Brewer's Tale, The Read Online Free PDF Page A

softer voice, ‘I’ll be in a position to be able to offer you, and your brother and sister, a roof over your heads.’
    â€˜ You would offer me, us, a home?’ I couldn’t keep the surprise from my voice.
    â€˜I didn’t say a home, I said a roof.’ She bent until I was forced to meet that gelid gaze. She might be my mother’s blood, but her eyes were like my father’s. ‘Up until a few hours ago, you had a dowry, prospects. Your father and I would have found someone in town who’d be pleased to call you wife, mayhap even one of those broken-hearted souls you’ve rejected over the years. Now you’re a liability. That’s the word you used, isn’t it, Master Makejoy?’
    Master Makejoy mumbled into his chest, shuffling the parchment on the desk.
    Hiske laughed. ‘You’ve no prospects, cousin. Not any more. Why, you’re less than a crofter or villein’s daughter, and who in their right mind would want the burden of a penniless wife encumbered with two extra mouths to feed?’ She paused as if expecting me to respond. ‘Exactly,’ she replied, snapping the silence. ‘That’s why, though my responsibilities have, with your father’s demise, formally ended, out of the goodness of my heart, and Master Makejoy’s, I’m prepared to have you come and live with me —’
    It was my turn to look startled.
    â€˜As my housekeeper.’
    I swallowed. ‘And the twins?’
    â€˜I would clothe and feed them until they were of age and then, of course, they would be put to work. Master Makejoy is sure he could find a position for Karel. Betje, well, one can always do with an extra kitchen-hand or chambermaid. I’m sure Blanche, or Doreen for that matter, would be happy to teach her. If not, the nuns would take her.’
    Doreen’s growing impudence suddenly made sense. Hiske had been planning to leave, to set up her own house, for some time.
    Taken aback at her boldness, her certainty that such an opportunity would be grasped, I gathered my thoughts before speaking. Hiske was right. Not only was I on my own, an orphan, so were my brothers and sister. Whereas Tobias, thank the dear Lord, was assured a future, nothing was certain for the twins or me any more. As a nineteen-year-old unmarried and penniless woman, I was indeed a liability. My situation had been cruelly defined, and it was brutally reduced. As for the twins … I recalled the fate of other, less fortunate children whose parents had been taken from them while they were still young. Monasteries were filled with these souls. Now, here I was, along with the twins, to be counted among the unfortunate, an object of pity. My chest burned.
    I could hear Will in the corridor outside, Iris too. It wasn’t just me and the twins who stood to lose each other, our house, our world. Our servants, most of whom had been with us since before I was born, relied upon us. They too were family. My family . And my family would not live with Hiske.
    No matter what.
    That Lord Rainford could set out the family’s obligations at such a time, define the extent of our losses; that Hiske and Master Makejoy resolved between themselves to announce our plight so soon after the news of my father’s death, reflected poorly on all of them. It made me furious and more than a little afraid. Our destiny had never been mine to control — that was for Father to manage — and he’d neglected that responsibility. Though I thought I knew why, I couldn’t forgive him. For just a brief moment, when I’d learned of Father’s death, I was disconsolate but, in the furthest recesses of my heart, I’d also caught a glimpse of liberty and extraordinary possibility. I wasn’t prepared to relinquish that and hand over my future to someone else — especially not to Hiske. I looked at her now, the narrow mouth, the almost non-existent eyebrows arched in