“And where were ye that same night?” she asked, arched eyebrows raised.
“That is not your business.”
“See? I should hate to see a bastard growing in thy belly, as well.” She watched me covertly for some time, then apparently felt vindicated, for she patted my arm. “Have ye dreamed? I should ha’ been here for thee, I know. What have ye done in here that it smells so strong of roses?”
“The rouge melted and I spilled it.” I rose from the table and went to stand beside my bed before the open window. But the damp turgid air had ceased. The normally fluid curtains now hung taut and unyielding. I rubbed the nap of my heavy bed drapes between my fingers, considered climbing behind them into my bed to sulk, to consider, to think in dark comfort.
“Yes, I have dreamed,” I said, with considerable melancholy. “Two visions.” I returned to the table and told her my vision of sailing away and of my seizure by Gorgon. “He tried to take me by force. Though I never admitted to having dreams, he knows. Oh, Peg, he wants to harvest my dreams for his own gain.”
Her mouth opened in dismay. She clasped my hands tightly between hers to comfort me.
“I have the same dream, night after night.”
“The one of the great battle?”
“Yes. It keeps changing.
“So, ye think ye see the future, though it does not stay the same?” Her face blanked in incomprehension.
“Yes,” I said, hardly able to sum it up any better. “I think it may be the possible future.”
“Yet what is to come is what ye see, yea?” The skin around her dark eyes wrinkled in hard consideration.
“I think so. Every time I dream, I see more and more of this horrendous landscape, sometimes differently, as though the fine details are not yet set, the fabric of this battle unfinished. Like an artist would improve a painting until it met with the vision in his mind.”
The light at the open window wavered and dimmed. A blessed breeze swept through the room, flapping the curtains, the smell of rain behind it.
“Oh, I have known. I have known it.” Peg stood up, her face pale. Her gleaming hair flowed in the draft of air. She paced around the room and returned to me. “Ye have the sight.” She stood above me, a heavy hand on my shoulder and stared at my face, my eyes. “And ye scare me, Elena. For thyself, ye scare me.”
Her scrutiny pierced my sense of comfort. I returned her frantic stare, suddenly uncertain of her continuing loyalty. The cloying taste of roses hung at the back of my throat. The blood left my face, and I gulped noisily.
“So, with the prince gone, where were you last night?” I asked, desperate to change the subject.
“Following Thomas.” She patted my hand and sat down as though nothing had changed between us and gave me a look of utmost civility.
“Why?”
“I took Bertram.”
“What did you find?”
“Nothing. Thomas be slick as an eel when he wishes to be, ye know.”
“You rode all day and half the night to find him innocent of whatever it was you suspected him of?”
“I think he met with a big, crop-haired Puritan and his Roundhead escort. I saw them. But I could not catch them together.”
“Peg, you must leave Thomas be.” I shook my head in disgust. “He has enough to do just to keep his head on his shoulders these days.” Still, the thought of my childhood friend in the company of the enemy did little to ease my mind.
Chapter Fourteen
Early the following Sunday, Thomas and I strode arm in arm down the central hallway toward the great hall. The soaring windows shone in the distance, floating dust motes visible in the wide stream of morning sunlight. He had been missing some days after the departures of Gorgon and the Royalist Army, but had returned just the day before. The countess had objected to his presence, but Thomas simply avoided her, knowing she was essentially powerless at the present time. She was in the chapel tower now, probably on the second floor, which she preferred because it was near her rooms. Quiet dominated, accentuating the tap of our measured footsteps along the wide, stone corridor.
Thomas had changed markedly. He now wore elegant clothes of current style and color, where I had previously only known him to wear worn, old-fashioned dress. Today, it was a flamboyant white satin shirt with full sleeves and turned-back cuffs under a black, partially buttoned jerkin, and matching pants. His blossoming attitudes, now rich and outlandish, had before been restricted, though ambitious and generally bitter as a necessity of his blighted existence.
“I have been here all along, you know,” he said, with a wink at me. “In his absence, I am my lord’s eyes and ears.”
