The Way Home

by Glover, Nhys

  ‘Madam, you would test a saint and I am not one. Take your foot away from the door and be gone! I have no time for your spoiled and brainless tantrums. There is danger here this night. Be gone!’

  For a moment Phil was struck dumb, the shock of his attack scattering all thoughts from her head. Then, a slow burn began to make its way up her neck and with it came fury.

  ‘You think that what you have witnessed so far is a tantrum, sir? Do not push me or I will show you a tantrum; one that will bring an army to this door and have you thrown out on your high and mighty posterior!’ She spoke softly, and because of it, her words carried weight. ‘Open the door and let my people and me in or there will be real danger here when I return. I am no brainless twit. This is my inheritance and you will not keep it from me, even for one night!’

  The door flew open once more before the sound of her steely voice had died away, and Phil pulled her aching foot back beneath her. For the first time, she saw the arrogant bounder who stood gatekeeper to what was hers.

  She was not a short woman, but she felt tiny in comparison to the giant who towered over her. He reminded her of the Keep that surrounded them, big and roughly hewn, cold and forbidding. And just as the Keep frightened her but would not put her off, neither would the man.

  He was dressed as a gentleman, if a rather dishevelled and unfashionable one. His hair was overly long, falling in curling waves to his shirt collar and looked black in the deep shadows that surrounded him. What she could see of his features in the moonlight was heavy and harshly defined, the nose jutting arrogantly from high cheekbones. Heavy brows shielded the caverns of his eyes. Several days’ growth bearded his cheeks. He was as tense as a tightly coiled spring and tired, she realised, with an unexpected pang of sympathy.

  ‘I am sorry for keeping you from your bed,’ she said more gently now that she had gained the advantage.

  ‘There will be no bed for me this night, nor will you find sleep within these walls if you are foolish enough to stay. I have warned you. Be it on your own head if you choose not to heed my warning.’

  With that final volley, the man retreated into the darkness leaving her standing in the doorway. There was not one taper lit in the huge entryway. How he made his way so smoothly without light was just another mystery amongst many.

  ‘Wait. Where are you going? You cannot just leave me here. You must send someone to show me to my bedchamber. Someone to accompany my men to the stables and find them a place for the night...’ her voice petered out as she realized he was not going to stop or turn around. Her victory of the moment before seemed suddenly very hollow.

  What could she do? She didn’t know what lay beyond the door. She didn’t even have a lantern to light her path. This was madness.

  She turned back to the coach and her servants, newly hired in London using the travelling money her father’s solicitor had provided. They looked as confused and frightened as she felt.

  ‘Unload my bags please, put them inside and light me a lantern. Prudence will come with me and the two of you men will have to find what accommodation you can at the stable, which I assume will be around the back.’

  None of her words seemed to appeal to the three people waiting at the bottom of the stairs.

  ‘You can ‘ave your bags an’ a lantern, Miss, but no amounta’ coin’s gonna make me stay ‘ere this night. I’m takin’ the Master’s advice an’ goin’ back to the village. It’s not far,’ said the gruff coachman.

  Phelps nodded his head in agreement and after a quick glance at the men, Prudence joined the revolution too.

  ‘I’m not stayin’ ‘ere tonight, Miss. You seem a nice sort, really ya’ do, but I don’ like this place, not a bit. I don’ need the work enough to risk me neck.’

  ‘You’ll be risking your neck far more by going back down that goat track in the dark. Don’t let that oaf put you off. We are perfectly safe here.’ Phil felt as if the ground beneath her feet had suddenly turned to quicksand. She fought the urge to panic. She had paid them all good money in advance. They couldn’t go off and leave her here alone, could they?

  But it seemed they could and would.

  After unpacking her new trunks from the top of the coach and lining them up just inside the door of the Keep, the men lit the gas lanterns on the side of the coach and gave her another to light her way.

  Speechless, she watched them go about their preparation to desert her. In the gentle glow of the lantern, Phil studied her travel-soiled clothing and grimy kid gloves that had been brand new at the start of her journey. Her fears intensified. They were doing it. They were really going to go off and leave her here alone.

  She could change her mind; there was nothing keeping her here. She could give in gracefully and let them drive her back down the moor to a warm, comfortable bed in a village inn. She didn’t have to stand her ground.

  But she did. Because that was how she had been raised. If her father, heartless brute that he later proved to be, could stand bravely against the marauding Russian enemy at Balaclava, then she could do the same here. This might not be the “Charge of the Light Brigade,” but there was no reason why she couldn’t show the same kind of bravery those men had done. She may only be a woman, but this was her land. Her father had left it to her and no one was going to drive her away, even for a night.

  With stubborn chin jutting, she watched the coach drive away into the night. The doorway yawned open, waiting to gobble her whole. She turned resolutely toward it and marched into the Keep.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Byron Carstairs watched the coach drive away with some satisfaction. At least now he only had one unsuspecting person to protect this night.

  And what a one she had turned out to be; the new heiress, daughter of the man who had been like a father to him for nine long years. He had not even known she’d existed until he read the letter Patrick had given him on his deathbed.

