Midsummer Night

by Charlie N. Holmberg

  “Blackstone. Grace Blackstone. Don’t you find it odd that you want me to travel all the way into Tenali, and yet you didn’t know my name?”

  “I know it now, Miss Blackstone.”

  “Call me Grace. If I’m to travel all that way with you, we should be able to use our birth names, should we not?”

  Her ghost lit up, his outline shining and his presence slightly warmer. “Then you’ll go?”

  “You did say lives were on the line. I’m not the sort of woman to turn my back on real need.”

  It was exactly for that reason that she’d never left the boundaries of her village. She didn’t leave because her mother needed her. Her sister needed her. And Grace had never been able to turn away that need.

  But now, she’d spent several days listening to her brother telling her of the things outside their village, considering that she might never be able to make a match and have children of her own to teach, which would leave her teaching the village children for a bit of coin for the rest of her life. She would never have a life that belonged to her—except this small part. She would go and find her ghost’s body and help him, if she could. She would do it because even when she returned home again, the adventure of what she’d done would live on in her memory, free to revisit whenever she wished. The bills were paid. The garden was bursting with fruits and vegetables. Her mother could handle things for a few days.

  “I have to set my family to rights before I leave, but yes, I will help you Mr. Ghost.”

  “Mr. Ghost?”

  “I apologize. I do not remember your name.”

  “My name is Arell Kiran.” His pale silhouette bowed. “You may call me Arell.”

  She smiled at the thrill of excitement that filled her along with a new sense of purpose. She sent Annabelle with a message for the farmer’s son who lived next door, who in turn must take the message straightaway to the village in the morning and put it in the hands of the magistrate so the man would know Grace wouldn’t be available to teach his children for a while. The message further explained that she’d send word when lessons would be available again.

  When Annabelle left to deliver the message, Grace explained to her mother that she needed to take a brief journey but would be back as soon as she could be. There was much arguing and questioning, but Grace shared little of the information the ghost had given her. Her mother only relented when Grace declared she needed a break. A minute to herself to think.

  “Don’t you feel you owe me that, Mama? Don’t I deserve a few days in light of the many years I have given you?”

  No argument could be given in response to Grace’s question, because her mother did owe her.

  Annabelle had returned in the meantime and followed Grace into her room after she’d made her mother promise to not neglect the garden or her sister, though Annabelle often insisted she could take care of herself.

  “But you haven’t said where you’re going!” Annabelle complained as Grace hurried to pack a bag with things she would need for the journey. The ghost might not require food or bedding, but she surely would.

  “There are people who are unwell. I’m going to help them.”

  “That doesn’t tell me anything!” Annabelle swept back the stray strands of blonde hair from her face and then propped her fists on her hips.

  “Are you not ready yet?” The ghost, Arell, was suddenly in her room, dropping the temperature enough that Annabelle shivered.

  She looked hard in the direction of the cold and gasped. “It’s the ghost! You’re going with the ghost!” Her pale eyebrows furrowed together. “Why are you going with the ghost, and where are you going?”

  “She’s a clever child,” Arell said.

  “She is clever, too clever sometimes.”

  “Did the ghost just call me clever?” Annabelle looked pleased.

  “Can you not hear him?” Grace asked. When her baby sister shook her head, Grace nodded. “Well, prove the ghost right, and be clever by being a good girl while I’m gone. Mind your chores and listen to Mama.”

  “Is the child not afraid of me?” Arell asked.

  “She’s excited, not afraid.”

  “Did he call me a scaredy baby?” Annabelle asked.

  “No, dearest. No one would ever say anything like that about you. I’m taking the ghost home so he can find peace. And don’t tell Mama about the ghost. She’d never understand. Promise?”

  Annabelle gave a solemn nod.

