The Guardian (Chronicles of Dover's Amalgam Book 1) (23 page)

“Do not dare to vomit,” he whispered. He leaned against her with his chest to her back. She shivered when his warm breath tickled her ear, and tried not to shrug or she would trap his head between her shoulder and cheek. She nodded. His hands came to rest on her sides, his large body caging her. “And I will try not to kill anyone for abetting the demise of these children.”

Elizabet was lost for words. He was serious. It would be nothing for him to cut down a group of nuns—she was sure of it. She could hear the anger in his voice and feel the strength of him at her back. He pressed against her, one of his arms snaking down and coming around her waist. She could sense the thinly veiled abeyance of civilization. Seeing him in battle had changed her vision of him. While it did not make her like him any less, she held a greater respect for who he was and what he stood for.

“Give me conscience, Elizabet, for it is failing me.”

“You’ll do what is right,” she said. She licked her lips and felt the roughness of the linen against her tongue. He was sucking the breath from her standing this close, this intimate. She did not know how to respond.

Jareth rested his head against her shoulder. “God help me.” He squeezed her against him before he released her.

She quickly forgot how good it felt to be held when the group of children turned and stared at the sound of creaking as the door swung open. Any thought or feeling other than outrage, pity, and mourning would be sacrilegious and mean. The children were of all ages, dirty, under- and inappropriately dressed. The smell, which intensified with the opening of the door, wafted from the room.

Jareth’s gaze darted throughout the room. Some children lifted their heads from their pillows as if rising was too burdensome to attempt.

“They are dying,” he said flatly. It was not his way to spare the raw truth. “All of them.”

Elizabet peered around him and through the open doorway where tiny, hopeful faces awaited. The position required her to stand on tip toes to see over his shoulder. She brought her hand to the makeshift mask to ensure it was secure.

Jareth’s mouth turned down in the corners. “We will perform last rites and pray for mercy. It is all that can be done. Make them comfortable, and then we shall go. Can you handle this?” He peered at her over his shoulder.

She nodded. “Is it the plague?”

“Yes,” he answered. “But I cannot be sure whether it is bubonic until I assess them.” He stepped aside and motioned for her to enter. “Shall we?”

They went straight to the back of the room, passing the many beds that riddled the room. There was a large wardrobe along the far wall; Jareth pushed it aside to reveal a hole in the mud plaster. He crammed his hand down into the opening and retrieved a zippered leather satchel.

Elizabet lifted a brow. “You have medical bags hidden in walls and you carry a bottle of ibuprofen? Anything else you want to tell me?”

“I save lives,” Jareth explained. There were seven empty water pitchers laid out on the only table in the room. He shoved them to the side and set the case down. “It is what I do, and I could not care how it is done. Sometimes I choose to cheat fate.”

“You love children,” she said as he took vials from the bag. “Especially those without families. I so get this about you.” She glanced back and noticed he had closed the door. “It’s one of the reasons I agreed to help you.”

His movement slowed, but he did not stop rummaging deep into the bag. “When you make certain assessments of my character, it sounds as though you romanticize me.” He looked up at her. “Do not.” His thick, black brows came together. “I am not a hero. Heroes do not cheat.”

“Not all heroes have access to the future.”

Jareth said nothing in his defense. He said nothing at all of a private nature as they worked. Whatever had passed between them was on hold, and he was all business. He put on a physician’s mask and everything else ceased to exist. It was yet another side of him she had never seen.

The room was set up youngest to oldest, although some of the healthier older girls helped with the babies. He commented that it was normal to have males and females together in an orphanage that housed all ages.

Elizabet applied salve to severely blistered bottoms while Jareth listened to lung and heart sounds with a modern stethoscope and assessed each live child. They found twenty dead in their small beds. It broke her heart that no one bothered to remove them for burial. Two of the stronger boys removed the bodies. They resembled walking corpses themselves, but did as they were told and hoisted the bodies over the window sill. Jareth said Gabriel and Minh would know what to do when they saw the collection of dead bodies leaking from the window.

