The Very Best of Kate Elliott

The Very Best of Kate Elliott by Kate Elliott Page A

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Authors: Kate Elliott
Tags: Fiction, Fantasy, Collections & Anthologies
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boiling water, not out on these cold rocks,” said the youngest of them, who was almost as pregnant as Mari. “Those women don’t talk to us. You have to go round to the Dowager House beside the King’s Palace. The king’s mother has been dead these five years, so the sister has set up housekeeping there. And a good thing, too.”
    “Shhh,” said the other women, and many of them hurried away.
    “Why do you say so?” asked Anna, watching the others vanish into the twilight. Smoke made the air hazy. Everything tasted of ash and rubbish and shit.
    “My pardon, I didn’t mean to say it,” said the girl. “It’s dangerous to speak of the troubles in the court. You know how it is.”
    “I am up from the country. We hear no gossip there.”
    “Better if I say nothing,” said the girl as she shifted the basket awkwardly around her huge belly.
    “Let me help you,” said Anna, taking the girl’s basket. “It is a shame for you to carry such a heavy load so near your time.”
    The girl smiled gratefully and started walking. “The work must be done. Where are you from, Mistress?”
    “Just a small village, no place you’ll have ever heard of. By the forest.”
    “Isn’t the forest full of wolves?”
    “Yes, it is.”
    “Aren’t you scared all the time that they’ll come and eat you?”
    “Wolves are no different than men. They hunt the weak. But maybe in one way they are kinder. They only kill what they eat.”
    The girl had a wan face, and hearing these words she looked more tired than ever.
    “Here now,” said Anna, regarding her sadly, for it seemed a terrible burden to be so young and look so weary. “If you’ll tell me how to find the Dowager’s House, then I will teach you some bird calls. Like this.”
    She trilled like a lark, and the girl laughed, so entirely delighted that she looked like a child on festival morning waiting for a treat of honey.
    “If you’ll carry the basket I’ll walk you there. It’s not so far from where I work and live.”
    “Do you wash all this laundry for a family?”
    “That I do, Mistress. I’m lucky to have the work with a respectable tailor and his household. The lady of the house has said she will let me keep my baby in the kitchen during the day as long as I keep up my work.” She named a name that she clearly thought would impress Anna, but Anna had to admit she had no knowledge of this well-known tailor and how he had once made a coat for the king’s sister’s chatelaine’s brother. Anna’s ignorance made the girl laugh even more. Anna was glad to see her cheerful.
    So they walked along cobblestone streets as Anna taught her the capped owl’s hoot and the periwinkle’s chitter and the nightlark’s sad mournful whistling “sweet! sweet!” until some man shouted from a closed house,“Shut that noise!” They giggled, and in good charity with each other reached a wide square on which rose the Dowager House, with stone columns making a monumental porch along the front and a walled garden with trees in the back.
    The girl checked Anna with an elbow, keeping her to the shadows. “There are soldiers on guard,” she said, bitterness staining her tone to make it dark and angry. “Those are not the king’s men. They belong to the Forlanger lord. He has people watching the Dowager House. He licks the king’s boots, so I wonder what he fears from the king’s sister.”
    Anna knew what he feared, but she said nothing.
    The girl took her hand, anger loosening her tongue.“My man soldiers with General Olivar’s company, a foot soldier. That is why I do not like the Forlangers. I thought they were to be back by now. He and I are to be wed next month.”
    The words took Anna like a blow to the heart, reminding her of Olef ’s last day, of his last words, of his last breath. Of how the Forlangers had been responsible, of how they took their war against General Olivar to the back roads and the isolated places where their actions would remain hidden

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