Dark Torment

by Karen Robards

  “My father is a just man. I know that’s hard for you to believe in light of what was done to you, but that’s something I still don’t understand: ordering that you be whipped isn’t like him. He would at least have given you the opportunity to speak.”

  “Well, he did not.”

  “Dominic . . .”

  “I won’t go back, Sarah. And that’s my last word on the subject.”

  Sarah looked at him, sighed, and recognized defeat. “What will you do? Where will you go?”

  He met her eyes very steadily. “I mean to go back to Ireland. It’s my home—though they sold my farm to pay the fine that was levied at my trial. But I can start again, and I mean to.”

  “But what about me? About—about us?” The question burst forth in an agony of pain.

  “You could come with me.” His eyes were suddenly very blue as they looked into hers.

  Sarah stared back at him, conscious of a rising anger. “As your camp follower? Your easy woman? Your mistress?” Her lip curled. “Do you really think . . . ?” She was working herself up into a fine rage, fueled as much by her hurt at his refusal to consider returning to Lowella with her, for her, as by his suggestion.

  “As my wife,” he interrupted quietly. Sarah stared at him. “I’m asking you to marry me, Sarah,” he said when she, shocked into silence, didn’t reply.

  His wife, she was thinking, his wife! Her heart leaped at the idea. She would be Mrs. Dominic Gallagher. . . . Suddenly she faltered. Mrs. Dominic Gallagher—the wife of a convict. In Australia, that would be to put herself beyond the pale. Her family would disown her; she could never go into society again; her children, their children, would be tainted. . . .

  “I can’t marry you!” she blurted. His eyes narrowed. She had not meant to say the words, at least not that way. She needed more time to think. . . .

  “Why not?” He wasn’t giving her more time. His eyes were hard as they raked her face. “Why not, Sarah? Last night you said you loved me.” His voice mocked her.

  Still she couldn’t say anything, though she sought desperately for words. He could not expect her to make a decision like that, now, here, without giving it careful consideration. He could not be aware of the enormity of what he was asking. If she married him, she would never be able to go home again, never see Lowella. . . .

  “Is it because you’re ashamed of me?” His eyes scorched her. “I’m good enough to be your lover but not your husband, is that it? Because I’m a convict?”

  The words were savage. Sarah’s eyes widened on his face as she sought desperately for a way to make him understand her position.

  “Dominic, you don’t understand. . . .”

  “The bloody hell I don’t!” He leaped to his feet, roaring, and began to pull on his breeches and then his boots while she watched helplessly. She stood, too, clad only in the blue shirt that left her long, slim legs bare, reaching automatically for his arm. He shook her off. The face he turned on her was so vicious that she recoiled.

  “Dominic, if you’ll just listen!” She was growing angry herself as he jerked on his shirt and began to throw some gear together.

  “I’ve listened enough to be sick of myself and you. Stand aside, Sarah!”

  His eyes flashed blue murder as she stepped in front of him, her hands going out to catch at his arms. As he had done before, he shook her off, then reached out to grasp her shoulders and lift her out of his way. That done, he stalked past her toward where the horses were tethered, his saddle and other gear over one arm.

  “Dominic!” Angry or not, when he started to throw the saddle on Kilkenny she ran after him. “Dominic, wait!”

  He had tightened the girth and was slipping the bridle over Kilkenny’s head. Untying the tether, he swung himself into the saddle. Sarah stood watching him, one hand to her mouth, unable to understand how they had gone so quickly from being tender lovers to bitter enemies.

  “Go home, Sarah,” he told her harshly, raking her with one last hard glare. Then he was riding away.

  “Dominic . . .” But it was too late. He was gone. Sarah stood there staring after him, feeling as though her heart would burst. Her anger was fading, to be replaced by a sickening knot in the pit of her stomach. She was very much afraid that she would never see him again. And she knew that she had made a terrible mistake. No matter how her father, Lydia, Liza, or their friends and neighbors, would view the union, she loved him and suddenly realized that she wanted very much to be his wife. Why hadn’t she come to that conclusion while he was waiting for her answer? It had been such a surprise, of course. She had never expected him to suggest marriage. She didn’t know what she had expected. That they would exist in their dream world forever and ever . . .