  He understood why the Captain, as he was called by all those who lived in and around Breckenhill Keep, had kept the girl a secret. His past life would have been a painful memory he preferred no reminders of. But why leave the girl this legacy? No loving father would be so cruel. Why insist that a young, innocent woman spend three interminable months in the hellhole that had been his prison for the last ten years? Why put her into such danger? Why let her risk learning his horrifying secret, which she was bound to do if she stayed long enough, after keeping her away from it for so long?

  Byron felt anger seethe beneath his carefully maintained facade. Wasn’t it enough that the Captain had laid the duty of care for the unfortunate denizens of the Keep in his reluctant hands for the last nine years? Now he’d added another burden to his overflowing load: Guardian of an innocent young woman. How could he be expected to protect her from what lived within the Keep’s stone walls? How was he to shelter her from the truth that would surely drive her mad if it didn’t kill her first?

  The only saving grace in this ever-increasing nightmare was that the girl wasn’t as sweetly docile as he had expected. Patrick Davenport’s daughter appeared to be a chip off the same block of granite. She even shared her father’s fiery countenance. But where Patrick had been a self-proclaimed “carrot-top” in his youth, Philamena’s hair beneath that demure bonnet had seemed a darker shade – more auburn.

  Darkness was deceptive, however. In the full light of day, perhaps her hair was ginger, her luminous white skin marred by freckles and those dark eyes fringed with pale red spikes that would leave her looking insipid. She might not be the glorious beauty the darkness had wanted to make of her.

  But even if that were the case and her eyes were not as dark and appealing as they appeared to be, he doubted that the word insipid would ever be used to describe Miss Philomena Davenport. There was just too much fire and passion in her to be labelled anything less than glorious.

  He was glad of that, even though it might have made his life easier if he could have bullied her into doing his bidding. If she were to stand a cha
nce in hell of surviving unscathed during her three months’ detention in Breckenhill Keep, she would need all the fire and spirit she had at her command.

  Brave men had been driven mad with fear by what the Keep contained. How was he to keep such a fate from befalling this one frail woman, no matter how spirited?

  The coach was gone now and he heard the great oak door close. He knew she was standing there in the entry hall, alone and unsure of her next actions. If she weren’t to fall into immediate danger, he would have to go and get her. He would have to give her a room with a stout lock and insist she use it. The moon was rising higher with every passing minute and though it was still quiet, he knew it would not be long before those kept imprisoned beneath the Keep discovered they were trapped and began their frenzied attempts to escape.

  He wanted her locked down safe before that happened, safe and unsuspecting. The first was far easier than the last.

  He quickly made his way back down to the entry hall where the girl stood illuminated by the glow of her one lantern. She looked terrified, standing there in her sober travelling clothes, dusty from the journey, bonnet slightly eschew. Wisps of dark golden hair hung lose around her pale face. Huge, dark eyes peered around her into the gloom.

  ‘If you insist on staying then follow me,’ he said grudgingly. He didn’t want to make this easy for her. Nor for himself.

  She seemed to have been aware of his return even though he moved in darkness, for she didn’t jump at his harsh words. Instead, she picked up a small valise at her feet and walked toward him.

  ‘Thank you for making an effort at hospitality now that you have scared my servants away.’ Her tone said that she was not in the least grateful to him. Byron wanted to smile and that surprised him. He couldn’t remember the last time he had smiled. Nine years ago? That sounded about right.

  In those long ago days he had smiled and laughed a lot. He’d been a happy-go-lucky young man with his whole future ahead of him. Soon, he would have reached the age to enlist and he’d been looking forward to the glory to be found defending Victoria’s Empire from the beasts of the Sevastopol.

  But that fateful moonlit night nine years ago had changed everything. His parent’s coach had overturned on the way home from a party. He had been thrown clear. When he’d regained consciousness, it was to a nightmare of blood and horror unrivalled even by the stories from the Crimea.

  Help had come that night in the form of villagers who had heard the accident. Their torches had driven the beast off but the horror was not so easily driven away, not when he staggered to his feet to find his parents torn to bloody pieces before him and the coachman blood-soaked but alive, groaning in agony.

  What happened next had been stamped on his memory forever, although for many days after the event he thought he had dreamed it. The villagers checked him for wounds and, finding none, assisted him, but they killed the wounded coachman right there in front of him. He had been in shock or he might have tried to stop them, but to his befuddled brain, it was just one more horror to add to so many others.

  Captain Patrick Davenport, dressed in full crimson and gold regalia, had come to see him the next morning. He had offered his condolences and offered to help Byron track down the wolves that had killed his parents. Byron had been so in awe of the war hero that he had willingly accepted the assistance. The villagers had tried to discourage him from going with the Captain, but their livelihoods depended on the land they tenanted from him so none could say an overt word against him.

  Had they told him the truth, he would not have believed them. By that time, he had convinced himself he had seen wolves in the darkness. What other explanation was there for the carnage that had taken place?

