by Trish Morey
‘Good morning to you, Mistress Barrett! And to you, Robert,’ Elizabeth said. ‘Don’t you look quite … well-rested today.’
‘And you look most charming, as ever, Lady Elizabeth,’ Rob said with a bow. ‘The goddess of the sun, the herald of the day …’
‘Pah, it is too early for your poetry! Go and talk to Edward. He is aching to show off his new hawk,’ Elizabeth said with a shooing wave. ‘I will introduce Mistress Barrett to her horse.’
She didn’t wait for an answer, but looped her arm with Anna’s and led her towards a sleepy-looking grey mare. ‘Robert said you haven’t had the chance to ride very much of late, so I found the quietest mount in the stables for you,’ Elizabeth said. ‘She knows every inch of this park and will carry you most safely.’
‘That was very kind of you, Lady Elizabeth.’ Anna cautiously patted the horse’s soft nose, and laughed when it whinnied and nudged at her. ‘I’m sure we will do well enough together.’
‘I’m sure you will.’ Elizabeth laid her hand on the horse’s bridle, watching Anna closely. ‘Tell me, Mistress Barrett, are you enjoying yourself at Hart Castle?’
‘Very much. I don’t see how anyone could fail to enjoy being at such a fine house.’
‘Yes. Though, I fear it was not always so happy a place.’
‘How so, Lady Elizabeth?’
Elizabeth studied the gleaming windows of the house with a little frown. ‘When I first met Edward—when he brought me here—it was a house of great sadness and seemed very lonely. Since Edward had lost his brother he seldom came here, because he could not face the old memories. His grief was too deep, and he and the house were both sunk in some terrible spell of sad lifelessness.’
‘How awful,’ Anna whispered. She looked across the drive to where Edward stood with Rob, both of them laughing at some jest. ‘He doesn’t seem so sad now.’
‘Nay. Sometimes, my dear Mistress Barrett, a person merely needs a reason to truly live again. A purpose that banishes the past and awakens them to the wonders of the present moment. A true passion.’
‘And he found that purpose with you?’
‘Me—and other things. Life is too uncertain and precious to waste, and love too rare to lose,’ Elizabeth said with a smile. ‘He and I both had to learn that. Maybe what happened to us could be useful for others, as well—others who struggle.’
Anna stared at the horse’s grey neck, unable to quite meet Elizabeth’s gaze. ‘You think I struggle?’
Elizabeth shrugged. ‘I have not known you long, Mistress Barrett—Anna—but I see the light in your eyes when you look at Robert, the way the two of you smile at each other. It’s as if there is no one else in the whole room—nothing else you see. That is also how I feel when I look at Edward.’
Somehow the understanding in Elizabeth’s soft voice, the truth of her words, melted Anna’s reserve. ‘I do care about Rob. But there is so much I don’t know about him, and what I do know tells me I must be cautious. My feelings frighten me a bit.’
Elizabeth nodded. ‘We can’t choose who we love, and I fear our hearts have not chosen easy men to care for. But my first marriage was not a happy one. My husband was much older than me, and not very kind. I thought I could never feel for a man as I do for Edward. I wasn’t even sure I wanted to feel that way!’
‘I am not sure, either,’ Anna murmured. Could she put the past behind her forever, and move forward as she had these last few days?
‘But I came to see it as a great gift, Anna, and you should, too!’ Elizabeth declared. ‘Just remember what I said—life is too fleeting for fear.’
‘My friends, shall we ride out?’ Edward called. ‘The day grows apace!’
Elizabeth gave Anna one last smile and hurried over to her own horse as a groom came to help Anna into the saddle. As she settled her skirts around her Elizabeth’s words echoed in her mind. Too fleeting for fear. Should she—could she—reach out and seize this time with Rob, no matter how brief, as a gift?
Rob reined in his horse next to hers and gave her a wide, white grin of sheer pleasure in the day. ‘Are you ready to run, Anna?’ he asked.
She nodded and laughed. ‘Aye, Rob. I am assuredly ready to run!’
