Faithfully Yours (12 page)

Eight

“Ezekial,” Faith said, putting another tankard on the tray, “please take this mulled cider out to the soldiers in the barn.”

“That is kind of you,” replied a voice that was much deeper than her brother's.

She forced a smile for Sebastian, hoping he had not noticed how her fingers trembled as she set the pitcher back on the kitchen table. “The night is cold, and I thought they would enjoy something warm to drink before they slept.” She shuddered at her own words.

“Is something amiss?” Sebastian asked as Ezekial opened the door and carried the tray out to the barn.

“No, everything is just as it should be.” She wondered if she had ever spoken such a heinous lie. On the morrow, she would be meeting Tom Rooke to give him more supplies, so she had put the powder he had given her into the cider, which would make Sebastian's men sleep long past midday.

“You look unsettled. Are you shivering?”

“It
is
cold.” She closed the door that her brother had left ajar.

He drew her into his arms and up against his chest. “It is warmer here.”

His lips on hers gave her no chance to answer, even if she had had something to say. Savoring his kisses, she let her fingers explore the breadth of his back before slipping up through his hair. One brushed puckered skin, and she pulled back with a gasp.

“That is a scar!”

He took her hand and led it back to the spot right behind his left ear. “The sign of a childish folly, nothing more. It is not, as you clearly fear, left by a ball that bounced off my hard head, but left from an attempt to teach Gaylord to use one of the old swords that hang on the wall at Kendrick Court.”

“He struck you with it?”

“Quite by accident.” He chuckled. “He was not much more than five years old, and his single attempt to heft the sword alone was a failure. I thought I might help him.” Drawing her hand back to his lips, he pressed his mouth to it. “I was a fool to think I could help him, and I received this blow to my head for my attempt.”

She pulled her hand out of his. “Maybe there was a lesson that you should have learned then.”

“To take care around someone who might injure me with such a glancing blow?” His arm around her waist tugged her closer again. “Or should I have learned that being so near to someone can be dangerous?”

“Being so near your brother that day was dangerous.”

“Without question.” His fingers curved along her cheek. “But being near you is even more dangerous, sweet one. You tease me to forget my orders—”

“You—forget your orders? I cannot imagine that.”

“Do you want to know what
I
can imagine?” As his thumb played along her jaw, he whispered, “I can imagine you slipping into my arms as I lean you back onto my bed. With your fiery hair falling free, I would gladly loosen the hooks along the back of your gown and free your breasts to be caressed by my fingers and my mouth.”

With a moan, she brought his lips to hers. This fantasy was not only his, but hers, as well. The longings kept her awake at night and lured her to him during the day. She had not guessed this unending craving for his touch could grow stronger with each passing second. When his tongue traced the whorls of her ear, she clenched his linen shirt. She longed to pull it from his breeches and stroke the bare skin across the hard muscles of his back.

“Faith, I—” Her mother's words ended in a gulp.

Pulling out of Sebastian's arms, Faith met her mother's wide eyes. Father stood behind her, a broad smile creasing his face. As he walked into the kitchen, his chuckle had the triumphant sound it assumed when he had gotten the best deal out of any negotiation. He slapped Sebastian companionably on the shoulder and reached for the pitcher on the table.

“Join me,” Father said with another chuckle, “in a drink of Faith's excellent mulled cider while we talk.”

Faith snatched the pitcher away from him.

“Daughter?” he asked, his smile wavering.

“This is … It is not warm enough.” She sought any excuse to keep her father from drinking the cider, which contained the sleeping powder. “Let me reheat it for you.” Her voice quavered, and she hoped they would think it was nothing more than her embarrassment at being discovered in Sebastian's embrace.

She thought someone might denounce her for the liar she was, but her father nodded and motioned for Sebastian to join him in the parlor. Her hope that Mother would go with them vanished when her mother remained in the kitchen.

