Once Upon a Romance 02 - As The Last Petal Falls by Jessica Woodard Page A

young giant hung his head and blushed. “I came to get Mistress Belle, and I didn’t want to just walk in.”
    “Of course ye shouldna just waltz in, laddie, but that dinna mean ye should wake us at such an infernal hour, either. Why’re ye fetchin’ the lass so early?”
    “Well, MacTíre—”
    Vivienne threw back the covers on her pallet. “MacTíre! What does that ill-bred mountain troll want now? ! “
    “Nothing, Mistress.” Marlplot let his eyes hang at a point just to the left of Vivienne’s face, as though he were reluctant to look at her. “Last night he told me that, in the morning, I should come find you and help you clean your room.”
    “Hmph. And I suppose the lout didn’t think to tell you to wait until a decent hour of the morning, did he?” Vivienne put softness into her testy words. Despite his huge size, the boy was obviously both very shy and not all that bright. It wasn’t his fault he’d followed MacTíre’s orders rather too well.
    Connelly cast her an approving look, and then turned back to Marlplot. “Is that it, lad?” When he got a nod in response, he went on. “Then I forgive ye, but next time wait til the sun is up, will ye?”
    “Well, all right. But the sun isn’t coming up today, Connelly. Look outside.”
    Both Vivienne and Connelly squinted through the window cracks, and saw that Marlplot was right. Giant grey clouds hugged the mountain tops that surrounded the valley, and chill winds blew the bare tree branches in a wild dance. It was clear that another storm was coming.
    “I best be off, then, ta snatch the last winter berries afore the storm shuts me in. Lass, I leave ye ta the gentle care o’ Marlplot. He’s a good lad, so be nice.” Connelly flashed her a broad grin and was out the door before she could say goodbye. When she was alone with her cleaning assistant, she looked up at him. Way, way up.
    “What’s your given name, Marlplot?”
    “John, Mistress.”
    “Well, John, show me to my room, and let’s start cleaning. The sooner I have a spot of my own, the better.”
    Cleaning the room was a hard, filthy task. For all that she was still mad at him, Vivienne was grateful that MacTíre had thought to send John along to help her. He brought bucket after bucket of water up to the room, while she slowly fetched a few logs of wood from the inner bailey. Once they had a respectable fire going, John found a copper kettle in the kitchen and started heating water. The giant steaming kettle was so heavy that Vivienne couldn’t lift it with one hand. Instead she let John lift it, pouring the boiling water over the thick cotton mattress that they had stuffed into an old, wooden hip bath. She used a wooden laundry paddle to move the mattress around in the boiling water as best she could, trying to make sure that every surface was thoroughly cleaned. Then they drained the tub and did it all over again, only this time Vivienne cast some dried lavender petals she’d gotten from Connelly into the steaming water.
    While the mattress soaked they swept and scrubbed the walls and floors. Generations of spiders were dislodged from the ceiling and unceremoniously tossed out the window to make their way in the wide world. Even with the fire blazing away the room was cold, so once it had been cleaned and aired, Vivienne made a trip to the laundry room and poked around in the rag bag until she found enough scraps to plug the cracks in her window shutters. John was immensely helpful in her weatherproofing. He could reach the top of the window without a stepstool, and he happily plugged the cracks that she couldn’t reach.
    While they worked, Vivi asked questions.
    “How did you come to serve with Master MacTíre, John?”
    “He helped me out, Mistress. Seemed the right thing to do.”
    “Helped you how?”
    “Oh, I shouldn’t say, Miss Belle. Sean Kelly says Master MacTíre gets real embarrassed when we talk about how he’s helped us.”
    “So he’s modest?”
    “I