Thirty-Seven

HE helped her climb up the small steps to get inside the smaller carriage when they got there. He said he was going to ride with the others on the horses on the first leg of the ride.
Odette came in after her with a box of accoutrements she could use to check and clean the cut near her temple.
Adalene asked for Olivie right away.
Odette looked a little sad as she tended the cut. “She is on the other coach with our luggage. She confessed to talking with the ladies-in-waiting here about you, my lady. She is the reason why they knew things about you and your relationship with the Baron.”
“Why did she do that?” she asked, surprised but calmer now. At least, the woman was not hurt as she first thought.
“I think she is jealous of you,” Odette replied after a moment, her voice heavy with disapproval and a hint of shame.
“Because I am with the Baron?” she asked sadly. “Yes, if I wasn’t me I would get jealous of myself, too.”
Odette looked a little stunned at her words, then smiled, and her shoulders relaxed. She was more affected by Olivie’s actions than Adalene herself.
“Admit it.” she sighed, wistfulness in her very being. “I... even I couldn’t believe it. Him. This. How could any woman not be jealous?”
“I admit, my Lady, I am jealous, too,” Odette confessed in a soft voice as she cut the strips of gauze she was going to cover her cut with. “I would love to dream of a knight or a baron falling in love with me and show that love with every part of their being just like the Baron does with you. I have seen the same with my brother and his wife. He loves her very much. I dream of something like it.”
“And I pray you will get it, Odette. I really do!”
They were quiet for a moment until Odette was able to finish covering her cut.
“Olivie accepted payment from Sir Benoit to leave you, my lady,” Odette said quietly. “But she changed her mind and ran to warn Sir Yves.”
“Oh, *mon Dieu*,” she whispered. If Olivie had not had a change of heart, and that man had not been too drunk to walk straight, she would have been harmed. She shivered.
Odette continued with her tale. “The Baron was there at that time, looking for you. He came back posthaste after Sir Thibaut heard whisperings among the intoxicated men about him. It seems that Lady Veronique’s men have spread rumors that you will soon be discarded by Baron Deschamps. That you would soon be free for other men’s beds.”
Adalene closed her eyes tightly. “I’m glad we’re going back home,” she whispered miserably. “I don’t want to be here.”
Odette shook her head. “If that daft girl had not surrendered to her jealousy, this would have been avoided!”
“Oh, Odette, why will she not be jealous?” she said. “The Baron has given me so much, and I’m just an ordinary girl!”
“But you will not think to harm anyone, my Lady,” Odette said gently. “You will not let anyone harm your lady. You are not ordinary.”
She sighed. “You are right, as you, too... you’re not ever going to harm me. You’re very loyal to me, and I appreciate you, Odette.”
Odette smiled a broad smile. But we were both still worried.
“What will the Baron do with her now? Do you know?”
“The Baron will let her go when we get back to the manor,” Odette said gravely. “He will never let someone like her be near his wife again.”
Me, the Baron’s wife. Can it be true...? she thought in a daze. It must be her wound. It could be more serious than she realized. How else could she imagine she heard Fabian tell Sir Benoit that he had married her? And now, even Odette was talking about it, too. Could it really be true?
There was a knock on the carriage, and when Odette opened it, a lady-in-waiting stood there.
She turned aside, and the elderly lady in a luxurious gown that she had talked to earlier on the balcony stood there.
*Lady Madeleine Clemence Gauvreau*, Adalene thought in a daze. *Oh dear, not again!*
Then Fabian was there, and he was helping her down the steps now to face the matronly lady. Her heart hammered insanely inside her chest so that she felt faint. She had to force herself to remain on her feet as she curtsied in front of Fabian’s great aunt. “My Lady!”
Her mother had told her so many things about Lady Madeleine, but Adalene had never seen her before. Her mother said that there was a soft heart behind that robust, fiery mask.
There must be. She did not mean to insult her by not recognizing her earlier!
“Let me introduce my new wife, Aunt Madeleine, my lovely Adalene. Adalene, this is my great aunt, Lady Madeleine Clemence Gauvreau. She is a cousin to my beloved late grandmother.”
“Bless her soul,” said the aunt. “Will she not turn in her grave because of what you did, boy?”
“I chose a better woman.”
“You chose out of lust. But whatever... she is indeed a lovely one.” The aunt looked her over, and she tried not to flinch as those eyes seemed to bore at her, as if they could open her up to see her secrets. “They said she is home-taught? She can read?”
She chose to keep quiet. She was not the one being addressed.
