“With you,” he whispered.
Julia clung to her sanity and will. She raised her chin. “Not if you’re going to browbeat me into marriage or the nunnery.”
He grinned. Her heart spun in her chest.
“No browbeating. No national crisis. No nunnery, no Fox, no Royal Four.” He removed his palm with a last, lingering touch of his fingertips, then held out his hand to her. “Only you and I, together. Will you grant me that?”
Julia looked down at his open hand, then up at his face. He looked so weary, just the way she’d felt last night until the warm hearts of the fair folk had lifted her hopes.
She put her hand in his. “Stay with me.”
“The toff’s stayin’, is ‘e?” A big voice boomed from beside them.
Julia turned. “John.” She introduced her burly, bearded childhood friend to the immaculately dressed Lord Dryden with a smile. “Marcus, may I present John Wald?”
Marcus stuck out his hand, only to find himself drawn into a bear-like embrace.
“Marcus, you won’t find a better lady than our Jilly-girl! Now, it’s time you come help me shovel horse—” John glanced at Julia. “Shovel horse-apples,” he finished.
Marcus looked down at the muddy shovel that had appeared in his hand, then up at the brawny man standing next to Julia.
“Ah …” Julia seemed taken aback. “John, I don’t think—”
The big man crossed his arms. “It’s our way, remember? Now, come on, then,” the man said to Marcus with satisfaction. “There’s work to be done.”
Marcus blinked. “But—”
Julia was backing away, one hand raised, fingers waving, a small helpless smile on her face. “I shall see you at my wagon for dinner.”
Marcus took a step to follow her, then looked down. His boot was inches deep in a steaming manure heap that could not have come from a mortal horse.
“Told ye there was work to be done.” John chortled deeply. “Pile’s not getting’ smaller with you standin’ there.”
Marcus watched Julia disappear in a flutter of ill-fitting linen and sighed. Horse-apples it was, then. Not quite what he’d had in mind when he’d asked for one day. Still, the brightness in her eyes told him he wouldn’t be alone for long.
Julia watched John put Marcus to work from a distance. She hadn’t been able to bring herself to tell him that this was the custom when two of the fair folk were about to marry. The others kept the two apart, busy with other things all day. In a small encampment, where two lovers might well have grown up side by side, it was a way to increase anticipation and renew the joy of being together.
She could not tell him and she couldn’t bear to explain to her friends, so she let him be drawn away and put to work. The separation did not matter, for there was nowhere in the camp that she could not find him in a moment. As it was, she could feel his nearness like the warmth of a campfire on her skin as she went about the tasks she was set to as well.
Petunia watched her with mingled humor and worry, for she at least realized that a man like Lord Dryden would never stay. Julia smiled at her old friend and shook her head. “Let them play. He could use a day at the fair.”
Julia strolled the Fair, looking for Marcus. She’d caught glimpses of him all morning as he’d been put to one dirty chore after another.
Without her telling them a thing, the fair folk had taken Marcus in with laughter and good-natured teasing. They addressed him very formally, all the while ordering him to the worst tasks.
“If you please, milord, there’s a pisspot that needs emptyin’, if you would be so kind.”
“Thank you, milord. Here’s the new privy hole needs diggin’, milord.”
All the while, Julia kept an eye on his progress from afar. She’d seen him go from appalled dismay to easy calm to cheerful laughter as his work worsened.
Then the tide had turned on her. Now it was she who was kept too busy to think. Enough was enough, Julia decided. She longed to be with Marcus anyway.
If she could only find him.
She found him in Sebastian’s pen.
He was sitting with his back against the wagon wheel and his cap pulled down low over his eyes, relaxed and very nearly napping if his slumped posture was any clue. Julia held her breath, wondering if he realized that Sebastian had his great heavy head resting on Marcus’s lap and was sprawled at his side like a giant golden hound.
Then she saw Marcus lazily lift a hand and bury it in Sebastian’s mane, scratching in just the right place behind the cat’s ear.
My lads.
