Dark Destroyer

by Kathryn Le Veque

  “Be happy,” he whispered, his throat tight with tears. “Be good to Alex. He is a good man.”

  Kathalin burst into quiet tears, trying to grasp him but he pulled away from her. “I love you, Gates,” she murmured. “Until the end of time, I will love you.”

  Gates had to turn away from her because, for the first time in his adult life, he realized he was fighting off tears. “And I will be true to you and only you until I die,” he said hoarsely. “You are my heart, Kathi. Never forget that.”

  He was to the garden gate before Kathalin could say anything more. It seemed as if he were moving very quickly because by the time he reached the gate, he was nearly running. He opened the gate, nearly yanking it off its hinges, before charging through it. He was gone so quickly that that suddenly emptiness left in his wake was startling and painful. Too painful.

  Kathalin sank to her knees and wept.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  ~ The Tender Heart ~

  “I have come to see Lady Rosamund,” Elreda said. “Is she available?”

  After a soft knock on Rosamund’s chamber door, Rosamund’s maid had opened the panel to find Lady de Lohr standing on the landing outside. The maid remembered Lady de Lohr from visits to Hyssington in the past but she wasn’t sure she should admit her until Rosamund, on her bed, heard the woman’s heavily accented voice.

  “Elreda?” she said. “Is that you?”

  At the sound of Rosamund’s voice, Elreda pushed into the chamber, nearly shoving the maid out of the way. Clouds of the heavy clove smell greeted her and she rubbed at her nose, avoiding sneezing as Jasper so often did.

  “Aye, it ’tis,” Elreda said, her attention eagerly focused in the direction of Rosamund’s voice, towards her great bed. “Is it you, Rosamund? It has been so long since we last spoke, my dear friend!”

  Rosamund hadn’t physically seen Elreda in fifteen years, ever since the symptoms of her disease started becoming apparent. Elreda and Henry had invited her and Jasper to Lioncross, many times, and Elreda and Henry had even come to Hyssington and Trelystan a few times, but in all that time, Rosamund had never made an appearance, pleading illness or some other manner of excuse. But now, Elreda was here, on Rosamund’s doorstep, and there was nothing Rosamund could do but try to stay away from her.

  She didn’t want the woman to see the truth.

  “It is me, my dearest,” she said, making sure to keep herself covered up and remaining behind her sheers. “Please do not come any closer. I am ill and it is contagious.”

  Elreda came to within a foot or so of the bed, seeing her friend, swaddled up like a baby, through the sheer fabric of the curtains. She studied the woman through the wispy material, reacquainting herself with her friend from long ago. From the vivacious dark-haired lass to this bound creature, times had changed, indeed.

  “I am sorry to hear it,” she said after a moment. “It is unfortunate that you have been so ill, so often, that you have not come to see me in so many years. I have missed you.”

  Rosamund could see her friend through the fabric, as well. Elreda was older in feature, but still as lovely as she remembered from their younger years. In truth, it did her heart good to see the woman.

  “I have missed you, as well,” she said. “But my health is very poor. You are looking well, my dearest. How are your children? I hear that we are to be related now. I cannot tell you how happy I am at such joyous news.”

  Elreda smiled faintly. She was increasingly curious at Rosamund’s head-to-toe covered appearance, with only her eyes visible through a slit in the fabric covering her face. She wondered what terrible affliction her friend should have that would keep her so tightly wrapped and so utterly secluded. She thought to ask but then she assumed that if Rosamund wanted her to know, she would have told her. Still, she was very curious and concerned.

  “I am happy, also,” she said. “At least, I am happy at the prospect of becoming related to you. But that is why I have come, Rosamund. There is much turmoil surrounding this wedding and I am not sure if you know this. Have you been told?”

  Rosamund knew immediately what Elreda was referring to. There was little doubt in her mind. “Do you speak of my daughter’s love for another man?” she asked. “If so, I am aware. My daughter came to tell me herself.”

