Emerald Embrace (20 page)

Martise heard a soft rustle and, startled, she looked about. She didn’t see anyone, but as unease swept along her spine, she cried out, “Who’s there?”

There was another rustling sound. Suddenly, Martise could remember nothing but the sight of the corpse in the wall, and panic seized hold of her. She was a fool to be out here. It had gotten dark so quickly, and things … things happened at Castle Creeghan.

“Who’s there!” she snapped again boldly. She could not panic, she must not!

And then, just over the wooden wall that delineated Desdemona’s stall, a forehead appeared, and two very wide, very frightened eyes.

“’Tis me,” came a voice, and then, as an afterthought, “Jemie, milady. Jemie MacPeters.”

“Jemie!” She almost laughed out loud with relief and pleasure. “Oh, Jemie! Why were you hiding from me?”

She came out of the stall and impulsively stroked the urchin’s face, despite the dirt and grime upon it. “You frightened me by hiding!” she admitted.

He blushed furiously. “I’m sorry, ever so sorry, milady. I didna know who it was meself. I couldna—” He wanted to say more, but suddenly, he couldn’t.

She smiled, thinking that the boy wasn’t really retarded or daft, he was just slow, and needed help. “It’s really quite all right. I understand. I frightened you, too, right?”

Eyes still wide and luminous, he nodded vigorously.

“It’s because of the girl in the wall today, right?”

Again, he nodded vigorously. It didn’t seem, though, that she was reassuring him. If anything, he seemed more frightened.

“Well, you really mustn’t be frightened. Things happened long ago.”

He looked doubtful, then he opened his mouth, trying to speak. “Na, na, lady,” he managed to mutter. Then suddenly, his hand was anxiously on her arm. “Ye must take care, ye must run. ’Tis the masters. They be the sea gods and the earth gods. We must never, never go agin them, never, me ma said, for there’d be no food, no land, no shelter. But ye’re not one of us. Ye mustna disappear, ye must take care, ye’re—ye’re kind, lady. And his eyes be upon ye. The devil’s eyes, lady, he do mean to keep ye!” He was backing her against the wall, his hand still upon her. He was a youth, but he was strong, she thought. Cords were knotted in his throat. His fingers felt like steel.

She had no doubt that he was speaking about Bruce Creeghan, but he was scaring her silly himself.

She couldn’t stand there any longer, feeling his touch and wondering if she might not be the fool, if he might not be dangerous. He was telling her things, she thought. Telling her that the master was responsible for death and disappearances.

And that he was watching her.

She would be next.

And still, even as Jemie warned her, his fingers were upon her. Too powerful.

She caught his hand where it lay upon her arm and tried to smile. The effort was futile. She dropped his hand and told him, “You must not say such things, Jemie, truly, you must not!”

Then she did run, as fast as she could, into the courtyard. Once there she paused, feeling the mist swirl around her feet. Night had fallen. It had not come subtly; it had rushed down upon them. In the mist and the darkness, she felt real terror. She picked up her skirts and fled toward the doors to the hall, certain that all the demons of hell were behind her.

She reached the doors. Gasping, she turned around swiftly. There was no one behind her. The mist swirled silently in the darkness of the night. She was alone. Completely, terribly alone.

She swung open the doors to the great hall and passed through the entryway. She wanted to reach her room as soon as possible.

But the great hall was not empty. Even as she came into the entryway, she heard voices. She held still, holding her breath, and realized that Bruce had come back. He was by the mantel, and he was talking with his Uncle Peter.

Arguing with him.

“Well, ye’ve changed, Bruce, and I don’t mind saying so. Ye’re nigh on hard as nails now, stubborn, man, I say, and I can reason with ye no longer.”

“There is no reasoning it—” Bruce began, but he cut himself off and walked toward the entryway.

He stared at her, and she felt like a schoolgirl caught in the act of eavesdropping. Color flooded her cheeks. “I am sorry. I didn’t mean to interrupt. If you’ll both excuse me—”

“Ye needn’t be excused, milady!” Peter said quickly, inclining his head at her. “We were done speaking, lass, rehashing words said before. Ye two excuse me.” He nodded to them both.

