He was going to have to return to Yorkshire. The one clear advantage of death was that it would have removed the obligation to sort out the problems at the family estate. A second cousin he barely knew would be the next Lord Frayne, and perhaps the sorting process would have been easier for someone less closely connected.
He’d rather be alive and heading north than dead. But it was a close call.
Frowning, he forced himself to concentrate on the week-old newspaper. It was a relief when Ashby and Lucas Winslow stopped by for a visit. Despite their mud-splashed hunting pinks, they were a welcome sight.
He set the paper aside gladly. “Tell me about what great runs you’ve been having so I can suffer the torments of envy.”
“You will be pleased to hear that it was a bad day’s hunting,” Lucas said cordially. “The hounds had trouble finding and we spent much of our time sitting around on our horses in the rain and trying to remember why we do this.”
Ashby brushed droplets from his well-cut coat. “Worse, now that the hunt has ended for the day, the sun is coming out.”
“I’ll try not to gloat over your bad day,” Jack promised. “Shall I ring for tea? My jailer allows me certain privileges.”
Before his friends could reply, his chief jailer entered, pushing a wheeled chair in front of her. Jack felt his usual ambivalence at her presence, an uncertainty about whether to think of her as a compassionate female who had saved his life, as a wizard whose work was utterly repugnant to him—or a woman with a threatening degree of sensuality. The wheelchair definitely added weight to the view of her as compassionate.
“Good day, gentlemen,” Miss Barton said cheerfully. “Lord Frayne, I thought you might enjoy a roll around the house. My grandfather’s chair has been retrieved from the attics and still seems serviceable. I had the estate carpenter build a support for your splinted leg. Would you like to give it a try?”
“Yes!” He was already pushing the covers back.
“I’ll send Morris in to prepare you for this grand excursion. It might well take three men to transfer you safely to the wheelchair.” She withdrew from the room.
To Jack’s disgust, she was right. Ashby and Lucas steadied him while Morris helped him into a robe, then moved the chair behind him so he could sit down. Jack felt huge and ungainly as everyone worked to arrange him in the chair. Morris’s careful hoist of the broken leg onto the long, padded support caused excruciating pain.
By the time Jack was settled, he was sweaty and exhausted. For a moment he thought longingly of his soft bed, but he was not going to waste this opportunity to move beyond his cell.
Miss Barton reappeared with her arms full of folded blankets. He hadn’t realized how tall she was, only an inch or two shorter than Ashby.
She shook out the fabric, revealing two lap robes. “It’s drafty around the house,” she explained as she tucked one of the robes around his legs. Her gentle touch didn’t produce more pain.
As she wrapped the other robe around his shoulders, he protested, “I’m not an invalid!”
Her blue eyes sparked with amusement. “You most certainly are. Not for very long, I think, but it will be good for you to discover what it’s like not to be bursting with rude health. You will learn sympathy for those less fortunate.”
“You might even learn to be more careful so you won’t break your neck again,” Lucas said acerbically. “Are you ready to roll, Jack?”
He used his hands to shift his splinted leg a little, trying without success to make it ache less. “I am, and as excited as the first time I crossed the channel and set foot in a foreign country.”
“I can’t promise you the exotic delights of France or the Low Countries,” Miss Barton remarked, “but at least here everyone speaks English. Mr. Winslow, beware the sill between the bedroom and the hall. It’s necessary to go slowly from room to room, or your passenger will be jostled.”
Lucas slowed, though not quickly enough to prevent a painful jolt. “Sorry, Jack,” he apologized. “I hadn’t realized that there was an art to pushing a wheelchair.”
“The kingdom of illness is a whole different nation from the land of the healthy,” Miss Barton said musingly. “One that most of us enter sooner or later. Turn left at the end of this hall, Mr. Winslow. That will start us on a circular tour of the ground floor.”
As Lucas pushed him along, Jack studied his surroundings, absurdly delighted by the change of scene. It was a gentleman’s house, attractive and well furnished with a mixture of graceful new furniture and old pieces that had obviously been in the family for generations. Nothing proclaimed that Barton Grange was the home of ill-bred wizards.
