Autumn

by Lisa Ann Brown

  “What troubles you?” Eli finally asked as Arabel made no effort to release her tight grip upon him.

  “Don’t let me go,” Arabel whispered and so Eli pulled her closer, requiring no further invitation.

  Eli tilted Arabel’s sorrowfully beautiful face up toward him. He leaned down and kissed her lips softly and then deepened the kiss so that she swayed against him, her sadness forgotten at the scorching heat of his touch. Their bodies melded together, heart to racing heart, and the room seemed to disappear until it was as if they were completely alone in a world of their own making. A world where only their next breaths mattered and all of their longings were answered in the stillness of the autumn evening, with the expectant air the only witness to their undying passion.

  Arabel led Eli from the room, the rest of the meal forgotten. She pulled his hand willingly up the stairs, heedless of Morna’s shocked face, and the threat of her grandmother’s return. Arabel no longer cared what her grandmother thought; she felt freed from the restrictions of a conventionality not of her own creation and she vowed that she would live authentically within herself from this moment on.

  Arabel’s bedroom was dimly lit from the fire that burned in the grate. Eli caught a glimpse of cheery yellow and white furnishings as Arabel pulled him down beside her on the soft bed. They lay together in the darkening shadows, simply holding each other tightly. Eli kissed Arabel’s hand and traced her lips with his finger.

  “I’ll not let you be caught with me upstairs, Arabel,” Eli cautioned, determined not to further adversely affect Arabel’s reputation or her relationship with her grandmother. Eli had spoken with his mother about the situation and she’d assured her son to continue his relationship with Arabel, but to always maintain the correct lines of decency, so that her grandmother would not be able to fault him for anything less than the most gentlemanly of behaviours.

  But Eli wasn’t feeling very gentlemanly at the moment.

  He was as consumed by Arabel as she was of him; however, he was aware that there was something within the overtures of her lovemaking tonight that was not quite right. Eli wished it didn’t feel as though Arabel wanted to use her passion for him to distract herself from her feelings in regard to some other matter, but he could not quite shake the sensation. Eli took hold of Arabel’s wandering hand and brought it to his lips for a kiss.

  “Arabel-” Eli began, silenced by her lips as she closed the distance between their faces and taunted him with greedy, insatiable kisses. She tasted deliciously of mint and peaches.

  “Eli,” Arabel mimicked breathlessly, pausing for a moment to release him from her siren’s grip.

  “You know I yearn to be with you,” Eli spoke slowly, “but not when there’s a lack of clarity. And not when your grandmother could discover us at anytime. I’ll not have that displeasure upon my head.”

  Arabel scowled disbelievingly at Eli. “You’re frightened of my grandmother?” she scoffed lightly and Eli sat up abruptly.

  “I’m afraid of no one,” he replied, his tone distant as he struggled to regain his composure and gauge Arabel’s shifting, incongruous moods. Women, Eli thought to himself, with a sudden flash of unexpected humour.

  “Prove it.”

  Eli grabbed Arabel then, surprising her with his speed, pinning her lithe body tightly under his athletic frame. He leaned down and kissed her firmly. Arabel’s mouth was delectable and Eli wanted nothing more than to pleasure her senses all through the black and inky night and straight on till morning, but he could not do so when she was not being honest with him.

  “Out with it,” he said.

  Arabel returned Eli’s intense gaze innocently. “Why, whatever d’you mean?” she asked silkily.

  But Eli would not be thwarted. He showered Arabel’s face and her neck with kisses, stroking her face, her back, her hair, nibbling on her ears, kissing her nose.

  “Tell me what is bothering you; I shall not let you up until you do.”

  “I find myself to be quite content,” Arabel returned naughtily and proceeded to twist her body under Eli’s, delighting in her newly discovered feminine power, as Eli moaned in pretend defeat. But he was quicker and more determined than she’d thought.

  Eli pinned Arabel’s arms roughly to her sides and proceeded to drown her in a scorching kiss that threatened to undermine his decision to postpone their lovemaking .Then he rolled over, abruptly releasing her.

