Chapter Eighteen
Deborah stood at the window in her bedchamber, letting the frigid night air revive her. The last horse-drawn sleigh filled with neighbors had departed, and the house was finally silent save for the plinking of the harpsichord in the parlor and the occasional sound of male laughter. Snow was falling again and the sled tracks were beginning to disappear beneath the fresh blanket of glimmering white.
Every room in the house was filled with sleeping forms, guests who would be staying at Host's Wealth through the wedding celebration. It was only because Deborah had pleaded with Lady Celia that her room had not been made into a dormitory for young girls. She claimed she needed her privacy before the wedding, and Lady Celia had given in to her. Elizabeth and Anne were now sharing their bedchamber with four fourteen-year-olds.
Deborah sighed, fingering the lace-edged curtains that hung in her window. It had been a long evening and her head was pounding. Seeing the Earl with the young kitchen maid had disturbed her more than she realized. She'd known for years of the rumors that her father dallied with the servants, but up to this point, they had been nothing been rumors. Tonight she had seen the truth and it disgusted her.
Deborah's first impulse had been to confront the Earl with what she'd seen, but then better sense told her to bide her time. First she had to get the young girl out of the house and then she would use the information to her advantage. She had to be careful. The Earl's threat of throwing the servant into the bay was too real not to take seriously.
Movement below caught Deborah's eye and she leaned on the sill, brushing the curtains aside. There had been a shadow . . . a man. There he was again. It took only a moment for her to realize who the shadow must be. The man moved across the yard with an animal-like grace, becoming one with the night shadows as he drew closer to the house. It was Tshingee. . . .
Crossing her bedchamber, Deborah sat on the edge of the bed and waited. He came in through the window almost soundlessly and closed it behind him.
"You knew I was coming."
"I saw you below. You'd better take care, Wildcat of the Wolf Clan, or the Earl will have his dogs on you." She kept her back to him, afraid to turn and face him. Her heart fluttered beneath her breast. She had prayed he would come. She had prayed he would not.
"You have not come to me for three days, ki-ti-hi. I was worried." He stood at the window in his long cloak, staring at her slim form perched on the edge of the bed. His arms ached to hold her.
"I . . . I've been busy."
"I told you before that you need not come every day. But when you came every day and then did not come, I feared you were sick or injured, Red Bird." He came around the side of the bed and took her hands, raising her to her feet. "I came to be certain you were safe."
She lifted her lashes to gaze into his ebony eyes. "I'm safe," she whispered.
He brushed his thumb against her cheek and she lowered her lashes. "I also came to tell you I am going."
Deborah's heart skipped a beat. Her eyes flew open. "So soon? Going? Going where? What of John?"
He threaded his fingers through her thick hair. "I go back to my village . . . to get warriors."
"So it's come to that, has it?" she asked sadly. Her gaze rested on his solemn face, the most intriguing face she had ever laid eyes on.
"I fear it has." He touched the dark birthmark at the corner of her mouth with his fingertip. "I know no other way. I think time is running out for John Wolf. The Earl says men of the law have been called but I see no men. I see no trial. All I see is my brother chained to a wall in a barn like some beast," he finished bitterly.
"You've been to MacCloud's? You shouldn't have gone." She lifted her hands to rest them on his broad chest. Even through the thick hide cloak she could feel his heart beating rhythmically.
"I did not speak with John. I went only to see where he was and how many men guarded him. I could cut the throats of the sentries. They would die before they saw the Wildcat's shadow, but John wants no deaths on his soul. If I bring others, it may be that we can free him without violence."
Deborah lowered her head to rest her forehead on his chest. "Oh, Tshingee. Why has all of this happened? Why?"
Gently, he smoothed the hair that fell down her back. "I do not know, my Red Bird. The stars, that is all I can tell you. It was in the stars."
She inhaled the scent of him that lingered on his clothes. "I suppose you're right. It just seems so unfair."
"I wish that I could take you with me, Red Bird."
"I know."
"I wish . . ." His voice had a husky catch to it. "I wish that I could carry you off in my arms and make you my bride here beneath the stars."
"But you can't," she murmured against his chest. He shook his head. "I cannot. Perhaps after this is all over," he said hopefully. "Perhaps . . ."
Deborah pressed a finger to his lips. "Don't say it." It's too late, her mind screamed. Too late to turn back now. "You're right, my place is here and yours is among your people. I cannot ask you to put everyone in the village at risk for a love that was never meant to be. I understand."
"I pray that you do."
