FOUR

“SO, it was your father who had betrothed you to Monsieur Didier?”

“Oui. About three weeks ago,” Adalene replied in a soft voice. She had calmed down from the tumultuous event of the morning but was coming to grips at the moment of being with the Baron, of all people.

It had taken about three hours of riding in his horse on dusty, uneven roads from the chapelle before they halted in a cabin in the woods to rest and eat. Someone started fire to cook food while the Baron brought her to the riverbank, which was just a short walk away from the cabin to clean up and stretch her unaccustomed muscles from the cramp of riding his horse.

And now, she watched as he arranged his equipment of bows and arrows in their leather pouches on the surface of a shaven log that obviously served as a table of sorts by whoever owned the cabin. She could smell the delicious smell of soup and jerky from there and she was suddenly hungry, and grateful that they were going back to the cabin to eat after he was done with cleaning up his gear so he could have them kept away in a leather bag.

“I’m not doing this to scare you, ma bichette,” he said in that amused tone again when he saw her watching him checking each sharp point of the arrows. “It’s just that we’re done with our hunting and these need to be cleaned and kept with the others for proper handling by one of the men once we reach the manor.”

She shook her head. “Oh, no. No, I’m not scared. I’ve used arrows... before,” she told him, hesitating when he threw her an interested glance after what she’s said.

“Really?”

She nodded. “I sometimes go with my cousins to hunt in the forest. Just rabbits or birds,” she corrected. “They’ll never let me get deep in the forest enough for wild game. It’s... like a man’s place. And I know I’m not strong enough.”

“So... if I return you to your groom, you do know to shoot him with an arrow if he, say, hurt you?”

Adalene stared wide-eyed at the Baron until she realized she was staring at a baron, and she looked down. “I’m not sure I’ll even be allowed to speak to him,” she admitted. “Her isn’t like any man in my family.”

“Seems like your father had betrayed you instead of betrothed you. You are a young and beautiful woman. I see no reason he could not have found you a better spouse.”

Adalene felt her cheeks grow hot. She could not show anger at the man who found something to fault her father with, not just because he was the Baron, but also because she also felt it to be true. She wasn’t sure about being beautiful. So far, he had only shown her kindness. He probably was again being kind to her by saying she was beautiful because she knew he had met so many beautiful aristocrats in his visits to the Duke and Paris.

She opened her mouth to say something, but then she hesitated. Why would he be interested in what she thought, anyway? No man ever did. Certainly no man of his stature.

But the Baron paused from wiping water from his arms and looked at her. He’s begun washing his arms and his face after he was done with his gear. “What is it? You were going to say something?”

She looked at him. Why was he asking her these questions? He couldn’t really be interested. “I... I was just thinking that my father’s opinion and mine about what a better spouse is are obviously different.”

He definitely looked interested this time. He was again watching her with the kind of focus she’d understood a while back, when they were still in the chapelle. “Really? So what is your opinion of a better spouse?”

Even as she still suspected his motives, Adalene felt she had to reply. “I... I do not really mind if the man isn’t rich, as long as he will treat me right.” As long as he will treat me like I am important to him. That I am a treasure to him. Like my cousin treats my friend Marie, she thought wistfully. She would surely work hard to make herself worthy of said husband.

The Baron was staring at her thoughtfully. “Not many peasant girls will say the thing that you just said and mean it.”

That surprised another reply from her, and she didn’t think about it first. “Why will someone even do that? That’s confusing someone else, and it’s not good conversation.” She then gasped at being so bold with her opinion. She was talking to the Baron!

But he laughed. “Oh, you don’t know. Anyone else will say just about anything to get what they wanted.”

“Not to me... or at least in my family and village, I don’t think... I guess it’s because no one really would want anything that hard to fool me to have it.”

“And I have this feeling you’re a woman whose difficult to fool, ma bichette.”

She glanced back at him again, trying to see if had offended him. He was still smiling. “I do say what’s in my head most times, but just within my family and friends. Not that there’s much people around me, it’s really always them. But there really isn’t any reason for anyone to fool me, my Lord,” she said, politely, at last. “I have simple possessions. They can just simply ask.”

“Hmmm. Now, I have another question.” He was looking at her differently. Contemplatively. “Is it true that you’re a virgin? Have you even been kissed?”

This time, the heat in her cheeks went up in a rather alarming state that she suddenly felt a little faint. But she managed to reply. “Yes, I am a virgin, my Lord. And... no one has yet kissed me.” She looked down at her hands primly sitting on her lap. Eighteen and never been kissed. Her friends would often tease her about it. “My parents feel I should be a virgin and untouched, even by a man’s mouth on my lips, so they can find someone rich to marry me and he will not think I’m tarnished, even as...” she stopped, too hot to continue. She could feel her freckles jumping out of her skin.

“Even as...?” the Baron encouraged.

“The truth is I think my mother did not really want to marry me off. I have become older than my friends who have long ago married.”

He laughed again. He seemed very amused by this. “Tarnished. For being kissed. You have never been kissed, not even once, even on a May Day?”

She was shaking her head on the three instances. “I haven’t gone out on any May Day. My mother will not dare let me out on that day while my brothers often told me that kissing isn’t the only thing that happens on a May Day. I... people get handfasted quick on June because of May, so they’ll lose the chance to marry off their pretty sister to a rich man.”

This time, his laugh was so loud and so clear that it echoed in the forest. Birds flew from branches tittering their complaints. Even after that, he was still chuckling when he looked at her. She could not help but smile at the way his merriment had transformed him from a severe Baron to an affable one. She really couldn’t find a reason to be afraid of him. For one, he seemed to find her forthrightness funny instead of offensive. He didn’t find it odd that she talked-really talked-when she opened her mouth. Others, especially her father, found this really offputting. It was said that her mother shouldn’t have taught her how to read.

So Adalene decided she would not be afraid of the Baron from now on.

His next words threw that decision to the river.

“I am the Baron and I have claimed my right to your first night. That means it will not tarnish you if I kiss you. Isn’t that right, ma bichette?”

She opened her mouth because his expression was waiting for an answer, but all she did was gawk like a fish out of water as she tried to go around the obvious, because there was nowhere to go around it.

She sighed in surrender.

“Yes. I s-suppose if you will k-kiss me... it will not tarnish me at all, my L-Lord,” she said at last, looking at his amused face, knowing he knew that she knew he had just fooled her into getting what he wanted from her.

But she couldn’t get angry. Somehow, she enjoyed the banter.

“There is nothing to be afraid of, ma bichette,” he said in a gentle voice as he approached her. “It is just a kiss.”