“No matter what the time, looks like everyone’s gone to bed. I hope we don’t have to sleep in the coach. The seats are hard as bricks and too damn short. You need a place where you can stretch out and really get some rest.” I peered toward the dark inn, hoping someone would hear us and bring a light. At least I could see the inn, even from across the yard. The rain had stopped hours ago and the fog had lifted at last—
the single blessing from this day made up of one catastrophe right after another.
Around the time I started giving thanks for this small boon, such a clamor arose from behind me I nearly gave myself a hernia as I spun around.
“What in the world are you doing?” I laid a hand over my heart to still the palpitations.
“Calling a stable boy.” Caleb clanged away at a contrivance I had taken for a dinner bell.
“Calling a stable boy! Good Lord, you nearly scared the bejesus out of me. I thought you were calling the devil out of hell. If that thing doesn’t roust someone, nothing can.”
“As long as it wakes the lad.” Caleb continued ringing the damn thing until a boy about the size of a ten-year-old came out of the livery stable rubbing at his eyes. When he realized our conveyance looked a tad more important than a farmer’s gig, he hurried off, saying he’d fetch his Da.
I sighed. “So here we stand. Barely. The poor horses look tired, too.” Their necks had lost the proud, spirited arch they’d started out with earlier. While their heads did not quite hang in weariness, they didn’t look rarin’ to go either. All of their earlier vitality was gone. The grays had mud past their knees and the rear pair, in particular, were liberally splattered and soiled.
“Tired enough now you could handle them yourself, Boothenay,”
Caleb said.
“Hey, I can handle them anytime,” I replied, my pride struck. “I did all right back there on the road, didn’t I? I just thought the horses were your job, that’s all.”
How did he guess they terrified me? And the worst part is, I didn’t even know why.
“Right. That’s why you always circle around them from a distance of twenty feet or so, and look back over your shoulder saying…and I quote, ‘Nice horsy. Stay.’ You’re supposed to tell horses whoa.”
Underneath his teasing words, I heard laughter. “Never mind. Before we’re done, you’ll probably be pushing me out of the driver’s seat so you can take over.”
“Don’t count on it.” I imagined that would be the same day hell freezes over.
The boy managed to rouse his da who showed up with his wife and a daughter in tow.
All of them issued cries of welcome, assurances that, “No, we hadn’t put them out at all.”
“What a beastly night for driving.”
“Oh, you poor things, is anyone hurt?”
“Shall we call the doctor?” and most encouraging of all, confirmed the local magistrate would be warned, at once, of the presence of highwaymen in his district.
There is something rather reassuring in being cared for by people whose only concern is your comfort, even if they don’t listen to a word you say. I had begun to relax before we had gotten so far as the door.
The inn hadn’t been closed for long. A quick poke into the cherry-red heart of the banked fires soon had warmth spreading across the room. We gravitated to the flames like a magnetic force had taken hold.
Caleb opened his hands to the heat and tried to rub some life into his cold fingers, stiff from his stint at the reins. A slight tremor shook them.
He turned from the fire reluctantly when the innkeeper’s wife called us. A rich beery smell coming from the tavern’s taproom wafted us to the table she’d prepared. We sat down to a meal of cold meat, cheese and breads with luscious, crisp apples. Red ones. I ate two.
We basked in the warmth and good cheer the innkeeper and his family exuded. While this was not one of the grand posting inns where the queen kept a spare team of relay horses, finding this inn was the first good luck we’d had since we began this journey. Wonder of wonders, the place seemed clean—not a trivial observation given how rare cleanliness was. I, for one, had no qualms about begging a bed for the night.
Literally a bed for the barren, little chamber contained only the bed, one plain chair, a commode with a bowl, and a small table. This we discovered when the mistress ushered us to the cold, hastily prepared room. I asked for a fire to be built upon the hearth; quite the ultimate in luxury.
If only Caleb had not looked so tired as he sank down upon the room’s only chair and loosened his stock, I might have thought more about that one bed. In fact, he looked drawn and more than a little ill.
