Mariana

  It was approaching midnight when we heard the horses stop outside the house in a confused tossing of harness and dancing hooves and the shouts of men across the yard. And then the sounds retreated. The front door slammed and my uncle’s footstep sounded in the hall. Caroline and I sat straight and still, our eyes upon the door, and I fancied that we both held our breaths.

  The kitchen door rushed inwards on its hinges and crashed against the wall behind. Framed in the opening, my uncle glowered at us both, his expression blacker than the depths of hell. Johnnie, in my arms, began to cry.

  “Elias Webb is dead,” he said, his quiet voice more dangerous than any raging shout. “And good Bill Pogue, and Edmund Harrap. All dead.”

  We were not expected to make reply. Nor was there time for one. Immediately he spoke the words he turned and sent the table toppling to the floor with a great splintering of wood and crockery.

  “The devil take that rogue de Mornay!” he exploded, his face flooding with angry color. “I will not stand to suffer this from him!”

  Johnnie bawled more loudly, burrowing his tiny face in my breast and clinging to my dress with frightened hands. I gathered him close and rocked him, trying not to let my own fear get the better of me.

  “What injury has my lord de Mornay done you, Uncle?” I asked him, calmly, but he was past the point of hearing me. His eyes were fiery wells of hatred, glowing blackly in the flickering light cast up from the hearth.

  “The others would accept defeat,” he muttered, speaking only to himself, “and let the devil triumph. But I have seen the devil’s blood, and know he is a man.” He clasped a gloved hand round his sword, then frowned, and looked at me. “Can you not silence that child?” he barked roughly, and I clasped the infant more tightly, shielding him.

  “Uncle Jabez,” I said, wetting my dry lips, “what do you intend?”

  His smile was a thing unholy. “I intend to await your lord de Mornay’s return from his evening ride, and give him a welcome he’ll not soon forget.”

  I kept my voice calm. “You mean to harm Sir Richard, Uncle?”

  “I mean to see him dead.”

  Caroline blanched in her corner by the door. “But, Jabez, surely—”

  “Do you defy me?” He turned his wrath on her instead, looming very large and threatening above my chair. “By God! Do you think to defy me?” I saw the terrible intent in his eyes an instant before he moved, but I was powerless to stop him. Before I could protect the child, he was torn from my arms and, with a cruel gesture, dashed against the stone hearth where he fell like a discarded plaything, twisted and broken. “I am the master of my house,” my uncle thundered, “and by heaven, you’ll not question it again!”

  Shock kept me silent, a screaming protest trapped within my tightly constricted throat. My uncle stood motionless for a moment, glaring down upon us like the ruler of the damned, then turning sharply on his heel he left our presence, and the front door banged to in the hall behind him. A heartbeat later I heard the sound of a single horse heading in the direction of the village, and Crofton Hall.

  It was that sound, and the accompanying thought, that roused me from my stupor. Dazed, I lifted my head and turned to look at Caroline, who had flung herself with a wild cry across the room and crumpled on the flaming hearth, her arms wrapped tenderly around the lifeless body of her son. Her body rocked convulsively, her lips moving in a mumbled song of comfort, but he was far beyond her touch. I looked once into her eyes and could not bring myself to look again. They were dead eyes, dead and flat and inhuman. It was as though the horror of what she’d just seen had pushed her anguished mind past all sufferance, leaving but an empty shell where once there had lived a human soul. It was a painful thing to see.

  “Caroline.” I spoke softly, imploringly. “Caroline, we cannot stay here.”

  She did not answer me, yet I pressed onward, resolute.

  “Jabez has lost his reason, Caroline. ’Tis dangerous to wait for his return. We must seek help.”

  The hollow eyes stared through me, unresponsive.

  “Wait here for me,” I said to her. “I will but be a moment.” I did not wait to mark whether she had heard my instruction, but swung my cloak down from its nail behind the back door and, wresting back the latch, stumbled out into the night.

