Luckily, both granary and forge were significantly taller than the cottage wedged between; if that hadn't been so, both would have caught alight by now. They had a chance, a slim one, of saving both buildings, each, in different ways, essential to life at the manor.
Richard strode into the action before the cottage, now all but pulsing with flames. Time and again, he swore at grooms or laborers who sent their bucket loads too far from the vital walls. "We need it where it counts!" he roared up the ladder.
Grasping one bucket, he used his height to send its contents washing over one of the exposed beams in the granary wall. "That," he yelled, pointing to the area, "is where the danger lies."
One of the dangers.
He kept a sharp eye on the men on the ladders, stepping in to rotate them as they, most exposed to the heat rising from the fire, wilted. And when it seemed they were losing the battle for the forge, he went into the garden, grabbed a spade, strode down to the riverbank, and hacked through the softened ice to the water below, uncaring of the iced slush freezing his boots.
Within seconds, Henderson and one of the older grooms were beside him, helping to widen the hole. Then they were bucketing as fast as human hands could manage, sending pails filled with icy slurry up the gardens. Once the faster rate was established, chest heaving, Richard ran back up the slope, grabbing men as he went, positioning them bodily, too out of breath to speak.
As tired as he, but equally determined, they understood; nodding, they formed another bucketline from the river to the front of the forge.
Running back to the yard, Richard paused before the cottage only to rotate the men on the ladders again, then strode quickly to the pump. "Faster," he ordered, as he fetched up beside it. "We need more."
Two wilting farmhands looked at him in dismay. "The river's low-we can't," one of them stammered.
"Low or not," Richard growled, physically displacing them, "faster will still yield more."
He set a new pump rhythm, half again what it had been. "Here"-he passed the pump handle back to the farmhands-"keep it going like that."
They both looked at his face and didn't dare argue. They pumped. Faster. Richard waited to make sure it was fast enough, then nodded, and glanced at the other four men recovering from their shifts. "If you need to, rotate more often. But if you value your hides, don't slow down."
Quite what he meant by that, he neither knew nor cared, but the threat had the desired effect. The group manning the pump lifted their effort and sustained it-long enough to make the vital difference.
On the back step, leaning against the wall, her hands still in the pot of water, Catriona watched it all-the fight to save the manor's buildings. Watched Richard exhort the men to greater efforts, watched him instill his own determination into them. Watched him form them into a coherent force, then direct it at the enemy in the most effective way. Watched him whip them up when they were flagging, when the flames seemed poised to gain the upper hand. Saw them respond, meeting every demand he made of them.
She'd sent the other women and all the children inside, given orders for food to be prepared, for water to be heated. Done all she could to support the effort he was making for her-for them.
Eventually, they won. The flames, denied any hold on the neighboring buildings, spluttered, faded, then died, leaving the cottage a smoldering ruin of glowing embers and charred wood.
They were exhausted.
Richard started sending the men in, the oldest and weakest first, keeping the strongest with him to finish damping down the scene. At the last, when only wisps of smoke and an acrid stench rose from the building, he and Irons hefted grappling hooks, swung them about the ends of the big beams-and brought the whole structure crashing down.
Henderson, Huggins and the handful of grooms still standing used pitchforks to drag, poke and prod the smoldering remains about the yard, spreading them to minimize any chance of fresh fire.
With heavy axes, Richard and Irons weighed into what was left of the cottage, one from either side. By the time they'd finished, there were no contacts remaining between what had been the cottage and either the forge or the granary.
The buildings were secure.
Heaving a huge sigh, Richard leaned on the axe and cast a long look over the scene. Irons came to stand beside him, his axe on his shoulder. Richard glanced at his face. "We'll build it again, although not, I think, just there."
"Aye." Irons scratched his chin. " 'Twasn't wise, seemingly. The woodpile at the back didn't help, neither."
"Indeed not." Richard sighed as he straightened. And made a mental note to check where the manor's main woodpile was located. He couldn't remember seeing it; it might well be against the back of the granary. Or the stables. "Seasoned wood should be stored away from farm buildings-we'll need to build another shelter farther back."
