Hello, everybody! Okay, I only got about eight reviews for the last chapter. ='( I know that at least one hundred and ten people read my story when I updated it. Please, if you're nice enough to read my story, can you please review, too? It makes me happy!
WinterQueen: I'm going to post your review response here because I can't actually respond to it. Yes, the falling-in-love part is happening too fast, but that's the way I'm going to make it happen. However, Bella isn't quite in love with him yet. She's too smart for that. She has what can be considered a crush, and she knows that it's wrong. And for the French comment, no, they were not in France or any French-speaking country in the actual book, but I'm just going to incorporate some French words/phrases just because I never said the actual place, many countries speak French, and just because it's fun!
Okay, so even if you didn't read that whole thing, which might clear your mind too, I will now be posting responses to anonymous reviews up there because I don't know how else to respond. And on with the chapter we go!
Bella
For weeks I had been delivering messages to the duke. I was kind of relieved when I realized that Tanya had no intention of demoting me and replacing my position with someone else, something she had done to other messengers when she got annoyed with them.
Every time I went over to Duke Edward's mansion to deliver a message, I generally had to improvise again. Sometimes I was given a message by Tanya to recite to him, but it was usually my brain doing all the work.
And every time, the duke would ask me a few pointless questions; What is your favorite color? Do you have any siblings? – That one made me cry – What are your two favorite things to do? The list went on, and every time I came to deliver the message, at least ten of them were thrown at me.
I don't know why. But I answered them every time. He seemed to be intent on listening to my answers, if it didn't seem that he was deep in thought. However, I didn't understand why he would continue to ask me questions if he wanted to think about something.
Usually, he would look frustrated, or maybe perplexed. I had no idea why. Sometimes, he would be on the verge of asking something, and then his mouth would close again, and he would continue to puzzle over something for a little while before he asked the next question. It was all rather confusing.
But the most confusing part was the fact that I wasn't sure of my feelings toward this duke. Every time he would look at me to ask me a question, I would get momentarily lost in his gaze before answering. When he would speak, his voice washed over me, and it made me disappointed when I realized that I would have to be the next to speak, my voice sounding ghastly in comparison. And then, every time he would accidentally touch me by brushing his fingers against the back of my hand to reach for something or bumping into me on accident when he opened the gate, the same thrilling feeling went through me, sometimes shocking but sometimes so wonderful that it hurt me internally when the short moment of contact was over.
I knew that I was more attached to the duke than I should be, but I couldn't help it. I now knew why Tanya thought him to be so irresistible. But I slightly disagreed with that point; I was around him so much that if he was so irresistible, I would've already done something that would have made me be sent away from his house, never being allowed to enter again.
I knew that I was falling for him, though how far I already was, I had no idea. I hoped I hadn't fallen too deep, for it would cause me so much heart break if I had. He wasn't meant to be mine. If anyone, Tanya would become his. She loved him with all of her heart, and with the wealth and position she had, they were a perfect match.
And I knew that it was wrong to love him, if even a little. My lady had sent me to bring over her love, not to create another lovesick servant. Reason number two, he would never love me. And for the last time, that kind of love was never meant to be.
But if this was all me telling myself this and convincing myself out of it, why did it cause my heart hurt to come upon this realization?
For that, I had no answer.
But today, I was going to test my endurance. I was sending yet another message to the duke, and I would not get lost in his gaze, swoon, stutter, or anything of the sort because of him today. I would make sure of it.
As I was walking up to the gate, I saw Mike coming across the grass towards the gate that I was currently standing at. Sometimes, if we would see each other at this point, we would talk before I rang the bell, just so the conversation could continue without being interrupted. He had become a good friend. Sometimes he tried to be more than that or try to kiss me, but he was only a friend to me.
"Mike!" I called out, waving. He looked up from the ground and waved back with a smile on his face once he noticed who it was. He jogged over to me, and his breathing had turned heavy once he reached the other side of the gate. He slipped outside to talk to me, as it was kind of awkward to talk with a gate between us to block our faces.
"Hello, Bella," he greeted me, resting one arm against the gate. "What might be the cause of your visit today?"
I rolled my eyes at his dumb joke. "The same as it always is."
"And would that be to greet the most extraordinary Michael Newton?" he asked. This time I chuckled.
"No, that would be to deliver a message to the duke. But greeting Michael Newton sometimes is an added cause." I smiled at him and he smiled back. Our jokes were stupid, yet we continued to use them anyway. I didn't know why. But talking with Mike was easy, and it was one thing that I could look forward to when I came here.
"Well, you know how much I like to talk to you, but I must really be going," Mike informed me.
"What chore is it this time?" I asked, knowing that there was no other reason that he would stop talking with me than to attend to his duties.
"I have to pick all the lemons off of the trees…with the help of a few other servants of course."
"Ouch." I felt bad for Mike. Once, I had been given that responsibility. I had ended up with a few squished lemons – they had dropped – and many scratches up my arms from where the thorns on the trees had cut me.
"Yeah, but you know what might make me feel better?" He raised an eyebrow and leaned a little closer to me. I leaned a little bit back.
