Angel of Ash

by Law, Josephine

It was locked.

  He swore angrily. Turning towards his room and entering the hallway which led to her door. That to was locked against him. Three hard raps he gave her to answer him. “Open this door.” He bit out angrily.

  Silence reigned. He used his booted feet to knock the door aside, angry and deep inwardly down, hurt.

  She jumped, fleeing to the other end of the room, staring at him, her chest rapidly rising and falling. “What do you want?” She cried. “There is no more pain you can inflict upon me! No more words that will hurt me as have done already. So what do you want?” She cried.

  He stood still, watching her like a hawk. “You shall not lock your door towards me.” He finally spoke softly.

  She laughed, wildly, wickedly. “I grow mad, here, with you! I will leave, Asher, my father is already sailing here. I am leaving.”

  “Never!”

  “Why! You don’t care for me! How could you hate me so much when all I ever wanted to do was love you,” she began, her voice dropping, tears falling from her face. “All I ever want to do is love you.”

  “You should not discontinue.” He managed to say.

  She laughed. “Oh, Asher, don’t you see, you don’t want my love. You want me to hate you for some reason. Well, you won, are you happy? I don’t hate you and I don’t love you, I am so tired. Soon, I will give birth and I am so tired, all I want is peace. All I want is to be free from you.”

  He shook his head numbly. “No, there is no freedom, you’re mine, you will reside here, and you will stay with me.”

  The little fight which she had seemed to have left her, she whittled in front of him, became so very small and vulnerable. “You are my end, Asher, I see it now.” She spoke quietly, gravely. “A great evil will occur. You should rejoice, then. You will be free of me.”

  He could say nothing, trepidation racing his heart. What mysteries did she speak of? What horrors did she utter against him? “I know not of what you speak of. You shall reside here, I will allow your father visitation if you so wish it.”

  He turned at his last spoken words, intent on leaving when just moments before he’d wanted nothing more than to be near her. Yet, her words scared him, shook him to his very core. A warning, they were uttered in, a warning.

  “Asher!” Angel called after him. “No more, Asher, I cannot take a moment more of your hate. Whatever wrong I have done you forgive me but a moment more of your hate will send me to an asylum. No more, Asher, I am your wife, I am your family. Respect me as I have respected you. You are not my jailor, you are my husband. Give me the respect due me.”

  Asher did not respond.

  Angel turned upset, but grim resolution in her. She was so tired. Instead, she dressed, ignoring the shattered door that led to Asher’s room.

  “Where is my husband?” She asked Mrs. Bates moments later, downstairs.

  “He has left for his office, my lady,” Mrs. Bates said.

  “Have a carriage ready with outriders I want to leave within ten minutes.”

  “But, my lord, gave orders,” Mrs. Bates began stammering. “You weren’t to leave, without…his,” she tried to say.

  “My husband and I have come to an understanding, Mrs. Bates have a carriage at my disposal or I will walk to my destination, it matters not to me. I have no jailor nor slaver in this household. Do not dare question me again.”

  Mrs. Bates thinned her lips nodding resolutely before turning away; she didn’t allow the mistress to see the smile that played upon her face. Angel waited in the front hall less than ten minutes before the groomsman announced his arrival. She left Asher’s house in which she had been a prisoner in for more than three months, sickened at her weakness for allowing her own self imprisonment. Asher’s betrayal had delineated all forms of loyalty. She cared not at his approval at his anger for her actions. He would always find some excuse; always find her lacking and wanting.

  “Where to, my lady?” the head groomsman said, in his splendid red livery, a jockey hat sitting on his dark hair rakishly.

  “Anthony Hawthorne’s residence if you please, the master’s cousin,” she stated emphatically before being escorted inside.

  He whipped his horses and they were off momentarily, and she smiled, quite happy, free, a weight having been lifted, away from Asher’s damned house and many mood swings.

