Serpents in the Garden (38 page)

Chapter 42

He woke her with a kiss, told her to put something on, and led her out to the kitchen. Alex just gaped. At Jacob, at Matthew, and back at Jacob.

“How—” Before she could say anything more, her son had crossed the floor and swept her into his arms. God, he was big, bigger even than his father, and blond and good-looking and whole and safe and… Alex couldn’t stop crying, her hands flying over him.

“A beard?” she asked, fingers examining the thickened bridge of his nose.

“I couldn’t shave up in the woods.” Jacob scratched at his patchily covered cheeks.

“Up in the woods?” Alex whirled towards her husband. “Why you—” She flew at him, but she was laughing, and allowed him to draw her close and kiss her.

“Happy birthday, lass,” he said. “I couldn’t think of something you would want more.”

“How long has he been home?” Alex asked, kissing him back.

“A week.” Jacob sighed theatrically. “Living like a savage in the woods.”

“Nay, you haven’t,” Matthew retorted. “You’ve been sleeping in style in the hayloft.”

“And you’ve all known,” Alex said.

“Aye, well, he isn’t invisible, is he?” Matthew’s voice was loaded with pride. No, he definitely wasn’t. The half-grown boy had returned a man.

“Have you seen Betty?” Alex asked bluntly, making both son and husband grin.

Jacob nodded, twisting somewhat as he muttered that it had been a bit awkward at first, to see a girl he had for some years considered as his future wife so besotted with his brother and already with child. “She’s happy,” he said, “and she deserves to be.”

“And you?” Alex raised a hand to the unfamiliar bearded cheek. Hazel eyes softened and looked down at her, and in the back of them Alex saw pain and humiliation, heartbreak and a tentativeness she had never seen there before.

“I’m home,” Jacob sidestepped.

Alex was confined to her parlour for the rest of the morning, with Mary Leslie as her watchdog. From the kitchen floated enticing smells of baking hams and pies and bread, and out in the yard she could hear loud voices calling instructions, laughter and the occasional muffled curse as her family went about setting up their surprise. Not much of a surprise, she smiled to herself, listening distractedly while Mary told her the latest news from Boston.

“…and Harriet believes the girl is as taken as he is,” Mary finished.

“Ah,” Alex said.

“Alex!” Mary laughed. “You haven’t been listening, have you?”

“No,” Alex admitted.

“I was talking about Daniel, him and that girl of his.”

“Girl of his? Oh, you must mean Temperance!”

Mary nodded. “A very nice girl according to Harriet, and quite the catch on account of her mother. Hope Allerton is the only daughter to a draper, and the business is worth a substantial amount of money.”

“It is?” To Alex, all of this just meant one thing: her son might marry and settle so far away from her she would but see him rarely, and as to any grandchildren…

Mary sighed in agreement. Only once had she seen Harriet in the last five years, and as for the two girls left behind in England, the once so regular letters had dried up to become a dutiful annual epistle.

“I suppose Boston is better than England,” Alex said, “but it’s so uncertain to have them gone, isn’t it? Anything can happen to them, and we’ll never know until it’s too late.”

“Yes,” Mary replied shortly.

Too late, Alex remembered that Mary had recently lost one daughter to childbirth down in Virginia, only to find out in a stilted letter from her bereaved son-in-law. Alex covered Mary’s hand with her own.

All of them gawked: Ian, Mark, Jacob, Daniel – even David stared at his mama in her dark red bodice. Not that she noticed, because all she cared for was the look in Matthew’s eyes. She twirled, adjusted her laces, and smiled at him, a slow smile that she accompanied with a fluttering of eyelashes that made him laugh rather than pant. Still, when he took her hand, his fingertips caressed the inside of her wrist, and his eyes had gone a very golden shade of green, making something stir inside of her. She leaned towards him, a brush, no more, of her daringly exposed chest against his shirt.

“We have guests,” Mark reminded them.

“Many guests,” Ian nodded, and all the present Graham children burst out laughing at the way their mother rolled her eyes.

*

“Ouff!” Alex sat down with a thud on a stool, and flapped her hands in an attempt to cool her overheated cheeks. The barn was full of people, dancing, eating, drinking copious quantities of beer. Luckily, the Chisholms had brought some extra beer and cider with them, but what had seemed a mountain of food was now reduced to a couple of pies and a half-eaten loaf.

