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The girl held the bowl of water in her hands as carefully as cradling a pet. She knew she mustn’t spill any of it, or her step mother would be upset. The lady of the house was never one to exhibit the nicest temperament, despite her well-bred manners which she generously displayed to all the minor lords and their ladies during gatherings.
There had not been many gatherings since the death of her Lord father. The Falcon family had barely cast off the black when another dark cloud descended on their household.
Recently, all life in the house had become concentrated around one wing of their spacious manor. It was the location of the room where her older brother lay in his sickbed.
“What are you lingering for? Bring the water,” said the woman sitting at the edge of the bed, spitting the order out like venom. She looked bedraggled and ill herself. She was dressed in a fine green dress that hugged her tall frame, which still held itself up with tree-like strength, though her bloodshot eyes and wrinkled forehead told a different story.
Mierra stepped out from the corner where she had been standing in the dim recess, lingering at the top of the steps to the bed chamber.
She walked over silently, and placed the wooden bowl of warm water on the bedside table, noticing the odd instruments laid out on top of it on a white cloth, including some blood-stained rags which she couldn’t bear to look at.
Her brother’s face was barely visible in the low lighting of the room, head sunken into the pillow in a deathlike slumber. Still, she could see he looked a clammy white beneath the curly, dark locks that partially obscured his face.
A physician had been called. He was sitting on the other side of the room, keeping his tone low, and talking to her aunt, who sat on a seat beside him. It seemed he was preparing some leeches for an impending treatment. Her aunt looked to be better groomed than her step-mother. Yet there was nothing hopeful about their countenances.
“How is Dane today?” Mierra ventured to ask, timidly.
Lady Falcon appeared not to acknowledge her at first. She was looking at her hands, caressing the jeweled rings on her long, elegant fingers, freckled lightly with age.
“He’ll live another day,” said the older woman, in a bitter but pensive tone. “You can save your black for another occasion.”
Mierra did not like the way she spoke to her, as though she would be disappointed if her brother lived. He was her brother, her last living blood-family. She cared for him as much as she had cared for all of her other half brothers and sisters who had passed away.
She was only 13 years old, but she had heard the talk in the Great Hall when the lords of the minor houses came to pay homage to their liege. They had held a council, and examined Lord Falcon’s will, which stated that his estate is to go to his son, and in the event of his son’s demise, Mierra was to become the heir.
She had stood before the mirror in her small room many a day since childhood, combing her soft brown curls and wondering what it would be like to be a Lady. What good was there in being a bastard, if it meant being only a few steps above a scullery maid?
But she loved her brothers and sisters, and wished them no harm. It hurt her more than she could express to see the last of them fading away like a strangled rose.
They were a sickly lot from the start. Watching them die was like watching rotten fruits drop from a tree one by one, leaving only a single (and barely ripe one at that) whole.
Her stepmother never loved her. There was no telling what she might do if her son lived to become the new Lord, now that her father was no longer there to defend her rights.
The lords wanted a male heir, to lead them as their ancestors had.
It seemed everyone was waiting on a verdict, which only the gods could bestow. If she had only one certainty, it was as she always believed—that her fate would be decided in the sick chamber.