Suzanne Robinson (31 page)

Morgan closed his eyes and buried his face in her hair, when he heard a whimper. At last she lifted her head and tried to stand away from him. He kept his arms circled around her and watched her summon her reserve of courage.

Wiping her eyes with the back of her hand, she sighed and said, “I was right.”

“What mean you? Curse it, Pen, why did you do that? The horror could have killed you.”

Not answering at once, Pen stepped out of the circle of his arms and placed the hearth between them.

Drawing in a shaking breath, she said, “I did it to find the priest.”

“But why?”

“Weren’t you listening to me? I did it to hasten your departure.”

Morgan shook his head. “You’re lying, mayhap to yourself as well as to me.”

“I told you,” Pen said. “I no longer suffer from your enchantments. The most seemly description of my feelings for you is indifference.”

She added as if on an afterthought, “Except when you waste my food. Then you’re irksome.”

He tried to look into her eyes—wide, golden, and as warm as fire flames. She avoided his gaze.

“My stubborn-sweet mistress, I don’t believe you.”

She gazed down at the fire and warmed her hands before the flames. “I care not whether you believe me or no.”

“Pen.” He walked around the hearth, but she moved with him. “Pen, come here.”

“Don’t growl at me like a tomcat, Morgan St. John.”

“You’re making me hotter than this fire just by standing there.”

“Stop!”

She shouted the word so loudly that he obeyed out of surprise, but not for long.

“Gratiana,” he said as he resumed his slinking around the hearth, “do you remember that time in the gatehouse?”

“We’ll not speak of it.”

“Oh, aye, we will,” Morgan said softly. “You enjoyed it, you wanton, and surged against me until I was ripe and ready to burst.”

Pen batted her hand at him to ward him off as she skittered around the hearth.

“And when you put your hands on my—”

“The priest has hidden something at the stone circle!”

Morgan stopped circling. “What? What stone circle?”

“I saw the standing stones that lie past the forest. You haven’t been there, but I think they’re important to Jean-Paul. I think he’ll return to Penance because he’s left something valuable behind. I didn’t allow him to leave my charge once he came to the castle, so he couldn’t have removed it. He’ll have to come back to Penance Isle.”

“Jesu,” Morgan whispered. “Are you certain?”

Pen gave him an exasperated look. “Of course not. This gift isn’t like reading a book of psalms, Morgan. All I know is that we should go to the standing stones. Though we’ll have difficulty convincing Dibbler and the others to go with us. They say they’re haunted. It’s a place of fell magic from forgotten times.”

He nodded. “I’ll go. You will remain here.”

“You don’t know how to get there.”

“Tell me.”

She put her hands on her hips.

“Pen, tell me.”

“If you go alone. I’ll only follow. After all, this is my island. The standing stones are on my lands.”

“Damnable, obstinate wretch.”

“The storm has faded,” she said. “We should go at once, for who knows how long it will take Jean-Paul to elude Lord Montfort and make his way back to Penance.”

“How can someone with such a merciful nature be so stubborn?”

He considered locking her in her room, but then he’d have to lock everyone away to keep her there. “Very well, but you’re to do as I say and keep behind me. And if by chance he’s there, you’re to leave. Promise, or I’ll not go at all.”

“I give you my vow. You’ve no need to fear. If I see him, I’ll run behind you with pleasure. That man consorts with the devil, Morgan.”

In less than an hour they were walking their horses through the forest. Dibbler and his company followed behind them on foot, their steps growing more reluctant the closer they came to the standing stones.

The forest dripped all around them. Morgan felt icy drops land on his head, penetrate to his scalp, and slide down to his neck. The air was wet and sharp with cold. His gloves felt stiff with the chill.

He glanced aside at Pen. A few moments past she’d directed a glance at the square-linked chain of his belt and muttered something that sounded like “black damask and gold” in an offended tone. A mysterious comment.

Pearl-shaded moonlight illuminated her profile, and he almost smiled at the lift of her square little chin. She’d guessed what he was about and sought to deny him his revenge. What rankled was that she was also trying to deny her desire for him.

