The Whispered Kiss

by Marcia Lynn McClure

  Rising to his feet, Valor laid a strong hand on Godfrey’s shoulder. “And tell Richins Goliath is wounded. Tell Richins to tend to him when he returns to the stables.”

  “I will, milord,” Godfrey said, placing a hand on Valor’s shoulder briefly before turning to leave the gardens.

  “Come,” Valor said, and Coquette gasped as he unexpectedly lifted her into his arms. “We will see to this as best we can until the physician arrives.”

  “I am well enough to walk, milord,” Coquette reminded him.

  “I will say when you are well enough to walk,” he growled as he strode toward the house.

  Coquette was astounded that for his great fatigue and brutal wound, her weight in his arms seemed effortless enough for him. As he carried her, she looked over his shoulder to the body of Lord Noah Springhill lying motionless among the autumn leaf litter on the ground. He had meant to kill Valor, and she was glad he was dead.

  Valor did not even wince as the needle pierced his flesh again and again in the physician’s sewing his wound. All he could think of was the danger Coquette had been in, the wound to her beautiful and tender flesh. He had demanded the physician tend Coquette first, for he could think of nothing but her well-being. Even still, after seeing her wound tended, knowing it was not a wound to threaten her life—even still he could not bear the thought of her having been wounded by Springhill’s sword.

  He trembled with fatigue, fear, and a sickness in his stomach and chest. Though he did not speak of it to Godfrey or the physician, he wondered if he would awaken in the morning to find himself among the angels instead of in the comfortable linens of his bed.

  Valor felt he had somehow suffered a far deeper wound than the one at his shoulder. His chest hurt deep within, as if a hot steel blade had been thrust into his bosom. Perhaps it was the weight of killing three men in one day, but he doubted it. More, he thought, it was the wounded beast in him struggling to remain in power, battling to keep his heart and mind eternally encased in stone.

  “You need rest, milord,” the physician said more to Coquette and Godfrey than to Valor.

  “Is she well enough to travel to Bostchelan?” Valor asked.

  “Milord?” the physician asked.

  “Milady. She is to attend her sister’s wedding four days from this,” Valor explained.

  “She is full well enough to travel,” the physician answered.

  “I am not going to Bostchelan,” Coquette said. “I am not leaving y—I am not leaving Roanan now!”

  “Has the body been removed from my gardens?” Valor asked. His own voice sounded foreign to him; his mind seemed to swim in some thick fog.

  “The villain’s remains have been carried to Roanan, milord,” Godfrey said. “The constable saw to it.”

  “I have fresh water, milord,” Victoria said, arriving with a basin of steaming water and several small towels. “We will bathe your face and arms, your chest. You will sleep better for it.” She set the basin on the floor next to the chair and plunged a small towel into the water it held.

  “I am no infant!” Valor growled. Why did they insist on treating him as if he were ill or fatally wounded? He was merely fatigued from a long night’s ride and strenuous battle.

  “Your behavior would prove otherwise, milord,” Coquette said, taking his face in her hands and forcing him to look up at her from his seat in a chair near the fire.

  He nearly moaned aloud, so overcome was he suddenly by her sweet beauty, the bright moisture in her eyes. He was weakened, for there dwelt in him the wounded beast—wounded and weak—and he had not the strength to summon its full character.

  “Bathe him and put him to bed,” the physician told Victoria. “I will return on the morrow to be certain no infection has set in the wound.”

  “Very well,” Victoria said, wringing the water from the small cloth in her hand and handing it to Coquette.

  Valor moved away when Coquette endeavored to bathe his face with the wet cloth.

  “An infant or a man?” she said, her expression daring and determined. “Thank you, Mr. Dithers,” Coquette said to the physician as he took his leave. Tenderly, she pressed the cloth to Valor’s face.

  “You are quite officious this morning, milady,” Valor said as he gazed up at her. The warm moisture of the cloth on his skin was refreshing, soothing, and relaxing. He could feel the onset of sleep; his body and mind were fast giving into fatigue.