What had he expected—dried bats and newts hanging from the ceiling? Perhaps he had. It was strange trying to reconcile this peaceful oasis with the queasy darkness of wizardry.
As they rolled through the drawing room, he realized that he must come to terms with his deep distaste for magic. Out of cowardice and fear of death, he had accepted magical aid rather than die in accordance with his principles. Which meant that now he must accept a wizard wife and her wizardly family.
He hadn’t thought of any of this when he gave her permission to try to save his worthless life. The prospect of death tended to narrow one’s viewpoint dramatically.
The next room, a handsome library, revealed many books, a fair number of them scholarly treatises on magic, but still no dried bats. Jack made a mental note to visit the library at a later date so he could explore further.
Lucas swung the chair to enter the main drawing room. Misjudging how far the splinted leg stuck out, he banged Jack’s right foot into the door frame. Jack gasped with agony, his hands clenching the arms of the chair.
Lucas swore. “I’m so sorry, Jack! I’m a clumsy brute.”
“There really is an art to pushing a wheelchair,” Miss Barton said as she gently rested her fingertips on Jack’s right leg where the pain was blazing. Within moments, the pain receded to a manageable level. She continued, “Perhaps I should take over. I often wheeled my grandfather around, so I’m something of an expert.”
“I yield to greater experience.” Lucas stepped away with an exaggerated bow.
With Miss Barton doing the pushing, Jack’s ride immediately became smoother. She stepped on a foot lever on the back of the chair to slightly raise the front wheels whenever they crossed a sill or moved onto a carpet. There really was an art to living in the kingdom of the ill.
Abigail Barton might be a wizard, but she also had a gentle hand with the infirm despite her own robust health. He was very aware that she was right behind him, her fingers on the chair handles just inches from his shoulders. She was a powerful presence—and despite her wizardly calling, a comforting one.
They entered the dining room. “I remember looking at that handsome chandelier hanging directly over me, and hoping it wouldn’t fall and produce still more damage,” he said wryly as he recognized the dining room table where he had nearly died.
“You were not the first critically injured patient to lie on that table and the chandelier hasn’t fallen yet,” Miss Barton remarked. “With a long table and a good light, this makes a decent operating theater. Note the splendid red and black carpet, carefully chosen to conceal bloodstains.”
He tried to turn and look at her to see if she was joking, a movement that did his leg no good. “Is that true?”
She grinned. “Somewhat. The rug has been in the family for many years. I was the one who suggested that the dining room was a particularly good place for it.”
Ashby moved to the mahogany table, his fingers skimming the polished surface. “It looks so peaceful now, after the high drama of life and death.” His expression was abstracted as he remembered Jack’s accident and the healing circle.
“I prefer peace to drama,” Miss Barton said ruefully. “But we seldom have a choice.” She resumed pushing the wheelchair.
The morning room was in a rear corner of the house, the comfortable furniture sp
lashed with late afternoon sunshine. She pushed him to a position in front of the windows. Outside lay gardens to the right and outbuildings to the left. Largest of the buildings was the stable block. Jack regarded it wistfully. “Will I be able to hunt again?”
“If you wish. Though you will take longer to recover than Dancer.”
His head whipped around, and this time he didn’t care about causing pain in his leg. “Dancer is alive?”
Her brows arched. “Didn’t anyone tell you?”
Lucas, who was ambling along behind with Ashby, said, “I’m sorry, Jack. I assumed you had been told by someone else. We all must have assumed that.”
Jack drew a deep, unsteady breath, painfully close to tears. He had been so sure his magnificent, loyal horse was dead, killed by his rider’s heedlessness. “I knew his leg broke in the accident. I…I assumed he’d been put down.”
“Ashby wouldn’t allow it, so we arranged to have him brought to the stables here. Miss Barton, her excellent head groom, and those of her wizard friends who weren’t completely depleted did a healing circle for Dancer the day after they healed you,” Lucas said. “It was most extraordinary. The broken cannon bone is splinted and well onto its way to being sound again.”
