Chapter Four
STEPHEN’S HAND TIGHTENED convulsively around Olivia’s as he let out a soft oath, and on the other side of her, Lady St. Leger gasped, her hand jerking out of Olivia’s grasp to fly to her mouth.
“Roddy?” Lady St. Leger asked, her voice trembling and eager. “Roderick, is that really you?”
“Yes, Mother. I am here. Pamela, my love. You are looking very beautiful tonight.”
“Roderick!” Pamela said urgently. “Where are you? Let me see you!”
“You cannot,” he replied. “I am too new here.”
“Here? Where are you, Roddy?” Lady St. Leger asked, tears thickening her voice. “Are you happy?”
“I am among the shades,” the low voice continued in its odd, jerky way. “But I cannot rest. None of us can rest.”
“What?” Lady St. Leger’s voice registered alarm. “Why not? Darling, are you unhappy?”
“There are many lost souls here. This house—they cannot rest.” The voice grew fainter and more whispery. “They cannot rest because of what was taken away from them. I cannot rest, Mother.”
“Roddy!” Lady St. Leger cried out, her voice full of distress. “No, please—”
“Bloody hell!” Beside Olivia, Stephen pulled his hand away from Olivia’s and crashed it down flat on the table. “What rubbish!”
“Stephen!” Lady St. Leger exclaimed reprovingly. “No! You must not interrupt.”
“He is gone!” Madame Valenskaya proclaimed with disgust. “Our spirits haff left us.”
Olivia reached out and pulled the oil lamp to her and lit it, turning it up. The faces of those around the table appeared again, blinking a little in the new light. Lady St. Leger’s cheeks, Olivia saw with a stab of pity, were streaked with tears.
“You haff frightened dem away,” the medium said accusingly, glaring at Stephen.
“Nonsense. As if there were any here to begin with.”
“Is Roderick utterly gone?” Lady St. Leger asked Madame Valenskaya, her voice trembling. “Can you not bring him back?”
“I haff no power over spirits,” Madame Valenskaya replied flatly. “He is gone now. Spirits do not stay with unbelievers.”
“I must say,” Stephen said coolly, “that Roderick’s voice sounded uncommonly like yours, Madame Valenskaya.”
“The spirits use Madame Valenskaya to communicate with us,” Mr. Babington explained. “She is the instrument through which they speak, so naturally the voice is Madame’s. However, the words are the spirits’.”
Stephen snorted. “As if Roderick would have said anything like that.”
“He was unhappy,” Stephen’s mother said miserably. She turned to the medium hopefully. “Can we not try again? We could do it over. Maybe Roderick would return.”
“No,” Madame Valenskaya said flatly. “Is too late. He will not come again tonight.”
The medium looked at Lord St. Leger significantly. “Spirits will not come if unbelievers are present.”
“A convenient excuse, I must say.” Stephen turned to Lady St. Leger. “Mother, can’t you see that it is all trickery and fakes? That was not Roderick speaking to you.”
“Stephen!” Lady St. Leger exclaimed angrily. “You are being impolite to our guests. I invited Madame Valenskaya here, and I won’t have you behaving rudely to her.”
Stephen’s brows rushed together, and he drew breath to speak, but Olivia quickly laid her hand on his arm. “Lady St. Leger, I am sure your son did not mean to be rude.” She turned to Stephen with a warning look as she continued. “Nor does he want to frighten away the spirits. He is merely concerned about you. He can see how unhappy the spirit’s words made you.”
“Yes, of course,” Stephen agreed grudgingly. “I cannot believe that Roderick would say anything to make you unhappy.”
“Of course not. Poor boy. He must be dreadfully upset to have said anything like that.”
Olivia felt Stephen’s arm tense under her hand, but he clenched his jaw and kept quiet. Olivia turned back toward the medium, and as she did so, she saw Lady Pamela looking at Olivia’s hand on Stephen’s arm. Olivia realized belatedly that it was too intimate a gesture to make to a man she barely knew, and she pulled her hand back. Pamela’s eyes shifted to Olivia’s face, and Olivia saw there a flash of pure dislike before Pamela turned back toward the medium.
