Her Muse, Her David (Muses Book 3)

by Jane Charles

  “Oh dear!” Scanning the road behind her, she hurried back toward Ravenglass, afraid of what she might find. And then she saw it, a strange black mist, hovering over a body. Anna grasped her throat as a scream lodged inside, her feet keeping her from moving forward.

  A chill ran up her spine and terror filled her entire being as the shadow shifted and then vanished. Despite her fear, and trembling legs, Anna forced herself forward until she arrived at the man’s side.

  “Lord Quentin?” she cried as she dropped to her knees. “You must wake. You must.” She tapped his cheeks, but he didn’t stir. Oh, why didn’t she carry smelling salts liked she’d been told on numerous times to do so by the well-meaning widows who came to call at the vicarage?

  “Lord Quentin! Wake up!” Anna shrieked, hoping for a reaction, but he didn’t stir.

  She glanced around, very much alone on this stretch of the road, and tried not to panic.

  Once again, she tapped his face, with a little more force this time and when that didn’t work, she attempted to lift his head. A warm, damp and sticky substance slid across her fingers and hand. Anna yanked it back, careful to not let his head hit the road. Her hand was covered in blood. “Oh, no.”

  Standing, she glanced about, praying someone, anyone, would come by. She couldn’t just leave him here, but she couldn’t very well drag him back to the castle either.

  In one direction lay Ravenglass, but they were currently without a doctor. Whitbeck was the closest village with a doctor, but it was quite far away. Torrington Abbey was much closer, and Brighid would know what to do. She could heal nearly anyone. “Yes, that was it.” She needed to get Brighid.

  Anna leaned down. “I’ll be quick and be back with help shortly, Lord Quentin. I promise.”

  She was fairly certain he could not hear her but wanted him to know that she wasn’t abandoning him, just in case.

  Anna had never run so fast in her life, weaving her way through the worn, wooden path between Torrington Abbey and Marisdùn. She didn’t even stop to knock on the front door to be admitted, but burst inside and immediately began calling for Brighid.

  “What on earth?” her friend asked, appearing in the doorway of the sitting room.

  All hope crumbled upon seeing her friend. How could she forget that Brighid was due to deliver any day? She couldn’t possibly go traipsing back to Lord Quentin. Even if she did, Mr. Chetwey would have Anna’s head.

  “Nothing, never mind,” she managed to squeak out before turning back for the door.

  “Stop!” Brighid cried. “What did you do to your hand?”

  Anna glanced down. She hadn’t done anything. It wasn’t her blood. “Nothing.”

  “Let me see.” Brighid held out her hands and Anna knew she would insist on examining her non-existent injury.

  “It’s not mine,” Anna blurted out. “I must go.”

  “Whose is it?” Brighid demanded.

  There was no hope for it, and Anna quickly explained. “You can’t leave and I have to get help.”

  “I’m coming with you.”

  “You can’t.”

  “I most certainly will.”

  When Brighid was in this state, it did little good to argue with her. Anna could only pray that Mr. Chetwey didn’t find out before Anna had a chance to leave the county. Perhaps a county wasn’t far enough. The Continent was certainly safer once Brighid’s husband learned what she’d done.

  Despite her condition, Brighid moved quickly from the house, stopping only long enough to retrieve a leather case and tell a servant to have a carriage prepared and sent on the road to Ravenglass, where they would find her before she hurried toward the wooden path Anna had just run down.

  “Shouldn’t you take a carriage?”

  “That will take too long. It will catch up to us, but I’ll be able to assess Lord Quentin before it arrives.

  Anna wasn’t about to argue with her friend, since she wouldn’t listen anyway. She followed Brighid as she quickly navigated the path to castle and then onto the road into town, praying her friend didn’t trip or fall, or worse, begin having pains that would lead to the birth of her child. Chetwey would certainly kill her then.

  Anna’s heart ceased when she spotted Lord Quentin. He hadn’t moved the entire time she’d been gone. This could not be good. Not at all.