  She saw now, with the wisdom of hindsight, that even if Dominic had agreed to return to Lowella with her, even if she had managed to persuade her father not to punish him, it wouldn’t have worked. Dominic was a proud man, almost too proud. He could never have tolerated the notion that she owned him, when all was said and done. That she could, if she would, force her will upon him with whips and chains. He would soon have hated her. And she realized now that having Dominic hate her would break her heart. As would never seeing him again. She lifted her hand to her eyes, staring in the direction he had taken. He was already out of sight. Tears welled to her eyes and rolled unheeded down her cheeks. And for the first time in years, Sarah succumbed to a feminine weakness she had always despised. She sank to her knees, dropped her head to her hands, and cried.

  The ominous rumbling of thunder roused her at last from her misery. She lifted her head, scrubbed at her swollen, tear-wet eyes with both hands, and stood up. As she had always suspected, crying had not done a bit of good. She still felt miserable, and Dominic was still gone, probably for good. Added to that were a stuffy nose and stinging eyes. . . . Those eyes widened as Sarah took in the sky. It was no longer a mass of soft, cottony gray rain clouds, but a solid ceiling of near black. At its center, tongues of lightning darted. It was going to be a bad one. Sarah knew that even before she became attuned to the nervous nickering of the horse behind her. He sensed the ferocity of the coming storm and was frightened.

  Sarah did not stop even to gather up her gear. She quickly finished dressing, threw her saddle on the horse’s back in record time, bridled him, then released him from the tether—being careful to keep a firm hold on his reins in case he should try to bolt—and swung into the saddle. The breeches made it easy for her to mount unaided and to ride astride. The horse—she was going to have to come up with a name for him, she thought distractedly—threw up his head and whinnyed as she kicked him into a canter. He was spooked, ready to take fright at the slightest provocation. Sarah clung to the saddle with her knees, wary of the beast’s reaction to the storm. Some horses went wild. . . .

  She stayed near the creek, knowing that, upset as she was, it would be fatally easy to let her mind wander so that she got lost in the bush. There was time enough to go overland when she was safely on station land. She was familiar enough with the station to chance it. The wind had changed direction, beginning to blow from the east. It was hot and fierce, whipping her hair, which she had not taken time to secure in a braid, around her head so that the ends stung her when they struck her face. The thunder was closer now, booming rather than rumbling. The black clouds roiled overhead, and the searching arms of lightning were getting terrifyingly near. The horse beneath her was whickering with fear, ready to bolt if she did not keep a firm grip on the reins. And maybe even if she did. There was an acrid smell on the wind, a smell that reminded her of something. . . . The night the stable burned. She looked around, eyes widening as she saw an orange glow lighting up the dark sky five or six miles behind her. A forest of dense tan and gray smoke was rising to join the ceiling of clouds. Bush fire! They were words to strike terror into the heart of any Australian, and they struck terror into Sarah’s heart now. The tongues of lightning must have found their target in the dry trees and brush,
and as a result the whole plain was on fire!

  Sarah abandoned the steady canter to which she had been holding her horse and kicked him into a gallop. He spread out beneath her, as frightened as she by the raging inferno that was consuming miles of brushland at unbelievable speed. It would not take long for the flames to catch them up. Worse, bush fires were unpredictable—they could start in a dozen spots at once, and once started they moved fast. There could be more ahead of her, to the east or west, anywhere. Even at Lowella . . . Lowella could be burned to the ground. Sarah knew it, but still she headed for home. Her father would have all hands marshaled to save Lowella—it would be marginally safer than anywhere else, and it was where she wanted to be.

  Her thoughts turned to Dominic. Would he recognize the significance of the orange glow in the air and head for safety? He was not familiar with the speed and ferocity of brush fires. But there was nothing she could do to aid him, no way she could warn him, because she had no idea where he was, so she tried to force all thoughts of him from her mind. Time enough to dredge up bittersweet memories when she was safe . . . She thought of Dominic trapped by a rushing outcropping of fire, surrounded. . . . Shuddering, she banished the image from her mind. And rode on.