“Surely you will not deprive us of the chance to talk to dear Roddy again,” Pamela said pleadingly. “I am sure Roderick knows his brother well enough to ignore his bad temper.”
“Yes, say you will sit again tomorrow night,” Lady St. Leger pleaded. “Lord St. Leger will not interrupt again. Will you, my dear?”
“No. Of course not. I promise that I will be quiet,” Stephen replied.
“And keep an open mind.”
“So open the wind will rush through it.”
“There. You see?” Lady St. Leger smiled winningly at the Russian woman. “Please, say we can have another séance.”
“Well...for you, my lady,” Madame Valenskaya said. She pushed back her chair and rose. “But now, I rest. Irina?”
“Yes, Mama.” Irina popped up and stepped around the table to her mother, taking her by the arm.
Mr. Babington went around to the medium’s other side, giving her his arm, and Madame Valenskaya exited the room, leaning heavily on both her supporters. Olivia glanced at Stephen, who was watching the scene with a grim expression. He sighed and turned to Olivia.
“Would you care, perhaps, for a stroll around the conservatory before you turn in?”
“That sounds delightful.” Olivia felt sure that he wanted to talk about what had just happened. She turned and made her excuses to Lady St. Leger, who answered her somewhat abstractedly.
“I apologize again for my behavior, Mother,” Stephen said.
“I know, dear.” Lady St. Leger smiled at him. “I do wish that you would give Madame Valenskaya the benefit of the doubt. Such a dear woman.”
“You did not use to be so skeptical, Stephen,” Pamela said in a teasing tone.
St. Leger looked at her and said in dry tone, “That was before I learned what people were capable of.” He turned back to his mother. “I know how much you enjoy Madame Valenskaya’s company. I will do my best to, um, restrain my boorish tendencies.”
With a small bow to his mother, he offered Olivia his arm. They strolled through the great hall and down the back hall to the conservatory, where wicker furniture, softened by flowered cushions, was scattered among the large number of green plants. It was dark inside, lit only by the sconces in the hall outside and by the moonlight coming in the many windows. Stephen paused to light a candelabra, then led Olivia into the conservatory, making his way to a wicker sofa in the center of the plant-filled room.
“I am sure you are going to tell me that I was foolish,” Stephen said. “I know I was. It was that woman’s trotting out Roddy like that. I couldn’t bear hearing her use his name to perpetrate her schemes. And to play on my mother’s grief in such a manner!”
It struck Olivia that he had made no mention of Roddy’s widow’s grief. She had also noticed the steel in his voice earlier when he spoke to Pamela. However, she had no intention of mentioning either of those things. She said only, “I know. It is despicable. But your mother wants so badly to believe that Madame Valenskaya can contact your brother that we will never be able to convince her simply with reason. We will have to catch the medium in the middle of her deception.”
“Yes. It is rather clever of her to have the spirits ‘speak through’ her. There’s no rapping at which one can be caught out. And it sounds like her because the spirit supposedly uses her voice. Pretty difficult to disprove that.”
“Yes. But she did the trick with the hand. I feel sure that was a painted glove stuffed with paper or cloth and held up with a telescoping rod. She could easily hide the glove and rod in a large pocket. Her skirts are full. And you’ll remember that she went back to her room before she came to the séance, so she could have slipped the things into her pocket.”
“True. But I can hardly stop her leaving the room and demand to search her pockets.”
“No. We will have to observe what she does, and when, and then, at just the right moment, light a match and reveal her actually doing the trick.”
“Sometimes I wonder if Mother would believe it even if she was confronted with the evidence.” He paused, looking thoughtful, then asked, “But why that talk of unhappy shades, these souls that can’t rest? That’s not the normal thing, is it?”
