In the Forest of the Night & The Barmaid and the Blacksmith

by Lizbeth Dusseau

“I’m perfectly all right,” she vowed to him. “If I don’t have my garden for a day, I’ll surly die here.”

  “What will we do with you in winter?” Joshua wondered aloud, even as he walked off, not hearing a reply from her. It was a serious concern for them both. Once the weather turned, there would be few days she’d be able to enjoy the out of doors. As the fall of the year was approaching fast, the winds shifting wildly on some days, it was becoming increasingly dreary for Fiona.

  Coming in from out of doors one afternoon, Fiona was surprised to see her husband discussing plans for a meal with Mrs. McCready.

  “We must have beef and fowl . . and fish as well. The finest quality, you’ll order it special as we used to?”

  “Yes, sir,” she replied, the cook’s eyes lighting proudly, with the news of such plans.

  “What are you doing, my darling?” Fiona asked, bewildered.

  “A harvest feast. Something of a tradition in this house. I think it would be a fine plan, considering the coming season. You’ll meet some other people, perhaps create a friend or two, who might help you endure the coming winter.”

  “I have no desire for any friend but you,” Fiona swore to him. “Please don’t do this for me.”

  “That’s fine.” He wouldn’t argue with her, she’d been adamant with him about entertaining outsiders in the home. “But there will still be a feast.”

  “How many do you expect?” Mrs. McCready asked.

  “Thirty, perhaps more. Nigel and I will create the guest list and let you know.”

  Fiona dashed upstairs when the plans became too much for her to listen too. She knew nothing of such events, they frightened her as much as long faced fancy women frightened her. She even took her meal in her room that night, refusing to go down to the dining room when the upstairs maid was sent to fetch her.

  When Joshua arrived in her room, shortly after the maid announced Mrs. Kane’s plans, he was clearly annoyed with her.

  “I’m not allowed to act like a gentle lady and take my meal in my room?” she asked.

  “No,” he replied evenly.

  “And why not?”

  “I don’t plan on our having arguments I know nothing of, you’re obviously upset.”

  “I am. You know how I feel about entertaining guests.”

  “You sound more like my mother every day,” Joshua said, “and you are not her. I don’t want you to become the recluse she was.”

  “That’s not my plan. And this has nothing to do with your mother. I simply do not plan to attend your little fest. I want nothing to do with it.”

  “Fiona, that’s ridiculous. You will attend, and that’s that. And I’d be surprised that you didn’t have the time of your life. There will be fine food and wine and dancing. You’ll love it.” His eyes narrowed as he spoke. He was in one of those moods where he planned to have his way, and there was no use arguing with him. “I’ll have the tailor come and make you a new dress.”

  “I don’t want a new dress!” she sputtered.

  “You’ll have one anyway, and you’ll wear it!” he vowed.

  Their eyes were sparking back and forth as the lighthearted conflagration began.

  “You’ll dress me up like some fine prissy woman, with a high fancy collar and lace all over the place!” She screwed up her nose at the very thought.

  “Oh no! Not for you. This will be a regular ball gown, something scandalous, cut so low that your breasts will pop from the bodice. It will be tight at the waist, and there will be a great wide skirt, and you’ll go naked underneath, except for the stockings.”

  “So you’d have me dress like a brazen hussy!” she said.

  “Yes, and I’ll take you off into the pantry again, at the height of the festivities and screw you till you scream and all the guests will hear,” he gesticulated wildly. He was trying to make her laugh, she could see the by the merry expression in his eyes.

  She eyed him furtively, his playful mood beginning to put a crack in her indignation. “So, you promise you’ll do that? Raise my skirt in the pantry and poke me with that rod of yours? Right in the midst of the festivities?”

  “I will,” he assured her.

  “And you’ll run your hand along my breast right in front of our guests?”

  “If that is what you wish. I’ll even bend down and kiss the white flesh and leave you flushed.

  “You’d be that forward with me in public?”

  “I’d screw you in public and not care.”