"We all do what we think is best, Tshingee. We all have responsibility for someone besides ourselves." She thought of the tiny baby growing within her and tears sprang in her eyes. I hope you understand why I must marry Tom, she thought, and why I do not tell you of the child.
Tshingee pulled her against him, pressing his lips into her soft hair. "K'daholel. I love you, Deborah Montague."
"Tshingee." She lifted her head. "I have to tell you something.' "
"You do not."
"But . . ." Her lower lip trembled and he kissed her mouth.
"You want to tell me that you will marry your Thomas."
"How did you know?" The smile on her face was bittersweet.
"I see it in your eyes." He tugged on her shorn lock of hair. "I hear it in your voice."
"And doesn't it hurt you?"
"As much as it hurts you, Red Bird, it hurts me more. But you do the right thing and that makes my chest swell with pride."
"Oh, Tshingee," she sobbed. "I love you."
He held her in his arms, stroking her back and shoulders. Then with his hand, he lifted her chin to stare into her teary eyes. "I must go, Deborah. It is not, safe for me to be here."
"No!" She clasped his arms. "Stay with me, just tonight."
"It is not right. You belong to Thomas now." I should take to the shadows honorably."
She pressed her lips to his, her kiss hard and demanding. "Please," she begged. "One last time, I need your love."
"But you have my love, always." He moved his lips over hers, down her jaw, into the soft flesh of her neck.
"No. I need to feel your love." She fumbled with the leather ties of his cloak, pushing it down off his shoulders. It fell to the floor in a heap behind him. "Please . . ."
Tshingee rested his hands on her narrow waist. His ebony eyes were fixed on hers.
"Please . . ." She showered his face with a sprinkling of kisses. "Love me, Tshingee, love me tonight," she begged in anguish. "Just one last time, make me feel alive."
With a groan, Tshingee lowered his mouth to hers. Threading his fingers through her thick hair he delved deep into her mouth, their tongues meeting in a dance of desperation. Deborah clung to him, moaning softly as his hand fell to the ties of her dressing gown. He released her breasts from the confines of the silky material and fondled one warm mound, testing its weight with the palm of his hand.
Leaning against Tshingee, she sighed, stroking his broad chest beneath the linen of his shirt. Pulling the shirt from the waistband of his breeches, she slipped her hand beneath the material, her fingertips making contact with the hard bud of his nipple.
Sweeping her into his arms, Tshingee carried Deborah to her bed and laid her gently on the counterpane. Then he stood upright and began to remove his clothing. Deborah followed his movements through half-closed eyelids.
Tshingee of the Wolf Clan was a glorious sight as he pulled his linen shirt over his head to reveal his bronzed, sculptured form. The whipcord muscles of his arms flexed as his hands went to the ties of his breeches. Deborah lowered her gaze to watch the buckskin fall to the floor. His stomach was taut and flat, his manhood hard and bulging, his thighs thick and perfectly formed. Tshingee sat on the corner of the bed to unlace his moccasins and Deborah knelt behind, him pressing her bare breasts to his back. She lifted the heavy curtain of midnight black hair and kissed the nape of his neck.
"I love the way you smell," she whispered. "Like the forest before a rain."
Tshingee's eyes drifted shut and he leaned back, enchanted by the feel of her peaked breasts brushing against him.
Deborah slipped her dressing gown off her shoulders then pulled him backward onto the bed. Leaning over him, she caught his male nipple with her mouth and he groaned, lifting his head to catch the tip of her breast. Deborah stroked the hard flesh of his chest, moving her fingers over his flat stomach and down to the apex of his thighs. Her mouth burned a trail of scalding want over his midriff and along the length of his sinewy thighs.
A raspy groan rose in Tshingee's throat as he stretched out on the four-poster bed, his hands moving over her lithe legs, massaging the flesh of her buttocks. Resting his head on one silken thigh, he caressed the mound of her womanhood, glorying in the sound of the soft moans of contentment that escaped her lips.
Caught in the throes of arousal, Deborah rolled onto her back, stretching out her arms to Tshingee. He rose over her, and their lips met as he caressed the full peaks of her breasts. She clung to him, her hands resting on his hips, as he slipped his shaft deep within her.
Consumed by fire, Deborah cried out and Tshingee muffled her voice with his mouth. Lifting her dark eyelashes, Deborah smiled languidly. She brushed his cheek with her palm, pushing a lock of ebony hair behind his ear. "I love you," she whispered as she moved her hips rhythmically against his.