"Aye, 'twould be silly not to learn the lessons The Lady sends us." Irons straightened and looked directly at Richard as he held out his hamlike hand for the axe. "I'm in your debt."
Richard smiled wearily; he clapped Iron's broad shoulder as he handed over the axe. "Thank The Lady." He turned away. Lifting his head, he saw Catriona waiting-and murmured, "This is what I'm here for."
They gathered in the aftermath in the dining hall. All were weary, but too keyed up to rest; the effect of what they'd faced had yet to leave them.
Richard took his seat by Catriona's side at the main table and gratefully helped himself to the thick stew and fresh bread Cook and her helpers had labored to provide. A thirty-six-course meal at Prinny's Brighton monstrosity could not possibly have tasted better. Or been more appreciated. Conversation was minimal as both men and women ate, children-all safe-balanced in their laps.
It was Henderson who, as empty plates were cleared and maids hurried to place round cheeses on the tables, voiced the common thought.
"Odd thing, that fire."
Huggins, at the near end of one of the other tables, nodded. "Can't see how it started, myself."
They all looked at Richard. Lounging in his chair, pushed back from the table, with one hand idly resting, unconsciously possessive, on the back of Catriona's chair, he returned their gazes steadily. Then he looked around the room. "Does anyone know of any possible cause?"
Heads shook on all sides.
"Never seen anything like it in all my years," McArdle huffed.
"It was all well-seasoned wood-once lit, it would burn. What I can't understand," Richard said, "is how and why it caught alight."
"Aye, there's the mystery." Henderson nodded dourly. "Midwinter-admittedly it's been dry. And that wood was all under shelter. But…"
Richard met his eye. "Precisely. But… something must have touched spark to the tinder."
"Aye, but what?"
It was a question no one could answer. They batted it back and forth, until Richard, glancing at Catriona, caught her straightening, caught her in the act of drawing on her reserves to preserve her outward facade. Noting the dark shadows beneath her eyes, the incipient haggardness in her face, he swore beneath his breath and turned back to the others. "Enough. We're merely speculating. Let's sleep on it and see what tomorrow reveals."
All nodded. Many of the household had already dragged their weary bodies from the hall. Without waiting for the others, Richard placed a hand beneath Catriona's elbow and rose, lifting her to her feet beside him.
She blinked, dazed and weary, up at him; jaw setting, Richard denied the impulse to sweep her up in his arms and instead calmly supported her from the dais and into the front hall. Once out of sight of the others, he slid one arm around her; supporting her against him, he steered her up the stairs.
To their bedchamber. He halted before the door, for the first time in his life, not entirely certain of his footing. His welcome. He glanced down at Catriona; she met his gaze-when he didn't open the door, she frowned.
"What is it?"
The same question he'd asked her-the one she'd refused to answer. Richard held h
er gaze and fought against the compulsion to make the same mistake. "I…" He paused, then went on: "Perhaps I'd better find a bed elsewhere."
The frown in her eyes grew. "Why? This is our room." Her tone was entirely uncomprehending. Before he could say more, she set the door wide, then glided through; fingers clutching his sooty sleeve, she towed him, unresisting, behind her.
He shut the door. "Catriona-"
"Our clothes are ruined." She looked down at her filthy gown, then turned and looked at him. "And we both need a bath. And your hair needs cutting-it's badly singed at the back. Come on."
She tugged; inwardly sighing, Richard acquiesced. Her eyes were still wide, their expression dazed-he knew shock when he saw it, heard it.
He followed her into the small bathing chamber that gave off their room. A welcome surprise awaited them-some kind souls had slipped upstairs while they were discussing the fire and half-filled the large tub with hot water, now cooled to warm, and set metal pails of steaming water in the hearth where the blaze, stoked high, kept them hot.
"Oh." Catriona stopped and stared.
