Shivers Box Set: Darkening Around MeLegacy of DarknessThe Devil's EyeBlack Rose (Shivers (Harlequin E))

by Barbara J. Hancock

  “Stand back, Tynan, Lucy.” Uther’s voice provoked my new friend into a low, rumbling growl of warning. “The creature is clearly dangerous.”

  “But that is nonsense!” I cried. “He is a veritable pup still and harmless with it. Why, we have just been playing with him.”

  To my horror, Uther drew a pistol from his saddlebag. Clapping my hands together loudly, I shooed the dog and, with a look of reproach and a startled yelp, he ran away. I was shaken by the extremity of Uther’s proposed action, and began to say so. I was brought up short and silenced by the way he was carefully watching Tynan. It was as if he was assessing his nephew’s mood. Tynan seemed oblivious to his scrutiny and, apart from the sullen aspect which always struck him in his uncle’s presence, he remained unperturbed.

  Apparently satisfied that all was well with us, Uther rode on to complete his business in Port Isaac. I was distracted as I walked beside Tynan down the narrow, rock-strewn path. I had heard it said that dogs could sense insanity. I wasn’t sure about that, but I did believe that canines were more finely attuned to smell, body language, posture and facial expression than humans. They were, therefore, quick to suspect when someone might be different or dangerous. In India my father told me the story of a soldier who was approached by an old woman. The soldier’s dog hurled itself at the woman, even though its handler, horrified, tried to haul the animal away. In the ensuing scuffle, a huge knife slipped from the woman’s hand and she ran off into the night with surprising agility for one so seemingly frail.

  Our charming new acquaintance had, in my opinion, perceived something that changed his manner from playful friendliness to fear. What concerned me most was that the dog had not evinced any signs of distress until Uther arrived.

  * * *

  “The west wing may be insufferably gloomy,” Tynan stated, looking up at the grim, layered turrets against the rough grain of an evening sky, “but at least there are no secret passages.”

  I paused. The pale mauve tapestry of twilight was interwoven with threads of cobalt blue. It was a beautiful scene, but Tynan’s words intruded on my enjoyment of it. I turned questioning eyes upon him.

  “The secret passage that leads to the east wing bedchambers,” he explained. When I admitted that I had no idea what he was talking about, he led me into the great hall. He drew aside one of the tapestries, this one depicting a bloody battle in which a knight in Jago colours laid waste to all about him. Concealed in the intricate panelling was a narrow door.

  “Thought to have been added during the reign of the Virgin Queen,” Tynan told me, in the manner of a tour guide, “when religious persecution made a place of concealment a desirable addition to a gentleman’s residence.”

  “Is it locked?” I asked, glancing over my shoulder in unaccustomed nervousness.

  Tynan nodded, but pointed to a heavily carved panel a few feet away. In its centre was an intricate rose and he reached out a hand, twisting the flower’s wooden core. The door clicked open. Tynan gestured for me to step into the darkness beyond. With a slight feeling of trepidation, I did so. Tynan picked up a branch of candles and followed me, closing the door after us. We were in a small, square, roughly panelled space, not much larger than a cupboard. I could stand, but Tynan had to hunch his shoulders slightly because the ceiling was so low. The air was stale and dusty and the flickering candlelight threw grotesque shadows onto the panels. A narrow winding staircase occupied the wall opposite the entrance. Tynan went up ahead of me, turning slightly and holding the candlestick high so that I could see my way. Each stair creaked stealthily under our weight. At the top of the staircase we found ourselves in a narrow passage, just wide enough to walk along without brushing the walls on either side. Tynan had to stoop even more under the low-hanging beams. The floor was wildly uneven and Tynan cautioned me to watch my step. There were three doors leading off this corridor. Tynan pointed to the middle one.

  “Your room,” he informed me with a cheerfulness that chilled me.

  The door had a similar hidden mechanism to the one downstairs, and we walked through it in silence. The familiar surroundings of my bedchamber seemed false from this new angle. There was my bed, with its pretty coverlet and bank of pillows. A welcoming fire blazed, and Miss Clatterthorpe had set out my dress for dinner on a hanger over the bed rail. It was comfortingly normal…and yet not. Nothing was normal any more. I took a step into the room. I was standing in the exact spot where I had found Tynan’s handkerchief on the night of the storm.

