Darkest Dreams Page 7

  “Do you have any arguments I can smack over Stuart Frye’s stubborn head?” Bridget asked, changing the subject. “Nothing I say seems to get through to him. As long as his mother and brother are under charges in Mary’s death, accidental or not, Stuart won’t have anything to do with me. He will barely even speak to me.”

  “Give him time,” Cassie said. “He is only seeking to protect you from having the villagers think badly of you.”

  “I don’t care what the villagers think. My mum and brother are here, safe from harm’s way. If he really loved me then it wouldn’t matter.”

  “I went through the same thing with Sean,” Cassie said. “In trying to protect me, he rejected me, and that hurt me the most.”

  “Try living eight years that way,” Prudence said quietly, shocking us all. It wasn’t a secret the earl had had a relationship with Prudence when she was an upstairs maid younger than Gemini’s tender eighteen, but Prudence had never spoken of it.

  Cassie recovered from the shock quicker than anyone else. “My father-in-law or not, the man is a fool for not marrying you. His vow not to love anyone because those he does love either die or live under a curse is ridiculous.”

  “Marry me?” Prudence shook her head, distressed. “Cassie, he’s an earl. Earls don’t marry cropper’s daughters.” She set her teacup down and stood. “I shouldn’t have said anything. Forgive me. I’m going to go check on Rebecca.” She started to leave the room.

  “Prudence,” Cassie said. “I’m sorry. What is it? What is wrong? I didn’t mean to upset you.”

  Prudence turned to face everyone. She drew a deep breath. Tears filled her golden eyes. She was breathtakingly beautiful in a very delicate way, like a porcelain doll; petite, with luxurious dark hair swept into an elegant coiffure, a perfect creamy complexion, and always dressed romantically in satin and lace. “Don’t apologize, please. What is wrong is that I don’t belong here with all of you, Cassie. You and your sisters have embraced me, befriended me, and have graciously refrained from mentioning the fact that I am but a low-born woman with an illegitimate child. But nothing will ever bridge the gap between the realities of my life and those of yours.”

  Gemini stood. “But none of that is your—”

  “It is my fault. The earl didn’t force me. He didn’t even chase after me,” Prudence said, cutting Gemini off. “He is a very handsome man, and that attracted me to him, more so than his wealth. I deliberately caught his eye. I put myself in his way and became involved with him, hoping he would make me his mistress. After we were together I fell in love with him. That you believe he would ever marry me shows how very different we are. My only hope, my dream, is that one day he will make me his mistress again, and I would gladly live that way just to be able to love him. I’m not worthy to be your friend.” Turning, she moved quickly to the door.

  “Wait,” I said, upsetting my teacup to jump up and stop Prudence from leaving. She paused with her hand on the door handle, but didn’t turn. “You can’t leave us, Prudence. By going, you’re inferring that we’re casting stones, that we’re condemning you for being who you are and for believing your life is unlike from ours. We all have things that…that are different from each other, things that isolate us.”

  “Andrie’s right, Prudence,” Cassie said softly. “You cannot leave us.”

  I knew Cassie was thinking as I was, for we both were burdened by gifts. Cassie dreamed a person’s death, and I saw into their minds.

  “Were it not for the fact that I had my sisters and my family to consider, if my choice had been to either be with Sean as his mistress or to never love him, I would have chosen to love him,” Cassie said, shocking me completely.

  Gemini gasped. Prudence swung around, her gold eyes wide and blinking at even more tears.

  Bridget spoke up. “I daresay this is the most scandalous parlor conversation to embark upon, but I would bloody well do the same with Stuart, if that were my only choice.”

  I shouldn’t have been surprised by everyone’s admission, for I had already seen enough of their thoughts to know it. It was the admission of it that stunned me. Women really did choose to live improperly sometimes for the reason of love.

  “But that’s wrong,” Gemini said.

  “In society’s eyes, yes,” Cassie said softly. “But then in society’s eyes it is wrong for a woman to have much of a say in how her life is lived. No one is speaking of loving a man who has committed himself to another woman. If you think about it, in God’s eyes, Adam and Eve never had their banns posted in a church or obtained a special license. They loved and cared for one another, and that was all that mattered.”

