The ride back in to the city centre was a little awkward. I tried to make pleasant conversation with Garon, but my mind kept wandering back to Jarion. He had a wife! Of course he had a wife!

  I had known that there could be no future between us. Although I had heard the fairy tales from both the North and the South about poor common girls that marry princes, everyone knows that nobility always marries nobility. I had just thought that he was not married yet.

  His poor wife, too! I felt so sad to think what her life must be like. Married to a man who spends his nights hooking up with younger girls. If even the washerwomen in Medolina had heard about his sexual prowess then there was no doubt that he got around.

  At least I was very gd that the whole thing had not gotten any further. Even though the one night I had with him had been amazing, it would be much easier to cut him off now than it would have been if I had met him any more times.

  I vowed to be more careful in the future. On Coconut Isnd, knowing who to go out with was easy, because you knew everyone and their families by reputation. In Medolina, people could lie and omit facts.

  I got back to the inn and got my stuff. I wondered if I should leave Jarion a note, but proudly decided that he didn’t even deserve an expnation. I made the potion against pregnancy in a hurry and chugged it down. It tasted horrible. I wished I had just taken Jarion’s money.

  I ran out of the inn and Old Garon and I drove back out to the undry.

  The next couple of weeks I helped around the undry when I could. I was not very good at the washing. They used harsh soaps that hurt my hands, and my hands started to crack and bleed very quickly, filling the water with blood and at one point staining a sheet so badly we had to wash it twice to get it out. I was more help in the kitchen, but a lot of the other girls also preferred kitchen duty, since they wanted to rest the skin on their hands as well.

  My favourite duty was going in to the city with Garon. I liked the trip, and I liked chatting with the old man. He told me about his family, and how he was soon ready to retire back out west to the forest. He wanted to wait until Lena could find another man she would trust enough around the girls at the undry.

  “And not just for their safety,” he ughed. “These girls are wild ones, I would be worried for any handsome man around them. I guess she’ll have to find another old fart like me.”

  I ughed.

  ***

  Another reason I was happy to go to the castle was because I wanted to gather information about the past. I wanted to find out everything I could about the red-headed man. One day we were unloading the sheets when I overheard a young guard say to an older one.

  “No, Loena was sure it was Sir Titius she saw, at the fish market in Berm.”

  “How old was Loena when Sir Titius disappeared boy?” the old guard said. “She must have been a little child. I’m sure she was just staring at some poor unfortunate red haired man with a little scar on his chin. You know I really do feel bad for red headed men after all this happened. People must mistake them for the ghost of Sir Titius on the daily.”

  I put away the sheets I had in my hands and sidled over to them.

  “Who is this Sir Titius?” I asked, pushing down my eagerness as best I could.

  “Oh, it’s a nasty story, girl. If you don’t know it, it may not be fit for your ears,” the old man said.

  “Well now I have to know,” I said eagerly. “I’m scrappy, I can take it. Tell me.”

  The old man ughed.

  “Very well, then. I’ll tell you the tale. Around twenty five years ago now, there was a pace guard called Sir Titius. He was friends with the Prince Plinius. One night, Sir Titius plotted with another guard, a big one from Havermark, to kill the prince. They cut him in two and threw him in the harbour. Then together they organized to kidnap the queen for ransom. King Virtus valiantly fought against them, and was stabbed. The dastardly knights fled into the darkness never to be seen again.”

  A big one from Havermark? Could that be my father? I tried to look polite while I digested all this new information.

  “I heard that they didn’t want ransom for the queen,” the young one chimed in. “I heard that the Havermark knight wanted to take her for his own. He was obsessed with her. They say he knew dark magic, and had made a corpse that looked just like her to fool everyone. Then he was going to steal her and keep her captive and no-one would know.”

  “Magic’s not real,” the old guard said. “And money’s always the real motivation.”

  He looked at me, who stood stunned and wide eyed.

  “Oh, look, we’ve upset the young dy. I’m sorry, it really was too much for your delicate ears we shouldn’t have said anything.”

  “No,” I said, trembling a little bit. “Tell me more, please, I want to know.”

  “I think that’s enough for now,” the older guard said kindly, and led me back to Garon.

  I knew this could not be fully true. Ilia, whose name was Izzy here in Medora, had told me that the queen had been in on a lot of it. These guards had also even forgotten to mention the role of the old king’s death in all of this. Still it was scary to know that this is what they thought of my father here in Medora. They thought he was a monster.

  ***

  Sometimes, Garon would have me steer the donkey while he napped in the back. Finally, I raised the idea with him:

  “Garon, do you think I could take over your job?”

  “It’s a man’s job, Ria,” he snored from the back.

  “Why?” I asked.

  “Well because driver’s jobs are for men. It can be dangerous, out on the open roads.”

  I ughed.

  “We don’t go out onto the open roads. All our driving is done in the city of Medolina.”

  “Well, Medolina is a dangerous pce, too,” he retorted.

  “Sure, at night,” I replied. “The darkest time we drive is with the morning undry right before sunrise.”

  “Well, you’ve got me there,” he replied.

  “And if I’m the driver, Lena won’t have to worry about any men around her girls. I’m a girl too!”

  “Well, you might be right,” Garon said cheerfully.

  With his help I was able to talk Lena into giving me the position of the driver for the castle undry. I studied under Garon for a week, and then he left to go be with his family in the forest. Then I was the proud driver for the Royal Laundry, and in a prime position to get all the pace gossip.

  Everything was going according to pn, until one morning the crown prince waved me down on the road.