  “Hush, milord,” her soft voice whispered. “You must rest.”

  Working quickly, for she knew he was dangerously tired, Coquette assisted Victoria in the bathing of Valor’s face, arms, hand, and torso. Then, with Godfrey’s help, for Valor’s strength was quickly leaving him, she led him to his bed and watched as he drifted into unconsciousness.

  Still, her heart hammered with residual fear, with the knowledge he might have been killed—whether by the highwaymen set on him at Springhill’s hand or by Springhill himself. And once she was certain he slept soundly, she buried her face in her hands and bitterly wept.

  “He is well, milady,” Godfrey said. “You need not fear for him any longer. It is only great fatigue overtaking him now.”

  “I nearly brought him death,” Coquette whispered, her hands trembling with residual anxiety.

  “That devil nearly brought him death, milady,” Victoria said, “not you.”

  “But it was because of me…because of my father’s promise to Lord Springhill…”

  “Then with your own mouth you have spoken the blame is not yours,” Godfrey growled. Instantly he frowned, bowed his head before Coquette, and said, “Forgive me, milady. I spoke—”

  “You spoke only the truth, Godfrey,” Coquette said. “And…and it is only grateful I can be that my father entered Roanan’s gardens and stole a rose…else what might my fate have been?” And it was true! Had her father not stolen the Roanan rose, had Valor not sought vengeance because of it, would she indeed have found herself married to the demon who now lay dead at the gravedigger’s feet? “Still, all of it nearly brought him to his death!” she cried in a whisper.

  “But it did not,” Victoria said, taking Coquette’s face in her soft hands. “There he is, resting in his comfortable bed, breathing, living, and you should do the same.”

  “I should rest?” Coquette asked. It was true; she was overwhelmed with fatigue of mind.

  “Yes, milady,” Victoria said. “I will sit with him so you may rest as well.”

  “I cannot leave him,” Coquette whispered, tears streaming over her cheeks. How could ever she leave him again? For the simplest tasks that must be done—even then, how could she ever leave him? “I cannot leave him,” she repeated.

  “There is no need that you should,” Godfrey said then. “’Tis big enough a bed for all of us.”

  And it was true. She was his wife! What necessity was there that she should leave him?

  Coquette studied Valor’s face for a long time. Certainly her eyes were heavy, her mind and body craving sleep. Yet simply to watch him breathe seemed a sudden necessity.

  Godfrey and Victoria had left Coquette alone with Valor more than an hour past, and still she could not let her eyes close, could not release the vision of him lying next to her so battered and worn.

  “Valor,” she whispered, thinking how well the name fit the hero.

  He moved, turned from his back to his side, facing her. Coquette could hear him breathing—sensed his breath on the ribbons at the bosom of her dress. So close was he, the warmth of his body warmed her own. He grimaced in his sleep, and she wondered what pained him most—the wound at his shoulder or the wounds in his soul, most of which were there at her own hand.

  Her eyes felt dry, her eyelids heavy, and at last she did slumber—slumbered long until something drew her from her deep sleep. So greatly fatigued was she that, at first, Coquette could not raise herself from the depth of her sleep. At her side, near her wound, an odd sensation—pain mingled with a slight tickle—a sudden sense of cold
there. Slowly, as she pulled herself to some breath of consciousness, she realized someone was touching her side, the flesh around her wound. Had the physician returned already? Had morning come so quickly?

  She opened her eyes and looked down. Valor knelt at her side, his fingers gently caressing the flesh surrounding her wound through a tear in her dress. A dagger lay on the bed beside her, and she realized he had used it to cut into the cloth of her dress and expose the wound.

  “So this is how my protection finds you,” Valor mumbled.

  “Alive is how your protection finds me,” she whispered.

  Valor looked at her then, his face weathered-looking, weary. Still he needed rest, and she wondered what had disturbed him. “You will go to Bostchelan,” he mumbled. “You will go to Inez’s wedding.”

  “I have no wish to go to Inez’s wedding,” she told him. How desperately she desired to reach out and weave her fingers through his brown mane, to feel the warmth of his face beneath her palm.

