Page 5 of Roses in Amber
Maman fainted and would not come to. We packed around her, all of us that much more sombre for her fragility, and if Annalise, our maidservant, didn't help, neither did she hinder us, even when we began to pack the sheets and blankets that belonged to the hotel.
Midnight had come and gone and we had long since finished packing our meager belongings before Glover returned. Jet and Jasper's excitement had not been enough to keep them awake so late, and I collected Jet while Father lifted Jasper's sleeping form into his own arms. Maman, either truly in a desperate faint or in an equally determined one, refused to awaken. Glover, with a glance at Father for permission, picked her up, and it spoke to her sincerity that she did not respond. Pearl, Opal and Flint collected our bags, though there was one too many and Glover said, "If you don't come with us they'll jail you for collusion," to Annalise, who sighed bitterly and took the last bag.
Glover led us out through the servants' stair and halls, our feet treading bare wood that no one of our class had ever walked before, and out a servants' entrance to be met by an enormous, sour-faced nag hitched to a thick, heavy covered wagon. All of us save Glover stopped short in dismay; he climbed with long sure legs over the wagon's tailgate and laid Maman inside before thrusting his head out the bonnet's pinched front. "There was nothing else to be had that would carry ten people. Swiftly, sirs and madams. The watch passes by in another nine minutes, and we do not want to be seen."
Pearl threw her bag in and climbed after with constrained rage. Opal moved more quietly, as if already tired—as well she should be, in the early small hours of the morning—and Glover took Jasper from Father, tucking him into the same small bed on the wagon's floor that Maman was already settled in. Jet was placed between them, and I offered Annalise a hand up. She stared at me sullenly, then took my offer in a fit of pique and flung herself against the back of the wagon as Flint climbed in and Opal tucked blankets around the trio sleeping on the floor.
Father joined Glover at the driver's bench, and their low voices exchanged information for a few minutes before Father, expressionless, joined us in the wagon. Glover, who had not retained a driver—how could he—clambered onto the bench, drew the wagon cover closed as tightly as he could behind him, and clicked to the vast black nag, who lurched into motion with a muttered protest.
I couldn't tell, from inside the snugly covered wagon, what roads he took, only that the cobbles turned quickly to frozen dirt, and that the night watchmen did not hail us. We took blankets from the bags and snuggled together, sleep taking us one by one.
I woke when the wagon stopped just after dawn, and crept through its puckered cover hole to the sounds of the nag slobbering water from a stream. I went a little distance into the wood and squatted to relieve myself, yellow steaming against the snow, then returned to Glover's side. He handed me a tin cup and I scooped from above the horse's watering place, and drank water so cold it made my teeth ache before it slid down to coat my stomach with its chill. I spoke softly, aware of how loud the stream's song was in comparison to the winter morning's silence. "Thank you. You should ride inside for a while. It's freezing."
"And who will drive the wagon?" Glover asked in not-quite-mocking amusement. I gave him a sideways glance, examining his tall, slim form, then gave the nag a better look.
Last night I'd thought her black as pitch. In the dawning light I could see she was a dark bay with black socks, and not a scrap of white anywhere on her. She also stood sixteen hands if she stood an inch, with a belly roughly the size of a barge. Feathery fur grew from her knees down her forelegs and swept magnificently over feet like dinner plates. She rolled an eye at me, and I swear the beast sneered, curling a big lip before puffing a hot breath over the stream and returning to her drink.
I set my jaw. "How hard can it be? If she runs—and surely she won't run, not after walking all night—you'll be right there in the wagon to help rein her in."
"A beauty like this can trot forty miles in a day," Glover said cheerfully. "Plodding along at night isn't enough to wear her out. But I could do with a little warming up," he admitted. "It's a long night, sitting on a bench like that."
I nodded. "Where are we? How far do we have to go?"
"We've come some fifteen miles. It's another seven to the next village—we passed through a couple last night—and we might go on by one or two after that and still be well settled before evening. We can make better time in the light."
Towns and villages lay some seven miles apart by nature, that being the distance most people could walk to a market and get home again in the same day. Even I knew that, though on the occasions we left the city it had always been in a carriage, and seven miles had seemed nothing to me. If we passed through another three villages today, we would be close to fifty miles from the city and that much farther ahead of any pursuit. I found that I preferred, intensely, to be as far away as we could be. "Will she be all right with that much walking?"
