Part 2 of 7

Lord Montalli had visited twice. One visit was spent inside of her quarters, talking and drinking tea and eating sweet treats. It had felt nervously intimate to have him in her private space, sat in a chair mere feet from the bed she slept in every night. The other visit had involved a stroll of the small gardens kept on the west side of Ravenskeep; they were accompanied by an entourage of guards and servants. They spoke in small bursts in between viewing beautiful sculptures and carefully trimmed topiaries. She hoped either they would find some common ground soon or a silent affection would bloom between them. As yet, she only felt tremulous in his presence. He had good breeding that had lent him a handsome face with a prominent nose and high cheekbones. She hoped to grow an attraction to him beyond his looks, though. All of his topics of conversation revolved around her physical features, but she was not looking to be flattered; she was hoping for an intellectual connection.

The visits did not follow a pattern she had noticed thus far, but she had not seen him for a number of days when the commotion began.

Clattering and yells of surprise were muffled by her door, but they still roused her from her doze. She sat up in bed unsteadily, blankets slipping down to her lap. It was nearing midnight from what she could tell from the minimal light allowed into the room by her small window. The horrifying cry of a man that sounded like Mister Auguste (her guard for the night hours) snapped the sleepy haze from her body. The pain in his voice was startling and stomach-turning.

Riella’s bare feet were skittering across the cool stone floor before she remembered leaving the bed. With a skid she halted just before the door and leant her face close until her ear was almost touching the wood. Multiple male voices growled on the other side, yelling, threatening, calling for aid. Metal and wood clashed and clanged without rhythm. Riella’s heart was beating in her cheeks, fingertips and stomach. A chilled sweaty sensation rippled over her skin both inside and out of her nightdress. They were fighting, but she didn’t know who ‘they’ were. The only voice she recognised was Mister Auguste.

Suddenly she heard a woman’s voice grunting and shouting added to the concoction of noise, recognising it after a few moments as Miss Asta. She was not due for rotation for hours yet, the sun was not close to rising. Riella could no longer hear her night guard, Mister Auguste. She closed the last of the gap between her face and the door, crushing the delicate skin of her ear against it.

As the peal of metal bouncing off metal continued, Riella’s terror had her alternating between holding her breath to hear better and panting through the anxiety that was clutching her chest. She had never been in such a situation; she had never fought anyone or been attacked. But the cries of pain and fury outside gave her conscience a thumping. She could not hover on the other side of the door and do nothing. Miss Asta and Mister August could be injured or in mortal danger. She could not stand by and let them get hurt, there was always something that can be done.

Riella jerked back from the door and began searching the tiny room for anything of weight. All she had to her name since leaving her family home were a few items of clothing and jewellery, books, perfume, and a pocketful of coins. Ravenskeep had provided her with bedding, a tin cup, a two-coloured rug, and… Riella’s eyes fell on the broom propped up against the wall beside the door that led to her private washroom. She snatched it up and ran back to the door. Fear-induced hiccups wracked her breaths, but she had no time to pause and gather herself. She needed to be of some help, any help.

Riella took as deep of a breath as she could shudder into her chest and threw the door open, broom raised over her head, and screeched, “Leave Miss Asta alone!”

A thick, tension-filled silence settled on the hallway before her. Piles of bodies littered the ground with two standing in the centre. Asta swiftly cut the throat of the last intruder with a shortsword and dropped the slight man’s body atop the others. He went down with barely a gargle and was dead before he hit the ground.

“What in the gods’ names are you doing?”

Riella lowered the broom slowly, her arms shaking,

“I… I heard scary noises, I thought they were hurting you.” She managed to garble out through her tears. They had burst forth into her eyes in the same moment she had burst into the corridor.

The hard-faced guard looked her up and down scathingly and raised her brows, crinkling the scars that ran through one.

“And you intended to battle them with… that?”

“I don’t have anything else, ma’am,” she sobbed, the overwhelming panic catching up with her again now that the fight seemed over. She dropped the broom with a clunk and covered her face with her nightgown sleeves. Half to cover her mortification and the other half to shield her eyes from the blood-coated hallway.

Asta approached swiftly and grabbed at Riella’s legs, swooping her up against her chest and walking her back into her room, kicking the door shut behind them.

“You’re okay, you just took a fright,” she murmured comfortingly against Riella’s hair.

Riella clutched Miss Asta’s loose shirt wretchedly and sniffed. It was strange to see Miss Asta in comfortable clothing rather than armour. She guarded Riella’s quarters during the day, so she must have come straight from her own sleeping quarters when the disruption began. In the half-sleeved shirt, Riella could see the tattoos that decorated Miss Asta’s bulging arms. They were mostly patterns with a few symbols dotted between them, all black ink.

