Chapter 3

Three

I greetedMrs. Hale as I entered the dining room for breakfast, my mind going in a thousand directions at once. “Good morning.”

“Good morning, Your Grace.” She looked unfairly chipper despite the fact she’d gotten to bed long after I had. Every strand of greying hair was in place in her usual high bun, her apron pristine, though it was fraying around the edges.

I sat at the head of the table, as usual. I preferred something light in the mornings, so a salad, roll, and three boiled eggs were already on my plate. It was perfect after the wine last night.

Which reminded me… “How’s our guest?”

“He should be down shortly.” Mrs. Hale filled my teacup, chattering all the while, as was her wont. “Such a nice man, he really is. Very polite. I took him up a hangover potion and some fresh clothes to change into this morning, and we chatted for a bit. Did you know he’s literate? He was writing something at the desk last night before bed.”

I blinked, surprised by this. “He is?”

“He said he was a businessman on his world.”

“Ah.” Now that made sense. Merchants were usually literate. They had to be.

She retreated to put the teapot back on the table.

I started on breakfast, as I didn’t know how late Jake would be. He had drunk quite a bit the night before. Not that I blamed him. If I were in his shoes, I wouldn’t know how to react. Knowing me, I’d likely track down the ones responsible for summoning me and put them in a shallow grave.

I was not precisely the forgiving sort.

Last night, it had been hard for me to fall asleep again. Hope had kept me awake. My situation here had gone beyond desperation, and honestly, I didn’t see how we’d make it to the end of the year. Every possible thing that could go wrong, had. I wasn’t sure if we had enough to eat this winter, and there was precious little time to rectify that. Jake’s arrival seemed like some sort of signal from the gods that maybe things could be turned around.

Eventually, though, doubts had crept in. Jake had told me frankly that he possessed no magic. Being a man, he couldn’t possibly be a holy maiden, either. Usually summons were holy maidens but…well, it seemed like the way he’d been brought here was unorthodox. I doubted he was a true summoned.

Perhaps it was desperation that made me want to lean on him, but that was hardly fair to him. He’d been brought here against his will. Shoving all my concerns and problems onto his shoulders wasn’t right. Also not practical. What could a man from another world possibly do to help me?

The best thing was to help Jake acclimate here, and then if he chose to set off, let him go. This duchy had no future, after all.

Jake, so far, had handled it all gracefully, with a poise and confidence I rather envied. Speak of the devil, and there he was. Jake walked in looking downright perky for a man who had tossed back almost a full bottle of wine last night. He was in new clothes—dark brown trousers tucked into knee-high boots, a black shirt and vest, with a hunter green coat that fit him rather well. The clothes were very flattering on his slim body, highlighting his short platinum blond hair and fair skin, the coat accentuating his green eyes. He was almost…petite…for a man. Very much on the smaller side. I didn’t for one second believe him to be weak because of it.

This man had a spine of pure iron.

Perhaps that was why I found him attractive. He was a beautiful man, and his confidence attracted me to him, like a bee to a flower. I didn’t want this harsh land of mine to break him.

Jake greeted me with a smile. “Good morning.”

“Good morning. Did you sleep well?”

“Like a log,” he replied cheerfully. “And those hangover potions? My god, I love them so hard. If only I could export them to Earth, I’d make a billion overnight. Not sure what to think of the waste chute, though. I’m used to toilets. Adjustments need to be made.”

He seemed…chipper? Strangely so. I would have been more somber and worried in his shoes, but his mood didn’t seem put on or forced. His body language was relaxed, no tension to be found as he sat in the chair.

“I was thinking,” he started, reaching for his tea first. “I want to take a tour around the duchy, get a feel for the place. It feels strange not knowing where I am. I feel like a tour might give me orientation. Also, if we can somehow confirm whether I was transported here for a purpose or not, that would be great.”

I was loath to announce Jake’s presence to the central government. For many reasons. I’d put that off for a while yet. “I will think of a way. Giving you a tour of the duchy is fine. I intend to walk about today, anyway. There’s several things I must check on.”

“Cool. I’ll tag along, then.”

He spoke in such interesting ways. I understood his meaning, from his tone and body language, but the words and phrases he used were foreign to me.

I didn’t want to question his good mood but something urged me to at least ask, “How are you doing?”

He popped a bit of roll into his mouth, chewing and regarding me before swallowing to answer. “Honestly, whole thing still feels surreal to me. Like a very vivid dream. I’m having a hard time believing it’s real.”

Ah. Now that explained his attitude.

“And,” he tacked on, “this place is already better for me. Here, I don’t have parents forcing me to do things I would rather not. Like stay married to a scumbag.”

I froze for a moment. I didn’t know why, but I didn’t like hearing he was married. “You are…married?”

“Well, was.” He grinned, pleased. “I filed for divorce before I got hit by truck-kun. Come to think of it, if I’m dead on that world, the marriage is definitely null and void. Ha! In the end, I win anyway.”