  The dovecote was dark as a tomb inside, the thrumming of the birds a weird accompaniment to the frantic beating of my own heart. The trapdoor was closed. I pulled on the rope to open it, grateful for the rush of clean night air and the ethereal shaft of moonlight that pierced the living darkness, giving me light enough at least to see the faint suggestion of walls surrounding me.

  Groping my way along the wall, I nearly sobbed my relief as my fingers touched the broken ledge of an empty nesting box. If there was a God, I thought feverishly, the key would still be there. The key that Richard had placed there for my use some two months earlier. The key that would admit me to the courtyard of the manor house. There would be safety there, I knew—safety at least for Caroline, Richard’s servants would see to that. For my part, there could be no sanctuary until Richard was delivered from my uncle.

  I have seen the devil’s blood, my uncle had said, and the words ran like ice through my veins. Was Richard wounded, then? No, of course he wasn’t, I told myself sternly. Had he been wounded, my uncle would surely have gloated over the fact. Perhaps Richard had ridden the whole way to Oxford with the king. Oh, please, I prayed, let him have the sense to stay with the king. Do not let him return home tonight…

  My knuckles scraped raw against the jagged stone as my fingers closed around the key, and I drew it forth hurriedly, gripping it tightly as I ran back across the yard to the house.

  Caroline was sitting primly in a chair, waiting for me, her cloak neatly fastened about her shoulders. With careful hands she wrapped a shawl around the lifeless baby in her lap. “He might take cold,” she explained, speaking low as if she feared to wake him.

  My heart wrenched painfully in my chest, but I made no protest. Now was not the time to break her fantasy. “Come, then,” I beckoned to her, and together we went out of the somber house, closing the door behind us.

  Not once did Caroline ask where I was taking her, nor show the slightest interest in her surroundings. She followed behind me blindly, silently, clutching her dead child tightly to her breast. The night was cool, and fair, spread bright beneath a pale and shining moon. It was the kind of night that the hunted things fear, a night when your own shadow chased you across the fields and even the forest could not shield you from the waiting, watching eyes.

  We passed swiftly through the trees towards the Hall, skirting wide around both church and stables to approach the house by the western wall. At the edge of the stableyard another shadow scurried past us, and I gasped in terror before I saw it for what it was—only a prowling, timid dog, its tail between its legs. I fancied I heard another indrawn breath besides my own, but Caroline had made no sound and I put it down to a strained imagination and the echo of the wind.

  It was a simple matter to find the low door nestled in the courtyard wall, but my trembling fingers took three passes to fit the key to the lock. Once fitted it turned easily, and as the door swung inward on its oiled hinges I ushered Caroline in before me, hastily locking the door again behind us. Pressing Caroline back against the wall, where the shadows lay deepest, I raised a finger to my lips and warned her not to speak.

  “Wait here,” I whispered. She hugged her baby and nodded dumbly, her eyes dull and uninterested.

  A yellow stream of light spilled into the courtyard from the library, and I made my way cautiously in that direction, lifting my skirts so they would not rustle against the grass. My heart pounded in my throat as I neared the open doorway, then stopped altogether when strong arms grabbed me from behind in a grip of iron, hauling me into the light.

  I
would have screamed had I been able to breathe, but both actions were made impossible by the large hand clamped around my nose and mouth, stifling me. My eyes widened first in fear, and then in recognition, and the choking hand dropped from my face as suddenly as it had come.

  “Mistress Farr!” The steward’s face, for once, betrayed his astonishment. “I pray your pardon! I took you for a thief.”

  I rubbed my neck, and smiled wanly. “I do but seek asylum,” I corrected him, “in the chamber of your master. Tell me, has my uncle come before me?”

  The steward shook his head. “He has not. No one has called here since yourself this morning.”

  “Good sir, I beg you.” I placed a hand upon his sleeve. “On no account admit my uncle to this house. He means to do Sir Richard mischief, and there is one with me who can attest the evil of his nature.” Turning, I called out to Caroline, who still clung to the shadows of the far wall. “Come, Caroline, this man is a friend. You will be safe.”

