She looked forward, then, to the end of this part of their journey, and urged her horse forward a little faster on the road.
The silence between them relaxed and became companionable, partly from fatigue, partly because . . . she felt it was from their friendship. For all the tension that existed between them, regardless of anything Jack said, she knew in her heart they were friends. She looked at the moon, frowning a little. A dimness seemed to cast itself across the light—thin clouds, she thought, but if they grew thicker, it would be too easy to lose their way and take the wrong road. She looked at Jack, who seemed to be lost in his own thoughts. Perhaps she should alert him; indeed, the scene ahead of them seemed to shift, for a mist seemed to arise from the dirt and cobbles, blurring the outlines of the road with the trees to either side. Her frown grew deeper. The mist hung low, curling forward toward their horses’ feet like beckoning hands, and then rose like slow, cold flames along their legs. Her mare flicked her ears forward and gave a concerned snort, and Jack’s gelding tossed its head nervously. Catherine could see Jack’s hand tighten on his reins. Clearly he, too, felt uneasy.
She cast a quick look behind her, and dread grew in the pit of her stomach. She could not see the road behind them; the moonlight should have illuminated it as clearly as it did the road before them.
She turned her attention to the road in front of them—no, that was not clear any longer, either. The mist had risen higher, up to the horses’ knees, and she could feel a chill touch her feet from time to time. She halted her horse as Jack drew his to a stop.
“God’s blood, this is a nuisance,” he said, clearly disgusted. Catherine nearly laughed at his pragmatic tone, but a finger of mist crawled up to twine around her ankle, and a stab of ice pierced her foot, making her jerk in her saddle. She swallowed.
“We must leave here, Jack,” she said.
“Certainly,” he replied, his voice ironic. “Where would you suggest we go?” He nodded toward where she thought the road must go. “If you can find the way out, lead on!”
“This way,” she said, jerking her chin in the way they had been going . . . or as much as she could determine the way. The mist rose higher, and snaked along her leg, and another lance of pain pierced her calf. She gasped. “We must go, quickly!”
Jack stared at her. “What is it?”
She looked wildly around her—a faint, sweet, familiar scent came to her, and her hands began to prickle with imminent pain. Despair seized her as the mist crept higher, and her back began to ache. She felt as if she could not move.
“Catherine, speak to me. What is wrong?”
Jack’s firm, patient voice roused her out of the fear that had numbed her muscles. She nudged her horse forward. “We must go. There is . . . there is evil here,” she said between gritted teeth, for icy pain seethed up the skin along her spine.
Jack muttered something in English—she thought it might have been a curse—and he moved his horse forward. The gelding tossed its head again and pranced about nervously; Catherine was glad she had a more placid mount, for her mare only flicked her ears forward again.
The mist rose higher, and Catherine swallowed bile. The familiar sweet scent grew stronger—she glanced at Jack, the sight of him dimmed by an occasional rise of mist—did he not smell it?
She wet her lips, and made herself breathe long and slow. She would not be afraid. She had vowed it. She lifted her chin and encouraged her horse forward a little faster.
“Damned fog.”
A lift of mist obscured Jack from her sight for a moment, making her heart hammer quickly.
“I thought I’d left fog like this behind when I left London,” he continued in a conversational tone. “But the devil would have it I’d be plagued with it in France, as well.”
A bubble of laughter escaped her. Despite the threat she felt around her, the aggrieved note in his voice at the contrary nature of France’s climate pierced her fear and made her heart feel lighter.
“We have more fog than you English think,” she said, trying for an equally casual tone. “Such as . . . such as this, for example.” She glanced at him, and caught the glimpse of an encouraging smile.
“Eh, this, a fog?” He gave a skeptical snort. “This is nothing compared to what we have in England. This is the sun at noontime, ma chère! Why, if you were to have a real English fog, you’d swear you were fighting your way through a bale of wet Suffolk wool.”
