Chapter 10

Groaning Willow pulled the blanket up over her face to block out the sunlight that was streaming through the windows. Elise had once again, without any mercy, pulled open the curtains at 7:30 o'clock sharp and chimed her cheery "Good morning.".

The mornings after spending the night out were always hard, but that day it was worse than any morning before. Willow felt like she had just fallen asleep minutes before her maid so rudely interrupted her slumber. It was no surprise though, as the thoughts in her head had been going round and round even when she was already back in bed again. That stranger on the horse just wouldn't leave her mind it seemed.

"Chop chop! Out of bed with you." Elise's voice rang through the blanket that Willow was still trying to hide under. "We don't want to leave your brother waiting at the breakfast table."

With a heavy sigh Willow finally complied and threw the blanket off of herself. It would just draw her brother's suspicion on her if she were to stay in bed late and she didn't want to risk that. Also he would probably end up giving her a lecture about how it was unladylike to be late and so on and so forth. Ugh, he was so annoying!

Elise helped Willow get dressed in one of her day-gowns, while Willow was more focused on getting somewhat awake, rubbing her eyes multiple times in the process. "Someone stayed up late reading again, huh?", Elise questioned with a knowing smile on her face. She had always been the closest thing that Willow had to a mother and Elise knew her quite well. Luckily she hadn't figured out about Willow's nightly trips off of the grounds though.

A yawn escaped the young duchess' mouth, which was answer enough for Elise and left her giggling, while Willow made a pouting face. It wasn't like she could really be mad at Elise though.

Once Willow looked somewhat awake and presentable it was already time to head downstairs to meet her brother for breakfast. Willow secretly hoped that he would have breakfast in the study today, but that hope was quickly crushed when she entered the dining room and already saw him sitting there, reading the newspaper. A habit of his that he had developed in the last year or so. Willow didn't understand why anyone would read the newspaper. To her it was nothing but gossip.

"Good morning." She mumbled out under her breath and plopped down on her chair a little less gracefully than she normally would. But at this point she couldn't care less. Willow heard the rustling of the newspaper getting a little louder and then the sound of it being placed down on the table. "Good morning." Philip replied, eveying his sister closely.

"You seem tired." He stated. Oh really? Willow thought to herself. But instead of speaking those words out loud she made an effort to sit up a little straighter and smiled at her brother.

"I just lost track of time reading last night." She lied smoothly, then focussed back on the breakfast, that had just been placed in front of her. She was really in no mood for an interrogation by her brother.

"Oh really? Because to me it seems like you barely got any sleep at all." Her brother continued. Obviously not buying her excuse like Willow had hoped he would. God, why couldn't he just drop this conversation?

"Just didn't sleep too well." She replied the annoyance at her brothers questioning clear in her tone of voice, which led Philip to raise an eyebrow at his sister. Someone didn't seem to be in the best mood today...

"Anything on your mind?" He continued his little interrogation. Something was off today. Philip couldn't tell what it was just yet, but his sister had never once shown up this tired at breakfast before. Surely there was more behind this than just her staying up late reading.

"No." Willow snapped back at her brother. "And even if, it would be none of your goddamn business" She grumbled to quiet for her brother to make out what she was saying.

"What was that?" He asked her to repeat those last words, being sure that it had been something inappropriate.

"Nothing" Willow sighed, rolling her eyes at her impossible brother. "Nothing at all." Why was he being so noisy today? Was she not allowed to be a little tired just once? Of course he had to be extra annoying today. "Now if you could please stop this interrogation. I would like to finish my breakfast in peace."

Philip threw a reprehensive look towards his little sister, but decided to not give her a lecture right now. It would go in one ear and out the other, he was sure of that. But that didn't mean that he would just let such behavior slip either. He would talk to her about it later, when she was more awake and hopefully had her senses back together.

Her brother seemed to finally have gotten the message that Willow was in no mood for smalltalk this morning as he didn't say another word and they both finished their breakfast in silence.

As Willow got up to leave, her brother's voice made her stop in her tracks once again though. "I'll see you at lunch." was all he said. It sounded somewhat like a threat to Willow. She gave him a small nod of acknowledgement and left the dining room. Willow was well aware at what her brother meant with that last sentence. He'd give her a lecture about her behavior this morning at lunch. And she probably deserved it. But she was just SO tired.