  Grace cinched up her bag of belongings and kissed her mother and sister farewell. She tried not to cringe on the outside along with the twinge of guilt on the inside. She shouldn’t leave them. It wasn’t responsible. But was letting a ghost stay a ghost responsible? Was letting the royal family die without warning anyone responsible?

  She prepared her horse and tied her bags of provisions to the saddle. She’d brought a bedroll and enough food to hopefully not need to dip into her coin purse. Being willing to help didn’t mean she was willing to let her family go hungry come winter.

  She looked toward the source of iced air at the barn door. Her traveling companion made her feel as though winter had already come. I shouldn’t be doing this, she thought. What kind of woman leaves her family to go off and do the bidding of a stranger? But what kind of woman would she be if she stayed?

  She pulled herself up into the saddle. “So how does this work?” she asked.

  “Work?”

  “You’re far too cold to be on the back of my horse. You’ll freeze her where she stands.”

  He paused, considering. “I’d suggest I meet you at our destinations, but a woman shouldn’t be traveling alone. Can you not blanket the horse?”

  “And what of me? I will also freeze if you ride behind me. Besides, no one can see you. It’s the same as me traveling alone.” Her horse sidestepped and pawed at the ground, anxious to be moving now that she had a rider. “Easy, Maisy. Easy, girl.” She might have been talking to herself as well as the horse for all the worry she felt bubbling and brewing in her belly.

  “And what do I do if you’re injured or harmed along the way? How would I know how to find you if I leave you?”

  “How did you know to find me the first and second time we’ve crossed paths?”

  He didn’t answer, likely because he didn’t know. Grace tsked, feeling as anxious as Maisy to be on their way. She felt if she stayed too much longer, then she might change her mind altogether. “Fine.” She slid off Maisy and hurried to the house where she gathered up the three quilts from the trunk at the foot of her bed.

  She used two of the quilts to cover the horse and then wrapped the third over herself. She felt the weight of his cold settle in behind her—not a physical weight, nothing that would actually add to Maisy’s burden, but the tangible cold had an emotional weight. She hated to admit how much safer she felt knowing he’d not left her to travel alone.

  She released a self-deprecating breath. Safer? Traveling with a ghost?

  “I’m truly not dead,” he said as if he heard her thoughts.

  Maisy hardly seemed to notice the cold as she nickered and stamped her impatience to leave.

  “Of course not.” With no more excuses, Grace clucked her tongue and coaxed the mare forward.

  Once they were out past the surrounding villages and on the first roads leading to Tenali, Grace slowed Maisy’s gait to an easier walk. She needed to save the animal’s strength so they didn’t kill the poor thing.

  “It’s brave of you to be willing to help me. Honestly, it’s brave of you to have not run screaming when I first entered your room.”

  She laughed. “I did entertain that idea for a brief moment, but that would have required me to leave my blankets. As cold as you’d made my room, there was no way I had any intention of leaving the little warmth left to me.”

  He laughed as well, the sound silvery and warm. She got the feeling laughing wasn’t something he did very often.

  He fell silent immediately after, which only deepened her b
elief that he’d lived a rather solemn existence. “I’m sorry about ever entering your room. I was standing outside the door of your home and was about to knock. My only thought was to ask for help, and suddenly there I was with you.”

  “Well, you went to the right place in my household if it was help you were after. My mother happens to be afraid of the dark, and my sister, while not afraid of the dark and not really afraid of anything else either, is still just a small child.”

  “What of your brother? Was he not there that night?”

  Grace felt the niggle of resentment that came when she thought of her brother and shoved it away. “He was home then, but just to visit. He had to move out a while back to learn his trade. Right now, the only person he helps is himself.”

  She hadn’t meant to say the last out loud.

  “You’re angry with him.”

  Grace twisted in the saddle to try to meet the ghost’s eye, though she couldn’t see more than a sliver of his shape. “No! I’m not angry. He should have left years ago to make his own way.”

  She didn’t add that she should’ve left years ago to make her own way as well. It didn’t matter.

