Trapped in Their Manor, Twin Dukes Keep Me Captive

Chapter 10:Let the spectacle commence.

From this imbalance sprang the mail bride system, underwritten by ocean liner companies. Minor lords in the New World seeking a fitting spouse paid a substantial sum in pounds sterling to the shipping firm. This payment served both as proof of their financial standing and covered every expense of the woman’s voyage: gowns, gloves, parasols, and even a personal maid’s wages. Once enough marriage applications were filed, the liner company recruited willing gentlewomen from Europe. Each candidate was required to provide reference letters from reputable sponsors testifying to her unblemished lineage, confirming she fled her homeland out of devout faith rather than moral or religious disgrace.

These Old World gentlewomen who sailed overseas to wed strangers became known as European mail brides, and the arrangement earned the title “bride shipping”. Under ordinary circumstances, each bride would be met by her husband the moment she stepped off the vessel, welcomed as his legal wife rather than a guest in a lord’s manor. Yet the New World stretched vast and unruly—only heaven knew what twists fate might deliver.

This unique custom birthed the cutting remark Old World nobles hurled at the self-made nouveau riche of the New Continent:

“They lack a single true gentlewoman on their shores, so they must beg Europe to send them brides of pure, untainted blood.”

After lingering on the forest’s fringe for many tedious days, the Count’s hunting party at last returned to Kolleck Manor.

They had failed to bring down the legendary brown bear—the beast that stood taller than a grown man and had dragged whole horses away—but their game haul was bountiful all the same. There were iridescent pheasants, wild geese with rare, stunning sapphire tail plumes, and even a live young fawn. They had meant to retrieve its mother too, yet the doe’s wounds were far too grave; they had slaughtered and devoured her on the spot deep in the woods.

That delicate fawn became the core of the scheme I had devised for Annie.

That very night of their return, the Count ordered a lavish feast held in the great hall.

To my eyes, it was nothing more than a petty banquet staged solely for his amusement, its splendour dwarfed by the birthday celebrations of a mere baroness back in Ludwigsburg. What grand noble feast invited not a single outside guest? The retinue surrounding him counted as mere attendants at best; judged by aristocratic standards, the Count had hosted a solitary supper for one.

Still, every soul within Kolleck Manor buzzed with wild excitement, as if this trivial feast were the highest reward the Count could bestow for their labour. Preparations had descended into frantic chaos the moment the messenger’s word arrived.

The Turkish-patterned tapestries hung upon the oak wainscoting lining the great hall’s walls were stripped away, dismissed as overly antiquated, and replaced with fashionable shimmering Indian silk hangings. Every windowpane and balustrade was scrubbed spotless, the maids’ damp linen cloths picking at every speck of dust trapped within carved crevices until not a mote remained. Cabinets painted with figures of Hercules were thrown open, revealing sets of silver tableware wrapped and secured with pins in fine white linen, immaculate porcelain reserved exclusively for grand festivals, satin napkins embroidered with golden rose vines, wine goblets so clear one could make out a guest’s eyelashes through the glass, and long engraved silver-and-gold wine ewers for pouring spirits. Every trivial detail imaginable for a feast was meticulously readied under the watchful direction of the thorough old steward and his understeward.

Every dish served at dinner drew its ingredients either from the manor’s lands or the day’s hunt, and the undisputed centrepiece of all game was the much-admired young fawn. Eager to defend the culinary honour of Kolleck Manor—and to put the insufferably arrogant head chef who had accompanied the Count from Frigu Manor firmly in his place—Old Moreau, Kolleck’s cook, had snatched the precious fawn straight from the returning hunting party at my and Annie’s urging. The Frigu chef was reduced to menial assistant work, left sputtering and fuming with no power to contest it.

The feast was destined to be an all-out celebration of venison. To open the meal, Old Moreau served a crystal-clear broth of venison shredded with parsnips. Next came a platter of smoked venison slices, venison ham, and venison sausage garnished with herb salad fit to eat. The third course was a steaming whole roast venison loin, and the fourth—the main dish, Moreau’s painstaking magnum opus—featured tender young venison loin lightly seared, stewed alongside a large chunk of marrowbone in rich aged wine, crushed potatoes, and fresh vegetables plucked from the manor gardens. Blending the deep char of roasting with the soft richness of slow stewing, its aroma alone was enough to make every guest’s mouth water.