Still, the more she defied him, the more he wanted her, and the more he had to admit she provoked his admiration. Jesu, the woman had more courage and audacity than a gyrfalcon.

Behind him he could heard Dibbler hissing orders at Sniggs, and Sniggs muttering protests. Turnip slipped on a pile of wet leaves on the forest floor. Erbut sneezed, and was shushed by all three who made more noise than had Erbut. Morgan shook his head, then pulled up his mount as Pen lifted her hand. She dismounted, and he joined her.

“The circle is but five minutes walk ahead in a plain that lies south of Much Cutwell.” She eyed her quarreling band of blunderers. “We should leave them here.”

“Wise advice,” he said, trying not to let the mockery in his tone become too apparent.

She wouldn’t take his hand when he offered it. Walking ahead of him, she led the way through leafless black trees that creaked in the wind. It wasn’t long before she paused at a point where the forest began to thin.

He joined her to look out onto a great plain that stretched from the edge of the forest to the western cliffs. Flat and featureless, its only landmark was an eerie arrangement of massive boulders. Upright stones stood in a circle, capped by a continuous horizontal lintel. They surrounded an inner horseshoe of giant stones, and around them both stretched a trench. The moonlight caused the stones to shine with a faint silver hue.

Pen moved, but Morgan held her back, waiting. He listened to a forest quiet after the ordeal of the black squall. Here and there on the plain lay limbs broken from trees. An owl circled over the standing stones and screeched, the call resounding in the vastness of the sky.

When he was certain the standing stones were deserted, he began to approach them with Pen at his side. Pen directed him toward a pair of slabs that appeared to mark the entrance to the structure. Before them stood a great conical stone, standing guard over the whole edifice. As they walked between the slabs, he saw Pen pause, then turn to look back at the conical stone.

“This is the heel stone,” she whispered. She gazed at it, frowning, then stepped past the slabs.

Morgan walked between the two stones, roughly hewn, upright rectangles. As he moved, the wind rushed through the narrow space. He heard something far off. That sibilant hissing.

Cocking his head, he strained to make sense of the whispers. A cloud moved across the moon, then floated on, and silver light illuminated the circle of stones. Long shadows stretched across the space between Morgan and the stones, forming a pattern of dark and light bars. That far-off whispering seemed to commence from inside his head rather than from any outside source.

“Are you coming?” Pen said.

Morgan started, then regained control of himself as the hissing vanished.

“Aye.”

He joined her, and they walked beneath the stone lintel. Pen walked around the half circle of inner stones to pause at the tallest. It consisted of two uprights surmounted by a lintel stone that must have weighed thirty tons. She stood in the resulting arch and gazed up at the stars. Morgan kept looked outward at the plain, watching for anyone’s approach. His view in the direction of Much Cutwell was blocked in part by several standing stones. He was about to move so that he could get a better look, when Pen spoke.

“No, this isn’t right.”

“What isn’t right?”

“Not here,” she said, and she walked past him, back the way they’d come.

He followed her. “God’s breath, Pen. Say you we’ve come for naught?”

“No,” she said without looking at him.

The rebuff stung. He sped up and almost caught her at the slab entrance, but as he passed between the two stones, that hissing came back to him. He slowed, then stopped, gazing about in an effort to find the source of the sound. Without warning the noise burst at him, loud, invasive, and painful.

He covered his ears, but the sound came from inside him. He planted a hand against one of the slabs for support—and glimpsed sunrise. He was floating above the plain, hovering over the standing stones. Grayish light covered everything, and the sky was beginning to glow with the first of the sun’s light. Long shadows stretched from the base of the standing stones toward the entrance slabs.

Men and women in coarse clothing stood about the circle. A young man in warrior’s garb holding an ax of bronze approached the conical stone. Another man in a long robe joined him. Together they turned toward the rising sun as those near the standing stones chanted.