All Willow really wanted to do was head back to bed, but at the same time she knew that that wasn't an option. She'd end up being even more tired and she wouldn't be able to sleep at night, if she spent the whole day in bed.

On the other hand... Who said she had to spend the night sleeping? She could go for another stroll outside the Cornwall grounds. Who knows, she might just run into that stranger again.

There was a whole new thrill to sneaking out now. Now that she had talked to someone outside the grounds. Now that she knew that her disguise was somewhat convincing enough for her to be seen as a stable boy or something of that sort. Just the thought of going out again tonight, lightened Willow's mood to a point where she didn't feel so tired anymore.

What if she really met that stranger again? Would she even recognise him? And would he recognise her? What would they say to each other?

Willow knew that this was anything but likely to happen. It had been too dark to make out any features on their counterparts, so even if they were to by some miracle meet again, they probably wouldn't recognise each other. And wouldn't it be kind of awkward if they did meet again. What were the odds of that happening? You would nearly have to consider that fate.

Willow had been strolling through the house without paying too much attention to where she was going, but she had made her mind up now. She would head to the stables. Some fresh air would definitely do her good.

The weather was breathtaking today. Not a single cloud anywhere to be seen and it was quite hot for the middle of June. Willow couldn't help but wonder if the night would be one of those warm summer nights that she enjoyed so much. She would have to go out again and find out. Even if she didn't get to meet anyone that night, just being outside in a night like that, was so worth it.

Willow had reached the stables and smiled good morning to Arthur, their actual stable boy. Willow hoped that whoever that stranger might have been was not close to her brother in any way and wouldn't think of coming here, looking for the stable boy that he talked to last night. Obviously Arthur wouldn't know a single thing about the talk that had happened that night and he looked nothing like Willow. He was a good head taller than her and not the skinniest lad either.

"Good morning, m'Lady." He greeted, smiling back at her, but continued with his work right after that. They never talked much. And Willow was glad that he just let her be and enjoy spending time with the horses without judging her for it.

He let Willow help with currying the horses and was very patient whenever she asked him to show her how to do something new, like cleaning the horses hooves. But today Willow resigned from doing that. She got her dress quite dirty the last time she did that and her brother wasn't too pleased when she showed up for lunch in a muddy dress.

So Willow decided to stick to braiding the mane of Mora, her brother's grey horse. She knew that she would already have to face a scolding from her brother at lunch time today and she wasn't planning on making it worse than it already would be. If he happened to be in a bad mood he might just decide to lock her in her room again and then there would be no nightly adventure for her that night. And that would be a shame, especially since it looked to be such a promising night.

Way too soon Elise showed up at the stables to collect her for lunch. If there had been a way for Willow to avoid the conversation with her brother that she was about to have, she would have avoided it. But she knew that procrastinating it would only make it worse. Her brother had shown her on multiple occasions that it was best to face the consequences right away or things would only get worse for her. He wasn't one to just forget about her misbehaving, like her father had been. No Philip was way different when it came to this. He seemed to remember every last detail of every single thing that Willow ever did wrong.

In the past years Willow had gotten quite well at keeping out of trouble for the most time, but when she did say or do something that her brother did not approve of, she had always gotten in quite a bit of trouble. But to be fair it was quite hard to please her brother and sometimes anything would tick him off.

Willow entered the dining room before her brother had arrived there. She sat down at her usual spot and waited, not anticipating the conversation ahead in the slightest. She hoped that he would at least let them eat before he started with his scolding. Taking a deep breath she reminded herself to just stay calm and agree with everything he had to say and to apologize for her impossible behavior this morning of course, as she was sure that he'd consider it just that.

A few more minutes passed until Philip finally showed up. Willow plastered a smile on her face, greeting her brother and hoping that her smile seemed somewhat believable. Her brother greeted her back but didn't bother to smile. Instead he sat down at the table as well without another word as silence settled between the siblings. Luckily enough in that moment Thomas entered the room with their plates in hand and placed the food in front of them.

Willow forced herself to focus on eating, trying to avoid making too much noise and looking at her brother. The silence was anything but comfortable. Quite the opposite was the case as the air between them seemed to get more tense every second.

