Forcing his thoughts away from the torturous night that surely await him, he continued to dig about in his satchel. Eventually coming across the objects of his search, he drew them forth from the leather sack and lowered his bottom onto the floor, pulling the oil lamp closer.
Gaithlin, her eyes half-closed, watched him with as much curiosity as she could muster. “What are you doing?”
Christian carefully unwrapped what looked to be a book. Cut into squares, it was laced together with fine hide strips into a thick, sturdy pad and he drew back the cloth-bound wooden cover, exposing the vellum beneath. Near his thigh he had settled a quill and a wooden vial filled with dark liquid, both obviously well-used from the stains that plagued them.
“I am writing,” he said softly, carefully turning the pages until he found the place he had left off. “Go to sleep, honey. I shall be to bed shortly.”
Truthfully, Gaithlin was exhausted. But her curiosity was piqued by Christian’s material-bound album and she raised her head, attempting to gain a better look at his activities. Education, something she had never been exposed to in an organized sense, was a mysterious, fascinating thing and she was deeply impressed by Christian’s obvious schooling. It was almost enough to cause her to forget her fatigue.
“What are you writing?”
He dipped the long quill into the black ink, shaking off the excess. “Nothing that would concern you,” the air scratched with the strokes from his quill as he began to letter. After a moment, he realized Gaithlin was still watching him intently and he raised his eyes from the vellum, meeting with wide blue eyes.
He couldn’t help but smile at her blatant awe. “I shall only be a moment, truly. Go to sleep.”
She returned his smile, her respect for his talents obvious as she stared at his materials. “I did not know you could write. What do you write about?”
She was so genuinely curious that he lowered the quill in favor of gazing into her magnificent face. “Observations, mostly. I like to chronicle my day to day happenings, writing about events or feelings or politics. General items, really.”
“Are you writing about what has happened today?”
He snorted softly, with amusement. “I haven’t made an entry since I abducted you from St. Esk. To record what has happened since then would take weeks at best.”
With a bold wink, he resumed his quill and precisely scratched out several more letters. Gaithlin, however, was still propped up on one elbow, watching his movements closely. He was concentrating so directly on his words that he barely heard her sultry, sensual voice as it wafted upon the warm, musty air.
“You didn’t abduct me from St. Esk.”
He stopped mid-letter, her statement instantly sinking deep. Slowly, his ice-blue eyes came up to meet those of the deepest, most glorious blue.
“What?” he was barely audible.
Slowly, ever so easily, she lay back down to the dank wool and cold rushes. Her cat-like eyes glittered at him with a torrential tide of unleashed emotion. “You didn’t abduct me,” she repeated, softly. Gathering his cloak tightly about her shoulders, she turned onto her side, away from him. “I came willingly.”
He continued to stare at her, watching her torso heave gently as she attempted to find sleep. Quill still poised above the yellowed parchment, he couldn’t seem to refocus his eyes or his attention to the vellum in his lap. All he was capable of feeling, hearing or seeing at the moment was Gaithlin’s overwhelming presence.
The parchment was forgotten.
“How can you say that?” he whispered, uncertain if he were seeking a literal answer or not. “Since the moment I abducted you, you have known nothing but fear and cold and humiliation. I have shown you nothing but my supremacy in size and arrogance and pure might. And I have done nothing but force you to submit to my will.”
“You have shown me a good deal more,” her voice was barely audible as her wide eyes gazed at the darkened wall. “You have shown me a measure of life I never knew existed, Christian. And I thank you.”
His eyebrows rose slowly in astonishment. Laying the quill aside, he carefully set the diary to the dirt and crept on his knees towards the lanky, supine figure.
“Look at me, Gaithlin,” he said, placing his hand on her arm in a weak attempt to roll her onto her back. “Why would you thank me for showing you such brutality and hardship?”