  Shaking the memories away, Byron turned back towards the staircase he had just descended. He didn’t have a room ready for her. There had been too much happening since the Captain’s death to deal with the practicalities of a possible visit from the new heiress.

  She would have to have the best chamber in the Keep and he hoped it was furnished well enough to suit this young, well-bred lady. There would be no fire in the grate, but it was not as bitterly cold in midsummer as it was at other times of the year. Hopefully the new heiress would be only mildly put out by its lack.

  He would deal with the room’s regular occupant in the morning.

  He heard her footsteps on the marble stairs behind him. Even as exhausted as she had to have been, her steps were still light. He was reminded of the speed she had shown when dashing up the stairs to put her foot in the doorway to stop him closing her out. That had been impressive, if foolhardy.

  At the top of the staircase, he turned left and wound his way along the stone balustrade balcony until he reached the door he was looking for. He pushed it open and made a graceful bow as he gestured for her to enter; it was only partly cynical.

  ‘You will find everything you need in this room. There’s a chamber pot under the bed and there will be fresh water to wash with in the morning. Not before. Do not, under any circumstances, try to leave your room until I come for you in the morning. Keep your door locked at all times. There is a key on the inside. Use it.’

  She stood in the doorway of her new room and stared up at him. He had the strongest desire to tear off her bonnet and loosen her hair so he could see what colour it actually was. At the moment, in the glow from the lamp, it looked like burnished copper. He wanted to feel the silky texture of it between his fingers. He wanted to brush the stray locks back from her pale face.

  As they stared at one another, it seemed as if time had stopped. He watched in bemused delight as her cheeks darkened with a blush and her eyes sparkled. Her breasts, so tightly cocooned beneath the sober bodice, rose upward and seemed to struggle to escape their bondage. She swallowed and sucked in her lush lower lip, chewing on it nervously. Something had shifted between them and he could see that she was as affected by it as he was.

  ‘You… you are still trying to frighten me away. Can’t you see that such a ploy will not work with me?’ she asked softly, brushing back the errant lock he had wanted to touch.

  ‘I am not trying to frighten you. I am trying to protect you. You have no idea what your pride has led you into.’ His voice was little more than a whisper and she shifted forward slightly to catch his words.

  ‘Who are you?’ Her mouth formed a moue, as if caught on the last word. ‘Why would you want to protect me?’

  Byron lifted his hand and let his fingers touch those pouting lips. Like a sea anemone, they withdrew from his invasion.

  He grunted at his own lack of restraint. He had more pressing matters with which to concern himself than this pretty Miss, and yet he regretted her rejection of his touch. It stung.

  ‘I am Byron Carstairs. I was your father’s assistant.’

  Her eyes lit with amusement. ‘You had a poetry lover for a parent, I assume?’

  Byron groaned. His mother’s love of Lord Byron’s poetry had indeed been the reason for his name. He had been teased mercilessly throughout his school years for it, and he had never liked his namesake’s writing. It was highly unrealistic in its romanticism.

  ‘Good night, Miss Davenport. I will see you in the morning.’ He tried to maintain his fierce persona but she had dislodged it with her amusement, and though he knew it was no time for frivolity, he felt lightness in the moment.

  She smiled a slow and knowing smile that created dimples in her flushed cheeks. ‘Goodnight to you, Mr Carstairs. I will look forward to it.’

  His pulse raced and for one daring moment, he thought of dragging her into his arms and kissing those smiling lips. She was like nothing he had ever known. In this dark place with its horror and pain, she was a glimpse of light that shone brighter than the sun. He wanted to bath in it, to soak up the warmth of it and let it drive the darkness away…

  If only for a few precious moments…

  The howl that broke the spell was harsh and eerie, echoing up from the dungeons below. With sickening hea
rt, Byron watched the beautiful face register shock at the sound and then fear. She reached out and grasped his arm.

  ‘My Lord, what was that!’ she gasped, the lantern light flickering as the hand that held it shook.

  ‘Go inside and lock the door. You will hear more of that in the coming hours. I did warn you that you would not sleep if you stayed here tonight.’ He tried to draw his arm back from her but she held tight.

  ‘Tell me what that howl is. It sounds like something is in pain. Is it a dog?’ she asked, pressing him for answers he didn’t have time to give.

  ‘It is something that only your worst nightmares have answers for. And it is pain, anguish and fury that you will hear in those howls. Go inside now. I have work to do.’ He drew her clutching hand from his sleeve and gently pushed her into the room. Her big eyes stared at him as he pulled the door closed.

  He waited to hear the lock turn and was relieved when it did. She was no fool. Suddenly, she had realised that his words of warning were not just designed to frighten her. He really was trying to protect her. She may not know from what yet, but she had been galvanized to action nonetheless.

  Relieved, he turned and hurried along the balcony toward the staircase just as another ear-piercing howl rent the air. If she wasn’t rushing to hide under the bedclothes by now, she should be. He just wished that he could be under them with her, but he had duties to fulfil and they could not wait.