  Brighid knelt beside him and tapped his face, much like Anna had done earlier.

  “Where did the blood come from?” She asked while studying his body for injury.

  “The back of his head.”

  “He’s still breathing, at least,” Brighid said. “Though, his skin is like ice. I do not like it.”

  She lifted his lids to look at his eyes and frowned. “He is quite unconscious.” Brighid then gently turned his head, revealing a bloody gash at the back. Anna’s stomach churned as Brighid lowered his head to the ground again. “We need to wake him. The longer Lord Quentin is unconscious the more dangerous it is.” Brighid opened her leather case, filled with vials, bottles and other supplies, and began searching for something.

  A moment later, the carriage from Torrington arrived, sliding sideways on the gravel. Anna held her breath for fear the three of them would be struck.

  Brighid grinned up at the driver. “That didn’t take nearly as long as it usually does.”

  “Anna Southward!” Her uncle yelled from the opposite direction. “What are you doing?”

  Oh, this was not good. Not good at all, but what would he have had her do? Leave him in the middle of the road to die. That wouldn’t have been the Christian thing to do, and she would remind him of that if he started harping on her about the people she should not have contact with.

  Lila was with him, and hurried in his wake.

  “My lord!” Lila breathed out before she dropped to the ground and touched Lord Quentin’s brow.

  “What happened?” her uncle demanded again.

  Anna shook her head. “I’m not certain, Uncle Walter. I was coming back from sketching when this huge black horse nearly ran me over. And then I saw…something, I’m not certain what. A shadow or something hovering right here.” It still gave her chills thinking about what she’d seen, though she doubted her uncle would even believer her. But, the others would. “And that’s when I saw him like this, lying on the ground. Whatever was here faded away like it was my imagination, and maybe it was. I’m not certain what I saw, but when I realized he wasn’t coming to, I ran to fetch Mrs. Chetwey.”

  Her uncle narrowed his eyes and scowled at her. Well, what was she supposed to do? It wasn’t as though they had a doctor anywhere nearby and she couldn’t just leave him here and go about her day as if nothing happened. Uncle Walter might not believe in healers, but she did and if she were injured, Anna would rather have Brighid treat her than any doctor, even Dr. Alcott, who used to reside in Ravenglass before he moved to London.

  Lila blinked up at Brighid, her eyes filled with concern. “Can you help him?”

  “He is very weak,” Brighid said, frowning. “But he’s breathing and I’ll do what I can.”

  “You there!” Papa called to the Torrington coachman. “Can’t you ride for Whitbeck and fetch Dr. Robbins?”

  “Papa,” Lila said softly. “We may need the coach to move Lord Quentin back to Marisdùn.” She touched her hand to Lord Quentin’s brow once more. Over the last year whenever the man’s name had been mentioned, Lila practically swooned and it didn’t take a fortuneteller to realize how in love she clearly was with the gentleman.

  “No, no,” Brighid began. “He’s hit his head. We don’t want to move him just yet. I’d like to see if we can get him to come to first. See what sorts of injuries he might have sustained before we try to get him anywhere.”

  Then Brighid uncorked a small, dark bottle and placed it right beneath Lord Quentin’s nose. His brow furrowed and Anna breathed out a sigh of relief. His nose twitched right before he opened his eyes. Upon seeing Lila, a look of horror flashed in his eyes and he let
out a strangled gasp as he tried to push away.

  What in the world was that about?

  “What is it, my lord?” Lila asked, not letting go of his hand.

  “Lila?” he whispered, his face relaxing, as if he were seeing her for the first time. “Is that really you?”

  In that moment, Anna would have bet her finest paintbrush that Lord Quentin was just as in love with Lila as she was with him.

  A relieved smile came to her cousin’s lips. “Yes, my lord, it’s me.”

  Lord Quentin sucked in a breath and glanced around. “Falacer!”