The gentle tugging nonetheless accomplished his goal; Gaithlin rolled onto her back, gazing up at Christian in the dim firelight. A soft smile gently creased her ripe lips, drawing him deeper into her aura. As she had done so ably the very first time he had ever set eyes upon her, he found himself sucked into the vortex of the water nymph’s magic, unable to break free.
“This is not brutality and hardship,” her voice was a whisper. “It is freedom, Christian, like I have never experienced it.”
His expression was soft as he drank in her delectable features, seeing a depth to her character he hadn’t noticed before. A genuine appreciation of the simplest matters, willing to overlook the harshness in lieu of the positive. The emotion, the infant love he had so willingly given in to, filled him like the most potent narcotics and he found himself succumbing to her overwhelming spirit.
Suddenly, he was lying beside her, his massive thigh draped over her hips as his arms enclosed her torso. Their faces, inches apart, basked in expressions of awe and wonderment and discovery.
“Tell me what else you have experienced,” he whispered, wanting to hear her thoughts.
She smiled, touching his beautiful face. “Truthfully, I am not sure,” she replied huskily. “All I know is that I have been happier in the few days I have spent with you than I have ever been in my life.”
He smiled faintly, kissing her fingers as they drifted close to his lips. “Is that so? Even if I am the Demon of Eden?”
She returned his smile, a bit sheepishly. “You’re not so fearsome. I have beaten you once in a fight already.”
She giggled as he frowned. “You were given an unfair advantage. I did not expect to be blindsided in an abbey.”
“And I did not expect to be abducted within the protection of sanctuary.”
He cocked an eyebrow. “You just finished telling me that I did not abduct you, that you were indeed a willing party.”
Her smile broadened as she snuggled up to him, closing her eyes against the reverent lips so sensually caressing her forehead. After a moment, her eyes opened, gazing into the dancing shadows of the room.
“I think I could be happy here forever, Christian,” she murmured.
His chin against her forehead, he kissed her again. “There is a good deal of peace and primitive charm,” he agreed. “But we shall have our own manse. Somewhere beautiful and serene.”
Her brow furrowed slightly. “Why would we have our own manse when you shall inherit Eden and I shall inherent Winding Cross? We only need one place to live.”
Christian grunted. “I fear my father shall live forever, so great is his dedication to the St. John cause. Moreover, I doubt your father will be entirely joyous for the Demon of Eden to inherit his keep. Most likely, he’ll burn it to the ground on his deathbed and laugh in my face for doing so.”
Gaithlin giggled, caught up in his sarcastic humor. Fatigue and tenderness comprised her thoughts at the moment and she simply wasn’t thinking when she formed her characteristically truthful reply. No matter how badly she wanted to preserve the de Gare mysteries, her foolish lips had other ideals.
“Impossible, Christian,” she snorted. “He has been dead for….”
With a jolting surge of horror, she caught herself before any more of the carefully-protected truth could come spilling from her lips. But the damage had been done; one word, blended into two, stirred into four… the gravity of her error was obvious.
Christian wasn’t a fool; he understood the gist of her sleepily-uttered statement before it had broken free of her giddy lips. He felt her stiffen; or mayhap, it was him who had tensed w
ith shock. Whatever the case, he comprehended her words more deeply than he had ever understood anything in his life; an overwhelming astonishment that wrestled for his emotions and sanity. For a brief instant, he was torn between absolute disbelief and utter, mounting, all-consuming fury. His fury won over.
Before Gaithlin could draw another breath, Christian had her by both arms, his ice-blue eyes cutting her to shreds with their searing intensity. She could feel the agony as sharply as if he had driven a dagger into her very soul.
“He’s been what?”
Filled with terror, Gaithlin’s wide blue eyes met his blazing stare. Weakly, her head bobbed back and forth, struggling to control a situation that was rapidly reeling out of control. “I… he’s…”
“Dead?”
“I didn’t mean..!”
“Gaithlin, he’s dead?”
She cried out; his grip was so harsh on her upper arms that he had bruised her tender flesh. Instantly, he relaxed his grasp but continued to hold her tightly. Beyond a rational fear, Gaithlin’s eyes filled with tears and she instinctively turned away.