‘Where are we going?’ Anna asked as Rob led her along the soft green banks of the river. He laughed that she whispered the words, as if they were sneaking away from the party in stealth, even though the chattering voices of the others were now a mere echo behind them.
Now the sumptuous picnic that had been laid out for the hunters in a shady grove had been consumed they were all falling into a happy lassitude, induced by fine wine and Elizabeth’s soft song played on her lute. Rob had taken Anna’s hand and lured her away from the group.
‘‘Tis a secret,’ he said, tossing her a roguish smile over his shoulder. ‘Unless you don’t trust where I might lead?’
Anna laughed. ‘I don’t trust you a whit, Robert Alden! Yet you always intrigue me so greatly I fear that I forget all prudence and follow you.’
‘You are a secret adventurer, then, fairest Anna. I see it in your eyes. You try to hide it behind your sternness and your grey gowns, but you can’t conceal it forever. We are both much too curious about the world around us for our own good.’
Anna smiled, but Rob could see a dark cloud pass fleetingly over her face. ‘Perhaps I was curious once. Until I learned it is better not to be.’
He remembered her tale of her nasty husband, and the scars on her back from where the villain had tried to beat the curiosity, the bright spark out of her. Fury still burned within him that anyone would dare treat her so—would bully and oppress her, his beautiful Anna. Master Barrett was fortunate he was dead, or Rob would soon have tortured him most painfully into that state. He could never bear to see a woman scarred, like Anna and his sister.
Yet Barrett hadn’t extinguished Anna’s spark, her passion. He had merely forced it into hiding behind a brittle shell of caution. Rob intended to see it free once more. Surely he could give her that one small thing? A moment of freely won happiness, before he himself had to hurt her all over again?
Or maybe he was merely selfish and wanted to taste her happiness for himself. He found he yearned for it as he never had anything else.
‘Do you remember when I told you of my disobedient youth?’ he asked. He wrapped his arm around her waist, holding her against his side as they strolled beside the water.
She wrapped her arm around him, too, leaning close. ‘Aye, you said you would climb out of your window at night and run free to sit by the river and dream of your future plays and poems.’
‘This was that very river.’
She looked down at the water, burbling gently past below the banks, her eyes wide with surprise. ‘Is it truly?’
‘I lived in Hartley Village, not so very far from this estate, and I often trespassed on this land to swim in the river or wander the woods. Edward’s father was always at Court, waiting on the Queen in her younger days. There was no one to care what one small boy did here.’
‘And you imagined tales of knights and kings and gods here? Just like in your plays?’ she asked.
‘Perhaps then they were more bloody and full of battles and revenge,’ he said. ‘The fashion now is for tales more romantical. I had no liking for such things then.’
Anna laughed. ‘And now?’
‘Now they are my favourite tales of all. What poet is not inspired by the beauty of his lady?’ He caught her up in his arms and carried her over to a narrow wooden bridge as she laughed and held on to her hat. She was so very beautiful when she laughed, her face glowing in the bright day. ‘Or by the music of her laughter?’
‘Audiences do like tales of love,’ she said. ‘But they also love stories of bloody revenge just as much as ever.’
Rob didn’t set her back on her feet, despite her wriggling in his arms, but carried her along the overgrown path that led away from the river. He couldn’t let her go yet. ‘Then I must strive to give t
hem what they want. Love and passion, ending in a noisy, messy battle.’
‘As it always does, I fear, in one way or another.’ Anna laid her head on his shoulder with a sigh. ‘I think you do give the people what they want in your plays. You see into their very hearts and your words speak to their deepest desires and fears. It is why they flock to the White Heron to see your work. You see the truth of people, deep down.’
He wished he could see the truth of her. All of her—not merely the tantalising glimpses she offered in the heat of their passion. But then he would have to show her the truth of himself in return, and he wasn’t ready to lose her. Not yet. He hadn’t realised how dry and barren his life had been before, how hungry he was for what Anna offered. Not just sex, but her laughter and secrets, too.