"She will," Glover said with confidence. "But an early night will be good for her, after that. We'll rub her down, get her some good oats and some bran, and she'll be set to walk till sundown tomorrow."
"And how far is our journey?"
"Some seventy leagues, miss."
A chill that had nothing to do with the crisp air seized me. I turned involuntarily to look at the road we'd taken already. The last village was well out of sight, not even smoke from chimneys visible above the trees, and those trees closed like dark arches over the lonely frozen road. The gentle blues and pinks of a winter dawn made their frost-rimmed branches beautiful, but not inviting. Like Pearl, I thought, and shivered again as I looked the other way, at the road ahead.
The noisy stream followed the road a little way before diving back down beneath the earth, and the road itself curved gently not too far ahead. Seventy leagues was over two hundred miles, and none of us, save Father, had been more than ten or twenty from our home. Well, perhaps Maman, if the hunting lodge washers, but Maman rarely went beyond the city walls, and certainly we children had never gone so far. I was abruptly afraid, too aware of wolves and boars and bears, all the murderous beasts that lived in the woods. Last night, fleeing had seemed the only sensible thing to do. In dawn's breaking light, knowing there was a week's journey in the winter ahead of us, I wondered if I had been a great fool, condemning my family to starvation in the wilderness.
"Come along, miss," Glover said gently. "When there's nothing left behind you, the only way through is forward. I'll drive with you a bit, and then if big Beauty here doesn't take advantage of you, I'll slip inside for an hour or two's warmth before spelling you again."
"Thank you, Glover." He helped me to the wagon's bench, and under the sun's bright reflective gaze, I learned how to drive a wagon and one, the first of many strange lessons to come.
I hadn't known, until a day of it had gone by, how tired the body could be left from riding in a wagon. I ached everywhere, my limbs were stiff, and my head seemed to bump of its own accord, even when the wagon had stopped. And I was young, and so comparatively unaffected: Father moved like an old man, creaking and grimacing as he stretched. The boys were hardly bothered, leaping about when we stopped and sometimes running alongside the wagon, even in the cold, for an hour or more. After the first day, I joined them as often as I could, and Opal emerged whenever she thought Maman could be left alone for a while. Maman and Annalise refused to leave the wagon except to do the necessary, but once in a while even Pearl stalked along beside the wagon to stretch her legs.
She would not, though, deign to touch the reins. Opal did, with shy amusement, and Flint took them with obvious pride. Even Jasper had a go, and Jet, sitting in Father's lap, held their tails while chattering to birds and rabbits. Mostly, though, Father, Glover and I took turns driving, while Flint walked beside Beauty—for so the big nag had been deemed—at her head, talking softly to her and, as far as I could tell, transforming her personality from surly to soft.
Four days along the road, at lunchtime, Annalise exited the wagon with her chin high and fierce color in her cheeks. "My home village is two miles down that track," she announced. "I'm going back there. I won't go with you to the ends of the earth. I've done nothing wrong and won't serve you in isolation when I've family and friends at home."
Maman let out a terrible cry that affected Annalise not at all as she turned and simply walked away from us. Opal gazed after the girl in pure astonishment, while Pearl's beautiful features pinched with disbelief. I was only surprised because I hadn't known she had somewhere to go; it had been clear she didn't want to be with us. "We have no way to pay her," I said to the cold afternoon air. "There's no reason for her to stay."
Maman cried out again, sending Father and Opal into the wagon to tend to her. Pearl and I exchanged glances before she said, coolly, "There will be more food for the rest of us, then," and climbed into the wagon as well. The boys, standing in a circle of surprise, looked between Glover and myself, and after Annalise, and then Glover said, "We might as well be on the way, then. No sense in losing daylight."
"Will she be all right, walking home from here?"
Glover shook his head. "We've seen no brigands and she seems to know the territory, so I can only assume so. I've a quick step, miss, but I can't walk her home and catch up with Beauty's pace while it's still light out."
"No, I…" I looked after Annalise a moment longer, watching her cloak mottle and fade with distance, and spread my hands. "No, you can't, and she didn't ask. I hope she'll be all right."
"That one lands on her feet." Glover lifted Jet into the back of the wagon. "All right, lads, let's move along."