"What?" Of course, I already knew what it was; a kiss. This was the way he tried to get me to kiss him half the time. The other half… I don't really know what to say.
"A kiss from you." Yes, I was right. He started to lean in so that his face was a couple inches from mine and his eyes were half-closed. I stuck my arm out to ring the bell while leaning farther back.
"Sorry, Mike. It's not going to happen." His eyes opened at the ring of the bell – he knew that at any moment someone would come to allow me in the house – and tried to give me a quick kiss again. But once he got about four inches from my face, Spoden came out. My savior.
"Isabella, right this way," Spoden addressed me. He opened the gate for Mike and I to come in. Inside, I felt intently happy. I mouthed a 'thanks' to Spoden and he gave me a small smile back. He and I had been getting along now, and he no longer acted as if he was so much more important than me.
"And you," he turned to address Mike. "Shouldn't you be out picking the lemons off the trees? I recall giving you the assignment a while ago."
"Oh, um, yes Sir," Mike stammered. Spoden raised an eyebrow at him, and Mike scurried off in the other direction.
Once Mike was out of earshot, I turned back to Spoden. "Thank you for that."
He just sighed. "Anything that the master wants to happen will happen." I cocked my head to the side and gave Spoden a puzzled expression. "He doesn't want you to be uncomfortable in his estates. But besides that, I would do it anyway. That particular boy is quite a pest sometimes."
I smiled a small smile. Then my smile got bigger when I recalled Spoden's words: He doesn't want you to be uncomfortable in his estates. Duke Edward didn't seem like he cared for many of the servants in his house, much less the fact that they were comfortable or not. Why was I different?
A tiny voice in the back of my head started to speak. Maybe he likes you the way you like him. Another smile formed across my face before I could stop it, and then I began to beat it back. There was no way that the duke liked me the way I did him. There was no possibility. And then I reminded the torturous part of my mind of the reasons I had thought of earlier; the love was forbidden, there was no way he could love me, and Tanya trusted me. I wasn't supposed to betray her.
I was so focused on making myself see sense that I didn't notice the step that I had to walk up to pass inside the doorway. I tripped and braced myself for hitting the hard tile. But I didn't. Instead, two strong hands that definitely weren't Spoden's caught my arms, stopping me right before my face hit the floor.
The arms brought me to an upright position, and I looked down to brush the dirt off of my dress.
"Thank you," I whispered, but the person who caught me must've heard me anyway because he replied, "You're welcome."
My head snapped up in astonishment and blood rushed to my cheeks. The duke was standing before me in all his glory, smiling a small, crooked smile. My heart pounded at the sight of him.
Duke Edward turned to Spoden. "I can take it from here, thank you Spoden. Besides, it is my message."
The duke and Spoden exchanged a silent conversation in which they only flickered their eyes towards the object of their silent statement, tilted their heads, and made odd facial expressions. At the very end, Spoden nodded and the duke turned back to me.
"What is the message today? And for a second question, is the message an improvisation that we can cut short so that I can ask questions, or is it a message from Tanya?" I almost sighed when he talked about his interrogations, which I had never gotten the point of.
"It is, in fact, a message directly from my lady. And must you interrogate me so?" He chuckled and smiled slightly at me again.
"Yes, I must. But the reasons are known to me only," he added, realizing that I was about to cut him off and guessing my question. "But I'm not sure that I will pry information out of you today."
I breathed a sigh of relief while he seemed to contemplate something to himself. He came back to our universe to ask, "And what might this message be?"
"This is quoted to the best of my memory, so it might be a little different, but her message states, 'My dearest Edward, I have been sending Bella to give you messages that she writes herself for so long that I know I myself haven't actually been able to tell you just how much you mean to me. But as these are my own words, I am doing that just now. You need to know that I love you with all of my heart. I can't express how much my heart swells when I see you, and I don't even know myself how many pieces it breaks into when you push me away or don't even pay attention to me. I want to know what it is I have to do to stop being just another person to you. What is it? I need to know what can make you love me. Sending this message with all my heart, Tanya.'" I took a deep breath after reciting the message, holding it while waiting for the duke's response.
"That was…long," he finally expressed after a few moments. I exhaled my breath in a long whoosh, happy that he hadn't gotten angry or even broken out of his calm – he seemed to detest Tanya.
"And she told me to tell you," I began after another minute. Edward looked straight at me after falling deep into thought for the minute that no one had said anything. "That you were invited to a ball at her estate. It's a masquerade ball, so you will have to show up in a mask. This ball is to take place the Friday after next in Tanya's own ballroom. Are you able to come?"
He smiled at me. "Yes, I am sure that I am."
I smiled back. "My lady will be pleased."
"I want to show you something." The duke grabbed my wrist and pulled me along behind him. All the way, my wrist was tingling with the same feeling it always did when he touched me. The feeling spread throughout me and made me feel wonderful.
I turned my head to look at all the pictures on the walls while the duke towed me to wherever we were going. At times we would pass other servants, and the females glared fiercely at me.