“No,” Olivia admitted. “That was odd. Usually they talk about the peace and beauty of the other side. After all, that is what everyone wants to hear—that their loved one is happy in the afterlife, that there is no more pain and suffering, and that whenever they, too, die, they will join them in that blissful place.”
“But for some reason she wants Mother to believe that Roderick is unhappy, that his soul is uneasy. What do you want to bet that it will take some certain amount of money to cause his soul to be at peace?”
“No doubt you are right.” Olivia sighed. “I am afraid that Lady St. Leger would be willing to pay almost anything if she thought it would help her son.”
“And completely aside from the money they are going to swindle out of her, there is also the fact that they are causing her pain right now. She is distressed because she thinks that Roderick is unhappy. That he ‘cannot rest.’ The woman is making her miserable, and she will make her even more so before she’s done. She has to make sure that Mother will be eager to pay whatever she asks.”
“You’re right. I’m so sorry.” Olivia laid her hand on his arm in a gesture of sympathy.
He looked over at her, and Olivia could not move, could scarcely breathe. Why did every nerve in her body seem to suddenly come to tingling life?
His other hand came up and covered hers where it lay on his arm. His skin was warm and faintly rough. Olivia felt suddenly hot and melting inside, quivering with sensations she had never experienced before. She thought that she could lose herself in those cool silver eyes, and she was not even sure whether she found the prospect frightening...or alluring.
“Olivia...” Her name was soft on his tongue.
Olivia looked at him, not trusting herself to speak. He leaned toward her fractionally, then stopped. A muscle jumped in his jaw, and he pulled his hand away, then rose to his feet. Olivia sagged slightly with disappointment, then stood up, telling herself not to be a fool. What had she thought was going to happen, anyway? Whatever fancy hairstyle Joan might give her, she would remain the sort of woman a man did not desire.
“Would you care to go riding with me tomorrow morning?” Stephen asked, his voice neutral, his gaze turned slightly away from Olivia. “I can show you around the estate a bit, if you’d like.”
“Yes. That would be very nice.” She was not a good rider, and as a result, she rarely went, but she could not bring herself to turn down the invitation.
“Very good, then. After breakfast?”
Olivia nodded. His invitation meant nothing, she told herself. He had to pretend to be friendly with her; he had invited her, after all, and no doubt his family would consider it odd if he did not spend some private time with her.
Stephen picked up the candelabra to light their way, and they left the room. The warm glow of the candles lit a small circle around them, leaving the rest of the large room in shadows. Neither of them glanced around into the dark recesses of the conservatory, and so they did not see the still, dark form standing silently in the corner of the room, hidden by the fronds of a palm tree.
* * *
OLIVIA AND STEPHEN rode out the next morning about an hour after breakfast. She was happy to see that he had had a docile mare saddled up for her, and that he seemed content to amble along talking and pointing out various landmarks on the way. Their path curved around the stand of trees at the end of the garden, then into the meadow beyond. They rode past farms, and Stephen greeted by name everyone they met in the fields.
When Olivia remarked on it, he shrugged and said, “Well, they are my tenants, after all.”
“Still, I would lay you odds that there are those who know the names of scarcely any of their tenants.”
“Hardly behavior to emulate, I would say,” Stephen replied. He glanced at her. “I am afraid you’ll find I am not your typical aristocrat. Perhaps it comes from being in America for ten years. But I find I care less and less about one’s class. And an estate seems to me more a business venture than some divine right passed down to me.”
“Careful,” Olivia said with a chuckle, “or people will start to label you ‘mad,’ as well. What you just said sounds very much like my brother Reed, who, by the way, I have cast as your friend.”
Stephen turned to her with a puzzled look, and she explained. “Belinda wanted to know how we had met, and I felt it best not to say we had created a commotion at a séance, so I said that you came to call on my brother Reed, and I met you there.”
“Ah, I see. Very wise, I’m sure. And how is it that I know your brother?”
