Lady Changeling

by Ken Altabef

  Lady Changeling

  LADY CHANGELING

  Copyright © 2018 by Ken Altabef

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever, without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embedded in articles or reviews. Contact the author for more information.

  New York

  This is a work of fiction. Except in the case of historical figures, all names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  ALSO BY KEN ALTABEF

  ALAANA’S WAY

  Book 1: The Calling

  Book 2: Secrets

  Book 3: Shadows

  Book 4: The Tundra Shall Burn!

  Book 5: The Shadow of Everything Existing

  FORTUNE’S FANTASY:

  13 excursions into the unknown

  GIANT SLAYERS

  (with Jeff Altabef)

  www.KenAltabef.com

  Chapter 1

  June 14, 1750

  Graystown, England

  A whiff of myrrh. The reek of faerie musk where it should not have been. That’s all it took. And Eric Grayson awoke to a nightmare.

  His wife of ten years lay beside him on their bed. He could see only the back of her head, a tangle of honey-colored hair wild across the pillow, a small brown beauty-mark against the perfect skin at the nape of her neck. And yet, he was deadly certain. His wife was some kind of a monster.

  A cold sweat gathered across his bare shoulders like an icy shawl as he listened to her gentle breathing. Tranquil appearances aside, something was terribly wrong. He felt it in the pit of his stomach like a thousand sour needles churning up a witch’s brew. The silky cocoon of comfort and familiarity had begun to fray, the illusion parting at the seams to reveal a glimpse of the writhing horror that lay below.

  Or maybe it was just a dream. The first few physical sensations of the day—a cold draft invading through the bedroom window and an ache in his shoulders and arms, a result of hard lessons doled out by his master-at-arms during the previous day’s sparring session—these very real sensations slowly washed the lingering dream away.

  The sun had just broken the horizon, the room still swathed in semi-darkness. The four-poster bed was as it had always been, the fine linen canopy, the sturdy oaken furniture. A vase of daisies and daffodils on the nightstand. Nothing had changed.

  “Momma?” A sleepy voice called from the doorway.

  Theodora rolled over, still half-asleep herself. She had a long, slender face with prominent cheekbones, a strong jawline and slightly pointed chin. A delicate mouth with thin but appealing lips curled upward at the ends to form a sensuous half-smile. Her nose was long and slender and just a little bit sharp, a proud, genteel nose worthy of any lady of high court. Her eyes fluttered open. Slanting slightly upward at the corners, they were as honey-tinted as her long wavy hair, and just as soft.

  “Momma?” asked James again. The boy remained squarely in the doorway, a slender ten-year-old dwarfed by the high mahogany molding. Eric watched silently from the bed as if he were merely an observer to his own family drama. He wondered what night terror had awakened his son at this misty hour. Perhaps the same nightmare which had roused him?

  “What’s wrong dear?” Theodora asked.

  “I want to play.”

  She took a slow breath and smiled. “It’s too early to be up. Look—it’s still dark outside. Back to bed.”

  The boy whimpered his disappointment.

  “Come and give mummy a hug.”

  James ran into his mother’s arms. She purred contentedly and planted a firm kiss on his forehead. “Back to bed now. And quietly, so you don’t wake your sister.”

  Eric, propped up on his elbows, watched the boy scoot out of the room. Soundly ignored, he grumbled softly.

  “What’s the matter with you?” she asked.

  “Hmm. Nothing. I suppose little boys only think of their mothers in the dead of night.”

  Theodora chuckled. “It’s only fair. Nora always calls for you when she’s having bad dreams.”

  Bad dreams. As far as bad dreams go, he was sure he’d just been having a whopping big one. But now the details had already faded away into the morning mist. He sat up in the bed, struggling to recollect. Something about Theodora…

  “You look so grim,” Theodora noted. She snaked a hand under the blanket and ran it across his thigh.

  “Too early for the children to play,” she added. “But what about us?”