  Prudence slowly returned to her seat. “Wanting to be the earl’s mistress is my darkest secret,” she said in shock. “I can’t believe you don’t think I’m horrible.”

  “No,” I said. “There are much worse things.” Like my secret. I wanted to reach out and touch her, but I didn’t.

  Chapter Six

  “You’re killing her,” I shouted at the man whose beefy hands were wrapped around a woman’s slender throat. The woman struggled, her dark eyes pleading, her mouth open in a soundless scream.

  My heart pounding, I grabbed at the man’s shoulder, trying to pull him away. I couldn’t move him. Reaching for his hands, I attempted to pry them from the woman’s throat. Her skin was icy cold, her complexion a blue-tinged milky white. I hit at the man’s arms, doing anything I could to stop him. He only laughed. Frustration and rage filled me. “Stop,” I screamed at him. “Stop!”

  I ran at him from the side, planning to hit him with my whole body and knock him off the poor woman, but at the moment of impact, everything disappeared, and I went plunging into a dark abyss where I floundered helplessly. Falling…falling.

  I awoke drenched, breathing so harshly that my lungs hurt. My heart thudded painfully in my breast, and a high-pitched scream pierced my ears. The scream of a child. Rebecca!

  Struggling against the covers, I ran from my room, not even bothering to gather my robe or my slippers. A short distance down the corridor, I reached the quarters where Rebbeca and Bridget slept next to Prudence’s. The door was open, and both Bridget and Prudence were with the child. Poor little Rebecca was wrapped in her mother’s arms, but was screaming. “Mary! Mary! Horseman take my Mary. Horseman hurt my Mary and make her cry!

  I didn’t hesitate; I ran to Rebecca, grabbed her hand, and closed my eyes, plunging myself into her dark world, into her nightmare. I read what Rebecca heard in her mind and instinctively felt that she was reliving the last time she was with Mary.

  “Stay away from her. You’ve compromised her.”

  “She sinned, Mary. Now she must pay for her sins.”

  “What? Are you mad? You seduced her!”

  “Only because she asked for it. Just like you. I know what goes on between you and The Killdaren at night.”

  “You’re insane! Stop it! What are you doing?”

  “Only what The Killdaren does to you. Scream and the child dies.”

  “Run, Rebecca! God. Run!”

  My cousin’s scream ripped through me, doubling me over in pain, and I fell to the floor as a black void wrapped around me and sucked me under.

  “Andrie? Please wake up, Andrie.”

  My eyes fluttered open to see Cassie leaning over me. She had my hand clasped in hers. I was shuddering so badly that both she and the curtains on the four-poster bed were shaking.

  “What is it?” she whispered. “What did you see?”

  I could hear others in the room. Bridget and Gemini were talking in hushed tones about me. Since I didn’t hear Rebecca screaming anymore, I knew she had quieted for now, and that Prudence would be with her. The evil of what I felt I’d learned tonight sickened me horribly.

  Oh, God, Mary! What did you suffer? How much more had Rebecca heard of what had happened to Mary? Though Rebecca was blind and couldn’t have seen Mary being attacked and worse, the trauma of hearing it was still just as shat
tering. No wonder the child screamed uncontrollably. I wanted to do the same no matter how irrational it was. Inside, I already felt as if I were screaming.

  There was more than just Mary involved in the portent of the words. The man had intended to harm another, and I had a sickening suspicion that person was Flora, Bridget’s sister who’d left here after Mary’s death to seek fortune on the stage with a man known only as Jack. I had no proof that all I was supposing was true and no real way to communicate it either.

  “Nothing,” I croaked in answer to Cassie’s question. “I…I can’t remember. My head hurts.”

  Cassie just looked at me. and I tried to meet her gaze but failed. I had to look away. How could I tell her what I’d heard from Rebecca’s mind? Cassie was pregnant with Sean’s baby and already upset. It would only worsen her situation. And to hear that Mary and Sean might have been involved… Oh, God. I didn’t want to know these things. They were too painful. It was too hard to accept the dark secrets and dreams hidden inside of everyone.

