Lord of the Beasts

by Susan Krinard

  Cordelia shivered. “It must be gratifying for the vixen to have such power.”

  “Females have a great deal of power in the animal kingdom, Cordelia. Much more than you might imagine. In a majority of species, it is they who choose with whom they will mate.”

  “Like the peahen with the peacock, selecting him for his brilliant plumage,” she said with an attempt at lightness. “Among the birds, it is the male who wears the brightest colors.”

  “And among mammals, it’s most often the strongest and fittest who win the right to reproduce. Even then, the female usually has the final say.”

  “And do you believe this rule extends to human beings?” she asked.

  Donal helped her to dismount again. The warmth of his bare hand penetrated through the kid of her gloves. “I believe that women possess more power than they realize.”

  “Perhaps in some distant land I have never visited, but not in England.”

  “Perhaps not,” he conceded, shedding his coat and laying it on the grass. “Yet you are free to make your own decisions.”

  She stared at the foxes, who stared back. “Am I?” she murmured.

  “Others may attempt to influence you, but you have the strength of will to set your own course.” He indicated his jacket. “Please, sit.”

  “I shall ruin your coat.”

  He chuckled. “You’ve never mentioned it aloud, but I feel certain that you regard my current wardrobe as sadly lacking in style. This might compel me to purchase a coat that will meet with your approval.”

  She sat down gingerly. “You certainly have no need of that!”

  He sat beside her. “Yet it is true that I am a rather plain beech owl compared to Lord Inglesham’s splendid peacock.”

  Cordelia adjusted her skirts over her riding boots. “Fortunately, I am no peahen.”

  “Far from it.” He cocked his head. “A peregrine suits you much better.”

  “Nor am I a hunter,” she said tightly.

  “I remember that you did not enjoy sharing Othello’s memories.”

  She rubbed her upper arms, though the early afternoon was far from cool. “You know they were not memories, Donal…only images your skill with hypnosis placed in my mind. And no, I did not enjoy them.”

  “That was my fault. I should have known better. The animals in the menagerie had experienced too much pain, and you were forced to share it.” He touched her shoulder with the tips of his fingers. “It’s not too late to try again.”

  “No, thank you. Once was quite enough.”

  “But there’s so much more to learn, Cordelia. So much you haven’t seen.” He looked toward the foxes, who had been joined by another adult. “I can show you what they feel…not as hunters, but as they are now…a family.”

  “I hardly see what purpose—”

  “The more you understand of the animals, the better you will be able to care for your own when I am gone.”

  Her heart climbed into her throat. “Gone? Are you planning to leave us, Doctor?”

  “That was always the arrangement, was it not?” He plucked a blade of grass and rubbed it between his fingers. “I have a little more work to do, and then…”

  “And then you’ll be off to find that place where no human being has ever trod.” The anger in her own voice startled her. “I’m sorry. You’re quite right—that was our arrangement. Do you anticipate an imminent departure?”

  “Not imminent. I do not believe that…Ivy is ready.”

  Cordelia bit the inside of her lip, wondering if Donal regarded her as much a failure with the girl as she did. “She is not making as much progress as I had hoped.”

  “You have an unfortunate tendency to hold yourself too much accountable for the well-being of others,” he said, “and care too little for your own.”

  “I took responsibility for Ivy of my own free will.”

  “But has caring for her made you happier, Cordelia? Would you surrender the responsibility if you could?”

  “Never.” She held his gaze. “I am more than fond of her. She needs me, and I should not know what to do without her.”

  “Is it enough just to be needed?”

  “What greater calling can there be, especially for a woman?”

  Donal plucked a blade of grass and twirled it between his fingers. “What of your own needs, Cordelia?”

  “An austere life suits me well enough, especially when it leaves more resources for those who are less fortunate, human or otherwise.”

  “And your dreams?”

