Luathara - Book Three of the Otherworld Trilogy (12 page)

The young woman looked up for the first time and I saw Melvina’s double, only younger, gazing back at me.  The
expression
of concern on her face was briskly replaced with surprise.

“Who are you?” she asked.

“Uh, sorry, I’m Meghan.  Meghan Elam.”  I held out my hand and grinned, but the girl’s eyes only widened.

She stood up and backed away, giving a quick
curtsy
, then
glanc
ed at her skirts and grimaced.

“Forgive me, Princess, I’m not looking my best.”

“Princess!” the boy shouted.

He quickly scuttled behind the older girl, clutching at her skirts and trying to hide.

“Niall!” the girl hissed, kicking him lightly with her foot and nodding towards me.

The boy, Niall, reluctantly let go of the girl’s skirts and stepped forward, sketching a bow that might have been
featur
ed at court.

I hadn’t realized I’d been standing there gaping like an idiot until the older girl cleared her throat.

“I’m sorry Princess Meghan, my name is Birgit, and this is my brother Niall and our sisters Oriana and Wynne.  Our father is Briant, the steward
of Luathara
, and our mother is Melvina the cook.”

The two girls scuttled from where they stood to go press against their sister’s other side.

Finally, my voice learned how to work again.  “No, don’t, I’m not-” I babbled.

The four of them gave me an odd look, and somehow I managed to find my composure.

“It’s very nice to meet you all, but please, just call me Meghan, or Meg.”

I
tried out a smile
, but they looked even more frightened.

“But mum says we have to always give respect to our elders.  What if I called you Lady MacRoich instead?”

Birgit hissed at her brother again, and I couldn’t tell what shocked me more, the fact that he considered me an ‘elder’ or that he thought I should be called Lady MacRoich.  I’m sure I paled, and then flushed
scarlet
right after.

I cleared my throat.  How had this strange encounter grown so awkward?  “Um, no, I’m giving you permission.  I’m not Lady MacRoich so you can just call me Meghan.  I’m not that much older than you.”

“Why can’t I call you Lady MacRoich?  Aren’t you the one Lord Cade brought back from the mortal world?”

“Niall!  Do I need to glue your mouth shut?” Birgit growled, giving him a look that would scare the audacity right out of me.

Before I could let his question sink in, Birgit plastered her face with a smile and said, “Don’t mind my brother, he has this horrible habit of speaking without thinking,
all
the time.  Is there someone you were looking for Prin-, uh, Meghan?”

I could tell Birgit wasn’t very comfortable using my name, but I was determined to show the people of Luathara that I was one of them.

“No, I was just exploring the castle and Fergus took off through the fence.  I think I’ve seen everything, though.  Would you like some help with the garden?”

Birgit’s eyes grew wide again.  “Oh no, you can’t be pulling weeds!”

I arched a brow.  “Why not?  I used to do it all the time at home with my brothers.”

The sudden thought of home and my brothers brought a pang to my heart, but I shrugged it off.

Birgit looked like she was going to protest again, but I walked past her before she could speak and knelt down in the partially weeded flowerbed.

“Um, you might want to show me which ones are weeds.  These don’t look anything like the plants in the mortal world.”

I
peer
ed over my shoulder to find Birgit, frozen in place with Wynne and Oriana still clinging to her skirts.  All three of the girls resembled Melvina, but Birgit had her mother’s graceful posture, d
espite the mud and dirt.  Niall, on the other hand,
was a spitting image of his father.

“I’ll show you!” he cried, instantly getting over his fear as he sprinted up to me.

I studied him as he slid into place beside me.  His hair was dark with a bit of curl to it, and his dark brown eyes were flashing to gold as he pointed out the weeds and explained that they had to be grabbed at the base if you wanted to get them all the way out of the dirt.

We had cre
ated a nice little pile of discarded plants
before Birgit joined us.  She remained silent, and I wondered why she was so quiet until I remembered that I was a princess to these people.  I sighed, but kept at my work.  Cade must have told them about me, but how much had he told them?  Obviously they knew I was Danua’s daughter, but wouldn’t he have told them that the high queen and I were estranged? 
Ye
t maybe he felt that it was my place to share that bit of information.  Then Niall’s words from earlier hit me full force:
Why can’t I call you Lady MacRoich?  Aren’t you the one Lord Cade brought back from the mortal world?

What had he meant by that?  I shook my head, reminding myself that my goal at the moment wasn’t to analyze the ramblings of young boys, but to try and make friends with the residents of Luathara.

I cleared my throat.  “So, uh, Birgit, how long have you and your family lived in the castle?”

She was quiet for a moment, methodically pulling weeds from the flower bed.

“A few months now.  Lord Cade asked my parents if they would like a position at Luathara Castle, and they happily agreed.”

She paused and pressed her hands to her thighs and looked at me with a small smile.  “We all love this place and it has been empty and sad for so long.  It's good to know that it will be occupied once again.”

I yanked at a weed and felt the satisfying tear of roots
leaving
the soil.

“Do you always call him Lord Cade?”

She shrugged and got back to work.  “Mother and father insist upon it, though he would rather we just call him by his first name.  He says it makes him feel strange, but Mother and Father would be angry if they knew.  It took them long enough to stop calling him Lord MacRoich.”