  “But you do desire to see Elise,” he mumbled, “and your father. Your desire is still to your father.”

  “In a manner,” she said, anger welling within her. In truth, she did want to see her father—wanted to see his face when she told him it was Valor he had sent her to marry, wanted to witness his expression when she told him of Lord Springhill’s revelation to her and of Valor’s vanquishing him.

  “For this,” he said, lightly touching the wound at her side with his fingertips, “for this I will allow it. For this I will free you to go to your family.”

  “But I do not wish to—” she began.

  He was instantly furious and rose to his feet as he growled, “You will go! You will go to your sister Elise…for I have sent her my word I would let you go!”

  The beast was roaring. Valor had withdrawn, it seemed, and the beast was baying at the moon once more.

  “You wish to be rid of me?” she asked, unable to look at him, for she did not want to see the loathing that must be in his eyes.

  “I wish to hold to my word to your sister,” he growled. “I wish to hold to my word before you are sequestered here in anticipation of bearing my heir.”

  It was a lie, and Valor feared she would know it. He did not wish for her to return to Bostchelan. He did not wish her father to have any blessing of her company, for he did not deserve it. For in addition to all Antoine’s evil lies and selfishness was Coquette’s endurance of Springhill’s—for had not Antoine allowed the monster to enter her presence in the first of it? Still, he knew she longed for her family, loved them without condition. The pain in his chest was forcing him to let her go.

  “Then you mean to say,” Coquette began, “that when I return you wish to…you wish to endeavor to have your heir?”

  “I do,” he growled.

  Another lie, for in the dark of his day, in the deep regions of what had once been his heart and soul, he meant to release her. He had awaken in his bed, his wounded beauty at his side, bearing wounds of his making—wounds of heart, mind, and body—and he knew. He knew the beast was failing and he must release her. He would release her, for he loved her above all else in life—even above life itself. He would send her to Bostchelan for Inez’s wedding, and Godfrey would inform her of her freedom when the time was right. She would stay in Bostchelan, and he would allow an annulment of their marriage. But for now, the lie of her return to Roanan afterward and his endeavor toward an heir would serve.

  Coquette’s eyes narrowed as she studied him. Something was strange in him. The amber of his eyes grew cool and unreadable. Yet to see Elise, to confront her father—perhaps it would serve.

  “Then I will go, for I would not have your word held uncertain,” she told him.

  “You will leave on the morrow,” he said. “Godfrey will accompany you in my stead.”

  “Godfrey is often in your stead, is he not, milord?” she asked.

  A reminder of his brutality, cowardice, and unfeeling beast’s heart—a reminder of his having sent Godfrey in his stead once before. Valor frowned, the beast in him rearing its vile head.

  “He is, for he is my first-man and stands for me in situations of secondary importance,” he growled. It was cruel, and he saw the pain in her eyes. Yet the beast was in him, and he must drive her away for her own well-being. He would not saddle her with the burden of such a beast.

  He watched as she rose from his bed to take her leave.

  “Rest well, milord,” she told him, tears filling her eyes. “I must prepare for my journey.”

  He could not keep his hand from reaching out and catching hold of her arm. She turned to face him, tears already on her cheeks. He winced, hating himself all the more for being the cause of so much of her pain.

  The beast was prowling, Coquette knew. Though she could not fathom his true reasons for sending her to Bostchelan, she knew there was more he was not telling her. Perhaps he wished for her to confront her father, to finally see Antoine de Bellamont’s bad character proven. Further, she had not missed the pain in his eyes when he had implied their marriage was of such little importance that he had sent Godfrey to stand in his stead. He was lying, and she had begun to realize the beast could not mask his lies any longer. Hope still hung thick in her veins, no matter the facade of the beast.

  “Milord?” she said, looking to his hand gripping her arm to stay her.

