The Forsaken (Echoes from the Past Book 4)

by Irina Shapiro

“Hugh, no,” Kate protested, but Hugh covered her body with his own as his kisses grew more ardent.

  “Kate, I love you,” he whispered, his eyes aglow with passion. “I’ll make you happy.”

  “No, please,” she begged as she struggled against him, but it was too late. Hugh had pushed up her skirts and was already fumbling with the laces of his breeches.

  Kate felt his hand between her legs as he attempted to guide himself inside her. She tried to squirm away, but he was too heavy, and there wasn’t anywhere to go. She cried out as he forced his shaft inside her, breaching her maidenhead and destroying any possible future she might have had in the Church or with any other man. Hugh began to move inside her, pushing deeper and deeper into her unwilling body. Honeyed words dripped from his lips as he made love to her, but Kate had to bite her lip to keep herself from howling in anguish. She didn’t want this; she hadn’t asked for this, and now there was no going back.

  “Kate, try to relax. All I want is to make you happy. Please, darling, it’s all right.”

  All the fight went out of her and Hugh thrust harder, making her cry out in pain, but he seemed to misinterpret her reaction as one of pleasure.

  “That’s my girl,” he whispered. “I knew you liked me.”

  Hugh eventually finished what he was doing and rolled off her. He cupped her cheek and looked into her eyes, as though seeking affirmation that all was well between them. “I’ll give you a good life. I promise,” he said. “You will never have cause to regret marrying me.”

  Kate nodded mutely, too afraid to look at Hugh for fear that he’d see the panic and revulsion in her eyes. She didn’t wish to marry him, nor did she think he could make her happy, but what choice did she have? Her fate was sealed.

  Hugh fell asleep, but Kate lay awake for hours, staring up at the tester. Had she still been at the priory, she would have prayed, but God seemed to have forsaken her this night, and she was on her own.

  She must have eventually dozed off because when she opened her eyes, it was morning, and weak sunshine was streaming through the dingy window. Kate sat up and looked around in panic. Hugh was nowhere to be seen. His sword belt was gone, as was his cloak. She was alone.

  Chapter 18

  July 2014

  Berwick-upon-Tweed, Northumberland

  Gabe brushed the dust off his jeans and reached for an old towel to clean his grimy hands. He’d turned his father’s study upside down, but found nothing pertaining to the plans of the house. He had found many other ‘interesting’ tidbits, which had reaffirmed his belief that his parents’ finances were in dire straits and that the repairs his father had planned never took place. There were estimates from various contractors, unpaid bills for services rendered, and an extensive list—written in his father’s hand—detailing all the work that needed to get done to get the house up to scratch.

  Gabe put the list out of his mind and returned his attention to the attic, which hadn’t seen the light of day, or an electric lightbulb, for decades. There were countless pieces of broken furniture, Christmas ornaments from the Victorian period that were probably collectibles by now and might actually pay for some of the restoration, and boxes and boxes of ledgers and various other documents pertaining to the running of the estate. Gabe had been at it for about eight hours and he was ready to chuck it in. There were no plans.

  “Damn it all to hell,” Gabe grumbled as he descended the rickety staircase and headed straight for the bath down the corridor. Even his hair was covered in dust and cobwebs.

  “You’re a sight,” Quinn said with a chuckle as she came out of the bath, her hair wrapped in a fluffy towel. “Anything?”

  Gabe shook his head and stopped as particles of dust flew in all directions and making Quinn sneeze. “Nothing. I’m filthy and hungry.”

  “Would you like me to make some pasta?” she asked.

  “Oh, no. We’re going out to the pub. I’ve earned a pint or two, and you’ve earned a dinner out.”

  “And what have I done to earn such an honor?”

  “You made love to me and did that amazing thing you do with your tongue,” Gabe replied without missing a beat.

  “Did I?”

  “Didn’t you?” Gabe asked with a wicked smile.

  Quinn smiled back. “You know where to find me once you’ve bathed. I’m not touching you looking like that.”

