To Chase the Storm

by Kimberly Cates

  "Come down here, Encina, and see how hard it is to kill me."

  "But don't you see, Santadar? That is the beauty of it. This time I will not have to see to your demise myself." His lips pulled back from his teeth in unholy glee. "I regret to inform you that you are to be brought before the Inquisition, Captain Santadar."

  "Are you mad, Encina? You can prove nothing against me. No one would believe your charges."

  "I have taken care of that one small difficulty—and with such genius it astonishes even me."

  Foreboding iced Rafe's veins, and his fists knotted as he watched the inquisitor's face.

  "You have been consorting with witches, my good Rafael." Feigned sorrow flooded Encina's face.

  "Like hell—"

  "And to banish any doubts the Holy Office might have, I have brought along the demon temptress who ensnared you."

  Horror clenched about Rafe's throat as Encina waved, and two burly Flemish sailors, reeking of rum, wrenched a pale figure into the light of the open hatchway. Even before Rafe's gaze locked upon that fall of midnight hair and those huge, oddly glazed dark eyes, he knew who lay within Encina's grasp. And in that instant Rafe tasted the terror his father must have known when he saw the woman he loved at the mercy of a madman.

  "Tessa!" he cried. The sailors pitched her through the open hatch and Rafe flung himself beneath her in an effort to break her fall.

  She crashed into him, and together they fell to the floor. Dull lances seemed to pierce Rafe's body at the impact, but he was grateful to have spared her that much pain at least. It was precious little, but this was all he could do for her. And he felt again the helplessness of the child he had been, his tiny fingers clutched about the hilt of a wooden sword.

  Hampered by his bound hands, Rafe struggled to turn her so he could see her face, and what was revealed to him filled him with renewed foreboding. Her eyes were dull, unseeing, her face gray, while the mouth that had always been so animated now trembled with the effort to speak. Unintelligible words snagged upon her tongue as her fingers gripped his doublet with the frail grasp of a babe.

  "What have you done to her?" Rafe's gaze slashed up to the inquisitor, and he hated the fear that edged his voice.

  "It seems that your lady was attempting to drown her sorrows in a flask of wine after your little misunderstanding. Lady Warburton merely hastened along the sweet oblivion the wench was seeking."

  "Poison? Damn you! Will she be all right?"

  “It would hardly be wise of me to kill the woman who is to be my greatest weapon against you, Santadar."

  Relief seared Rafe, and he sucked in a shuddering breath and looked again at the ashen face pillowed against him.

  It was as if the very sound of his voice held the power to loose the grip of the drug upon Tessa's senses, for a choked sob rose from her lips and the haze that had dulled her eyes receded a little. Rafe struggled to press her to him, wanting to soothe her, comfort her, but leashed as he was by his bonds, he was only able to capture her hands in his own.

  "Rafe..." She slurred his name, her voice unsteady, but filled with joy. "Thank God, Rafe, you're alive."

  Tears coursed down her cheeks, tears for him—the man who had allowed his pride to shatter her—and that certainty made his chest ache with anguish.

  "Yes, I'm alive. And you're here now, with me. I'll take care of you."

  "Take care of her?" The inquisitor's voice was like oozing poison. "Your interests would be better served if you choked the life from her now, Santadar, with your own hands. Don't you see? It is she who will destroy you."

  "She is nothing but an innocent woman, Encina. And by your black soul, you know your superiors will believe me. You have no proof! No proof!"

  "Ah, but that is where you are wrong. You see, your harlot is guilty of the most grievous of sins—torturing our good King Philip with her witchery."

  "Of all the insane accusations—"

  "It is scarce insanity, Captain Santadar. After all, it is known throughout the kingdom that our sovereign's joints have been paining him most grievously of late. The surgeons are having difficulty determining the cause, because it is not physical. Maybe His Majesty lies in agony because of the spikes your sorceress whore has driven through his joints."

  "You're mad, Encina," Rafe flung up at him.

  "The grand inquisitor will know the truth when I show him this."

  Something unfurled from Encina's hands, then dangled above Rafe's head like a felon from a gibbet.

