“But the snow, ma’am—.”
Katherine grasped his hair and pulled it viciously. “Do as I say, boy! Do you forget who is mistress here?”
“No, ma’am!” he cried. “I’ll run all the way if need be!”
“See that you do,” Katherine said and let him go so abruptly that he stumbled.
Chapter Five
It was late evening and Spencer was in his study. It had been two days since his conversation with Larissa and he’d managed to avoid her for the most part, no mean feat when they were virtually snowed in. The study was the safest place to hide in the castle as neither of Katherine or Finella would enter it.
More snow had fallen over the course of the day, but it had finally stopped and a bit of sunshine had crept in late in the day. They would be snowed in for at least a week still, and then for another week the road would be naught but mud. She was stuck there with him for a fortnight, at least. Their conversation had replayed in his mind more times than he cared to count. It stirred hope in him even though he resisted it. Hope was a foolish thing for someone in his position.
The past few days had gone well. There had been mild disturbances, a few shadows and faint whispers but he’d ignored them easily enough. Still, even without the violent hallucinations, his heart raced, his head ached, and even dim light seared his eyes. The combination of whatever illness or madness was consuming him, along with the devil’s own hangover, had done little to improve his outlook. There was an oppressive feeling of impending doom hanging over him, taunting him. He’d managed, though just barely, to convince himself that Larissa’s presence would not end in tragedy, but he wavered in his certainty.
She had not seen him at his worst. If she did, would she run in terror? Or, God forbid, would he actually harm her? He had no way of predicting. His behavior had become so erratic that he could no longer say with any certainty that he would not cause her harm, even indirectly. When those strange and haunting visions were upon him, when scenes from the battlefield recreated themselves before his eyes, he had no control over his behavior. For the moment, at least, he felt he still had a tenuous hold on reality, though it was becoming more and more difficult to keep straight what was real and what a mere figment. How long that might last was anyone’s guess.
A soft knock sounded at the door, and he called out to bid them enter. It would be Forrester or one of the other servants. The door opened and he turned his face away from the brightly lit corridor beyond. The glare from the heavy chandeliers burned his eyes like fire.
“Forgive me, m’lord, I know the light bothers ye.”
The voice was unfamiliar, but as he hardly knew the servants it was unsurprising. He’d spent the better portion of his tenure at Kinraven either locked in his study or hiding in his chamber. He didn’t acknowledge the statement. The maid approached the desk, burdened by a heavy tray. “I don’t want anything,” he said. The idea of food was revolting to him. Even brandy held no appeal, though he’d been neck deep in a bottle almost since his arrival at Kinraven, or prior to it, if he were to be honest.
“’Tis only an herbal tea, m’lord. Miss Walters suggested it,” the maid said. The tray rattled in her hands and her voice trembled as she spoke. “’Twill settle your stomach and ease you to sleep.”
So Larissa was already insinuating herself into his care. She had to go, she had to leave him here before it was too late. “It sounds horrible.”
“’Tis,” she agreed with a slight smile that did not reach her eyes. “But mayhap tonight it will help you sleep, m’lord. Ye’ve not rested well for days.”
“How do you know that?” he asked her.
She blushed furiously. “I make your bed every morning, m’lord. ’Tis obvious that ye’ve spent yer nights tossin’ and turnin’.”
Spencer was reminded of his earlier conversation with Larissa. If the servants were not truly loyal to him, but to Katherine and whatever scheme she was concocting, they had the kind of intelligence that would have been vital during the war. They knew everything, down to the most intimate of details.
“I don’t care for the tea, but you may leave it to avoid courting the displeasure of Miss Walters,” he said.
The maid nodded, and poured a cup of the brew regardless. Her hands trembled as she placed it near him on the desk. “She’ll be most upset if you don’t at least try it, m’lord. Perhaps you could add some of your brandy to it to make it more tolerable?”