  Anthony lived less than ten minutes away from Asher in a stately townhome, she knocked smartly upon the door, giving the groomsmen’s orders that she would be no more than an hour. It was still early yet, just eleven in the morning. She cared not for protocol, the ways of English society. For once in her life she would be the bearer and deliverer of her own tidings.

  It was Anthony himself who opened the door, staring at her wearily, but with no small smile.

  “And what do I owe this pleasure, my lady?” He said, escorting her inside, perusing a curious look out into the street, Asher missing.

  “Owe your pleasure, to my curiosity, Anthony,” she began, allowing him to take her light cloak, bereft of a bonnet. Anthony could sense the difference in her from three days ago, the grim resolution.

  He escorted her to his study, ringing a bell for refreshments before sitting himself across from her, curiously intent, but aware of her femininity the improperness of their actions.

  “Does Asher know that you are here?” He finally asked.

  “I am sure by now he has been told, I care not, anymore.”

  “Are you not…anxious, that he will not be pleased,” he said.

  “Asher will always grow…anxious, no matter what I do, Anthony, I will not blacken my soul to save his anymore. I am married not a slave.”

  “Well said, my lady,” he said, pausing when a cart was rolled in by a maid who looked at the two questioningly. However, she set up the refreshments and then left, her feet near flying, Anthony stood, closing the door soundly behind the two as Angel poured their tea.

  “Now, tell me why my husband hates me so,” she said softly, allowing Anthony’s gasp of breath, his choking fit to subside before she added one last word to her unusual question. “Please, Anthony,” she pleaded softly.

  “Asher does not hate you, my lady-”

  “No, please, no. Do not whitewash the black horror of our marriage, I bid of you. I am quite fond of you, Anthony. I appreciate your humor and your loyalty to my husband and your befriending me. But more than that, I appreciate your honesty. Now, please, I am asking you to tell me why my husband hates me so.”

  Anthony paused, his sight upon the opened French doors, it was a balmy spring day. The sun was out. All should be right with the world and yet here he sat contemplating on breaking this lady’s heart. “Asher had a hard life, my lady. It should have seemingly all been well, especially with a family such as his. Now, you must understand what I tell you is known to only his immediate family and then what I will tell you, well, some of it only known to me.”

  “I understand, Anthony.”

  “When Asher was six he was in a horrid accident. He fell down a chasm upon his parent’s property. He went missing for more than seven days. When they finally found him, he was half-dead. His family, of course, were able to nurse him back to health during the ensuing months, but something, perhaps the fear broke his mind in some horrid form. There was something not quite right with Asher after those days. He rarely spoke, was withdrawn and distant. The only peace he had was with Hunter, she somehow managed to stem the fear within him. A little more than a year later he witnessed a man brutally stabbing his wife and child in the village, Asher tried to stop the man, just eight years old and was nearly killed. He had more than six stab wounds to his body. Once again he danced at death’s door. When he healed from those wounds Asher did not speak for more than six months. The doctors feared for his sanity, there was talk among the villagers that he was haunted, that the devil followed him. It was during that time that he met her. She was a villager of the upper level. Her father owned his own farm, was related to titled gentry in London,
her mother was dead.”

  “What was her name?”

  “Deborah.”

  “Please continue, Anthony.”

  “He started speaking again, started smiling ever so often. But there is also a madness in our..the Hawthorne family…dark melancholia, some of our family members have it, our uncle, Timothy…Hunters’ abuser, grandfather. A madness that even the Lady Maria’s many cures…cannot cure. Mind you I grew up with the brothers, and Asher and I are of the same age and the closest of cousins and friends. He is like a brother to me, they all are. During the next few years Asher’s life was indeed endangered and after every horror he faced, what had made Asher who he is now started slowly building. Pain, fear hurt festered within him even when he fell head over heels in love with Deborah when he was but nine years of age. They were nearly inseparable. The families made no qualms that they favored the two young lovers. It was only Deborah who seemed able to calm the demons which haunted and chased Asher. Often. They married in secret at 16 years of age, but told no one. Asher was so honorable, once upon a time ago. He would not lay with her until she was his wife. But Deborah wanted a large wedding, and Asher, Asher wanted whatever Deborah wanted. So he waited as the wedding was being planned and they lay together as man and wife. The love he had for her, she could do no wrong in his eyes. When they turned nineteen, they wedding was finally in plans, the parents deemed the two ready, Deborah was pregnant, and they were to be married…this time in front of the family. But,”

  “That was the year Hunter was abducted.”