  The marionette swung on its strings, its carved features strangely sinister in the light streaming through the hatchway. And in that sickening instant, Rafe knew that Encina held him and Tessa in his evil power, for from his hand hung Tessa's likeness of the Spanish king—its knobby joints speared with the spikes that would condemn her.

  Chapter 14

  The hatch slammed shut, enveloping the hold in darkness, but this time Rafe welcomed the inky shadows that blotted out Encina's face. Rafe whispered soothing words to the still trembling Tessa, as her drug-weakened hands struggled with the ropes that bound him.

  "I can't loosen the bonds. I can't hold on to the ropes." Her voice quavered.

  "Hush, wildwitch, I know you can do it. Take all the time you need."

  She seemed to steady herself, the ragged sound of her breathing softening. Suddenly she gave a cry of triumph. Rafe felt the bonds fall free; pain speared through his hands as blood rushed into the numbed flesh. Yet despite the sickening sensation, Rafe caught Tessa to him, crushing the softness of her against his broad chest.

  "Wildwitch, when I saw you and thought they had poisoned you... I nearly went mad." He choked out the words as he felt her shudder against him. "Forgive me, Tessa, forgive me."

  "For being a blasted witling... a stubborn oaf?" Tessa sobbed shakily into his doublet. "I would hate and despise you forever, if I weren't so glad to see you alive."

  Rafe's eyes stung at her words, a ragged laugh working through him as he threaded his fingers through her hair. "Ah, wildwitch, only you would curse me to the high heavens with Encina hovering near." His lips traced the wet curve of her cheek, his arms tightening about her slender form, as though by his will alone he could shield her.

  "I've been worse than a fool, to let my infernal pride come between us. To dash off like a madman into Lady Morgause's grasp. What have I brought you to?"

  "Heaven, Rafael Santadar—and hell. And when we are free, you can take two lifetimes to make it up to me."

  When we are free... The trust in those words made Rafe wince inside, and it was as if he could feel the Inquisition's dread flames reaching out toward them. Encina would never let them go now... now that Rafe knew the inquisitor's secret. Rafe had seen the ruthlessness in the priest’s eyes. He knew that if, by some quirk of fate, the tribunal failed to condemn them, Encina himself would use any method necessary to ensure that they were silenced forever.

  The vile man had slaughtered Rafe's father and mother, and now, the cruel bastard possessed the perfect tool to effect Rafe's own destruction, and Tessa's as well. Rafe's eyes skimmed over her face. It was only a pale shape against the darkness, but in his imagination he could envision perfectly those fey wood-sprite features, so brave and yet so incredibly fragile.

  Did she not realize the stark danger in Encina's threats? No. Surely Tessa had no idea that the "evidence" the priest held would make his peers and then all of Spain believe them to be guilty of sorcery.

  She had witnessed the ugly face of a mob gone insane before, had seen the horrors they could wreak. But now she would stand before a tribunal of judges. Rafe sensed that she would expect some small justice, hold some hope.

  But she had never seen the eager crowds throng the square to watch the suffering of those who had sinned against the faith. She had never witnessed the superstition that clung about his homeland, had never seen the spectacle of the auto-da-fé.

  Thank God, a voice within Rafe whispered. For if she knew what was in store for h
er at the end of this voyage, her terror would be more than he could bear.

  She had quieted against him, her fingers tangled in the hair that grew long at the nape of his neck, her face tucked into the curve of his shoulder. Rafe drew rein on his racing thoughts, pressing his lips against her tear-damp lashes.

  "Rafe..." Her voice was tentative, quavering.

  "What, mi corazón?"

  "Your mother and father... Encina killed them? Tried to kill you?"

  Rafe's jaw clenched, his arms tightening about her. "Sí."

  He felt her hands glide down the corded muscles in his neck, her callused fingertips finding the arc of his scar by sense of touch.

  She pressed her lips, petal soft, to that jagged line. "I'm sorry you had to find out this way... here."

  Now, as I lie here trapped and helpless? Rafe thought. Now, when my love, my life is in the cursed butcher's grasp. Damn Encina! Damn him!

