Day's Patience

by A. W. Exley

  “Nothing?” That was how she felt. Nothing. An empty void. He wished to forget that their night of shared passion ever happened. “But I am your friend,” she whispered.

  “You were my friend.” He ground his jaw and a frown drew his brows together. He laid down his cutlery with quiet deliberation. He moved the fork to an exact distance from his plate.

  His mouth opened, but Lettie didn’t want to hear any lecture about how her selfish actions had destroyed their friendship. She had lost the regard of a good man. A man she loved. Her world crumbled around her, but this tower was destroyed by her own hand.

  “I’m sorry, I have ruined everything.” There was only one thing she could do. She pushed away from the table and rushed from the room.

  “Let me finish. Wait, Lettie!” Grayson called from behind her.

  She couldn’t stay. She couldn’t bear to look upon his handsome face if he was going to say that in his medical opinion, her needs were vile and unnatural. Perhaps he would recommend an institution where she could be confined so she didn’t attempt to seduce and pollute any more fine, upstanding young men.

  But most of all, she couldn’t bear knowing that she had given herself to him and now he no longer wanted to know her. Yet again his actions under the cover of dark were denied in the harsh light of morning.

  You were my friend.

  A sob broke from her throat as she ran from the back door and toward the stables. A boy was outside, leading a horse by the bridle, and she snatched the reins from his hands.

  “Give me a leg up,” she said.

  The startled boy stared at her. “I’ll go fetch the sidesaddle, miss?”

  “No. Bareback is fine.” She tossed the reins over the horse’s head and grabbed them in one hand along with a lock of mane. She bent one knee, and the lad tossed her onto the gelding’s back. Her gown rose up and exposed her knees as she wrapped her legs around his warm sides. Lettie nudged the horse forward the moment Grayson emerged on the back porch.

  “Lettie! Stop, please!” He waved his arms for her to stop.

  Lettie kicked the horse into a canter, and they clattered off down the drive and out onto the dirt road. She didn’t know where to go. She needed water to soothe her mind but couldn’t access the caverns without Samuel to open the fissure. Instead she headed for the ocean.

  The wind tugged at her hair and pulled it from the loose braid as she cantered along the coast. At length, she reached a high promontory and reined the horse to a halt. Lettie slid down his sides and left the horse to graze on the tufts of grass.

  She walked to the very edge of the cliff. Before her stretched her element, and yet it didn’t welcome her. Today was a turbulent ocean, whipped into white peaks by the wind blowing off the North Sea. Salt-tinged air buffeted her face. Her gown fluttered and flared out behind her while pressed tight against her body.

  A large expanse of water, but no comfort to be found. The salt water knew she wasn’t right. Just as she had sought comfort in Grayson’s arms in the dark, but by morning’s light found distance and disapproval instead. She had thought her body needed physical relief, but it was only in the quiet moments that she discovered the truth.

  She needed him.

  Her soul needed a connection with another being. Not just the physical touch, but the emotional bond, the sense of peace and belonging that came with loving someone and being loved in return.

  Marjory was wrong, though. Lettie couldn’t love and be loved. Or at least not with the person she wanted.

  Tears rolled down her cheeks as she stared out across the water. She had ruined everything. How easy it would be to end the pain. She had only to spread her arms and fall. But there were things she still needed to do. Byron Ocram had to tumble before she did.

  “Lettie, please step away from the edge,” a familiar soft voice spoke from behind her.

  How had he found her? A caw sounded from above. Samuel’s watcher had tracked her ride.

  “Have you ever wondered what it is like to fly?” She was mesmerised by the rocks far below. Water covered and then revealed them with each wave. Even from a distance, they looked harsh and unforgiving. There would be no soft embrace from the stone, only hard judgement. That would be a fitting end for the sylph who killed Julian, if she ever found the villain again.

  “No. I have never thought of flying. Such things are not for men.” Grayson’s voice was closer and thick with concern.