Had he found what he really needed now, all too late? Was this the true curse of his life? To see what he wrote of in his poetry but be unable ever to claim it? He would have laughed at the bitter irony if it did not make his heart ache.
‘Then I must finish my new play quickly for your father,’ he said. ‘And hope you will approve of it.’
‘I fear you won’t finish by going to country parties and wandering the woods with me,’ she said.
‘On the contrary, fairest Anna—walking the woods with you is the finest inspiration.’ Rob ducked beneath a low-hanging tangle of branches, Anna still held in his arms, and entered his old secret grove.
‘Oh!’ she gasped. ‘What is this place?’
‘It was my magical realm when I was a boy,’ he said. ‘I haven’t been back for many years. I’m surprised it’s still here at all.’
‘Who could bear to destroy such a spot?’ Anna asked. Rob gently set her on her feet and she drifted around the thick ring of trees, staring in wonder.
The trees were so closely grown that the circle was cast in deepest shade. The ground beneath was soft and emerald green, scattered with several large, flat rocks worn smooth by time. In the centre a blackened circle showed where there had once been an old fire-pit.
‘When I was a boy I imagined it was the realm of Druids and the fairyfolk, from the old tales our kitchen maid would tell me when my mother wasn’t listening,’ Rob said. ‘Or it could be the Dark Knight’s fortress—or a place where spirits could be summoned.’
‘It is an enchanted place. I’m sure of it,’ Anna murmured. She removed her glove and ran her fingertips over the rough trunk of a tree. ‘I’ve never been anywhere so quiet. So strange and haunted, yet so welcoming at the same time.’
Rob leaned against another tree, crossing his arms over his chest as he watched her. She tilted her face up to the faint rays of pale light that filtered through the trees, and spun around laughing.
He couldn’t look away from her at all. Her beauty held him spellbound.
‘This place likes you,’ he said. ‘It doesn’t welcome everyone into its midst.’
She twirled to a stop, her skirts swaying, and smiled at him. ‘Perhaps it welcomes you because you are the king of the enchanted grove and I am your guest.’
‘I would that I were king of so much more, with lands and jewels to shower on you.’ He wished he could give her everything, instead of the pain that was his only legacy to her. Wished he could be worthy of her.
‘No gift could be finer than this moment, here in this place.’ She slowly crossed the grove to stand before him, so very close, achingly close, but not touching. ‘With you, Robert.’
He could bear it no longer. He grabbed her hands in his and drew her into his arms, their bodies pressed tight together as she went up on tiptoe. He kissed her with all the hunger in his heart.
She looped her arms about his neck, his hat falling to the ground as she laced her fingers through his hair and held on to him. His tongue traced the soft bow of her lips, urging her to open to him, welcome him, before he pressed inside to taste her.
She met him with a soft moan that drove his need to even hotter heights. They fell together to the ground, wrapped around each other, their kiss deepening.
Rob traced his mouth over her jaw, the softness of her ear, the curve of her throat, until he rested his head on her shoulder and just held on to her. Breathed in deeply of the warm, summer rose scent of her.
‘I wish we could never leave this place,’ she whispered. ‘Do you think the fairies would carry us off to live in their realm forever?’ She gently cradled his head against her and kissed his brow.
‘They would make you their fairy queen.’
Anna laughed softly. ‘And you their clown. But surely in fairy realms a queen and a clown could be happy together.’
‘Happy forever, I’m sure.’
‘Then while we are here we are in our very own realm,’ she said. ‘Nothing can touch us—not here.’
They held on to each other in silence as the light turned sparkling and golden around them and time itself seemed to stand still. It was only them, Robert and Anna, in the perfect silence of their own realm, watched by fairy eyes that kept away the wider world with the force of their spells—or by the force of Rob’s own will, that wanted only one more moment with her.
But not even the most ferocious will, nor the spells of the fairies, could keep away the world forever.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
ANNA turned before the looking glass on her chamber wall, twisting her head one way then the other as she studied herself. She wasn’t sure it was really her, Anna Barrett, who stood there, even as the reflected woman obeyed her movements.