He sighed. “’Tis a waste of good brandy. What is your name, girl?”
She looked up at him, her eyes wide and frightened. “Mary, m’lord. My name is Mary. I shouldn’t have overstepped and made suggestions to ye… Please, m’lord, I need the work. I’ll not do it again.”
“You’re not being dismissed, Mary. I only asked for your name because I did not know it. You may return to your normal duties, child,” he said, hating that her voice quivered with fear of him. Was he such an ogre then? Yes. Moody, difficult, half mad at the best of times and a blathering idiot talking to shadows at the worst. As a peace offering, he picked up the decanter of brandy and poured a small measure into the cup, “I will take your suggestion and make this foul brew more palatable.
“Thank you, m’lord,” she whispered and moved toward the door. As she reached for the door knob, she hesitated and looked back over her shoulder at him.
Spencer reached for the cup and dutifully sipped some of the tea. A look of horror crossed her face and she bolted from the room.
“I do not understand this place or its damned inhabitants,” he muttered and winced as the bitter taste of the tea settled heavily on his tongue. He reached for the decanter again and added another healthy dose of brandy to the cup. “Vile, wretched swill.”
Perusing the stack of letters that had accumulated during his descent into self-pity, Spencer absently sipped at the heavily laced tea. He was halfway through the cup when the room began to shift. The suspicion was there, the memory of the tea that he hadn’t wanted, hadn’t asked for. The servant had said it was ordered by Larissa. He tried to hang onto that information, to commit it to some corner of his memory that would remain unaffected by whatever it was that he had just ingested. Even as the thought occurred, he could feel it slipping away, carried off by the lengthening shadows that peeled themselves from the walls and floors, taking on horrific shapes that mirrored events from his past. He knew those would fade eventually, what came after would be significantly more horrific. His ability to differentiate what was real and what was a figment of his fevered brain would fade as the terror inducing images intensified.
From the deeper shadows, he heard his father’s voice. “I knew you’d come to no good. To the world you were my son, but we know the truth… you’re nothing but a bastard pawned off by your whore of a mother.”
They were words he’d heard often enough from his father when the man had been alive. When the figure moved forward, Spencer recoiled. It wasn’t his father, but the rotting corpse of the man who’d belittled and berated him from birth. Covered in filth and muck, his fetid skin crawling with worms, the apparition was the culmination of his father’s favorite insult, that he’d rather be rotting in the ground and food for worms than see his property and title in the hands of a by-blow.
“It isn’t real,” he whispered aloud. His voice sounded deafening in the darkness, his sense of hearing as hypersensitive as his sight. The sensation of burning, of his skin heating to the point of pain was unbearable. He struggled with his coat, finally he managed to shed it and then unbuttoned his waistcoat. He tugged his cravat free. Even in just his shirtsleeves, the temperature was unbearable. The sound of his pounding heart flooded his ears as if he could hear the blood rushing in his veins. The whooshing sound of it overwhelmed him as he sank to his knees on the floor.
“Spencer?” The voice was Larissa’s. It came from just beyond the door.
“Go away!” he cried out. “Leave me be!”
The door opened and he turned his face away. Regar
dless, pain exploded behind his eyes from the intensity of the glittering chandeliers of the hall. He heard the door closing behind her and turned back. The brilliant red-gold curls were restrained with a ribbon, and as she walked toward him it appeared to be real flames, licking at her skin.
“Not real. Not real.” The words were whispered, over and over again, the litany had been his only companion for days during the worst of his madness.
“Spencer, what has happened?”
That soft voice was the greatest torment of all; the light feminine sound filled the room and his head, drowning out all other sounds. “You have to leave! It isn’t safe… please! I don’t want to hurt you!” His body was burning, the heat scorching his skin beneath his clothes.
“Spencer, I am here to help you. What can I do?” she said and the sweet concern in her tone lulled him, seduced him as surely as it would have if she were truly there.
“Just go… fetch Forrester.”
