, teeth bared. “Told ya she was a piece of work.”
Chapter 22
IN THE DARK, SLIMY SKITTERING THINGS CREPT OVER ME, but I was too weak to brush them away. My shredded fingertips were bleeding and numb from trying to claw my way out of utter blackness.
A tiny, waking part of me knew I was having the nightmare. I even knew where I was. The small bedchamber at Mabray House. Snuggled under heavy quilts in the narrow bed, Phoebe snoring next to me. I tried to fight my way out of the dream. But it sucked me under like a whirlpool of tar.