  She didn’t sound particularly sympathetic as she spoke and Elreda was surprised. There was something in Rosamund’s statement that suggested coldness. It was strange, considering she had always known Rosamund to be kind and compassionate. Still, perhaps the years had changed her. Having not seen or spoken to Rosamund in many years, it was possible that the woman had changed a great deal. That was a disheartening thought.

  “What did your daughter tell you?” Elreda asked.

  Rosamond paused before replying, as if contemplating what, exactly, to say. When she spoke, there was a disconnect to her words, as if she didn’t much care for her daughter’s problems. “She told me that she is in love with Gates de Wolfe,” she said. “You know Gates, of course. He has led my husband’s armies for many years. He and Alexander are close friends. My daughter also believes that Gates is in love with her but we know that to be false. Gates de Wolfe is incapable of loving just one woman. It is not in his nature. I am sorry that my daughter believes herself to be in love with the man, but she will get over it. You needn’t worry. She will not shame your son or the House of de Lohr.”

  Frankly, Elreda couldn’t believe the coldness she was hearing from her long-time friend. “But…,” she began, stopped, and then started again. “Rosamund, you know what it is like to be young and in love. Sometimes you do not overcome such things so easily. Alex seems to believe that Gates is, indeed, in love with Lady Kathalin He was in the hall pleading his case not an hour ago. He does not want to marry your daughter because he firmly believes she is in love with Gates and he with her.”

  Rosamund looked at her friend, the bright blue eyes piercing through the sheer fabric. “That is of no consequence,” she said. “Alexander is a much better match for my daughter than Gates de Wolfe.”

  “Why should you say that?”

  “Because she will not be shamed by Alexander’s past,” Rosamund pointed out as if Elreda was a fool. She was beginning to grow annoyed. “Why is my daughter’s misdirected love of such concern to you, Elreda? I told you that she will forget it. Gates will forget whatever he feels for her, too. I am sure he has felt what he thought to be love many times in the past. Knowing him, too many times. Jasper is arranging for the wedding to take place as soon as possible so this foolishness will come to an end. You put too much concern in the feelings of the young. They will forget soon enough and realize, in the end, that we knew what was best for them.”

  Elreda was speaking with someone she didn’t know. The Rosamund from years ago would never have spoken in such a way about love or emotion. The woman before her was as hard as stone and just as cold. Elreda began to move, to come around the side of the bed, to where Rosamund was sitting. She didn’t like the curtains up between them, shielding Rosamund from her. Shielding the woman she used to know. There was something odd and unfeeling going on here and she was determined to get to the bottom of it.

  “You have changed,” Elreda said. “The Rosamund I knew those years ago would not have discounted love so easily. I remember the days when you were very much in love with Jasper and he with you. Has so much changed, Rosamund, that you would forget young love?”

  Rosamund could see that Elreda was moving closer and she tried to shrink away. “I have not forgotten it,” she said. “It is wonderful while it lasts but when it ends, there is nothing more brutal. Mayhap, in a way, I am saving Kathalin from knowing such pain.”

  “Surely she knows it now.”

  Rosamund looked away. “It is for the best,” she said. “Soon it will be but a memory as she comes to know Alexander. He is a likeable young man; mayhap she will even fall in love with him, too.”

  Elreda came to a halt, seeing her old frien
d very close and contemplating her next move. “No one wants Alexander to be married more than I do,” she said. “But to marry a woman we know is in love with someone else… I am not sure that is right, not even in my eagerness for my son to wed. Can you not see this, too, Rosamund? Or have you changed so much that you are hardened to any matters of the heart?”

  Rosamund sighed faintly. “I have grown up,” she said. “I have come to realize that love is a fool’s dream, Elreda. If you and Henry still share love at your age, then I commend you. But it is not always so with most people. It is not true with Jasper and me. Marriage can be a prison more than the four walls of this chamber when the love that used to be there is gone.”

