The Seahorse and the Spice 🪼🎩✔

11: Say Something

We all ate at the big table that was usually reserved for when the duke would have guests over and we even had the cook sit with us. Lorado was doing something with the horses so we saved him and Bastion a bowl before it was all gone. I hadn't had a lively table in a long time and getting the duke to eat stew was probably the highlight of the evening.

"So, let me get this straight: I'm supposed to eat this concoction of foods as a whole?" he said, poking a potato sticking out of the soup.
"Yes. You are supposed to eat it like that."
"Andrew, you eat it... first..."
Andrew was already digging into it and eating away.
"Salem, just try it. It's actually very good."
"Why are you making a big deal out of it?" Eadric asked as he ate his. "It's just stew..."
"For your information, nobles never have the food touching until it hits the plate. Each serving is given to us and placed strategically on the plate." Salem said with a frown.
"For God's sake, man, just eat the food!" Andrew yelled, pushing a spoonful of the soup into Salem's mouth.
Salem's mouth closed automatically around the spoon and he didn't say anything for a moment. He then swallowed the soup and licked his lips.
"Well... it's different."
He began to eat and we talked discursively when Eadric began to stare at his soup. He stared at it for a long time when the hot beams came out of his eyes and began to burn a hole into the table. Salem jumped at the beams.
"What are those things?"
"They are beams of hot light. Sometimes he gets these small spells where he just looks at things. It doesn't happen often... Eadric!" I yelled.
He closed his eyes and then looked at me.
"Yes?"
"Do you want more food?"
"Sure... Oh, Bastion..."
Bastion walked in slowly and sat next to the duke on the other side of the table.
"I didn't know if you were going to make it so I made a bowl for you."
"Thanks..."
"How's your head?" the duke asked.
"It's still throbbing but I want something to eat."
I smiled and went to go get the bowl that I had set aside for him. Andrew brought his bowl with him and followed me into the kitchen.
"Bastion doesn't look very well; did you want me to take a look at him while I'm here?"
"If you don't mind. I hate to always ask you for medical things when you come over here for just a visit..."
"No problem. I don't mind doing it for you."
I smiled and looked at the bowl and then at Andrew. He was looking at me funny and I turned my head at him.
"What is it?"
"Why is someone like you a maid? You're kind and gentle and lovely... you cared for your sister's children like they were your own and even take on this idiot just to protect them... You're not worth being here."
"Um... thank you...."
I tried to get out of the kitchen but Andrew blocked me and I looked up at him.
"Andrew, I need to get back to the table."
"I know... He can wait a little longer I think." Andrew took the bowls from her and set them back on the counter and then pushed her up against it. "Your innocence is so tempting, Minerva... You just radiate virgin and I can't help but want you."
I gulped and bit my lip a little, holding onto the counter. Andrew rubbed his hand on my cheek and leaned in, kissing me on the lips. It was a horrible, forced kiss that made me want to gag. This didn't feel right... but I had to stay quiet or the kids would hear. If it would ensure the health of my boys and the health of the duke then I would have to endure this temporary lack of modesty. I didn't want to but... I'm a maid and he's a noble so I don't matter in the course of things.
Andrew put his hand on my shoulder and pushed my shift down over my shoulder, taking his kisses down my neck. While he was kissing me, his other hand was rifling through my skirts to try and find my lower half.
"You're so amazing, Minerva. Don't let Salem tell you any differently... Let me show you how a real man can help a girl out."
I gulped but just bit my lip more when I felt someone watching me. I opened my eyes and saw X looking at me with huge eyes. I stared at him to let him know I needed help and thank goodness he was an inquisitive boy. Unfortunately, he was still a little boy and thus, said some things that should have been said differently.
"I wish Mr. Andrew would stop touching mummy that way!" he yelled, confused and scared.
Andrew's hands suddenly topped touching me and flew back to his body, rigid straight at his sides. He bent up into a stiff position and X ran to me.
"Mummy, are you hurted?"
"No, honey, I'm fine..."
"What is going on? Andrew, what are you doing?" Salem said, waddling in.
"Standing here, looks like." Andrew said in an annoying tone.
He looked at me and he seemed to take in my disheveled appearance and looked at me with a strange look. He sighed and waddled out of the kitchen and X looked at Andrew with an angry look.
"What were you doing to my mummy?"
"Just having a bit of fun. Is there a way I can be normal now?"
"No. Mama didn't like what you were doing. You're a bad man."
"Xerxes, don't worry about it sweetie."
"But Mummy, he was touching you in the no-no spot! You said we can't touch people there."
"That's true, sweetheart, but don't worry about it al... right..."