  “I thought it was terribly unfair that Jasper and Julian could fly. It’s impossible to play hide and seek or chase when they can cheat and fly to wherever they want.” How they had tormented her as a child. They were able to flit back and forth or drop on her from the trees. Little wonder she exacted her revenge as they grew older. A flow of water at an inconvenient time ruined many a fledgling romance for her brothers.

  “Please don’t do this, Lettie. Step back from the edge and take my hand.”

  Movement flickered in the corner of her eye as Grayson approached, his hand extended to her.

  She wouldn’t really plunge off the cliff, not when she hadn’t finished her task in Whiterock. Yet it was tempting. The lure of ending the pain that coursed through her sang to her with a siren’s melody. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to ruin everything and lose you.”

  “You haven’t lost me, and I cannot exist in a world without you.” His words were almost stolen by the wind, snatched from his mouth and then thrown back at her.

  “I don’t understand. You said I am no longer your friend.” Lettie’s gaze drifted from Grayson to the ocean, where a small vessel headed out for a day’s fishing. The bow rose up and down as it met each wave.

  He took another step closer until he was almost within reach. “You ran off before I could finish what I was saying. You are no longer my friend because you are something far more precious. Just take my hand, Lettie, and allow me to explain.”

  She tried to laugh but it came out as a sob. If only she had stayed in her seat for a moment longer and let him say his piece. But she had been too afraid that he would reject her over breakfast.

  “Only if you promise to kiss me.” That was what she wanted more than anything. For him to hold her and kiss her as he did the previous night. She needed him to be her anchor and chase away thoughts of flying like Jasper and Julian.

  “I promise.” He was right beside her now.

  She stepped back from the edge and threw herself into his arms. He held her tight, as though still afraid she would fling herself off the cliff. He crooked his fingers under her chin, lifted her face to him, and claimed her mouth in a fierce kiss. His hesitancy was gone, replaced by determination to possess every inch of her.

  Lettie wrapped her arms around his neck and opened to him. Kissing him with all the love she had her in body, she showed him what she could not say. “I thought you hated me for what I did, and that with the morning you realised I was a terrible wanton.”

  He laughed and kissed her forehead. “I could never hate you. I have loved you since I was a little boy. But this morning you seemed distant, and I was worried that you regretted last night. Then when you said you would go to Ocram … it killed me inside.”

  “We are so close to finding out the truth about the Esmeralda, we only need a little more time.” If giving herself to Byron served a greater purpose, she would do it. A woman could give her body without letting someone touch the person or mind within. Byron would never have her passion or love, only her physical presence. But how to explain that to Grayson?

  Pain flared in his eyes as though she thrust a knife into his gut and twisted it. “There must be another way, please. I cannot bear the thought of him touching you.”

  While it didn’t concern her as a course of action, she could compromise if it bothered him. She remembered her mother once counselling that relationships were built on compromise. Lettie cupped his face with her hand. “I will not go if it distresses you.”

  He turned his face to kiss her palm. “Thank you.”
>
  “What do you mean you have loved me since you were a little boy?” She tried to remember him as a youngster at the estate, but memories were tightly wound with bonds of madness, and everything seemed a nightmare with only brief periods of sunshine.

  Grayson drew her away from the cliff edge and toward the longer grass where their horses grazed. They sat down and he wrapped an arm around her. “I knew my father tended a woman in a tower, but in my first memory of seeing you, I was five years old. I had visited Ravenswing with my father and to play with Elijah. You were walking in the grounds with Father and Jasper. I ran to my father, but fell over and skinned my knee. You kissed my cheek and said it would be all right. I decided there and then that when I grew up, I would rescue the fairy princess from the tower.”

  “You thought me a fairy princess?” Lettie snuggled into his side. It was odd to hear others recount events where she was physically present but she had no memory of the occasion.

  He kissed her again, a gentle touch as though he reassured himself she was in his arms and not a figment of his imagination. “I had never seen a woman so beautiful before, and with all the wisdom of a five-year-old, I knew you must be a magical creature like a fairy. I also cast Jasper as the cruel ogre keeping you captive in the tower against your will.”

