Dangerous Magic (11 page)

Rafe woke before dawn. Drew on his breeches and boots. Shrugged into his shirt. Gwenyth slept, her silver-blond hair fanned out upon the pillow. He smiled as he pushed a tendril away from her face, wishing he could crawl back into bed and rouse her with a kiss and a slow caress. He grew aroused just thinking about the soft, creamy flesh hidden beneath the bedclothes, and he licked his lips, the taste of her still on his tongue. As confident and self-possessed as she was during the day, at night in his arms, she dropped the glamorie, the veil that set her apart and kept everyone at arm’s length. She became a woman ruled by passions rather than prophecy.

His heart stirred as he watched her sleep. Had he begun a life last night? Had he fulfilled his side of their bizarre agreement? He bent to press a light kiss upon her brow before leaving and prayed to anyone listening that she remained barren. He didn’t think he could bear this homecoming without her beside him.

Mist hung low over the grass as Rafe started out across the park. It felt good to stretch his legs, and even if the air didn’t carry the bite of ocean spray, it was clean and sharp.

He rambled with no firm destination in mind. It was enough to be out and alone with his thoughts. Beyond, the forest beckoned, but he kept close to home. Instead, his steps turned to his childhood haunts—the gatehouse lodge, the banks of the river beneath the bridge.

The summerhouse.

He slowed, running his hand across the marble baluster. Pulled back the drape of budding roses to duck inside. There were the low, long seats. The table at the center with a bowl of forgotten spring narcissus wilting in the gloom. All as if he’d only left it the night before with Anabel’s betrayal fresh in his mind. Her scathing rejection ringing in his ears. Setting in motion all that had followed.

What would his life have been if she’d accepted him? Would today have seen him captaining his own ship of the line? Would he have children? Would life have unfolded as he’d once dreamed? He couldn’t imagine Anabel a patient wife, waiting for a husband gone more than he was at home. Or scrimping on half pay when he was ashore. But stranger things had happened. Look at the mad arrangement between him and Gwenyth. That was as strange as they came.

He left the summerhouse, crossed the hedge to enter the north fields. Followed the track down the hill toward the woods. It wasn’t until he’d passed beneath the first trees that he had an awareness of someone watching him. A pricking of his shoulders. A crawly feeling up the back of his neck. He wheeled to his right, plunging into the trees, heart slamming into his throat. A shadow darkened the path. The man was only paces behind. Dark coat, plain hat. Nothing to mark him out as odd. But Rafe knew him. This was Gwenyth’s mystery man.

Rafe swung around, sliding between the trees, never making a sound. He knew this land. He was on home ground here.

The man came on, steady but unhurried as if he knew Rafe wouldn’t have strayed too far. Just as he passed, Rafe lunged out, knocking the man off-balance. The two fell to the ground in a tangle of fists and knees.

He was a scrapper who knew his way around a street brawl. Rafe would give him that. Hands. Fingers. Elbows. Teeth. He fought like the devil. But Rafe had bulk and a determination to end this once and for all. He pinned him to the ground.

“Who are you?” he demanded. “Why the hell are you following me?”

The man spat blood into the dirt, squinting up at him through a blackened eye. “I ain’t following you. Out here for a stroll, and you attacked me. It’s unlawful. Illegal. I’ve a great mind to have you clapped in irons.”

Rafe refused to be duped, but doubt crept in. Had he been mistaken? Had he lived with danger for so long, that he jumped at shadows? Found threats behind every tree? “Who’s sent you? Answer me.”

“You let me up, I’ll tell you,” the man grumbled. “I don’t answer questions with someone sitting on my gut.”

Rafe pulled the man to his feet, though he kept a firm hold of his collar. “All right. Talk. What’s your game?”

“Name’s Cotter,” the man continued, banging his dusty hat against his thigh. “Visiting my sister in Upper Yewford, I am. I decided to do some fishing. If you like, I can show you my rod and tackle. Left it back at the edge of the woods.” He turned to point back up the trail.

Rafe’s eyes unconsciously followed Cotter’s directions. That was when he struck. His knee came up in a gut-sucking blow to Rafe’s midsection. As he doubled over, the heel of Cotter’s palm connected with Rafe’s chin, knocking his head back, his neck twinging with spasms. Free, Cotter tore back up the path, out of the trees.

