Chapter #2: The Scarlet Witch
The rustling next to me awakened me. Eve was sitting up, tossing back her long black hair, fumbling around on the ground for her servant's dress. Once an accused witch chained in my dungeon, she was now my concubine—and for all intents and purposes also head of the household, my primary liaison to the castle staff.
"Good morning, my lord," she said, looking over her shoulder. "Sorry to wake you. I wanted to head down to the kitchen to see how the cooks were coming with your breakfast." She was carefully keeping her back to me while putting her clothes back on. She knew that were I to get a good look at her lovely, full breasts I might well end up waylaying her from her task—although I don't think that she realized that I was on to her in this regard. It was fine with it; as it was I partook of her charms nearly every day, sometimes more than once.
"Yes, pray do," I said, "I'm famished."
She nodded in acknowledgement, then cracked open the doors, peeking out and looking both ways. She must have only seen guards, for she quickly darted out of my private chamber and down the corridor. While my lying with Eve was not an uncommon event, her spending the entire night in my bed was. We both did not wish it to be common knowledge about the castle when it happened. Eve knew my mother and sister did not approve of my carnal affairs, and I saw nothing to be gained in showing my surviving gamily any of the overwhelming evidence that when my father had been the Duke he was no less generous with his seed—only perhaps a bit more discrete about it. I felt I had nothing to hide as I was unmarried—although when eventually there was a Duchess of Averic, she would need to accept that there would always be concubines in the household as well.
As for Eve, my first and so far only concubine, I had no complaints, for she understood her standing perfectly. She was there for me when I wished for her. Were it not for me, she would either have been tortured to death as a witch or would have been a destitute citizen of the town, while as one of my, shall we say, favored servants she had a pretty good life in the castle. I knew that deep down, Eve longed to have me for herself, but she understood that this could never be. I think part of her attraction to me was that she admired my zealous attempts to bring the chivalric ideals of justice and fairness to the province. I would also like to think that, in part, it was because I had been part of the king's Elite Guard of knights until becoming Duke just a few weeks before. I was still muscular and lean from constant physical activity whilst wearing heavy armor. I hoped to avoid the portliness that comes of too little activity and too much feasting, such as my father had been.
Most of the time Eve fulfilled her role perfectly, but some times, usually times where she had been particularly reactive to my lovemaking, to the point where I would feel tremors shaking the length of her body, she had a hard time disguising her desire to have me for herself. It was usually at those times that I took pity on her and asked her remain in my bed for the night. By morning, she invariably was able to regain her sense of decorum. Make no mistake, I was quite fond of Eve, but I had by chance fallen into a position that afforded me access to many a fair maiden, and I saw no reason not to make the most of that chance. In exchange, I told Eve that she was free to find a husband for herself, if she so chose, with the one stipulation: so long as she continue to serve in her current capacity, she was to lie with another lover only if employing a sheath. As for myself I usually wore one when having relations with her—but not always.
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When I arrived at breakfast, my sister Elizabeth was lying in wait for me. Without looking up from her plate, she accused "I see you slept with that hussy again last night."
I continued to my seat at the head of the table unmoved. "What I did or didn't do is none of your business, dear sister." I should have known that there was no sense in hiding it; by trusting Eve with many of my most sensitive tasks, I had leapfrogged her over many people in the household pecking order with much more seniority. I had no doubt there were plenty of jealous servants eager to tell the old guard of the castle when her chambers remained vacant for the night.
"You mother is very upset by your...behavior," she replied, knowing mother's voice carried some weight where hers did not.
"Then let her come and tell me so herself," I challenged. Perhaps I was being unfair, but I was not convinced that mother was truly unable to lift herself from her bed since my father passed—she merely chose not to.
Elizabeth made a sour frown, still not looking at me directly. I couldn't tell if she shared my opinion regarding Mother's incapacity or not. "She says you should be looking for a Duchess, not parading around with trollops."
"Perhaps you could then dance barefoot at the wedding?" I said snidely. The remark hit its target—I was not a sister, but it was still common practice to marry older children before younger ones. Had I not suddenly become Duke when my father and brother were taken by a plague, I would have been expected to delay marriage until Elizabeth had wed. Having made my point, I diverted the blade: "Besides, so long as mother resides in the Duchess' apartment, there would be no place to put one!" It was of course a silly argument in a castle this size, there could easily be two Duchess' apartments, but Elizabeth did not press the point. She had lost this round, but we both knew it was not the last this topic would come up.
I decided I would be well-served to get Elizabeth more on my side. "Listen, Elizabeth, in all seriousness—you are one of the most important assets of the province. You are young and beautiful and of royal blood; you will make someone an excellent wife, and with it forge a strong blood alliance with another state. The same for when I take a Duchess, and I will. But we can marry but once—it makes no sense to rush into a union with no political advantage when we may need to forge alliances in the future. Our unmarried (to have said "chaste" in this situation would have been hypocritical) status is a powerful tool that must be used wisely and, in frank, tactically. We must save ourselves for Averic's need."
She didn't say anything, but I could see her demeanor change. She liked to feel important, and I reminded her that indeed, she was. I knew that she personally objected to my taking concubines in large part because she knew I would not stop doing so after marriage, and imagined herself likewise having to a future husband that had no intention of remaining faithful to her. This was not the fairy tale picture she had been raised to try to attain. And, since she knew nothing of my father's exploits, she attributed this to a personal fault of mine. Perhaps it was, but it was a fault I was quite satisfied with.
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After breakfast, it was straight to the grand hall for audiences. I was mediating a dispute between two neighbors involving a field of hay and a goat—for the third time. This sort of thing happened all the time, and besides, ultimately both were my property. But these two men had despised each other for a long time and tried to get the other taken away—and yet neither had take up any of numerous offers to be moved and work a different part of the lands. Both were trying to impress upon me how egregiously they had been wronged, and my patience was wearing thin.
Just then there was commotion at the back of the hall. A group of about six peasants was dragging a frail feminine bundle of rags into the great hall. One of my guards was ostensibly escorting her, but in reality he was watching to try to keep the mini-mob from hurting her—or each other. Leading the way was a shopkeeper that I had already known thought himself very important, bellowing "A thief! This cur is a thief—and a witch! Burn the witch!"
I sighed. Always it was witchcraft this and witchcraft that—it seemed every young woman accused of anything was right away accused of being a witch as well. Superstitious people, my vassals. I quickly disposed of the property dispute and stood to see what was being brought to me.
With a great shove, the mob thrust the bundle of rags towards me, such that she fell at the foot of the stair below me. "What is this commotion that you dare disturb the Court of the Province of Averic?" I demanded.
The shopkeeper bowed low, and assumed the exaggerated obedience with which he always addressed me. "Your Grace, Duke of Averic...this cur was caught stealing..." he droned on for a while... "And if that's not enough, the people of town have seen this demon practicing witchcraft about the town! Look...she even has the mark of the devil upon her." Right on cue, one of the mob pulled on the hood covering the ragamuffin's head. Although mottled and darkened with filth, her hair was unmistakably flame red.
I sighed inside again. Stupid people...in the north, half the population has red hair, and in my experience the fairest maidens to a one bore scarlet locks. But down here red hair was rare, and since the devil's color was red, they concluded that red hair must be mark of the devil. I supposed I shouldn't be too smug, for these folk had never been outside of Averic in their lifetimes.
