Chapter 5: Hild's Terms

The captain left us in the hollow with a bow.

His look said he would sooner hang a man than explain a duchy to a girl.

Hild stood with her arms folded and the knife tucked in her belt.

She had stopped shaking.

"Right," she said. "Terms."

"Terms?"

"You're the Duke."

"I didn't say that."

"A knight on his knees said it for you. Terms, your Grace."

I sighed.

The old Duke had warned me that the clever ones are the ones who unpick you.

"Tell me," I said.

"One. Mam doesn't know."

"Agreed."

"Two. You call me my lady."

"No."

"Three." She jabbed a finger at my chest. "You hang Osgar Gaunt in front of the whole village, and I get to hold the rope."

"That one is law, not a bargain."

"Then I'll settle for the second."

"My lady," I said.

She grinned, small and fierce, and I saw our mother in it, though I would not have said so yet.

We walked down through the trees together, and I let her talk.

She told me about the croft, the tally-keeper's cottage that the manor lent to her father for his clerking.

She told me how he'd made the figures for the Duke's rolls and carved horses for the fair in the evenings.

I said nothing.

I watched my boots.

"He was the quietest man I ever knew," she said. "He didn't shout. He just stopped talking, after. For years."

Keep reading free with an account. Start The Lost Son Returns as the Duke from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.