Old Moreau’s cooking was a resounding triumph, yet his true masterpiece waited until the feast drew to a close. After common dishes prepared by old Joseph from Frigu—roast pheasant, silky liver pâté, and jelly desserts decorated with stag antler carvings—were set upon the table, wine had dulled the lord and his attendants’ interest in food alike. That was when Moreau’s genuine showstopper made its entrance.

Old David had expressly instructed me to stay out of the Count’s line of sight yet remain nearby, so I was assigned to tend the small wine cellar adjoining the great hall, tallying and managing the manor’s prized fine wines. From there, tracking the rate at which bottles emptied at the table, I witnessed every step of the grand dish’s presentation unfold.

It was a colossal pastry stag, so massive four footmen were required to carry it between them.

Of course, it was no real deer. Measuring over a metre long and half a metre wide, complete with hooves, head, and branching antlers, it had been moulded from hundreds of pounds of flour and lard, baked for hours on end.

At first sight of the giant stag pie, the attendants clustered around the Count, who had been trading witty jests amongst themselves, fell silent for a heartbeat. Then a murmur erupted—exclamations and amused chatter flooded the entire great hall, only to fade swiftly as every pair of eyes swivelled toward the Count, waiting for his verdict.

The Count’s back faced me, yet disinterest laced every syllable of his voice; he had clearly seen such gaudy, hollow novelties before. “What is this?”

The lead footman’s cheeks burned bright red, elated beyond measure to be addressed directly by his lord. He boomed in a resonant voice, “Long live the House of Haiges! My honoured master, accept our sincerest tribute!”

The instant his words died away, the stag pie’s antlers twitched once, startling the whole assembly. They shifted again, accompanied by tiny silver bell chimes, and a girl’s voice rose from the hollow pastry belly, singing a hymn of blessing.

The entire ploy had been my idea for Annie. The six-hour bake had hardened the pastry crust into a sturdy, freestanding shell; the venison filling inside was long since spoiled and inedible, but once hollowed out, it formed the perfect hidden chamber.

The footmen worked in unison, swinging open the pastry’s side like the carriage door of a coach. Annie stepped forth just as Venus rising from her oyster shell, descending onto the table mid-song, gliding past the dumbfounded ladies-in-waiting with haughty poise.

She wore a flowing Grecian silk gown, tiny silver bells strung around her bare ankles that tinkled with every step, a wreath of unopened rosebuds coiled around her throat, and clutched a goblet of rare fine wine meant for the Count.

She held the wine out to him.

“Noble master, accept Kolleck Manor’s most sincere homage.”

The Count accepted her tribute—and claimed a new lady-in-waiting all at once.

Annie’s ambition had finally borne fruit. Having watched the entire spectacle from close quarters, I slipped back into the wine cellar before the Count’s wandering thoughts could turn to me.

Once the feast dispersed, Old David sought me out, his brow furrowed with grave worry.

“You two have behaved recklessly beyond all sense!” he chided me sharply.

“But the servants from Frigu carry such unbearable arrogance,” I argued weakly. “If we do not humble them, they will think Kolleck nothing more than a forgotten wilderness outpost.”

“You know full well that is not what troubles me. This scheme courts disaster; sooner or later the Count will uncover your part in it, and I fear the torments you endured before will repeat themselves. Perhaps I erred from the start to let you stay—yet beyond the manor walls stretches untamed wilderness, and I could not send you out there alone. It would be sending you straight to your grave.”

I stared at the old steward’s shadowed, sighing face in the candlelight, and all my petty, quibbling excuses died on my tongue.

We fell into a heavy silence, until I laid bare my whole reasoning to the kind old man. “I fear the return of that cruelty too—that is why I aided Annie. You know the Count still owes me forty-five lashes waiting to be delivered. If one day he flies into another rage against me, Annie might be able to intercede, to beg mercy on my behalf.”

I had conceived the giant stag pie trick, easily persuading Old Moreau to join the ruse, and the footmen had thrown themselves into the plan out of loyalty to defend Kolleck’s pride. Every other soul was kept entirely in the dark. Until the pie was split open, Old David had believed the tough pastry shell concealed a young lamb stuffed with wild geese.

My motive for aiding Annie was plain and simple: to have a familiar face within the Count’s inner circle. It might, perhaps, possibly… grant me a small measure of protection if I ever stirred his wrath again.