  “Yes. The wedding was postponed; Deborah had a miscarriage, Asher’s black moods and depression returned as we searched for Hunter. When Asher returned home after long years of futile searching, Deborah had visited the Continent, been wooed by many men, had turned away from being the wife of a second son, she had fallen out of love with Asher. Her sights were set upon one greater than him. She fashioned her sights upon Caleb, even while still married to Asher. Asher had no knowledge of her betrayal. They continue lying together as man and wife, their official wedding was being planned once again, she’d told Asher that she was pregnant. The family had found out about their earlier wedding but still insisted they act proper about it. The day their second wedding was to take place, Asher found her and Caleb together. Up until this point Deborah had been Asher’s first and only lover. No other woman existed for him. He loved her more than he loved himself. She had been his wife, from the moment he laid eyes on her. Women had thrown their selves at him since he turned thirteen years of age, and no one existed for him, ever. The betrayal, his brother, and the woman he loved, his wife…Asher, Asher never recovered from that betrayal. ”

  “No, Anthony, no,” Angel denied, shaking her head in horror. “Why would Caleb do such a thing to his brother? Why would she?”

  “Deborah had used both Caleb and Asher. It was Caleb who told me that he’d fallen in love with her and they were to tell Asher the news. Caleb wanted to marry her. In front of Asher and he, nude, she laughed at them both. Stated she’d never settle for Asher as a second son as long as Caleb was alive. But if Caleb died she’d welcome Asher back into her arms. She was so cold, so bitter, it was business to her. Even though her father was related to titled gentry in London, he was a poor farmer, I assumed, her first priority was to never be poor, to be able to live in the lap of luxury which her father could not afford.”

  “There was a great altercation, Asher left for London that night, and it was a long time before he was able to speak to Caleb again. When he arrived in London, he was in a deep depression; there was talk of having him committed. His parents saved him from that horror. His pain was torture to watch. He was a shell of a man. His hatred and horror and blame was something I had never seen. During that time Deborah fled in disgrace and disappeared in London. Seven months later she contacted Asher, stating that she was giving birth. Asher found her in a dilapidated home, she was half dead, wasting away from cancer, the baby, she’d just given birth to a baby boy. When he entered the room, she, she was strangling the baby. Asher was too late in saving the newborn. She pulled out a pistol, shot at Asher; it struck him in the chest. He watched, as he lay wounded, as she stuck the pistol in her mouth…and killed herself.”

  “Asher, even as darkly cold and emotionless a man he had grown to be…it was nothing compared to the days, weeks and months immediately following that horrid event. There was nothing of Asher left. He cared for no one, he wanted no one, hate and anger and guilt festered within him. To this day still do. He cannot get over his past, my lady, no matter how much you love him. The Asher I had once known died that depressingly horrible afternoon. The only thing that made him somewhat human was the return of Hunter to the home. Even then, my lady, even then, her reunion added more guilt and rage and self-blame to his already darkened conscious. It’s been years and still there is nothing within him. That’s when he became…the bastard that he is today. He takes pleasure in sleeping with women and hurting them, he punishes his current lover for Deborah’s betrayal. There is no love, no hope, nothing within him. He hates and he hates and there is no love or forgiveness within him. Asher blames himself for so much. His accident at the age of six. For allowing that poor villager to die and her child. Deborah, he most of all blames himself for Deborah. He blames himself for the death of his newborn son by her hands. Asher is chased by demons and I know not why, his mother has prayed most over his soul as she had no other. There is a deep darkness and emptiness that has been born unto him since I have known him, since before the first incident with the chasm. I remember when we were around five years of age, even then Asher was always cold and withdrawn, he’d stare at his brothers as if…as if he did not fit in, did not belong to the family. Hunter has that same…oddity about her also. Asher has never been happy, never enjoyed life. He treats it as a business, his life. A weaker man would have committed suicide, but not Asher. He is waiting for death, wants it, and therefore endangers his life, but to kill himself, he will not do, simply because of the dishonor it would bring to his family. If he was but weaker, he would have done it a long time ago. ”

  “My God, Anthony, my God.”