  She gazed at the river, letting the sparkle of sunlight on water carry her away from the dangers of emotion. “My dreams are for Ivy, for the wonderful life she will have when she…when she finally realizes…”

  “Promise me you will not marry Inglesham.”

  She blinked, certain she had not heard him correctly. “I beg your pardon?”

  He looked up, and she saw that his eyes had gone dark and strange. “He doesn’t merit your trust in him, Cordelia. And your father does not have your best wishes at heart.”

  Cordelia struggled to stand, tangled her feet in her skirts and snatched the trailing fabric away with a ferocious sweep of her hand. “I know perfectly well that you do not like the viscount, Doctor, but—”

  “You must trust me in this,” he said, his voice hoarse, pleading and demanding at the same time. “Please, Cordelia.”

  She took a step away from him. “Why?” she asked. “Why do you so despise a man you hardly know?”

  “You may have little faith in instinct, but I must rely on mine.”

  “That is the best explanation you can provide for such vague accusations?”

  He gave a helpless shake of his head. “I have no other.”

  “You may think that my father wishes to be rid of me, but I assure you…”

  “No.” He drew his hand across his face. “No. I spoke out of turn. Forgive me.”

  His genuine contrition disarmed her completely. The tightness in her chest receded. “Perhaps we should find another topic of conversation.”

  “Yes.” He glanced at the thicket of goat willow. Cordelia was surprised to see that the fox family was still there, apparently fascinated by the inexplicable human antics.

  Donal rose and gazed into Cordelia’s eyes. “Let me make amends,” he said. “Let me give you something beautiful.”

  She knew at once what he wanted of her. She had been so determined to avoid any further intimacy with him, and yet what he proposed was the most extreme form of closeness imaginable.

  “Only this one last time,” he said, “and I shall never suggest it again.”

  One last time before he leaves us, and then these upsets and arguments will be over. My life will be normal again….

  Just as she wanted it. Just as Lydia had yearned for her own life to be, in the weeks before she died.

  “Very well,” she said. She settled again on Donal’s coat and let the tension flow out of her arms and legs. “What shall I do?”

  “Only relax, and think of the foxes. I’ll do the rest.”

  Cordelia could not help but try to remain alert as Donal began to speak, but his voice was like the gurgling river or the soughing of wind in the treetops, and soon she was drifting, anchorless, in the world he built with his words. It was as if the animals themselves spoke in her mind, and she began to see through their eyes, feel what they felt.

  Joy. Not the fear she might have expected in animals so often mercilessly hunted by men, nor the ceaseless focus on obtaining food. Instead she felt the boundaries of her body dissolve, replaced by a supple, red-coated form ideally shaped for its life and environment.

  She raised her muzzle, broad ears catching every sound and movement from shrubbery, meadow and river. The water sang to her, and each breath of wind brought some new, fascinating odor that stirred the hairs on her back with a kit’s restless excitement.

  A sharp yip from one of her two little vixens brought her back to the thicket. She nose
d at each of the younglings in turn, admonished them to remain close, and then turned her gaze upon the two-legged ones across the meadow.

  She knew they were harmless, these creatures; they carried no pain-sticks, offered no threat. One of them was so different from most two-legs that the vixen was confused at first; to her it smelled almost like a fox. She nuzzled her mate, who reassured her with a wave of his handsome brush.

  Male and female, he reminded her. She coughed in amusement, remembering the way the two-legs had bristled and circled one another like vixen and dog fox at their first meeting, each testing the others’ worthiness. She could not tell which had gained dominance. Both were still, almost as still as a hunter awaiting the reckless dash of a mouse from its nest in the grass, but the eyes of the male were upon the vixen, eyes the color of summer leaves….

  She shook her head and bent again to her young ones. They rolled about in mock battle, all three strong and thick-coated with health. This territory the vixen had chosen was abundant with game and hiding places where the kits could rest in safety; it seemed likely that the entire litter would survive the season. She caught the young male under her paw and licked a patch of mud from his coat while he protested and squirmed, only half as indignant as he pretended.