Jareth administered oral pain medicine to the older children and cajoled small infants into sipping from a plastic syringe filled with anti-pyretic medicine. He was a pirate, and she would have smiled at the thought if things had not been so grave. They were using smuggled, modern means to aid these children. She was both proud and in awe that he cared enough for forgotten children. The way he held each baby, each child, was a blow to Elizabet’s heart. His voice was soothing and kind as he ministered care to them with tender touches. He was nailing her fate and he did not even know it.

Jareth uncorked a vial of oil and tilted it against his fingertip. He made the sign of the cross on the girl’s forehead and bowed over her, then murmured a prayer in Latin.

The girl holding vigil at the bedside looked to be about eleven years old and was ravaged herself. She asked Jareth a question in Norman French. Elizabet paused in what she was doing to listen to their conversation; Jareth would share with her later what was said. It was not hard to imagine, though. The seriousness and fear were heavy as she spoke.

“She is the girl’s sister,” Jareth confirmed in English. They will both be gone by morning.” He asked the girl another question in slow, sympathetic French. Two tears spilled onto her cheeks and her bottom lip sucked into her mouth as she sobbed.

Jareth looked away and wiped the oil from his fingertip and onto the bed. The girl came to kneel where he could reach her. Jareth tipped the bottle against his fingertip. His hand shook, but he made the sign of the cross on the girl’s forehead and recited the prayer of the sick—the last prayer said before one died.

THEY TRAVELED HARD
for several hours before they stopped to rest their horse. Jareth kept a punishing pace, as if riding recklessly would change what they had seen. Elizabet rode behind Jareth so he could ride hard, and she clung to him. They wanted to reach Dover by nightfall, because they did not know how many of James’s men had escaped. It would be unwise to forget why they were far from home.

Jareth scratched the animal behind her ears as he held a bucket of ravine water for it to drink. It was not the first time she was caught off guard by the way he dressed. It was simple attire; a white shirt, black pants and boots, but all modern. They were custom made to suit his taste, which was a mixture of various time periods. It made him even dearer that he could have a touch of vanity and still be so honorable.

“Do you need the bathroom?” Minh’s inquiry shook Elizabet from her thoughts. He grinned slightly and wagged his eyebrows when he caught her gawking at Jareth.

Elizabet leveled a stern expression at Minh. The break in silence captured Jareth’s attention and he caught her staring before she could look away. “I can hold it.”

“You’ve been holding it for hours,” Gabriel said as he emerged from the forest’s edge. Obviously, he had no compulsion against using a tree for a toilet.

“We won’t peek,” Minh promised.

“I’m fine,” she said. In fact, she had been to the bathroom in Portsmouth. It was not something she liked about medieval time and she was rather embarrassed at how the maid remained the entire time she used the chamber pot. She heated and felt a deep blush at the memory. She was planning to learn how long she could hold her pee. “Yep, I’m fine.”

Jareth set the bucket on the ground; the horse’s nose followed and he continued to drink. “Give us a moment,” he said.

Minh and Gabriel exchanged looks. After a beat, Minh shrugged and pulled an arrow from his quiver. “Whatever,” he muttered under his breath. He notched the arrow against his bow and walked across the path with it drawn as his eyes swept the perimeter.

“Fifteen minutes,” Gabriel said. “There are wolves in the area and we are far from Dover. Another fifty miles.” He jerked his head in the direction he just came from. “There’s a clearing about twenty paces. I saw a doe about twenty paces northeast—just the head and hooves. Someone’s hunting this area. We can’t be sure they’ll be friendly. We haven’t identifying flag or colors.”

“I’ll go back to the fork in the road and scout. Be sure no one is following us,” Minh called over his shoulder.

Jareth motioned for Elizabet to go before him into the line of trees. It was winter and the trees were mostly barren, but the density of proximity gave privacy as they entered the sleeping forest.

“Are you ill?” Jareth asked.

Elizabet jumped. She had not expected his voice to be mere inches from her ear. The heat from his body radiated against her the way it had at the orphanage; he was only inches from her person. She tightened the cloak around her, taking special care to cover her neck and ear lest he make her shiver. His voice alone was lethal. Her entire world was tilting on its axis, yet Jareth went about as though everything was business as usual. He showed no signs of her inner turmoil.