But he would have no part of her denial; roughly, he shook her, attempting to force her to meet his infuriated stare. “Answer me,” he snarled. “How long has he been dead?”
Bordering on panic and devastated by her own stupidity, a weak sob escaped her lips. Certainly, there was no use in denying what she had already confessed. He well understood the meaning of her stupidly uttered words and to refute their truth would only serve to perjure herself further.
Tears fell from her cheeks to the woolen blanket below. “Ten years.”
“Ten years!” Christian roared, leaping to his knees. “Good Christ, are you telling me that Alex de Gare has been dead for ten years?”
Released from Christian’s grip, Gaithlin rolled into a fetal position, sobbing pitifully. Christian stared at her, his expression laced with more disbelief and horror than he could scarcely begin to comprehend. White-lipped and white-knuckled, he struggled with every ounce of self-employed control to prevent himself from raging unchecked.
“Who have we been fighting, Gaithlin? Who has been behind Winding Cross’ defenses?” his voice was inherently low, quaking with emotion. “An uncle? A brother we were unaware of?”
Hand over her mouth in an attempt to stifle her sobs, Gaithlin could only gasp with the struggle to bring forth a reply. Christian’s ashen face stared at her, unwilling to yield to his patience.
“Answer me,” he said. “Who have we been fighting all of these years if your father is dead?”
His demand was met with muffled sobs, piercing the still night air like the most powerful of daggers. Slicing, cutting, destroying all they touched. Christian’s heart was already smashed with the knowledge of secrets and humiliation or else the violent sobs would have destroyed that as well.
“Nay,” she finally gasped. “No brother. No man.”
“No man?” Christian was struggling against every emotion he had ever experienced, now muddled by the confusion of her statement. “What do you mean no man?”
She swallowed. There was nothing left for her to say. No excuse left to give. The secret was about to be released.
“My… my mother.”
Christian didn’t believe it was possible for him to feel any further astonishment; he was wrong. All of the amazement that saturated his soul with her honest reply settled deep, cleaving his torrential fury. He seemed to be incapable of feeling anything other than pure, simple, overwhelming shock.
His instinct was to quit the shelter, only to return when, and if, his calm was restored. But gazing at Gaithlin’s shaking body, he couldn’t seem to accomplish the necessary actions. She had confessed Winding Cross’ darkest secret, a slip though it might have been, and was understandably ashamed. Ashamed that she had been unable to contain the truth until she desired to use it against him.
A cold, calculating blanket of doom settled about Christian’s shoulders. It was an aching stench so powerful, so heady, that it nauseated him. Sickening him to the realization that Lady Gaithlin de Gare might not have been as naive as she appeared. A realization that, mayhap, she had been using him all along, playing to his sympathies so that he might forget his true directive in life – to quash the de Gares.
Good Christ, he had almost forgotten his motive. He wanted to forget his motive in lieu of a delicious future within his captive’s arms. She knew his wants.
God, he felt like a fool.
“Is there anything else you have neglected to tell me?” his voice was hoarse with emotion. “Tell me now, or God help me, you will not be pleased with my reaction should I discover it on my own.”
Sobbing abating, Gaithlin listened to the low rumble of his voice, never more terrified of anything in her life. Wiping at her face, she forced herself to calm; he had every right to be angry with her. Certainly, he had every right to feel the humiliation of the St. Johns as they discovered themselves to be matched against a woman.
Realizing there was nothing left for her to do but be completely honest about all else she had attempted to hide and pray the Demon’s mercy was a giving entity, she sat up on the rushes, turning to face him.
“I have no dowry,” she said, her sultry voice scratchy and faint. “Winding Cross has no money to speak of. We haven’t for years. The St. John blockades have managed to cut off the majority of our supply lines and we have hovered in the bowels of poverty since before I was born.” Taking a breath for courage and strength, she continued; she couldn’t bear to look at him. “All that is left of a once-powerful army are fifty men-at-arms and two knights; my mother took up arms ten years ago when my father was killed by a St. John arrow and has fought in his stead ever since.”
