Chapter 4 – Damien
I met up with Gregor later the next evening and he had a tale to tell me. He had looked out for Harriet or some information of where she was and he had gotten more than I had bargained for. I knew something had happened though, it was written all over her father’s face when he looked at me with the hatred that he had carried. It was hard to deny the way his eyes had flashed and I knew then that he would have most assuredly hit me where I stood, if not for who I was and who he was. At one point he had treated me like a son, so it was clear that something had happened to change him so much.
Gregor was one that had a flair for the dramatics and he was keeping me in suspense.
“I don’t know if you want to hear this, Damien. It is not good news.”
My heart sunk a little and my mind raced with the possibilities. I had thought of many, but I was not prepared for the answer that I received. I had not seen that one coming.
“Just tell me already you redheaded brute! You know what she means to me!” Everyone was a bit too clear of how I felt about her. It was a problem, something that I had tried to avoid, but I had to give a reason why I was so interested in what she was doing. I was interested because she was mine. Harriet had been mine since that night, before that even. She had been mine since the first time that I laid my eyes on her. I knew that she was the one for me and it didn’t matter about who she was or who her parents were. I just wanted her.
“Her parents sent her away in shame, Damien.”
I knew what it meant deep down, but at the same time, I didn’t want to think about it. If she was sent away in shame it meant our union was known about. It was what I had come to think about it all after seeing Michael the day before, but it still didn’t tell me who found out and how they found out to begin with.
“What was her shame, being with me?”
Gregor nodded. The men knew the rules were different for them. They would have been shamed a hundred times over if the same rules had applied. But they didn’t apply to them. The only dishonor was in shaming a girl. I wouldn’t feel anything over the guilt I was feeling now. There would be no whispers behind my back and nasty words said to my face. It was not the way of it.
“There’s more.”
How could there be more? Wasn’t the fact that I had ruined her life and chances of an honest marriage enough? Wasn’t I supposed to feel worse than I did? I knew then that she really was mine, but it was not the same victory as it had felt like before with her submission. I had been gone too long and it seemed like she had suffered in my absence.
“What more is there my friend? You are now the bearer of bad news.”
He shook his head and it was clear to me that he didn’t want to be. Gregor looked uncomfortable and I couldn’t think of what could be worse than what he just told me. What could be worse than her shame and being made to leave her own home?
“She is with child.”
“My child?”
Gregor shrugged, but I wasn’t really asking him. I knew that it was my baby, but there was a shock in my voice. I felt like it was coming from nowhere. It had only happened once, one sweet night and I never imagined that it would produce a babe.
“I do not know if it is yours, but everyone that I talked to seemed to think it was. They also had a few choice words for you, scoundrel being one of them for ruining her innocence. People think that you should do the right thing and marry her.” He was smiling when he said it and I realized then that he enjoyed seeing me squirm. I wasn’t the only man who had been put into a tough position because of my randy manhood, and I dare say I wouldn’t be the last.
“I can’t marry her. My family would never agree and I would be disinherited.” It wasn’t the idea of being penniless that bothered me, but the idea that my younger and less competent brother would be left in charge of the family castle and wealth. I was sure he would quickly lose it all to gambling and women in the taverns. It would quickly be gone, the family legacy and I couldn’t see that happen.
But she was having my child. We were going to have a child together and I couldn’t think straight. Could this really be? Could I really be a father?
“Well, that is up to you, Damien. I am only telling you what I have heard, like you asked. I never said that you were going to like what I had to say.”
“No, thank you. I have not gotten the same information. Is it really that common of knowledge?”
He shook his head that it wasn’t, but there were rumors and sometimes that was all it took was a few busybodies to come to assumptions and then it was soon talked about as if it were fact. I didn’t like to think about how it had affected Harriet. If it was true, she must be furious with me for leaving. Did she not think that I would come back, that I would break my promise? I wasn’t sure, but I knew then that I had to find her even more than before. There was nothing I could do until I seen her again and then what?
“So tell me you know where she is.”
He nodded and then shrugged a little. “I had to work hard for that information, but from what I hear, she was sent to her aunt’s house in the countryside to have the baby.”
I did the math in my head. It meant that soon she would be having our child and if I didn’t hurry, I was never going to find her. I was given the name of a town to try to find her at and when I left, I had a feeling that I was about to change the course of both of our lives. In the end, I didn’t really care what happened, as long as it somehow ended with Harriet in my arms at the end of it.
***
It took only a matter of a couple of days to find myself in the very village that Harriet was supposed to be in. I had ridden hard most of the time and I had to hand it to her parents, they had certainly gone out of their way to save their own reputation, if not for their daughter. What I couldn’t believe was that I was so close and still did not know what I was going to say to her. She was carrying my bastard child and I couldn’t marry her. What did I have to offer her, a house to raise our son or daughter? And if it was my son, then how could I not let him inherit all I had to give? I was torn in too many directions and even as I signaled the man driving the horses to stop them, I still was unsure what was going to happen next.
I didn’t like feeling that way, not knowing. The unknown was never something that I favored. I had to be in control, things had to go the way I needed them to go, but what was the end result for this? Was I going to marry her or was I going to try to make her my mistress? The idea of asking her to be my mistress didn’t sit well and for one reason, I didn’t think she would be so swept off her feet from the suggestion.
Nervously, I walked into the local tavern and ordered a drink. It was the perfect place to get some information about Harriet if I could and it was also the place to get something to calm my nerves. I hadn’t felt like this in a long time. I was trapped wanting her and I had to see her again, if only to remind myself that she wasn’t the one for me. But I knew she was and I knew in the end I was going to have to ask her to marry me. It was what I wanted to do and it would make it so my son, my heir, wasn’t born a bastard.
I had to hurry though. The baby would be coming any time and I still was not exactly sure where she was. Setting the drink down that I now saw the bottom of, I got up and went back out where I came. I had asked around, but still didn’t find an answer. I was standing there, looking up one side of the street to the other and then I noticed a woman passing not too far away from me.
There was nothing spectacular about the woman to cause such a stare, but it was the small necklace around her neck that made me look again. I would know that piece of jewelry anywhere and I knew it was the very one that I had given Harriet. It had to be because I made sure that it was designed just for her and there was not another one like it.
I couldn’t stop her then or grab for the necklace like I wanted to, but I did want to see where she was going. I hoped that the woman would lead me to Harriet and if not that, maybe I could find out some information before I was too late. I followed the woman a few paces behind her, trying not to startle her by getting too close. She had to lead me to Harriet; I was just so sure of it that it just had to be.