  “What of your father?”

  Grace pressed her tongue against her teeth as she formed the words in her mind before letting them escape her mouth. She didn’t want to disparage her family. She loved them, after all. “He went on a hunting trip and didn’t return. He was the sort of man to jump into the fray of any situation—even dangerous ones, I suppose. The townsfolk say he was filled with life, that he gobbled up every opportunity put in his way during the course of a day. Exuberant and energizing, they called him.”

  When Arell didn’t answer, Grace thought she must have done a good job at hiding how she felt about her father’s exuberance.

  “I always imagined that if I had a wife and child, I’d be less likely to jump into any so-called fray. I mean no disrespect to your father, but even now, with my own life, I’m cautious—at least as much as a member of the royal guard is able. When other people depend on you, it’s more responsible to think before jumping.”

  Grace wanted to reply, to either defend her father or to agree completely. Since she was torn as to which she wanted most, she said nothing at all.

  “But truly, I mean no disrespect.”

  “No. It’s fine for a person to say their mind. I’m the one who meant no disrespect. I love my family. The burden of being the eldest daughter falls to me, which means it’s my brother who must learn his trade for our survival. And I must stay in the home for the same reason. Any bitterness that may come from that is a failing of mine, not of theirs.”

  They crossed the bridge over the river, and Grace felt as though the universe played a cruel joke on her. “This bridge, for example,” she said. “I’ve never crossed it before. I’m now officially farther than I’ve ever been from my front door. And I’ve always wanted to travel to Blosen to see the glass blowers. I’ve heard there is no sight on earth like it. We’ll be traveling through the heart of that city. The irony is that I’ll still not see the majesty of their arts.”

  “I’m sorry,” Arell said, making her feel even worse. She didn’t mean to complain or be bitter. She didn’t mean to say any of it out loud as she had, but her feelings felt scoured like a pot drying on the sideboard.

  She laughed again and rolled her eyes at herself for being such wretched company. “Apologies? No. That will not do. For a man to apologize because he asks that his life and the lives of an entire family be put before some silly woman’s desire to see the whimsical will not do at all. No. I am sorry. Your situation is in every way horrible. And I will do my best to put it to rights.”

  She was sure she’d merely imagined it, but it felt as though his arm had come around her and squeezed ever so slightly. But that couldn’t have happened because she would have felt the cold of his touch, and she felt only warmth.

  They shifted among a walk, a trot, and a canter to protect the horse from wearing down while continuing forward. They followed the road alongside the river, which meant that they remained with a steady supply of water while they traveled. Arell assured her they would maintain their water supply because they would be following one of the tributaries to the river all the way to the palace. It was a trade route that was well enough traveled to keep them on good road.

  And they talked.

  About everything.

  About the royal family, about the king and how he worked hard to be fair to everyone, about the queen and how she spent more time playing with her children than throwing parties, which some courtiers liked and others didn’t. They talked about Arell’s family and how his mother had died in childbirth and his father had been a soldier. Arell had grown up in the guard house and could hold a sword before he’d lost his first baby tooth. When his father became sick and followed Arell’s mother in death, the other soldiers had kept Arell, figuring the boy was one of their own.

  “They’re my family, you see,” Arell said once they were camped in a clearing off the road well enough to keep them from becoming interesting to anyone of the bandit variety who might be passing by. “That’s why this business of Simmons betraying them is so hard for me to understand. Sure, Simmons is newer than most of the men within our ranks, but he’s one of us. How could he do such a thing?”

  Grace shrugged from where she was seated on her bedroll. The night was warm enough to not need a fire as long as Arell stayed a short distance away and Grace managed to stay bundled. Arell had said lighting a fire might draw attention. He worried because his limited appearance would make it look like Grace traveled alone. “Who can say why some people make choices that hurt others and ultimately themselves? What if they would stop only long enough to consider the consequences of their actions?”

