Alistar’s condition was no better. He locked himself away in his room each day, and stopped attending mealtimes. If he ate at all, then it was brief and inconspicuous. She went three whole days without seeing him, until one evening when he finally showed up for dinner, his hair tangled, his clothes tattered and his body unwashed.
His wonderful eyes were hollowed out and sunken, a grave expression on his handsome face. Her father was absent again, so it was just the two of them. She was happy for the company, but her cousin wasn’t exactly in the most sociable of moods. Madeline had just finished laying out meat pies and chilled cow’s milk, sparing Alistar a concerned glance before she moved to stand off to the side where she would wait on them until the meal was finished.
Not knowing what to say, Anice blurted the first thing that came to mind. “So you’ve finally left your room.”
Alistar looked up from his untouched food, and gave a broken nod.
“I thought you’d never leave. You can’t just stay in there for the rest of your life, you know.”
He bit his lip, downcast.
She cleared her throat. “I’ve got an idea. Why don’t you come into town with me today? You can meet my friends!”
“You have friends?” he said dryly. A small grin fought its way onto his lips, but it left as quickly as it came.
She bit back a sharp retort and pressed him further, knowing that he was in low spirits. “It’ll do you good to get out of the house. Back when you just arrived, you were amazed by a ball of mouse droppings, but now you just sit in your room all day with only your thoughts for company. There’s a ton of stuff to do in town! I bet it will take your mind off of things.”
The cries of shattered glass and a heavy curse floated down from the floors above. Ignoring it, Alistar looked up at her as if she were a stranger. And then, against all odds, he let out a tired laugh. “You know, that has to be the most intelligent thing you’ve said since we met.”
More glass shattered from above.
Anice glanced at Madeline, who stood patiently with her arms folded, a concerned look on her modestly pretty face. Turning back to Alistar, she said, “So? Will you come with me?”
He didn’t answer immediately. He ate in silence, apparently seized by a sudden hunger, ignoring his manners as he stuffed the food into his mouth at an unhealthy pace. Once he finished, he glanced down at himself and muttered, “Let me go wash. I’ll meet you back here in an hour.”
An hour! He rushed out of the dining hall before she could voice a complaint. Madeline cast a considerate gaze at Alistar’s back as he left, quickly cleaning up after them and then leaving to attend to her cousin.
An hour and a half later, Anice was standing by the dining table with her arms crossed, her foot tapping against the floor in annoyance. Just what was taking him so long?
He better not have changed his mind.
Right when she was about to go drag him from his room, he walked in from the far door, running a hand through his freshly cut hair with an odd look on his face as if rubbing at someone else’s head. Those greasy, long tangles were gone, shorn down to the length of a finger and freshly washed. The new look surprised her so much that she let out an awkward, startled squeak.
“Y—your hair!”
He shrugged, glancing over his shoulder at a satisfied Madeline who had followed in his wake while hefting up her skirts. “She wouldn’t take no for an answer. It’s weird, isn’t it?” He kept running his fingers through the honey-brown strands, which sat handsomely above his newly exposed face. It was quite distracting.
“Y—yeah,” she mumbled. “It is weird. Really weird!”
“Are you okay?” he asked. “Your face is red.”
She kicked one of his shins.
“Ah! What was that for?”
She turned on her heels. “Let’s go already. I’m tired of being in this room.” She caught Madeline hiding a smile, though she ignored it. The woman saw them to the edge of the property, to the end of a cobblestone pathway that ran quite a distance up to a pair of heavy iron gates that formed a break in the stone walls that surrounded most of the estate, which were opened by a male house servant dressed in fine greys. Nearby, two guards sent lazy waves in their direction before returning to a game of cards where they had set up a wooden table beneath a small canopy to shield them from the sun’s rays.
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Madeline chose to stay back, which left Anice blinking in surprise. Was it because Alistar was going out this time? As they left the adults at the gate, she began scheming to bring her cousin into town as much as possible from today onward.
“Be back before sundown, you two!” Madeline waved as they set off down the dirt pathway that wound around a big hill that sat between the estate and the town. The path trailed through a long swath of oak trees, which opened up to an impressive view of the sprawls of rooftops and the occasional high-standing buildings that made up Mayhaven.