He’d eaten very sparingly of his supper, for which I chided him.
A jaw-breaking yawn threatened to split his face in two as he shed his red uniform coat and swung his arms a couple of times. “I wasn’t hungry after all,” he said. “Too tired, I guess.”
“Where are we, Caleb?” I asked. The innkeeper’s wife finished with the fire, turned back the covers on the bed and spent what seemed an interminable amount of time plumping the pillows before she finally left the two of us alone. “We got off on a wrong road somehow or another, didn’t we?”
Or, in a word…lost.
Caleb ducked his head in embarrassment and avoided my eyes.
“When the horses took off after the highwaymen business, I imagine.
We must have been too busy hanging on to notice, but instead of turning onto the western road, the horses ran straight on. Or maybe I didn’t notice the turn-off last night in the fog and rain. I don’t know.”
“I didn’t see any other road,” I said, hoping to console him.
“I didn’t either,” he admitted. “The good news is that, according to the innkeeper, the detour subtracts a good ten miles off the total. On the other hand, he says the other road is better. And since the relay team is stationed over there, we won’t have a change of horses for the morning.
I must confess I’m partial to the grays. My feelings won’t be hurt with having to stick with them the rest of the way.”
“Where are we?” I repeated. “Will we get there—to Dartmoor—
tomorrow?”
“I’m beyond making predictions. Two or three days is what I’d planned originally, but so many things have gone wrong—who knows?” Caleb winced as he stretched his legs to the warmth of the fire, closing his eyes and groaning. “I’ve got my headache back, a real doozy this time, and if this leg doesn’t heal up pretty soon, they’re going to have to whack the damn thing off.”
Whack his leg off? That horrifying thought knocked me speechless for a moment, and when I got my voice working again, I said uncertainly, “Caleb?” I wasn’t at all sure who’d be answering, for while the idiom may have sounded like Caleb, surely the sentiment did not.
“What?” He rubbed the back of his neck. At least he still answered to his name.
“What you said about your leg. For a minute you sounded like Ethan.”
“Did I?” He didn’t seem dismayed. “Well, and why not? He is a part of me. In fact, if you want to consider the evidence more technically, I’m actually only a part of him. This is Ethan Delaney’s body, in Ethan Delaney’s world.”
I gave an unwilling jerk of my head. “I guess you’re right. We are only borrowing this time and space.”
Of course he was right. The paradox was the same for Belle and me; I just had a problem merging quite so completely. I wouldn’t be very smart to consider such a meld anyway. And while I may have concluded Belle’s magic was stronger than my own, that didn’t mean I was willing to concede what I had. I only hoped my own puny powers would prove adequate. Although the question of magic seemed premature at this time, I knew its presence was integral to Caleb’s safety.
“Well, Mr. Whoever-you-are-at-the-moment, forget that for now.
Your leg is what concerns me. I hoped with your medical background you might make a diagnosis and suggest a cure. I’ve noticed you’re limping
worse today than you were yesterday, and that’s before your little swim in the creek.” I hesitated, not sure I wanted an answer to my next question. “You didn’t mean what you said, did you, about cutting the leg off?”
Moving behind him, I took over the chore of massaging his neck and shoulders. From this position he couldn’t see my face. Good, since I knew the shock must show. I didn’t understand how he could sound so matter-of-fact.
His skin felt hot under my hands although I didn’t think I’d worked up that much friction with the massage. As hard as I tried, I could not summon the power I’d raised earlier this evening when Caleb’s first headache had gone away.
He sighed with pleasure—I think it was pleasure—as I kneaded his abused muscles. I felt him relax and knew I was helping a little, even without magic.
“Caleb?” I urged, when he didn’t answer. “You don’t mean that literally, do you? About amputating the leg? Can’t you do something?”
“Physician, heal thyself?” he asked wryly after a deep sigh. “Oh, for a course of penicillin. Better yet, a couple of injections twelve hours apart would clear things up quite nicely even now, when the infection has a good start. Zap those unprepared little buggers in a flash.