  Her mate rubbed his cheek against hers, his contentment as warm as sunlight playing among the branches overhead. He was as proud of his litter as if he had borne them himself. Proud of his mate’s beauty, her grace, her cunning.

  She leaned into him, anointing herself in the musky scent of his coat, his compelling maleness. Images flitted like butterflies through her memory: the redolent crunch of last autumn’s leaves under her paws as they met again after a long season’s parting; the dance of approach and retreat, flight and pursuit; his hot breath misting about her face as he sang to her of the most delightful joining to come. Her tail trembled with need of him, with the exaltation of their reunion….

  Cordelia swayed, her mouth flooded with unfamiliar tastes, dizzy with the smell of inexorable masculinity. Donal was pressed close, his skin radiating heat through the thin muslin of his shirtsleeves, his face mere inches from hers. The pit of her stomach throbbing with a need she recognized and could not resist.

  Donal cupped her face between his strong countryman’s hands and kissed her. Her mouth opened under his, thawing and blossoming beneath the healing warmth of his caress. He gentled her as he might gentle a frightened, wounded animal; his lips were firm but never invasive, giving far more than they took. She melted into him, arms stealing about his waist, hands splayed over the hard, shifting muscles of his back and shoulders.

  He groaned softly, echoing the cry trapped in her own throat. She welcomed the erotic memories he called out from the depths of her mind where she had hidden them for so long: sensual visions of swaying branches and broad leaves slick with moisture at the end of a sultry day; a resplendent jungle flower luring her to its quivering petals with the sheer, carnal seduction of its perfume; the pungent aroma of exotic spices and sweetmeats dripping with honey; the silky laughter of veiled women and the flash of a brown hand, painted with henna in ancient designs; a drift of strange, enticing music that slid over her skin like silk.

  And then she was naked, her entire body taut with anticipation of the ecstasies to come. But it was not James she envisioned lying beside her amid a wanton tangle of sheets and coverlets. It was him…this man, this lover, Donal Fleming with his otherworldly magic and jungle-dark eyes….

  “Cordelia,” he whispered.

  The sound of her name broke the spell. She jerked, her fingernails tearing into his shirtsleeves. Reality plunged her into a well of icy comprehension. Shame brought her to her feet and guided her to Desdemona’s side when her vision was too blurred to show her the way.

  You have not changed. Oh, God, you have not changed at all….

  “Cordelia!”

  She dragged herself into the saddle, her skirts flying above her ankles, and lashed Desdemona into a startled run. The foxes disappeared in a streak of red, and Cordelia prayed with all her heart that she would never see them again.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  THE FIRST RACE MEETING was everything Donal had feared, and a thousand times worse.

  The course had been laid in a fallow field just outside the market town of Chipping Milborne, not twenty miles from Edgecott, and though it was a modest event in comparison to venues such as Newmarket and Ascot, the sponsorship of the local earl had attracted a sizeable contingent of county society as well as farmers, shopkeepers and laborers from the surrounding counties. The lure of sport and money attracted people of every occupation, from seasoned “turfites” to amateurs hoping for a few guineas’ profit.

  The din of the crowd beat on Donal’s ears like the pistons of some great, many-legged machine, and the sour smell of human sweat compounded the nausea Donal felt every time a greedy, gape-mouthed turfite rubbed against him on the way to place his next bet.

  Lord Inglesham paid not the slightest attention to Donal’s discomfort. He was in his element; his grin drew men to him like flies to a carcass, and he flashed banknotes as if they were so much confetti. He carried the Racing Calendar and Ruff’s Guide to the Turf under his arm, elevated to the ranks of the “knowing ones” through no skill or merit of his own.

  He had already led Donal on an early morning inspection of the race entrants, making use of his unctuous charm and well-calculated bribes to gain admittance where it would ordinarily be denied. And he had been exultant when Donal provided him with the subtle details of each horse’s condition, giving him an edge that no other turfite or even the cleverest tout could hope to duplicate.