“What do you tell him of me?” I studied him with carefully restrained concern.
“What I wish to tell him, which is not much.” He waved a postured hand, dismissing my apprehension, then leaned toward me. A smirk settled across his lips. “Though I am most appreciative of Lord Gorgon’s patronage, I want you for myself, you see.” He stopped, and I with him. Both of us admired the room before us, the echo of our footsteps fading away.
The graceful curve of the stair, redone in the previous decade, loomed beside us in the sultry air. There had been hopeful showers early, but the day had come up hot and heavy. Thomas studied the chairs sunning on the dais and my gaze picked out the one central, oversized chair, the earl’s throne, at the center. Faint boot-steps sounded in the distance down the hall behind us.
“Gorgon is not an English lord, Thomas,” I said, ignoring his banter, as I had learned to do throughout our childhood.
“He is my lord and wishes to be addressed as such.”
“Address him as you wish then. I have no interest in the man and hope to be relieved of my betrothal to him. If I can show the earl that I can tend my duties and remain out of sight, no threat to him or his stupid countess, perhaps he will allow me to stay.”
“Well . . .,” he hedged, then finally smiled, one of his slow, patronizing shows of teeth that never made it to his dark eyes. “I still love you, Elena, no matter what happens with Lord Gorgon or your uncle.” His hand came around behind my shoulders and settled, warm on my upper arm. He pulled me close. A teasing smile played at the corners of his mouth, which moved toward mine.
“I have told you over and over. . .” I pushed him away, my face undoubtedly cross with irritation. “You are my dear friend. Anything beyond that is out of the question. Besides, my heart lies elsewhere.”
Thomas squinted at me, suspicion rampant on his darkening face. “My guess would be with the good captain, yes?”
At that moment Duncan strolled up behind us. He jerked Thomas across the hall, slammed him against the stone wall, and twisted his lace neck-piece tight in his fist. Thomas gasped for breath. Held in nerveless shock, unable to move, I witnessed these events in absurd slow motion.
“I saw that,” Duncan growled, his arms extended in murderous rage. “From this moment, stay away from Lady Elena. Or you will answer to me . . . and Prince Rupert.”
“Wait,” I finally cried. I pulled at Duncan’s rock-solid arm. “Stop. Leave him alone. Thomas is my friend.”
Duncan dropped his hands to his sides, and Thomas collapsed against the wall, caressing his neck with both hands.
“He was taking liberties, misleading you,” Duncan said, his face still frozen in a sneer, dark eyes kindled with hatred. “I could see it in him.”
“That is my affair.” Affront spiraled through my veins. “If I require your help, Captain Comrie, I shall advise you. Leave him alone,” I said, stone serious.
“Captain Comrie, is it now?” Duncan pivoted toward me, ruddy hair swinging around wide shoulders. His face brilliant with anger, he strode away forward through the great hall and out the entry doors.
I turned to find Thomas well down the hallway. He marched away toward the back of the house, his manner jerky, his face red. I was just as happy to see him go.
The smell of hot bread and venison wafted down from t
he gallery, breakfast awaiting the countess. My mouth watered, but I did not want to encounter my aunt.
So I returned to my rooms where Peg flayed a finger at a frustrated Annie, who was learning the basics of etiquette at meals. I sat down at my disturbed dressing table, every pot, brush, and container askew. Perhaps Annie had never had things like these. I shrugged, not really caring at the moment, and ran my fingers over the dressing table’s fine oiled surface.
Duncan had overreacted, and I could not blame him. How had I reacted at first sight of Annie hanging off his arm? Annie, who sat demurely across the room from me now, moving a tin knife and spoon around a wooden trencher. Yet it was too late for these thoughts. I had already alienated him.
Under Peg’s suspicious eye, I paced around our quarters, unsure what to do next. Consideration of my hope to break my betrothal, deliberation as to how to mend the rift I had created between Duncan and myself, and how to leave Thomas in peace at the same time heckled me. These issues required my undivided attention—in solitude. But I could not resort to my bed and the escape of sleep, though it seemed a convenient excuse. Dreams lingered there. Night after night, the colossal Royalist defeat waited to sweep me away yet again.