  Without thinking, Eric placed his hand over hers and pushed it away. He immediately regretted it. Was that really what he wanted to do?

  Theodora rolled atop him, resting her elbows on his chest, her knees straddling his hips. Her long, fine hair brushed his face. She swept it across his cheeks and out of the way with a flick of her chin. Smiling, and so very beautiful, she kissed his cheek and neck, flicked a tongue against his earlobe. “Want to play?”

  Eric was lost in the lush apricot and wildflower smell of her. Theodora ran a fingernail along his bare chest. She arched her hips, shifting her weight down against his groin. She leaned back, rocking slowly, her head thrown back, eyes closed.

  Eric reached up for her lips with his own.

  Across the cobbled courtyard, Meadowlark sneered. Perched high in an ancient oak tree, his legs propped atop a sturdy branch, his hands clasped behind his head, he would have appeared an errant schoolboy taking an unsanctioned break from his studies—that is, if anyone could see him at all. Mere human eyes would never pierce his disguise of green and brown, of feathered leaf and shaggy bark.

  Shaggy bark, he thought, but my sight is keen in the dark. Not seen, but seeing. He had no trouble witnessing all the fervent gyrations of Lord Eric and his wife through a slit in their gauzy bedroom curtains. He heard clearly the lady’s groans of pleasure, the sweet nothings she whispered in her lover’s ear. Were they genuine? Even after so many years, he still couldn’t tell.

  He’d heard similar sounds from her honeyed lips when he and Theodora had intertwined years ago. He remembered a tryst under a moonlit sky. How she’d caressed him, so young and desperate, in those days. How tight she held him as they joined. He could still smell her, apricots and honeysuckle. He remembered her little cries of pleasure. Her startled gasp as lightning had flashed above their heads, cold splashes of rain as a sudden summer storm buried them in blue water.

  The memory faded, the dream evaporating like the long-ago sheen of rainwater on lovers’ skin.

  Moans, groans, and bumps in the night. So what of it? She was skilled at feigning love now, with her fancy British Lord, but what about then? Had it ever been real? What was real? For ten years he’d watched and waited, wearing the crook of this branch smooth with the curve of his ass.

  Fie! What did he care? What was ten years?

  Love’s labor lost, tossed, cost. Love? Hardly that. A little bit of fun, a little bit of fluff, a walk around the park. That’s all.

  He flicked an acorn dangling from the branch. It plunked against the side of the manor house, but the distracted lovers did not notice.

  Chapter 2

  Eric rose early. Their lovemaking done, he could not fall back to sleep. Theodora lay face down on the pillow, snoring softly. He adjusted the blanket across her bare shoulders.

  The bedroom’s second-story window opened upon a fine view along the west wing of the manor house. The magnificent front court of Grayson Hall spread out below, parting the emerald green lawn, the graveled roadway stretching into the woodland beyond. The sun was just up, painting the cobbles with a warm, buttery light and
setting the distant fields aflame. The courtyard lay empty, the stable master likely still asleep.

  A splash of cold water felt good on his face. He let it drip slowly back down into the basin on top of the window ledge. Eric especially enjoyed the mornings. The air seemed so fresh and cool, a pleasant harbinger of a new day ahead, his thoughts clear and ready for whatever challenges the day might bring.

  Though today, his head didn’t feel quite so clear at all. There was the lingering sense of a bad dream, a feeling that some hideous disaster was poised and ready to strike. But that was silliness and nonsense. All in all, it looked to be a bright, cheerful day and Eric felt a little flash of guilt at having such an ugly feeling inside.

  He dressed in a white linen shirt and tight-fitting black breeches, polished leather boots and a light summer waistcoat of tan wool. As he descended the grand staircase, his life settled back into place all around him. He took comfort in the familiarity of the surroundings, this great house in which he had lived all his life, with its sturdy walls, high ceilings and elegant appointments. He crossed the drawing room and stepped into the long hall of the west wing. The smell of fresh bacon was in the air; the cook must already be up.

