De Wolfe Pack 05 - Walls of Babylon (39 page)

As she watched Teague and Tiernan tussle over wanting the same piece of bread, the door of a closet in the entryway slowly creaked open. Nicola caught movement out of the corner of her eye, turning to see the mad, old woman emerge from her cave and begin her nightly dance. Kenton, too, saw the movement as the old woman flitted about in the entry hall, just outside of the reach of the light. He could see her silhouette in the darkness, moving about. The twins, naturally, were frightened and climbed upon Kenton for protection, while Tab stood up from his seat, moving around his mother so he could have an unobstructed view of the dancing woman.

Tab had seen the old woman many times in his life but when he came to realize she was not a ghost, as Kenton and the other knights had explained to him, he began to be more curious about her. Most nights she came forth but, as of late, her appearances were less and less frequent. Even her dancing seemed to be slower and less energetic. But to Tab, she was of increasing interest now that he was more aware of her. As the woman danced in the darkness just beyond the hall, Tab turned to his mother.

“Mam,” he said, pointing to the woman. “Who is the ghost?”

Nicola looked at Tab, surprised to hear the question. He’d known of the “ghost” for years but had never shown much interest in her, so his question naturally had his mother surprised. He was almost six years old now and as Nicola thought on his question, she presumed he had a right to know the truth. He was old enough and certainly becoming more curious and aware about things. Her little boy was growing up.

“That is Lady Aspasia Thorne,” she said, putting her hand on Tab’s shoulder. “She is your father’s mother. She is your grandmother.”

Tab continued to watch the woman, now with his brow furrowed. “She
is
?” he asked with some awe in his tone. “Then why does she do that? Why does she live in the closet?”

Nicola squeezed his shoulder. “It is sad to say that she is not in her right mind,” she said. “She has not been in her right mind since I came to live here many years ago. Your father made her live in the closet because she was not fit to be around other people, so she has lived in that closet so long I do not believe she knows anything else. You know that she will not harm you as long as you leave her alone.”

Tab was rather rocked by the information that the woman in the closet was his grandmother. “It was not right for Papa to make her live in the closet,” he said. “She should not be there.”

“She likes to be there, Tab. As long as she is content, then you must leave her alone.”

Tab wasn’t so sure. Something in his young, growing mind felt sorry for the woman, feeling empathy his father never had. The woman was evidently his family, after all, and he was coming to understand a good deal about family and taking care of those he loved. He never understood that so much as when Kenton started to take interest in him and his brothers, and now the man had returned to them. He had learned a great deal from Kenton in the short time he’d known him. He was a man that Tab wanted to emulate.

His father had never been kind. He had always known that. He never regretted stabbing the man when he had been taking his fists to his mother on that terrible night, stabbing him with a sword he had stolen off of one of the old, drunk soldiers. His father had been ill after that and then he had died, so Tab had always suspected that perhaps he had killed his father. He’d never told his mother his suspicions, however, because he didn’t want to upset her. Maybe she didn’t realize that what he did had caused his father’s illness and eventually killed him, so he didn’t want to tell her. Let her believe that his father simply died and that was the end of it, because to Tab, it
was
the end. Gaylord Thorne, the man who had fathered him, had finally ceased to exist.

And then came Kenton.

Kenton had been the enemy but he had shown them all more attention and affection than Gaylord Thorne could have ever dreamed of. Nay, Tab wasn’t sorry at all for what he’d done. In his view, he’d had to do it. He had to protect his mother from his father. But he did not have to protect her from Kenton. Watching the gray-haired old woman dance around in the dark, Tab was coming to think there was one more woman who had needed protection from his father, only Tab hadn’t realized that until now. Maybe he could help her somehow. Picking up a piece of bread from the table, Tab made his way towards the old woman spinning in the dark.

Nicola, puzzled, opened her mouth to stop her son but Kenton put a hand on her shoulder, quieting her when she turned to look at him quizzically. Together, they watched Tab as the boy walked slowly and carefully towards the mad, old woman. He continued through the doorway and into the darkened entry, and when the woman saw him, she came to an abrupt halt and hissed at him. Tab jumped but he didn’t walk away. He simply extended the bread to her.

The old woman stopped her hissing, looking at the bread very curiously. Since she ate only what she could steal, scraps from the dogs or rubbish to be burned, the concept of fresh bread was foreign to her. She sniffed the air in the direction of the bread and, realizing it was quite appetizing, timidly reached for it. Tab held it out, steadily, until she finally snatched it and ran off, disappearing back into her closet and slamming the door. Tab went up to the closed door and tried to listen, to hear what was going on inside. All he could hear was rustling and grunting.

“I shall bring you more bread tomorrow, Grandmother,” he said loudly. “My… my name is Tab. I will bring you more food tomorrow.”

With that, he turned around and headed back into the hall, where Nicola was quickly wiping tears away at the compassionate gesture from her young son. She knew, without a doubt, that Kenton was to thank for it. Through his compassion and honor, her boys were learning the same. They were learning traits they would have never learned from their own father and it was yet one more thing to thank Kenton for.

“That was very kind of you, Tab,” she said as her son resumed his seat next to Kenton. “I am sure she appreciates your gesture.”

Tab shrugged, picking at his cinnamon apples. “I will bring her more tomorrow.”

Nicola smiled. “I am sure she will appreciate that.”

Kenton interjected. “That was a very gracious thing to do, Tab,” he said. “I am proud to have witnessed it.”

Tab looked up at Kenton. “Will you help me?” he asked. “What I mean to say is that she may like more food, too. Will you help me carry it to her?”

Nicola answered before Kenton could. “Kenton has many duties to attend to, Tab,” she said. “He will be quite busy tomorrow, I am sure. He has only just returned to Babylon, after all. I will help you carry the food if you wish.”

