Lady in Red - A Medieval Romance (The Sword of Glastonbury Series Book 8)

by Shea,Lisa

  She nodded in quiet resolution. She had to tell the truth, as far as she could. If she made sure never to name names, she imaged that her story was similar enough to a thousand others that he would not make the connection.

  Her resolve strengthened. She could do this. She must do this. She had made it this far. If he had not yet realized the two women were the same, then undoubtedly she could maintain the charade for just another few weeks. It was all the time she needed to get the task done.

  “I grew up with just a father,” she explained softly, her eyes watching the water ripple past her toes. “My mother, like so many other women, died in childbirth. In her case, it was with my younger brother. My father was heartbroken; he had loved my mother with all his heart and soul. He was utterly devoted to her. He never remarried.”

  “I am sorry to hear of your loss,” murmured Berenger.

  She shrugged softly. “It was a long time ago; I barely remember her at all.” She felt the truth of it weigh on her.

  “What was your childhood like?” asked Berenger, his voice low.

  Jessame flushed, keeping her face pointed downstream. How could he ask that of her? Her every memory was of being with him, of racing down grassy meadows with him at her side, of laughing in glee with him as they chased dragonflies along the edge of the pond.

  They had scaled every tree in the orchard, seeking out the ripest apples. They had explored every dark corner of the surrounding forest, delighting in each new striped or spotted or speckled mushroom. Every morning had been the brilliant beginning of a fresh adventure. Every evening they had laid out, side by side, under the sparkling canopy of night stars.

  “It was blissfully happy,” she managed, closing her eyes for a minute.

  A long silence ensued and she could not bring herself to break it. When at last he spoke again, his voice seemed tight. “What happened?” he asked. It seemed an effort for him to even say these two simple words.

  She ran a hand through her hair, remembering the day he had left her. He had not turned back, he had strode out of her life, and she had waited, and waited …

  “My father got sick,” she replied instead. The all-too familiar iron bands constricted around her heart when she thought of her beloved father swathed in those bandages, only his eyes peering out to remind her of who lay within. His mind was as keen as ever, his brain active, and he was trapped within the decaying frame.

  She found it hard to speak. “He was … the doctor said there was no cure.”

  Berenger’s eyes widened with surprise, and he leaned forward. “I am so sorry,” he offered, his voice rough. “Does he still live?”

  Jessame nodded, looking down at her hands. “Yes, but barely. Eight years ago the doctor said my father would be lucky to survive the year. Eight years later, the doctor has passed away and my father is still here, tenaciously clinging to life, taking every medicine we offer, allowing himself to undergo any treatment we try. I even went as far as Lincolnshire, a few months ago, to seek out a last gasp of hope. Like everything else we’ve tried, it was a bitter failure.”

  She bit her lip. “So far he has beaten the odds, but I do not know how much longer he can hang on.”

  Tears welled in her eyes, and she brushed them away. “Still, he is a fighter. It could be another year; it could be another ten. Whatever it is, I will stay by his side and do everything I can to support him.”

  “You must miss him when you are away,” he mused in a low voice.

  She nodded, wiping her face and taking in a deep breath. “I do, but sometimes sacrifices have to be made. I take each day as it comes. When I wake up the next morning, I start all over again.”

  Berenger paused for a long moment. “What illness does your father have?”

  Jessame shook her head, looking away, pain wrapping around her with an icy grip. “Could we talk about something else?” she ground out.

  He flushed. “Of course.”

  He took in a deep breath, glancing back at the cottage. “How do you like it here?”

  A soft smile came to her lips, and she relaxed again. “I enjoy it very much,” she admitted, running her hand over the soft texture of the moss. “It is serene and full of peace.”

  He quirked up an eyebrow. “Those are hardly the words that would normally come to mind when I thought of …”

  His cheeks reddened. “Of this type of a house.”

  Jessame smiled more widely. “Perhaps mine is unique, then,” she admitted. “I love this spot by the stream, to watch the eddies swirl and twist. I love sitting by the window, listening to the robins warble in the trees.” She sighed. “It may be small, and simple, but that is all I need to keep me content.”

  His eyes were steady on hers. “So you would not follow Cassandra in her quest for golden goblets of wine and silver threads tracing through her clothing?”

  A lightness spread through her heart at the idea. “What need have I for a golden cup, when the sunshine spilling across the meadow can set the gorse aglow in the late afternoon? How could silver threads in a dress ever compare to the dancing sparkles in a pond, echoing with the singing of birds?”

  She gave a dip with her toe, and circular ripples moved out into the stream, stretching into long oblongs, waving and vanishing with the moving water.

  Her voice was soft. “What need have I for jewels, when the night sky presents itself fresh, glowing, twinkling, richer than I could possibly imagine?”

  A time passed, and his voice was rough when at last he spoke again. “And yet, it does seem that some money is necessary to sustain life.”

  She thought to the mercury so critical for keeping her father alive, to the way they had sold off every spare stick of furniture, every uneaten head of cabbage, every not-critically-necessary pot and pan. How at last the trader had come for her beloved Misty, how she had cried, laying her hand along his mane, before watching him walk away, leave her forever.