Richard glanced at her face, then drew up a bathing stool to one side of the fire and sat her upon it. Then he picked up a towel, wrapped it around the handle of one pail, and added it to the tub. After adding all the pails but two, he tested the water; it was perfect, hot but not scorching, just right for easing chilled and tired muscles.
Returning to Catriona, he took her hands and drew her to her feet. She immediately started to unbutton his waistcoat. He sighed and shrugged out of his ruined coats. Once she was absorbed with the buttons on his shirt, he reached around her and tugged her laces free. She didn't notice until he loosened the neckline and started to draw her gown down over her arms.
"No." She tried to tug it up again. "You first."
"No," Richard said, calmly, soothingly. "Both together."
She paused, then looked at the tub; he quickly drew her gown down and freed her hands. She sighed and stepped out of the puddled cambric and kicked it to join his coats. "I suppose we'll fit."
They did, very comfortably. Just before she joined him in the blissfully hot water, Catriona went to a shelf and selected a jar, then returned to sprinkle its contents into the tub. Richard, surfacing from rinsing his hair, tensed as crystals hissed in the water, then relaxed as a delicious herbal scent filled the room.
After returning the jar to the shelf, Catriona stepped into the tub and sank down opposite him, then picked up the flannel. "Turn around." She gestured with her hand. "I'll scrub your back."
Richard complied; he closed his eyes in bliss as she scrubbed and kneaded the stiff muscles. She worked over his shoulders and upper back, then reached below the water.
He heard her hiss-an indrawn hiss of pain. Swinging around, he saw her shake her hand; he caught it-and saw the burned palm. What he said made her wince more.
"Lie back! Rest your hands on the edge." He took the flannel from her and quickly finished his own ablutions, then found the bar of soap she preferred-a tantalizing mix of summer flowers, the scent she always bore-and lathered the flannel.
And proceeded, ignoring her weak complaints, to wash her.
Catriona tried to struggle, then surrendered. She was in shock and she knew it-the shock of the fire-the shock of his totally unexpected return. The shock of seeing him plunge into the burning building, relief at his safe return. The horror of seeing flames licking his hair, the pain of her burned palms. She didn't know what she thought-she didn't know how she should respond, how she should react to any of it.
All she could do was flow with the tide, close her eyes and accept his ministrations, the steady, unhurried sweep of the flannel over her skin.
He was very thorough. Setting her legs wide apart, he sat between; he started with her face, caressing it gently, then laved her neck, then moved on to her shoulders, then extended each arm to lovingly cleanse it, all the way to her fingertips, carefully avoiding her raw palms. Leaving her hands propped on the tub's edge, he reached around her and stroked her shoulders, then the long planes of her back, the curves of her hips, the globes of her bottom in long lazy sweeps, lifting her easily in the water. Setting her down again, he reached for the soap.
From under heavy lids, she studied his face; his expression was deeply calm, like the surface of a fathomless pool. Calm was usually her province, but in the fright and flurry of the evening, she'd misplaced her inherent serenity. She'd lost her calm-but he'd found his. Or, she silently amended, could show his. He wasn't wearing any mask, any social cloak-this was as he was. The warrior who was most at home on the battlefield, in the heart of the fury-that was where he was most at ease. Where he was calmest.
Opening her weary senses, she closed her eyes and shamelessly drank in his calm, and felt it ease her. Let him press calm on her with every smooth caress of the soapy flannel as he gently, lovingly, washed her breasts, her waist, her gently rounded stomach. He moved steadily down, slowly, soothingly, washing every inch of her; by the time he reached her toes, she was floating on a warm tide.
She felt the water shift as he discarded the flannel, then he gripped her wrists and drew her up. Drew her toward him, lifted her so she sat on his thighs, her legs instinctively wrapping around his waist. Her forearms sliding over his shoulders, she blinked her eyes wide as his arms closed around her and his lips found hers.
He kissed her gently, her wet breasts pressed to his wet chest, a thin layer of water sliding between their warmed bodies. Despite their aroused state, it was a soothing kiss. She kissed him back, in the same vein, simply grateful to feel his achingly familiar lips on hers.