"K'daholel. I love you as the heavens love the stars," he murmured, gazing rapturously upon her. "I love you as the oceans love the tides. K'daholel."
Slowly Tshingee quickened the rhythm of his thrusts and Deborah rose to meet his demands. She caressed the thick muscles of his back and shoulders rising higher and higher on the wings of throbbing ecstasy. Tshingee's breath was hot on her face as she lifted her hips in a final drive for fulfillment. Sobbing in utter, sweet abandon, she clung to Tshingee; her world splintered into a thousand shards of bright light. A split second behind her, Tshingee drove home with a final stroke, his voice echoing hers as they both tensed every muscle in their bodies and then went weak.
Tshingee rolled onto his side, covering Deborah's dewy flesh with feather-light kisses. She lifted her eyelids, smiling, her breath still coming in short gasps.
"It is a wonder your father has not brought his hounds to your chamber, as much noise as you make, my love," Tshingee teased.
She lifted her head, covering her mouth with her palm. "I wasn't too loud was I?"
He laughed, kissing her love-bruised lips. "Your voice was nothing but a sigh carried on the wind beneath my kisses."
She dropped her head back on the bed, stroking his head of shiny hair with her hand. "Thank God one of us has got some sense. At least the door is bolted. Wouldn't that be something, Deborah Montague, Thomas Hogarth's betrothed caught with her lover in her own chamber." She giggled, then yawned. "I'm so tired."
Tshingee laid his head on her breast, wrapping his arm around her waist. "Sleep, then," he whispered.
Her eyes flew open. "You won't go, will you? Not while I'm asleep?"
He pulled the counterpane over them both. "No. I will wake you before I go." He kissed her forehead. "Now sleep, my Red Bird."
Hours later, Tshingee woke her and they made love one final time. Deborah held back tears as she watched him get out of bed and begin to dress. She brought the counterpane over her shoulders, kneeling on the goose tick mattress. "I would give anything to change what's happened . . . what must be."
"I know." He pulled on his buckskin breeches. "But we cannot change the stars, can we?" His voice was almost hopeful, as if he expected Deborah to disagree, but she only shook her head firmly.
"Then marry your Thomas and live a happy life." He thrust his arms into his muslin shirt. "But remember the gift of love the Heavenly Father gave you and I. Cherish that gift deep within your heart."
She watched as he laced up his moccasins, knowing he was right, wishing desperately he was not. All she could think of was the child that grew within her. The son or daughter Tshingee would never know.
Silently, Tshingee finished dressing. A lump rose in his throat so that he could not speak. Tying the leather thongs of his cloak, he put out his arms and Deborah came to him. For a moment he held her in his embrace, then he kissed her lips ever so gently. "K'daholel, Red Bird."
"K'daholel, Tshingee," she answered bravely. Then she stepped back. "Go," she whispered, pointing to the window.
Tshingee stood frozen for a moment, then slowly he turned and made his retreat. When he opened the window snow blew into the room. The breeze tugged at the hem of his cloak and whipped his ebony hair off his shoulders. Hesitantly he looked back, as if to say something, but Deborah brought her finger to her lips. Bowing his head, Tshingee turned away, stepping over the sill, then disappeared into the night.
For a long time Deborah stood in the center of her bedchamber, shivering, staring at the open window.
Deborah crept down the grand staircase, her bare feet padding lightly on the polished hardwood steps. The case clock at the top of the first landing chimed ominously. Two in the morning. In less than twelve hours she would be Mistress Thomas Hogarth.
Clutching her night robe to ward off the chill, Deborah slipped past the parlor. A rumble of snoring wafted through the darkness. The wedding guests had eaten well this evening and drunk their share of Christmas spirits. It was not often that the Earl of Manchester opened his house to his neighbors, but when he did, the occasion was always celebrated on a grand scale. No one could say the Earl watered his wine. The heavy snoring throughout the house was proof of that.
Making her way to the back of the house, Deborah slipped noiselessly down two steps and into the kitchen. On the far wall a fire burned low in the huge fireplace. The new kitchen maid slept on a pallet on the floor.
"Dory." Deborah knelt, shaking the girl's thin shoulders. Dory, wake up."
The maid jumped at Deborah's touch, leaping from the pallet. She clutched her wool blanket to her chin with trembling fingers, her eyes wide with fright.
"It's all right, Dory," Deborah whispered. "Don't be afraid. I won't hurt you."
The slave took a step back. "You . . . you need somethin', lady?"
"Shhh, we mustn't wake anyone, Dory." Deborah put her finger to her pursed lips. "Speak quietly."