Olivia shrugged. “I shall let you decide that. Perhaps he belongs to your club. Or maybe you met him through some kind of business. He oversees all our family’s finances. He is quite good at it, which is fortunate, for I am afraid that none of the rest of us are. Papa is devoted only to antiquities, and Mama is more concerned about the women’s vote and factory workers’ wages.”
“What about your other brothers and sisters? What are they concerned with?”
“Well... Theo—he’s the eldest—is fond of adventure. He comes home every year or two, and then he is off again to explore the Amazon or the heart of Africa or somewhere like that. Right now he is in Australia and has been for almost a year. We are hoping that he will come home again before too long. Thisbe, his twin, is a chemist. Kyria’s business is the social whirl. And Constantine and Alexander—the second set of twins—are only ten, so mischief is their chief employment.”
“Constantine and Alexander? As in the emperors?”
Olivia chuckled. “Yes. Believe me, it could have been worse. Papa wanted to name them Castor and Pollux because of their being twins, you see, but Mother put her foot down about that one.”
“I am sure they will bless her when they are older.”
“No doubt,” Olivia agreed.
“They sound like a lively family.”
“Yes, they are—and not a mad one among them.”
“Oh, Lord, I can see that that remark will continue to haunt me,” Stephen commented ruefully. “I am most dreadfully sorry, you know. I didn’t mean it. Obviously I didn’t even know your family. It just—”
“I know. It just came out.” Olivia sighed. “That, I’m sure, is because you had heard it often enough.”
“No one really thinks they’re mad, I’m sure. It’s just a way of talking.”
“Yes. I realize it’s a jest, or mostly a jest. They mean, I think, not insane, but decidedly odd.” She paused, then went on. “And I guess we are. It’s just infuriating that what makes us odd in their eyes is that we care more for knowledge than for one’s skill at sitting a horse, say, or making social chitchat. We are odd because we care about people who are not in the same class—indeed, we are branded exceedingly peculiar because we don’t like the idea of class at all. I am mad because I prefer to be called Miss Moreland instead of Lady Olivia Moreland. My mother is mad because she believes that all children deserve an education. Kyria is mad because she refuses to marry a man just because he has an excellent title and lineage.”
Olivia’s eyes flashed as she warmed to her subject, her cheeks flushing with the strength of her feelings. Stephen found that he could not take his eyes from her.
“Why are we the ones who are peculiar?” Olivia demanded. “It seems to me that it is the others who are odd. Why is it considered wrong to be devoted to what we believe in? We simply invest a great deal of emotion in the things we do.”
“You are passionate.”
His words hung on the air between them, and suddenly there was a tension between them, an awkwardness that had not been there before. Olivia, who had been rushing along on her rising tide of indignation, halted, suddenly unable to think of anything but passion in the word’s most basic, carnal sense. Her fingers curled around the reins she had been holding loosely as her mind was flooded with images—Stephen’s hand around hers, his skin arousing feelings in her she had never known before, the almost electrical shock that had run through her the first time she looked into his eyes, the heat that seemed to blossom inside her whenever he looked at her or touched her in even the slightest way.
“Yes, I suppose we are passionate about our ‘causes,’” Olivia said, her voice thin with the effort of keeping it level and unconcerned. She carefully did not look at Stephen. “I am sorry. You must think I am foolish, to get so emotional about what is, after all, only a silly jest.”
“No, indeed. I do not think you are foolish at all.” The warmth in his voice made Olivia turn her head to look at him in surprise. There was no levity in his face, only a sincere admiration that jolted her. “I think you are quite remarkable.”
She glanced away quickly, feeling a flush rising up her throat. She was, she thought, hopelessly inept in such a situation. Kyria would have been able to take a compliment gracefully. All she could do, she thought, was blush and feel like an idiot.
Fortunately, a woman was emerging from the doorway of the cottage they were about to pass, and at sight of them, she came forward to greet Stephen. By the time he was done introducing Olivia to his tenant’s wife and they had all commented on the loveliness of this August day, the awkward moment was past, and they were able to ride on in easy silence.