“I’m not leaving you,” she said firmly, but still went to the bell pull and called for other servants to come. When she returned to his side, she knelt on the floor beside him. Her touch was gentle as she felt his forehead. “You’re burning up again… Is it a fever?”
“I don’t know. I don’t know,” he murmured. He shook his head trying to clear his mind, to erase the dark visions that crept in around them. With her there, it was as if there was a circle of light around them. The darkness was, for the moment at least, held at bay.
“It will be fine, Spencer. I will find out what has caused this… I swear to you.”
He looked up and the small bit of security that he’d clung to was yanked from him. He could see her standing there, but no longer his Larissa. The creature in front of him was like a grotesque doll. As he watched, the porcelain perfection of her cheek cracked, the skin seemed to peel away like the shell of an egg and beneath it he could see only the flames.
Fury washed through him. It was like nothing he’d ever felt, even in the heat of battle. To have her image corrupted so before him and whatever darkness had taken up residence inside him use her against him so cruelly, was simply too much. Blinded by rage, he reached out, his hands encircling the slender throat of the apparition. It felt strangely solid beneath his fingers, but he knew, just as he’d known the black shadows weren’t real, that this wasn’t either. It was just another form of torment, the offer of slim hope and the unprecedented cruelty of having it yanked away. “Liar!” he roared.
Hands grasped and clawed at him, dragged him away from the fiendish creature that dared come in the guise of the woman he craved with all his heart and soul. He struggled against those holding him down, tried to escape, but he was too weak. When they placed a dampened cloth over his mouth, he tried to scream, but no sound emerged. But it grew dark again, the horrific visions fading into nothingness as the blessed sleep of unconsciousness claimed him.
Larissa was shaken but relatively unharmed. Her throat ached and she would undoubtedly have bruises from the strength of Spencer’s grip on her throat, but all things considered, it could have been infinitely worse. Katherine and Finella were seated before the fire. While Finella appeared both concerned and morbidly curious, Katherine was suspiciously unconcerned about the incident.
“What happened to him?” she demanded. “He was somewhat confused last night but not like this! Nothing like this!”
Mrs. Agatha entered the room then. “I warned you.”
Larissa whirled on her. “I asked for facts, madam, not superstition and gossip. If I require either of those things, I am fully aware of where they may be obtained! I want a full accounting of who has come and gone from that study today!”
Katherine rose then. “You are overwrought, Miss Walters, and deservedly so. Being very nearly murdered at the hands of someone you obviously have such tender feelings for would be enough to overset anyone.”
“I am not overwrought,” Larissa protested. “I am concerned for Spencer and I cannot believe that these radical changes in his behavior and his perception of the world about him happen without any sort of antecedent! Something must occur that triggers these episodes!”
Katherine shook her head. “You are grasping at straws, my dear. I am sorry to have to tell you that Spencer is suffering from the same affliction that has burdened so many men of the Kinraven line. Madness is not unheard of in this family.”
Larissa stared at the woman for a moment, her eyes narrowed with suspicion. “He is not mad. Who has entered that study today?”
“No one,” Katherine replied. “Save for you. Perhaps you are the source of his madness, then?”
“He didn’t fetch his own tea.”
Dorcas was standing near the window, staring out into the darkness, but her surprisingly calm observation effectively silenced everyone else in the room.
“What do you mean?” Larissa asked.
Dorcas shrugged. “You must not have noticed what with being near strangled and all, but there was a tea tray on his desk and a half empty cup sittin’ there. I might be wrong, but I don’t know what gent fetches tea for himself. Don’t matter if they’re earls or butchers. Men just don’t do for themselves.”
A commotion from the corridor prompted Larissa to turn. Several of the footmen were assisting in carting a half conscious Spencer up the stairs. “What did you give him?”
Katherine sighed. “It is an old sleep remedy made from hemlock.”
“It’s poison!” Larissa cried. “Do you mean to kill him then?”