I faltered when I saw the barrel of a rifle and then Salem walking in as he loaded the rifle with two bullets.
"I don't appreciate people coming into my home and defacing a woman in my own kitchen."
"What the hell are you talking about? You were just in Lord Jacoby's house deflowering his daughter under his own roof!" Andrew yelled.
Salem closed the gun and looked at Andrew with a horrid glare that I had never seen.
"Lord Jacoby and I are not childhood friends." He cradled the gun in the crook of his arm. "I will give you the count of ten to get out of my house and never show your face here again unless you are medically needed. Ten... nine... eight..."
"X, let me go! Let me go!"
"Xerxes..."
"Alright... he can go."
"Four... Three... Two... One..."
He shot right above Andrew's head and he ran out of the back door of the kitchen, Salem firing the second shot.
I stared at him and he turned to me, the same look on his face.
"If you had wanted to be fondled, Ms. Cavensold, I could have done it with better finesse and timing."
"I- I wasn't enjoying it!"
He put the gun next to the door, leaning on the table to get pressure off of his back.
"Well you didn't really put up a fight about it, now did you?"
"I thought it was rude of a lady to affront a nobleman's sexual wishes. Then she would be called a whore and fired promptly."
"Oh, get real, woman! You're in my house! I'm known as the most philandering nobleman out there! I know you enough not to try that in my own house, let alone let another man try it! Who do you think I am?"
"I thought it was because you were with child that you haven't tried your way with me again."
"You take me as a simple rake, my dear." He walked up to me and pressed his distended stomach against mine as he tried to lean on the counter behind me. "I have ways of making a woman swoon without saying a word or batting a lash. But, you, my dear innocent little Minerva, are dumb enough to think that's what I would condone in my house?"
"As Andrew said, you did it in Lord Jacoby's house not too long ago."
"And look what's happened to me?" he said, displaying himself. "If he had taken advantage of you, you might be in the same situation. Do me a favor and don't view yourself as some cheap maiden whore. Got it?"
He began to walk away but I was so mad at him. How could he say that to me?
"You deserve every bit of what has happened to you! I sometimes wish you were bedridden again. At least you were tolerable and nice! I hate you, Lord Barma!"
"I hate you, you imbecile woman! To think that you have to give yourself to a nobleman if he makes advances? You are a lying little bitch! You completely pushed yourself away from me when I tried that not too many months ago! Don't you dare say that you thought it was "what maids do". Don't you dare lie to me!"
He left the room but I ran after him.
"You didn't have me cornered in the kitchen with a room full of family in the next room! I could say what I wanted without reservation when I was in your room!"
He turned to me again. "Minerva, why don't you just admit that you wanted to be taken. Right there on the countertop with everyone in the next room and no one ever knowing."
"I did not!"
"You like Andrew, I know you do. He's got charm, money, and isn't magically pregnant like I am. He's a good catch, definitely. If you hadn't wanted it, Minerva, you would have pushed him away immediately, you would have slapped him in the face, you would have stabbed him. You wanted it."
I went up to him and slapped him across the face but he turned around and smacked me back, sending me flying. The three boys got up quickly and Salem glared at me visciously.
"People like you are the reason I hate being what I am. If you don't want to be here, then leave, but you are still welcome to stay though I do not require your services any longer."
He left to go to his room.

Salem
I never meant to strike her or lay a hand on her at all. But that woman is so unnervingly dense! How could she think I would forget how she openly pushed me away and said her piece and then not notice when a man is doing the same thing and nothing is done? I'm not an idiot. That little idiot thinks I care nothing about her innocence to let my friend do something like that to her? As a friend, he should have known to not ever do that under my own roof. I leaned against the wall and began to cry, the level of intensity and anger getting to me as well as being pregnant.
I felt horrible about what I had said and what I had done but what was I supposed to think? Besides, she wasn't even denying much of it... I went back to my room and got in the bed, falling asleep.

I woke up the next morning feeling as if I had been drained and my head was killing me. I tried to get up but every time I moved so did the room and in a different direction. I began to shake and got cold very quickly. It was very scary to feel this way, almost floating. I couldn't even gather enough strength to yell out, though I doubt she was still here. I looked over at the side of the bed and saw the pull cord for the cook. I swallowed and stretched out to pull the cord but it was out a little farther than I anticipated and I fell off the bed. I hurt to fall to the floor and I couldn't even get up. I just sprawled out on my floor as darkness took over my sight.