Alex grinned at the sight of Mrs Parson dancing with Peter Leslie, and turned to face her son. “She’s seventy-one. You wouldn’t believe it, would you?”

Jacob shook his head. “It will be him that keels over first.”

As if he had heard him, Peter held up his hands in an apologetic gesture and dragged himself over to where the drink was.

“Was she pretty?” Alex asked.

Jacob’s mouth curved into a reluctant smile. “I thought so, but then I thought a lot about her that later proved to be false.” He met her eyes. “Later, I’ll tell you all of it later.”

“Of course you will,” she said, and he nodded in defeat.

“Should he be dancing?” he asked instead, pointing at Ian, who was on the dance floor.

“No, but if he’s willing to take the pain that comes tomorrow, well, that’s his business.” She stood up and extended her hand to him. “One more, Jacob, seeing as your father has escaped outside.”

“Mama,” he groaned, but got to his feet anyway.

*

“Nowhere close, not anymore,” Matthew said to Peter and Thomas Leslie. He had looked, God how he had looked, those first few weeks after the attack. Mark and he had scoured the woods, and had they found them, the Burley brothers would no longer be walking the world. Where before the Burleys had mostly woken fear in him, now it was hatred and rage that flowed through his veins when he thought of them. He cleared his throat. One day…

“They make dangerous enemies,” Thomas warned, regarding Matthew through a thin veil of pipe smoke.

“So do I, and I won’t forgive them for damaging my son.”

“Mmm,” Peter nodded, “terrible…”

Matthew felt it unnecessary to comment.

“Will you help me find them?” Matthew asked, directing himself to Thomas, who nodded.

“And what will you do if you find them?” Peter asked.

“If?” Matthew shook his head. “There’s no if. It’s a when.” He closed his hand round the piece of bread in his hand and watched it disintegrate. “And when I do…” His voice trailed off into heavy silence.

Any further conversation was interrupted by Alex, appearing rosy and warm in the barn door.

“You promised you were going to dance with me, Mr Graham,” she said, and came to take his hand.

“I did? As I recall, what I said was that, if I danced, it would only be with you.”

“Same thing,” she said and tugged at him. “You also made some very cocky remarks about dancing me off my feet. So far a lot of words and no action, if you see what I mean.”

“No action?” His mouth was very close to her ear.

“No action,” she repeated, and pulled him back with her into the barn.

Matthew danced her off her feet. When she pleaded for mercy, he shook his head, leading her out into every dance. They twirled, they stamped, they weaved through complicated patterns with the other dancers, but all the while his eyes were glued to hers. She was lifted in the air, she was held close enough that he could feel the rise of her breasts against his chest, and only when she threatened to sit down where she stood, did he take pity on her and lead her off the dance floor.

“You said how you would dance a slow dance for me,” Matthew murmured some time later, handing her a cup of cider.

“Not for, with, and I’m ready whenever you are.” She drained her cup, set it down and walked with swinging skirts in the direction of the woods. He followed, smiling when he saw that she’d taken off her shoes and stockings, walking barefoot through the grass. She held out her arms to him, winding them hard around his neck.

She sang in his ear, the same song she’d sung him in the bath about summer breezes and touching in the pouring rain, and he tightened his arms around her and kissed her, trying to show her just how deep his love was. Forehead to forehead, they slowly turned, singing the chorus together.

*

From where he was standing a few feet into the forest, Qaachow watched Matthew and Alex slow their dance to stillness, saw him take her hand and lead her towards the house. He motioned for his men to remain where they were, and stepped out of the wooded fringe that surrounded the central buildings of the farm. When he was a boy, not that long ago, all of this had been forest, oaks and maples and sycamores standing never-ending round him, and now it was all gone. His land was gone, his people were gone, the spirits of the deep woods had fled further north and further west, and soon nothing would be left to show his people had ever been.

From the barn spilled the sound of white man’s music; in the door he saw the shapes of white men’s bodies, skin that shone fair in the light of lanterns. In the yard, a group of children ran and played, boys mostly, but here and there he caught the long braids of a girl.

We should have driven them off, he thought bitterly, our ancestors should have thrown them back into the sea whence they came. Even now, it was perhaps not too late. Kill all the men, take the children and women with them, and make them forget who they were and where they came from.