Marcus yawned. Sebastian followed suit immediately, in all his toothless grandeur. Julia shook her head fondly. “Lazy sods, the both o’ ye,” she whispered.
She returned to their—her—wagon and began to peel potatoes for a filling camp meal. She paused somewhere around her twelfth potato and gazed down at her hands, struck by the contrast to herself a week ago. Lady Barrowby had slipped from her like an unwanted wrapper, leaving behind someone else entirely.
She was Jilly, yet she was far more than simple Jilly with her common speech and her fearful secrets. She was more than obedient Julia as well, for all that she had loved and worshiped Aldus.
It was as though Julia and Jilly had been blended and strained through, leaving only this new, purer creature behind. She had never felt stronger or more at ease with herself as she did sitting tailor-fashion on the wagon’s apron, peeling potatoes for Lord Dryden’s supper.
It was too bad she was no longer to be the Fox, for she felt as though she could perform those duties better now than ever before.
She smiled and returned to her task. Then again, she might find it hard to resist the common urge to spit in Liverpool’s eye now and again. “Oy,” she murmured to herself. “What a stick.” The occasional lapse into vulgarity was proving to be good for her soul.
“Who’s a stick?”
She looked up to see Marcus lounging against the wagon’s side, smiling at her.
She raised her brows and pursed her lips. “Did you lads enjoy your nap?”
He snorted and rubbed his neck sheepishly. “Sebastian’s not so bad under all that hair.”
“Is that so?” She threw a piece of toweling at him. “Wash the lion off yourself. I love Sebastian, but I don’t want to smell him in our wagon tonight.”
He caught the cloth absently, watching her oddly. “There’s something … you seem different, somehow.”
She smiled up at him. “I’ve simply realized who I am.
He blinked. “Oh. All that since this morning?”
She picked up the pot of peeled potatoes and hopped down off the wagon. “You know me. I ponder and mull and cogitate—”
He grinned. “And then you assume control of the world.”
She leaned close and tilted her face up for a kiss. “I prefer to think of it as sort of a boiling point.”
His eyes darkened. “Boiling. Fire. Heat. Let’s pass on dinner, shall we?”
She gave him a sultry look. “Trust me, you’ll need food to keep up your strength.”
He closed his eyes in a pained expression. “Ah. You’re going to do me in, you temptress.”
She laughed and pulled away. “Stop. You’ll make me spill these.”
He peered into the pot. “What are those white things?”
She blinked at him. “You don’t know?”
He wrinkled his brow. “Um … eggs?”
She rolled her eyes. “My lord, you may be a splendid raker of muck, but you have obviously never set foot in your own kitchens.”
“Should I have?”
She hesitated. “No … no, of course not.” She’d almost forgotten who he truly was. He was one of the most powerful men in England. He was the Fox.
And he wasn’t hers.
She smiled to cover her sudden sadness. “Now get thee to the basin, O Lord of Lion’s Breath.”
He snapped the towel at her bottom as she walked away. “You’re a cheeky little sausa
ge, my lady of the peeled potatoes.”
She turned. “So you did know—”
He was gone, leaving only the faint echo of his laughter behind.
Julia bit her lip. Dear God, how she loved that man. She would love him forever.
Even if she would only have him for now.
After their simple dinner, Julia gazed about the camp, challenging the eyes that she knew were watching. “I’ve had a trying morning,” she said loudly. “I think I’ll have a bit of a nap.”
Marcus blinked. “Ah, certainly. I’ll just—” He hesitated. “Should I—”
Julia rolled her eyes. “Good heavens, Marcus,” she hissed. “Are you a spy or aren’t you?” She stood and shook out her borrowed skirts, then turned to climb the steps into the wagon without another word.
She was naked beneath the quilt by the time the trapdoor in the floor lifted. She rolled onto her stomach and propped her chin on her hands to gaze at Marcus in exasperation. “You must be the slowest lover to sneak into a wagon in all of recorded history.”
He grinned as he clambered into the narrow confines of the wagon. “I think I did it rather nicely. They all think I’m back at the beast master’s.”