  “Oh, but I would!” she looked at him shocked, even though it was all a meaningful tease.

  “So you will be the grandest young matron at my feast. You’ll look like the handmaiden of the devil to the men, though you will be as pure as heaven as my wife. I can think of nothing I would prefer.”

  “You are a bawdy man, Joshua.” She shook her head, feeling less angry with him. All this lusty talk was arousing her, a wild surge of passion claiming her loins. She stood and walked to where he stood, and without announcing her intentions, she unbuttoned his pants and pushed them down. Her hands went to his crotch and his rising prick. “You can take me now,” she insisted, and with a curious smirk on her lips. She pulled him by his prick to the bed, where she climbed on hands and knees, swaying her ass lewdly before his eyes.

  He hardly had to be encouraged to take her. She was getting very wise about herself and her needs. A woman so forward would be shunned by many men, but not Joshua. He liked her this way, and he could count on her to be this bold, at least once a week. It saved him the need to seduce her.

  He was constantly seduced by her, it was pleasant to know that just the energy that passed between them, seduced her too, so much so that she wouldn’t wait for him to advance on her properly.

  ***

  By the time the day of Joshua’s grand feast arrived, Fiona had resigned herself to the event. She was still not happy with it, not happy that there would be forty fancy dressed people descending on her home, and so much commotion that she wouldn’t know what to do.

  “All you have to do is smile, and look for some lovely young woman like yourself to call a friend, if you like. You’ll have no problem winning over either women or men with that beautiful smile of yours,” Joshua told her one last time. He’d spent most of the last few weeks, reassuring her, though she was hardly reassured at all.

  After three hours of preparation that afternoon, Fiona was at last ready for the evening. The upstairs maid had helped, the girl alleviating her anxiety with her cheery tone.

  Fiona bathed until her skin felt like flower petals, and smelled the same. There was not one inch that she had not covered with rich cream. It took some time for the two young women to put her hair into a worthy fashion. Fiona couldn’t make her unruly locks behave, they seemed to have a mind of their own, adamant to fall about her face in sensuous curls that made her soft face look softer yet. On a sudden inspiration, she pinned flowers in her hair to match her dress, the maid thinking she looked ravishing, and not at all inappropriate.

  “I think Master Kane will find you perfect. And your bodice, so white,” she looked envious, seeing Fiona’s heaving breasts pushed tightly into the upper part of the dress, so that indeed her nipples practically popped out, though they didn’t. The maid doused her with powder to soak up the perspiration, and stood back to eye her again.

  “I’m so nervous. This is the thing I’ve dreaded most,” she exclaimed woefully. “Even now, even though I promised Joshua that I’d be there, I’d rather climb to the very top attic of this house and hide until all the carriages are gone.”

  “Ah, ma’am, you’ll do fine. You certainly don’t do yourself justice. You’re so beautiful, and whether you believe it or not you always act so confident.”

  “Yes, while I’m quaking in these shoes. Which are too tight, I’m sure that my feet will be aching in minutes. He says he’s going to teach me to dance. I can’t even fathom how awkward that’s going to be.”

  The poor girl had no way to hand
le all of Fiona’s objections, but she was patient. And when their work was done, the mistress of Kane Manor looked as if she was heaven sent, from the creamy bodice, to the pale green dress to match her eyes, to the untamed flower bedecked red hair that framed her sparkling face.

  At the stroke of seven, as Joshua had instructed, Fiona left the bedroom to join him downstairs. Already there were quite a few people milling about the entry. She stared down at them, finding her knees beginning to shake; she was afraid she’d stumble down the stairs.

  Luckily, she saw Joshua exactly where he said he would be. Gazing up at her, there was a welcome smile on his face. Fixing her eyes on him, she took the stairs slowly, with a smile on her face, not realizing that all eyes below were transfixed by the extraordinary woman that descended to take her husband’s arm.

  “You take my breath, lass,” he said as he leaned in, and kissed her cheek.

  She’d never seen Joshua look quite so fancy in his formal suit, his long hair freshly combed and pulled back, his beard trimmed. He was as stunning a sight to her as she was to him.