Qaachow sighed and turned away from the sounds of dancing and enjoyment, gliding back into the invisibility of the trees. He stood there a while longer, and now his eyes were riveted on the boy – his foster son. Tall like his father, dark of hair, and with a fluidity in his movements that made Qaachow smile with pleasure. White Bear leaped high in the air and landed with the ball in a firm grip, ducked to avoid his elder brother and, with a whooping sound, threw the ball to another child. Soon, Qaachow mouthed soundlessly, I will come for you soon.

*

“Alex?” Matthew groped for her hand.

“Mmm?” She braided her fingers round his.

“I love you,” he said to the dark, overcome by an urgent need to tell her what she surely knew anyway. “So very much do I love you.”

She raised herself on an elbow and kissed his cheek. “I know,” she said, nestling back down against his chest.

He waited and waited, and thought she might have fallen asleep.

“I love you too,” she breathed against his skin. “I always have, and always will.”

“Always?” His fingers brushed through her hair.

“Since before I was born,” she replied, giggling at her own jest.

“Alex?”

She didn’t reply, and, from the sound of her breathing, she had fallen asleep.

Matthew cradled her to him and kissed the top of her head. “I don’t think I’d want to live without you,” he said out loud, his cheeks heating. “I don’t think I could.”

*

Alex opened one eye and smiled. Me neither, she thought drowsily, me neither, Matthew Graham.

* * *

“A package?” Simon turned it over. “Who’d send me something from London?”

“Unless you open it, you won’t find out, will you?” Joan offered him her scissors to cut the string. She laughed at his hesitation. “It won’t bite you.”

“Oh, aye? And how do you know?” he said, but he smiled at her as he said it. He sneaked her a look from under his lashes. Whatever it was Alex had suggested she take, it helped, even if at times the sweetish smell was rather cloying. There was a tinge of pink in Joan’s previously so grey cheeks, and her mouth that for years had been set in a line had relaxed back into its natural fullness.

Simon Melville wasn’t a fool. He knew his wife was dying – she’d been doing that for the last five or six years – but now it seemed these last few years would not be one long agonising journey, and for that he was hugely grateful.

He unwrapped the last of the packing around the object. “Dear God,” he whispered, almost throwing the small square from him. He had seen something similar to this once before, and he knew what they could do. Joan leaned over his shoulder to look, a shocked exclamation escaping her. A painting: swirling greens and blues, a heaving mass of colour that entrapped your eyes and enticed you to look deeper, lose yourself in it.

“How?” she said. “And why to you?”

“I don’t know.” He nudged the painting. “Do you…do you think it’s the same?”

Joan swayed, gripped his arm and sat down on a stool, eyes tightly shut. “Yes,” she groaned. “Dearest Lord, take it away, destroy it!”

“Joan?” Simon gave her a gentle shake. In response, she moaned, a weak mewling no more.

“Joan!” He grabbed at her when she slipped off her stool.

Lucy started from where she’d been reading by the window, oblivious to their conversation. Her eyes flew to her parents, and she rushed towards them.

“Here.” Simon rewrapped the painting with one hand, the other arm supporting Joan. He handed it to Lucy and waited until she was looking at him.

“Burn it,” he said slowly. “Burn it, aye?” He jerked his head in the direction of the empty hearth. Lucy nodded, took the package and made for the kitchen where there always was a fire.

*

But Lucy didn’t burn it. She couldn’t – not when for the first time in her life, she heard sounds, wonderful magical sounds.

Revenge and Retribution

The Graham Saga continues in book six

The sun had just cleared the eastern forest when they set off next morning: six horses, two loaded mules, and seven people. Thomas Leslie took the lead, with his armed manservant riding just behind him. For practical reasons, Alex was riding pillion behind Matthew, while Daniel rode the roan she’d ridden down, and, given the general bustle of departure, it took Matthew some time to realise his wife seemed out of sorts, uncharacteristically quiet and distracted. She didn’t join in the banter between Ian and Daniel, she expressed a vague “Hmm?” when Betty asked her something, and to Matthew she didn’t say a word, a silent warmth at his back no more.

“What is it?” he finally asked.

“Bad night.” She tightened her hold round his waist.