“I will show you my favorite part of the estate,” St. Leger told her, turning his horse from the well-trodden path on which they had been riding. “It will be the perfect place to get off and try the lunch that Cook sent with us.”
They struck out across the fields, stopping to unlatch a gate and pass through, a consideration for which Olivia was grateful, as she was sure that had he been alone, Stephen would merely have jumped the low fence, a feat she was sure she would not have been able to accomplish. She could still remember the anguish in the head groom’s voice as he had told her that she needed to help her horse over the obstacle, not fight him, and the gratitude she had felt when her father had said placidly, “Oh, what does it matter, Jenkins? You’d best stick with teaching Kyria and the boys. My Livvy’s a scholar, not a rider, aren’t you, sweetheart?”
They entered the trees beyond the field, following a barely discernible path, and when they emerged from the wood, they were in a small meadow, slanting down slightly to a pond. A grove of trees lined one end of the pond, following its gentle curve. It was a scene of tranquility and beauty, and Olivia drew in her breath in a soft gasp of pleasure.
“It’s beautiful!” she cried, pulling her horse to a stop, struck by a deep, intense emotion, which she could neither understand nor describe. It was as if, in some incredible, utterly illogical way, she knew this piece of land.
“Do you like it?” Stephen turned to her, his eyes lingering on her face, lit now with an inner glow. “I’m glad. This has always been my favorite spot—where I like to come and think, or just sit.”
“It’s wonderful,” Olivia agreed, urging her horse forward again.
They rode to the trees at the edge of the pond and dismounted. Olivia looked around her, smiling. “I feel so peaceful here. So safe.”
The words surprised her even as she spoke them. Whyever should she not feel safe? Yet she knew that a sense of safety was part of the feeling that she got from this place, and the sweetness of the emotion inside her was disturbed by a sudden sense of unease.
Olivia pushed the thought away from her. She was being silly. This was simply a lovely tranquil place, and whatever connection she felt to it was nothing more than a normal attraction to a beautiful spot.
Stephen took the hamper from the back of his horse and set it beside the pond, then spread a blanket on the ground for them to sit on. Cook had prepared a bountiful luncheon for them—an array of cold meats, cheeses and fruit, supplemented by thick slabs of dark bread spread with pale yellow butter—and they spent the next few minutes doing justice to her work.
Afterward they sat in contented silence, luxuriating in the warmth of the sun on their backs, listening to the rustle of the leaves as the breeze moved them and the occasional song of a bird. It would be a wonderful place, Olivia thought, to sit and read, or even to curl up and doze in the sun, like a lazy cat. She would have to bring a book here another time. She caught herself on the thought. She would not be at Blackhope that long; she was here merely for a visit, and then she would return to her home.
“It must have been nice, growing up here,” she commented.
“Yes. Roderick was four years older than I, so when he went off to Eton, I was mostly alone. I used to like to ride to this pond and sit and read.”
Olivia smiled at the echoing of her thoughts. “What sort of things did you read?”
“Oh, tales of derring-do—grand adventure and mysterious happenings. Romantic nonsense, most of it. I was young and full of dreams.”
“Is that why you went to America? To pursue adventure?”
He shrugged, and his face closed down, the smile that had curved his lips vanishing. “I suppose. Mostly I wanted to get as far away from here as possible.”
His answer puzzled her, and she would have questioned him about it, but Stephen went on before she could speak. “I wanted to make my fortune. Prove my worth. Typical ambitions of a younger son.”
“Where did you go?”
“To the West. That was the place to make one’s fortune, that was what everyone there said. I tried a few different places, different things, but I wound up in Colorado, silver mining.”
“What was it like there?”
“Harsh, cold, beautiful. The mountains are incredibly high and stark, the sky enormous. You cannot look at them without thinking of words such as ‘grandeur’ and ‘majestic’ and ‘sweeping.’ The land dwarfs you, and yet somehow it emboldens you, makes you think that anything is possible.”
He shrugged, looking a little embarrassed. “Sorry. I don’t usually go on about it so.”