  The smell was worse now, and smoke was beginning to swirl in teasing little tendrils beneath her nose. There must be fire ahead of her as well as behind her. Instinctively she turned the horse, heading for the creek. It might be her only salvation.

  The smoke was growing thicker, making Sarah’s eyes water and her nostrils sting. The horse was stampeding now, running headlong for the water. Sarah made no move to check him. She was terribly afraid that the fire was dangerously close. . . .

  She screamed as, without warning, a solitary gum to her left exploded with a loud boom. The heat had been too much for the volatile sap. The tree burned brightly, instantly consumed in flames, as the horse beneath her, maddened with fear, screamed, too, and reared and bucked in a frantic effort to escape. Sarah, her attention momentarily, disastrously distracted, felt herself flying through the air. She landed nose first in a gorse bush, and immediately, without even waiting to check for broken bones or other injuries, forced herself to her feet. It would need only a single spark from the living torch that had only seconds ago been a tree to set the brush alight. As she shook herself off, she saw her horse disappearing in the distance. Whether he was heading toward the fire she had no idea, but she thought not. In a situation like this, a horse’s instincts were often better than a human’s. She was on foot now, alone in the bush, and the bush was afire. There was no time to take further stock of the situation. A loud boom made her jump as another gum exploded behind her and burst immediately into flames. Thick smoke poured from the burning trees toward the sky; tendrils oily from the burning sap escaped to coil around her. Sarah coughed, choking. Showers of sparks were raising tiny flickers of fire in the grass. . . .

  Sarah ran for the creek as the flames spread. The water, she knew, was her only hope. She thanked God that she was wearing breeches. A long, trailing skirt, impossible to hold off the ground altogether, might well have been the death of her. As it was, she might die anyway. Gum after gum was noisily exploding, until, as she reached the water’s edge and cast one last, scared look behind her, it seemed as though the whole world was in flames.

  She felt heat blistering her cheeks as she plunged into the creek and waded out to the center, which came no higher than mid-thigh. Sparks were swirling in the air around her as she sank to her knees, submerging herself up to her neck. She could only pray that the smoke wouldn’t get too thick, or the fire heat the water to boiling. She shuddered at the idea of being boiled alive. . . .

  The next thirty minutes, as the fire leaped the creek to rage ferociously on each bank and groves of gums and eucalyptus burst noisily into flames, seemed like as many hours. The water was crowded with animals that had flocked to escape the blaze. Koalas, dingoes, kangaroos, and other marsupials huddled in the creek along with snakes and hares, emus, kiwis, and other birds. In this time of emergency, none threatened the others, or Sarah. She didn’t even shiver when a reptile some fifteen feet long slithered through the water right in front of her nose, closely followed by another of its kind. They were intent only on escaping the fire.

  The heat grew so intense that she felt as if it was scorching her lungs. She held her head beneath the water for as long as she dared, surfacing only to draw a quick breath of the hot, smoke-thick air through the soaking tail of her shirt before submerging again. Sparks fell like rain to sizzle on the surface of the water; on the banks, flames raced through grass and up trees to leap for the sky.

  The water was getting hotter and hotter. The animals restless shifting indicated that the fire was reaching its peak. Would they live or would they die? Sarah could only pray.

  Then, as if her prayers were answered, a miracle happened. The heavens opened as though a giant hand had ripped out its bottom, and deluges of icy water descended to soak the earth. In minutes the fire was out. The earth steamed in silent relief.

  It was some little while later before the animals, one by one, began to slink and waddle and hop from the river. Sarah followed cautiously on unsteady legs. Her face was sore from the heat, and the ends of her hair were singed. Her lungs ached with every breath she drew. Her throat and nostrils were raw. She shivered with chill as rain poured over her already soaked body, but after the deadly heat of the fire the cold was a welcome relief. She wanted to cry, laugh, sing. She was glad to be alive.