Rafe threw himself after him, but the man had speed as well as strength. He was halfway across the field by the time Rafe made it to the wood’s edge, and completely swallowed by cover after no more than a few minutes of chase.

Bent over, hands on his knees, chest heaving, Rafe watched him disappear. Who the hell was he? And what did he want?

A thought crossed his mind. Like a ghost of a shadow, it plagued him, but it was too soon to know. He only prayed he was wrong.

If he thought coming home had been difficult so far, this would make it damn near impossible.

Gwenyth rose, her body singing with the faint echoes of Rafe’s lovemaking. Nothing had prepared her for what he released in her with every caress. No gift she carried within her body gave her as much pleasure as the touch of his lips or the soft lingering stroke of his fingers. She buried these feelings beneath a hard layer of common sense that told her these thoughts boded nothing but ill. There was no future with Rafe Fleming. There was nothing for her there but grief. Only if she kept her head and refused her heart, could she come away unscathed.

Weary, but successful in grounding the wild dreams threatening to overwhelm her, she tried to dress. But no matter what position she twisted her body into, she couldn’t manage to tie the offending tapes at the back of her gown. Frustrated and giving rein to the bitterness in her heart, Gwenyth cursed as she tried once more with no success. “
Dampnya!
Why on earth do they be making these
gokki
things with no way of putting one on without an army of servants?”

“Miss? Miss? Can I help you?”

Gwenyth heard the voice, but in her agitation didn’t answer.

“
Mestres?
I said, can I help you?” This time the words came in Cornish.

Gwenyth whirled around, eyes wide with shock. “
Soenno dhymm!
Bless me, I haven’t heard any speak the tongue since leaving home. What’s your name?”

The maid bobbed a quick curtsey. “Nellie,
Mestres.
Lady Brampton sent me to help you.”

Gwenyth took the maid by the hands and drew her into the chamber, ignoring her anxious looks. “You’re from Cornwall?”

Nellie nodded, answering her in the same language. “From Falmouth, miss, though my ma came from the west. She’s the one taught me the Cornish.” Withdrawing her hands, she deftly took charge of Gwenyth’s willful tapes as well as the row of buttons upon her sleeves and the lace at her hem and collar. “It’s good to speak it after so long.”

Gwenyth forgot herself in the joy of having a small piece of home handed her like a treasure. Though few spoke the language—even in Kerrow only Jago and a few doddering ancients—it represented her world. A world growing fainter with each passing day spent so far from it. “A gift from the gods, you are. I’ve been fiddling with this silly piece of frippery for a half-hour.
Durdallody’hwi.
Thank you.”

Nellie nodded and ushered Gwenyth to her dressing table. With a few brushstrokes, a well-placed comb or two, and a handful of pins, she swept Gwenyth’s thick hair into a stylish chignon rivaling anything seen on Sophia or Anabel Woodville.

Gwenyth smiled her thanks into the mirror. “You’ve managed to turn a peasant girl into a princess. They’ll be thinking I’m putting on airs.”

“You’re most welcome,
Mestres.
I feel as if I’ve had a visit home without stepping beyond the door,” Nellie said, echoing Gwenyth’s thoughts. She bobbed a quick curtsey. “Bless you.
Dursoenno dhis, Mestres.
”

Her eyes suspiciously bright, she dashed from the room, nearly bowling Cecily Fleming over on her way out.

Cecily held a half-eaten piece of toast, red jam already staining the collar of her gown. “What was Nellie saying just now? It sounded like a foreign language.”

Gwenyth cast a glance at Cecily’s curious eyes and firm chin, so like Rafe’s in its stubborn set. This young woman was more perceptive than anyone in the house suspected. She must warn Rafe. If anyone were to find out the truth about them, she had a feeling it would be Cecily.

“Speaking the Cornish, she was.”

Cecily settled upon the same chair as yesterday. She showed no hesitation in making herself at home, invited or not. “Is it like Gaelic or Welsh or something?”

“A bit like both and not at all like either.”

Cecily sat forward, her gaze eager. “Could you teach me? I know French, German and some Italian. I can even say a few things in Spanish. We had a gardener from Seville. Please, could you teach me Cornish?”

Gwenyth raised a questioning brow. “Why would you be wanting to know such things? You’ve no one to even speak it to.”

“You’ll be here to speak it to.”