She grinned, but shuddered when the mist rose thickly between them as if to defy Jack’s words, chilling her so that she could hardly feel the reins in her hands. The cold crept up from her spine to her neck and seemed to creep up to her face. Her chest felt stiff, and she took in a slight, moaning breath.
“Catherine.” Jack’s voice held concern, an edge of urgency. “What is it?”
She forced her attention on him beside her, and her leg bumped against his. She looked up—he had moved his horse closer to hers. Warmth spread from where they touched, and moved over her heart; a heat grew there, and the prickling in her hands receded. She put her hand over her heart and felt the cross underneath. “Jesu, Marie,” she breathed in relief.
She looked ahead of them and saw nothing but dark blankness—no moonlight or shadow, only a deep formless grey. “Do . . . do you see anything, Jack?” she asked. She cleared her throat, for her voice had come out a whisper. “It looks . . . like nothing,” she said, forcing her voice out louder. “It is as cold as a grave.”
“No . . .” Jack’s voice sounded thoughtful. “No, I’ve been in a grave, and even this is a damned sight warmer, I give you my word.”
His words startled a laugh from her, and the chill retreated until her hands unstiffened on the reins.
He let out a long breath. “But I’ll admit, it’s as bad as the worst fog I’ve seen, and I’ve seen the worst.”
“It chills me to the bone, Jack, but we can’t go back or stay here.”
He looked at her, but she could not discern his expression, for the darkness obscured his face. “I should say not,” he said. “I’ll not sit in the middle of wet Suffolk wool.” She could see his hand gesture in front of them. “But damned if I can tell whether forward is any different than backward.”
She took in a deep breath that came more easily to her now, and summoned up a smile. She nodded in the direction at which he had waved. “That must be the way; we have not turned one way or another, and if we leave the road, we’ll know by the sound of the hooves on grass instead of dirt and stone.”
He nodded, and they moved forward.
She could see nothing, only a dark, grey, formlessness in front of her. She felt for the chain around her neck and pulled out her cross, holding it tightly in her hand. It gave her comfort, and the prickling in her hands and the pain across her back receded. She sighed. At least she had not bled again. She noticed that Jack had brought out his sword. He, too, must have felt the strangeness of the mist.
She was not sure how long they rode through the thick fog; she was only aware of how fingers of mist would catch at her legs with a freezing grasp. But she noticed that as long as she kept near Jack and kept her hand on her cross, the paralyzing chill would go no farther than her leg.
It was an evil thing, this mist. It reminded her somewhat of the monster she had faced in Paris, though she was not sure exactly how. Perhaps it was the cold, or that elusive scent—and yet, the monster had certainly not smelled the same as what she was sensing.
Dread tried to force its way up from her gut, but she tamped it down. This was no time to give in to her fears. But she could not help thinking that Père Doré was wrong; here she felt the signs of the stigmata she bore, and if it were true that it was a holy thing, then surely she would not feel it after having lain with Jack.
It was all of a piece; the stigmata had come in the presence of evil, regardless of the state of her soul. It had nothing to do with whether or not she was in a state of grace, but in the presence of evil. It must mean, therefore, that
the stigmata was more a curse than a holy thing.
She briefly closed her eyes and swallowed down despair. It was just as well that she return to her home and that Jack go on to Breda. If she was cursed, she did not want to endanger him any more. Even if they were not attacked, manifestations of her curse would certainly delay them. Indeed, even if Jack did not feel this mist as painfully as she did, it was nevertheless an obstacle.
She would show him, once she returned home, that she was content to stay there, and then she would seek a convent or find a way to travel on her own, perhaps even fight duels for money once she regained some knowledge of who she was. She had shown she was capable of winning one so far; surely there were others she could win.