Their voices buzzed inside Morgan’s head as the sun cleared the horizon and cast its light from the standing stones on a direct path through the entry slabs and onto the heel stone. The young man with the ax gave a shout. He turned toward the heel stone, and Morgan saw himself, arms raised, battle-ax held high. He found himself looking into his own eyes.

He gasped, recoiling, and then someone hit him. He blinked, and glanced down to find Pen clutching his
arm. He touched his cheek.

“You hit me!”

“You were babbling like one possessed.”

He grabbed her by the shoulders. “It was like a waking dream. I saw people, and a holy man, and—and a warrior with a bronze ax who looked like me.” Even to himself he sounded crazed.

“Saints.” Pen gaze up at him in wonder. “Do you know, I begin to think your own enchantment drew you to Penance.”

“I’ve been hearing these strange murmuring sounds, but I thought them only manifestations of my illness.” He felt a minute tremor of apprehension. “What does this portend? Am I possessed?”

“Fie,” Pen said. “Once, in times forgotten, your ancestors must have sprung from this island.”

Morgan cursed and shook his head. “I’m well repaid for how lightly I considered your suffering because of your gift.” No wonder Pen feared her own power. He felt besieged by devils and furious at being at the mercy of phantasms. He shook his head again. “Jesu, what ails me? We’ve no leisure for visions. Have you brought me here for nothing?”

“Arrogant wretch, I have not.”

Pen shrugged off his grip and went to the heel stone. She walked around it, then joined him to stare at it in silence. Morgan was still feeling slightly confounded by the experience of his vision, so he made no objection when she placed her hands on the flaked surface of the stone. Nor did he express vexation when she rubbed it as if it were a cat, then knelt at its base. Suddenly she dug her hands into the wet earth.

Morgan stood over her. “What has possessed you?”

“There’s something here.”

At this, he dropped to his knees and helped her. His hand dug into the earth and hit a slick shape.

“I’ve found it,” he said as he pulled a package from the mire.

Wrapped in oiled cloth and bound with twine, it was caked in grime. Morgan cut the twine. Pen pulled away the cloth to reveal a leather document case. They wiped their hands on the clean side of the protective cloth, then Pen opened the case and withdrew a sheaf of unfolded papers and a heavy velvet pouch containing gold and silver coins.

Morgan found another containing jewels. Into his hand spilled an enameled gold pendant set with diamonds and rubies, a gold ring set with an onyx cameo of Mary Stuart, and a heavy shoulder chain of silver bearing sapphires and pearls. He and Pen exchanged glances.

“A wealthy priest,” Morgan said as he stuffed the contents back in the pouch. “What have you?”

Pen rose, holding the papers. She held them so that they caught the moonlight. “Can you see?”

He looked over her shoulder, but there was little light. He glanced to the bottom of the page.

“This seal,” he said. “It belongs to the French ambassador at the Spanish court.”

He strained his eyes to catch some of the writing, then drew in his breath. “Jesu, Pen. Mary of Scotland is seeking funds from his majesty of Spain for her troops.” He maneuvered the pages to catch the light again.

Pen pointed to a line on the page. “She says she’d raised the army and wants him to help her keep it together so that—Almighty God …”

“I told you the priest was dangerous,” Morgan said.

“
Oui
,
Anglais
, I am,” said Jean-Paul. “Especially to you and your witch of a lady.”

A BREAST OF MUTTON STEWED

T
ake a very good breast of mutton chopped into sundry large pieces, and when it is clean washed, put it into a pipkin with fair water, and set it on the fire to boil; then scum it very well, then put in of the finest parsnips cut into large pieces as long as one’s hand, and clean washed and scraped; then good store of the best onions, and all manner of sweet pleasant pot herbs and lettuce, all grossly chopped, and good store of pepper and salt, and then cover it, and let it stew till the mutton be enough; then take up the mutton, and lay it in a clean dish with sippets, and to the broth put a little wine vinegar, and so pour it on the mutton with the parsnips whole, and adorn the sides of the dish with sugar, and so serve it up: and as you do with the breast, so may you do with any other joint of mutton.