Julia raised a brow. “They all know you’re in here with me. The point is to be discreet so they can pretend they don’t.”
His eyes darkened as he took in her nudity beneath the faded cotton coverlet. “Stop talking. Now.”
She smiled coyly at him and threw back the quilt. “Shutting up, milord.”
Unfortunately, Marcus had never tried to undress in a space more like a coffin than a room, much less do so in a great hurry. He still had one arm tangled in his shirt and one foot stuck in his boot when he looked over at her in desperation. “Help.”
She sighed, wiping the tears of laughter from her eyes. “The show is over then.” She reached for his hand. “Sit.”
He sank to the low bench, flushed with his exertions. “This is most embarrassing.”
“You’ve had a humbling day, haven’t you, my darling?” Julia tempered her sympathy with a hot, wet kiss to his neck as she removed his shirt. “Poor, disadvantaged Lord Dryden.”
She was all lithe, naked woman and quick fingers. Marcus couldn’t get a proper grip on her until she’d made him as naked as she was. Then she landed on his lap, facing him, with her long thighs wrapped about his back and her slender arms twined about his neck.
“All better?”
He pulled her tightly to him, hands spread on her back. “All best.”
And it was. They proceeded slowly, cherishing the sensations of skin on skin and kissing deeply. Once Marcus tried to speak, his pain dark in his eyes, but Julia put her finger over his lips. “One day,” she whispered. “Let us not waste it.”
So they stayed silent but for sighs and cries and wordless passion. There was no ending and no beginning again. There was only touch and scent and helpless, heartrending pleasure. He moved above her. She moved above him. Their skin dampened and heated and melded together until there was no separation.
Time hung suspended elsewhere, for this one moment had to last forever. Every minute was strung tightly, humming like a wire, thrumming in time with her heart beating against his.
She took him in her mouth and he closed his eyes in surrender. He savored her with his lips and tongue and she cried out his name. He delved into her with aching solemnity and she gazed into his eyes as he took her flying somewhere beyond awareness of their fate.
It was time to forget.
It was time to remember.
At long last, somewhere between loving and mourning, they slept.
A tapping on the wagon door brought both Marcus and Julia awake in an instant. Marcus reached for his pistol but Julia waved him back. Her belly felt like ice. There was something amiss.
“Milady?” John Wald’s whisper came through the thin wood. “Milady, I know it’s late, but I wish you’d come talk to Petunia. She’s in an awful fit.”
Petunia didn’t take fits.
Julia spoke through the door. “I’ll be right there, John.” She turned back to smile at Marcus. “You needn’t get up. John and Petunia have a tumultuous marriage, but they’re mad for each other really. I’m sure she just needs a bit of soothing about something or another.”
He grinned and lay back down. “When you’re done, I could use a bit of soothing as well.”
She returned his lazy smile with an ache in her heart. There were only two reasons that would spur John to wake Lady Barrowby at this hour. One was fire. The other was worse.
The other meant that she would be forced to choose again.
She threw on the mismatched clothing the fair folk had given her—sturdy boots that nearly fit beneath a faded muslin gown that hung at the waist and dangled inches above her ankles—and pulled a threadbare cloak about her. “I’ll be back soon,” she whispered to Marcus, who was watching her dress with sleepy appreciation.
“Sooner,” he said. “I can’t bear to miss a moment.”
She put one palm to his cheek in a last caress. “Today was the most glorious day of my life.”
He blinked, drawing his brows together. “You’re very serious all of a sudden.”
She forced a wicked smile. “Dead serious, love. Now rest up. I’m a woman of high standards.”
He nodded, relief flashing in his eyes. “I live to serve.”
She kissed him hard, with all the promise she could never keep. Then she left him in her bed to wait for her return. On the way out, she furtively slipped his pistol into her pocket.
John and Petunia awaited her by their fire with a stranger.