  An overwhelming feeling of anger shook me. “So anyone, at any time, can enter my bedchamber whenever the mood takes him?” I whirled to face Tynan, who took a step back in mock alarm.

  “No, because you can close this latch, see?” He showed me a neat wooden catch disguised as a carved bunch of grapes within the heavy oak panelling.

  “Only if you know about it!” I exclaimed. “Which I did not!”

  “But now you do,” he pointed out reasonably.

  I studied the door for a long time. Even now I knew of its existence, it was very difficult to see it once closed.

  “Does Uther know of this secret door?” I asked.

  “Of course he does,” Tynan said. “You should know by now there is nothing at Tenebris that Uther is unaware of. Why do you ask?”

  “Because I’m wondering why, when he showed me around the castle, he omitted to mention its existence.”

  “Perhaps he did not want to alarm you?” Tynan speculated. “People tend to either love or hate the Gothic nature of Tenebris and you do—if you will pardon me for saying so, hweg—appear considerably more delicate than you actually are! Maybe Uther succumbed to some chivalrous instinct and was trying to protect you from dreams of dead monks and headless horsemen stealing along the passage?”

  I remained silent. No one had greater cause than I to know that chivalry did not feature large amongst Uther’s motives towards me. And, in any case, when I confided to him that someone had entered my room in the middle of the night, he still did not say anything about this secret door. Even if he did not wish to alarm me, surely he would have taken steps to ensure it could no longer be used to gain access to my room? I could think of no reason why Uther would wish to allow someone to enter my bedchamber at will. I preferred to believe he had simply forgotten about the door, but a tiny, niggling voice prevailed. It told me, quietly but insistently, that Uther Jago was not a man to forget anything, even the most trifling detail.

  * * *

  The day was warm and drowsy. In the distance, arcs of white sail were stark against a field of brilliant blue. Not even the tiniest cloud dared mar the perfect heavens. Velvet bees strummed from lupins to foxgloves, stopping off at delphiniums along the way. Dragonflies danced from shade to drowsy shade. Tynan and I batted a shuttlecock between us in a decidedly half-hearted manner. I was uncomfortably aware that the exertion had painted my cheeks with shiny pink and that my hair was escaping from its pins. Laughing, I begged Tynan for a break so that I could regain a little dignity.

  Tynan began a teasing answer, but he paused in midsentence, clutching the sides of his head. His beautiful features contorted suddenly in pain. I rushed to his side, sliding an arm about his waist and, as we made our way slowly back to the castle, he leaned gratefully against my much smaller frame.

  “The sunlight.” He raised a shaking hand to shield his brow. “It hurts my eyes.”

  When we reached the great hall, I helped him lower himself into a chair. He was trembling violently and I called out for Pascoe. “Bring His Lordship some water, and please find Mr Uther and Desmond! At once!” The butler bowed and hurried to do my bidding. I knelt on the cold stone flags before Tynan’s chair and held his hands. He returned my grasp gratefully, and I was shocked to see the fear in the raw depths of his eyes. An angel of death danced in their golden light.

  “What can I do for you?” I asked quietly, but he shook his head. I interpreted this to mean that he was unable to speak. I raised one of his icy hands an
d held it against my warm cheek. We stayed like that for only a minute or two before Uther strode into the room and took charge of the situation. Desmond was a heartbeat behind him.

  Between them, they half supported, half carried Tynan. I rose to accompany them, but Uther gestured for me to remain where I was. They lumbered up the staircase. I watched from my kneeling position until they were out of sight. Sadly, I rose and, needing to be busy, began to remove a few dying blooms from one of the vases. Roses wither and belief dies. The bright colours blurred as unshed tears burned my eyes.

  “Tynan is unwell and will not be joining us for dinner,” Uther explained as we met in the hall before the evening meal. He handed me a glass of wine.