  Looking around at their guests, she smiled, exactly as he’d told her to, and then feeling a little giddy about the whole silly thing, she leaned into Joshua’s ear and whispered, “I’m wearing no underwear, just as you said.”

  He laughed, realizing the joke was only to dispense her fears.

  On his arm, Mrs. Kane strolled into the sitting room and continued to greet the guests, each quite impressed by Joshua Kane’s common but very beautiful wife.

  Once they sat down to dinner, Fiona thought that at least for the moment, she was safe. Seeing the goblet of wine poured for her, she quickly picked it up, and downed the entire glass in one gulp, thinking it might settled her frayed nerves. However, when replacing her goblet by her plate, she looked up to see that there were a least a dozen pairs of eyes gazing at her, including Joshua’s. Her own eyes widened in apprehension.

  Joshua quickly motioned to the valet at his side. After whispering some message to the man, Fiona’s glass was discreetly refilled. Once done, Joshua stood to begin the toast.

  This ritual was unknown to her, at least in the formal version practiced in Kane Manor. Toasts in the taverns were bawdy moments, where liquor flowed and no one cared about who drank what when. Fiona blushed through the entire act, knowing that her impulsive drinking had broken the proper etiquette of the ceremony. Joshua wouldn’t care, but it was hardly the impression that she wanted to make on their guests.

  Chagrined, Fiona was quiet the remainder of the meal, afraid to even say a word. And yet, as the meal was nearly over, with Fiona thinking that she might at last be able to relax, her second mishap occurred when her nervous clumsy hands knocked her wine glass, so the front of the beautiful green dress was doused with the liquid.

  “Oh, my word!” she exclaimed. She was lightheaded afraid that she had drunk far to much to behave soberly.

  She might have recouped with Joshua’s reassuring hand on hers, but a whispered voice far down the table seemed to rise above the din, “She’s not raised well, I hear.” The sentiment instantly stuck a raw nerve in Joshua’s young wife, and she tried to bolt the table. Instead, she felt her husband’s firm hand on her arm, keeping her from the hasty exit. Looking at him, his stern expression bore into her and kept her in her place. Though, it did not keep the tears from forming in her eyes.

  After a few flustered moments, the conversation continued, though Fiona was certain that all the whispered words around the table had to do with their host’s inept bride.

  “ … her hair, have you ever seen anything like it … those flowers … the dress is beautiful, but immodest, and now ruined … there are stories that she was raped, and Joshua rescued her … little good sense there … I hear she wears britches and works with the gardener like a servant …

  The tittering voices claimed her mind, her heart was pounding as rapidly as her head; the fierce desire to flee had not left her, though Joshua’s intimidating eye prevented her from making a move.

  When she happened to gaze down the table, her blurred vision suddenly cleared, and Lowell Kane’s visage came distinctly into view, a horrid smirk breaking out on his gloating face. She felt completely undone, knowing that it was her abominable brother-in-law that had planted these noxious rumors about the room of guests.

  With Joshua speaking to someone on his other side, not suspecting that she would try to leave, Fiona quietly slipped from her chair and moved rapidly to the doorway of the dining room, her husband not noticing her absence until he saw the green dress disappearing on the other side of the door. From the doorway to the dining room, Fiona raced up the staircase to the second floor, and hurriedly made her way to their bedroom. Then, thinking Joshua would surely follow her, she dashed passed the door and climbed another flight of stairs to the third floor, and yet another flight to the attic.

  Fiona had been in this room once before, the dusty old place filled with cast off things. It had perhaps been the most fascinating room in the entire house, and she’d wanted to inspect it further, but had not taken the time to do so. Now, it was hardly time for inspections; all she wanted was peace, a place of solitude away from the crazy crowded life in the rooms below. She slumped down into an old broken chair, the dust flying around her, then settling in again, as if she was as much a cast-off as the other things in this cast-off place. She wanted nothing more than to disappear into the walls and woodwork and the atmosphere of decay, letting herself wither into nothingness. The darkness surrounding her was welcome, and she closed her eyes to rest, hoping the pounding in her head and heart would go away.