Walking through the western gates of the city, Alistar’s face lit up like it had many times before when she had showed him all sorts of things around the manor house. He hadn’t shown her this expression since before he’d received news of his mother’s passing. Buildings as tall as three storeys sat cluttered along well-paved streets, side by side with the many houses that stretched far off in each direction.
Anice snuck glances at her cousin as he drank in the sights around him, which were overshadowed by the beautiful, snow-peaked silhouettes of the Tall Mountains in the backdrop.
He caught her looking at him and asked, “So, where are we going?”
“To the market square.”
The market in Mayhaven was located at a huge plaza in the heart of town. The area was littered with dozens of stalls that advertised various wares and merchandise. There were a lot of food stalls there that Anice frequented and she figured that tasting some of the local cuisine would brighten Alistar’s mood. Most of the dishes found there wouldn’t appease a noble’s palate, but she thought many of the recipes were delicious and didn’t care how messy or cheap they might look. Besides, she hardly ever paid for her food. She was the count’s daughter, after all.
Most of the lengthy trek was spent in silence, largely because Anice didn’t know what to say. Alistar looked a lot different with his hair shortened, and for some reason she found it hard to tease him, which usually made up most of her dialog toward him. After the market square, she planned on showing him to her friends’ special spot, the place they hung around by large river that cut directly through the eastern area of the county. The others were almost always there, and she had a feeling that Alistar would have no problem fitting in with them. He was smart, like Corrie, so at the very least those two would become friends. He was the only person as competitive as Helen, and she figured that he was more fit than Zech, who took pride in his athleticism. As long as he got along with those three, then he shouldn’t have any problems with the others.
Anice smiled as she imagined the perfect situation playing out in the coming weeks. She would drag Alistar into town as much as possible, and since the house servants favoured him, they would leave them to their own devices without supervision. Alistar would make new friends and hopefully cheer up, and then once he was in a better mood he’d play with her more often.
Soon enough, they were entering the market square from the western entrance. Four long streets led up to the plaza, one from each direction. Most of the people that walked the streets were in the midst of returning home for the day, since it was Sunday, and people only had to work half of their usual workload should they desire to work at all. Anice could see herds of sheep and other livestock being led away by their owners, and pointed this out to her cousin, much to his enjoyment.
Many of the shops and stalls were closing up early for the holy day, some last-minute shoppers haggling for prices with merchants and stall owners. Perhaps over a hundred people were still in the area, with occasional groups of guards passing in twos and threes while they kept an eye on those around. For some reason, Alistar glared at every man in uniform that they passed.
“Alistar,” she said, “it’s rude to stare like that.”
He blinked, catching a guard’s eye in passing as the man laughed along with a stall owner. “You’re schooling me on manners?”
“Shut up!”
He sighed. “So, what are we—”
“Granny!”
Anice spotted her favourite stall and rejoiced that it was still open. The old woman behind the table sold sweet rolls and sugar sticks, which were the perfect after-dinner snack.
“My, if it isn’t little Miss Silverkin.” The elderly woman wore a loose, brown smock under a cream-coloured apron that might have once been white. Her frayed, greying hair was bound back by a strip of cloth, her eyes wrinkled in a way that said she smiled often. She bit her lip for a moment, most likely because they had caught her in the midst of closing her stall. “What can I do for you this evening?”
“Two sugar sticks!”
Anice loved this lady’s candies.
“Two sugar sticks it is.” The woman grabbed two of the smaller sticks from the little bin she stored them in. She was always giving Anice the smaller sticks, which was the only complaint that she had of the woman. Handing them down, the elderly woman noticed Alistar, who was looking this way and that with wide eyes full of wonder. “My, what a handsome boy. I’m not sure I recognize this one. Is he part of your little group?”
“This is Alistar.” Anice tugged on his sleeve. “He’s going to be living with us from now on!”
As if he’d been oblivious to the interaction, he looked up, a bit startled, and introduced himself. “Pleased to meet you,” he bowed. “My name is Alistar.”
Anice had never seen the old woman show any signs of surprise. She was usually frowning, which was unfortunate, since she would sell a lot more sugar sticks if she just smiled more. But her eyebrows had pulled up when she heard that Alistar would be living at the estate. “The pleasure is mine,” she said softly, staring into his eyes as if trying to spot something behind them.
Anice always left the moment she got her sugar stick, so she thanked the elderly woman and turned to leave, but was stopped by Alistar’s outstretched hand.
“Don’t you have to pay her now?”