  “May I visit him?” I asked, sipping the dark liquid.

  He looked long and hard at me. “That would not be wise,” he replied gravely. He drew me over to the casement window and I studied our reflection in the glossy surface of the darkened panes. We looked together at long shadows, which stretched the castle’s columns so that they caressed the night-time clouds. Night stole the light away from the ancient walls, leaving behind a sullen purple tint. In contrast, the moon threw her beams across the deathly calm of the ocean.

  “The moon will be full again in a day or two,” Uther said. His nearness affected me as always, but, despite the reluctant lust which began inevitably to thrum through me, I sensed a deeper message in his words. Tynan had been unwell when I first came to Tenebris. And the moon had been full then, too.

  * * *

  Dreams penetrate the thickest walls, darken the lightest room and laugh at locksmiths. I awoke with the dawn and, my mind being too much disturbed to find sleep again, rose and watched the gradual advance of day. Morning prayers could not lighten the burden of my thoughts. I could not reconcile all that I had heard of Tynan’s madness with what my heart knew of him. True, he was often gauche to the point of incivility. He blurted out his thoughts as they came into his head, and he had that uniquely Jago need for physical contact that bordered on the inappropriate. Those faults did not add up to insanity! My thoughts were unbearable. I had to be sure. Purposefully, I marched along the corridors until I reached the west wing. I knew which turret housed the earl’s quarters from the tour Uther had given me on that first day. It seemed so long ago, but was, in fact, just one short month.

  Tynan’s suite of rooms was reached by a spiral staircase, and I navigated this cautiously. I had no desire to meet Uther and have him scupper my mission. The door at the top of the staircase was of gigantic proportions, of carved oak as thick as my forearm and ornamented with heavy brass features. I half expected to find it locked, but, with a world-weary groan, it opened when I lifted the ring held in the mouth of a carved lion. Pausing only to draw a steadying breath, I tiptoed inside.

  The heavy crimson curtains were drawn, throwing the scene into a parody of shadowy twilight. Tynan was slumped in a chair. His white shirt was crumpled and open to the waist, his black hair disordered. Stubble darkened his jaw and chin, and blue shadows lay vivid beneath his bloodshot eyes. What shocked me more than his wild appearance was the iron manacle clasped about his bare ankle. This was attached to a chain just long enough to allow him a circle of about six feet. A sob rose in my throat and it must have escaped my lips because he looked up then.

  “Lucy!” His speech was slurred, but the familiar, dear smile lit his eyes. There was no madness in their golden depths. Against all the warnings I had been given, I rushed forward to embrace him. We clung together desperately for long minutes and, oddly, it was he who comforted me.

  Kneeling before his chair, I sat back on my heels. “Tynan, this is barbaric!” I indicated the chains. “There can be no need for this, surely?”

  His lips twisted into something between a smile and a grimace. “I have no memory of what I do, but Uther assures me I am capable of any atrocity when the demons are upon me. This is his way of ensuring my own safety and that of others.”

  “But you must see other doctors! There must be something…”

  He shook his head sadly, releasing the pins from my hair so that he could tangle his fingers in its soft waves. “Think on, hweg! Uther will not bring shame upon the Jago name by announcing my affliction to the world! Not unless he is forced to do so. If I were to follow too closely in my father’s footsteps, perhaps.”

  The words should have terrified me as I knelt there between his knees, his hands on my head. But I had no fear of Tynan.

  “I never really knew my father—I was too young. But the vague stories others tell are not of a madman.” His voice was tinged with regret. I rubbed my cheek against his hand. “I suppose I know my mother a little better through her letters.” I looked up in surprise. “She left a pile of letters she wrote to me with my nurse. It seems strange, does it not? As if she had a premonition that we would not know each other.” He made a harsh sound of melancholy mirth. “Although it is probably just as well. She would hardly be proud to see me now.”

  “Don’t say that!” My voice was fierce. “Don’t ever even think it.” His smile in response was sad. “Is there no clue in your mother’s letters as to what caused such a catastrophic event between your parents?”