  “I’m sorry,” Arell said. “I’ve done all the talking, and we’ve been gone the better part of a full day.”

  “Don’t apologize. It’s interesting to talk to someone when the conversation isn’t with parents and has nothing to do with their children and how well those children are learning their letters or when it isn’t with older ladies from town and has nothing to do with how my mother is faring or when it isn’t with younger ladies in town and has nothing to do with when my brother might return or if he might be interested in the young lady in question.”

  Arell laughed. And as it had so often throughout the day, the sound warmed her.

  “So your brother is a catch, is he?”

  “To many, it would seem he is. Our family is far from wealthy, but my brother is a handsome one—handsome enough to make him hard to ignore.”

  “Must run in your family.”

  Grace felt heat flash up her neck. He thought her handsome? “Excuse me?”

  Arell stammered before saying, “He likely takes after one of your parents? Your father, maybe? I didn’t see your mother, but often young men favor their fathers in looks.”

  Her cheeks burned even hotter at that. So, he hadn’t meant the compliment to her. She felt foolish for thinking such a thing and grateful to have no campfire to give away her blush. The conversation, which had been energetic and seemed incapable of stopping, finally wilted into the darkness between them.

  Grace yawned, though she felt too invigorated by her circumstances to be tired, and explained they should try to get some sleep. “That is, if you do sleep. Do ghosts sleep?”

  “I’m not dead,” he reminded her.

  “No. I know, but you’re not here either.” She shook her head and felt as though she might never say another intelligent thing again. “Anyway, I need to sleep. Goodnight, Arell.”

  “Goodnight, Grace.”

  She slid into her bedroll and looked in the direction of her ghost. He seemed brighter, more visible in the moonlight. She snapped her eyes shut when she realized she considered him handsome even if he didn’t return that feeling. Don’t be a fool, she thought. Ghosts are not handsome.

  But no matter what she told herself, she kn
ew that her ghost was, in fact, very handsome. And her feelings regarding that fact had little to do with his looks.

  Arell

  Arell watched Grace as she slept—or pretended to sleep. He’d embarrassed her by insinuating that she might be attractive, but he couldn’t help what she was. He shouldn’t be noticing how she looked, the way her every movement enchanted him.

  She managed her horse well, an area in which few enough women in his acquaintance had any skill. She was a considerate master of the animal. Her horse had repaid the kind consideration with miles. They’d made it farther than he’d hoped. And yet there was still so much land to cover. So much was at stake if they failed to reach their destination in time.

  So why was he wasting time watching the way her dark hair fell over her pale cheeks? Why was he wishing he could brush that hair out of her face so that he could see the curve of her jaw? Why was he wishing she would open those eyes that looked like pools of cool blue water?

  Not that he needed anything cool. He was cold enough. But with her nearby, even the cold felt bearable.

  He’d told her that he’d ended up in her room when he’d tried to knock on the front door for help. What he didn’t tell her was that he’d remembered being in the dark, feeling the cold of his crypt all around him. He remembered feeling a desperate need to find help at that moment. The next thing he knew, he was at her farm. It was as if the universe knew she would help, that it equated such service with her.

  And why not?

  What an incredible person she was to be willing to agree to this journey, even to be willing to believe his outlandish tales. Not one woman had ever caught his eye or his interest so intensely in all his life before now. But not one woman had ever been as full of service, compassion, and intelligence as this one woman.

  He felt more anxious than ever to be restored to his own body, to be able to actually touch her cheek, to hold her warmth close to him, to taste her perfect, rosy lips—Stop it! But his mind didn’t stop thinking of her, not even when he turned away and looked up at the sky and the ever growing moon. Not enough time, he thought. We don’t have enough time. Not enough time to spare his life and save the royal family. Not enough time to spend with this woman who’d undone him and bewitched him even more deeply than Norton. Norton’s bewitching was the work of a spell. But the feelings this woman brought out in Arell were greater than any magic.