“There, it seems we are out.” She heard a clear sigh of relief from Jack. She looked up from her thoughts; stars shimmered in the dark night sky where the moonlight did not overpower them, and behind them the trailing mist seemed to curl into itself and fade away. She let out a long, shuddering breath; her hands and her back ceased to hurt. Cautiously she released her cross and glanced back again . . . the mist was still gone. “Yes,” she said. “It’s disappeared, and the evil with it, Dieu merci.”
“Are you well? Damned if you didn’t seem about to faint, ma chère.” His teasing voice held a note of rough concern. It made her smile a little, for he sounded as if he talked to a fellow soldier, and she realized she had done well. Many other women would indeed have fainted or screamed.
“Not I!” she said firmly. “Did I not cut off the head of a demon? What is a little mist to me?”
Jack chuckled. “Little fire-eater. If you could, you’d fight the Dev—”
“Shh, shhh!” Catherine said hastily. “Do not tempt fate, Jack! Did you not feel the evil in the mist? It crept up my legs like a viper and froze me with its bite, I tell you.” She gazed at him, hoping he would understand, that he would not think she had gone mad, for no mist was like the one she described.
He was silent for a moment. “It was the damndest thing, Cat.” He took in a deep breath. “When I was a boy, I attended a hanging. The man deserved it—he’d . . . he’d done a foul thing to two little girls in the village near my home, and then killed them. The whole village came out to watch and throw offal at him; God knows he deserved it. I never thought about evil until then—hell, I was just a boy, and if you’d asked if I believed in it, I might have had my doubts before then.” He fell silent again and drew in a deep breath. “But just before they pulled his neck, the man looked around, grinning as if he were at a wedding instead of being measured for his own funeral. And I swear, if I didn’t believe evil existed before this, I believed it then, for the man looked me straight in the eyes and he had nothing behind his own except the cold soul of the Devil himself.” He let out a long breath and shook his head. “I doubt I felt all the things you did, ma chère, for you’re a sensitive thing, but I felt as if that man were staring at me the whole damned time we were in that mist, and that I was going to my own hanging.” She shuddered, for she could understand the sensation. “If I ever complain about wet English Suffolk wool fog again, ma chère, slap me. I’d much prefer it than . . . that.” He jerked a thumb behind him.
He hesitated, and she saw him glance at her. “I’m of half a mind not to return you to your home, Cat, for if you’ve got this kind of thing so near it, it can’t mean any good.”
She thought the same thing, but she shrugged. “Or it could be merely the consequences of being with me, Jack. No—” She held up her hand at his imminent protest. “You cannot say you haven’t thought it, for certainly I have. And this . . .” She jerked her head toward the road behind them. “This shows me I must find out all I can before I go anywhere else.”
“Hmph.” The sound was disgruntled, as if Jack could not find words to protest. He shook his head. “But—”
“And what is this ‘Cat’ you called me?” she interrupted. She did not want to talk more of the mist or her fate, for she feared she’d break down and agree with him and avoid returning home altogether.
He chuckled. “‘Cat’ is ‘le chat’ in English, ma chère. It’s often what we English call women named Catherine, and it fits you, for considering all you’ve gone through, I think you’ve got more lives than a cat.”
She smiled, for the thought pleased her. She liked cats; they were one of the best survivors on the streets and were good at ridding houses and alleys of vermin. She, also, had rid the alleys of human vermin . . . and with God’s and the Holy Mother’s help, she’d survive whatever she encountered. She nodded. “You may call me Cat, then. It is a good name.”
“I thank you. I shall,” Jack said, and there was laughter under his words. He gestured at the sword at her side. “Heaven knows you can scratch as well as a cat.”
“‘Scratch’!” Catherine made her voice sound insulted. “I do more than scratch! I can fight even an accomplished swordfighter—you have seen that yourself.”
“‘Fight’!” he said, and snorted in apparent disbelief. “‘Scratch,’ that’s all, ma chère. With a bit more training, I might say you could fight—”
“Might!” she cried in protest. “I have had plenty of training!”
“Not in my opinion,” Jack said firmly. “Next inn we find, we rest, then you train again.”