  Elreda’s features narrowed in concern. “And you would commit your own daughter to such a prison?”

  “I am doing it for her own good.”

  Elreda shook her head. “Nay, you are not,” she said, yanking back the sheers so she could see Rosamund without any material between them. “What is your motivation for this, Rosamund? Are you somehow punishing her for knowing love when you no longer do? Are you punishing her because she is young and passionate, and you can no longer feel the same way? There is something very wrong here for you to be so cold towards your own child. She loves a man who evidently loves her in return. Are you so bitter and jealous of that love that you would separate them simply because you have the power to do so? That is not the Rosamund I used to know and love. The woman I used to know was generous and compassionate, not petty and cruel. Is that what you have become?”

  Rosamund’s bright eyes flashed as she turned on her friend. “You have no idea what I have become,” she growled. Suddenly, she yanked off the veil across her face, revealing a collapsed, flat nose and lips that were twisted with old scars and new sores. She ripped off the covers on her hands, showing that four of her ten fingers had been lost and stubbed by disease. Her flesh was gnarled and black, and she thrust her hands in Elreda’s face. “This is what I have become! A monster, a creature who hides in darkness, a twisted relic who lost the only love she knew long ago because he could not bear to touch this gnarled flesh! Have I become cold and unfeeling? It is very possible considering that, for the last fifteen years, that is all I have known. How dare you come in here and accuse me of being cold and unfeeling, Elreda de Lohr! You live in your beautiful home with a husband who is still attracted to you while I live in the dank depths of a hellish existence. You have no right to judge me!”

  Elreda was appalled at what she was seeing; her gorgeous friend was now decayed with a horrible disease that had robbed her of her physical beauty. Tears sprang to her eyes as Rosamund pushed stubby, black fingers into her face, but to her credit, Elreda didn’t back away. She remained in place as Rosamund raged, her heart breaking for the truth behind Rosamund’s years of absence. Now, some things were becoming clear but others were not. Her features were wrought with distress as she spoke.

  “My friend,” she murmured. “My dear and true friend. Now I understand why you have been captive in your own home. There is nothing I can say that will heal the scars left by this disease, for you have every right to show your agony. But I will say this – has this disease also robbed you of your good heart? You used to have one. You were so very kind and gentle, but it would seem now your heart is as twisted as your body. How could you become so cold and gnarled? How could you forget about love and blame your daughter because she has experienced it? That is not the Rosamund de Lara I grew to know and love. It is as if your very soul has left you!”

  Rosamond sat back on her bed as if she had been struck, as if suddenly realizing she had just exposed her secret to the world. To her beautiful friend. Quickly, she lowered her head, struggling to put her veil over her face with fingers that didn’t work correctly any longer. She pulled the sleeves of her robe over her hands, covering them, hiding them from Elreda, her embarrassment and horror filling the room like a cold, gray fog. Even Elreda could feel it, breathing it in, as Rosamund shrank away from her.

  “You may go now, Elreda,” she said, her voice sounding strangely weak after her outburst. “It was good to see you again. I pray your good health continues.”

  Just like that, Rosamund was shutting her off. No more conversation, conjecture, or the exhibition of pain. A simple shut-down of everything. Elreda stood over her friend as the woman tried desperately to cover herself, her heart breaking for the lovely woman that once was. In spite of everything, she didn’t hate her. She didn’t even dislike her. She felt a good deal of compassion and love for her old friend, now a mere shell of herself. Impulsively, she leaned down and wrapped her arms around the woman, squeezing tightly.

  “And I pray you find your heart again,” she whispered, kissing Rosamund on the top of her wimpled head. “No matter what was spoken here today, you are still my friend and I still love you. I pray that you find peace, Rosamund. I pray that you know happiness again. I will pray for many things for you, but most of all, I will pray that you reconsider your stance against your daughter’s happiness. Remember what it was like to be in love with a man, Rosamund. Surely you cannot forget such a thing.”