Duke Edward pulled me up a grand staircase made of smooth white marble. My shoes echoed off of the rock and the walls, endlessly sounding throughout the halls. The duke's steps, however, made not a sound.
At long last, the duke opened a pair of huge, white doors, and he then let go of my hand. I gasped at what I saw inside the room. It was very open, almost empty. The ceiling rose at least ten feet above me. The room must've been facing the front yard, for directly across from the wall with the doors were many clear glass doors leading to a balcony. I walked swiftly towards one of the glass doors and flung it open to lean over the edge of the balcony.
It was amazing. I could see almost our whole town. To the right of my vision was Tanya's house. I watched as she herself came onto her own balcony, her head seeming to turn towards where I was standing for a few seconds. I fought the urge to wave to her, and I found I won the battle instantly.
Directly in front of me was the street, and it wound its way toward the center of town, where the market was. I saw the baker closing his door, a tray of leftover pastries from that day's business in hand. I passed him a lot on my way home after delivering a message, and sometimes he gave me one of the leftovers as a treat. Across the dusty street from him was the tailor, who was also coming out of his shop. But instead of a tray of pastries, he was holding a dress.
As I looked to my left, I saw the river that flowed endlessly like a ribbon on the outside of town. A few children were playing in the river, and occasionally one of them would emit a soft squeal.
I turned to walk back in the room, closing and re-locking the door to the balcony behind me. I was immediately drawn to a portrait of a girl on the west side of the room. She seemed a little younger than I was, but she was incredibly tiny. She had short black hair that spiked out around her face – and odd hairstyle for the women of this town. Her eyes were a bright blue, and they seemed to be a little too big for her face.
But what caught my attention the most was her smile. Most people didn't smile in their portraits, for it hurt their face to stay in that position for hours. And if they did have a smile, it always looked very fake. But this smile was genuine. It reached her eyes, and curved into one huge semicircle.
"That's my cousin," Edward's voice came from behind me, but I didn't turn to look at him. I was too entranced by the portrait of the lovely young girl. "Her name is Alice. This used to be her living quarters, but she moved out. She now lives across town with her husband. I visit them occasionally, and they sometimes come here, though very rarely."
"She's lovely," I responded, turning around to face him. He was sitting at a magnificent black piano in the east corner of the room. It looked quite new, and it was in pristine condition. Duke Edward was sitting on the piano bench.
"Come over here," he beckoned, pointing to the seat next to him. "The room isn't what I really wanted to show you. In fact, I actually wanted you to listen to something."
I hesitantly crossed the room to sit next to the duke on the short bench. The close proximity was making me feel very nervous.
"I was inspired to write this a while ago, and now it's all but perfected," he whispered, and then his hands flew across the keys.
A lovely melody started, soft and sweet. It was no louder than his whisper at first, and then barely growing in volume. Every single time his hands would touch the keys, the notes would hang in the air until another set of notes, just as loud as the last set, would replace them.
It was hard to grasp the fact that only Edward was playing the song, for it seemed to be coming from all around me instead of right in front of me.
I closed my eyes to savor the sound and let it wash over me for a few more minutes before I heard it come to a close. I opened my eyes, and a few tears swam at the edges. I wiped them away with my sleeve before speaking to the duke.
"Sir-"
"Call me Edward," he insisted, sending a thrill through me.
"Edward, then. Edward, that was beautiful. I really think that it was wonderful. And thank you so much for sharing that with me. I would really wish to see the beautiful lady that inspired you to write such a lovely composition. But I must go now. I'm afraid it's getting dark, and I must be getting home before the path is all but gone. Again, thank you, and good-bye."
I then stood up from the bench and walked out of the room towards home, the soft lullaby replaying itself in my head.
Spoden
I had been in the gardens for a few minutes directing the servants when I heard the music. Such a beautiful sound. It seemed to be coming from Lady Alice's old room, which was now Sir Edward's private room.
He was now playing the piano, something that he hadn't done, or been able to do well, for quite some time now.
And I understood what the song was about, too. It was a soft sound, barely audible to my ears, and also very calming and sweet. It was about the messenger, Isabella, or Bella, as she liked to be called.
He had been working on that piece ever since the first day she had come to the estate. It was undeniable that he had fallen for her, though how far in I had no idea. He was considerably happier since that one day.
Although, falling for her might have been a little bit of an understatement. It was wrong, though, the feelings that he had toward her. She was a servant, after all. Not that I had anything against her, but it was still immensely wrong. That kind of love was almost forbidden.
But forbidden or not, I couldn't deny the truth. Sir Edward, who was like family to me, was in love with the messenger.
Yay! We get to hear from Spoden! I personally think that he is one awesome dude, though that might be because I'm the only one who really knows him… But anyway, Happy New Year! It's 2009!!
And hopefully you are all happy, because the fact that this chapter is 3,310 words long is your Holiday present! Of course, you shouldn't be expecting them to be this long all the time.
The song I have been listening to about twenty times on repeat this whole chapter was Dirty Little Secret by All American Rejects, though it has nothing to do with the chapter.
And please, don't forget to review!!!