Finally Philip was done with eating and put his fork down beside his plate. As much as Willow dreaded the conversation that was about to start, the silence between them had been even more unbearable.

"I'm sure I don't need to tell you, that your behavior this morning has been absolutely impossible and unacceptable." Philip started talking. "You are to treat me with respect, no matter if you're tired, sad, happy or angry. Is that clear?"

"Yes." Willow replied in a small voice, looking down at the empty plate in front of her. "I'm sorry I know I shouldn't have acted the way I did this morning." She lifted her head to look at her brother again, knowing she would get in even more trouble, if she avoided his stern gaze on her for too long.

"If you know how to behave I do not understand why you don't just do it!" Philip fumed, obviously not as satisfied with Willow's answer as she thought he would have been.

"I... I... It was just..." his sister was at a loss of words.

What did he want to hear? She had already apologized, now hadn't she? He had made his point clear. She'd make sure to not let it happen again. That should be the end of this conversation in Willow's opinion.

"You were just purposely trying to get on my nerves." Philip accused, which led Willow's mouth to drop open in utter disbelief. Was that really what he was thinking?

"As if I wouldn't have other things to deal with!" Her brother continued furiously.

Willow was still at a loss of words, opening her mouth to say something and closing it again a couple of times, as she tried to wrap her head around her brother's words. Why ever would she do something like that on purpose? Did he think that she liked to fight with him?

"I promise I didn't do it on purpose." Willow looked right in her brother's eyes, begging him to see that she was being truthful. "Look, I already apologized. I am really sorry about my behavior, but I didn't do it just to annoy you. Or do you seriously think that I like arguments like this?"

"At this point, Willow, I'm not so sure." Philip replied all of a sudden oddly calm. "All you ever do it seems is to get in trouble and do things you are not supposed to do."

That sudden calmness was scaring Willow to the bone. Yelling was bad but this... this was way worse.

"Please, Philip. I promise I'll behave. I'll keep out of trouble. I'll not be a bother to you. I promise." Willow was pleading now, trying to prevent this from getting any worse.

Philip looked at her sister with an unreadable expression for a moment. Willow was feeling more frightened and more uncomfortable by the second, as she stared back at him, waiting for him to finally say something.

"This is your last chance, Willow. Your very last chance, do you understand?" He finally spoke up. "If there is any more misbehaving on your part so help me god you will not like the consequences."

Willow swallowed hard but nodded her head obediently. She would have never expected this conversation ending up like that. Under no circumstances did she want to find out what those consequences would be. She would not put it past her brother to just lock her in her room for the rest of her life at this point.

The rest of the day seemed to go by in a blurr. Willow hardly noticed how the time passed as she just sat in her room, staring out the window, without really paying attention to what was happening behind it.

Only the loud rumbling of thunder finally seemed to shake her out of her trance and made her jump. Now actually looking at the sight behind her window, Willow found the sky full of heavy clouds and only seconds later it started to pour. There was no way she'd sneak out tonight. Her brother's threat was still ever so present in her head and the weather wasn't on her side anymore either.

Willow felt trapped inside this house more than ever before. And she felt alone. Oh so alone. As if the only person here in this prison with her, was her brother that acted more like a warder than anything else. A few silent tears ran down her cheeks as she kept staring out the window. Wondering what the future would bring.

She knew that she would have to behave herself around her brother. She had to be more careful than ever before. She would make sure to only talk to him if he had addressed her first except for greeting him, as he would consider it rude if she didn't do that. She would make sure to keep out of his way even more than she had previously. In fact she would avoid him at any cost.

But she wouldn't let him keep her from her nightly trips. No one would take those away from her. Not even her brother. She deserved that bit of freedom and she needed it to keep her sane.

More than ever Willow wished that her mother would be there at that moment. She would surely know what to do. She would talk some sense into her brother and make him see that this was no way to treat his sister. But her mother was gone. And Philip was in charge. No one could or would tell him how to treat Willow and even if anyone tried, Willow doubted that he would listen to them. She'd just have to stay strong. She could do this. She'd just take one day at a time. And maybe tomorrow night she could sneak off again.

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