When she set her upon the floor, Riella’s legs were trembling but the tears had stopped, and she had been reduced to sniffs and hiccups. Something about the shock of seeing Asta, and even more so in her bedclothes, then being held by her like a child in her arms, had apparently aided in knocking the hysteria out of Riella.

“Go wash you face,” Asta ordered.

Riella nodded solemnly, her bottom lip distended, and turned on the spot to leave.

Asta grabbed the back of her nightie with the reflexes of a viper.

“What the?” The guard said aloud, crouching to examine the backs of her legs.

Riella stiffened. he did not know how many more scares she could take before she fainted. “What’s wrong?” she squeaked.

“It’s my fault, I got blood on you when I picked you up.”

“What?!” Riella darted to her floor length mirror in her washroom and peered over her shoulder at her backside; she had to lift her nightgown higher than she’d usually like to see it, but sure enough there were scarlet, dripping, handprints on the backs of her thighs, just beneath her buttocks.

A churning feeling pulled at her tummy, but she tied her nightdress up in a knot around her waist once she had checked that Asta was still in the main room and could not see her. With the bottom half of her body exposed she briskly washed the wet marks from her thighs. Her hands moved quickly because the water was cold, and the blood smell was tickling the part of her throat that made her retch. Once the back of her was clean and dry, she returned to the main room with her nightdress released to cover her fully. Miss Asta was standing in the centre, her posture strict.

“It’s a good thing you noticed, I can’t be getting anything on my nightie - I only have the one,” Riella said as lightly as she could manage. Her voice shook despite her best effort at composure.

“You could send it to be washed,” Asta offered.

“I wouldn’t have anything to sleep in for the rest of the night.”

“You could sleep naked.”

Riella’s hand jumped to her face. “Ladies don’t do that!” she whispered with a nervous giggle.

“If you pay them enough, they do,” said Asta with the slightest tweak of a grin. There was a reminiscent tint to her eyes.

Riella flushed, her entire body heating uncomfortably. “Oh, my goodness.” She could not meet Miss Asta’s eyes as she tentatively asked, “Is that what you spend your free time doing?”

Miss Asta’s almost-smile dropped. “My free time is none of your business, little lady.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Riella mumbled, flustered by the sudden change of atmosphere. She could have sworn the temperature genuinely dropped a few degrees in the room.

A hurried, messy, knock on the door behind Asta had her drawing her sword again. She threw the door open with her body in a defensive stance. Riella hovered behind her, her own body wracked with jitters.

“I was sent to check on Lord Montalli’s bride.” A man’s voice announced. “There have been multiple groups of crazed men forcing their way into the keep.”

Asta lowered her weapon but did not sheath it. “The group that came our way are all on the floor at your feet,” she said carefully. There was a tinge of threat behind her words. As though she were the warning the man that if he were lying, if he was secretly one of those crazed men himself, that he would meet the same fate as those in the corridor.

“None slipped away?” he asked.

“Not that I saw. I also came to protect Lord Montalli’s betrothed - I am her day guard.”

“Understood. I see she is in capable hands, I will continue my scouting of the area.”

“Have fun,” Miss Asta grunted before shutting the door. The man’s footsteps on the stone floor could be heard through the door for a few seconds before they dissipated with distance.

Riella shifted her weight from foot to foot and wrung her hands. “What about the others? Where did Mister Auguste go? Will Lord Redfallow be in danger?”

“He has his own guards. My job is to guard you, so we will not worry about anyone else.”

“I don’t think I can keep from worrying,” Riella admitted.

Asta shrugged. “Well, I am locking us in here either way.” As she said it, she was already pulling a key from one of her pockets and shoving it into the door.

“Okay, ma’am.”

“Go. Wash up. Then you will go to bed and do your best to sleep.”

Riella nodded obediently and returned to the washroom to give the rest of her body a rinse. The skin of her face prickled at the chilly water, but she felt bounds better once she was clean. Temptation won and she took a quick glance in the mirror before she left the washroom. Her reflection’s eyes were puffy from tears, and her cheeks and nose were dusted with a light pink blush. Sleep would soothe her body, if she could get some.

Riella slipped back into the room, past Asta and to her bed. She slipped under the blankets and pulled them up to her chin. The room was as dark as it had been when Riella first awoke. Miss Asta had not lit a candle or lamp. She wondered if that was for the benefit of her rest, as Miss Asta had taken up a sentry position sat on the floor with her back against the door.

“Miss Asta,” she whispered. “What will happen if more of those men come?”

“I will kill them, little lady,” Asta answered lazily. She was wiping blood from her sword as she spoke. Moonlight glinted off her weapon and her hawk-like eyes.

Riella buried her face into the pillows beneath her and squeezed her eyes shut. Sleep did not come easily to her.