“It must have been difficult to leave it.”
Stephen glanced at her, surprised. “It was. Most people don’t understand that. They think I must have been ecstatic to come home to England, to suddenly acquire the title and estate. I wasn’t. For a short while, I even thought about not returning. But I knew the estate would suffer. One cannot really manage effectively from thousands of miles away. And there were Mother and Belinda to consider. So in the end I sold out, and I came back here.”
“Do you regret it?”
He did not answer right away, considering her words. Finally he said, “No. I don’t regret it. It’s a different sort of life, but I suppose it is really the one I was born and bred for. No matter how beautiful the Rockies are, however challenging the land or the work, this is where I belong. Blackhope is my home.” A quick grin quirked up the corners of his mouth. “Even with all the lost spirits.”
Olivia smiled back. “Do you think we shall have a repeat performance tonight? More words from the spirits?”
“My guess would be no.” His face turned serious again. “I think our Madame Valenskaya will make Mother wait for a while. Bring her eagerness to a greater level. I think she will find it too enervating to go into a trance again, or she will declare the spirit guides unwilling to return to the house of a disbeliever. She wants Mother to be so impatient for word from Roderick that she will believe anything, no matter how implausible.”
“No doubt you are right,” Olivia agreed with a sigh. “I feel so sorry for Lady St. Leger. It must be horrible to wait and hope like that.”
“Yes.” Stephen’s mouth turned down grimly. “That’s why I intend to expose these charlatans as soon as we possibly can.”
The pleasant mood of the afternoon was gone, chased away by thoughts of Madame Valenskaya and her fraudulent schemes. Stephen and Olivia turned away and began to pack up the remains of the food. He stood up and reached down a hand to Olivia to help her. She took it and rose to her feet.
He did not release her hand immediately, but stood for a moment holding it. Olivia looked up into his face and found him gazing at her in a way that made her pulse speed up.
“I am glad you came here,” he said. His eyes glinted silver in the day’s light.
“I am, too,” Olivia found herself answering a little breathlessly.
He bent closer to her, and her heart knocked frantically against her ribs. She closed her eyes, and then his lips were on hers, soft and lingering. Olivia’s fingers curled into her palms. She had never been kissed before, and she found that it was unlike anything she had imagined. His kiss deepened, and heat flooded her.
Her hands came up. She wasn’t sure what she intended to do, but when her fingers came into contact with his jacket, they curled into the lapels and she held on fiercely. Stephen’s arms went around her, pulling her up into him, and Olivia rose onto her toes, pressing her lips against his. Glorious sensations radiated through her, and she trembled, eager and excited.
At last he released her, and she slipped back down flat on her feet. She lifted her eyes to him, her mouth slightly open with astonishment. Stephen stared back at her, almost as stunned as she.
“I—I—” He stepped back, his hands balling into fists. “I beg your pardon. I should not have done that.”
Olivia wanted to protest his words, to tell him that she was quite glad that he had, but she caught herself. To say such a thing would not be at all ladylike. Indeed, what she had just done was doubtless not ladylike, either, and she suspected that her unusual upbringing was again at fault. So she swallowed her words and merely shook her head.
“No, please, do not worry. It was—it was—”
“Pray don’t think that I brought you out here to force my attentions on you,” Stephen went on stiffly, more in control of himself.
“No, indeed, I do not,” Olivia assured him. She could think of no way to say what she truly felt without sounding like a forward hussy. Her insides were jumping about wildly, and she pressed her hand against her stomach as if to quiet them.
Stephen stood for a moment, facing her. Olivia appeared soft and vulnerable, gazing at him with her huge dark eyes, her mouth still damp and a dark rose from his kiss. He felt like a cad for grabbing her and kissing her like that, yet he could not deny that, looking at her, he wanted to pull her into his arms once more and kiss her all over again.
“I am sorry,” he repeated finally, and turned to fetch their horses.