Bruce did not see him go up the stairs, for his eyes never left hers. “Come in, sit, enjoy the fire,” he said softly.

“Really,” she protested. “I was just going to my room.”

“But you must not,” he told her, and, smiling, he took her arm and led her to one of the chairs before the fire. He rested his booted foot upon one of the stone supports before it and set his elbow on the mantel, smiling down at her.

“It seems that we have so little time alone,” he said.

“Or perhaps too much,” she murmured.

He laughed, and then left the hearth and sauntered around behind her. She felt him at her back and nearly jumped when his hands fell softly upon her shoulders. Then his thumb gently caressed her cheek.

Fire seemed to flame throughout her. She fought hard to remain still. There were things she wanted to say to him, things she wanted to shout.

Accusations that screamed within her heart.

“The games are this week,” he told her lightly. “It seems that you will still be with us for the event.”

“What is the occasion that brings these games on?” she whispered.

“Pardon?”

“Well, I’ve heard about your maypole, and the fact that the dances were once a form of worship, just as the pole itself is a—a symbol.”

“Phallic?” he inquired politely. She gritted her teeth. For a man determined to shelter her from the horrors in the cellar, he had no difficulty with sexual boldness.

“Indeed. So what brings on this fest?”

“Hmm,” he murmured. “Well, it is fall. It is nearly All Hallows’ Eve. Surely, it must go back to the bringing in of the harvest, don’t you imagine?” He was no longer behind her. He had walked around again, as lithe, as silent, as agile as a great cat. He sat in the chair opposite her, his legs outstretched, and he smiled. Complacent.

Dangerous.

“You’re to win the caber throw,” she said.

“Aye.”

“And will you?”

“I do assume so,” he said, adding a blunt “I’m good.”

“Very powerful.”

“Milady, why do I always feel that your words are leading somewhere?”

She didn’t reply. Instead, she looked to the fire, and she felt its warmth lull her slightly. She turned back to Bruce and asked a question instead, softly, almost wistfully. “What was your life like with Mary, Bruce?”

He lowered his eyes. “Mary was sweet and bright and everything that a man might love,” he replied. “As lady here, she was deeply cherished.” His eyes rose again to hers. “That I swear to you,” he said, a deep tremor to his voice. But then instantly, he changed again, and his smile tightened. “Ah, alas, I had forgotten. You are convinced that I did Mary in, are you not?”

“Not convinced.”

“Just very suspicious.”

He stood, and in seconds he had passed the distance between them. Upon his knees he caught her hand and turned it palm up. And he began to stroke it as he spoke, and she felt the hypnotism of his voice, and even as she longed to bolt, she sat still. She watched his thumb move over her palm, and she wondered how such a simple movement could seem so intimate, how it could touch her deep inside, seem to strip away her clothing and leave her bared and naked.

And vulnerable.

“It’s been an intriguing day for you, has it not?” he said, and his voice was soft, and it seemed to blend with the flicker of the fire that warmed his face and burned within his eyes. “Alas, you must wonder about me, for the lairds who came before me do not speak well for the clan! A poor wee lass walled in, implements of torture inside the walls … and there’s more, of course. In the 1600s one of the lairds was dragged from this very hall, from his stance by this very hearth, by a neighboring earl. His people had tried to defend him, but he had stolen the earl’s daughter, you see. The earl swore that the Creeghan had taken maiden after maiden. He and his men brought the laird to the town, and there accused him of crimes of lust and bloodlust, and he was beheaded by the earl’s sword then and there. There are many, many skeletons inside many closets, milady. It is, I think, a danger of knowing one’s past so well. I do know mine. And it is frightening.”

“Ah,” Martise whispered. “But the sins of the fathers need not be visited upon the sons!”

He laughed, delighted. “No? But the warning is clear and bold! Women beware, for women have met such sorry ends within these walls. Terror has come here.”

