The Spellbound Bride (23 page)

He turned away from her, pinning his gaze to the moon outside their window. He felt her roll away from him in the bed.

What Sorcha failed to understand was that he had no intention of ever letting her go.

He had already experienced the intense pangs of longing that accompanied the loss of Mary, and his devotion to Sorcha outstripped that feeling by leagues.

If he were to lose her, Ian believed he would go insane.

He rose from the bed and found the bottle of wine that had been placed in their room with a congratulatory note on the their marriage. Before he reached the bottom of the bottle, a comfortable numbness had enveloped his senses. A few minutes later, the empty bottle rolled away from his grasp as he lay unconscious on the ornate carpet covering their chamber floor.

Chapter Thirteen

The insistent rapping at his chamber door awakened Lord Malcolm Hunter in the wee hours of the morning. He stumbled out of bed, cracked the portal open, and peered out into the hall.

The light of a single candle was near blinding after the pitch darkness, and gave ghoulish look to the face of his groom.

"What is it?"

Trying to look as dignified as possible in his nightshirt and robe, Mr. Crombie straightened his shoulders to respond.

"There’s a messenger downstairs, my lord. He says it is urgent that he see you."

"About what?"

"He wouldna’ say, my lord, but did emphasize that you should hurry."

Grumbling, Malcolm pulled on his dressing robes and raked his hands through his hair. This had better be damned important. In the well-appointed parlor of his Edinburgh home, a blond man waited. He sat, his twisted foot resting against the edge of the chair, and unsteadily made to rise to his feet when Malcolm entered.

He bowed. "My lord, I have news of the utmost importance regarding your brother."

Malcolm’s heart rate doubled. Earlier Ian’s poisonous words had bitten into him like a snake, coiling around his heart and squeezing as the venom dripped steadily into his veins. His brother had not disappeared to cool off after their last battle as he had surmised, but was filled instead with malice and hate.

As much as he would like to brush off this messenger and be done with Ian, he could not. He had tried to shake off the nagging feeling that danger lay in wait for this brother.

"What news have you?"

"Your brother has been poisoned, my lord."

"What?" He leaped upon the messenger, grabbing him by the shoulders. "Is he alive? Tell me!"

"Aye, my lord, but only just. His witch wife struck him down with sorcery earlier this evening. When they found him, he was barely breathing."

"What’s been done?"

A pounding on the door jarred both men. Lord Hunterston’s manservant opened the door to reveal a disheveled Lord Rorick Campbell, his eyes gleaming with malice. He was ushered into the sitting area.

Campbell sketched a bow to the slightly elevated Lord Hunterston.

"Lord Hunterston, there isn’t a moment to spare. The witch will kill your brother if you do not call the kirk this instant to fetch her."

"Forgive my ignorance, Lord Campbell, but are you speaking of the woman you claimed killed your son?"

"Aye, the very one who has married your brother as her third husband."

Pressure was building at the base of Malcolm’s skull, pounding in angry fury. If he called the kirk, they would summon a witch pricker. They might determine the truth of this accusation or simply accuse the woman because of the lateness of the hour and their irritation at being rousted out of bed.

"Lord Campbell it is too late in the night for such business. I will call in the morning— "

Campbell grasped him by the nightshirt.

"Nay! Ye must do it now!"

The man clearly had lost his good judgment, otherwise he never would have grabbed one of his betters. Malcolm grasped Lord Campbell’s hands and removed them.

"I will call them, sir. But not until morning. I bid you good night."

Rorick Campbell spun on his heel, cursing under his breath, and slammed out the door. The lame servant doffed his hat, mumbled a hasty good evening and left as well.

Malcolm was no fool, but he was unsure of this situation. What exactly had his brother blundered into? He could be certain of only one thing: if there was any way to protect his brother, he knew he must.

* * *

Back at the inn, Archibald paced the small room making Sorcha’s distress only grow.

"You must leave him here," Archibald hissed.

Sorcha laid her hand against Ian’s brow. It was hot. The fever colored his skin, angry and red.

She glared at Archibald. "I will not leave him thus."

He caught her by the shoulders and leveled her with a serious stare.

"Listen to me. Lord Hunterston has called the witch pricker to court. They will be here by tomorrow. If you are to escape the kirk’s judgment, it must be tonight."

She laid her palm against his cheek.

"You know I cannot."

His mouth tightened into a scowl.

"Do you really think he would want you to stay, to put yourself in the very danger he and I have worked to protect you from? I’ve brought the money I promised, so what need would he have of you now? He’ll leave for France and forget you ever existed," he said, gesturing to the small trunk in the corner that contained eight hundred pounds in coin. She turned away, unable to answer the question truthfully without a pain knotting within her chest. "If the positions were reversed, he would never leave my side, and neither would you. I cannot ask any less of myself."

Archibald’s shook his head, and sighed.

"I think you place too much faith in him. You must remember that no one can save you once they’ve come."

She hated to disappoint Archibald in this way, but Ian was far too precious to her now. Until he had revealed the depth of his feelings, she had not been willing to accept the overwhelming bond that had formed between them.

"I know, but let me stay at least until his fever breaks."

Archibald grasped her hand for an instant and gave it a small squeeze before releasing it.

"I will see what can be done to intervene and give you time. But you must leave." The door scraped shut behind him.