He will be quite busy tomorrow.
Kenton heard the words, thinking that now might be the best time to mention that his plans for the morrow were set. As much as he wanted to put it off, he knew that he could not. Nicola needed to know and the longer he waited, the worse it would be. He might end up not telling her at all and not leaving Babylon, and that would not be good for any of them. Sooner or later, Warwick would come after him and he didn’t want that. He had an obligation to the man that he had promised to fulfill.

“You have brought up a very good point, love,” he turned to Nicola, gazing into her lovely eyes. “In fact, I will be quite busy tomorrow. I have duties to fulfill that will take me from Babylon, so at dawn tomorrow, I will be leaving.”

The warm expression vanished from Nicola’s face. “Leaving?” she repeated, her brow furrowed. “Where are you going?”

He reached out and put a big arm around her shoulders, pulling her against him. He simply wanted to feel her against his flesh, memories to keep him sane for the days and weeks ahead. For a moment, he simply looked at her, thinking of what to say. He ended up kissing her cheek to soften the blow for what was to come.

“Warwick still has need of me,” he said quietly. “I was almost prevented from coming back to Babylon because of it. It would seem that Edward is gathering a force and moving south towards London. Warwick must prevent him from getting into the city and he requires my sword. I could not deny him, you understand. The man had just freed me from Edward’s clutches and to refuse would have been to appear ungrateful and insubordinate. I have no choice. He has already taken de Russe, Wellesbourne, and le Mon with him. Conor and I will be departing Babylon tomorrow to join them.”

Nicola’s expression changed during that speech; at first she was concerned, then resistant, then even angry, to finally saddened. Kenton watched all of those things roll across her features, an inkling of what she was feeling as he explained his immediate future. When she finally spoke, there was resignation in her tone. She was trying very hard to be brave.

“Where are you going?” she asked softly.

He shook his head. “I do not know yet,” he said. “All I do know is that I will go to Warwick Castle first but after that, I do not know. It will depend on Edward.”

“How long will you be gone?”

Again, he shook his head. “I have no way of knowing, love,” he said. “It could be one month or six. That being the case, I hope you will understand when I say that I do not wish to wait to marry you. I will marry you tonight so that when I depart tomorrow morning, I will be bidding farewell to my wife and not simply the woman I love. You are, and always will be, everything to me. As my wife, you will become more than that. You will become all of me.”

Nicola was struggling not to weep. To have him back at Babylon, so briefly, and then cruelly taken away again was almost more than she could bear. She lifted a hand to his cheek, a tender and comforting gesture, and Kenton kissed the palm of her hand, waiting for great arguments to come forth. He knew she did not want him to leave; he could see it written all over her face. But to her credit, she was not making a spectacle of herself by begging him to remain for she knew it would do no good. Kenton was a warrior;
Warwick’s
warrior, his attack dog, and someone Warwick has also risked much to save from Edward.

He owed the man.

“But you
will
come back, won’t you?” Nicola finally murmured, tears filling her eyes. “You will not forget about us?”

He pulled her close, kissing her, hearing her soft sniffles in his ear. The twins were crawling all across the table, chasing one another now, but neither Nicola nor Kenton seemed to notice. They were completely focused on one another and on the painful poignancy of the moment. Another separation was coming and there wasn’t anything either one of them could do about it. The finality of it was in the air, heavy, like a weight bearing down on them both. Nicola finally buried her face in his chest if only to feel him, and smell him, something she would cherish always.

“I will come back,” Kenton whispered against the top of her head. “There is nothing on this earth save death that will prevent me from returning to you. Do you believe me?”

Face still in his chest, she nodded. “Aye.”

“Swear it?”

“Aye.”

He put his hands on her cheeks, pulling her away from his torso. Head cupped in his big hands, he gazed into her eyes intensely, as if this one powerful look was enough to seal his promise to return more than words ever could. He wanted her to understand that he meant what he said and that he would not fail her.

“I cannot tell you how much I love you more than I already have,” he said huskily. “You already know that you are the very air I breathe. You belong to me and after this night, we will be a part of one another more than any two people have ever been.”

She nodded as if she agreed with him, accepted him, but then suddenly she threw her arms around his neck, so forcefully that she hit him in the Adam’s apple. As he coughed, the boys, seeing their mother throwing herself on Kenton, thought it was a game and threw themselves on him as well.

Suddenly, Kenton was being piled upon by three little boys. Tab had him around the neck from behind, Teague had an arm, and Tiernan had climbed onto the table and now tried to drape himself over the man’s head. All the while, Kenton was trying to stay focused on Nicola but he simply couldn’t do that any longer when Tiernan ended up falling over his face. He started to laugh and Nicola laughed right along with him.

“I will have to become accustomed to this, I suppose,” he said as he lifted Tiernan off of his neck and set the boy on his feet. “Either that, or we will have to train them not to interrupt us when we are speaking.”

Nicola was gently pushing Teague off of Kenton then pulling Tab’s hands from around the man’s neck. “Tab, please take your brothers up to your chamber,” she said. “Do this now. I will be up shortly.”

Tab obediently climbed off the seat and took Teague by his tunic sleeve, pulling him along until he came to Tiernan, whom he also grabbed. As he pulled the whining twins from the hall, Kenton called out to him.

“Tab,” he said, watching the boy come to a halt and face him. “I have something I would like to say to you and your brothers. Come back here.”

Dutifully, Tab went to Kenton, still holding on to Tiernan and Teague, who were starting to struggle with their older brother. Kenton put out a hand to still the tussle, forcing the three boys to look at him.

“I have something very important for you three to do,” he said seriously. “You will listen to me now. I am leaving in the morning and I am trusting the three of you to watch over your mother while I am away. Will you do this?”