He packed the picnic hamper on his horse, then gave Olivia a leg up onto hers, both of them doing their best to pretend that the necessary contact between them did not exist. They rode back to the house feeling rather awkward, their infrequent words being directions as to where to turn or stilted attempts at polite chitchat, such as a query on Olivia’s part about a certain tree or Stephen pointing out a low stone wall that was reputed to have been standing since before the Conquest.
Once they were back at the house, Olivia thanked him politely and went straightaway upstairs to her room. It was already midafternoon by the time they returned, so she decided not to try to do anything else, but to simply take a bath and get ready for the evening meal. Since she washed her hair, as well, she spent the next little while running through the tangles with a comb, then brushing out the long mane in front of the low fire.
When her hair was almost dry, she rose and went to the bed and lay down on her side. She was a trifle tired, and her head was still reeling with thoughts of that afternoon. She smiled a little secretly to herself as she had done frequently since their picnic. She relived Stephen’s kiss inside her head. She wondered if he had really been sorry that he had done it. More than that, she wondered if it might ever happen again.
As she watched the flames flicker up from the logs of the fireplace, the light seemed to dim, and the room before her subtly changed.
* * *
A THICK RUG lay on the floor, but smaller and reddish in color, and it lay only in front of the fireplace, atop the bed of dried reeds that covered the floor. The fireplace, too, was different, made of large blocks of stone, the opening larger, the fire higher and smokier. Gone was the chair beside the fire where Olivia had sat to dry her hair, and gone, too, the low decorative mahogany table that lay before it. There now, just to the side of the rug, stood only a heavy wooden stool.
A woman sat on the rug, her legs curled under her, running a brush through her long blond hair. Firelight flickered on her hair, turning the pale strands copper and gold. Olivia knew that she should be frightened to see a stranger sitting here in her room, but she was not. All she could feel was a sudden stunned amazement...and curiosity.
She stared at the woman, who seemed sublimely unaware of her presence. Her face turned to the side, the woman stroked her hair in rhythmic movements as she hummed a tune beneath her breath. She was a pretty woman, with a squarish face, her cheekbones high and wide, and there was a faint indentation at the bottom of her chin, right in the middle, that gave her a piquant look. It was too dark to see the exact color of her eyes, though they seemed light. Her feet were shod in leather slippers, and on her body she wore a long, slender blue tunic that fell straight from her shoulders to her feet, skimming her hips. Beneath it she wore another, lighter dress of a beige color that showed in the neckline and along the deep-cut armholes of the side. Long sleeves fell to points on the backs of her hands, and at the top, the sleeves were tied to the armholes of the underdress. A belt of gold links encircled her body, just above her hips, fastening in the middle in front and falling down in a straight line to her thighs. Where it fastened, there were three links set with colored stones.
A man came into Olivia’s vision, crossing the room to the woman. She turned her head at his approach, and a radiant smile broke across her face. She glanced behind him, then, the smile giving way to an anxious frown.
“Do not worry, my love,” he said. “None saw me enter your quarters. Your name will not be sullied.”
He wore a gray tunic over an undershirt of blue, and below that, leggings of the same color. Around his hips ran a wide leather belt, and hanging from the left side of it was a sword in a scabbard. His hair was longish and cut shaggily, a darker blond than the woman’s, almost brown, and there was a little bit of a curl to it.
Standing behind the woman, he unbuckled his belt and laid the sword aside. Then he knelt and curled his arms around her, laying his head against hers. He kissed the top of her head, and she let out a little sigh and snuggled into him.
“’Tis a sin, I know,” she said in a soft voice. “But I cannot help myself. Each day is black unless I see you. I cannot bear to be apart from you.”
“’Tis the same with me.” His voice was a low rumble, and he nuzzled her neck. “I love you.”
“And I love you. I cannot even confess my sins, for I cannot say that I repent.”
They kissed, clinging to each other. His hand smoothed down her back and over her hips, and he pulled her closer to him. She turned, her arms going around his neck, pressing her body into his. With one arm around her, he eased her back to the floor.