  It was some time before Joshua found her, and by the time he made the trek upstairs, he was furious with her flight.

  “If you couldn’t stand it, Fi, the bedroom should have sufficed for comfort,” he said.

  “I didn’t want to be found.”

  “You foolish girl, you know I’d have looked for you until I did. Now, I’ve left our guests far too long. If you want to remain up here, and I suppose I can’t force you to go back with me … “

  “Never!” she shouted.

  “Well then, stay here, and when you hear all the carriages have left, you can creep back like a timid mouse, and perhaps then we’ll talk.”

  “You are angry with me, aren’t you?”

  “Passionately, but at least I know you’re all right.” That comment almost sounded kind, and the expression on his face, what she could see in the light from the candle in his hand, was not as angry as it might have been.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Fiona did not easily recuperate from the catastrophe of Joshua’s grand feast. For three days, she nursed her broken ego, refusing to leave their bedroom for any reason. She ate slept and cried, and little else. They certainly did not make love and in fact, that very night, Fiona asked that her husband find somewhere else to sleep besides their bed—something he only agreed to because he was himself so angry with his wife and the unfortunate end to his harvest feast. Joshua slept in an adjoining room, and continued to do so for two more nights.

  On the fourth day however, he decided that this mourning period was over. Before eight that morning, he came into their room, and dragged her from the bed.

  “What are you doing to me?” she asked.

  “You’re not going to remain in this room another day, if I have to lock you out.”

  “Stop it!” she shouted, wrenching away from his tight grasp.

  “I swear, Fi, I’ll not tolerate this mood of yours. It’s not like you and it’s going to end. The dinner was unfortunate, but hardly the end of the world. You are making far too much of it, and this avoidance of me is ruining the peace we’ve had between us. Besides you look a mess,” he added, seeing that she’d not bathed, her hair was a stringy mass of tangles and her eyes looked horribly puffy from having cried so much.

  “I can’t go down there,” she cried at him.

  “Good god, lass, the guests have left and my b
rothers are off their own devices.”

  “Oh, yes, and Lowell will not greet me with some self-satisfied smirk?”

  “Lowell will behave himself with you, or he’ll feel my fist across his jaw again.”

  Fiona tried to catch her breath, but all the horror of that one night seemed to surge in her again. “Stop it now!” she shouted at Joshua. “I will not be responsible for this unwholesome difficulty with your brother.”

  “You are not responsible for it, Lowell is. The bastard has been a troublemaker all his life. You’re not going to change him, or prevent him from acting like a bore.”

  “But I can’t stand living here anymore. I want to leave!”

  “Fiona stop!” he ordered. “You’re going on like a child of six. You’ll get up now, and if nothing else eat your breakfast in the kitchen and spend some time in your garden. It’s a lovely day, and you’re looking much too pale.”

  “But look at me,” she said.

  “Yes, look at you. Better get yourself cleaned up. But mind you,” he said, as he was going to leave. “You be down in a half hour, or I’ll come up and get you. And you won’t like that.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “You don’t want to know,” he advised her, and he stormed out.

  A rocky silence reigned between them, and no one, including Lowell had the courage to cross the frustrated and angry Mrs. Kane. For the next several days, she took her meals in the kitchen and spent every available hour in the garden, though by then, there was little to do to tend the place. It was as tame as it would be, the greater part of the work was over. It was simply there for her to enjoy, even if the enjoyment was clouded by everything else that had happened.

  At night, Fiona was unmoved to sexual things. Even when Joshua moved back into the bed, she rebuffed his advances, turning a cold shoulder to him. “I can’t make love with you, Joshua, I’m still too upset. I have no feeling for it at all. In fact, the thought of it makes me sick to my stomach. Please, please take your hands off of me.” She truly did think she was about to retch.

  “This cannot go on,” Joshua told her bluntly, a week after the unfortunate dinner.