But there was one thing she knew how to do that most servants did not: she knew how to read. She had convinced Lady Dorothea to teach her years ago and then to allow her to join the lessons with her tutor.
“I like to read and make up stories.”
This time both his brows quirked up. “Stories?”
“Tales. I write tales of adventure, quests of courage and love. Romances.”
The muscles around his mouth went slack.
Was it bad for a lady to make up tales? The chancellor’s wife was staring at her with round blue eyes and a half smile.
After a few moments he said, “I should like to read one of your tales.”
“Oh,” Avelina spoke through her sigh of relief, “I’m afraid I did not bring any with me.” She smiled, trying to look apologetic.
Was that a disapproving look on his face? Though the margrave’s chancellor and his wife looked very pleasant, the margrave was definitely scowling. “And what kind of things do you like to read?”
“I don’t actually—” She was about to say, “I don’t actually have any books of my own.” Her heart skipped a few beats. An earl’s daughter would never say that. “That is . . . my father does not approve of my reading romances, so I must read them in secret. I also read the Bible.” When I can sneak the German-translated version out of Lord Plimmwald’s library.
“Do you like to hunt? We will form a hunting party at least once while you are here.”
“Oh no, I cannot abide hunting.” Truly, she had never been hunting before, but the prospect filled her with horror. “I shall stay at the castle during any hunting parties.” That should annoy him sufficiently.
“Do you enjoy dancing? We shall have two balls.”
“I am not a good dancer.” She had never learned to dance. She was too busy working at the castle to dance in the streets during festivals with the other villagers, and she had never learned the courtly dances Lady Dorothea knew, the ones the margrave’s guests would no doubt be dancing at the ball. “I shall watch all the other ladies dance during the ball.”
His brows low and drawn together, he did not look pleased. With her strident answers, he’d never guess she was a lowly servant. And voicing such strong opinions made her hold her head a little higher.
“I see. And what are your thoughts about marriage?”
“My thoughts about marriage?”
He nodded.
The question made her heart speed up and her breath grow shallow.
Her feelings about marriage were . . . fanciful and unrealistic. The other servants laughed at them, and Lady Dorothea rolled her eyes and called her “daft.” Noblemen and women saw marriage as a contract, a means to an end, and most of all, a duty. But why change her tactics now? She would tell him the truth.
“I have always thought one should marry, if at all possible, not because the person you marry can give you the most position or wealth, but out of love. After all, if there is no love, if you have no romantic thoughts about each other, then you are much more likely to treat each other badly. And all the position and wealth in the world will not make a person happy if they feel unloved.”
The margrave opened his mouth as if to answer but said nothing. She couldn’t resist going on. She had given this a great deal of thought, after all.
“A woman wishes to be swept up by a man’s fervent feelings for her, by love and longing and depth of feeling. She does not wish to be married for her father’s coin or her noble birth or because she is a sensible choice. She wants to be wooed, even after she is married, to be cherished and loved for her very self, not just because she has a beautiful face, long after she has passed the age of freshness and youth.”
She had said too much. She sensed it by the way no one spoke or even seemed to breathe—besides she herself, who was breathing rather fast. The chancellor was still writing furiously. The slight scraping of his quill was the only sound.
Her face burned and she suddenly was quite smothered in the closed-up room. “That is, if one does not have to marry for duty. For, as I already said, a lady must think of her people first and foremost . . . not about love or feelings or any of those . . . things.”
What a clumsy, unrefined person she must seem to the sophisticated margrave, the chancellor, and the chancellor’s beautiful, polished wife. Ach. She must have frightened him away from ever wanting to marry her, at least.
She pulled at her sleeves, wishing it were permissible to push them up past her elbows. Was it hot in this room? Sweat was starting to trickle down the center of her back.