  “It is not your fault, his lack of love for you, no matter how perfect you are, how beautiful you are or how much you love him. Asher is dead on the inside. He is the living dead. A ghost of a man.”

  “Do I resemble her, Anthony, do I look like her?”

  Anthony nodded his head slowly. “Yes, my lady, very much so. She had black hair, the same shade, hue and length as yours, silver eyes, your stature and weight, although her skin was pale. Even your voice, my lady, even your voice, you sound so achingly like her. The brothers and I were so stunned, shocked when we first viewed you, first heard your voice. Like you, my lady, her smile would light up an entire room. Men flocked to her. Like you my lady, she was truly beautiful. My lady, it is as if Deborah was reborn in you, you seem so achingly familiar. I know nothing of death and heaven and reincarnation or souls and damnation and forgiveness. But it seems in you Deborah was reborn to live her life again. To perhaps make amends for the great wrong she had done. You are her and yet you are not. A frightful thing has occurred, my lady. Your fate and the fate of Asher are horridly intertwined and will always be til the day you die. It is outside of your wishes to love him; you must love him because it is your destiny. And Asher must forgive you for things you had no part in. What a twisted horrid tale that has been written, isn’t it? Your fate and his are no longer yours…were never.”

  “I see now,” she began softly, a sad smile upon her lips. “I see now, this is why he wanted me. Because in me he sees her. He sees so much of her he can never really see me. Through me he punishes her. I don’t even exist to him. I am merely a vehicle of his pain, of his guilt, of his hurt. Just an ugly reminder of a past he dares not forget. How can I look so like a dead woman? It frightens me, Anthony! I do know that upon first look at Asher, upon my first touch of him…I felt, I felt as if the last piece of my soul
had fallen into place. And even as he hates me now, I still pray before the Lord, that one day, one day he will favor me, one day he will love me. Even today, that missing piece of my soul is his to my death.”

  “My lady, I am so sorry for your pain, so sorry. You’re are but an innocent caught in his web. I am so sorry. He knows not what he does. He knows not who he is anymore. Asher was born with an old soul, but once upon a time ago, when he…when he and Deborah were together, before Hunter was kidnapped, there was some semblance of peace and happiness about him. He smiled, my lady, not calculating and cold. But genuinely warm. There was once upon a time a good man within him. Now, he is still my best friend, my closest brother. But if he was not, I would not wish him upon my worst enemy. He will destroy you if you stand in his way.. I wish there was…I wish you were not involved within this mess.”

  “Too late for wishes, Anthony. I thank you, all the same for answering questions which have no happiness to the subject. I must take my leave, dear cousin,” she said, standing up wearily, the weight of the world upon her shoulders, her thoughts heavy and burdened.

  As she made her way to the front door, Anthony stopped her pausing her movements with a touch of her arm. “He runs an orphanage, my lady, one that no one, not even the members of his family knows about. It is an orphanage for unwanted children. He built the home himself…he started days after he buried Deborah and his son. There is still good within him my lady, deep within. Many a night I know you question as to where he is…he is there at his orphanage, it is run by more than ten efficient staffs people, nurses, doctor, teachers, caretakers. Asher protects those children with his life. He has invested thousands of pounds to keep those children safe and happy and healthy. Remember that my lady, remember there is still good deep within him. You must be willing to find it and have all the patience…of an angel.”

  “Two last question, cousin and then I shall take my leave. Where is Deborah’s’ grave and the orphanage?”