However, it just ain’t gonna happen, Boothenay. There’s only one cure for runaway infection in this day and age, unless you count death as a cure. You might as well be prepared.”
My mouth opened and closed like a distressed fish. “What do you mean?”
Caleb shrugged my hands aside, rose from his chair and walked over to warm his backside at the fire. He kept his face in shadow. “You realize, don’t you, that life expectancy in 1811 isn’t quite the same as it will be in another two hundred years? I’m, or maybe I should say Ethan, is almost thirty years old. That’s middle-aged, Boothenay. A pretty good run for a front-line military man.”
The dinner I’d just eaten sat heavily in my stomach. Heartburn crawled all the way into my throat. “Are you trying to tell me you’re—
make that Ethan—is dying?”
He shrugged. “Barring amputation, it’s a possibility. And that, madam, is my official diagnosis.”
“Well, forget it! You’d better get your act together, Mr. Caleb Deane or Captain Ethan Delaney or whatever you want to call yourself.
You’re not going to conk out on me here!” Fury—I think it was fury—
augured through me. “We’ve got a job to do, and I’m quite, quite certain it doesn’t include me arranging for your funeral. You are not going to die! Do you hear me?”
I’d promised both Caleb—even if I hadn’t told him so—and myself before we ever started on this expedition, that he’d get back okay. I intended on keeping that promise come fire or flood, although I thought a little cooperation would be helpful. Even if I had to kick butt to get it.
I don’t know how—God knows I didn’t even feel my feet moving—but there I was, standing in front of Caleb, screaming like a newlywed who has just learned her husband is a bigamist. Maybe the heartburn wasn’t heartburn at all. Maybe what I felt was heartache because, the next thing I knew, Caleb was knuckling away the tears that wetted my face. I swear I’d shed more tears in the time I’d known this man than in all the years since my childhood—maybe in my entire life.
“Hush,” he whispered. His thumb roughened my cheek. “Don’t be frightened. I’d didn’t mean right this minute. It’s all right, Boothenay.
I’m all right.”
He spoke soothingly to me, as if I were a child in need of comfort.
I slapped at his hand and tried to turn my face away. “God, Caleb!”
Caleb shook his head and gathered both my hands in his. “Hey.
Easy, sugar. I have every confidence we’ll be home safe long before whatever happens to Ethan happens. I doubt there’s anything either you or I can do anyway. A couple more days and we’ll be out of here.
Right?”
I’d thought he meant now. Somewhat shakily I bobbed my head, while a whole convolution of feeling rocketed through me. Caleb and I both were in a curious state. In any given moment, he could be Caleb, wishing for antibiotics, and in the same breath be Ethan, who in a rock steady voice, talked about cutting off his leg in a last ditch effort to save his life.
And I? Belle could be very prosaic, accepting of loss while remaining dedicated to her duty. What I wanted to do was change the world, both in the past and in the present. And why not? If my magic didn’t allow me this power, what was I doing here? What did history need with another witness?
I stepped through Caleb’s arms and flung my own around his neck.
He automatically held me, though he lurched as I pressed hard against him. I tried not to lean on him.
“I want to go home,” I whispered against his neck. “This is not fun, Caleb. I never thought you’d actually be in danger. Believe me, I haven’t done this on purpose. Nothing has gone according to plan.”
“I know, sugar. This was my own choice, Boothenay, you know that. I wanted to experience this journey. It’s not as if you didn’t warn me.”
My warning hadn’t been strong enough. I’d known that at the time—planned it, if you come right down to brass tacks.
He planted a light kiss on the side of my mouth. “Anyway, we can’t abandon Ethan and Belle, not to mention Jon, in mid-stream, can we? It wouldn’t be right.”
I didn’t think we had a choice. I didn’t know how to get us home.
