Love’s Magic

by Traci E Hall

  Nicholas found his fingers shaking like a silly twit’s as he pulled his new tunic from the rumpled sack. He smoothed the folds of cloth, noting the occasional uneven stitch as if he were discovering a pearl amongst the sand. His throat was clogged with unwanted emotion as he remembered the look of heartbreak on her face. He’d treated her so poorly. “The gold falcon was to be our crest?”

  Petyr nodded. “Aye. She said Willy helped her draw out the pattern. Fine work, eh?”

  As Nicholas packed the tunic away, he said, “She deserves better than me, Petyr. No matter what else comes of this journey to my father, the Montehue family will be released from his tyranny. Celestia will get her annulment.”

  Petyr had been nodding and smiling like a proud teacher listening to a prized student. Until he heard the last part of the speech.

  “Ye’re bloody daft!”

  Celestia hoped she hadn’t made a mistake, sending Petyr after Nicholas. She didn’t want her husband dragged home like a naughty child, but the thought of him journeying alone gave her chills.

  The cloudy vision she’d had of him, trapped and miserable, could be something from his past – or, she paced the room with worry, something to come.

  Chewing slowly, she supposed it was only fitting that she should give her heart to someone as bullheaded as she was. Finishing the last bite of omelet, she put her spoon on her plate. Beatrice had outdone herself on the egg dish, but it would not sway her mind. The cook had apologized and promised to behave, even Father Michael had interceded on Beatrice’s behalf. Yet something about the woman made her uncomfortable. It very possibly had to do with Beatrice locking her in a room and calling her a witch.

  Turning to Viola, who had a dreamy look on her face as she scooped up the last of her berries and cream topped with cinnamon, she ordered, “Stop that. Beatrice is not staying here. I should never have let her pleas sway me.”

  Viola licked her lips guiltily. “Aye, I know. She accused you of witchcraft. But anybody can make a mistake, Lady Celestia.”

  Celestia shook her head with impatience. “I’d always worry she’d try to poison me. I’ll go and give Father Michael my final answer, and then, we are opening the north tower. We will put these ghost stories to rest once and for all.”

  Viola sprang to her feet.

  “And stop that, too. You are supposed to be wounded, remember?”

  The maid immediately slumped and rubbed the bandage on her side. “Oh, yes, my lady, I’d forgotten. Limp to the left, limp to the left,” she repeated.

  Celestia pinched the bridge of her nose. She hadn’t slept well, and her body was as dry as the stream by the mill, thanks be to all the crying she’d done. Falling in love with one’s husband was a stupid thing to do, and now she would pay the price for her folly.

  Her healing hands would be no more; her life would be as empty as the north tower. What a maudlin thought.

  Had her husband been pleased with the gift she’d made, just for him? She wondered if the single-minded, stubborn oaf had even found it yet. Well, once Petyr caught up with him and gave him his mother’s rosary, which he’d forgotten—again—then, for certes, he’d see the tunic.

  Arriving in the large main room, she eyed the other knights in their new attire. They stood straighter, prouder. They were Lord Nicholas’s men now, and no longer belonged to the baron. Celestia sighed, knowing she had some decisions to make. The knights would not look quite as nice in Montehue green.

  Pausing at the doorway, she accepted that she was now the person in charge of this cursed keep and things needed to change. She puffed up her chest, lifted her chin, and clapped her hands for attention.

  She waited until everyone was looking at her, then climbed up on a chair. Forrester quickly came to her aid. As if she would fall, ha! “As you all know, my husband has gone on an important pilgrimage to Spain. In the future, you will be dealing directly with me, or Sir Geoffrey, with any issues you may have.”

  She ignored the muttering voices as they questioned Nicholas’s abandonment. “I had promised that we would open the tower and disprove the notion there is a ghost lurking inside.” She’d not sensed any spirit activity, although she’d received many visions that didn’t make sense. Scenes or images in quick bursts, as if the sender of the visions was being interrupted.

  “We shall adjourn to the tower. Father Michael? Will you escort me?”

  The old priest got to his feet and smiled, his good eye flashing. “I will, my lady.”