How bad had this marriage been that he celebrated his death as a way of being free of his spouse…? It wasn’t my business, so I bit the question back, but I had to wonder.

“The food is delicious.”

He didn’t seem to realize the table was meager in offerings. Normally, a lord’s table had twice as many dishes as this, even for breakfast. Well, he’d realize shortly just how poor my duchy was. Then, no doubt, he’d be eager to leave for the capital. I wouldn’t blame him for that. Although if he did turn out to have any kind of power, I’d have to find a way to keep him here.

We ate the remainder of our meal in silence, then I silently gestured for him to follow me. We passed through the main hallway of the castle and outside, and I watched his face as we walked. He seemed…actually, I wasn’t able to discern his emotions from his features. He looked intent, as if he were soaking it all in.

My people took pride in their territory, so everything was clean and orderly, but no one could claim it to be in good repair. We just didn’t have the means. The houses arrayed in front of us were shabby—there was no other word for it. Patchwork on top of patchwork, with obvious signs of damage not properly fixed.

We walked out of the front gate and Jake didn’t say a word, staying in step with me as we went down the main drive. My first stop was Grit, who manned the storehouses. Jake had told me only humans lived on his world, so I thought it wise to drop a word of warning.

“Jake, most of my people aren’t human.”

He tilted his head back to look up at me. “Yeah?”

“We’re sort of a hodgepodge of people who have gathered here over decades. Everyone here is good people, and I know their appearance might take you aback, but there’s no need to fear them.”

“Got it. Thanks for the heads-up.”

Hopefully my warning was sufficient. I didn’t want him scared. He was dealing with enough as it was.

Grit spotted me first and waved a hand above his head. “Your Grace. Good timing, got lots to say.”

“Good morning, Grit.” I clasped hands with him, still keeping a weather eye on my guest.

Jake did something of a double take upon seeing Grit, not that I blamed him. Half Troll, half Giant, Grit had to be the largest person I’d ever met. He made me look short, and that was something of a challenge. He towered over draft horses, his girth matching his height. He’d told me once his father had dropped him as a child, and that was why his cheekbone, jaw, and forehead weren’t shaped correctly on the right side of his face. He looked ugly as sin because of it, but Grit was one of the most reliable people I had. I was blessed he’d joined my duchy thirty years ago, as I couldn’t imagine what situation we’d be in now otherwise.

Hoping for the best, I did the introductions. “Grit, this is my guest, Jake.”

Grit bent a little and offered a hand in greeting. “Jake, a pleasure.”

To my surprise and delight, Jake took Grit’s hand firmly and looked him right in the eye. “Nice to meet you, Grit. I’m very new to this country, so do you mind if I ask you questions?”

The tension riding in my chest eased. Jake, apparently, was not one to judge based on appearances.

Grit grinned, showing crooked and yellowing teeth. “Ask away, little man.”

“Excellent, thank you. Is this a grain bin?”

“It is.”

“One of the things I had to check on today was our grain supply,” I explained. “We’re in midsummer right now, and if we don’t have enough food in stock for the winter, I need to find a way to get more in quickly.”

Jake squinted at the sky. “So you’re saying it’s summer right now?”

It didn’t feel that way to him? To me, it was already uncomfortably warm this morning. “Yes, the height of summer.”

“Huh. Feels like a spring day to me. Your winters must be very cold.”

Grit laughed, but it was black humor at best. “Snow gets to the top of the roofs some winters.”

Jake’s eyes widened almost comically. “Yikes! Well, thanks for the warning. I’ll invest in some snowshoes and lots of blankets. How much food do you need for the winter?”

“More than what we have.” Grit’s shoulders slumped, a sigh strong enough to shake the leaves off a tree gusting out of his mouth. “My lord, it’s not good. That damn miasma somehow got into the north grain bin.”

My heart sank. That was precisely what I had feared. What I’d hoped against hope hadn’t happened.

The north grain bin wasn’t actually that close to the Wall, but it was the northern storage for the farms that were—had been—in that area. To think the miasma had come that far south was just…it worried me. Even the word worry paled in comparison to the emotion twisting at my guts.

And there wasn’t a damn thing I could do about it.

“Miasma?” Jake asked, eyes darting between us. “Theon mentioned this last night, but I don’t really get what it is.”

Grit put a hand on his shoulder and turned him, pointing toward the massive wall that rose behind the castle. “See that purple fog coming out from over the Wall there?”

“Yeah, hard to miss. That’s miasma?” Jake squinted a little. “Looks eerie as fuck.”

“It’s poisonous,” I said hollowly. “A slow, insidious poison for anyone living in the area. It won’t harm living people immediately, but to plants, it’s instantly lethal.”

Jake’s gaze turned to me and stayed there, studying my expression. “So, in other words, your land is being overtaken by a slow-growing poison by inches. And it’s destroying your crops while doing it.”