The magic decided the when, and so far had shown no sign of deviating from this story, not even when Ethan’s head had bled red ribbons into the creek. I resisted admitting my weakness to Caleb and shook my head in amazement. “You still want to go on? Even sick? Even knowing…”
“Never let it be said Caleb Deane lacks proper family feeling,”
Caleb said. “Or more to the point, I’ll admit to a thoroughly aroused curiosity. Our names are all written down, you know, in the old family Bible, so I have to find out how they got there. And no matter what else happens, I want you to know I haven’t been bored. Not for one instant.
You, Boothenay Irons, are one fascinating lady.”
I laughed, a tickle of relief, against his chin. “And you’re weird.”
There didn’t seem to be any point in trying to fight against his determination and logic.
The last turn of my head brought our lips together, and later, when we came up for a breath of air, I knew for sure what that buzz feeling had been when he’d awakened me earlier.
He gathered me closer against him. An interval passed—an interval where neither of us paused to draw breath, except what we drew from each other. And now I found power. I found power in him as reaction to Caleb’s passion exploded in every circuit of my body. I took his passion, matched and grew with it, then gave it back to him, multiplied tenfold, until his energy and strength surged in response. Fleeting?
Perhaps. One thing I knew—his curiosity wasn’t the only thing about him that was aroused.
One moment we were standing in front of the fireplace, kissing, touching, learning each other as the tension between us built. The next thing I knew, my knees were backed up against the bed and Caleb was enthusiastically urging me to lie down. How we’d gotten there, I don’t know. We may have walked, although I had the curious sensation of floating, bound on a wave of emotion.
“I thought you were tired.” I drew back a moment in a half-hearted attempt to stay him. “I thought you were ill.”
“Umm. Not now. Not too tired—not too sick.” With insistent, yet gentle fingers, and stopping often so he could explore, Caleb divested me of my clothing. He fumbled with the ribbon drawstring that gathered the dress just under my breasts. The knotted bow resisted him for only a moment and when he had it free he bent, grasping the hem and pulling the dress off over my head. His green eyes glinted as he looked at me and he made a low sound deep in his throat.
My legs felt too weak to hold me any longer and I collapsed onto the bed. Caleb followed me d
own.
I gasped and trembled and arched my back to make myself more accessible. His hands drifted, breast to belly and lower yet. I think I moaned as I opened myself to him. Dear God! I must have been hot for my breath came in quick, shallow gasps. When I remembered to breathe at all.
He laughed softly.
Laughter that stilled in the eager anticipation of discovery. He looked at me as if he liked what he saw, and his hands and his mouth followed where his eyesight led. I tingled. I burned.
My turn to explore his body now with my hands and my lips. He quivered.
“Boothenay.” His voice was a reverent whisper. “Don’t stop, sweetheart.”
No one ever had called me sweetheart before.
Urgently, I pulled him to me. “Yes,” I said. I don’t know if he’d asked a question.
His hair was soft as I tangled my fingers in the dark strands, and when he captured my hands and we lay, breast to breast, belly to belly, thigh to thigh, I discovered hot was a buoyancy. Hot was a flame of fusion. Hot was when we carried each other over the edge and into the fire.
I wanted to tell him I loved him, for I did. Beyond time, beyond reason.
I didn’t say the words. I was afraid.
Perhaps he understood the language of my body, as I hoped I understood his.
He didn’t say the words either.
So this is the aftermath of passion, I thought dreamily. Time passed while I resolidified out the puddle I’d dissolved into. I didn’t want to think—I just wanted to feel. I think I slept for a few minutes, and so did Caleb.
Sometime later I discovered we’d forgotten to blow out the candles.
I saw Caleb’s eyes when he leaned over me, glowing with the look of a self-satisfied Persian cat in the soft, diffused light.
“I’ve wanted to do that from the moment I first saw you,” he said.
“What? Sex?” I grinned at him. “Liar. The first time you saw me, you thought I’d shot somebody.”
He propped himself on his elbows, still leaning over me. “Oh, I think I felt protective, you looked so fragile and insubstantial. Well, maybe the risk turned me on, too. There’s nothing like a little danger to get your hormones pumping after all.”
In The Service Of The Queen (The Gunsmith Book 1) Page 18