  “I beg your pardon?” Lila asked softly, her silvery eyes wide as she looked at him with such concern.

  “My horse,” he whispered.

  “Quent, how is your head? Does it hurt?” Brighid asked quietly.

  “Brighid?” He glanced at Anna’s friend with a bit of confusion. Of course, he had struck his head pretty hard. Many things might be confusing right now.

  “Do you remember what happened, Quent?” Brighid asked.

  He glanced back at Lila. “I thought I saw you, but…”

  “Me?” Lila’s mouth dropped open in surprise.

  “My daughter was nowhere near here,” Uncle Walter grumbled, glaring at Lord Quentin.

  “No, it was something else,” Quent breathed out. “And then it was over me.”

  So, Anna hadn’t imagined whatever it was she saw. “I saw something. Hovering over you, but it vanished when I came upon you.”

  “Hovering over me?”

  “Sounds like something might have followed you from Marisdùn,” Brighid muttered with a frown.

  Quent focused on her. “But we banished my great-grandmother.”

  “Yes.” Brighid agreed with an incline of her head. “But there are certainly a plethora of other sprits within the walls.”

  “That is completely ridiculous.” Uncle Walter argued. “Marisdùn Castle is not haunted. I’ve been inside the castle hundreds of times and never encountered any such thing. Only fools believe otherwise.”

  They probably wished to avoid his unpleasantness as much as she did. Anna glanced away from her uncle and to Brighid so he couldn’t read her thoughts on the matter. She very much believed there were dozens, if not more, spirits floating around the place. Her friend, on the other hand, cast Lord Quentin a look that bespoke of not arguing with the man.

  “Do you think you can stand, Quent?” Brighid asked after a moment. “If we can get you back to the castle, I can do a more thorough examination of your head.”

  Instead of answering, Lord Quentin looked back to Lila. “Will you come with me?”

  By the softening of her cousin’s eyes, Anna already knew the answer.

  “My girls and I need to return to the vicarage, if Mrs. Chetwey is fine without us,” Uncle Walter barked before Lila could respond.

  “Of course, Mr. Southward,” Brighid said. “I can manage just fine.”

  Chapter 9

  David was headed toward the stables when cries rang out from the smithy. He and Garrick had arrived just in time to see servants carry a badly burned body away from the fire.

  “He just slipped in,” one of them was saying.

  “We couldn’t get to him in time,” another said.

  They lay the body on the ground and stood back, helpless to do anything, just as David was. The man was gone.

  What a horrible way to die.

  More people rushed around them, including Quent and Brighid.

  Where the devil had she come from? Did Chetwey know she was here? He’d have Quent’s head if he sent for her.

  “Damn it all,” Quent grumbled.

  “Sounds like he slipped,” David muttered quietly. “Then burned himself alive.”

  “Just awful,” Garrick whispered. “Boys in the stables heard the screams, but it was too late to do anything by the time anyone got here.”

  “Awful indeed,” Quent said as he turned away. “We’d better send for Sir Cyrus,” he called. David remembered the man. He was the magistrate in the district and Braden’s now brother-in-law.

  “What is wrong with the back of your head?” Thorn called out. It looked as if it were matted with blood, and there was some on the collar of his shirt.

  Quent’s hand went to the back of his head, but he didn’t turn around. “Only a minor mishap,” he said before he strode off as if he didn’t wish to discuss what had happened.

  David turned just in time to see Brighid heading back toward the castle and hurried after her.

  “I should escort you home, Brighid.” The longer she was here, the more livid Chetwey was going to be when he found out. If he could return her soon, maybe there was no reason for Chetwey to ever learn. It’d be safer for all of them. Not that he’d harm Brighid, but his friends might not escape so easily. “You should be resting. Not traipsing around Marisdùn.”