  “Geoffrey?”

  A startled clunk of heavy cookware rang out from the kitchen. A kindly face peeked round the doorway. The cook was a short, elderly man who had been with the Grayson family for decades. His close-cropped hair was a fine powdery white and his chin had a short beard to match.

  “Morning, sir, morning,” he said loudly. “I’ve fresh-baked scones at the ready. Bacon and a cheese omelet if you’ll wait just a moment…”

  “Just the scone will be fine. Thank you.”

  Eric rounded the corner to the dining room and sat at the head of the long table. Geoffrey appeared almost immediately, scrambling to set the table with china plate and silverware. His hair was still mussed and hadn’t been greased down as he usually wore it. He clawed at it in an attempt to bring some sense of order.

  “I’m sorry sir. Not yet completely prepared for the day.”

  At the far side of the room, across the great table, a portrait of Eric’s grandfather Griffin Grayson, oversaw the proceedings. The patriarch was square-jawed and white-haired, with a stern expression perfectly preserved by the artist in oils.

  Eric ran the palm of his hand along his grandfather’s table. Like Griffin Grayson, it was hard and rough-hewn and immovable. The surface was a massive plank cut by Griffin’s own hands from the heart of a tree which must have been three hundred years old. If his grandfather’s ghost resided anywhere on the estate it was in this room, within this slab of sturdy oak.

  Geoffrey set down a pair of buttered scones and a glass of juice. Eric hardly noticed.

  “Just the quick bread, sir?”

  “What? Oh, yes, that’s fine.”

  The cook studied Eric for a moment, his brow creased with genuine concern. “Are you feeling well? You seem… a bit out of sorts.”

  “I’m fine. Just can’t sit still, that’s all. I’ll eat as I go.”

  Eric took a bite of the scone, tipped an imaginary hat at his faithful cook, and proceeded down the hallway. He paused at the rear of the manor house to survey the varied outbuildings behind the main hall. The day was bright and clear, but his mood still gloomy. He chewed thoughtfully at the scone’s crust. Something was still bothering him, though he couldn’t quite place it. Something about Theodora.

  A familiar whinny from the stable turned Eric’s steps in that direction. The yard was empty but he found Fitzroy March in one of the stalls, saddling up a tall brown mare.

  March was a heavyset but powerfully built man, who stood a few inches taller than Eric. His black hair was cut short with no attempt to hide the large patches of gray at the temples. A carefully-tended mustache lay down over his thin-lipped mouth, also graying round the edges. He wore a dark, loose-fitting cassock with several rows of fine silver buttons down the front and tan breeches tucked into riding boots.

  Eric was glad to see his master-at-arms and greeted him warmly.

  Fitzroy was the son of Brendan March, an outspoken Scottish nationalist and preacher. While Fitzroy was still a little boy, his father’s loose tongue earned him a quick execution by the British authorities. He was beaten and hanged in full view of his family. Having few other prospects, young March took up with the self-same British military. In the summer of 1715 he served alongside Eric’s father against the first Jacobite rebellion and became the British lord’s closest friend and confidant. March proved himself a capable man both on the battlefield and off, and Henry Grayson brought him home to the Northern coast of England and educated him. March proved as intelligent as he was deadly, and eventually gained the position of chief administrator of all the Grayson estates. He continued to serve Eric in the same capacity.

  “Off for a ride so early?” Eric asked.

  March grumbled. “I’ve got to pay a visit to the port. A couple of shopkeepers late with their rents again.”

  “How many?”

  “Three.” March grimaced. “And that’s three too many. They do this every few months, whenever The Boston Clarion posts grumpy news from the Colonies. I swear our merchants can smell revolution brewing all the way across the Atlantic. Then the men get to talking in the pub and, you know….”

  “We’d better put a quick end to any hot talk before things get out of hand.”