  Just as Berenger had left her.

  Her voice nearly cracked when she drove herself to speak. “Sometimes one does what they have to do.”

  He was quiet, and this time he did not break the silence again.

  The two sat for hours as the sun drifted lower in the sky, the colors easing from light blue to tangerine, from soft rose to a dusky violet.

  At last he gave himself a shake and glanced back at the cottage. “I am afraid my horse’s presence here all day may have scared away any evening clients,” he stated, his voice tight.

  Jessame shrugged, but he was rummaging in a pouch at his belt, pulling out a handful of coins. He held it toward her, his eyes lowered. “Here.”

  Jessame’s face flamed with heat. The sum he was offering was more than she had seen in months. Was that really what prostitutes were paid in the Holy Lands? Had he been frequenting these sorts of houses, to know what the best women charged?

  His hand was before her, steady, and she found it almost impossible to consider taking the coins. It felt as if it would make her position real. It would solidify her as an actual prostitute, rather than just a role she was playing.

  But if she did not take the payment, he would wonder. He would investigate. She absolutely could not have that happen, not now.

  At last she forced herself to reach out and take the coins from his palm. His skin was warm, sturdy, and she lingered her fingers against it for a long moment before taking up the metal, tucking it back into the pouch at her own belt.

  Then he was drawing to his feet, striding across to his horse, and mounting in one quick motion. He pulled the reins hard, wheeling about, riding off at a canter toward his home.

  Jessame found she could not move, could not do ought but stare after him, at the vanishing shape in the growing dusk, at how he had left her, once again, without a backward glance, without a single word.

  Chapter 8

  A steady weight pressed on Jessame’s heart when she woke up the next morning and looked around her small cottage. She missed her father desperately. Her tal
k yesterday with Berenger reminded her just how frail her father was, how tenuous his connection with life. Any day could be his last.

  She reminded herself that a murderer was out there. Any delay could result in an innocent woman being slain. She moved to the table, flipping her tablet over in the warm morning sunshine, and looked from name to name with careful attention. Could she downgrade Lord Cavendish from a seven to a six? The man had a lecherous aspect to him, but after all he was of the same generation as her father and Berenger’s father, Aldric. Surely by now the hot fires had eased in him, and he simply delighted in flirtations.

  His young wife, though … Jessame tapped a finger to her lips. Lady Cavendish did seem quite focused on making her new home area up to her high London standards. The murders almost coincided with her arrival a few months back, when Lord Cavendish ramped his courtship efforts up to greater heights. Could she be that keen on ensuring her neighborhood was sanitized of unwanted individuals?

  Jessame adjusted a number there, added a note there, but there was not much she could do without further data. She needed to trust that her trap was well laid and that the miscreant would come to her.

  She glanced around the small cottage. The chances of that happening during daylight hours seemed quite slim. She might as well go home, spend the day there, and come back in the evening when there might be a visitor. Hopefully it would be the person she sought, so she could end this all, could return to hide in her home, remain at her father’s side, lose herself in the darkness.

  Her mind made up, she hung the red dress to one side and slipped into her brown traveling dress, taking one last look around the cottage before heading out. She knew the path through the woods by heart, tracing her way over fallen logs and through dense thickets with comfortable ease. The sun was high in the sky when she came up before her home, knocking on the door.

  Millie opened the door with a warm smile. “Why, we did not expect to see you today,” she welcomed Jessame. “Come on in. Your father has been asking for you; he will be delighted you are here.”

  Jessame changed quickly, braiding her hair, slipping around the study door, and was pleased to find her father sitting up in his chair, sipping at a mug of mead with tremulous hands.

  He glanced up at her, then called out, “Mutantur omnia nos et mutamur in illis.”

  She chuckled, coming to sit at his feet, to lay her head against his knee. “All things change, and we change with them.”

  “Yes indeed, my darling,” he agreed, smiling down at her, brushing her hair with his mitted hand. “Change is inevitable in our world. The most we can seek to do is stay aware, and appreciate each day we have.”

  “I try my best,” she offered, looking up at him, seeing the hollows where his eyes were, remembering the laughing, enthusiastic man he had been in her youth. He would ride with her then, would take her on long walks, would read to her at night. Now he was a human mummy, was wearied by walking from his couch to his chair, and yet inside he was the same, he was the father she adored. His mind was just as sharp as ever, and it was trapped within this withering frame.

  There was a knock at the door, and she flinched, looking around sharply. Who was interrupting her precious time now? “I will be right back,” she promised her father, standing, moving to slip out the study door. She heard Millie open the front door a crack, heard her make a soft inquiry, and then there was a male’s response. She could not make out the words, but she knew the tone, knew the timbre. It was Berenger.

  She moved quickly to the hall, slipping on the veil and circlet out of sight of the door. “It is all right, Millie,” she offered to the woman. “I will take care of this.” She pushed past Millie to stand on the step, closing the door firmly behind her.

  “Jessame, let me in,” he started without preamble, his voice rough, his eyes shadowed as if he had not slept a wink the previous night. “I have known you since you were born; I have spent practically every day of my childhood here. I have seen you and your family in every state imaginable. Let me come in. Let us talk about what is going on.”

