Uncertain Magic (51 page)

"It's the truth," Geoffrey said softly, meaning more than the fire. "God's truth, Faelan. I feared she'd be down with pneumonia."

Roddy felt her husband's slow, harsh exhalation. "Yes. And so you rendered the only aid you could think of. I might have known it would involve taking a female's clothes off."

"She's all yours, my friend." Geoffrey's voice held a tentative grin. "Not in my style at all."

Roddy turned. "Of course not. Any female with a brain in her head isn't in your style," she said waspishly.

"You see what I mean."

"This is all very affecting," Earnest said, "but we aren't making much progress toward a port."

Roddy straightened. "I'm staying with Faelan," she de-dared. "It's you and Geoffrey who'd best leave the country."

"I'm not leaving without
you
. That's the only goddamned reason I'm here in the first place! God knows, I'd rather be on my way back to Dublin to clear myself. I don't fancy carrying the title of escaped felon all my life."

"'Escaped felon'! When Faelan risked his life—" Roddy almost choked on her ire. "Earnest, do you know what the House of Commons did that morning before Faelan got you out? They almost carried a measure to execute suspected rebels
before
the rebellion!
Before it
! So unless you're looking for posthumous vindication, you'd better take yourself off smartly!"

"Lord, poppet," Geoffrey said. "Where'd you learn words like that? 'Posthumous vindication.' It sounds like something your husband would say."

"It sounds to me more like something you'd say," Faelan drawled, "but consider the sentiment seconded."

"Then how does it look, for God's sake?" Earnest's voice quivered on a note Roddy had never heard from him before. "Escaping with the same damned rebel I'm supposed to have been helping in the first place?"

"It appears to me you're in prime shape." Faelan let go of Roddy and hefted her saddle from its sprawled position on the ground. "Covered on both sides. If the rebels have Dublin and the French are on the sea, you're a red-blooded patriot for aiding our hero here." He nodded toward Geoffrey. "If the thing's crushed—then… what do you know of it? Butter couldn't melt in your mouth. You've never seen a radical, never heard of democracy, never imagined an upstanding gentleman like Lord Geoffrey was a sleazy closet republican. You're just a poor English sod who came over to help his sister and got caught in the cross fire."

"Ever-practical Faelan," Geoffrey said indulgently.

Earnest looked exasperated. Roddy suspected it was because he had a notion that Faelan was right. For now, with the rebels apparently in control of most of the countryside, Geoffrey's company was more safeguard than menace. And later, once Earnest was out of Ireland, Delamore money and prestige would be standing against the flimsy evidence. And if the evidence weren't Faelan's, it would be flimsy—of that Roddy was certain. Earnest would very likely never even come to trial, unless it was for the escape itself. And surely that could be excused under the circumstances.

Earnest stood, glaring at Faelan and Roddy. She would not open to the question in his eyes, but instead answered by moving closer to Faelan. "Tell Papa that you did your best," she said in a softer voice. "But I can't come with you, Earnest. I can't."

His glance drifted over Faelan with lingering distrust. "Can't?"

"I won't." Roddy pressed back into her husband's arms.

For a long moment, Earnest hesitated. Then with an angry sound of defeat he turned to Geoffrey. "So. It's Wexford, is it?"

Geoffrey grinned. "You and I, comrade."

"
Comrade
." Earnest spun away in disgust.

Faelan worked open the leather bag attached to Roddy's saddle. "Take this." He pulled out a second pistol, a money purse, and a packet of powder and ball. "It throws left a hair. Remember that."

Earnest took the offering. He met Faelan's eyes with a level look. "Thanks," he said dryly, and then with a reluctant twist to his mouth: "For everything."

Faelan nodded, curt, and turned away. He repacked the saddlebag and held it toward Roddy. "We'll stop here for an hour to eat. I want to push on west while it's quiet."

They reached Kilkenny by noon. The town seemed drowsy with Sunday quiet, but Roddy had learned that horror could hide beneath the calm. They crossed the river Nore in view of the old castle walls, and she looked with eyes of weary apprehension at the scarlet coats of the occupying garrison stationed at points across the broad lawn. There was evidence that the area had been "disarmed" with the government's brutal effectiveness. She and Faelan had passed burned-out cottages and stripped farms, and no single soul had appeared on the road, though Roddy knew that the inhabitants were there—in hiding, watching from hedgerows and empty barns.

Faelan stopped just over the bridge and gave her a smile that looked strange and fierce in the dark stubble that shadowed his jaw. "Will you go another hundred miles if I ask you?"

Her whole body ached and her eyes burned. She'd been riding since midnight: she was hungry and thirsty and bruised and scared.

She looked up into his eyes and said, "Yes," without flinching.

He reached out and touched her cheek as their horses stood with heads lowered together. "Little girl. You're turning into a heroine on me."

"Am I?" She managed a smile in return. "It must be rubbing off of you."

He looked down at that, with a faint frown, as if it had been an accusation instead of praise. He swung off his horse and handed her the reins. "I'll see what I can find out."