  “I must know what’s troubling you, Arabel,” Eli tried again and Arabel relented at last.

  Arabel haltingly filled Eli in on her morning interview with Dorcas. As she spoke, Eli began to see how the news of her grandfather’s murder had incited within Arabel a need to rebel against the confines of her grandmother’s authority and against the rules of society in general.

  Eli understood Arabel’s desire to lose herself in passion, and in the act of lovemaking, but Eli was determined that when they consummated their affair, the circumstance would be sublime, and not tainted by old cruelties and talk of even older curses. Eli wanted everything to be perfect for Arabel. Being a romantic sort by nature, and loving Arabel as he did, Eli wanted nothing more than to encompass them both in a world of loving so pure and true than nothing could stain its light.

  “Have you any idea what curse the old woman spoke of?” he asked Arabel, and she shook her head.

  “I’ve no idea.”

  Eli stretched out his long frame next to Arabel. The warmth of her body was a beguiling force that beckoned him to move closer but he refrained from doing so. He idly stroked her long black hair and she sighed.

  “I do love you, Eli,” she said.

  “As I love you, Arabel,” he replied.

  They lay cuddled together as the room became fully dark and only a faint glow emanated from the stone fireplace. There were no sounds from within the house and it was almost as if they were actually alone in their own world, and Arabel was content that it should be so.

  “I should like to stay with you here forever,” she remarked, sighing.

  Eli nuzzled Arabel’s neck with his warm lips, tickling her. “I’m afraid that would not be enough time to prove how much I adore you,” he responded and Arabel smiled.

  “Did you bring up the wine?” she asked and Eli laughed, glad that Arabel’s humour was restored.

  “Yes, but I will not be partaking,” he answered, reaching for the bottle and Arabel’s glass, which was on the floor next to her bed.

  “It’s early yet,” Arabel implored. “Stay awhile.”

  Eli shook his head as he poured Arabel’s wine, silently wishing he had not been raised as properly as he had, even by the standards set for a Gypsy boy. Eli liked to push against authority as much as Arabel did, but he also desired the approval of her grandmother, Amelia Bodean, murderess or not.

  “Dawn comes early, as you might recall,” Eli drawled engagingly into Arabel’s ear.

  “Then don’t sleep,” she retorted, smiling, knowing already he was not going to stay.

  Eli tucked a loose strand of jet black hair behind Arabel’s ear. “When I do spend the night with you, Arabel, you have my word and my promise that neither of us will sleep.”

  Arabel sat up and surveyed Eli. He looked rumpled, relaxed, and thoroughly male, therefore completely and incongruously foreign within the domain of her girlish bedroom. Arabel loved the look of Eli. Loved that his presence dominated her feminine room with his blatant masculinity.

  “I’ve never had a gentleman caller in my bedroom before,” Arabel said, attempting coyness, as she sipped her peach wine and stared at him over the rim of the glass with her relentless baby blues.

  “Glad to hear it,” Eli retorted, shifting himself into a sitting position as well, mentally preparing himself to leave the warmth of Arabel’s cosy room to venture out into the dark cold of the autumn evening.

  Arabel suddenly started, as if she’d just remembered a matter of great urgency, and perhaps she had.

  “You do dance, don’t you?”
Arabel asked urgently, and Eli, bewildered, nodded affirmative.

  Arabel sighed in relief at his answer. “And have you a good suit? Something for a formal occasion?”

  Again, Eli nodded affirmative, his almond eyes lighting up with humour.

  “Where, may I ask, are you taking me?”

  Arabel peered at Eli, as if eyeing him up, toying with him.

  “Well,” she replied mischievously, “there just so happens to be an occasion next week where I require a suitable escort, and since you dance, and own a good suit, I hazard you will do just fine.”

  Eli ran a hand down Arabel’s back. “I’ll have to make sure I’m free…” he trailed off, noting a sudden naughty glint in her flashing blue eyes.

  Arabel threw the first of a series of pillows at him and Eli ducked and laughed at her expression.

  “Of course I’ll escort you; you do need to tell me where and when, however.”

  “The Autumn Ball at Murphy Estates, I believe it’s to be on Saturday evening.”