  Tears filled my eyes and spilled over. “Rest,” I whispered to Cassie. “Please let me rest.”

  She sighed. “Rest for now, Andrie. I’m here. I won’t leave you.”

  I saw in her mind, memories of our childhood when we’d climbed into a dark closet together and whispered about our gifts that we weren’t supposed to let anyone know about. Having her to share it with had made the secret bearable then. But her thoughts drifted to Sean, and I slipped my hand from her grasp and turned over, seemingly trying to make myself more comfortable.

  Unbelievably, exhaustion pulled me into a deep, dreamless sleep. But it was my only reprieve. When I woke, it was to find a breakfast tray being pushed at me.

  “What time is it?” I asked, sitting up. Cassie stuffed a thick pillow behind my back. She looked as ragged as I felt and made me feel guilty for what I said next. “I need to be at Dragon’s Cove by nine.”

  “You’ve plenty of time,” Cassie said firmly. “The maids are readying your bath water as we speak. What happened last night? What did you see in Rebecca’s mind that devastated you so?”

  “It’s as I said. I don’t know. Maybe I just felt her pain and terror so deeply that I fainted. I’m sorry.” I’d decided to wait before I tried to tell anyone exactly what I’d heard. I needed more proof of my suppositions before I caused that much pain for everyone, especially for Cassie and Bridget.

  “Heavens, don’t you dare apologize, Andrie. We just need to figure out how to explain things to Bridget and Prudence.”

  “Tell them I had a bad dream, and when I heard Rebecca, I rushed to her so quickly I fainted.”

  “Are you sure that’s all?” Cassie sat back against the stuffed cushion of the chair she’d pulled next to my bed. “I sorry, but I was so hoping that you’d be able to see into Rebecca’s mind and tell us what happened to Mary.”

  “I do see into Rebecca’s mind, but it is very difficult. Because she is blind I don’t ‘see’ anything. Her thoughts and memories are a collage of her interpretation of the sounds and sensations around her, like a very dark dream. Mostly her thoughts about the day Mary died are a wild odyssey beginning with happiness, songs, of sun-warmed sand and comfort that abruptly changes with the sounds of horse’s hooves and Mary’s frightened cries, then Rebecca’s frantic terror to get help for her and Mary.”

  Taking time to spread jam on my toast, I contemplated my next sentence. Perhaps I didn’t need to be completely silent but to subtly steer things in a certain direction. “The impression of those sounds and sensations lead me to the conclusion that we need to be questioning Mrs. Frye and Jamie’s story.”

  “I been asking questions since Mary disappeared, and I’m still dissatisfied with Constable Poole’s investigation.”

  “The sensations I glean from Rebecca’s thoughts don’t match up to what Jamie and Mrs. Frye claimed happened. Mary and Rebecca went on a picnic and then hours later Rebecca is found wet from the cold sea and screaming for Mary. Later we learned a bad horseman has taken Mary.”

  Cassie nodded. “Which in no way concurs with Mrs. Frye’s claim that she argued with Mary and caused our cousin to trip, roll down the sand dune, and strike her head on a sharp rock. Mrs. Frye also claims Rebecca wasn’t anywhere in sight and didn’t know Rebecca was with Mary at the time, and that doesn’t make sense.”

  I set down my teacup. “I can’t imagine Mary wouldn’t have had Rebecca right next to her. For Mrs. Frye to claim she didn’t when Rebecca was always with Mary at that time of the day is ridiculous. And no one has come up with a real explanation as to how Rebecca ended up on the roof either.”

  “Even if Jamie’s knife was in the tower, I don’t see him doing that to Rebecca. So why is Mrs. Frye lying about what happened?”

  “I don’t know,” I said, unwilling to suggest anything else until I had time to think about what I’d learned. A knock on the door rescued me from saying more.

  “Come in,” Cassie called out.

  Gemini entered. “I’m sorry,” she said, glancing from me to Cassie and looking hurt. You two are talking again. I’ll come back later.” She whipped around and shut the door behind her, rather firmly.

  “What’s wrong with her?” I asked.