  “Is it not tradition for the lady to bestow a gift, a token, upon her champion?” he asked. She sensed a battle in him, for the frown furrowing his brow was deep and uncertain. “I did battle for you this day, milady,” he said. Again she sensed he was struggling for words, fighting for an excuse to give as to his having taken hold of her arm. Her heart swelled, as did her courage. It was time to test the beast—it was time to test Valor.

  “Yes,” she said, turning to him. “You are quite deserving of a gift, a token, milord.” His frown deepened. He was unsettled by her agreeing with him. “What gift do you wish me to bestow upon you? This ribbon?” she asked, pulling the emerald ribbon from its place at the bodice of her dress.

  “I-I…” he stammered. It was entirely unlike the beast to struggle for words so.

  “My virtue perhaps?” she said.

  “You mock me,” he growled.

  “As you mock me,” she told him. Still, he remained unsettled as she placed her hands on his chest and gazed up into his eyes. “Yet you did fight the hero’s battle today…and I am ever thankful and ever in your debt. Therefore,” she said, pushing at his chest until he sat on the bed behind him, “therefore a token of my gratitude shall be yours. What token do you beg, milord? What gift of thanks this day?”

  “I-I have no thought of what token to beg,” he stumbled. Great fatigue was in his eyes. He was tired of battle, mind, body, and soul. The fight was gone from him. Valor had triumphed over the beast in that moment.

  “None?” she whispered, leaning nearer to him, letting her face hover just above his.

  “Your sweet mouth pressed to mine?” he mumbled. “If I beg a kiss as a token…if I beg a kiss, will you grant it?”

  Warm delight drizzled through Coquette. Her heart swelled with triumph! The beast was wounded nearly to being vanquished. For a moment only perhaps—but a moment was a moment, and she kissed Valor ever so tenderly. Again she kissed him, allowing the soft kiss between them to linger. She kissed his upper lip, slowly—kissed his lower lip, letting her lips linger a moment before kissing him full on the mouth once more. She felt his arms go around her waist, sensed him rising to his feet as he pulled her against him. Her heart hammered with mad delight, for she knew he had grown impatient with her playful kisses, and in the next moment, his mouth captured her own in passion’s flaming exchange. She was mindful of the wound at his shoulder, careful to embrace him and not cause pain. He, however, seemed entirely unaware of any wound, his or hers, as he crushed her body to his, drinking deeply of the moist warmth of her mouth.

  For long minutes he held her thus, seeming to savor the feel and
taste of their kisses. Suddenly, however, he broke from her, breathless and wholly disheveled and confused in appearance.

  “I am worn, Kitty,” he mumbled, placing a tight fist to his forehead as he staggered backward to sit on the bed once more. “I…I am not myself from it all. I do need rest.”

  Coquette could not help but smile. Kitty! He had, in consciousness, called her Kitty! “I understand, milord,” she said. “I will leave you to you rest.” Coquette knew it was best to leave him, to press the beast no further, lest he roar more furiously than ever before. “Rest well, milord,” she said. He nodded and lay back on the bed. She left his chamber, closing the door behind her.

  Inhaling deeply, she thought of her father—thought of the danger he had placed Valor in at Springhill’s hand. Yes, she would go! Though she was loath to do it, though she was loath to leave Valor even for one moment, she would return to Bostchelan and face the truth—the truth of everything that blessedly found her at Roanan—the truth of all that had led her to Valor Lionhardt, her heart’s only true necessity.

  In Bostchelan

  The landscape was beautiful indeed. Godfrey could smell the sea, though he could not yet see it. So far, the outer edges of Bostchelan boasted rolling hills of green, green grass as far as the eye could see. Even for autumn upon it, the grasses were yet green. He drew the lines of the team to one hand while the other reached into his coat pocket to ensure the documents were still there—documents he would just as soon toss into the sea as deliver. His master had misplaced his reason—sending milady to Bostchelan, somehow believing she preferred her insipid family to he who loved her best of any. Yet he knew his lady would not choose to stay, nor choose to sign the parchments cached in his coat pocket—the documents annulling the marriage of the Lord of Roanan, Valor Lionhardt, to Coquette de Bellamont.