  Celestia didn’t miss Forrester’s brief look of disappointment when she nimbly hopped down from the chair without falling, or needing his aid. The boy was a man, she reminded herself. Ordering the knights to gather their tools, Celestia led the fifteen or so servants down the long, narrow hall leading to the north tower. It opened to a sitting area, where she sat them all back against the keep wall, where they could witness but stay out of the way. The interior door had been boarded over, and mortared.

  Forrester arrived with a sledgehammer and an axe. Willy had an iron pick, as did Geoffrey and Bertram. Celestia looked around. “Where’s Henry?”

  “I’m here, my lady.” Henry wore gloves on his hands and carried two buckets.

  A chill was settling on her skin like mist before a rain. Goose bumps traveled up her arms and down her spine. Was it a warning? Or a greeting?

  “Let’s begin.”

  The servants were forced back into the narrow hallway as the dust from the mortared ashlar stones thickened the air. Celestia felt a need to remain as close as possible to the tower, so she wrapped a veil of gauzy material around her mouth and eyes. Viola bravely joined her.

  “’Tis too bad that Lord Nicholas couldn’t be here for this.” The maid had to shout over the pounding noise of the knights as they battled the rock.

  “Aye. I wish that Nicholas could have held his journey off by a day to see it.” But her husband was too stubborn, too focused on doing the noble thing to see that they needed him here, too.

  Father Michael came to stand at her other side, and Viola bobbed her head and left, carefully limping to the right, then left. “Nicholas is going to Spain, my lady? In such a hurry that he leaves you to dispel the ghost of his mother?”

  Celestia bristled at the disapproving tone in the priest’s voice. Leaning over to whisper directly into his old ear, she said, “Nicholas found the original relic.”

  “What?” Father Michael’s eye widened. “Where? Did he go to see his father?”

  “Nay,” Celestia swallowed, glancing around to make sure that nobody could hear her. “Grainne Kat had it. Nicholas took it from her hut.”

  Father Michael coughed as a heavy plume of rock dust came toward them. “Nicholas stole it away from Grainne Kat?”

  She clapped her hand over his mouth. “Shh! How did she come by it? It was never hers.”

  He knocked her hand away. “Theft and murder, ghosts and plots. This has never been a peaceful village, my dear.”

  “There is a mystery here, and I want it solved. I’ll not have Nicholas go on this journey to reclaim his soul only to come back to a deserted, ill-used heap of stone.”

  “So you’ll not be leaving him, my lady?”

  “Where did you hear that?”

  He lowered his eye. “Gossip, it abounds. But some of us were awake when you screamed that ye would take a lover, my lady.”

  Celestia’s cheeks flamed as she recalled the courtyard scene. “Oh.” She put one hand against her churning belly. “Well, I just might do that. And I might leave, but afore I do, I would make things right for him when he comes home.”

  Father Michael broke into deep chuckles as he patted her on the arm. “Ye love him, then? It is not often that the scorned woman worries about making things ‘right’ for her man before she leaves him for another. Aye, ye love him, my lady, and you’ll not leave while there is hope.”

  She clapped her hands over her ears in a childish gesture. Did the entire keep know that her love was unrequited?
<
br />   She was a fool.

  “Lady Celestia,” Willy yelled with excitement. “We’ve broken through!”

  Celestia coughed her way through the thick dust, waving her hand in front of her face, as if that would help. It didn’t.

  Forrester took her by the hand. “This way, my lady.”

  They had made a hole in the mortar the size of an oak tree trunk. She bent over and peered inside. The stairs leading to the top were dark, until her eyes adjusted. “Why is it so light in there? It’s bright as day—how did I not realize how many windows there were?”

  Father Michael called for quiet as the clamoring from behind increased. Everybody wanted a peek at the ghost of Lady Esmerada.

  Celestia leaned farther in—first with her head, and then her shoulders. She didn’t mind the dust at all. Excitement brought plenty of air to her lungs.

  Inside the tower was a thin and crumbling stairway, and it was suddenly, urgently, imperative that she climb it. Celestia was halfway through the wall when Forrester pulled her back.

  “Nay, my lady. It might not be safe. Let us finish clearing the debris, and then I will join you.”