Jack turned awkwardly to look up at Miss Barton. “Please, is it possible for me to go see him?”
Ashby frowned. “Trying to carry you down several steps to ground level would be difficult for us and painful for you, I think.”
“Actually, we had a ramp built from a small side door down to ground level for my grandfather’s sake. He hated being trapped inside,” Miss Barton said slowly. “The pathways were made as smooth as possible for the same reason. But it will still be an uncomfortable trip.”
“I don’t care. I promise I won’t complain.” Jack would also do his best to avoid gasping with pain, since his friends found it unsettling.
She studied his face. “Very well. I suspect that you and Dancer will benefit by seeing each other.”
He had to smile. “You’re a practical woman.”
Under her breath she murmured, “Practicality—the spinster’s compensation for being plain,” in a voice so low he guessed she hadn’t meant her words to be heard.
She thought herself plain? The comment made her sound more vulnerable than he would have guessed. Though she was not a classic beauty and not at all his type, neither would he call her plain, not with that sensual, tantalizing body. He studied her richly curved figure and wondered how he would react to her if he was at full strength. Even in his present state of weakness, he was disturbingly aware of her. She had the kind of provocative allure that might destroy a man’s control. It was a disquieting thought.
While his thoughts were wandering, his entourage followed him to the exit that was ramped. Miss Barton turned the chair halfway around so his back was facing the door. “It’s safest to take a chair down backwards,” she explained. “I’ll ask one of you gentleman to take over. I don’t know if I’m strong enough to control it on the ramp.”
“Allow me,” Morris murmured. Jack guessed that his valet thought he’d do a better job than the aristocrats would. Morris was not only a good valet but a big, strong fellow. Jack had once accused him of taking the post because Jack’s cast-off clothing was such a good fit. Morris had smiled imperturbably and not denied the charge.
As Miss Barton had said, going outside wasn’t comfortable, starting with an instinctive feeling of panic that he would fall over backward as the chair descended the ramp. Facing forward might have been less alarming, but falling out of the chair would have been a real possibility. It was a relief to get off the ramp onto level ground.
The pathway to the stable was also much rougher than a hardwood floor, and the gravel wasn’t improved by puddles from the recent rain. None of that mattered. Neither did the painful jolt when the chair had to be manhandled over a high sill to get into the stables.
What did matter was Dancer’s familiar whickered greeting when Jack approached. Morris pushed the chair up to the box stall, and Dancer immediately bent his head over and butted Jack’s chest with enough impact to knock the chair back. Morris caught the chair and moved it closer again.
The position was awkward, but Jack managed to hug the horse with one arm while scratching between his ears with the other. He hid his face against the glossy neck, near tears. What did it say about him that he’d felt more true grief at the thought of Dancer’s death than he had when his father died? Of course Dancer was much better company. “I don’t even have any sugar for you, old boy.”
“Here’s some.” Ashby offered several irregular lumps chipped from a sugar loaf. “My horse can do with less.”
“Thank you.” Jack offered the sugar a piece at a time. Dancer slobbered the lumps up greedily.
Jack smiled, feeling more normal than he had since the accident. He and his horse both had broken legs, but one day they would ride together again. He glanced up at Miss Barton. “I knew I owed you my life, but this is…. even more. Not everyone would go to the effort to save an injured beast.”
“Credit goes to young Ella,” she said. “To be honest, I didn’t even know your horse had been brought here.”
“She may have been the messenger, but you were the one who led the healing.” He rested his forehead against Dancer’s neck, thinking that marrying a wizard who took horses seriously was no bad thing.
Miss Barton’s soft voice said, “It’s time for you to return to the house, Lord Frayne. You’ve had enough frolicking for one day, I think.”
It was a measure of his fatigue that instead of arguing, he just gave Dancer a last pat. “I’ll be back tomorrow, old fellow.” And he’d bring his own sugar.