Gwenyth took a steadying breath, hoping the girl was wrong. The past minutes had shown Gwenyth how much she wanted to flee to the refuge of Kerrow and the life she had chosen to abandon. She must find Rafe Fleming a woman quick and escape before it was too late.

Rafe found Gwenyth wandering up and down the stable’s wide aisles, reaching to pat a stretched-out nose or scratch behind an ear. Dressed in a stylish gown of cloud-gray that matched her eyes, she stepped regally as a queen between the barrows of soiled straw, leaning forks and shovels, and buckets of water lined up for distribution among the loose boxes.

The grooms allowed her peace to enjoy the horses, but Rafe caught the appreciative eyes and knowing nudges between the men as they went about their chores. For some reason, their admiration didn’t pique him as had the hungry glances of the village men of Kerrow. Instead pride swelled his chest, and he found himself savoring the knowledge that she belonged to him—at least for a little while.

He thought about confessing to his confrontation this morning. Asking her opinion. But if his hunch was right—No, it was best to let it lie. Cotter and his associates were his worry. His problem.

Gwenyth spoke without looking up to see who approached. “I’d a feeling you’d be here sooner or later.”

Her words might have discomfited someone unfamiliar with her unnatural gifts, but Rafe merely smiled. “My mother stopped me to let me know about the ball in Carrisbridge next week.”

She gave him a sidelong glance of amusement. “Is she fearing I’ll cast a cloud over your triumphant homecoming? Mayhap eat with my fingers or dance upon the tabletops?”

Rafe laughed as he took her elbow, leading her toward the curricle, even now being readied for them. “I believe you never entered her mind. She thinks it shall take only one look at the eligible young ladies of her acquaintance and you’ll be sent packing back to your village.”

Gwenyth took a deep breath. “She’s no idea how right she is. The women shall be thick as heath upon the ground. Perhaps my task won’t be so hard after all.”

Rafe quashed the flash of anger at Gwenyth’s eagerness as he helped her into the carriage. Seating himself next to her, he warned her to hold tight, shouted the grooms to stand away from the horses’ heads, and flicked the ribbons as he chirruped to the beautiful matched bays. With a grunt of satisfaction, he heard her quick cry of alarm as they circled the yard and bowled out along the avenue. But by the time they’d reached the park’s boundaries, he’d put aside his momentary resentment, and she’d settled back to enjoy the rush of speed.

Rafe turned onto a side road, a long shaded avenue of birch trees. Pulled the horses back to a slow trot, allowing Gwenyth to look about her without fear of being jounced from her seat. Rolling parkland stretched to either side of them, the house slipping in and out of view between the stands of ash and elm, hazel and hawthorn. Kestrels called
klee-klee-klee
as they dipped and soared above the open fields scented with early blooming wild thyme.

Passing into a shaded copse of beeches, the light dimmed to a filmy green, and the air cooled. The Lady Wood stretched between the edge of Bodliam’s park down to a shallow river bottom, the river now little more than a narrow stream. They crossed a low stone bridge, the current below them flashing silver beneath the arched stonework.

Turning out onto the road, Rafe twitched the ribbons and the curricle sprang forward. Gwenyth grabbed for her bonnet, but when he glanced her way, her eyes shone with delight. In moments they passed into the village. For Rafe, it was like stepping back in time. Nothing about the rows of cottages, the crooked lanes or the open, ruddy country faces had changed in all the years he had been gone.

“Well?” Rafe gestured toward the men and women crowding the main road and gathered upon the green. His gaze scanned them, wondering if he’d spy the mysterious Mr. Cotter. But he was disappointed. None among them were the dark man from the woods.

Gwenyth arched a brow in question. “Am I supposed to be finding you a bride like I’d be picking out a ripe melon?”

Rafe brought the horses down to a walk. He shot her a teasing glance. “You mean the otherworldly Sight of the Witch of Kerrow can’t manage a trifling matter like finding a needle in a haystack?”

When she didn’t answer right away, he glanced ahead. Across the road, standing in front of the grocers with her arm upon a young man’s sleeve, was Cecily. They weren’t alone. Two young women stood with them. Dressed in stylish gowns, their hair in modish ringlets beneath chip straw bonnets, they chattered and gossiped like magpies. The bored expression on the young man’s face told Rafe that much.