  She wiggled out of his hold. “I will go now!” Where was this urge to scramble up those steps coming from? She felt as if she could find her way in the dark, or with her eyes closed and blindfolded. She knew that she belonged at the top of the tower. Apples. Sweet, yet with a sour twist that whetted the appetite.

  A screech like a wounded owl penetrated her dreamlike state, and she turned, ready to chastise whoever had broken the trance.

  Grainne Kat barreled through the throng of servants, smashing her sideways, directly into Forrester’s waiting arms. Grainne Kat fell on top of them, and the trio hit the stone floor with a thump.

  Celestia struggled to her feet, her humiliation warring with the need to retaliate and beat the woman with a huge stick.

  “Grainne Kat!” For certes, this woman could give her answers about the relic, and mayhap the baron, as well.

  Henry helped the old woman to stand, where she wobbled as if trying to find her balance. She kept her gnarled finger pointed at Celestia, while screeching in a language Celestia couldn’t understand.

  Cool air swirled at her feet, and Celestia turned her eyes to Father Michael, who was as colorless as a corpse. “Father? What is she saying?”

  Brave Viola pushed her way through the tightly packed bodies. “Move over!” She turned Grainne Kat around, spat on the ground, and forked her fingers against the woman’s evil eye. “What are you saying, crone? If it be a curse against my lady, I’ll knock ye flat.”

  “Not against Lady Celestia,” Father Michael said, his voice trembling. “She’s speaking of Lady Esmerada’s curse!”

  Snorting like a determined boar, Sir Geoffrey demanded, “What language is she speaking? And what is the matter with her eyes? Is she mad?”

  Father Michael snapped his fingers under Grainne Kat’s nose. “She’s not speaking in tongues, just the Scottish brogue, so thick that only another Scot can understand it. Grainne Kat!”

  The old woman’s eyes shut at the same time as her mouth, and she visibly shivered beneath the onslaught of wild rage.

  The servants muttered, and Celestia knew that she’d have to forestall another riot.

  When Grainne Kat finally reopened her wicked eyes, they were no longer dilated with fury. “What are you doing?” she rasped.

  Celestia stuck her chin in the air, knowing she was being had. How was she supposed to defend herself against the wise woman? The servants, and even her knights, were petrified.

  “We are opening the tower.”

  “Ye can’t!”

  Relying on her own anger, and the pain of some new bruises, thanks be to Grainne Kat’s mad strength, Celestia furrowed her brow and crossed her arms in front of her. “This is my home. I wish to dispel the rumors there is a ghost in this tower.”

  The woman’s face paled.

  “Just as I will confront you about why you were creating rumors amongst the village about me being a witch. What did you think to gain from such nonsense?”

  Grainne Kat seemed to shrink under the confrontational onslaught. She slumped her shoulders and tucked her chin into the folds of her cloak. All of a sudden she was no more than a pitiful old woman, and Celestia knew that the crone had won again.

  Tossing the long ends of her veil over her shoulder, Celestia vowed to watch the dame like a cat watched a snake.

  Grainne Kat lifted a trembling hand and said in a shaky voice, “Lady Esmerada’s tower cannot be disturbed! Her ghost has been resting, until you came.” She pointed a bent finger at Celestia. “Esmerada is not happy with you living here in her keep.”

  The group whispered.

  “Now that ye’ve disturbed her in the tower, she’ll haunt ye ‘til ye die.”

  The peasants gasped in fright at the prediction, but they didn’t move away. Father Michael had told them all he would no longer allow them succor in the church if they misbehaved, Celestia knew. “You lie.”

  Shy Sally said, “Beware, my lady, lest ye get cursed with warts.”

  Grainne Kat hissed, and Shy Sally shrank back. “You overstep your boundaries, me lady. I knew the Lady Esmerada well, just as I knew Nicholas when he was but a boy. I know much, Lady Celestia, that you do not. Take care that ye don’t cross me.”

  “Cross you? What would it take for you to share some of those secrets, Grainne Kat? Coin? I have plenty of that.”

  “My knowledge is not to be bought or sold.”

  Knowing she was perchance playing with fire, Celestia sniffed. “Again, I say you lie.”