  “It would seem she is feeling excluded again. Remember right after Grandfather died and how badly I felt that I couldn’t help him? You spent hours consoling me, and Mother kept hovering over me.”

  “And Gemini decided she was going to run away since she really wasn’t part of the family at all.”

  “And mother decided to tell her about our ‘problem’.” Gemini went around for a week predicting the future. Mother nearly had an apoplectic fit when Gemini said it was going to storm and it did.”

  “Gemini danced all over the house ecstatic.”

  “And Mother forbade her to ever play around like that again.”

  Our sighs seemed to escape at the same moment. I pushed my breakfast tray away. The kidney porridge wasn’t very appetizing anyway.

  “What are you going to tell her?” I asked Cassie as I slipped on my robe.

  “That I’m pregnant. What about you?”

  “The truth as well. That I’m having dark dreams in the night, and Rebecca’s screaming badly frightened me.” There was enough truth in that statement to keep me from going to perdition for lying, but it did little to change the living hell I was in, or keep it from getting worse by the day.

  I shuddered. Dear God, Mary. I’m sorry. Nothing that I was going through could compare to what she must have suffered.

  My first day on the job and I was late. Though my nine o’clock arrival time had been more my suggestion than the viscount’s, and my schedule was completely up to me, it still bothered me.

  Each week, or each month, I was to submit a tally of my work hours to Mrs. Lynds and she would see to my payment. Alexander had arranged everything so that he would not have to suffer my presence at all. I should have been elated to be venturing upon my first step toward independence. But between Rebecca’s nightmare and Alexander’s planned absence, a dark cloud as ominous and threatening as the deadly beasts depicted on the entrance to Dragon’s Cove hovered over me.

  The buggy drew up to the front, and I instructed the driver to return for me at five as I exited with my bag of cataloguing supplies. I firmed my shoulders, stiffened my back and marched up the stairs. Halfway to the dark doors I came to a halt, checked my appearance, then chastised myself for doing so. I’d worn a simple but elegant high-necked, forest green gown with cream lace at the neck, one that I considered extremely proper.

  Since I planned to work, I’d left off wearing gloves, but couldn’t leave Aphrodite’s ring behind. The serpent eyes winked at me again as I drew a deep breath, and had me wishing I’d see Alexander again soon.

  I expected Mrs. Lynds to answer the door. Instead an elderly man, wearing a patch over his left eye presented himself. “Ye must be the lass the Captain Black mentioned. Blimey but you’re a welcome si
ght. I’m Brighty Smith, his butler. Come on in with ye.” He motioned as he stepped aside.

  I had to bite off my surprise and force my feet into motion. It was odd to have a formally dressed butler look and talk like a pirate. “Is the viscount here?”

  He shook his head, bringing my attention to the matted wig he wore that somehow made him just a little bit endearing. “Knowing ’im as I do, ’e’s likely out racing ’is ’orse Devil about this time of day. What room are ye workin’? I’ll let Mrs. Lynds know.”

  That the viscount rode with the devil fit his character perfectly.

  I wasn’t familiar enough with the castle to know many of the rooms, or even the most logical place to begin, so I chose the room I was in. “I’ll start here, in the grand entry hall.”

  “Don’t be afeared to call if you need anything,” he said.

  I nodded and he left. First, I made a list of everything in the room and described each item in detail, giving it a catalogue number and a category notation. Later I would go back to this master list and create smaller lists so that all pictures would be together and all statues and so on. Before I could set my eye on what artifacts needed to be removed from the grand entry hall to make the room more aesthetically palatable, Mrs Lynds appeared.

  “Hope you’re ready for a bite to eat, lass. You’ve been working for hours.”

  “Yes, I am hungry.” A fact that surprised me. Last night had not only drained my energy but it had stolen my appetite. Glancing at the grandfather clock, I saw it was already after one, and I sighed with relief. I’d actually had several hours free of troubling thoughts and problems—mine or other people’s. It felt amazingly wonderful.

  “I can serve you outside on the terrace or in the family dining room.”

  “The terrace would be lovely, Mrs. Lynds.”

  “You’ll find what you need to freshen up in the water closet at the end of the corridor down this way. I’ll escort you to the terrace when you’re ready.”