Mrs. Agatha made a derisive sound. “It can be deadly if used incorrectly. But in small doses, as it has been administered to his lordship for his own safety and yours, it merely induces sleep!”
“At whose order was this substance given to him?” Larissa demanded.
“On my orders,” Katherine replied evenly. “It will not harm him. It is administered with the utmost of care.”
“No more,” Larissa said. “You will not use such dangerous substances to treat him without an actual physician present!”
“You cannot simply come into my home and issue orders!” Katherine hissed at her.
Larissa refused to back down. Spencer’s very life might depend upon it. “I can and I will. You, madam, reside here in his home on his charity!”
“And I am his cousin and you are a mere acquaintance!” Katherine protested. “You must see where the power lies in this situation!”
“The power in this situation lies with the woman who will become Countess of Kinraven,” Larissa proclaimed boldly. She’d never have dared make such a claim, but it seemed that Spencer’s life might very well depend upon it. The lie hung heavily on her lips but she brazened it out. “And that is not you.”
Katherine recoiled as if she’d been struck. Finella muttered worriedly beneath her breath and Dorcas let out a low whistle. It was the latter who spoke first, murmuring beneath her breath. “We can get my vicar to perform the service.”
“Enough, Dorcas,” Larissa said.
“You are lying,” Katherine challenged. “Spencer, just this morning, proclaimed that he had no intent to marry.”
“He only said so because I refused his offer before he left,” Larissa lied smoothly. She was becoming quite good at it with all the practice she was getting. “We spoke about it after breakfast the other morning. You can ask your aunt. We were closeted in the drawing room together for some time.”
Katherine smiled. “And a lovely conversation you had there! It made no mention of marriage!”
“And were you eavesdropping to know the content of our private conversation?” Larissa demanded.
“Perhaps. Perhaps you were merely speaking so loudly that I could not avoid hearing… I understand, of course, that it was quite an upsetting conversation. Having to revisit such ugly memories of your vicious attack at the hands of Lord Moreland,” Katherine said with a triumphant gleam in her eyes.
“Rest assured, whatever is in my past,” Larissa vowed, “That there is only one woman
in this house that Spencer desires. It clearly will never be you. Why, you’re nearly old enough to be his mother!”
Katherine’s triumphant gleam turned to cold fury. “I will concede to your greater desirability to him… after all, your innocence offers no impediment does it?”
Larissa raised an eyebrow at her. “And what of yours? Dallying with the butler?”
Finella gasped and several other servants that were present quickly turned away, but there was a quiet hum of whispers throughout the room. Larissa knew then that she’d won the round, though the fight was far from over.
“When Spencer is well enough,” Katherine stated, “I will have the answer directly from him. In the meantime, I will allow you to play out this fantasy and issue your orders at will. But when you are proved a liar, I will exult in tossing you and that low creature you call a companion out into the snow!” With that, Katherine turned and marched from the room. The door slammed loudly inner wake.
“In the meantime,” Larissa said, as she pointedly ignored Katherine’s vitriol, “We must send one of the kitchen lads to the village for a physician!”
The housekeeper sneered at her. “This is not London! We have no physicians here! The surgeon came from town but his lordship near broke his arm and the man’s refused to come back!”
“I’ll send for a physician of my own, then,” Larissa said. “In the meantime, no one will enter this room without supervision from Dorcas, Forrester or myself! Is that clear, madam?”
“Miss Katherine is right! You’ve no right to order everyone about in this house!”
Larissa had no argument for that. The woman was absolutely right. She had stepped well beyond the bounds of propriety and had lied through her teeth to force the issue, but it was too late to retreat. “I have his best interests at heart, madam, which is more than can be said of you or anyone else in this house! When he is recovered enough to address the matter, I will discuss it with him. In the meantime, you will remember your place and your station!”
The Dark Regency Series: Boxed Set Page 57