Setting the pewter pitcher back on the table, Faith went to the cider jug and poured more into a pot by the hearth. She sprinkled some spices into it before setting it to warm. She waited for her mother to say something, but the kitchen was silent.

Finally, unable to endure the quiet any longer, Faith said, “I know you have something to tell me, Mother.”

“You are a woman grown. You have been taught well. Your decisions are yours to make.” She put her hand gently against Faith's cheek. “And your actions are yours to take, whether they are folly or wise.”

“Do you think kissing Sebastian is folly?”

“Do you?”

She faltered with her answer as she let the memory of his touch swirl around her, sweet and tantalizing and threatening to jeopardize her vow to keep her neighbors from suffering more in the war. She wanted to be in his arms as he brought to life the fantasies he had whispered to her. She wanted him gone.

“I think,” she whispered, “it is both.”

“I think you are right. Take care, daughter, because the choices you make now may change your life forever.”

The shouts woke Faith. Too many nights had been interrupted like this, but she could not accustom herself to being ripped from her dreams to yet another disaster. Buttoning her wrapper to her chin, she winced as she hurried across the icy floor. The night air must be far below freezing, she thought, if the hearths below could not ease this cold.

She was not surprised to see Sebastian with his cloak over his arm as she came down the stairs. As a chill came from it, she realized he had been outside. Had the shouts been his? That possibility amazed her because he was usually so calm.

“What is wrong?” she asked, pausing on the bottom riser.

He turned from where he had been talking to her father, who was adding logs to the hearth in the parlor. “My men. They are viciously sick.” He tossed his cloak back over his shoulders.

“Sick? How sick? If they are suffering from what your brother had—”

“It is something different. They cannot keep anything in their stomachs.”

Faith did not hesitate. She raced back up the stairs. Dressing quickly, she pulled on her thickest socks and her heavy boots. She ran to the first floor even as she was drawing on her gloves. Throwing her cloak over her shoulders, she buttoned it into place and took the pot her mother held out to her. The aroma of chicken broth drifted from it.

“Sebastian is in the barn,” Mother said. “Start with this broth while I make some chamomile tea to ease the nausea. I added some calamint to soothe their stomachs.”

Nodding, Faith hurried out into the cold. The grass beneath her feet crunched, and snowflakes floated aimlessly through the night like stars falling to the ground. She shrugged away that fanciful thought as she rushed to the barn.

A single lantern burned within. Slipping through the door, she closed it hastily behind her. Groans reverberated through the barn, and the animals shifted with disquiet. She hurried to where men were thrashing on the hay-strewn floor. The odors of sickness struck her, warning her to turn back. She tried to ignore them and the nausea that roiled in her stomach.

When a hand settled on her arm, she recognized the thrill of delight that accompanied Sebastian's touch. She looked up into his drawn face. Her fingers rose to smooth the furrows in his forehead, but she lowered them before she could be caught up anew in the desire that urged her to think of nothing but satisfying it.

“Here,” she whispered, handing him the pot. “We need to see if we can get them to eat.”

“I shall tend to that. You should return to the house.”

“I can help. I helped you tend your brother.”

“This is not a place for a woman.” One corner of his mouth tilted up in a smile. “If you have never trusted me before, sweet one, trust me when I tell you this. The men do not want you here when they are in such a state.”

She started to argue, then heard a man retching on the other side of a stall. “Mother is making some chamomile tea to ease the stomach cramps. I will—”

“Have one of your brothers deliver it here.”

“As soon as it is ready.” She recognized his stubborn tone. He was determined to protect her from this illness.

When he turned to ladle some of the soup out for his men, she turned to leave. She faltered when she saw the men holding out the pewter tankards that she had filled with the mulled cider that evening. Each man had one lying beside him.

Her own stomach tightened. She could not believe that the powder Tom Rooke had given her had done this. It should have made the men sleep—nothing more. He had assured her of that. Her nails bit into her palms as her hands became fists. Tom hated the British. Had he lied to her and used her to make these men so ill that they could not complete the duties that had brought them here?