  The ground felt hot beneath her feet as she went up the bank and along the creek. Tall, blackened corpses of what had once been trees stood smoldering, steam rising from their lifeless limbs as the rain doused the last remaining sparks. Ashes lay thick on the charred ground as she walked through the remains of what less than an hour before had been a living grove of ghost gums. An unnatural stillness lay over everything. There was absolutely no sound except for the slapping of the rain.

  Then, from directly overhead, came a sharp crack. Sarah glanced up to see a huge black branch hurtling like a bolt from heaven. She didn’t have time to cry out before it struck her. And for her, the world ceased to exist.

  XXIV

  Sarah opened her eyes, winced, and promptly shut them again. Even that tiny movement caused blinding pain to stab through her head. She moaned. Immediately a cold cloth was pressed to her forehead, her eyes, and then wiped carefully over her face.

  “It’s all right, my lamb. It’s all right.”

  Sarah knew that soothing voice. Despite the pain, she forced her eyes open to stare with amazement at Mrs. Abbott’s homely face bent over her. Then her eyes went beyond Mrs. Abbott to the familiar peaches and creams and greens of the room: her room. The bedroom she had slept in since she was small, at Lowella.

  “What happened?” Her voice was so faint that it alarmed her.

  “You were caught out in that bush fire, and a limb fell and hit you on the head. But you’re safe home now, Miss Sarah, and you’re going to be all right. All you need is rest.”

  “But how did I get home?” She was too tired to talk, and her eyes were closing even as she said it.

  Before Mrs. Abbott could attempt to answer, Sarah was asleep. When she woke again, she did not know how much later, Mrs. Abbott still sat beside her. After drinking thirstily from a glass of barley water the housekeeper held to her lips, Sarah determinedly repeated her question. Disjointed memories tugged at the edge of her consciousness; there was something important that she should recall. . . .

  “How did I get home, Mrs. Abbott?”

  “Miss Sarah, you shouldn’t be talking.”

  “Then you talk, Mrs. Abbott. Tell me what happened. Please, I need to know.”

  Mrs. Abbott leaned nearer, concern and indecision plain in her plump face.

  “You were carried home, Miss Sarah. Your pa’s face lit up like a candle when ’e saw that you were safe. ’E was beside ’imself when we found you’d been taken, you k
now. ’E had all the men out looking for you, and was even ready to offer a reward for your safe return—and you know how ’e is about money. We were all sore afraid for you, Miss Sarah.”

  “But who carried me home?”

  Mrs. Abbott moistened her lips, looking uncharacteristically nervous. “Miss Liza was sitting on the porch when she saw this man riding in with you ’eld in front of ’im in the saddle. Lord, she let out a scream that must near ’ave shattered the windows! And we all came running, thinking something awful ’ad ’appened to ’er. And we saw you. You looked like you were dead, Miss Sarah. It was near dinnertime, and your pa and Mr. Percival were in the ’ouse. Your pa snatched you down from the ’orse and carried you inside. ’E was yelling for Madeline to be brought to tend you—”

  “But who was the man on the horse?” Sarah interrupted. She was beginning to feel considerably better. The pain in her head wasn’t quite so acute, and her thought processes were clearing. And still that niggling memory nagged at her. . . .

  Mrs. Abbott looked uncomfortable. “We can talk more when you’re better, Miss Sarah.” She stood up, brushing nervously at her skirt. “I’ll go fetch you some more barley water.”

  “Mrs. Abbott!” Sarah’s voice was sharp. Mrs. Abbott backed toward the door, looking hunted. “It was Dom—Gallagher, wasn’t it?”

  “Oh, my, oh, my! Lamb, don’t get yourself upset! When you’re better . . .”

  “Wasn’t it?” That was the memory that had plagued her. Dominic’s strong arms around her, lifting her, carrying her . . . He had somehow found her and brought her home. When he had been so adamant that he would never return to Lowella.

  “Miss Sarah . . .” Mrs. Abbott sounded really upset.

  Sarah sat bolt upright in the bed, ignoring the throbbing in her head. “How long ago was that? What’s happened to him?” A terrible fear was coiling in her belly. Had he been right about her father after all? Surely Dominic wasn’t—they hadn’t harmed him?