“Yes, Aunt,” Fabian replied with an amused tone in his voice. “Taught at home by her mother. Remember when you used to teach your handmaidens while you stayed in the Manor for quite some time when I was very young? You used to get bored reading on your own. One of those handmaidens is her mother.”
The aunt raised elegant eyebrows in surprise. “Pray tell, Lady Adalene, what is the name of your mother?”
She bowed her head. “Her name is Angelique, my Lady.”
“Angel... your mother is Angelique?” The lady was suddenly smiling. “Oh, how many times had she gotten in trouble for allowing my younger sister to play with the men’s arrows in the woods? Or dance with maman’s beautiful silver shoes in the kitchen?”
Adalene couldn’t stop her smile from showing. She was indeed talking about her mother. If she didn’t have the kind of mother she had, she didn’t think she could do books for their farm’s produce or be able to help to hammer nails for repairs on the kitchen roof when the men were all so busy in the fields and they couldn’t wait for them to get up there to fix it before the storm comes.
She would not be allowed to wear loose pantaloons under her skirts so she could jump higher when they played their games.
And she would not be allowed to spend time reading instead of inventing ways to stretch their store for cooking food for the men!
She did learn more about what could be edible to eat in the wild forests eventually, and that it did help. But the women in her family weren’t relegated to only being housekeepers of the house.
“She was a bad nanny, she could never say no to your cousins, she just couldn’t, even as she scolded them like a mother hen,” she exclaimed further. Her aged, powdered face had become rosy as she seemed to retreat to another time that evidently made her happy. “Those were good times.”
Then her eyes focused on Adalene.
“Does your mother still cluck her tongue when she is not pleased with something?”
She nodded. Oh, Lady Madeleine truly remembered! “Yes, she still does, my lady. My older brothers mostly keep her in practice, even to this day.”
The older woman laughed, and then she looked at her nephew, the Baron. “You must realize that if she is truly her mother’s daughter, there will be no doubt in my mind about her wit and her virginity.”
“I don’t care what people say. I was the one on that bed on her first night, Aunt Madeleine,” the Baron said a bit haughtily, which she had never seen him do before.
She blinked. Odette hid a grin behind Knight Yves, clearly already used to this.
“Well, you got her a virgin, and that’s all everybody seems to be saying. A girl this lovely would have much wit with her if she was able to keep her drawers intact before her married years. I surely hadn’t.”
Fabian’s eyes looked at her, and she colored hotly. She knew he was thinking about the ripped drawers. Surely, he would never mention those!
“Yes,” the Baron answered again, his look remaining intimate, making her blush all the more. She was relieved when he finally returned his attention to his aunt. “Though I was dismayed when you didn’t believe me at first. You have to go and look for her. If you aren’t my beloved and most favorite aunt, I would get offended.”
The Baron received a pinch on his arm. “I am your only aunt, and I am not what I am without a little arrogance. Oh well... arrange the wedding ceremony so we can make the intricate details official. I will have my carriage readied to follow after I’ve talked to the Lady Veronique about that stupid knight.”
“W-Wedding ceremony,” she whispered. She turned to the Baron. “Fabian?”
“What? She still doesn’t know about your intentions?” the aunt said, frowning. “How is she supposed to secure her standing if she doesn’t even know where she stands?”
Fabian sighed. “The lady, my bride—my wife—doesn’t know that I am seriously going through with the contract. Adalene and I will still need to talk, Aunt Madeleine. She still needs to make a decision.”
“Decision? What decision? She is daft if she thinks she has to decide to marry you. I will marry you if you aren’t my nephew. And if you propose nicely enough.”
This time, even the ladies-in-waiting dithered, and the few knights grinned.
The old lady had a truly wicked sense of humor and she did not seem to mind when she made others laugh.
Fabian was shaking his head at his aunt, but he was grinning with his knights in attendance.
Adalene could only stare at them and gulp.
But then, all the other men finally arrived with the second coach and she was lifted back to the first one.
She watched as the Baron bade a temporary goodbye to his aunt.
“Thank you for your timely intercession with the Duke. I know the news had shocked you, but you recovered fast enough to back me up.”
“He is a gambler and an astute one at that. He is a businessman at heart. He will come through eventually; I just made it quicker,” the elderly lady said with a kind twinkle in her eyes. It clearly showed how much favor Fabian enjoyed with this aunt of his. “Now, off you go. And do be careful. I hope to be there when you make your vows to make sure the court in Paris will know I witnessed.”
And right after that, they left the Duke’s castle.