the man came round in front of her.
“I didn’t expect you so soon,” Mistress Lockley said. “Tonight I thought surely you’d bring the whole garrison.”
“Most definitely, Mistress,” he said. His voice was almost lustrous. Beauty felt a peculiar tightness in her throat and scrubbed on, trying to ignore the softly wrinkled calfskin boots in front of her.
“I saw this little partridge auctioned off,” said the Captain. And Beauty flushed as the man made an obvious circle around her. “Quite the little rebel,” he said. “I was surprised you paid so much for her.”
“I have a way with rebels, Captain,” said Mistress Lockley in her iron-cold voice without either pride or humor. “And she’s an exceptionally succulent little partridge. I thought you might enjoy her tonight.”
“Scrub her and send her up to my room now,” said the Captain. “I don’t think I want to wait until this evening.”
Beauty turned her head, deliberately shooting a harsh glance at the Captain. Brazenly handsome he seemed, with a blond stubble of beard on his chin as if his face had been brushed with gold dust. And the sun had left its mark on him, deeply tanning his skin so that his golden eyebrows and his white teeth seemed all the brighter. He had his gloved hand on his hip, and as Mistress Lockley told her frostily to drop her eyes, he only smiled at Beauty’s insolence.
PRINCE ROGER’S STRANGE LITTLE STORY
BEAUTY WAS lifted to her feet roughly by Mistress Lockley, who, twisting Beauty’s wrists behind her back, forced her out the back door into a large grassy yard of heavy-limbed fruit trees.
In an open shed on smooth wooden shelves half a dozen naked slaves slept as deeply and easily, it seemed, as they had in the more sumptuous Slaves’ Hall in the castle. But a crude woman with her sleeves rolled up had another slave standing in a hogshead of soapy water, the slave’s hands tethered to an overhanging tree branch. The slave was being scrubbed by the woman as coarsely as if he were salted meat for supper.
Almost before she knew what was happening, Beauty had been forced to stand in such a tub, the soapy water swirling about her knees, and as her hands were tied to the branch of the fig tree above, she heard Mistress Lockley call for Prince Roger.
At once the Prince appeared, upright this time, with the scrubbing brush in his hand, and he went to work on Beauty immediately, covering her with the warm water and scrubbing at her elbows and her knees, and then at her head, as he turned her this way and that very rapidly.
It was all necessity here, and there was no luxury to it. Beauty winced as the brush scrubbed between her legs, and she moaned when the harsh bristles ground at her welts and bruises.
Mistress Lockley was gone. The heavy woman had spanked the poor whimpering scrubbed slave back to bed and disappeared herself into the Inn. And the yard, save for the sleeping ones, was empty.
“Will you answer me if I speak?” Beauty whispered. The Prince’s dark skin was waxy smooth against her own as he tilted her head back and poured the pitcher of warm water over her hair. He had cheerful eyes now that they were alone.
“Yes, but be very careful! We’ll be sent off for Public Punishment if we’re caught. And I loathe amusing the common louts of the town at the Public Turntable.”
“But why are you here?” Beauty said. “I thought I came with the first slaves to be sent down from the castle.”
“I’ve been in the village for years,” he said. “I scarcely remember the castle. I was sentenced for sneaking off with a Princess. We hid for two full days before they found us!” he smiled. “But I’ll never be summoned back.”
Beauty was shocked. She remembered her stolen night near the Queen’s very bedchamber with Prince Alexi.
“And what happened to her?” Beauty asked.
“0, she was in the village for a while and then she went back to the castle. She became a great favorite of the Queen. And when it was time for her to be sent home, she remained to live here as a Lady.”
“You can’t be speaking the truth!” Beauty said in amazement.
“0, yes. She became one of the Court. She even rode down to see me in her new finery and asked if I should like to come back and be her slave. The Queen would allow it, she said, because she