  “Excellent work, my friend,” he said, slapping Donal on the shoulder. “Of course we’ll know more when you see the nags at the starting line. I have a comfortable arrangement with one of the best bookmakers in the south; he’ll make any necessary adjustments for me if new information becomes available.”

  Donal had said nothing, his stomach roiling with the thought of what he had been forced to do, and why. What he hadn’t known of the track and its sordid world he had rapidly been compelled to learn: how the form of poor horses could be “puffed up” to deceive all but the most well-informed betters; how even the best animals could be made to appear lame or listless with various drugs; how owners commonly bet against their own horses, pulling their entries at the last possible moment. And though many of the horses with whom Donal had spoken were high-strung with excitement at the prospect of the coming contests, he knew how completely they were subject to their owner’s cruel whims.

  “I cannot read the minds of men,” he warned Inglesham again as they threaded their way through booths and wagons manned by thimbleriggers, card sellers, and vendors of every sort of food and drink. “If an owner chooses to withdraw his entry or instructs his jockey to hold the horse back, I will not know.”

  Inglesham paused at a stall, paid for a mug of ale and inhaled the brown liquid with all the gusto of a laborer on holiday. “That can’t be helped,” he said, wiping the foam from his lips with the back of his hand. “And I know most of the owners, anyway. I’m familiar with their tricks.” He grinned at a voluptuous young woman whose manner hinted at the pleasures to be found beneath her low-cut bodice. “Come along, Fleming. We’ve more work to do.”

  Donal followed, powerless as a beaten dog at the end of his master’s chain. Anger seethed in him, but he kept it under strict control. If he let it escape it might affect the horses. They had burdens enough of their own, and no means of freeing themselves from this bondage that made them the disposable playthings of avaricious men.

  Try as he might, however, Donal could not calm his troubled heart. He and Inglesham had left Edgecott two days after his perilous encounter with Cordelia by the river…two days after she had fled the estate, bound for some purported business in London. They hadn’t spoken again after the kiss; Donal had deliberately stayed away from the house that evening, and by morning Cordelia
was gone.

  He had been relieved at first. He had called himself a hundred kinds of fool for breaking that fine, fragile thread of propriety that still lay between them, knowing that he’d severed it beyond repair. Knowing that he had not only brought himself one step closer to disaster, but that he had betrayed Cordelia’s trust, perhaps even made her believe that a lasting relationship was possible when he knew it could never be.

  Yet even as he wondered how he could have lost his human will so completely—how he had let the foxes’ emotions and his own banked desire so cloud his reason—he recognized that his fears were almost certainly exaggerated. Cordelia was far too intelligent, too sensible, to read more into the kiss than a moment’s error in judgment. The suppressed part of her nature, the part she refused to acknowledge, would slink back into the darkness of her memories.

  And therein lay the real, tragic consequence of their fleeting lapse of discipline: that Cordelia would turn her back on her feelings once more, convinced that they could not be trusted, and remain a prisoner in her cage of conformity and self-denial…simply because Donal hadn’t the courage to help her escape it. He had attempted a healing he couldn’t hope to complete.

  You are not to blame, Cordelia. All the mistakes have been mine, from the moment we met. I knew I could never give up my gifts, or my freedom. And yet I believed I could make you see….

  “Fleming!”

  Inglesham dragged Donal from his grim thoughts with a firm tap on his shoulder. “Methinks your mind ain’t on the business at hand, eh?” he said, his words slightly slurred from the effects of several drinks. “The first race is about to begin. I’ve a place in the grandstand, and of course you’ll be my…guest.” He leaned close, his breath sour in Donal’s face. “I expect a reasonable profit in at least two of the races, Fleming…as a sign of your good faith. Less than that and I’ll know you’re shamming.”