Faith wanted to shout
No
! to that thought, but she could not. It followed her back to the house and taunted her as she worked in the kitchen to try to devise something soothing that would help Sebastian's men. When her mother fell asleep on the settle by the hearth, the heckling thought grew even louder. She sent her mother to bed, promising to wake Mistress Cromwell if there was a change in the men's conditions before dawn arrived. Her brothers came and went to the barn as they carried hot tea out to the men.

When the door opened, Faith saw that the gray she had hoped meant the coming of dawn was simply a layer of snow reflecting in the dim light. Sebastian came into the kitchen. She rushed to steer him to the settle where her mother had slept.

“No,” he mumbled, “I don't want to sit. If I do, I may not have the strength to stand again.”

“Are you ill, too?” She tried to keep hope from her voice. If Sebastian was ill, then this sickness was not caused by Tom Rooke's powder. Then she shuddered. Another illness could be even more dangerous.

“No, just exhausted.” He smiled, surprising her. “Yet the very sight of you rouses me. If the situation was not so grim, I would ask you to join me in my bed, where we could fall asleep together.” His voice deepened to a husky whisper as he repeated, “Together, sweet one.”

Faith found herself a captive of the image his words created. Yet, even into that pleasure intruded the guilt of knowing that she might have played a part in making his men ill. “You must rest before you sicken, too. Let Osborne help.”

“He is the sickest. If he does not stop heaving everything in his stomach, I fear he will not last much longer.” He curled his hand into a fist and banged it against the wall. “No soldier should die like this.”

Faith swallowed hard. Bending, she poured more of the soup into the container and handed it to Emery, who was coming in the door. He tried to catch her eyes, but she looked away as she went to cut more slices from the loaves of bread.

“Have your men soak the bread in the soup and eat it very slowly,” she said, handing the plate to Sebastian. “They should be able to keep it down.”

“I find it odd that none of your family is ill.”

“Nor you.”

His lips quirked into a reluctant grin. “I would be wise to remember that, rather than seeking some enemy who has found a way to almost destroy us.” His smile vanished as he added, “My suspicions remain that they ate something filled with rot during their most recent visit to the tavern.”

Faith brushed crumbs from her apron and went to the hearth. Stirring the soup kept her from having to answer. Curse Tom Rooke! He must have known that the powders he gave her would make Sebastian's men sick. Had he guessed that powder might do even more than cause them to be ill? If Osborne died, it would be
her
fault. In her efforts to save her friends and neighbors, she might have doomed Sebastian's men.

Sebastian rubbed sand from his eyes, which ached from lack of sleep. How many days and nights had he spent tending to his men? Counting back, he was surprised it was only three. It seemed as if he had spent a lifetime nursing his men back from the debilitating illness.

His lips tightened. Calling it an
illness
was foolish, when he knew that no evil humor had created this. Someone with evil intentions had. He looked down at the pewter tankard he held. The proof was here.

The lilt of a song nuzzled his ears, and he turned to see Faith tossing corn to the chickens scurrying between the frozen puddles of yesterday's melted snow. Her shawl had the distinctive red stripes that she seemed to knit into every garment she made. Red trim decorated the hem of her full skirt, which was cut back to reveal her petticoats beneath it. The bodice that hugged her curves reminded him of how many long hours had passed since he had last held her.

He groaned with unsated need. What he had discovered this morning was certain to keep him from satisfying his craving for her, because the task ahead of him must not be ignored. Not even for a minute.

Yet, as he thought that, his heart was directing his feet to stride toward her. When she looked up, a tentative smile on her soft lips, the ache to be part of her sent another groan bubbling into his throat. He silenced it as he stopped on the far side of a wide puddle. If he kept the puddle between them, he might be able to say what he must without succumbing to the longing to tug her into his arms.

“Good morning,” she said, the ruffle on her cap fluttering in the cold breeze.

“I wish I could reply the same.”