Page 50 of Slippers and Thorns
“I don’t mean to dissuade you, of course, but…are you sure you want to dismiss your retinue?” She played with the reins that she had reclaimed from the groom who had held Shadow while she dismounted.
“I’m a big boy, Ella,” he laughed. “I don’t need babysitters.”
“No…” she drew out. “But have you ever gone on a trip by yourself? Did you even notice the groom who took Chief while you helped me? Or observe enough of the packing of your belongings to know where to look for your clothes?”
Michael gave her a funny look. “What does that have to do with anything?”
He wasn’t sure if it was a gleam of amusement or a shimmer of misgiving that he saw in her eyes. “Never mind.”
He left Arabella to find her maid and her luggage and wove through the members of their party until he found Oliver. The middle-aged man might be getting older, Michael thought fondly, but he would keep him as long as he could. After all these years, it was hard to imagine someone different in his place.
“Yes, Your Highness?” Oliver greeted him. He still sat astride his horse, a wool cap covering his head instead of his cloak’s hood to allow him a better range of vision.
“She said yes,” Michael said. He couldn’t help a small smile, even if her agreement hadn’t been everything he’d hoped for. “Time to start splitting up the group.”
“Yes, sir,” Oliver calmly replied. Without another word, he lifted his reins and nudged his horse towards the clump of Arabella’s guardsmen.
Before long, Michael realized that Arabella may have had a point. While he was skilled in negotiating disputes between guilds and organizing logistics on a large scale, the finer details of the situation had eluded him. If nothing else, perhaps he should have presented the idea to Arabella before they ever left the castle. For example, he had expected the guards to wear off-duty clothes with their leather jerkins for protection so that they would not be recognized as members of the royal guard as they rode along or when they arrived at the inns. Unfortunately, it was too cold to expect them to change outside, and even if the weather had been warmer, he could hardly have asked them to strip off their shirts on the side of the road.
Thankfully, between their standard-guard leather jerkins and the standard-guard cloaks they all carried, they were able to cover their royal guard insignia, so the deception would still work.
Also, the transition to two traveling parties would have been smoother if the servants had planned for it while packing. Since they had no expectation of such a thing, trunks had to be unearthed from the supply wagon that could have been arranged nearer the top…if the packers had known it was necessary. Food had to be repackaged so that smaller quantities could be carried by the royal couple and their guards while the bulk remained in the supply wagon. Individual outfits and their accompanying clothing items had to be drawn out of their carefully-packed positions and stuffed into saddlebags.
And all of it was happening on the side of the road with a stiff breeze waiting to turn into ice any fingers that dared to be without the protection of gloves for the sake of being nimbler.
He hoped that there was enough food and little enough clothing visible to convince passers-by that the clearly-royal travelers were simply setting up for an early outdoor lunch. Only a few miles from the city. On a day masquerading as early winter.
What a mess.
When everything was finally arranged, Michael, Arabella, and their guards positioned themselves at the back of the caravan. They could travel faster with only horses than the rest of the group could with the vehicles, but Michael wanted to travel at a leisurely pace since his primary goal – now that he had no meetings to fill his day – was to spend time with Arabella and re-charm her. Therefore, he was going to let the servants set a quick pace and outstrip him instead of the other way around.
They rode in silence for about an hour. When Michael decided that the caravan had enough of a head start and that the guards had spread far enough away, he pulled the hood of his black cloak back far enough to show his face and looked over at Arabella.
One of her maids had taken advantage of the stop to pin her hood to her hair so that she had the same freedom of vision as without the hood, but maintained some of the hood’s heat-trapping advantage. The dark blue nestled in her blonde hair contrasted beautifully with the rosy red of her exposed cheeks. Under the cloak, she wore one of her blue riding dresses. There was no extra skirt from the dress to spread across Shadow’s flanks since the “dress” was split down the middle, but the extra length of her cloak filled the role perfectly. Someone – probably the same maid who had arranged her hair – had spread it out evenly so that Arabella and her mount made a magnificent picture.
“I suppose I should fill you in on the rest of the details,” Michael said, breaking the silence. Their silence, that was – the wind wasn’t exactly howling, but it wasn’t quiet, either.
Arabella turned her attention from the colorful leaves on the trees lining their path to him. “Details?”
“Yes. If we are going to present ourselves as someone other than ourselves, our stories need to match.”
Arabella considered him for a moment before nodding. “That makes sense. So what is our story? I assume you have already decided?”
“Naturally,” he replied. “I wouldn’t have suggested it unless I thought I could present something believable. So I’ve already worked out the details.”
“Hopefully better than the details of leaving our crew,” she cut in. It could have been a snide comment, but her voice was light, and there was a slight twinkle in her eye.
He shook his head and grinned. “Touché. You were right, I was a little out of my depth there.” He shook a finger at her. “But I ran our story by Oliver while discussing the security concerns with him. He agrees with me that it should work as long as we can pull off the act.”
“Oh, well, if Oliver signed off on it, that’s fine then,” Arabella breezily said. Michael felt his heart lift a little. Being a demure, gentle creature, Arabella didn’t often tease. The fact that she was definitely teasing now boded well for him.
“Thanks,” he said ruefully.
“So, the story?” she prompted.
“Right. We are well-to-do nobodies: enough money to travel in our fine clothes, not enough status to travel with an entourage, not important enough to bring guards.”
“Well-to-do nobodies?” Arabella laughed. “I have experience being a nobody; I guess I can be a well-to-do one. But wouldn’t it be easier if we were the type to bring guards? Then they wouldn’t have to hide.”