That vivid reality that I had experienced of a ship slamming across a windy sea had not returned. Hopefully that possibility had ended with my escape from Gorgon’s clutches.
In the end, I took one of my stiff, gilded chairs and sat down at the table, Peg and Annie by then intent at a game of draughts. They were well matched. Next game, I would play the winner. It was a diversion, until I could figure out what to do.
Duncan was nowhere to be found. When I inquired, Lieutenant Penrod, Wallace’s best officer, stood at precise attention, his protruding gray eyes alight and advised me that Captains Comrie and Wallace had gone for a long reconnaissance and should return soon.
Though I was dressed to ride, I found my own lengthy respite . . . in Amilie’s tower. No one was about when I stepped into the stable yard, and so I followed my inkling and entered the tower, which I had never before done in daylight. In the rose-scented air, the vague ghost quested around me in a sprightly manner. The hesitations and sudden touches put me in mind of a younger sister wanting to know where my lover had gone.
“He remains,” I announced to the dim, somehow organic room. “He is not about just now.”
Fingers slid across my cheeks, seeming to search for tears. Could she somehow sense my discomfiture? With a light pressure at my back and a gentle breeze, she led me to the roof stair, and let me through.
The roof was littered, just as it had always been. On closer examination, the leaf, dirt and rock debris appeared deeper though, forming wide shelving piles along the parapet wall. Did Amilie’s presence somehow attract this clutter? I wiped the grit off the bench and sat, feeling stiff and alone. My last moments in this place came to me, and I wished fervently for Duncan.
Finally alone with my thoughts, the truth of the situation with Thomas came full upon me. Because, by his own admission, he was Gorgon’s creature, I should avoid him, no matter my old feelings of trust and support which were left over from a childhood admittedly long gone. Of all people, I knew Thomas’ manipulative, greedy ways. He would survive without my friendship; it was his nature, but I dared no longer trust him. I vowed to approach Duncan as soon as I saw him and apologize.
Careful to emerge unseen, I left Amilie’s tower and made my way to the stable. I saddled my great bay, mounted and rode out only to find Wallace before me, waving me aside. He and Duncan must have returned. My stomach went suddenly hollow with anticipation.
“Where is Duncan?”
“At the gate towers, my lady. A force approaches. You must remain with me. Come.” He raised a commanding hand to help me dismount.
My spurred heels jabbed my mount’s sides. “Apologies, Captain,” I called back to a frowning Wallace as I whipped past him on Kalimir at a full gallop. I drove my stallion along the stable road at the west side of the house, past the courtyard, and out the inner gate.
Duncan was mounted on an irritable Ajax, one pistol drawn. He obstructed the way through the open front gate. Anyone could simply walk around him in the wide gateway, but threat was apparently his intent.
Movement from above caught my eye. The massive towers that sided the gateway were crawling with armed men, marksmen with fowling pieces, who moved into place in the crenellations along the tall battlements on the roofs of the sun-drenched towers. Duncan had returned at an opportune time, though from Captain Wallace’s attitude I suspected they had seen the approach of this force and raced back to Tor House to confront them.
Was it Rigby again, that Parliamentary colonel who had kept us so long behind our walls? I settled Kalimir and waited anxiously. Our food stuffs were replenished and the house guard comfortably expanded from Duncan’s recruiting around the area. If it came to it, we could hold the house.
Framed by the open outer gate, a force of men in tunics appeared in the open meadow, still some distance away. A good look at the consistent, gray tunics brought home the bitter truth. Their broad, menacing leader urged his men into a gallop with a sweeping wave of his arm. This was no Roundhead threat. The distant sounds of hammering hooves, the chink of metal and the creak of leather, hurled toward us in the form of a hundred men or more. It was Gorgon, returned in strength.
Duncan turned back, his highly-colored face shiny with perspiration in the relentless heat, and brought his stallion up beside mine. Kalimir snorted and danced in objection.
“I will keep him out if I can.”
