Page 36 of The Noble Servant

“You had better hurry up and prove it, then. Because as soon as my mother finds out what has happened, she will demand justice, spreading the news from one corner of the civilized world to the other.” She was not at all sure that was what her mother would do, but it sounded good.

“I cannot allow that.” Panic was in his voice now.

She rather enjoyed his distress. It lifted her shoulders.

“Please, Magdalen. For the sake of our friendship.”

“Friendship?” She halted just short of the top of the hill and faced him. “Friends don’t go two years without writing.” Now he would know that she was angry he had not written to her, that she had expected him to after their time at Thornbeck.

“Well ...” He seemed at a loss for what to say to that. “Some friends don’t write. Some friends stay friends even though they haven’t seen each other or spoken for two years, or many more years than that. Some friends, like us, recognize each other evenafter two years have passed and one has grown a beard and the other has become a goose girl.”

Magdalen clenched her teeth to hold in the growl of contempt in her throat. “I would be a fool to stay here now that I know you never wished to marry me. I came here to marry a duke, and now I am going home. Do you hear me? Home. Where people respect me and care about me and have my—my—welfare in mind.” Not her mother, perhaps, but she would not tell him that.

“Lower your voice.” Steffan glanced around. “Someone might hear you.”

“Is that all you can say to me?” She spun around and marched straight to the servants’ quarters.

“You cannot leave now. Wait until tomorrow.” He followed her across the open yard.

She suddenly realized something else and spun around so swiftly, he had to bring himself up short to keep from running into her.

“You were never planning to send my letters, were you?”

The guilty look in his eyes and the way his mouth hung open gave her the answer.

“Give them back to me.” She thrust out her hand. “Immediately. I demand you give me back my letters.” She stared pointedly at the big leather pouch hanging by his side.

He put his hand protectively on the bag.

How dare he keep her letters from her? She lunged at the bag. He held on to it, holding the flap closed. She tried to rip it out of his hands, but he was too strong.

“Stop. I will give you your letters, if you are so determined to have them.”

She let go and he reached in, pulled out her two letters, and held them out to her. She snatched them from his hand and marched to the servants’ quarters.

Just as she reached the door, a voice called out, “Agnes!”

The voice was so familiar, Magdalen turned her head.

The real Agnes was walking toward her with one of the guards from the castle. But she was not smirking. Her eyes were wide and she looked almost ... afraid.

“Where are you going?” She tried to smile. “I thought you were taking care of the geese.”

“I ... I was ... looking for something in my room.”

“What is that in your hand?”

Magdalen’s stomach sank like a stone.

“Nothing. Just some paper.”

“Magdalen, I want you to work in the castle, close to me. Come. Get your things and I shall make you an indoor servant. You would like that better than being a goose girl, would you not?”

Her mind was racing. Why would Agnes want her working in the castle where the duke—Alexander—might see her? Did Agnes know he was not the real duke? Or was she planning to lure Magdalen into the castle and then lock her in the dungeon? Either way, this would ruin everything. She had to run away, to get back to Mallin, and she could not if Agnes held her captive in the castle.

She glanced back at Steffan, but she could not ask for help from him. He was supposed to be dead—or he would be if Agnes’s husband and Lord Hazen discovered he was still alive.

With the guard standing there, she had little choice but to go inside the servants’ barracks, gather her things—the things Agnes had allowed her to have—and head back out to where Agnes and the guard were waiting for her.