Christian watched her, feeling more confusion and grief than he ever imagined possible. A small army, led by a woman, had managed to hold off hordes of St. John soldiers for years. Had the situation not been so terribly shameful from a St. John standpoint, it would have been a most admirable feat. But it wasn’t so much the fact that a woman had routed Jean St. John and his mighty son; it was more the fact that Gaithlin had kept the information from him.
But in the same breath, he was fully cognizant that the Gaithlin de Gare he had come to know over the course of the past few days was a remarkably strong woman, full of bravery and wit and inner strength. Even in the face of her fear and humiliation, she had shown amazing fortitude. And she had always, always, been brutally honest in every sense of the word. Even when he did not want to know the truth.
Gazing into her beautiful, tense face, he could not honestly bring himself to believe that she had been keeping Alex’s death from him as some sort of secret weapon, a private joke she intended to enjoy alone. In faith, the disclosure of his death could only serve to weaken her cause and as he reflected on that thought, he came to realize that she had most likely withheld the information for that very reason.
She didn’t want the Demon to believe Winding Cross to be any weaker than it already was. Still, he had to know the truth. He had to hear it from her lips.
“Why didn’t you tell me this sooner?” he asked hoarsely.
She shrugged weakly, staring at her hands. “I did not want you to know,” she whispered, bringing her gaze to meet his icy orbs. There were tears welling in the deep blue depths. “Why do you think I was so adamant that you not blackmail Winding Cross with my abduction? You would have discovered the truth of the matter, that there was no Alex de Gare to bargain with. With my father gone, what is left between Eden and complete victory? For the sake of my family’s honor, I had to maintain the illusion of de Gare strength for as long as I was able.”
He was still crouched on his haunches, watching her with rigid intensity. Good Christ, her reasoning was completely logical and he could hardly dispute her loyalties. Weak with an emotional turmoil such as he had never known, he sank to his buttocks, resting on the cold dirt floor. His expression, his entire demeanor, was laced with fatigue and confusion
.
“When did you plan on telling me?” he finally asked. “I would have found out eventually.”
Cold and tired and utterly beaten, Gaithlin averted her gaze. “What does it matter? You know now that there is nothing left of Winding Cross. You are in possession of her heiress and soon your father will use me to blackmail my mother.” Weakly, she lay on her side again, away from him; Merciful Heavens, she could no longer bear to look at the man. “And I lied on another account, sire. My mother will indeed sacrifice Winding Cross to keep me safe. She will turn it all over willingly in the hopes that your father will spare my life. So, you see, Winding Cross was yours the moment you whisked me from St. Esk, whether or not you realized your feat.”
He stared at her, his face pallid in the weak light. He couldn’t remember ever feeling so defeated. He found he couldn’t reply to her statement, merely capable of dully gazing upon her horizontal form as she lay deathly still within the confines of their musty shelter. The discovered revelations and the ensuing emotional upheaval was almost too much for him to endure.
“I am sure you realize that there is no need to marry me any longer,” Gaithlin’s voice was a slurred whispered above the snapping embers. “I can bring nothing to this marriage, as you have already acquired Winding Cross. Pray be merciful in your judgment of my heritage and actions, Demon.”
He continued to gaze at her a moment longer. Gaithlin heard his joints pop as he rose from the floor, his soft boot falls as they crossed the room. The old door creaked open, then shut softly behind him.
Gaithlin lay there and wept.
*
Eden was certainly an appropriate name for the fortress labeled the Gem of Cumbria. Within the gray-stoned walls of the mighty fortress, there was music and laughter and food for all.
Certainly, the grand hall of Eden was greater than any house in the north. With two six-foot hearths filled to capacity with flaming embers, a collection of minstrels huddled in the open-beamed loft above, peppering the merry crowd of diners with their assortment of musical delights.
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