Chapter One
Hollow
Caelia stood before her family table in the back of the manor house. She pushed the heels of her hands into the warm, sticky dough. Too sticky. Her fingers dipped into the sack beside her. She sprinkled flour across the top and folded it in. The dough clung to her skin before coming clean away.
Her family’s servant, Joy, stepped up beside her. Her hair was tightly curled and black as night. Her skin was a cool brown. The woman was like her bread, warm and soft and filling. She tested the dough’s release. “Perfect.”
Caelia smiled to herself, proud of the simple task she had mastered. The fire was warm behind her, pleasant in the cool, predawn morning. Joy and her kitchen were like splashes of rain to Caelia’s parched soul, each drop thrumming into the hollow emptiness inside her.
Wearing his most elaborate leather vest, her father stepped into the room. They had the same pale skin and black hair, though his was turning gray at the temples and beard. Caelia’s smattering of freckles and her winter-blue eyes came from her mother.
Her mother. Dead of the putrid throat three years past. The pain in Caelia’s heart was still sharp and poisoned.
Papa frowned when he saw Caelia’s dress, the lines bracketing his mouth severe. “I buy you a wardrobe of the finest dresses from Landra, and you wear a peasant’s attire.”
Caelia brushed her hands down the apron, aware of the baggy shirt and plain brown skirt she’d bought in town yesterday—the shopkeeper had assumed she was buying it for Joy, and Caelia let her think it.
She couldn’t bend in her fine dresses—not with their blasted corsets and tight bodices. Not to mention that it was impossible to brush the dirt from the fine velvet skirts. “I need to work in the garden.”
Her father pulled out a chair and sat at the table. “That’s why we have Joy and the hired hands. You’re a lord’s daughter. Not a maid.”
Caelia’s head dropped. She was trapped in this house. Trapped by the disgusted looks and the buzzing gossip that followed her like angry wasps—never to her face. Not yet. After all, she was still the lord’s daughter. Expected to manage the household, plan parties, and keep correspondence with their family throughout the United Cities of the Idelmarch. Not hoe the garden barefoot, the sun-warmed earth soothing the hurt inside her.
Joy pulled the skillet of dala bread off the hearth stones, and plopped it down hard on the table. “Taking nothing and making it into something can be its own kind of healing, Lord Daydon.” She was obviously angry, but smart enough to keep her tone civil.
Papa clearly wanted to argue—the servant shouldn’t talk back. But Joy wasn’t just any servant. Her breads and jams were enough to keep any man silent. And there was the matter of Caelia and her father’s secret. Joy couldn't know for certain, but she had to suspect.
“Fine,” Papa grumbled. “But you will not wear that attire beyond the yard.”
Caelia bowed her head. “Yes, Papa.”
Grumbling, Papa looked around the spacious kitchen. “Has that boy not come down yet?” He cupped his hands around his mouth. “Bane! Breakfast! Now! Or you’ll have nothing until lunch.”
Caelia shot Joy a thankful look as pounding footsteps traced Bane’s progress from the side of his bed on the second story down the narrow stairs—where he skipped the last four to jump to the bottom—and rounding in through the kitchen.
Still half asleep, he raked thick, black hair out of his eyes. It promptly fell back. He had the same pale skin and hooked nose as Caelia, though his eyes were bright gold surrounded by brown. He instantly zeroed in on the dala bread. “Is there honey?”
Joy chuckled. “Honey, yes, but only if you agree to a haircut.”
He glared at them from under said hair. “I hate haircuts.” Stuck between a child and a man, his voice warbled.
“I’m afraid that will have to wait.” Papa laid a slice of ham onto his plate beside his dala bread. “We’ve a full docket of rulings today. The magistrate will be waiting.”
Gleeful at his triumph, Bane wolfed his meal down like he hadn’t eaten in days, though Caelia had heard him sneaking food from the cellar in the middle of the night.
Joy packed them eggs, bread, cheese, and an apple for lunch. “Speaking of which, I need permission to attend today.”
He eyed her as he drank his tea. “You’re a complainant?”
This surprised Caelia. Joy and her husband and daughter got along well with everyone in their small town.
Joy didn’t meet his gaze. “Yes, sir.”
“Why not tell me now?”
Joy shuffled uncomfortably. “Harben agreed to pay us ten bags of wheat and two chickens for our goat when his harvest came in.”
Papa’s teacup froze halfway to its saucer. Caelia’s heart echoed frantically through her hollow chest. Harben’s wife, Pennice, knew their secret. If the woman told anyone, rumor would be confirmed as fact and Caelia was through.
“If Harben can afford to keep the pub in business all on his own,” Joy went on, “he can afford to pay us for our goat.”
Harben had a bloated sense of self-importance and poor money-managing skills. Papa couldn’t offer such a man leniency. Besides, if Papa started favoring Harben now, when would it ever end?
Papa studiously avoided Caelia’s panicked gaze as he pushed to his feet. “Maybe you’d better come after all, Joy.” He stiffened as he noticed Bane watching them from underneath his unruly hair. “The forest take you, boy, get dressed! I’m ready to leave.”
Bane shot to his feet and out of sight beyond the kitchen.
Joy untied her apron. “Make sure you grease the corners and mind you don’t burn the bottom.” Caelia didn’t understand what the woman was talking about until Joy nodded to the bread pans.
All at once, Caelia became aware of the dough drying under her nails and around her cuticles. “Yes. I mean, no. I’ll watch it.” She turned away before Joy could note the desperation on her face. Their family servant already suspected more than she should.
“Fetch your cloak, Joy,” Papa said. “And wait for me outside. It’s chilly this morning.”
“Yes, of course.” Joy took her cloak from the peg and slipped outside, where the light had turned more silver than gray. Sunrise would be coming soon.
“I’ll take care of it,” Papa said softly to Caelia.
“How?” Caelia’s voice broke.
“I’ll tell Pennice we owe her one favor—anything she wants. But she can ask once.”
“What makes you think she’ll honor that agreement?”
Papa spread his hands on the table and leaned forward. “If she doesn’t, she gets nothing.”
Their secret lay heavy and dark between them. Caelia could feel the tears building.
“No one has any proof. Just stay by me until the storm passes.”
Clearly, the town didn’t need proof. “And if it doesn’t?”
“I’ll make sure it does,” he said firmly.
Wanting desperately to believe him, she hastily wiped her eyes and nodded.
Her father went for his own cloak when a distant shout sounded from the town. Then another. And another. Each closer than the last. The bell tolled, the peal resonating through the hollow of Caelia’s chest.