“I’m fine,” she stammered. “Just not used to traveling by horse.”

“Elizabet, look at me. Something has changed. I can sense it.” He was close on her heels. She increased the speed of her steps. Her short legs had nothing on his longer stride, but she did it anyway. She needed space, not a gravely handsome man-boy who played havoc on her feminine senses. It was scrambling her peace of mind.

They had ventured far enough that they were hidden by the dense trees. The sun peeked through the branches, giving a faint glow. It was sundown. The night would be upon them in the hour.

“I don’t want to look at you,” she bit out and was remorseful at once. He would not understand her irritation.

“Why?”

She could hear the smile in his voice and that made her smile. It killed the anxiety she felt, so she stopped in a clearing. Her hands clenched at her sides as she braced herself. He was close again. The edge of her cloak rustled as he passed, and her eyes went downcast as she shifted to follow him with her gaze. “Because I’m afraid of what I might see.”

“Are you afraid, also, of what you might not see?” She sensed that he paused. The wind kicked up and blew a flurry of leaves across her feet. “Because I can assure you that you will not be disappointed.”

“What do you think I want to see?” Her breath hitched in her throat, where her heart was racing. Jareth had a way of sucking energy from the air when he was intense, and right now—right here—he was
intense
. It was evident in the way his stride was loped and calculated as if he were either stalking her or trying to calm her. She had seen her grandfather do this with horses that needed to be broken.

That idea caused her to panic. She did not need to be broken, but instead, to stay intact. In her life, she had never been in a relationship. She did not know what a broken heart was and had no compulsion to find out.

He stepped back, the leaves rustling under his boots. Hoby boots again; both the pirate and the rebel in him appealed to her equally, if she was honest with herself. There were so many facets to his personality that she could not pick out the one that did her in—the one that snagged her and engraved his name on her heart. It was impossible to choose when so much of him was perfect and good. He had tarried after Portsmouth to look after orphaned children when his own life was in danger. Who did that?

Someone wonderful, that was who. Elizabet was lost. Even if she only admitted it to herself, she must be honest.

“You are terrified to find yourself married. Married and in a time you do not know. You are frightened because you are no longer considered a child.” His voice was deep and soothing. “You are frightened that I may take from you and give nothing in return. You are scared that you will be left with a broken heart.”

Elizabet closed her eyes and nodded. There was freedom in admitting that. Freedom and wonder that Jareth could voice the intentions of her heart with assurance. That he could voice exactly what she felt. If he was perfect, she was the opposite side to his coin—the tarnished side that was flawed. While she had come to the conclusion that she was hopelessly enthralled somewhere between Torquay and the orphanage, she was sure he saw how unsuited they were. “How do you know?”

“Consider this—perhaps it is how I feel as well. Perhaps I am fearful that you will find me unacceptable once you see me for who I really am.” She opened her eyes and raised her chin. That haughty brow of his winged upward and his lips twisted. “I kill easily. My mind is a tool no one knows quite what to do with. The nature of my birth is questionable. I have a tendency to become obsessed with certain topics, and there is no cure for it.”

“I’ve heard all of this before, but it’s you who doesn’t know everything about me,” Elizabet insisted. “There are things I’ve learned about myself through Google. Things I’ve had a hard time believing.” The cloak fanned open and let in cold air. She tipped her face to the shrouded sky; the sun’s rays bled through the pointed bare limbs of the treetops.

Saying this would make it real. “I am the first Duchess of Dover. I will have six children by you and die when I am ninety-three.” She held her breath for a beat, because the air in her lungs had escaped. Jareth’s eyes held an intense stare that she could not behold for long, but it was as if he was encouraging her to continue. To get it out; throwing down a gauntlet. While saying the words aloud made it real, it also sounded as absurd as a fairy tale. But it was her life. It was no story. Elizabet forced herself to hold his gaze. “I die after you.”

“At least I will never mourn you,” he said, his voice soft. It was weird how she thought he was closer but now there was space between them. It was as if he had faded slowly away to give her the room she needed. He was leaning against a tree, watching her with that intense stare that had her nailed to this spot in the woods.