  But Rafe only made a soothing sound low in his throat, brushing his knuckles in a tender path down her cheek. "Don't think about that now, wildwitch. Just rest. Sleep."

  She murmured bits of her own story, but he scarce heard her as she told about the lady of Warvaliant and the drug that had swept Tessa to sleep.

  For as he whispered gentle endearments to her in Spanish, his fingertips smoothing her hair, he was listening instead to the lapping of the sea beyond the ship's hull. And he knew that for the first time, the vast ocean was his enemy, trapping him for Encina, cutting off all escape until they reached Spanish shores.

  But once they did, he vowed he would find a way to avenge his parents and save this woman in his arms, this woman who had sacrificed so much for him, who had shown him what true courage was, and love.

  "Tessa." He breathed her name against the babe-soft curve of her brow. "I love you."

  As he spoke, he sensed Morgause's posset claiming her again, for Tessa's voice blurred as she whispered, "It is about time you realized it, you stubborn oaf."

  * * *

  Tessa braced herself against the lurching of the closed coach, knowing that she must not—must not—show her fear. To do so would torture the man beside her more than any device in the inquisitors' chamber of horrors. For days she had watched the lines carve themselves deeper into Rafe's face. She had seen the desperation build in those eyes that had always been so strong. And she had known that the anguish in those indigo depths was caused, not by his own dread of the cruelties that awaited him, but of his terror for her.

  "Tessa," he had said, "what have I brought you to?" The torment in those words still clawed at Tessa, mingling with her own private hell as she watched guilt eat at the man she loved.

  Rafael was near crazed with the need to save her. He had raked through a thousand desperate plans as the days at sea bled into weeks. Even the brief moments of respite they had captured making love in the ship's dank hold had been tainted by Encina's shadow. Rafe’s wild need as he pleasured her had taunted Tessa with the certainty that Rafe was not truly making love with her, but rather was struggling to bring her surcease in the only way within his power.

  "Forget, Tessa love," he had whispered when he thrust inside her, his hands and mouth devouring her as he drew upon every skill he possessed to drive her to madness in his arms. Yet afterward, when he thought she was sleeping, she would perceive his despair, and tears would sear her eyes at the thought of his pain.

  She had lost her confidence that no one in Spain—not even the Inquisition—could break the man renowned as the Phantom of the Midnight Sea. For as she watched Rafe's mounting agitation, heard his half-crazed plots as he groped for some small chance of escape, even she was forced to see the hopelessness of their plight.

  She closed her eyes, trying to blot out the memory of the first night she had seen Rafael Santadar—on the beach near Gnarlymeade, the air thick with the stench of burning flesh. Hagar had been dead when the flames consumed her, but there was little chance that the Inquisition would accord a sorceress the same mercy—a sorceress who had woven a spell about their king.

  Tessa shook herself inwardly to stifle the wild laugh that rose in her breast. It was the ugliest of jests that the puppet she had carved to lighten the fears of children would now be used to destroy not only her but the man she loved as well. Even Encina's evil power could not have touched Rafe were it not for the wood-carved figure in the loathsome inquisitor's hands.

  Damn him to hell, Tessa railed, the image of Rafe's hated enemy rising again in her mind. Nay, Encina, you'll not have Rafe! No matter what horrors you work upon me, I'll not betray him. If it costs me my own life, I'll not drag him into the flames.

  Tessa again looked up into Rafe's taut face, memorizing those proud features, the high slash of cheekbone, the patrician nose, the mouth that had given her such exquisite pleasure, such sweet, sweet tenderness, and the eyes that had burned with passion, aye, and with unshed tears... for her.

  "Tessa."

  The ragged edge in his voice snapped her from her dark musings, and she forced a stiff smile to her lips, knowing that what he needed of her was courage.

  "You once told me Spain was beautiful," she said, her eyes scanning the interior of the crude coach. "When we are free, you must show it to me."

  “I will,” he said, but anguish lay buried in his voice. He arched his head back against the coach wall, and she could almost hear the thoughts that tormented him. I feel so helpless. They're going to hurt you, and there is nothing I can do.