  The peasants were shaking from limb to limb, but they stayed. Celestia was impressed by the control Father

  Michael had over his flock.

  She instructed Forrester to hit the wall. “The sledgehammer, if you please, sir knight. I say this tower is going to be opened, and that Lady Esmerada’s curse will be dissolved.”

  “Nay!” Grainne Kat wailed in fury.

  Forrester swung back with all of his might and hit the stones. The muscles in his arms flexed beneath his red tunic, and Celestia gave Grainne a defiant smile. She was the victor here.

  “Oh, oh, no. No, Lady Esmerada!” Grainne Kat brought her hand to her forehead and then collapsed in a heap of sodden cloak.

  Forrester, chivalrous knight, dropped the sledgehammer and knelt at the old woman’s side. Father Michael cleared the way through the crowd, and soon the crone was set up on a cushioned bench in the main room of the keep by the fire with a mug of ale in her gnarled hands.

  Placing her hands on her hips, Celestia growled low in her throat. The tower was forgotten as everyone crowded around the wise woman. Grainne Kat had the audacity to wink at her when nobody else was looking.

  She stomped her foot at the woman’s daring before admitting that she might have a thing or two left to learn about the road to victory.

  Chapter

  Seventeen

  Grainne Kat was the center of everyone’s attention, and the old dame was loving every bit of it. Her customers from the village gathered around her feet to show their support for the elderly wise woman.

  They were probably afraid of being turned into toads.

  Traitors, Celestia thought as she edged closer so she could hear what the woman was saying. She was jostled from behind. “Beg pardon,” Celestia said as she turned.

  Maude grinned at her in a cocky way. “I’m sorry, me lady. I didn’t see you down there!”

  Celestia’s vision turned red. “Listen here, Maude,” she began.

  Viola bumped into Maude with a plate of scones. “Excuse me,” she trilled, “I’m so clumsy, I was trying to help, my lady, but mayhap my wound is not healed enough.” She ineffectually brushed at the crumbled scone on Maude’s tunic, getting more onto the fabric than off. “So sorry,” the maid said, her lowered brown eyes twinkling with mirth.

  “Perhaps ye need to control your staff?” Maude�
�s pretty lips pursed.

  Celestia took the tray from Viola. “You’re flushed, Vi, go take a seat. If Grainne Kat wishes to give her guests refreshments, then her daughter can serve them.” Celestia handed Maude the tray and walked to where she could hear better.

  Viola giggled. “I don’t like her, my lady.”

  Jealous thoughts chased ‘round in Celestia’s head. She knew Maude wanted Nicholas. “That makes two of us, Viola.”

  “Grainne Kat is about ready to tell of the curse,” Shy Sally whispered as Celestia made her way to a bench seat near the hearth. A chill settled at her neck, and she got an immediate vision of Nicholas and her brothers and pink beady eyes.

  Her brothers had been turned into rats?

  She stood, noticing Forrester gazing at her. Perfect. “I’ll be back in but a moment,” she said softly to Viola.

  Celestia hated the visions, especially when they weren’t clear.

  Her brothers could not be rats. Not really. And Nicholas? If he were caged again, he would, for certes, go mad. What man who had suffered captivity once could survive it again?

  “Forrester,” Celestia tugged at his arm until the knight leaned over. “You must ride in search of Petyr and Nicholas. I believe they are in grave danger.”

  He arched a handsome dark brow. “My lady?”

  “You will have to trust me. Occasionally I have a, well, hunch. And sometimes I’m right. Ride to the baron’s castle. Be stealthy.”

  “I thought my lord went to Spain.”

  “Aye.” Celestia smiled and batted her lashes, hoping to charm her way past his arguments.

  “Do you have something in your eye, my lady?” He peered at her with concern.

  She sighed, and pinched the thin skin between her thumb and index finger until tears came to her eyes. “I’m worried about my noble husband. I won’t sleep, for fear will keep me awake. I beg you, my chivalrous knight, to find my husband and warn him of this danger.”

  Celestia felt a moment’s guilt for playing upon his youth. A jaded knight would ignore her silly plea, but according to the minstrels, a young knight simply lived for the next noble quest.