  Slowly she came, in that stiff and painful shuffle, clasping the pitiful bundle to her breast protectively. As she drew level with us, the light from the library fell full upon the child’s waxen, lifeless face, and showed the trail of drying blood that stained the blue-tinged skin.

  The steward looked, and lifted horror-stricken eyes to mine. “Where is your uncle now, mistress?” he asked me.

  “I fear he waits in hiding outside this very house,” I answered him plainly. “Have you a man that you can trust?”

  “I have three men as able as myself,” was his loyal response, “and a young lad who would not shrink from duty, were he called. Do you wish me to send for the bailiff?”

  I shook my head, my heart sinking. “The bailiff would be of no use, sir, for he is dead and a traitor besides. I confess, I know not who to trust in this affair. The wolves are well disguised among the lambs.”

  The steward squared his shoulders proudly. “Then it is left to us,” he said. “I will send my men to watch the road for Sir Richard’s return, that we might warn him of this danger.”

  I smiled at him in relief. “I thank you, sir. Where may I take my aunt, that she may be more comfortable?”

  “There is a fire in the Great Hall, mistress, where you both might warm yourselves. I’ll send a maid to attend to you, and to the… child.” He looked with pity at Caroline, but she only stared back at him with wooden eyes, and followed us when she was bidden to.

  I waited until the maid arrived and saw Caroline settled in a chair before the fire, where she rocked Johnnie back and forth, humming contentedly. Unable to remain, I took my leave of both women and went upstairs, taking the steps two at a time in my haste.

  The crimson bedchamber felt cold and lonely without Richard there to fill the room. The moonlight made ghosts of the bed hangings, and cast a spectral pool about my feet, but I dared not light a candle for fear of my uncle’s eyes. He was out there, I knew, concealed somewhere behind a tree or hedge or garden wall, driven by a cruel and single purpose. The lawn spread pale and peaceful beneath my window, but I could sense the evil presence of the serpent.

  I stared out over the lawn, towards the road, hoping that one of Richard’s servants had already intercepted him and turned him back. I went on watching, hoping, until my vision blurred with weariness, and still I did not look away. I do not know what hour it was when the first small flicker of movement caught my eye, and jolted me awake.

  At first I could see nothing clearly, only a flash of white between the trees that marked the curving road from the south, and then I saw it was Navarre, cantering innocently homeward with Richard on his back. Ghostlike, silently, they moved against the darkness, the rising scream of the wind stealing the sound of the stallion’s thundering hooves.

  They must have seen him, surely—one of the servants must have seen him, and spoken to him; yet still he came on.

  He had come back for me, I thought painfully. He knew that Jabez Howard lived, and that my uncle in his anger would return to seek revenge. It had been fool of me to think that Richard would choose to turn from danger, and yet his reckless bravery saddened me, I knew not why.

  It was not until the horse drew nearer that I saw the reason Richard had not turned on the road, and why his servants’ warnings had not reached his ears. The stallion ran with a single purpose and would not be stopped, his rider sprawled senseless across the broad gray neck. Navarre eased finally to a slow walk, and then stopped altogether, his heaving sides bathed in foam. In horror I watched as Richard pitched forward, sliding heavily from the saddle to land full-length upon the ground. He did not move.

  I remembered my uncle’s leering smile, and the sound of his rasping words… But I have seen the devil’s blood, and know he is a man.

  For the second time that night, my mind filled with screams of terror, and for the second time I was powerless to give them voice. I saw a shadow running across the lawn towards the fallen man, and an urgent litany ran through my agonized brain. Get up, I begged the dark and crumpled figure. Oh, please, get up. Please… please… please…

  The running shadow was much closer now, and spurred to action I dragged my leaden feet from the spot before the window, flying with a speed unnatural down the stairs and through the darkened passage.

  The silence in the Great Hall should have warned me. The wind wailed still against the tall windows, but there was no other sound, and my running feet had carried me well into the room before I perceived my error.