  “Not to worry, I’ll get them sorted before they get any silly ideas.” March adjusted his sword belt and rapier.

  “Oh, I’ve no worries about that.” Eric tossed the remains of the half-eaten scone into one of the stalls.

  “Something else bothering you?” asked March.

  “Wasn’t there another girl?”

  “M’lord?”

  “Before Theodora. Wasn’t there a girl I was supposed to marry? Do you remember?”

  “Of course. You’re thinking of Marjorie Hightower, the grand-daughter of the Earl of Kent. You two were promised to each other from the age of six, I believe. Your father thought the marriage would be very favorable.”

  “That’s so very peculiar. I can’t remember her at all. Not at all. What did she look like?”

  “A pleasant girl. Dark hair, chestnut brown. A lovely profile. A very pleasant face.”

  “I can’t picture her.”

  “Well, the years have flown. And what does it matter now, after all this time?”

  All this time. Ten years, married to Theodora. Eric reached for March’s arm. “Tell me, what happened to her?”

  “Well…she died when she was fifteen, some few months before you were to marry.”

  “I don’t remember any of this. How did it happen?”

  “She drowned. Took a tumble into the river while she was walking alone. That’s as far as anyone knows. We never did find out the whole story. Just a tragic accident, I suppose.”

  Eric still couldn’t picture the girl. When he tried to remember her, he kept thinking of the day he met Theodora instead.

  His parents had both died in the spring of 1738, victims to a terrible disease that ravaged Graystown and Graysport. His elder brother Hake had inherited the estate before him but succumbed to the Creeping Gray Rot by the fall of that same year. The Rot was a strange affliction which began as scaly gray patches on the hands and face. The lesions bulged outward as they grew, becoming shelf-like protrusions resembling mushrooms on old bark. Eventually the Rot caused a ceaseless, maddening itch that tore at the victim’s soul, leaving them a feverish, raving lunatic. Before it finally burned itself out, the disease had claimed a full third of the population of Graystown and its outlying farms.

  Eric had inherited a land ravaged by disease, chaos and madness. He’d been twenty-three at the time. Fitzroy March had suggested Eric make a tour of the town and its surrounding farms. “Let the people see,” he’d said. “Let them see that the manor house has a lord who is fit and well, sound of body and mind. Let them see a man who represent
s stability, who will look after their interests, and who feels their pain.”

  And so, riding through the outskirts of Graystown, through ramshackle clapboard buildings and shit-clogged streets, Eric visited the public well. Was this before or after Marjorie died? He couldn’t remember.

  What had made him thirsty at that precise moment? What had made him pull up his horse at that particular fresh well? What makes any chance encounter? Is it really chance, or the invisible machinations of God’s plan? Or some other?

  Several local men were gathered around the well. Having hauled up a bucket of water they passed around a dipper and drank. When they walked away, a young girl was revealed in their wake. She looked about fourteen, wearing a featureless sack of frayed cloth that could hardly be called a dress, held together by a patchwork of crude stitching. Her hair was in disarray, her cheek smudged with dirt. Despite all that, Eric was impressed. There was no denying she was beautiful in a timid, waif-like way.

  The girl waited until the men trudged away then sat on the lip of the well, carefully balancing a sealskin water bag in the center of her skirt. She poured straight from the heavy bucket, sucking at her lower lip with a look of extreme concentration. If she overbalanced one way or the other she risked drenching her entire skirt.

  Eric watched this fragile, shy creature as she struggled with the bucket. In the end she performed ably, without spilling a drop as far as he could see. He approached when she had finished.

  That was a funny thing too. For, as thirsty as he’d felt on the road, he never bothered to actually take his drink.

  “May I have the bucket?” he asked softly.

  The girl sent it back down the well. Busy sealing the bag with a knotted thong, she didn’t even look up from her task.

  “I’m sorry, I don’t know your name…”