  “I would never ask for such a sacrifice, but I bet medieval ladies welcomed their knights home from battle with open arms, despite the stench from days locked in their armor and the muck of the battlefield.”

  “And when you come to me clad in your armor after having taken the throne, I’ll be all over you.” Quinn giggled as Gabe smacked her bottom.

  “Wait for me.”

  “Oh, I will,” she promised.

  Once they were settled in the pub with a pint in front of Gabe and a glass of mineral water in front of Quinn, she considered the problem with the house plans. “Have you looked online?”

  “Of course I have. There’s some information about Berwick Castle, but nothing much about the other houses in the area.”

  “Tomorrow, I’ll visit the library. They might have something. Will you be returning to the trenches?”

  “I don’t know if it’s worth it. There’s so much rubbish up there, I can barely get around without having to create a path between the junk. If there’s any useful information up there, it might take me months to find it.” Gabe took a long pull of his ale. “Ultimately, it’s not that important. Our man was buried within the walls of the house, indicating that he wasn’t deserving of a Christian burial. But whoever buried him treated him with love and respect, so most likely he was buried by his family.”

  “The poor lad must have committed some unforgiveable sin,” Quinn agreed.

  “Can you tell me more about Guy?” Gabe asked.

  “I’ve told you all I know so far.”

  “I’m dying to find out what happened to him. I just can’t seem to reconcile what I know of Guy de Rosel to what we discovered, but I don’t want you to get upset or emotionally involved. I know what a toll it takes on you.”

  “Gabe, I promise to keep a professional distance.”

  He gave Quinn a look of such stunned disbelief that she burst out laughing.

  “All right, I won’t,” she conceded. “But I need to know what happened to him. And don’t tell me what you know. Not yet.”

  “Can you tell me about Kate then?”

  Quinn shook her head. “I need more time with the rosary. Kate’s life turned upside down the moment her brothers stepped onto that battlefield. Their deaths changed everything, but so did her encounter with the de Rosels. I believe that her fate was intertwined with theirs, but I don’t yet know how the story played out.”

  “It’s a mystery.”

  “Not for long,” Quinn promised. “Ah, good. I’m starving,” she said as the waitress brought their food. “Want some chips?”

  “I’m happy with my steak pie and mash,” Gabe replied, eyeing his plate like a man who’d just come face to face with his long-lost love.

  “Do I have time to visit the library before we leave tomorrow?” Quinn asked as she popped a piece of flaky fried fish into her mouth.

  “Of course. I still have a few things to tidy up before we leave. Can you collect Emma on your way back from the library?”

  “Sure. I might even take her with me. She can look at children’s books while I troll the research section.”

  “She’d like that. I think she’s getting a bit restless with Mum and Cecily.”

  “She misses us,” Quinn said and smiled happily. It still gladdened her heart to think that Emma saw them as her parents and not just a couple who looked after her in lieu of her mother. They were a real family.

  Gabe smiled at her across the table as though he understood what she meant. “It’s wonderful, isn’t it?”

  Quinn nodded, suddenly overcome. She was always close to tears these days.
/>   Chapter 19

  Quinn glanced toward the children’s section to make sure Emma was happy and occupied before returning to the folio she’d found on the history of Berwick. The library was small enough for Quinn to see Emma, who was sitting in a comfortable chair, her legs folded beneath her, a picture book in her lap.

  Quinn leafed through the folio, searching for any references to Gabe’s family or ancestral home. She didn’t find anything, given that the family wasn’t titled, so not worthy of mention in the history books, but she did find sketches of other wealthy homes.

  “Well, this is interesting,” she mumbled as she studied a drawing of a tower house from the fifteenth century. She went through all the source material she found, which wasn’t plentiful, and called out to Emma. “Time to go, darling.”

  “All right,” Emma said and returned the picture book to the shelf. “I wish I could read this.”

  “Would you like me to read it to you?” Quinn asked. “We have a few minutes to spare.”