The girl took another step back. "Y—yes, ma'am."
"Dory, I want you to get dressed, get your cloak and mittens, and come with me to the Earl's office."
"I can't go in there! Ain't no body 'llowed in the Earl's office!"
"Dory, do as I ask, please."
Dory's entire body shook with fear. "If I goes in there and the Earl, he finds me, he'll—"
"He'll do nothing, because he won't find out. Now do as I say and hurry!"
Deborah took a candle from a candlebox on a table and lit it from the coals in the fireplace. "Go ahead, Dory," she whispered, going out the kitchen door. "Get your cloak and mittens and meet me in the office."
Walking quietly down the hall, Deborah opened the door to her father's office and went to his massive desk. Sitting in his chair, she put down the candle. Retrieving a sheet of paper, a goose quill, and a bottle of ink, she began to scribble a message.
A few minutes later, Dory slipped into the room. She was dressed in a worn homespun skirt with a tattered shawl draped over her shoulders. In her arms, she carried a patched woolen cloak.
"Now listen carefully," Deborah instructed, sprinkling a few pinches of sand over the wet ink on the paper. "Do as I say and you'll be perfectly safe. No one is ever going to harm you again, Dory."
"H—harm me? N—nobody ever done harmed me, lady," Dory answered. "N— nobody."
"Dory." Deborah looked up. "I know what my father did, and I know there's nothing I can do to take away that pain but I can keep it from happening again."
"What—what the Earl did?" Dory shook her head. "The Earl, he—he din't do nothin'."
Deborah blew the sand off the sheet of paper. "I also know what he said, what he threatened to do if you ever told anyone."
Dory gulped. "You did?"
"Mmhmm. That's why I'm sending you away from here."
"Away, ma'am?"
"Far away where the Earl can never hurt you again." Deborah dripped a glob of candle wax on the sheet of paper and stamped it with her father's family-crest seal.
"I . . . I don't understand, Lady Deborah."
Deborah came around her father's desk, the sheet of paper in her hand. "I'm giving you your freedom, Dory. This paper, it says you're a free woman. I've made arrangements for you to go to the Virginia Colony. Tonight you leave here; tomorrow you begin your journey."
Dory stared at the sheet of paper in Deborah's hand. "You lettin' me go?" she asked in disbelief. Tears welled in her eyes.
"I am, Dory. Now take this paper." She folded it and handed to the girl." Anyone who asks you who you belong to, you tell them you're a free woman. This paper is proof. It says the Earl gave you your freedom."
Dory stared at the paper, then at Deborah. "If the Earl finds out what you done . . ."
"He won't find out. By the time the wedding fuss is over, you'll be long gone. Everyone will just think you've run off."
"The sheriff, he'll be lookin' for me."
"No, he won't. He'll be looking for Dory, the Earl's slave, not for Sally Freeman."
The maid smiled, showing off a perfect set of even white teeth. "You'd do this for me, Lady Debbra?"
Deborah pushed the folded sheet of paper into Dory's hand. "Yes. Now put on your cloak and go out through the kitchen. There's a man there who will take you away from Host's Wealth tonight. He'll take you to someone's house and tomorrow you'll be bound for Virginia . . . a free woman."
"W—who is this man?"
"You don't need to know. Just trust me. I've paid him well. He's a man I contacted in Annapolis yesterday. He does this sort of thing all the time." She smiled. "So, go on with you."
Dory threw her cloak over her shoulders. Her fingers trembled as she tried to tie her hood. "I thank you, Lady Debra. Ain't nobody ever done anythin' for Dory like this."
Deborah crossed her arms, hugging her waist. "Just promise me you'll be happy, Dory. Leave your old life behind and forget it. You'll be working for a nice family at a tavern somewhere on the James River. But you'll be working there because you want to. And you'll be paid."
Dory's pitch black eyes shone as she put out her hands, taking Deborah's. "Thank ya."
"Oh, I almost forgot." Deborah slipped a small leather bag from the ribbon that tied her robe shut. "This is for you."
Dory accepted the leather bag and opened it. She snapped it shut. "Good Lord, lady! That's more coin than this girl's ever seen in her life!"
"Take it. You deserve it. It's the price my father paid to purchase you. He owes it to you."
Dory smiled. "I can never thank ya enough."
"Just go. Knowing you're out there free to come and go as you please is all the thanks I'll ever need."
The black girl nodded, stepped back, then ran out of the office.
Sighing, Deborah blew out the candle and crept back up the steps to her chamber.