  “I can’t leave just yet.” She brushed aside his concern and entered the garden she’d spent so much time in last year and entered the castle through a back door. He knew this was right off of the herbarium and where she kept her spells, potions and books. Surely she knew she couldn’t help the man. She might be a powerful witch, but bringing someone back from the dead was even beyond her capabilities.

  At least he assumed so.

  “Does Chetwey even know you are here?”

  She stiffened barely a moment before entering the herbarium. “No, but that can’t matter at the moment.”

  Now she’d gone mad. If she thought Chetwey was going to let her remain here above a moment, then she had lost her mind. And Chetwey would kill him if he didn’t make her leave.

  “Well, gather what you must,” he gestured about the room. “And I’ll deliver you home.”

  With a sigh, Brighid settled on the stool. “I’m afraid I won’t be going anywhere for some time.”

  Bloody hell! “Though your skills are rather impressive, I don’t believe the smithy requires your services.”

  She grimaced at the reminder. “You’re quite right, of course, but something is not right here.”

  “Is anything ever right at Marisdùn?”

  A short laugh erupted before she sobered. “You have a point, but I fear there is a very real evil brewing.”

  At her words, the hair stood up on the back of his neck. He’d never forget what they’d all gone through, and done, last year to bring Callie Bradenham back. What was brewing couldn’t possibly be worse. “All the more reason to get you away from here.”

  “All the more reason to remain, just a bit.”

  Chetwey was going to have his head. It would be placed on a pike above Torrington Abbey as a warning to all about for not delivering the man’s wife home when they should.

  Brighid looked up, pinning him with her eyes. “Has anything, odd, more out of the ordinary than usual, happened recently?”

  David could only shrug.

  “Tell me everything that’s happened since you arrived.”

  “There isn’t anything to tell.”

  “Something has happened. Leave nothing out.”

  So, he told her from when he arrived, the lost earbob, discovery of the items in the Priest’s hole.”

  None of this seemed to interest her. “The children take items all the time, so that isn’t it.”

  “Why do you think something is wrong?” David finally asked.

  All she did was blink up at him, as if stunned. “Don’t you feel it?”

  “Feel what?” he asked slowly. He’d definitely felt something, but he put it off as just the unusualness of the castle.

  “The heaviness, the foreboding, the darkness.”

  A chill went down his spine and he tried to shake it away.

  “Well, the sàisde fiadhain isn’t going to do any good.”

  “The what?”

  “Sàisde fiadhain. To burn, I thought it would help with the odor.”

  “I’m not sure anything can get rid of that stench,” David agreed.

&n
bsp; “At first I shrugged it off. My sense of smell is rather strong at the moment and there are many odors I find disturbing.”

  This he did not need to know about her condition.

  “I should have known it was more,” Brighid said as she got up from her seat.

  Finally, they were leaving. There was still a chance Chetwey would not have David’s head.

  Instead, she went to the trunk, opened it and pulled out a book.

  “As you’ve given me no hint, I must figure this out on my own.”

  “I have an idea,” David offered hopefully. “I’ll personally load everything into a wagon and take it to Torrington myself. There, you can do whatever it is you do, in the safety of your home while your husband hovers, waiting for his child to come into this world.”

  Brighid simply rolled her eyes at him before turning the next page. “Do ask Cook to bring a kettle of water. Oh, and if you could move the cauldron, I need a nice fire.” She rubbed her arms and looked about. “It’s a bit chilly in here. Odd, that. I haven’t been chilled in months.”

  David did as she requested and then got away from Marisdùn as quickly as his horse would allow. If the witch would not leave the castle, as she should, he would bring her husband to fetch her home. Marisdùn, on the eve of Samhain, was no place for a witch who was liable to give birth at any moment. And to think he was willing to bet that she would deliver on Samhain. Which was well and good, if she was in her own home and not the most haunted place in all of England.

  * * *

  Anna had been dreading this moment the entire walk back. Her uncle may have held his tongue, but anger radiated off of him and she was certain it was about to be directed at her. She had been the one to fetch the healer he didn’t much like.