  “No, I want to read it myself.”

  “You will be able to read for yourself very soon. By next year, in fact. Now that you’re starting school, you’ll be learning to read.”

  “I want you to teach me,” Emma replied.

  “I’d be happy to,” Quinn said. She’d taught Emma her letters over the past few months, but they hadn’t progressed to actually reading words. Quinn thought that Emma might be bored in class if she already knew how to read and had to wait for the other students to catch up. But if she wanted to start reading, Quinn could hardly refuse.

  “All right then,” Emma replied happily. “Let’s go.”

  By the time they returned to the house, Gabe had already loaded their cases into the boot of the car and had cleaned the kitchen. He’d procured some yellow tape from somewhere and made a large rectangle around the hole in the floor, also winding the tape around the backs of chairs that he’d placed next to the opening to alert Phoebe not to cross the line. She knew the hole was there, of course, but might forget and walk toward the sink out of habit and fall.

  “We are ready to go,” Emma announced as she bounced into the kitchen.

  “We’ll just stop by Cecily’s and say goodbye to Grandma. Shall we?” Gabe asked.

  Emma nodded. She checked her backpack to make sure that her picture book, Mr. Rabbit, and several coloring books and pencils were all packed.

  The stop at Cecily’s cottage took longer than expected since Emma had to say a very thorough goodbye to Buster, who seemed sad to see her go. Once Emma left, he’d go back to his routine of daily ‘walkies’ with Phoebe, instead of running around happily as Emma tossed him a ball or chased him round the garden.

  “Find anything at the library?” Gabe asked Quinn as they finally drove away.

  “Not specifically pertaining to this house, but I did discover something else,” Quinn said. “There were a few drawings of houses from the period. Several showed a cross on the East-facing section of the house.”

  “A chapel?”

  “Yes, and our man was buried facing east.”

  “That’s brilliant, Quinn. I should have realized there’d be a chapel at the keep. I found several prie-dieux in the attic and assumed they used the prayer desks in their chambers.”

  “Some people used prie-dieux in chapels, particularly if the chapel was too small to hold actual pews. I think that our man was buried beneath the chapel floor,” Quinn theorized. “What I don’t understand is how come no one had come across him before, especially when they built a whole new house in the eighteenth century.”

  “That I can explain,” Gabe said as he swung the car onto the southbound carriageway. “My ancestors were tight-fisted sods who decided to build on the old foundation to save on costs. They built upward, but no one had any reason to dig below the foundation, and when they laid the pipes, they avoided the grave by sheer coincidence.”

  “Which would suggest that there was only one grave,” Quinn said softly, so as not to frighten Emma.

  “Perhaps there was more than one, but we’d have to demolish that entire section of the house to find the others.”

  “So, it is possible that our man got a Christian burial after all. The de Rosels might have had a priest who celebrated Mass at their private chapel and would have performed a funeral service.”

  “Yes, it’s possible,” Gabe agreed. “And that changes all our previous assumptions.”

  “For now,” Quinn replied. “We’ve yet to see what happened to him.”

  With that, they dropped the topic because Emma was getting restless in the back seat. That usually meant she needed the toilet, or more likely, wanted to stop under the pretense of using the toilet to wheedle a snack and a drink from the rest area.

  Chapter 20

  April 1461

  Belford, Northumberland

  Kate drew up her legs and rested her forehead on her knees as hot tears spilled down her cheeks. She had no notion of what to do. Her father had evicted her and Hugh had abandoned her at the first opportunity, having taken her innocence and her honor. He’d spoken to her of marriage to silence her protests, thinking that in her gratitude she wouldn’t object to him bedding her. He hadn’t been rough or abusive, as her mother had predicted, but he had taken what he wanted all the same, sugarcoating his actions with words of love and devotion. His ardor had lasted only as long as it took him to destroy any future prospects she might have. He was probably halfway to Berwick by now, the promises of last night forgotten.