“Oy,” the wiry tinker man said, nodding vigorously. “That sounds like ’im alright. Small bloke, young face, deceivin’-like. Coughed like ’e were sick in the lungs. Soon as I ’eard the ‘Say’ tonight, I know’d him for the bloke in the story.”
Julia was not surprised by the confirmation. She’d always known somehow, hadn’t she?
The Chimera was alive.
“Me cousin was fixin’ tin for a village in the north. That fellow were stayin’ at the inn there and he come to ‘Enry for a knife. He didn’t ’ave no blunt for it, but damn if ’e didn’t talk ‘Enry out of it anyway. Same w’ the innkeeper’s wife. Talked her out o’ payin’ for ‘is room and all—or maybe scared her out o’ askin’ for it.”
The man shook his head. “ ’E were a cold one, by all accounts. ’Enry said it strikes ye when he’s walkin’ away, like. Feels as if ye found a snake in yer boots.”
Julia nodded. “Indeed.” Her heart felt like a stone in her chest. The moment had come. No longer could she convince herself that it didn’t matter. Now, there was no denying that she must have confirmation of her own.
If what she suspected was true, then she must act without regard to her own future. Every shred of information was needed if England had any hope of defeating the Chimera.
Her only hope was that she could rescue Marcus from the consequences. She must save him.
The Four—and England herself—needed him more than Julia had the right to.
She took the wiry man’s hand in hers. “I cannot reward you for the information, as much as I wish to, but know that you have done a great service to us all.”
The tinker stared down in awe at her elegant fingers wrapped about his blackened ones. “Th—that’s all right, milady. You ain’t but asked a question.”
Julia smiled. “And you answered it.” She bent forward to kiss the man’s weathered cheek. “Thank you.” She stood. “John, would you saddle my stallion for me, please?”
The little man put a shaking hand to his cheek. “Cor,” he whispered. Petunia gave him a sympathetic pat on the shoulder.
“I know it,” Petunia told him. “She’s an angel, I tell you.”
Julia turned away. An angel wouldn’t walk away from the people who had helped her. An angel wouldn’t do what she was planning to do with the stolen pistol in her pocket and the st
olen horse John was leading toward her even now.
She felt something pressed into her hand. She looked down to see a small, worn purse, then looked up to see Petunia’s watery smile.
“We had a bit saved up.”
A very little bit, by the weight of the few coins in the purse. Julia closed her hand over the cracked leather. She was loath to take their savings, but she could not give in to sentiment now. Those paltry coins might make the difference in her success or failure.
She took the stallion’s reins, ignoring the beast’s irritated lipping at her hair. There was no time to indulge in oats now.
John tilted his head at her wagon. “What you want me to tell Himself?”
Julia bit her lip. She couldn’t bear to face Marcus. He cared for her, she knew. Unfortunately, there was no possibility that his attachment could ever withstand the knowledge of who she truly was.
“Tell him to go to Barrowby. It holds everything he needs. Tell him to look beneath the lake.” She turned away, then turned back. “Tell him … tell him to be happy.”
Then she rode into the night, alone.
21
Why does contentment seem so possible in the moonlight, then so unattainable in the light of day?
A thunderous bellow broke the spell of sleep. Marcus stretched, wondering precisely when he’d become accustomed to waking to a lion’s roar instead of a simple cock’s crow or the rattle of a milk wagon on the cobbles.
Julia wasn’t in the wagon. Marcus smiled. Off to tend to her giant tufted infant, no doubt. Then his grin faded as a few tiny anomalies came to his attention.
One, Julia had not woken him when she came back from seeing to Petunia.
Two, there was a strange silence about the wagon, as if he sat alone in a wood, not in a busy encampment.
Three, his pistol was not where he’d left it.
In seconds he was dressed and at the door. He thrust it open and bent his head to pass through. When he straightened outside, it was to see the two wagons and only the two wagons where the night before there had been dozens.
John Wald sat on the steps of the other wagon, whittling listlessly at a piece of wood. He looked up at Marcus. “Morning, milord.”
Celeste Bradley - [Royal Four 03] Page 19