  Caroline and the maid still sat before the fire. They sat like pokers, stiffly wary, eyes fixed upon the man who stood upon the hearth rug with his hands outstretched towards the blaze. Beyond him lay the door to the outside, and beyond that lay Richard—helpless, perhaps dying, on the lawn. But my uncle blocked my way to both.

  He turned his head, still with his back to me, and addressed me over one shoulder. “Well, Mariana. This is a pretty welcome. And what have you to say for yourself?”

  I said nothing in reply. From somewhere in my stunned and reeling mind, I noted that my uncle had removed his belt and gloves, though he yet wore his sword. My flailing gaze lit upon the belt where he had thrown it across a chair, and dimly I registered that his dagger yet rested in its scabbard. It was a lethal enough weapon for my purpose.

  Jabez Howard followed my gaze, his brows lowering ominously, and I moved. My lunge was quick, but not quick enough. I had but crossed the floor and closed my fingers round the dagger’s handle when he was upon me, grabbing the blade from my hand and sending it clattering to the floor, his eyes contemptuous.

  “Would you play me for a fool?” he demanded, his hand closing painfully round my wrist. “Did you think I would not learn of your sins? You are the devil’s harlot, Mariana Farr, deny it not.”

  I set my jaw and met his eyes. “I am no harlot,” I denied the charge. “And Richard de Mornay is no devil. He is to be my husband.”

  Again I saw that evil, twisted smile, and hated it.

  “You cannot marry a corpse, I think,” my uncle said.

  “He is not dead!”

  “What matter? If he is not now, he soon will be.” The smile faded beneath those mad and piercing eyes. “And you may wish yourself so, when I have finished with you. You are a wanton sinner, Mariana, like your mother before you, and the Lord will shower vengeance upon your head.”

  I saw the blow coming and flinched from it, but his hand against my jaw had none of its original force. Instead I felt him shudder, felt the convulsive tightening of his hand around the fragile bones of my wrist, and even as I cried out from the pain his fingers loosened and fell away. He reeled sideways, his eyes rolling backwards in their sockets, and fell without a sound.

  I stared a moment at the creeping stain between his shoulder blades, where the handle of the dagger still protruded, then raised my eyes to look at Caroline. She stood close by the body of m
y uncle, her hands held stiffly in front of her body, fingers half-clenched. Her features yet showed no trace of expression, but in her eyes there gleamed a faint glimmer of triumph.

  I heard the running footsteps approaching, and turned in a daze to face the returning steward.

  “The stable lad thought he saw a man enter by the scullery door,” he warned us breathlessly, then halted at the sight of the tableau before him.

  I cleared my throat. “My uncle has met with an accident, sir.”

  The steward’s eyes met mine above Caroline’s shoulder, and a flash of understanding passed between us. He nodded tactfully. “It shall be attended to, mistress.” Then, almost as an afterthought, “Sir Richard has returned.”

  I swallowed painfully. “Is he… is he…?”

  “We carried him into the church, not knowing whether the house was safe, you understand.” His eyes were guarded. “I am sent to ride to Marlborough, to fetch the surgeon there.”

  “Then he is…?”

  “He is alive, and asks for you.”

  It was all that I needed to hear. I forgot about the body slumped at my feet, about Caroline, about everything. I thought only of Richard, and his need for me, and my feet scarce touched the ground as I raced over lawn and garden towards the church, its tower looming tall and black against the dawning sky.

  Chapter 32

  “You are not to grieve.”

  He was awake, and watching me. I lifted my chin and met his eyes squarely. “I’ve no intention of grieving,” I said, with a calmness I did not feel. “You’re going to get well. The surgeon will be here presently.”

  “Mariana.” It was a gentle admonition, rumbling low in his shattered chest. His eyes slid away from mine and focused on a dimly lit corner of the church, where the torchlight could not reach.

  He had heard the talk, of course, as well as I—the vaguely conspiratorial whispers of the servants who had carried him here, and who now stood watch outside the door. It was a mortal wound, they had told me, if ever they had seen one, and they had seen some wounds in their time… not safe to move him, best let him lie in peace… and they had shaken their heads sadly, their faces lined with the grief of old men who must watch a young man die.