Then he rose, Sifting her with him; her legs slid down and she was standing beside him. He reached for one of the pails left waiting and rinsed her, then repeated the performance on himself, using the last pail. She went to clamber out, but he was before her. He closed his hands about her waist and lifted her clear, setting her feet on the thick towel laid before the hearth. She accepted the towel he handed her gratefully, and ignored, as best she could, the flush that turned her skin a delicate rose, and the more pointed evidence of his arousal.
Revived, she quickly dried herself, then helped him mop his broad back. Standing behind him, she considered, then swiftly looped the towel around his hips and anchored it. "Sit," she said, prodding him toward the stool. "I want to neaten your hair."
He turned and looked at her with that unfathomable calm in his eyes, but consented to sit. She found a comb and scissors, and started snipping, removing the burnt and singed locks. Then she reached to brush the clipping from his shoulders, stopped, and peered. "You've got burns across your shoulders!"
He wriggled them. "Only minor ones."
"Humph! Well you can sit there a minute more while I salve them." She fetched the right pot from her supplies on the shelf; luckily, her fingers weren't burned, only her palms. She could grip things, could spread and knead; she carefully worked the salve into his burns. Then she stood back and surveyed his back more carefully.
"If you've finished soothing those burns, I have another burning part of my anatomy awaiting your attention."
The gravelly comment jerked her upright. "Yes, well." Quickly, she replaced the pot on the shelf. Half turning, she gestured to the bedchamber. "Come to bed, then."
His gaze fastened on her hand as he stood. "One moment."
He caught her hand, and inspected the raw redness. He swore, glared at her, then towed her back to the shelf. "Where's that salve?"
"My hands will be all right."
"Ah-ha!"
Catriona frowned as he lifted the pot down. "What happened to your burning anatomy?"
"I can suffer a few minutes more. Hold out your hands."
Trapped between him and the door, she had to comply. "This is quite unnecessary."
He glanced at her briefly. "All healers are supposed to be terrible patients."
She humphed, but held her tongue, surprised to find how cool and soothing
the salve felt on her scorched flesh. She studied her palms while he returned the pot to the shelf. His left hand appeared; he grasped her right wrist and tugged forward. She stepped forward and looked up-and stubbed her nose on his back. "What…?"
For answer, he clamped her right forearm beneath his right arm-tight as a vise. She pushed against his back; it was like pushing a mountain. "What are you doing?"
On the words, she felt the soft touch of gauze; she whipped her head around and scanned the shelf-the roll of gauze bandage she kept there was missing.
"Richard!" She tried to wriggle and accomplished nothing. The gauze wound steadily about her hand. She glared at his back. "Stop it!"
He didn't. He was surprisingly deft; when he released her hand, she found herself staling at a perfectly neat bandage, secured by a tight knot. He reached for her other hand-
"No!" She danced back, hiding it behind her.
"Yes!" He stepped forward.
"I'm the healer!"
"You're a stubborn witch."
He was unstoppable; despite her protests, despite her active resistance, her left hand, too, was carefully wrapped in gauze, so her fingers were locked together with only her fingertips protruding. Defeated, she stared, first at one mittened hand, then the other. "What…? How…?
"There's nothing you need do until morning-that'll give the salve a chance to sink in."
She narrowed her eyes at him.
"Come here. You have ashes in your hair."
He pulled her to the stool; resigned, she sank down and stared at the flames as, standing behind her, he pulled out her pins, searching through the wild mass her hair had become to find them. He shook the long tresses out, then fetched her brush from her dressing table and proceeded to brush out her hair.
"Thank God-or The Lady-there are no burned or singed locks. No thanks, however, to you."
Catriona wisely kept mum and concentrated on the tug of the brush through her long hair, on the soothing, repetitive rhythm. The flames in the hearth burned strongly; she closed her eyes and felt their warmth on her lids, on her naked breasts. With him behind her and the fire before her, she felt secure and warm. Her senses spread, sure and calm; about her, her world had steadied.
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