I winced and nodded. It felt like bile crept up the back of my throat, the whole situation making me nauseous. Still, I had to deal with it.

“Grit, can you work up a list of how much grain we need to recover? And send it to my desk. I’ll do what I can to replace it.”

Grit gave a low hum. “I can, but where do I put the good grain?”

Fuck, that was another problem. All our other grain bins were full, and we couldn’t trust the north grain bin as safe. “The ballroom, if you have to. Just find somewhere safe to put it.”

“Will do.”

I motioned for Jake to follow and set off once more. He stayed in step with me, and I could see the wheels and cogs spinning in his brain.

“Is this why I was likely summoned? To deal with that miasma?”

“It’s a good possibility. They normally summon a holy maiden when the miasma starts to grow out of control, or some other problem has occurred in the country.”

His footsteps paused, eyes sharp on me. “Maiden? But I’m neither a girl nor a maiden.”

Hence my concern. I didn’t think Jake could fix this miasma problem. “I don’t have an answer to that. I just know they traditionally call a girl.”

“Well, fuck. So I’m likely a mistake?”

I didn’t want to tell him so. Truly, I hoped I was wrong and that he did have divine power. But the answer was obvious. “Quite possibly. Or, for once, the summoning spell brought in a man.”

Jake’s nose scrunched up in doubt. “Yeah, I think I’m weighing in on the ‘mistake’ side myself. Like I said, not magical. You don’t sense magic on me, do you?”

“Well, no,” I admitted. As one of the Fae, I would be able to easily tell if he had traditional magic. I wouldn’t be able to tell if he had divine magic, though. Hence why it was still up in the air whether he was a divine “maiden” or not. Well, that and... “Except the coin in your pocket.”

“What?” Jake patted his pockets, looking confused, then drew the coin from his coat pocket with a sigh of exasperation. “I did not put that there. Why does it keep showing up in my pocket?”

“Items made from Fae magic grow attached to people.” I shrugged. “It won’t let go until it’s ready to do so.”

“Lovely.” Jake shoved the coin back into his pocket.

Truthfully, it was the coin that sparked hope in my chest. Anyone claimed by Fae artifacts had something special about them. I didn’t know Jake well enough at this point to guess what it might be, but I was determined to keep him close until I figured it out.

“Where we heading next?”

“The watch’s barracks.”

“Oh, sure. Makes sense that you have lots of soldiers here in a duchy.” Jake pursed his lips as he looked around. “Can I ask nosy questions?”

“Feel free.” His questions would tell me much about him. I wanted to get the measure of this man.

“How big is the duchy? I have no sense of scale right now.”

“Roughly forty-five thousand acres, but we only have access to about half of it.”

Those vibrant green eyes were sharp on my face. “Because of the miasma?”

“Yes.” I gestured toward it wearily. The damn stuff was the bane of my existence. “When it first manifested, we built a wall to keep it out, but then we had to move the Wall and make it a more permanent structure as the miasma overrode the first one. We lost half of the territory in the process.”

“Shiiiit.” Jake let out a low whistle, expression perturbed. “That’s not good. How many people in the duchy?”

“Roughly thirty-six hundred.”

“It takes roughly ten acres to support one person, so…what you’re saying is you don’t have enough workable farmland to support the duchy.”

Look at that sharp mind, how quickly it did the math on it all. He really was a businessman, wasn’t he? “That’s the core of the problem. The second problem is that we don’t have good trade going. We’re far out of everyone else’s way, and we also don’t have any unique products to offer at the market, so there’s nothing to build commerce with.”

Jake looked around again, at the simple wooden houses we passed and the people who greeted us. All of them thin, worn, looking tired but pulling on smiles to greet me. My people had never blamed me for their poor conditions. They should have, as it was my job to provide for them, but they never had. I was both grateful and laden with guilt.

“It’s not sustainable,” Jake muttered, almost under his breath. “Trying to eke out a living in these conditions isn’t sustainable.”

“I know.” I did. Painfully well. I was between a rock and a sword point. I just didn’t have any more options to pursue. With a humorless smile, I joked with black humor, “It might not matter by next year, anyway. If the miasma comes much farther over the Wall, we’ll have to retreat or face the grave.”

He was still studying me, as if trying to divine my true feelings. “Is there truly no one you can call in for help? No resource to use to at least buy you more time?”

“I’ve used every resource I had to get us this far. The miasma has been encroaching farther south with every year. We’ve reached the point of inevitability.” I shook my head, moving two steps forward to open the door into the captain’s office. “You landed in the wrong duchy, Jake.”

He didn’t give me an answer, but I didn’t expect one. For his sake, I would treat him well, as he didn’t deserve all my problems handed to him. I’d take him to a priest after this to be tested for divine power, on the off chance he was a holy maiden, but if it proved he didn’t have any power whatsoever, I’d find a way to send him to a more prosperous place.

There was, after all, no point in leaving him here to suffer.