  Lettie laughed—in his dark moods, that was an apt description for her brother. “He does have ogre days.”

  Grayson held her a fraction tighter and dropped his head to rest on hers. “I have loved you since that day. The last few weeks here gave me hope that you might see me as more than your physician or a brother. When I see you with Ocram, or when I remember that you are an Elemental and I am just a man … it destroys that childhood dream inside me.”

  She nestled closer to him and laid a hand on his chest. “The dream of defeating the ogre and rescuing the princess?”

  “Yes. We all have a dream buried inside us, even if we are not aware of it.”

  Did she have such a dream? When she was young, she wanted to fly. Then she had been tormented by nightmares for so many years that dreams were a luxury stolen from her.

  “As children we see the world as endless possibilities. We have numerous hopes and dreams. Then, as we grow older and move into adulthood, those dreams fade, one by one. We realise that they will never happen with the path we have taken. But we always have that child inside us, hidden deep down. And that child clutches one dream. That single imagined idea that meant the most to us, and that keeps hope alive in us.”

  “I cannot remember.” Lettie shook her head. She couldn’t imagine what dream little Lettie had clutched like a worn doll.

  To help people, a tiny voice whispered. She puzzled over that, struggling to piece together the theme from her childhood dreams.

  “It will come to you. Yours is just hidden from you. Imagine that dream is a picture that you drew as a child. Over the years, the picture becomes worn and crinkled. The edges of the paper are torn and it is dirty, but we hold on to it regardless. When something happens that makes us doubt, it tears a piece from that picture. Bit by bit, it is destroyed and it can never be recovered.

  “It is agony to destroy the hope of the child still within me, who clings to the knightly quest of saving the princess. For what will remain of us, if we no longer have a dream? I suspect we become empty shells. People who find no joy in life.”

  “You have saved me,” she whispered and looked up to meet his gaze. “I thought I had made a horrible mistake last night, using a friend and losing you forever.”

  “Never,” he said and kissed her again.

  Grayson might not be her mate, but her heart swelled like the ocean below, and love flowed into all her empty spaces. She couldn’t imagine what Jasper and Dawn shared as mates chosen by the Cor-vitis seed, but it couldn’t be any grander or larger than what she felt in this moment.

  23

  Lettie returned to the house in the opposite mood to which she left. Peace flowed through her soul, and a smile graced her lips that she had difficulty in budging. Grayson loved her. It was only as they handed over the horses to the groom that she realised she hadn’t said the words to him, nor had he asked her to. It seemed so uneven. He had loved her for years, but she had only recently become aware of him as a man and not the soothing presence that had sheltered her during the worse of her nightmares.

  She stood on the back lawn and tried to work up the bravery to say the words out loud. Samuel’s watcher glided to an elm and joined its brethren. Now numerous black eyes watched events below, like gossiping old women in the village square.

  “What’s wrong?” Grayson asked as she tugged on his hand.

  “You said you loved me.” She swallowed. Her throat was suddenly dry and scratchy. Words raked over her tongue like a rasp working a block of wood. Why couldn’t she say it? Something still held her back.

  His moustache lifted as a smile touched his lips. “There is no compulsion for you to say the words just because I did. I have loved you my entire life, and it is a truth that resides deep in my bones. I imagine this is still rather new to you. Why, only a couple of months ago, Ava’s tendrils tormented your mind. Do not let those words pass your lips until you are completely sure of them. We have time.”

  Time. But it ran at different speeds through their hourglasses. Ten years for Grayson would be only one to her. It didn’t strike her as fair that he said those words, but she choked on them. Was that what held her back, time and all the implications of the disparity in their lifespans?

  Before she could muster up a reply, the back door burst open, and Marjory and Samuel rushed out and along the path.

  Marjory glanced from Lettie to Grayson and then clapped her hands. “Thank goodness you two sorted things out. Samuel was going to bang your heads together.”

  “I thought you said there was enough banging last night?” Lettie asked with the most innocent expression she could manage on her face.