“But …” She paused, moistening her lips. And then she demanded, “Is it coming here again, my lord? Is it all happening—again?”

He folded her hands within his own. “You should leave here, milady.”

She shook her head. “I cannot.”

“Why?”

“I—I must know.”

“And what if you do risk your own life?”

“Do I do so?” she demanded.

He did not answer her, but cross-queried her instead. “What are you looking for?”

“Nothing!”

“Ye should know that the infamous lairds of Creeghan deal harshly with thieves.”

“I am no thief!” she protested.

“No?” He brought her hand to his mouth, kissed the back, and twisted it slowly, then kissed her palm where he had stroked it before. Excitement seemed to sear and dance within her, and shocking sensations rushed to even more shocking and intimate places.

And he rose, pulling her up with him, and kissed her lips softly, and then with more passion. His fingers curled into her hair, and he loosed it about her shoulders, and his whispers touched her ear and raced hotly against her flesh. “Ye should go, milady, I warn ye again, fer if ye stay … I want ye as I do not remember wanting even air to breathe, or water to drink. I want you as simply as I want to wake, to move, to live. I do not know what so drives the ache and the longing and the need. I want you beneath me, naked, with this great tangle of hair spread out beneath us and between us, golden like flame, soft like silk, taunting. Aye, my dear Lady St. James, I want you hot and anxious and eager and awaiting my touch with those naked blue eyes of yours wide and seeing the beast and the man for all that he might be.”

“Stop!” she gasped, realizing at last that no true lady would even listen to such words, that she should have slapped him, should have escaped him.

“Aye, lass, I want you. As you want me.”

“No!” she protested.

“Then run.”

“I cannot.”

“What are you looking for?” His voice was no longer a whisper, it was thunder.

She jerked from his touch. “Nothing!”

“If I catch you too close to the flame, lady, you will get burned, I promise you!”

“How dare you—?” she began.

“Nay, lady. How dare you. I warn you again. Come too close, push too far, and you will feel the flame. Enter into my arms, and I will carry you where I please.”

“Into a crypt where I might be walled away forever?” she challenged in a whisper.

His eyes narrowed and darkened dangerously. He swore with sudden impatience and his booted footsteps brought him striding past her. At the stairway he paused and turned back.

“Contrary to your beliefs, madam, I like my women awake, alive, and willing. Hot, even, milady, simmering hot, blazing hot, wanting—no, needing—to be loved. Do you ken, milady? If not, perhaps you will. I warned you oft enough. Yet I believe you must like some of the heat, for you are ever wandering nearer and nearer the fire.”

He paused, and a slight smile curved his lips. “Nay, lady, I will take you to no crypt. I will take you wherever it is that you finally taunt me too far, be it my bed, the earth, the hay. And I dare say that you will scream, but with pleasure. And you will certainly arise from it all very much alive and shatteringly aware of all that has been.”

“You arrogant bastard!” Martise hissed.

“Aye, that. But not a murderer, milady.” Then he smiled, and bowed, and turned his back on her, and his footsteps carried him up the stairs.

Always the master, he had spoken the last word.

Seething, she followed him up the stairs, and she bolted herself into her room for another night in Castle Creeghan.

T
he next few days passed slowly, and with little incident. Martise felt curiously as if it were a time of waiting, and that there was little she could do about it.

Something would happen, something would break, soon enough. Bruce Creeghan was seldom in the castle, and Martise passed her time with Elaina, or alone. With Bruce gone, she dared to start through the library again.

And then, one evening at dinner, when she learned that Bruce had gone back to the village to see Dr. MacTeague, she thought it might have come time to try to search through his tower quarters.

She yawned and excused herself to Elaina early, and hurried to her room. She waited there a while, and then slipped out, remembering what Hogarth had told her that first night in the castle. The west tower held the great hall, her room, and, she had learned, Elaina’s suite. And then he had said, “The lower floors of the north tower house the servants, the east tower holds the family rooms, and the south tower is the sole domain of the lord of Creeghan.”