“Why do you not use our defenses?” I blared back at him, anger heating my face. “Close the gate. Close the portcullis. Pull up the drawbridge.” Though it was too late for that. “Keep him out, for God’s sake.” I glared at him, my chest heaving in fury.
“I cannot.” He set his jaw. “I am empowered to preserve this house against Parliamentary attack, not against potential allies. I understand your situation and will attempt to defray him. I can give you time if you wish to flee. But you need to go now.” His look softened, though Ajax chose that moment to shift under him. “I apologize for the other day. You are my heart.”
“As you are mine.” Every injustice melted away in the heat of sudden arousal. “It is I who was wrong. Forgive me. I will stay.”
“Though you are endangered?” he asked with grim hopefulness.
“I stand with you.”
We clasped sweaty hands across our blowing horses. Welcome strength flowed from his grip into my fearful, flagging spirit. He reined Ajax around, and I followed him as he resumed his position under the open gate’s substantial archway, where we at least had some relief from the sun’s pounding rays.
The approaching force slowed as it neared the other end of the drawbridge and finally came to a stop there. Heavy dust blew up my nose and I sneezed. Gorgon’s bulky girth was magnificently arrayed for war in gleaming breast plate and plumed helmet. Alone, he clattered across the bridge atop a black great horse with hairy white fetlocks. His steed clopped into the gate’s shadow where Gorgon reined him in beside Duncan, the great horse overshadowing even Duncan’s substantial Ajax.
“Well, well. Captain Comrie,” Gorgon said in a carrying whine. From under his helmet, trickles of sweat ran into his beard and brows. “Why this stance? What do you fear?” A sly smile compressed his mouth, demonstrating the scar in his beard. With a lustful stare, he then looked me over as he would a prize brood mare.
“You are not welcome here, Steward Gorgon. We would that you return from wherever you came,” Duncan challenged in a deep, spirited voice, pulling Gorgon’s gaze back to him.
“Oh?” Gorgon’s face vacillated between red and purple. With a great effort, he controlled himself. “Does not your prince desire recruits for his attempt on York?” He twisted in his saddle and held out a demonstrative hand toward his rough-looking men waiting at the other end of the drawbridge. “These are experienced fighters, worth thr
ee times their number in raw recruits. But before going to war, I am here to claim my bride and her house. Move aside.”
“And I represent Prince Rupert’s wishes,” Duncan called out. “This house and the heiress, among other people, remain under his protection.”
“That has been made abundantly clear to me,” Gorgon rasped. He cringed in hatred and fury. To gain entry, he needed to get around us. Yet now, when he expected capitulation, he was forced to use persuasion, where normally he would simply gut any man who challenged him. I had seen him do it. His hand moved to his sword hilt, and his face curled into in an intense sneer. “However, I do not conduct talks with subordinates. Your prince and I will discuss this matter . . . upon his return. Move aside.”
“Take no liberties, Gorgon,” Duncan said, his words tense with threat. He reined back, leaving the way clear.
The steward signaled his men with a violent swing of his arm, and they clattered onto the drawbridge. Gorgon’s steed broke into a canter, but his forward momentum was cut short with a brutal wrench of the reins, directly in front of me.
“You attack the earl and dare return here?” I asked, giving him no quarter. The ripple of Kalimir’s tense muscles under my knees heightened the sense of danger that emanated from this man, and I reined him in hard.
“He lives. That between us was of no import.” He looked me over once more with an intense smile. “My dear beloved, why are you here at the gate astride that horse? I am impressed at your ardor, but don’t ladies generally greet their loved ones at the house steps?”
“I have no need or desire for you, Edward Gorgon. I reject your suit. And, by the by, I follow no one’s rules, maybe especially yours.”
“A worthy bride.” His smile widened. A thin tongue licked at dried, barely visible lips within his beard, bushier than when I had seen him last.
Disgusted, I touched my spurs to Kalimir’s flanks and he leapt away, carrying me through the inner gates. There, Thomas stood conveniently positioned at the entry steps beside the countess. The two of them eyed one another in choked distress, then gawked in unison as I flew by.
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