  Now she’d have to fend for herself, but she had nothing of value, save her rosary, and she’d never part with it, not for all the world. Kate momentarily considered returning to the priory, but that was no longer an option, not when her thighs were smeared with Hugh’s seed. More than anything in the world, she wanted her mother, but the woman who’d loved and cherished her was locked in a prison of suffering, unable to leave her sickbed. Anne would have reasoned with her husband last night and convinced him that Kate was innocent of any wrongdoing, but now there was no one left to champion her, not even the abbess. She was completely on her own and utterly bereft.

  Kate angrily wiped the tears with her sleeve and looked around. She had to keep a cool head. The first thing she had to do was remove all traces of Hugh from her body. She felt disgusted and ashamed, and soiled. The water in the pitcher was cold, but Kate didn’t mind. At the priory, they always washed with cold water, even on the most frigid days of the year. She found a linen towel and went to work, starting with her hands and face and moving downward. She grimaced with distaste when she washed between her legs and hastened to complete the task. Once clean, she dressed and plaited her hair. She didn’t even have a hairbrush, or a spare chemise. The only thing she had in the world was Marie de Rosel’s gown and the gray cloak she’d been issued at the priory. She also had her horse, if Hugh hadn’t taken it.

  Kate stilled when a soft knock sounded on the door. “Come,” she called. A dark-haired girl of about eleven poked her head in the door.

  “I hope I haven’t disturbed ye, me lady, but Master de Rosel bid me bring ye something to break yer fast when the church bell struck the hour.”

  “Thank you,” Kate said and beckoned the girl into the room.

  The girl set a plate of bread and cheese on a small table and placed a cup of small ale beside it, then curtsied awkwardly.

  “When did Master de Rosel go out?” Kate asked.

  “’Bout an hour since. He left this for ye,” the girl added, taking a note from her pocket. She’d clearly forgotten all about the note, and would have walked off with it had Kate not enquired about Hugh.

  Kate unfolded the small square of paper. Hugh’s handwriting was elegant, but his message brief.

  Dearest Catherine,

  Gone to the Grange to speak to your father. Will return before noon. Be ready to leave.

  Your devoted Hugh

  The girl looked on with interest as Kate read the note and stowed it in the pocket
of her gown after refolding it.

  “Bad news, me lady?” she asked, her eyes dancing with curiosity. She probably would have liked nothing more than to stay for a little chat to avoid whatever duties awaited her downstairs, but Kate wasn’t about to discuss her situation with a child, no matter how much she longed to talk to someone.

  “No. All’s well.”

  “I’ll leave ye to it then,” the girl said, and backed out of the room.

  Kate sat down and took a sip of the bitter ale. No, it wasn’t bad news that Hugh hadn’t deserted her, but she wasn’t convinced it was good news either. At this stage, she wasn’t sure what would constitute good news. Her life was irrevocably altered, and now that she was no longer at the priory she needed the protection of a man, be it her father or a husband. A woman on her own was helpless and vulnerable, and ultimately doomed to a life of poverty and deprivation. The only thing Kate was certain of was that she’d never resort to whoring to survive. So she either had to go begging to her father—who wasn’t a forgiving man by nature, so appealing to him would be pointless given his harsh treatment of her—or agree to marry Hugh, if he still wanted her.

  Kate finished her meal, grabbed her cloak, and headed for the door. She had some time before Hugh returned, so she would go to church. She needed guidance, and since she couldn’t talk to her own mother or the abbess, she would speak to Father Phillip, who’d known her since she was born. Father Phillip had baptized her and watched her grow. He would be kind, understanding, and truthful.

  Kate walked the short distance to All Saints’ and pushed open the heavy door. The interior of the church was dim and cool, and for a second Kate thought it was empty, but then she saw Father Phillip emerge from the apse and head toward her down the nave. Father Phillip was in his sixties, gaunt, stooped, and gray. He walked slowly, as if in pain, but when he recognized her, his eyes lit with the warmth Kate had longed to see in the eyes of her own father, and a smile of welcome lit up his weathered face.