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“Where are your shoes?”
“I outgrew my shoes. My mother said my feet are too big for my body.”
“Well, why don’t you get some bigger shoes?”
“We don’t have any money. But now that you gave me this, I am going to save it so someday I can pay a cobbler to make me a pair of shoes.” The boy held up the penny she gave him, smiling and showing the missing spaces where he had lost a few teeth.
She spoke in a soft voice as they headed down the corridor. “Why doesn’t the High Sheriff give you shoes? He should take care of his servants.”
“Before Lord Emery died, we used to have everything we needed. But Lord Gregory is mean and doesn’t care about anyone but himself.”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” said Maira, her heart going out to the boy. “But now that I’m here, I will make sure you have a pair of shoes to wear as well as anything else you need.”
“Are you going to be the new Lady of Durham since Lady Catherine died?”
“Well, I don’t know about that,” she said, not wanting to reveal to the boy that she had no intention of sticking around that long. “Tell me, where is the kitchen? This castle is so huge that I’m afraid I’m already lost.”
“The kitchen is next to the great hall,” he told her. “But we can’t go that way or the High Sheriff will see you.”
“But I need food for my friends.”
“There’s another way we can go, and no one will see you at all.”
“What do you mean?”
“This way,” said the boy, leading her down a darkened corridor that looked as if it were a dead end.
“This doesn’t lead anywhere,” she told him, thinking he was playing a game with her.
“It does, if you know about the secret passageway.”
“Secret passage?” She looked around but, in the dark, couldn’t see an opening anywhere.
“Under here,” he told her, pulling aside a hanging tapestry and pushing against the wall. She heard a creaking noise and then felt a gush of stale air hit her in the face. There was a soft light coming from up ahead. “There’s the kitchen,” he told her, leading the way.
In the dark, Maira ran her hand against the wall to guide her way. They came upon a maze of openings, and as her eyes became accustomed to the dark, she could see cracks of light every so often.
“What’s down these corridors?” she asked, hearing her voice echo in the tunnel.
“They lead all over the castle,” the boy told her.
“Does the High Sheriff know about these passageways?” she asked curiously, already devising a plan of escape.
“Nay, my lady. The servants know about them, but no one has told him, just in case we need a place to hide. Lord Emery never used them and it has only been since the High Sheriff took over the castle that we started using them again.”
“Interesting,” she said, making a mental note of where to find the entrance to the secret passageway.
The boy pushed aside another tapestry and they entered into the very busy kitchen. None of the servants even paid them any attention as they went about their work. Servants hurried to and fro, baking bread in the large, brick ovens, and turning roasted meat on spits over the open fires. There was a scullery at the far side of the room where the servants washed the dirty dishes in water that they hauled from the well outside.
“My mother is over here. I want you to meet her,” said Tommy, taking her hand and pulling her across the room. The servants all looked tired and gaunt and very dirty. She wondered when they’d last washed their clothes or had a bath.
“Mother, this is Lady Maira,” said Tommy, stopping in front of a butcherblock table. A tall, thin woman wearing a wimple and a gown covered in flour turned her weary eyes to meet her.
“My lady!” She dropped the dough she was kneading and curtsied. Some of the other servants heard her and stopped what they were doing and bowed and curtsied as well.
“No need for that,” she told them with a wave of her hand. “Please, go on and get back to your chores.” The last thing she needed was the High Sheriff seeing his servants bowing to her right now.
“Tommy, why did you bring her in here when we’re working?” scolded his mother. “If the High Sheriff knows, he will be furious.”