Beside her, Ian groaned quietly.

"Hush now," she crooned. She dipped the cloth again in the bowl of herb-infused water, wrung it and placed against his flushed cheek.

Ian’s eyes opened.

"Sorcha," he croaked.

Her attention was instantly riveted on her husband.

"Can you drink?"

He barely nodded in reply, the motion clearly an exertion for him.

Out of habit Sorcha glanced behind her before stirring the powdered white willow bark into his wooden cup. "Drink this. ‘Twill bring the fever down and ease the pains." She lifted his head and raised the cup to his cracked, parched lips.

He grimaced. "Not again. Is this mixture as foul as the other?"

"Nay, but ‘twill bring down the fever." He sipped at the cup, a bit of the mixture dripping onto his chin to rest in the cleft there.

Sorcha wiped it away, her finger lingering in the intimate hollow so near his lips. She longed to kiss him. Had there not been the threat of the kirk stealing closer with every moment, she would have got under the covers and curled up beside him as much to comfort him as herself. Sorcha brushed back a thick lock of his hair, heavy and damp with sweat.

"‘Tis not how I planned to leave. I always though I would be sailing away..." His cracked lips parted in a soft smile.

Sure she was alone with Ian, Sorcha leaned close and spoke softly near his ear. "You’ll not be leaving this easily, Ian Hunter. You’ve got a voyage ahead of you.
Chaumiere de Heureux
is waiting for you."

She dug into her pockets and brought out rosemary he favored and crushed a bit of it beneath his nose. He focused on the scent, inhaling as best he could.

"Can’t you smell the pungent green of the hillsides?"

He tried to chuckle, but it degenerated into a hard coughing fit. When he regained his breath, he smiled.

"I do not think I’ve the strength to try it at the moment, lass," he rasped.

"All the better reason you must get well."

"I’m cold." He quaked beneath the light blanket.

"Your skin already burns. We cannot risk the fever growing." She grasped the bowl beside his bed and prepared the wash water for him , blending in the rosemary she had crushed and the mint to sweeten it. Methodically, she submerged the cloth and wrung it out, then bathed his face and neck in the cooling water. Again she dunked the cloth, but this time her touch lingered as she touched each plane of his face as if committing it to memory for the last time. His noble brow, the lids of his eyes, his chiseled cheeks and chin, the cleft, his lips.

In the back of her mind the knowledge that the kirk was coming hammered at her, making her heart beat fast and her mind race. Lord Hunterston had been quick to call them when his brother had fallen into the sudden illness.

She had intentionally kept the knowledge away from Ian, knowing it would have only cut him further to the quick to know of his brother’s actions. But she could not, would not, rush this time to care for him.

She pulled down the blanket, baring his chest. She continued to bathe him. His strong neck, the stark white scar that slashed downward from his ear, his broad shoulders and firmly muscled chest, the hair that glistened darkly with moisture from his fever that trailed down a stomach flexing at her gentle touch. She blew against his damp skin to cool it, and his nipples hardened in response.

"Had I known that you would bathe me thus, I would have feigned sickness long ago," he rasped, then offered her a weak smile.

"Had I known how much you enjoyed it, I would have made you wait for it until you were well."

He was tired. The evidence of it lay in the lines that creased his face and the waxy pallor of his skin. She pulled the blanket back up over him and brushed his dark hair again with her hand.

"Rest now, and we shall talk more of it later."

His nod was barely perceptible. Sorcha waited for him fall soundly asleep. She stayed by his side, drinking in the site of him and knowing that her time was short.

What would happen to those she left behind? The kirk would not be merciful enough to prevent her from going to trial, but if she left now, would she be giving a death sentence to Ian?

Near the corner of the room, she spied a folded bit of parchment. Dread rushed through her. In her blood she knew without touching it that it was one of those hated notes.

With a shaking hand, she plucked it from the floor and gingerly unfolded it as though it might bite her. The reddish-brown ink shook her to the bone.

He’s not the last.

She crushed the note and threw it back into the corner. A deep, dull pain settled in her chest. Her eyes burned. She could contain it no longer, and wept.

She shed tears for all the things that would never be between her and Ian. For the time lost to them. For the children they would never have. For never seeing the home he would claim for them. The knowledge sickened her.

Since she had lost her mother, siblings, and father, the need for family had been intense.

If something happened to Archibald, she would never forgive herself.

She cried until she felt hollow. Sometime in the night she fell asleep touching Ian.

She awoke when she felt the movement of him beneath her hands and face. He was no longer hot. His fever had broken, leaving him weak, but alive. She looked at him, a mixture of joy and sadness confusing her heart.

"Good morrow— " she bit her greeting off, stopping herself from saying the word husband. She must begin to let him go. "How fare you?"

His voice sounded gravely and dry. "I feel awful."

Sorcha smiled.

"To the tell the truth of it, you look awful too. Can you drink?"

"Aye, anything you have, and half of Loch Aber as well."

He lifted his head. Sorcha brought the cup to his lips, and he drank greedily.

"Go slowly, or you’ll sour your stomach."

He lay back against the pillow, gasping for breath.

"How long am I to be bedridden?"

"Only until you gain your strength back. If you leave the bed too soon, the fever might return. ‘Tis best not to rush this."

He growled. "I feel useless lying in bed."