A Brother's Price

from his sisters’ bedroom. At first he ignored it; then, with a spike of cold fear, he realized he was supposed to be alone. He turned and saw a shadow, cast from his sisters’ window, on the floor of the parlor—the outline of someone climbing through the window. He snatched up the fireplace poker, hefting it high, and edged sideways toward the bellpull.
    The path to the bellpull, however, took him in front of the bedroom door. He saw, for the first time, that it was a boy climbing through the window. Jerin froze, confused.
    The boy looked about sixteen, with dirty blond hair and square, plain features. While cut from fine cloth, his light woolen kilt of green was gathered high about his waist with a horse-blanket pin. One knee bled slightly, while the other sported a scab from previous outings. He started at seeing Jerin, his green eyes going wide in surprise. “Oh! There you are! You gave me a start! Quick, hide me!”
    Jerin considered. If a strange woman appeared in his quarters, he knew what to do: flee, fight, or shout for help. But what about a strange man? The boy seemed to lack any malice, and Jerin hadn’t seen another man outside his family since the harvest fair. “Um, you can hide in—in my room.”
    The boy needed no further directions. He beamed a happy “Thanks!” and darted off to Jerin’s bedroom. Jerin returned the poker to the fireplace and followed, still confused but now unalarmed.
    “What are you running from?” Jerin asked.
    “My sisters. Stupid rules. Complete and total boredom.” The boy threw himself onto Jerin’s bed. “ ‘Sit up straight. Smile. Don’t sit with your legs open. Don’t slouch. Don’t talk. Don’t think.’ I’m bored, and lonely, and’now I’m whining. Sorry.”
    “I don’t mind,” Jerin said. “I didn’t know there was another man in the palace.”
    “We got in last night. The Queens invited us to stay. I think to give you someone to show you the ropes without getting your sisters’ hackles raised. But, of course, every time I asked when we were going to meet, it’s ‘later,’ and ‘in good time’ and ‘when there’s time.’ All I have is time! I’ve been sitting sewing wedding linens all morning, with tiny invisible stitches, and no one even offered for me yet.”
    “And vou are?”
    “Cullen Moorland.” A brilliant smile. “I’m the Queens’ nephew.”
    Jerin considered what he knew of the royal family. “I didn’t think the Queens had a brother.”
    Cullen laughed. “You don’t know who I am? I’m hurt! But I forgive you, since you don’t know better. My mothers are—were sisters to the Queens’ consort, the princesses’ father. We’re old blood, very tah, tah and all that, but we didn’t have much clout until the royal wedding brought us up in the world. Got anything to eat?”
    “We could ring for tea,” Jerin stated, and then marveled at how naturally it came to him, as if he always had tea delivered at the ring of a bellpull.
    “Then they’ll know I’m here.”
    “And you shouldn’t be?”
    “Oh, it’s just that it’s more fun them not knowing. It makes being here feel like I’m doing what I shouldn’t be doing.” Cullen took a deep breath. “The air even smells better when I decide where to be.”
    “You could stay in here when the tray comes.”
    Cullen flashed another brilliant smile. “You’re a great gun! Ring away.”
    Jerin went back to the parlor and pulled the bell cord. A tap on the door announced a Barnes sister. Jerin unbarred the door and asked for a tea tray, adding that he felt very hungry, and that his sisters might return in time to join him, so could she make it a generous tray with at least four sets of cups? The Barnes youngest nodded, impassive as always. Was she totally unaware of Cullen, or was she humoring Jerin like a child?
    When Jerin returned to his bedroom, he found Cullen kneeling beside the nightstand, jiggling the open drawer.
    “This is the best suite in the palace.” Cullen lifted out the drawer and set it on the bed. “We usually have it when we stay here. It put my sisters’ noses out of joint to find you were put up here instead. I don’t know why—we’ve had to give it up before. A case of speaking before thinking, to be sure.”
    Cullen reached into the empty drawer hole and fished out a bundle of papers. “My secret stash. Look at these.”
    Still kneeling beside the bed, he untied the bundle and spread seven tintypes out onto the