She’d tell him in her own good time what it was that was preying on her mind, so instead Matthew concentrated on the way his stallion moved beneath him. Aaron was in many ways a throwback to his sire, but where Moses had been a singularly docile horse, Aaron was far more hot-blooded, capable of taking a leap to the side in an attempt to dislodge his rider – or get closer to the mare.

“You’ve had her already, you wee daftie,” Matthew said, slapping Aaron on the neck. “She’s with your get.”

“Do you think he knows?” Alex sounded very amused.

“What? That he’s served her or that she’s with foal?”

“Both, I suppose.”

Matthew thought about that for a moment. “I hope, for his sake, he recalls the serving of her. It’s not much more than a dozen times a year for him. But as to the foal…nay, he doesn’t know.”

“Oh.” Alex fell silent for a while. “Do you think he’s alright?” she asked with a hitch to her voice.

“Who?” Matthew did a swift count through his head – all their bairns were, as far as he knew, safe.

“Isaac,” she whispered.

“Ah…” No wonder she’d been tossing through the night. She’d been dreaming of her lost life, of her people in the hazy future, foremost amongst them her future son – this no doubt brought on by the discussion they’d had about that accursed little painting. He shifted in the saddle. Thinking about this made him right queasy: his wife a time traveller, her mother a gifted painter that painted portals through time, and wee Isaac seemed to have inherited his grandmother’s magical gifts. After all, it was one of Isaac’s paintings that Magnus Lind, Alex’s father, had used as a time portal all those years ago, appearing one day much the worse for wear in yon thorny thicket back home.

Matthew strangled a nervous laugh: first his wife, then her father. And as to those paintings… Ungodly, such paintings could only be created with the help of potent magic – black magic. Matthew tightened his hold on the reins and uttered a brief prayer to God, begging him to protect them all – and especially his wife – from evil. He coughed a couple of times.

“What do you think?” he said.

“I’m not sure. I never miss him, not truly. Yes, I think of him, wish him well in his life and all that, but he’s no hole in my heart. What if I am a hole in his?”

Matthew reached back to squeeze her thigh. “He was but a lad when you disappeared from his life. Aye, surely there are nights when he dreams of you, moments when you are a vaguely remembered shade, but a hole in his life that you are not. Man is too resilient for that.”

She didn’t reply, but he felt her relax, and after a few minutes of silence she changed the subject by asking him what he thought of Lionel Smith, pompous shit that she found him.

*

It was nearly noon before they stopped for a break – and by then Alex had been fidgeting for some time. She more or less fell off the horse and made for the closest screen of shrubs. Alex hiked up her skirts and crouched. She cocked her head to where her men were busy lighting a fire in the glade, grinned when Daniel loudly complained about the state of his buttocks, tore off some moss to wipe herself with, and rose.

“Mrs Graham, what an unexpected surprise.”

The voice froze Alex to the spot, but with an effort she turned, only to find herself a scant yard or so from Philip Burley. Still with that messy dark hair that fell forward over his face in an endearing manner that contrasted entirely with his ice-cold eyes, still with a certain flair to him, albeit that he was dishevelled and dirty. Alex opened her mouth to yell, but all that came out was a squeak.

“Down to witness the hanging of my dear brother?” Philip continued, his voice far too low to carry to her companions. Low, but laden with rage.

“Good riddance,” Alex managed to say. She whirled, screaming like a train whistle.

Things happened so fast, Alex’s vision blurred. The ground came rushing towards her, her face was pressed into the mulch by Philip’s tackle. She heard Matthew roar, set her hands to the ground and heaved. Up. Philip grabbed at her skirts, Alex kicked like a mule, and here came Matthew, bounding towards them. Philip scrambled to his feet, and Alex crawled away on hands and knees.

In Matthew’s hand flashed a sword, Philip levelled a pistol but had no opportunity to fire it before Matthew brought his blade down, sending the gun to twirl through the air and land in a distant bush.

Men. From all over, men swarmed, and there was Walter Burley, fighting his way towards Matthew with an intent look on his face. He was brought up short by Dandelion, over a hundred pounds of enraged dog throwing himself at Walter. A howl, a long howl that ended in a whine. Walter brandished his bloodied knife and cheered, a sound cut abruptly short when Thomas Leslie charged him. A hand grabbed at Alex; she tore herself free and backed away, looking for some kind of weapon, anything to defend herself with. And there was Matthew – everywhere was Matthew: kicking her assailant to the ground, fending off Philip’s sword, swinging round to punch Walter, grinding an elbow into yet another man, and all the while he was yelling out commands to his sons and Thomas.