I nodded.  I knew exactly how Cade felt.  He
and I had a somewhat similar past
, growing up with foster parent
s
and not really ever belonging.  Just as being called 'Princess' felt so very wrong
to me
, I’m sure Cade
shied away from
the title of 'Lord'.

We spent ten more minutes pulling weeds, Birgit telling me about life in Kellston and Niall piping up every now and again to add his own details while their two younger sisters, who I learned weren’t twins but only a year apart in age, played in the flower bed a few yards away.  I thought about my own family back in the mortal world and I had to suppress the pain.  I wondered
when I'd get a chance to visit them again
, if only to make sure Aiden was okay. 
He'd
taken my departure the worst.

A sharp bark and the sound of heavy footfalls on the gravel drew my attention away from the weeding.

“Over here, my lord.”

I glanced up to find a young man following Fergus.  And behind him was Cade.

Cade stopped in his tracks and eyed me from head to toe.  I glanced down at my jeans and shirt and suppressed a grimace.  I was filthy.

I met his eyes and gave him a sheepish grin, blushing a little, then shrugged my shoulders.  “I wanted to help.”

Cade simply crossed his arms casually and shook his head, a humorous lo
ok on his face, his green eyes flashing to pale gray and back again
.

Birgit and Niall had leapt to their feet the moment they saw Cade and now had their heads slightly bowed.  I was still kneeling in the mud, so I had to crane my neck to look up at them.  Ugh, I was
so
not used to this kind of behavior.  I would expect it
at
Erintara in my mother’s
court
, but not here.

“Thank you, Arlen.”  Cade nodded to the young man.

Arlen bowed his head once, then he glanced up and gave Birgit a quick smirk before turning and leaving the garden.  I craned my neck again and noticed the slight blush and smile on Birgit’s face.  I felt
the
corners of
my own mouth curve
upward
.  Looks like I’d have something to ask Birgit about
the
next time we met.

Cade strode forward, so I made some effort to get up.  My legs were stiff from kneeling on the ground for so long and Niall was quick to come to my aid.  I thanked him when I was
on my feet
and his eyes widened with pride.  I laughed.  He’d be a charmer when he was older.

I turned my head and found Cade standing right in front of me, arms still crossed and one eyebrow arched in question.

“Look, I made some friends,” I said, turning to indicate my weeding partners.  “Birgit, Niall and their little sisters.  They told me that Briant and Melvina are their parents.”

Birgit and Niall curtsied and bowed at the mention of their names, but Oriana and Wynne were too busy making mud pies to notice us.

“I see you’ve done a good job getting the anchor root out of the chamomile patch.”
 
Cade waved a hand to indicate our handy work.

“Anchor root?” I asked.

“Oh!  That’s what we’ve been pulling out!” Niall jumped in.  “It’s called anchor root because the roots are really hard to yank out of the ground.”

I felt Birgit more than saw her stiffen behind me.  Niall noticed too because he suddenly became silent and his brown eyes grew wider
as
his face paled.

“I’m sorry, my lord,” Birgit said in a pained voice, “Niall has a problem with manners.”

Ahhh, that’s right, the whole ‘lord’ and ‘lady’ thing I was wholly uncomfortable with.

I glanced at Cade,
hoping to gauge his reaction.  To my great
delight
, he was smiling warmly and stood just
as
relaxed as ever.

“Birgit, we’ve had this discussion many times, you Niall and I.  You don’t have to call me ‘lord’ and you don’t have to worry about offending me simply by sharing your thoughts.  Please, I am the furthest thing from nobility and the last thing I want is for those who work and live here at Luathara to think that they are in any way beneath me.”

“But, you’re the grandson of-”

Cade raised his hand to stop Niall from continuing, and to my surprise, the boy stopped mid-sentence.

I arched a brow at Birgit, but she only turned her face away, scowling down at her talkative little brother.  I gave Cade a sidelong glance, but he wasn't looking at me.  He had never mentioned grandparents be
fore, but with Niall's outburst
I was curious.  Very curious.  Unfortunately, now wasn't the time to probe.  I made a mental note to ask about it later.

“That doesn’t matter," Cade said, answering the boy.  "I know your parents wish for you to act a certain way, and I won’t argue against that, but Meghan and I both would like you to feel comfortable around us.  Show us the same courtesy you would your fellow neighbors in Kellston.”

A strained silence fell over us all until Cade held his hand out to me and said, “Melvina has informed me that dinner will be ready in an hour, so if any of us needs to clean up, we best go about doing so.”

He eyed me again, that glint of mirth in his expression, and I had to bite back a small smile.  I took Cade’s hand, wiping as much dirt off as I could before I laced my fingers in his.  He didn’t seem to mind.  I turned and waved at Birgit and Niall and told them I’d see them later, then Cade and I made our way back to the castle.

“Did you have a good day?” he asked as we stepped through the archway into the courtyard.

Everyone seemed to be packing up for the night.  The men and women
who were rebuilding the
crumbling wall climbed down from the scaffolding
,
and those already on the ground stack
ed
loose stones up in neat piles.

I sighed, somehow gladdened by the scene.  “I had a wonderful day.  What time is it?”

“Five thirty,” Cade answered as we
ascend
ed the few stairs that fanned out in front of the castle keep’s main hall.