  At the first touch of the embrace, Rosamond stiffened and tried to pull away. It had been fifteen years since anyone had touched her. But the moment she felt the warmth of human contact, and the love of Elreda’s embrace, the tears began to come. She didn’t realize how much she has missed such things, an embrace to tell her that she was still loved in spite of the fact that she had become a slave to the disease that imprisoned her. It was the most simple of gestures yet one of profound power. As Elreda gently squeezed, Rosamund couldn’t help the tears from flowing.

  She couldn’t stop them.

  The pain, the years of pain, washed down her face, dampening the veil that covered her twisted features. Elreda felt the woman sob beneath her and her tears quietly joined Rosamund’s. She couldn’t help it. Together, the old friends wept for the cruelty life had dealt Rosamund and for the soul she had seemingly lost. Perhaps it was too late to reclaim anything; perhaps not. For the moment, the coldness from Rosamund was gone and, once again, she felt human.

  She felt loved.

  For the moment, it was simply her and Elreda, and a simple embrace that Rosamund needed so badly.

  Elreda held her friend until the tears would no longer come, until, exhausted, Rosamund lay back on her pillows and closed her eyes as she was overcome by the emotion of the day. Elreda pulled the coverlet up around her friend, seeing the sunken face and black fingers but remembering the pert nose and exquisite skin instead. That was what she chose to remember.

  That was what she chose to see.

  As Elreda left Rosamund sleeping in her chamber, the beautiful face from fifteen years ago was, in fact, the only thing she could remember.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  The night was cold and the dark clouds that had gathered that day had finally started to shed some of their freezing rain. As Kathalin sat at the window, overlooking the now-dark herb garden, the wall of Hyssington beyond that, and then the landscape in the distance over the wall, there was so much in her heart that was frozen like the clouds and the rain, an indefinable coldness that had settled into her soul. She was numb against what was to come, numb against a future that would be determined on this night.

  Gates wouldn’t fight for her.

  That was all she could think of. He refused to run, refused to take her and marry her. He gave his reasons and although, in theory, she understood him, the truth was that her heart was damaged and all she could see was that his honor meant more to him than she did. Or the honor of Alexander, and the entire houses of de Lohr, de Lara, and de Wolfe. So many people he was concerned with over her, or perhaps it was as he said – he’d never done anything truly honorable with regard to his personal life and felt strongly that he had to start somewhere.

  So he started with her and in choosing this situation with which to regain his honor. Maybe it was true what she said, that he didn’t
love her enough to take her and flee. That was what it boiled down to, she thought.

  He simply didn’t love her enough.

  Therefore, she sat and brooded, thinking back to the day she had first met him in the kitchen of St. Milburga’s. She had been attracted to him, then, the very big man in the red de Lara tunic, fighting off the Welsh raiders who had invaded the priory. But that attraction had turned to hate when he had captured her, bound her hand and foot, and carried her off towards home. But the night before they’d reached Hyssington, when she’d seen the soldiers fornicating through the hearth and her wrists had been so terribly chaffed by the rope, he had softened his harsh stance against her and brought her so many lovely things. A peace offering, she knew, but she didn’t care. It was then that the hatred had left and the emotions sprouting up in its place had turned into something warm.

  Those warm emotions had turned into adoration for the man. He was strong, wise, humorous, at times, and honest. God’s Bones, he was honest to a fault. She’d learned things about his past she probably didn’t want to know, but in the course of honesty, he had told her. She knew a great deal about him and she still loved him, and he loved her.

  … so why was this honor he spoke of worth more to him than she was?

  Kathalin didn’t know. She was muddled and distressed, too distressed to eat the food that the Tender of the Keep had brought her earlier in the evening. It now sat, cold and congealed, next to her bed. She couldn’t even think of food at the moment, knowing that Stephan had ridden for a priest. A priest for her wedding. It had grown dark some time ago and she was coming to wonder if the priest would even come this night, as she’d been told.