Like a deadly whirlwind was Matthew Graham, and beware to anyone coming between him and the man he was screaming at, spittle flying in the air as he advanced, step by step, towards Philip, a Philip who seemed surprisingly taken aback, retreating towards the woods. Matthew lunged, Philip fell back, using a stout branch to defend himself. Again, and Philip took yet another step backwards. Alex intercepted a swift glance between the Burley brothers, and she didn’t like the smirk on Philip’s face. Matthew charged, Philip turned and fled with a triumphant Matthew at his heels.

“No…” Alex croaked. A dull crack, and Matthew staggered, a giant of a man appearing from where he’d been hiding, brandishing a cudgel. Walter Burley whooped, doing a few dance steps. Alex didn’t stop to think. She launched herself at him, landing knees first on his chest. There was a whoosh when the air was expelled from his body, and then he went limp.

She picked up Walter’s pistol from where he’d dropped it and turned to find her husband locked in a fight with two men, while Thomas, his man and her sons were kept at bay by seven. Philip Burley yelled when Matthew succeeded in sinking his dirk into his right arm. For an instant, it seemed as if Matthew was about to tear himself free from the unknown huge man, but there was Philip, whacking Matthew over the head again. Matthew’s knees buckled under him and Alex fired into the air.

“I’ll cut his throat!” she screamed, holding Walter’s lolling head by his hair. “I’ll do it now!” Her hand was shaking so badly she at first couldn’t get to her knife through the side slit of her skirt, but then her fingers closed on the familiar handle and she pulled it free.

“Let him go!” Philip Burley glared at her. “Let go of him, you fool of a woman, or I’ll gut your husband like a pig.”

Matthew tottered, blood running in miniature rivulets over the left side of his face.

“An impasse, it would seem,” Alex said, struggling to keep her voice steady. “You let my husband go, and I’ll let your brother live. For now.” She increased the pressure of her blade on Walter’s skin, making him gargle.

Philip sneered and glanced down at his bleeding arm. “You stand no chance, Mrs Graham. We are ten to your six.”

“Seven,” someone said. A shot rang out, and the large man helping Philip to hold Matthew dropped like a stone to the ground, shot through his back. “And now you are but nine.”

Burley’s men shifted, trying to find the sharpshooter. Thomas’ hand flew out and one of the men fell to his knees, gripping at the hilt of a knife that stuck out from his thigh. A collective muttering ran through the six men left standing, their eyes sliding towards the relative safety of the woods. Alex’s hand was slick on the handle of her knife and, to compensate, she tightened her hold on Walter’s hair, pulling so hard the man squealed.

Philip scowled: at Matthew, at Alex, and at the woods. With a swift movement, he levelled a pistol at Matthew’s head.

“If any more of my men are hurt, I’ll kill him,” he shouted, scanning the surrounding trees. He jerked his head in the direction of the forest, and his men helped their wounded comrade to stand, closing ranks around him. Ian and Daniel closed in on Philip, who was dragging Matthew with him as a shield.

“My brother,” he said to Alex. “Release my brother, and I’ll release your husband.”

Ian raised his musket and aimed it at Walter.

“Do as he says, Mama. And if Da isn’t released before the count of three, then Walter Burley is no more.”

Walter’s breath came in loud hisses, his pulse leaping erratically against her hand. At less than ten feet, Ian would never miss. Daniel aimed his weapon at Philip.

“Nor is Philip Burley,” he vowed, but the barrel trembled a bit too much.

Alex let go of Walter’s hair and stepped back, watching as he lurched to his feet. At least one broken rib and, if she was lucky, maybe two or three. Walter Burley wheezed, wrapping his arms hard around his midriff.

He lifted strange light eyes to Alex. “You’ll pay,” he spat through colourless lips.

“You can always try, and next time I’ll squash your balls instead.” It took a superhuman effort to retain eye contact with those eerie grey eyes, but she did, stiffening her spine with resolve.

“One,” Ian counted. “Two…” Matthew was pushed to land at Daniel’s feet, and Ian swung the muzzle of his musket towards Philip and the band of renegades. “Three,” he said and fired, as did Daniel.