“Please,” her voice shuddered in his ear. “Nae matter his cruelty, he’s one of them, and they’ll never let ye live if ye kill him!Stop!”
It was another wave that did her work for her, separating Thomas’s death grip on the man and sending him tumbling onto the shore. He was shaking once more, but no longer with cold. No longer with fear. He swiped the seawater from his eyes as he saw the handful of village men dragging Dragan’s limp bulk out of the foam. They awkwardly maneuvered him onto the path and away toward the village, leaving Thomas alone in the rain with the woman and, standing some distance away, her father.
She stared at him, her eyes red, her chest heaving through her soaked gown.
“Who are you?” she asked incredulously, her voice breaking.
Thomas returned her confused gaze for a long moment. Who was he? He couldn’t be Thomas Annesley—that man was dead, killed at Darlyrede along with Cordelia; killed by betrayal on the bridge to Carson Town; killed on the wooded slope of Town Blair, just beyond Starving Lake by the stone in his own hand. Thomas Annesley was dead and buried so many times over, he could never be resurrected again.
And that was perhaps the way it must be if he was to survive, here at the end of the earth.
“Tommy,” he croaked at last. “I’m Tommy.”
“All right,” the woman whispered. “All right, Tommy. I’m Jessie Boyd. Come on now, back to the house. There’s a storm blowin’ in.”
Chapter 1
October 1458
Darlyrede House
Northumberland, England
“Is it done?”
The rasping whisper and skeletal fingertips digging through the sleeve of her gown caused the maid to gasp and freeze in her movements—she hadn’t known the lady was awake, she’d been so still, her eyelids drooping so low.
“Yes, milady.All is ready.”
“Then I am also ready,” Caris Hargrave said. She opened her hand and turned it palm up toward the maid, who took it in a firm but gentle grip and then seized the woman’s forearm, pulling her into a sitting position on the thick mattress, forested by towering piles of cushions and throws. The noblewoman dragged her thin legs from beneath the coverlet and, at first glimpse of the woman’s bare feet, the maid dropped to her knees to fit the fine, tall, calfskin slippers over the pale, blue-veined skin.
“Cordelia? No, of course that’s not right.” Lady Hargrave sighed crossly. “Forgive me; I…I haven’t beensleeping, and—”
“Think nothing of it,” the maid said, pulling the ties of the slippers tight—but not too tight—against the fragile bones of the lady’s foot. It was like fitting a songbird with armored boots. “I am called Beryl, milady. Remember?”
And that was true. The first rule was to tell the truth as much as possible.
“Beryl, of course. How could I...” Her words trailed away.
Beryl helped Lady Hargrave to stand, then held the thick robe while the woman slid her arms inside. She braced her with an arm around her waist and then, together, they turned toward the door and began aslow advance.
The maid reached out an arm to open the ornately carved door leading to the adjoining chamber.
“I remember now,” Caris Hargrave said as they entered the glowing chamber, lit by exactly fifteen candles. “The abbey.”
“That’s right, milady,” Beryl murmured, leading the woman through to the long, lead-paned window. “I will tryto remind you.”
“No, no,” Caris said dismissively as she lowered herself gingerly onto the window seat. “It is only a remnant of my nightmares, Beryl.”
As soon as Lady Hargrave was settled, Beryl took a step backward and folded her hands at her waist, prepared to wait silently. She would be standing here for at least an hour, and while there would be little conversation, it was an opportunity to further observe, and Beryl would take full advantage of it.
Lady Caris Hargrave. Aged three score, if reports were averaged. Her dark brown hair contained not even one strand of silver, her face pale and lovely still, even if the skin was thin and draped over the fine bones of her face like fragile pastry over a tart. Her eyes were the same dark shade as her hair, her brows wispy and arched.
Beryl thought that this woman could have passed for her own mother, and it made her heart ache quietly in her chest.
Lady Hargrave wore no veil in such private attire as her sleeping gown and robe; none of the heavy jewels Beryl had occasionally glimpsed. But, then again, she never wore them at night when she took up the vigil in the hauntingly still apartment of rooms that was Beryl’s primary domain. The entirety of her duties at Darlyrede House took place here, and they must be done with absolute precision.
Fresh linens. A pitcher of cold milk and a plate of cheese and crisp bread. Fifteen new candles lit and kept burning as night crept across the moors toward Darlyrede House. Every night. And for the first hour of the vigil, Caris Hargrave would keep watch at the window, waiting for the return of her missing niece. Fifteen candles to mark the age Euphemia Hargrave had been when she had disappeared.
