Their guides were Chancellor Jorgen and his wife, Odette, who began telling the ladies the history of the town and of the margravate of Thornbeck. Fronicka and two others ignored her and talked among themselves, but the rest of the ladies seemed to be listening.
As it was not a market day, the streets were not very crowded or noisy, and there was no wind, so they could hear her quite well.
“This street is known as the Jewish section of town.”
One of Fronicka’s friends whispered rather loudly, “Jews? Did she say Jews live here?” She, Fronicka, and her friends wrinkled their noses and said, “Ach,” and “Let’s go faster.”
Being Jewish was a lot like being a servant. No one outside your work status, or in their case, outside their ethnicity, wanted to have anything to do with you. But there was one difference: From the looks of the four-story, half-timber houses, many of the Jews were quite wealthy.
A little boy was walking with a young woman down the street toward them. Though they were well dressed, they kept their eyes focused down and did not meet anyone’s gaze. Did Lord Thornbeck mistreat the Jews? Many towns had laws that prohibited Jews from belonging to any of the skilled workers’ guilds, thus preventing them from having any but certain types of jobs. Some towns, she had heard, had expelled entire populations of Jewish people, blaming them for plague, for poisoning the town well, or other disasters. Were the woman and boy, both of them obviously Jewish, afraid of the margrave?
Her heart constricted. She knew how it felt to have other people treat you as no one at all. It was a matter of course for a servant girl, the daughter of a crippled stable worker. But to be looked down on simply because you were born Jewish—that somehow seemed even more unjust.
Just then she caught Chancellor Jorgen writing something in a tiny book. Was he spying on them so he could report back to Lord Thornbeck? What was he looking for?
Magdalen was looking at Odette and the chancellor out of the corner of her eye. Was she also noticing that something was going on besides just a tour of the town?
Somehow Avelina had to figure out how to make Magdalen stand out in Lord Thornbeck’s eyes. But to do that, she needed to know what he valued, what he was searching for in a wife.
They passed on from the Jewish section of town and entered what Odette called the skilled workers’ section. “This street over here is where you will find many butchers’ shops.” The air smelled faintly of raw meat.
Most of the ladies wore bored expressions, and some even slightly resentful. Avelina imagined they were irritated that they were not being entertained. Taking a tour of the streets of this town, encountering ordinary people who did not even know that they were the daughters of dukes, earls, and barons, was not their idea of being treated as they deserved.
Odette took them down a side street. “We shall leave our horses at the town stable and walk the rest of the way.”
The ladies stared at each other with open mouths. One or two scowled and grumbled under their breath, but they all complied.
How would Lady Dorothea have reacted? No doubt she would have been as indignant as Fronicka and her friends appeared. Dorothea might have even protested, saying something like, “We are noble-born ladies. We are not accustomed to soiling our feet on the common streets of town.”
But no one complained loudly enough to be heard, and they all dismounted, including Lord Thornbeck, who was only a few feet away, observing them.
She supposed she could not blame him for watching them, for wanting to know the character of the woman he would marry, wanting to make the wisest choice. Still, it made her feel a bit like cattle, lined up and waiting for the farmer to choose who to kill for the king’s Christmas feast. But these ladies, especially the three or four who always had such passive expressions on their faces, were used to thinking of themselves as pawns to be married off to a powerful or wealthy man in order to benefit their fathers. They were well aware they had no say in the matter of who they wed. Therefore, they could have no say in how someone as powerful as the Margrave of Thornbeck chose his bride from among them.
Avelina had always imagined that someday she would be fortunate enough to marry someone who fell in love with her first. She had written about such a happening in many of her stories, imagining all the ways it might happen for her.
She was a poor servant girl. And even though it was unlikely she’d ever be wed to someone wealthy or powerful, no one was telling her who she must marry.
At least there was one blessing to being poor.
After handing off their horses to the stable workers, they set out on foot.