  Marjory nearly collapsed in raucous laughter, and even old Samuel coughed into his hand as his chest heaved.

  Grayson pulled her closer. “You are quite incorrigible,” he whispered in her ear.

  Lettie smiled at him from under lowered lashes. “You’ll just have to put up with that, I’m afraid. I’m not meek and mild like other women.”

  Grayson swept her into his arms and murmured, “I wouldn’t have you any other way.” Then he kissed her to applause from Marjory and Samuel. Even the ravens in the tree took up the refrain and cawed long and loud.

  The group went inside, the overall mood lighter despite Byron Ocram’s missive that would soon tip their hand. Jasper and Dawn arrived not long after. Their appearance was heralded by all the ravens flocking to the house like a black cloud. The birds assembled along the roofline and in the trees. Then they all took flight, screeching as they rose.

  “Not a very discreet entrance, brother,” Lettie said as she rushed to his arms.

  The gargoyle hugged his sister, her smaller frame dwarfed by his large Elemental form. “All orchestrated so that the watchers hid our arrival from any Soarers looking this way.”

  “Dawn.” Lettie hugged her soon-to-be sister-in-law. The woman looked tired, and her short dark hair jutted out at all sorts of wild angles. “What on Earth did Jasper do to you?”

  A tired smile pulled at Dawn’s lips. “It was a long journey. Jasper insisted on leaving as soon as we received Samuel’s raven. He didn’t even let me pack anything.”

  “I’m not a pack horse to carry luggage as well as you,” Jasper grumbled as he shifted and stone disappeared to reveal a well-dressed gentleman underneath. Jasper and Samuel hugged and then slapped each other on the back.

  “It has been too long, Lord Seton,” Samuel said.

  Dawn and Lettie exchanged looks and Lettie rolled her eyes. “Men. They never think of a woman’s wardrobe requirements. Luckily, we are the same size and Samuel has kept my entire wardrobe here from the last hundred years.”

  Lettie tucked her arm i
nto Dawn’s and then introduced her to the old Warder. “Dawn, this is Samuel Thorne.”

  “A pleasure, my lady.” The old Elemental took Dawn’s hand and bowed over it in a courtly manner.

  “I will not be much company until I have some sleep, I’m afraid. But the raven said you had found something belonging to my mother?” Dawn’s gaze went from Samuel to Jasper.

  “Come inside. How about a bath first, and I can relate what we have found so far? Then once you are feeling refreshed, we can all meet in the drawing room to discuss matters.” Lettie led Dawn up the wide path to the rear entrance of the house.

  “I would love a bath. I didn’t realise how cold it was flying at night.” Dawn’s smile faded and faint lines tugged at the corner of her eyes.

  Jasper kissed Dawn’s forehead. “I’ll leave you in Lettie’s care while I talk to Samuel and Grayson.”

  Marjory and Lettie took charge of an exhausted Dawn and bustled her up the stairs to the bathroom.

  “We’re lucky the earl didn’t drop you in a paddock somewhere,” Marjory muttered as she helped Dawn out of her clothing.

  “Jasper wouldn’t dare drop Dawn, but being a thick-headed gargoyle, he wouldn’t have thought how tiring the journey was for his mate.” Lettie poured a few drops of lavender oil into the bathwater.

  “I don’t mind, really,” Dawn said as the women fussed over her. “And it was important we got here as quickly as possible. Neither of us wanted to wait until the train was due back in Alysblud. By the way, Marjory, Hector is most anxious for you to return. He seems convinced you have run away to sea with a fisherman.”

  Marjory chortled. “They do say absence makes the heart grow fonder. I find I’m missing his ugly old mug.”

  Dawn let out an audible sigh as she stepped into the bath and then sank beneath the fragrant water. She lay back and closed her eyes. “Why don’t you two talk while I soak?”

  Lettie placed the chair next to the bath. “I shall start at the beginning, when we arrived here and I saw the sylph, Byron Ocram, climb an invisible stair case …”