  “It will be my honour to escort you, Miss Spade,” Eli promised, bringing Arabel’s hand to his lips for another stolen kiss. “And now, much to my own dismay, I must take my leave of you, as the dawn does come early!”

  Arabel leaned into Eli and smacked her lips to his soundly, teasing them both.

  “I suppose I’ll let you leave,” she said with a regretful sigh. “No doubt Morna is prostrate right outside of my door, guarding my illicit secrets with her very body!”

  Arabel’s joking speculation wasn’t much of an exaggeration, as sure enough, when Arabel opened her door and she and Eli emerged into the hallway, the maid came rushing up to them immediately, an unguardedly shameless and interested look upon her face.

  “Your granny’s not home yet, miss,” Morna said immediately, “so your young fellow can still leave out by the back with none the wiser.”

  Arabel met Morna’s eyes squarely, her tone even, her meaning plain.

  “Morna, I appreciate your concern, but Eli will be leaving as he entered – through the front door, the same as any other esteemed guest to our household.”

  Morna’s eyes twinkled in like-minded humour and she preceded the young couple down the stairway. Morna brought Eli’s overcoat to him and then slinked away into the shadowy foyer, leaving Arabel and Eli to say their goodbye in private.

  Eli caught Arabel in a tight embrace and kissed her thoroughly, leaving them both a bit dizzy.

  “Until tomorrow,” Eli said reluctantly, kissing Arabel on the forehead.

  “Safe journey,” Arabel murmured and then he was gone, disappearing into the darkness, and she closed the door slowly.

  Morna reappeared, clucking noisily at Arabel. She’d obviously been waiting just outside the foyer.

  “You be counting your lucky stars, missy, that your granny’s not come home yet!” Morna said, grinning fiercely, wishing desperately for details, but reasonably happy with the information she had discerned upon her own.

  “She’s the lucky one,” Arabel said cryptically, turning to mount the stairs. “Goodnight sweet Morna, and thank you, for always being so supportive.”

  Arabel gave the maid a quick and well deserved hug, and then ran up the stairs, Eli’s kiss still fresh upon her lips.

  During the night, as she dreamed of Gypsy poison and untrustworthy lovers, Arabel felt a presence within her room. She twisted and turned, fighting to awaken as the perturbed knowledge that she was not alone in her room, and that someone was watching her, prompted her to wakefulness. Arabel snapped her eyes open to the dying embers of the firelight, the dark shadows of her room doing nothing to alleviate her unease.

  In the chair by the window, Arabel could vaguely make out the shape of someone. She did not think it was a ghost, but it was too dark yet to tell, and her eyes had not fully accustomed themselves to the lack of light.

  “Who’s there?” Arabel called to the figure, her voice shakier than she would have liked.

  There was no response. Arabel’s heart pounded as she sat up in bed, reaching for her wrapper which lay on the chair next to her.

  “I’ll scream if you don’t answer,” Arabel threatened the figure, shrinking back against her headboard as the figure stood up and moved toward her in the dark.

  “No need to scream, Arabel,” Amelia Bodean said.

  Arabel leaned against the headboard, clutching her wrapper to her chin, strangely horrified to have been watched while sleeping by her grandmother. The woman whom she now considered a stranger.

  “You can’t know what it was like,” Amelia Bodean said quietly, her voice sad and somewhat slurred.

  Arabel wondered what time it was; surely she’d been asleep for quite some time, long enough apparently, for her grandmother to have gotten thoroughly inebriated at her club.

  “Surely I don’t know what you mean.”

  “Oh, I think you do, young miss.”

  “Perhaps you need your bed, Grandmother.”

  “Perhaps you need to know the truth.”

  “And what truth is that? The convenient sort?” Arabel‘s voice rose in pitch; she could not quite keep the scathing sarcasm from it and she found she possessed no desire to censor herself.

  Amelia Bodean gasped a quick, indrawn breath. “It might be. It just might be,” she said agreeably.

  Arabel was silent. The moment ticked on, uncomfortably.