  He shook his head. “On the contrary. From what she wrote, they seemed happy enough. You are welcome to read the letters.” He gestured toward a large desk in a darkened corner of the room. I wanted to throw open the curtain so that I could see more clearly, but, when I made a movement to do so, Tynan protested. “The light hurts my eyes,” he reminded me.

  Eventually, I found what I was looking for and gathered up the little packet of letters tied with a bright red ribbon. I was touched that Tynan trusted me to read them. Returning to where he sat, I dropped a kiss on Tynan’s head. He placed his hands about my waist, holding me in that position so that he could rest his forehead against my torso.

  “Don’t come again, hweg,” he said gruffly. “I will be about again in a few days, and I don’t want you to see me like this. I have very little dignity left, but allow me this. Nor do I want you to face Uther’s wrath should he discover you have been to see me.”

  Chapter Nine

  It was the drama of the seascape that usually drew me. This time, I followed the path of a winding green-and-white brook, which led me inland. I had not come this way since the day that careless shot had been fired so close to me. Lost in thought, I wandered on without noticing the distance. I came upon a dewy glade, whose shrubs and flowers, sweeping down to the very edge of the water, made it an idyllic setting. The tranquillity soothed my troubled mind. For some time I sat against a tree trunk, lost in silent reverie, while the flowers that adorned the banks around me seemed to smile in new life. At last, I opened the packet of old letters and began to read the faint echoes of a love long silenced.

  Eleanor had begun writing to Tynan before he was born. Short, sweet love notes to her child that, at first, made me smile.

  A kiss upon your brow, my darling, and sleep well. Your fond mama will, I fear, struggle to do so, since your little feet and fists paddle my poor belly so relentlessly! Your papa will be here on the morrow. Oh, how I long to see him again! Will he laugh, do you think, to see how big I have grown, and how I waddle now instead of walking? Will he miss the slender waist he loved so much, or delight in its disappearance because it brings you ever closer, my dear one? Tenebris has been so quiet without Uther, who is in Paris, and Demelza, who visits friends. But dare I confess? I have revelled in the peace their absence brings.

  I found myself liking Tynan’s mother and wishing I could have known her.

  How beautiful you are! More so than even I dreamed possible. I spend my waking hours (of which there are now too many, I must inform you, young sir) gazing at your perfect face and counting your tiny toes. When your hand grips my finger, my heart feels a corresponding grasp. I never knew I could feel a love like this. Oh, I knew I would adore you. Of course I did. But this bittersweet agony. Half fear, half adoration. Ruan laughs and
tells me he is saddened because I have lost my heart to another. How right he is, my dearest boy.

  I felt a pang again for the dear, sweet child who had grown up without the love of his parents, and in the shadow of their tragedy. The letters continued. Eleanor gloated over her son as she watched him grow.

  How strong you are, my little one! So robust and what hearty lungs you have! I need have no fears for your health!

  Tynan’s ill health clearly developed later since it was not evident in the months after his birth. I flicked through the letters, seeking those written closest to her death.

  My darling Ruan is worried about me and oh, how I wish I could tell him what ails me. This place saps my strength and reminds me too well of what has gone before. My dearest boy, how much I wish we could leave the past and tormented love behind us, never to return.

  Some women, I knew, sank into a trough of depression after childbirth. But Eleanor’s spirits had been so high after Tynan’s birth. It appeared to be something within Tenebris itself that disturbed her.

  I hope that Ruan knows that my heart and soul are his forever.

  It was frustrating that the letters ended so abruptly and did not convey any of the detail of what had led to Eleanor’s death. But then, I supposed, because Ruan was mad, there would be no point in trying to ascribe a reason to his actions. I glanced up at a movement and was spellbound to see a young deer taking dainty sips from the brook. The sight struck a chord, and I realised that this halcyon scene must be that place of brutal Jago legend. I was in Lucia’s Glade.

  * * *

  “Do you care to drive with me to Tintagel tomorrow, hweg?” Tynan looked tired, but calm when I at last returned to the castle. He had emerged from his confinement that morning. “We can ask Huddy for a picnic and spend the best part of the day there.”