  She could imagine the horrible scenes that must be unfolding before him like some macabre tapestry, scenes of his mother's death and his father's, Rafe's gallant crew lost in the inferno his beloved ship had become. And now Encina's fingers were working Tessa into that gruesome tapestry as well, as if the inquisitor was spinning out Rafael Santadar's own private hell.

  Tessa fought the tears that burned in her eyes. She would have given anything have her hands free of the chains about them just long enough to touch Rafe's face, smooth away his agony.

  "Whatever happens, Rafe, carry this with you," she said, her eyes bright with her love for him. "These weeks I've spent with you are worth any horror Encina has to offer."

  "Tessa—" His voice cracked. And she knew that seeing him suffering thus was the greatest torment she could ever know.

  "I love you, Rafael Santadar." She kept her voice steady, despite the fear surging within her as she heard the driver above them bellow out a command. The equipage came to an ominous halt, and she tried to look out through the slits in the coach. The slices of light that had brightened it moments before were now blotted out by the harsh plane of a wall.

  Tessa felt Rafe grow still beside her, and her eyes flashed to his features. She knew in that instant that they had reached their hellish destination.

  "Rafe..."

  She could not stop herself from whispering his name, as if it was some talisman that might spare them.

  As she looked into his eyes, she saw the fire of renewed resolve, the savage protectiveness of a lion whose mate is threatened.

  "They'll not break you because of me, Tessa." His mouth was hard and grim. "I vow it. I'll find a way to come for you."

  He strained toward her as Encina's minion wrenched wide the coach door, Rafe's lips claiming hers in a fierce, hard kiss. "I love you."

  A cry rose in Tessa's throat as rough hands tore him away from her and hurled him from the coach. Other hands, crueler still, grasped her arms and dragged her forth, but she did not feel the bruising fingers crushing her flesh or see the eager leers. Her gaze clung to Rafe's broad shoulders as he disappeared through the prison's dark entry.

  "Look well," Encina said. "For when next you see him, he'll be screaming as the flames devour his flesh. And you will be the one who condemned him."

  "Nay, Encina." Tessa met the inquisitor's gaze with a glare. "Do what you will, you will never destroy Rafael Santadar through me."

  Lips snaked over straight white teeth, a glimmer of anticipation dancing like a dev
il in the inquisitor's dark eyes.

  "We shall see the mettle of this English courage we have heard so much of, see whether you stand firm or scream, as Anne Santadar did so long ago. How much have the captain's thrusts meant to you, witch? Enough to make you suffer in silence as the garrucha rips your arms from their sockets? As the potro stretches you?"

  The inquisitor flicked travel dust from his robes with one long hand. "But even if you do suppress your screams, it will do Santadar no good—not when I produce your mannikin of the king. Not when they see your tempting witch's face."

  The Spaniard's nails bit into the soft flesh of her cheek as he traced its curve. Tessa gritted her teeth, her eyes aflame with hatred.

  "Sí, I might even be tempted myself, wildwitch"—Rafe's endearment was blasphemy upon Encina's lips—"were I not bound by my vows as priest."

  Tessa spat into that smug devil's-face, fierce joy spearing through her at the revulsion that swept Encina's features as he drew out a lace-edged cloth and dabbed away the spittle.

  "That was most unwise," he observed with a blandness that chilled Tessa's blood. "You would do well to tread lightly about those who hold your fate in their hands. Santadar is dead to you now, and no one within these walls cares what befalls you. The guards here are hardened to pain and screams. They are like the mellow music drifting up from minstrels during a feast. You are mine, witch. Mine. As is your cursed lover."

  One hand gestured toward the entry, and Encina's men yanked her forward. The death-cold fingers of the Inquisition closed about Tessa's throat.

  * * *

  Rafe paced the confines of his cell, feeling as though he would go mad. Mad? He gave a harsh laugh. Madness would be sweet relief from the grinding misery of watching the days slip by, seeing even the slightest of the hopes he had clung to disappear. How long had it been since they had torn him away from Tessa and thrown her into a cell God alone knew where. What had they done to her in the time that had passed? What had she suffered? For him, curse it, for him.