“Jack—!”
But it was a weak protest. She was glad they argued as friends, and if it meant she’d train to fatigue later this day, she did not mind, for it meant they could, for now, put the thought of the mist, evil, and her future aside.
For now. She closed her eyes briefly. I do not want to think any further than that, Dieu me sauve, she thought. Tomorrow, she would return to her home, but before that, she would make love to him one more time if she could. She would focus only on that . . . just for now.
Chapter 9
CATHERINE MANAGED ONCE MORE— after sleeping, then her sword practice, after winning another fight with a cocky musketeer and gaining more livres than she had at the first fight—to lure Jack into the bath with her after they came to an inn just outside of the city of Rouen.
Catherine had seemed to withdraw from him after their night in the mist. She was friendly, she was cheerful, and though she practiced her fencing exercises in excellent, amazingly expert form, she seemed distant from him until they entered their room at the inn again.
He protested very little, less than he had before. They had only a short time together; if his kisses had an edge of desperation, if he allowed her to kiss and touch him more boldly than she had when they had first made love, if it meant he had abandoned all honor, he cared not any longer. He said nothing as she moved her hand down his belly and grasped his manhood, only groaned and slipped his hand between her legs in return. I am a weak fool, he thought. A greedy fool. Most definitely a fool.
He did not care any longer. She would be gone from him this day, and he had nothing else to offer her but this worship of her with his body. He could feel her knees become lax and she shook with sudden heat when his fingers reached her woman’s parts. She would not protest if he took her fully, he was certain. He lifted her suddenly from the bath they stood in, the wet chilling his skin on the way to the bed.
He lay her gently on it, and followed her more quickly and held her more tightly than before, wanting to meld his body into hers. He kissed her mouth, her throat, her breasts, and spread her legs, pressing his hips against her, hard.
This time she did not pull away or cry out in fear. She even allowed him to lay atop her, and she gasped when he entered her.
“You did not do this before,” she whispered.
“I know,” Jack said. “Dear God, I know.”
He closed his eyes and slowly moved upon her, and he felt her tightness around him in his retreat and return. His actions drew out the exquisite sensations she’d begun in him earlier, and she twisted her body against him, clutching the small of his back with her hands, drawing him close.
“Come to me,” he whispered in
her ear. “Come, Cat. My Cat, my Catherine.” It was a chant, a prayer, holding hopeless wishes as he touched her and moved in her deeply, wanting to weep with longing and impending loss. He gritted his teeth instead, and thrust hard.
She stiffened suddenly, and he thought she might have done so in fear, but she let out a cry of pleasure instead, and his manhood was squeezed tight. He almost spilled into her, but managed to remember he would not put a child in her, and pulled out, pouring his seed on her belly instead.
He fell, gasping, beside her, and held her close and tightly. He heard her sigh, and felt her stroke his hair, then heard her make a disgusted sound. He looked up to see her expression marred by a wrinkled brow and a puzzled frown.
“What is this?” She pointed to the seed he had spilled on her. She stared at him a moment, then realization cleared her face. “Was this supposed to go inside of me?”
Laughter bubbled up inside of him, and came out in a chuckle. “I am sorry, ma chère, but I thought it best if I did not.” He rose from the bed and picked up the rough towel draped across the back of the tin bath. Carefully he wiped her belly.
“I might have had a child if you had,” she said thoughtfully. “I . . . would not have minded it.”
Frustration twisted inside of him and turned to anger. He threw the towel into the tub and moved quickly away from her, dragging on the clothes he had dropped on the floor.
“I have managed,” he said through gritted teeth, “to retain just a small shred of honor, ma chère.” Almost none, he thought. “You know my thoughts on this—I have already mentioned them. I will not go any further and ruin you totally by putting a child in you. I barely had the presence of mind to withdraw in time as it was. Thank God I did—at least I thought of the possible consequences, if you did not.”
Dark Enchantment Page 15