  Jessame thought of her father, frail and weak, bandaged in the study which he called his home. She thought of the few remaining rooms which still had furniture, of the hobbled together state they lived in. All defensive feelings flooded to the fore, and she stood before the door with her arms crossed.

  “No.”

  His face blanched in hurt confusion. “Jessame, why do you not trust me? Have I not always been someone you could rely on?”

  Her mouth dropped open at that, and her eyes blazed with heat. “Rely on?” she charged, the anger bubbling up out of her before she could stop it. “Rely on? How about that day, ten years ago, when you walked down that path, walked straight into the horizon, and never turned back once?”

  She strode a step forward, and he retreated back, giving her space, and it made her even more furious. “I waited for you to come the next day. I sat on the front step, staring out down that path, but you never came. Not that day, not the next, nor the next one after that.”

  Her eyes welled, and she swiped at them with her hand. It tore at her that after so many years he could still hurt her, still inflict this intense pain and longing.

  “You did not even care …” she found herself gasping out, and then she was turning, half running back inside, slamming the bolt home, leaning back against the closed door, her breath coming in heaves.

  There was a thumping on the other side of the door, but she ignored it, waved away Millie when she came at a fast trot from the pantry to see what was going on. She ignored the steady pounding while she carefully removed the veil and circlet, laid them on hooks by the side of the door, and moved slowly back toward her father’s study.

  Her father’s eyes held concern as she lowered herself back at his side, and his bandaged hand seemed even shakier than usual as it drew gently along her hair.

  “My poor darling, I wish I could ease your troubles,” he murmured at last. “Life does not always run smoothly.”

  She rested her head against his side, struck that he of all people could say that to her. He had shouldered his illness for the long years without a word of complaint, patiently trying every new medication they researched, never once mentioning any sadness as his world closed in around him.

  His thoughts seemed to be mirroring her own. “If anything, my illness has given me time to think about what is important in life, about what really matters.” He looked up at her. “And you know what? It is my spending time with you which has brought me the most joy.” His voice became soft. “In so many ways, you remind me of your mother. She would have been so proud of you.”

  Jessame wished she could remember even a glimpse of the woman. “Tell me again - what she was like?”

  A smile came to his cracked lips. “She was sunshine and morning dew; she was bright with curiosity and deep with compassion. Several of her uncles were priests, and they taught her to read from an early age. She devoured everything she could get her hands on, from the books of the Bible to history scrolls to myths of the Greeks.” His eyes sparkled. “I still remember when I was courting her and I made reference to a story of Hera and Zeus. She knew immediately what I meant. I knew on that day that she was the perfect woman for me.”

  He looked up at the shelves. “Many of these codices were hers; precious gifts given to her by her family members when we wed. They live to the far north, and they wanted her to have something to remember them by when she came to settle here with me.”

  Jessame nodded at the familiar story. “And so you taught me and Berenger to read, to put them to good use.”

  “And Rudyard too,” agreed her father. “I knew it would be nice to have him read to us in the evening, when my eyes began to fail.” He gave a wry chuckle. “I had no idea my health would falter so quickly.”

  Jessame’s voice became tight. “I wish it had not,” she murmured, putting to voice a thought which had been so strong in her mind for the past eight years.
“I wish that …”

  He shushed her gently, pulling her close, murmuring against her hair. She struggled to hold back the tears, leaning against her father, thinking of all the pain and loss they had both shouldered during the years.

  His voice was gravelly when he spoke. “By the time I was ten years old, my two younger sisters were both dead from illness. Only my younger brother was left of my siblings.” The corner of his mouth turned up in a fond smile. “I adored Simon. He was rambunctious, and wild, and he loved every moment of life. But one day, when he was seventeen, his explorations brought him into the breeding ground of a wild boar, and that was the end of his adventures.”

  Jessame’s shoulders slumped. “Why does life bring us so much pain?” she asked wearily.

  He patted her hair fondly again, drawing her against him. “Rather look at how much pleasure life has presented with us. It feels like I can remember every precious day I had with Simon, running in the fragrant fields of thistle, swimming hard in the chill springtime river. We made the most of each day we had, and he embraced every opportunity he was given.” He smiled at the memory. “I would not lose what we had for any golden trinket.”

  “But then you lost mother too,” murmured Jessame.

  “That I did,” he agreed, his voice tinging with wistful sadness. “But our four years together are some of the most precious memories I own. Her gentle laugh, the bright sparkle in her eyes, the warmth of her smile. I can wrap those memories around me at night and feel their embrace.”

  He looked down at her, his eyes clear and bright. “Nothing lasts forever, my darling. Houses eventually crumble. Bodies weaken and fail. Friends move away, and loved ones pass on.” A smile came to his lips. “What matters most is that we treasure the time we have right now, to do the best we can, to connect with those who love us. The future might arrive eventually, and the past is gone for good. What we can change, and alter, and draw in, is the present we are in.”

  “But what if you could be healthy?” asked Jessame, putting into words the grief that had eaten at her for so long.