Lady Elizabeth had loaned Anna her own maid again to help her dress and fix her hair for the ball, and the woman had worked wonders. She could almost be a fairy queen in truth, with her dark hair piled high in smooth, shining waves, pinned with pearl skewers and crowned with a delicate wire and pearl headdress.
She wore another gown borrowed from the White Heron’s costume coffers—a bodice and overskirt of white and gold brocade, with a quilted petticoat of deep crimson velvet. Lady Elizabeth had also sent jewels—pearl earrings and a long, looping strand of more pearls—and a white feather fan and silver pomander hung from her waist.
Such a creature could surely sit upon a golden throne in Rob’s enchanted grove, presiding over the fairy revels. But was it her?
‘It is me tonight,’ she said with a laugh, and reached for her bottle of scent.
Ever since the visit to Rob’s fairy circle, ever since he had kissed her there and held her so close, she’d felt—different. Lighter. As if she drifted above the ground on a golden cloud, dancing with each step. She wished she knew the antidote to keep the spell from fading away. She wished that she could always feel just like this—always.
She turned away from the glass and the false image it held to tempt her. Soon this party would end. The days were flying past, faster with every moment, and soon she would go back to Southwark. Back to looking after her father, keeping his ledgers, badgering bawdy housekeepers for their rent. Wearing grey gowns and living backstage, behind the action and noise and colour.
‘But in the meantime I will dance and dance,’ she declared aloud. She whirled round and round in her fine skirts, whirling until she was dizzy and laughing.
Until she collided with a solid, strong male chest.
She heard the sound of Rob’s laughter, and he reached out to catch her in his arms before she could topple to the ground.
‘Have you begun the ball so early, my lady?’ he asked. ‘And without me?’
‘I thought I should practise my steps,’ she said, breathless from her spinning—and from his touch. ‘I fear that particular dance might be rather unpolished for company.’
‘Not once they’ve had their fill of Edward’s fine Malmsey wine.’ Rob nuzzled his lips just below her ear, his breath warm on her skin. ‘You smell delicious, Anna.’
She wanted to melt deeper into his arms, seize him by the folds of his crimson velvet doublet and drag him closer and closer, but she could hear the faint strains of music from downstairs. She pushed hi
m away.
‘And you will muss Lady Elizabeth’s maid’s fine efforts,’ she said. ‘I fear one touch will bring this great edifice collapsing down.’
Rob kissed her hand in a most gallant, courtly manner, bowing low over it. ‘You will be the most beautiful woman there. All the men will be brawling for the chance to dance with you.’
‘I should hope not,’ Anna said sternly. ‘I should hate to see Lord Edward’s grand hall wrecked for the sake of my clumsy pavane.’
‘Nonetheless, you will have many partners tonight.’ Rob suddenly looked serious. ‘Edward has invited all the local gentry and some friends from London, as well as his house guests. The ball will be very crowded, and some of them are people you would not like to know.’
Anna laughed, but she was a bit discomfited by the sudden solemn look on his face. ‘Rob, I collect my father’s rent from Mother Nan and the proprietor of a bear pit. I work in a theatre. I am quite accustomed to the less genteel sort.’
‘Some of these people make Mother Nan look the image of honesty,’ he answered. ‘Just try and stay close to me. And don’t listen to anything they might tell you.’
‘Oh, Robert. I can take care of myself—even amongst preening courtiers.’
‘I know you can.’ He kissed her hand again, a lingering caress, and held on to her as if he didn’t want to let her go. ‘But you should not have to.’
The music grew louder, and Anna feared if she stood there with him a moment longer she wouldn’t want to leave. ‘Shall we go down now?’
Rob held out his arm for her to take and gave her a bow. ‘Your revels await, my lady.’
Anna laid her hand lightly on his arm, feeling his tight and corded muscles under her touch. He led her down the stairs to the foyer, where they joined a stream of guests pressing towards the great hall. It seemed as crowded as when the audience surged through the doors of the White Heron when a play was announced, with a jumble of laughter and shouted greetings, the hum of excitement, as if something was just about to begin.