Now that the excitement of seeing Dancer was past, he was so tired he could barely remain upright in the wheelchair. He’d never dreamed that sitting up and being wheeled around could take so much out of a man.
Being transferred from chair to bed was another awkward, painful endeavor, but sinking into the mattress was bliss. As Miss Barton drew the coverlet up to his chin, he said, “Thank you for letting me go outside. Now, all of you go away, please. You, too, Morris. Find yourself some supper and smoke your pipe and flirt with a housemaid before you return. I’ll be fine for a couple of hours. In fact I’m going right to sleep.”
His visitors all left without argument. An advantage to being convalescent was that all he had to do was claim fatigue to get privacy. He closed his eyes gratefully, hoping that sleep would claim him soon.
But despite his fatigue, sleep eluded him. Now that his mind was active again, it hopped as restlessly as a pond full of frogs. On the deepest level of his being, he sensed a profound irreversible shift. He suspected that it was called growing up, and that the changes were being triggered by his close brush with mortality.
Two complicated challenges confronted him. One was the knowledge that he was pledged to marry a wizard, a prospect so unnerving that he still hadn’t looked at it clearly. He owed Miss Barton a great debt, but the fact that she was a practitioner of magic gave him chills. He could feel them now. Or was that chills and fever?
He supposed he could learn to deal with Miss Barton; she seemed a sensible woman and she didn’t affect mysterious airs as some wizards did. She had also said that she would not be a demanding wife, so they should be able to find a way to get on tolerably well. Since she preferred the country, she could stay on at his hunting box across the valley, close to her family. She’d made it clear she wanted a child. If that happened, she would probably be content to stay here forever.
The other great issue was returning to Yorkshire to face his mother and stepfather. Would it be worse to confront his mother, whom he loved, or his stepfather, whom he hated? Unfortunately, the two could not be separated. Yet he had a responsibility to the people of Langdale, and it could no longer be denied.
Something hit the bottom of the bed with a thump and started walking firmly up the mattress. Startled, Jack opened his eyes
and saw a large black cat moving through the darkening room. He knew black cats were traditional for wizards, but he wasn’t so sure about the white feet and luxuriant white whiskers which curved out from the round black face. It was hard for a feline to look menacing with white socks and whiskers. “Hello, cat. I’m Jack. Who are you?”
The cat didn’t reply, but it placed its forepaws on Jack’s chest and leaned forward until their noses touched. The feline nose was pleasantly cool and moist against Jack’s heated skin.
Regarding the cat cross-eyed, Jack asked, “Are you the wizard’s familiar?”
The cat made a huffing sound that sounded suspiciously like disdain. Then it curled up against Jack’s side and began purring loudly. Jack stroked the silky fur. He’d always been a dog lover, but there was something soothing about a cat’s purr.
Very soothing indeed.
Abby’s restless sleep was disturbed by a tapping at the door. “Miss Abigail?” It was the worried voice of the housekeeper.
Yawning, Abby swung out of bed and opened the door. “Is something wrong?”
“Lord Frayne’s valet asked me to wake you. He’s concerned.”
“I’ll be right there.” Frowning, Abby pulled on a heavy robe and slippers and followed the housekeeper downstairs. Though the winter days had been fairly mild, nighttime was bitterly cold and drafty. She heard the tall drawing room clock strike three as she descended to the ground floor. Three in the morning, when vital spirits were at their lowest ebb and death drew near. She quickened her pace.
Morris greeted her with relief. He had made up a pallet in Jack’s room so he could sleep near his master, just in case. “I’m sorry to disturb you, miss, but I don’t like the way he’s breathing.”
“You did the right thing by summoning me.” Even before she reached the bedside, she could hear Jack laboring for breath. What was wrong? In the lamplight, his face looked gray and he seemed diminished, as if he was fading away. Her cat, Cleocatra, was sitting beside him. Had she thought Jack needed watching? Like most cats, Cleo was preternaturally sensitive.
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