A quarter of an hour later, Roddy was walking stiffly into an inn with the promise of at least a few hours' rest. "Not longer," Faelan said. "Nothing's reported to the south and west, but communication's cut off from Dublin. We're not far ahead of it."

"Thank you." She sat down and threw herself onto her back on the deep feather bed. "I'll certainly rest better for knowing that."

He pulled his boots off with the jack and sat beside her, smelling of horse and sweat and black powder. Roddy knew she could be no better, except for the powder smell. There was a smudge on his face where he'd used his arm as support once—aiming over his shoulder at a deserter who'd tried to take Roddy's horse.

She saw his lashes relax and lower as he looked down at her. His glance traveled the length of her body.

Roddy smiled and shifted her fingers, rubbing the back of his hand where it rested on the bed. "Too tired," she murmured. "Too tired." She closed her eyes and concentrated on the feeling of him, on the fine muscle and the bone beneath; his hard, steady warmth.

The mattress moved. He leaned over her. She felt his breath on her skin, and then the scratchy touch of his Cheek as he buried his face in her hair. "I'm sorry, love. God, I'm so sorry to put you through this."

She patted his back, the only part within easy reach, "It isn't your fault. 'Tis all the Geoffreys and the Mullanes and Willises in the world, who look at people and only see chess pawns. Who play with fire and think it's clay."

He rolled away and rested on his elbow, looking down at her with dark amusement. "Ah. She's become a philosopher now." He tangled his fingers in a strand of her hair and said slowly, "I'm sorry you're here, I meant, and not safe in England as Earnest would have you."

"Earnest," she said with disgust, and then bit her lip.

She turned suddenly, pressing her face to Faelan's shoulder. "Oh, God, I hope they make it."

He stroked her hair. "They will. Your brother has some sense, if Geoffrey doesn't."

"At least they had a chance." Her words were muffled in his coat. "Because of you."

His hand paused, wavered over her hair. He drew back and sat up. "Don't harp on that," he said harshly. The floor creaked under his feet as he stood and paced to the open window, where green light filtered through leaves and made a moving pattern on the wall.

She sat up. "No." Her words were soft. "I won't harp on it, if you don't like it. But I wanted to say—" She stopped, searching for words, and then shook her head in despair. "… 'Sorry.' That's not enough. That's not nearly enough. The things I said to you—the accusations—"

He turned on her. "Aye, you had every reason to doubt me."

"All I knew for certain was that you'd sent Earnest to the cottage." She could not tell him of her brother's suspicions, of how his interpretation had shaped hers. She shrugged, and looked at the plank floor. Color mounted in her cheeks. "You had far more reason to doubt me than I did you."

He shook off his coat and threw it over a chair. "Did I? You don't think I might have arranged Geoff's arrest in a jealous frenzy? And thrown in Earnest too, when I saw the chance?"

"No."

"'No, not anymore,' you mean." He stripped off his waistcoat and cravat. "You saw me break them out, so you think it's only logical that I didn't put them in."

She stared at him, suddenly uneasy with his words. "What are you saying?"

"I'm saying," he snarled, "that I don't remember what I did after I sent Earnest to that damned cottage to find you. I left there, and when I arrived at Denynane—" He bent his head, leaning into the windowpane, staring out as if there were demons in the yard below. "When I arrived at Derrynane—" He stopped again, and then like an explosion the words burst out of him. "—you were
there
, with that letter that said '
two days ago.'"

He refused to talk about it. The confession seemed to have been a rush of water from a weakened dam, quickly repaired and plastered over. That afternoon in Kilkenny, he had not allowed her even to respond, but only told her to go to sleep while she could, and pulled on his boots and left the room. Two hours later he'd woken her from exhausted unconsciousness and they'd ridden out of Kilkenny, driven by a rumor of rebel columns retreating south out of Carlow.

Now, close to home, she had finally begun to feel safe. In Kenmare, within the shadow of Iveragh's mountains, they had left the reports of uprising far behind. The country was in upset, but the rumors had become wilder and more unbelievable, and through her talent, Roddy picked out no one who had actually experienced any violence. The government repression in the area had been the same as in Iveragh—directed against property, not people. Roddy had come to understand how lucky the southwest had been in the restraint and humanity of the army's commanders there.

Over a quiet supper in one of Lord Kenmare's excellent inns, Roddy screwed up her courage and attacked the subject she'd been brooding upon since Kilkenny. "I think we should investigate," she said, between bites of stewed apple in their private parlor.

Faelan didn't look up from his lobster. "Investigate what?"

"Who betrayed Geoffrey and Earnest."

Instantly, she regretted her choice of words. He glanced at her, a flash of icy blue, and went back to his meal.

"The O'Sullivans and O'Connells can help us," she added doggedly. "Between them, they know everyone in the barony."

He poured himself another glass of wine.

"I've thought about it," she said. "It must have been someone who followed Earnest from Derrynane. No one but you and I knew Geoffrey was at the cottage, and only someone at the O'Connells could have known Earnest was trying to arrange passage for two people."