  “You don’t know what it was like,” Amelia Bodean repeated. “To be young, so full of hope. And to have it all wrenched from you!”

  “Is that your excuse?”

  “Excuse? I’m not making excuses! I did what I had to do, and I would do it again!”

  “What? Dispose of my grandfather and disinherit my mother? You’d gladly commit these heinous acts a second time?”

  “I never disinherited your mother! She ran away; she’s the one who left and never returned.”

  “You drove her away! You wouldn’t allow her to be with the man she loved! Well, you will not receive the chance to do the same with me!” Arabel vowed, all trace of sleep vanquished from her mind and body, vibrant anger and hot fear trading places with relaxation.

  “He couldn’t be trusted; he was one of them.” Amelia Bodean pronounced the word ‘them’ as if it left an unpleasant taste in her mouth, as if she could not even stand to think of Arabel’s father without grimacing in displeasure.

  “Why are you telling me this?” Arabel asked.

  Amelia Bodean sighed and Arabel could see the glass now, in her hand. Amelia Bodean raised it unsteadily to her lips, drank deeply, and then turned toward the door.

  “You should leave the past alone Arabel, there’s no skin left on those bones.”

  Arabel watched with incredulous outrage simmering inside of her as her grandmother wove her way unsteadily out the door of her bedroom and down the hallway, a darkened figure with a blackened heart.

  Arabel was too wound up to sleep. She got out of bed and placed several fat logs on the glowing embers in the fireplace. Arabel poked at the logs with her fire poker and was frustrated when a tear or two began to slide down her cheek. She thrust the poker angrily into the flames, sending sparks flying.

  How had Amelia Bodean known Arabel had delved into the horrors of the past? Could she have spoken to Dorcas as well? But how would she have even known to do so? Arabel’s thoughts were a confused muddle as she returned to bed and stared moodily at the flickering flames. It would be a long time before sleep would claim her again, and everything within her felt heavy with sorrow.

  Arabel felt under her pillow for the red stones Baltis had given her. Her fingers connected with the stones and instantly she felt the calm buzz of them begin to recharge her depleted energy. Arabel laid the magical red stones against her pale cheek and resigned herself to facing yet another dawn shrouded in confusion. The mysteries wrapped themselves around Arabel, beckoning to her to find answers. The upcoming dawn provided Arabel with another chance to continue on with the muddling quest for cl
ues and yet another day of trying to understand and eradicate all of the evil which swarmed around her.

  Arabel finally drifted off into slumber just as the dawn broke. She did not dream.

  As was her fashion, in the small hours after dawn, Morna brought Arabel her morning tea, along with the shocking and unpleasant news that another dead woman’s body had been discovered draped across the Great Torch.

  The giant heart of darkness swelled viciously and Arabel heard the laughter in her head, unrepentant, guttural, and hungry for bloodshed. Another victim had now been slain. Arabel wondered when the evil would finally come to claim her.

  Surely it could not be long now.

  The Last If Ever

  The dead woman’s name was Minnie Carlyle and she had been raped and choked to death.

  Arabel stood at the Priory with Ira on her shoulder, surveying the crowd which had gathered to observe the tragic scene. Minnie’s abused body was draped across the Great Torch as the others had been and her naked limbs arranged in a similar pose of sacrifice.

  Minnie had gone missing only last night and so the killer apparently had taken less time with her than with the other two female victims. Arabel saw Chief Constable Bartlin ordering his minions to rope off the Great Torch completely and his eyes met Arabel’s briefly. Arabel saw a wary respect in the Chief’s expression, but he did not linger in looking at her, and proceeded to continue barking out orders to his staff.

  Arabel moved further from the Torch and saw Zander Cross standing a small distance away. Zander spied Arabel at the same time and he hailed her in greeting, his normally merry eyes sober, their expression unreadable. Arabel and Zander moved toward one other, pushing through the excitable group which had gathered. Arabel felt the chalky taste in her mouth and was cognizant that the grey energy hovered nearby, pleased with the fresh, tragic disaster.

  Zander took Arabel’s arm and led her away from the crowd. He didn’t waste time with pleasantries.