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Authors: Brenda Joyce

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BOOK: House of Dreams
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“Antonio!” Cass screamed in warning.
Using the shard as she might a knife, Tracey plunged it into Antonio's back.
His eyes went wide in shock and surprise, and then he keeled over, face-first.
Cass stood frozen, and her gaze locked with Tracey's.
Tracey dropped the glass, gave Cass one hard look, and turned and fled.
Cass moved. She ran to Antonio, using both palms to cover the wound on his back. “Tonio?”
“Gregory,” he gasped.
Cass held him, still covering the wound with her hands, then she let him go, tore her T-shirt off, and used that wadded up, holding it tightly to the wound. “Let me take care of this first,” she cried. And she realized that if he died, she would never, ever be the same because she loved him with all of her heart.
He lay facedown on the floor, but his head was turned to one side, his eyes screwed shut. They opened, filled with pain. “I'm fine,” he gritted. “Let me up. I'll kill her.”
Cass went rigid. “No! That's my sister—even if she is possessed—and you are not going to kill her!”
“She's taken the children,” Antonio shouted, and then he shut his eyes again, gasping.
Cass put more pressure on the wound. Her temples throbbed, there was a ringing in her ears, and she could not think clearly. But what if the children were dead? Clearly Isabel wanted to kill Antonio and his brother. Did she want to kill Tracey? Did she want to kill Cass? Cass closed her eyes hard.
Peace is death.
“How are we going to stop her?” Cass whispered in despair. Her heart felt as if it were being wrenched in half. She was so afraid for Tracey. But she was even more afraid for the children and for Antonio.
Antonio did not answer.
Cass blinked back hot tears and looked down at him. He had passed out.
She froze. And she was suddenly enraged. She needed help, Goddamn it, she did. How could he pass out now? Damn him!
And then she felt tears, and she regretted her thoughts, her anger, but it was all Isabel's doing, Isabel was infecting them all—and she had been doing so ever since they had first arrived at Casa de Suen
os. Or was it since Tracey had come home to Belford House with Antonio for the black-tie affair?
And just how bad was his wound? And what about Gregory?
Carefully Cass lifted her T-shirt, but it was sticking to the wound as the blood clotted, which she prayed was a good sign. There were a few bandages left. She would bind the wound tightly, leaving her T-shirt in
place, she decided frantically. And then she would confront her sister.
No.
She would confront Isabel.
A few minutes later she had bandaged Antonio's back. Cass hurried over to Gregory, but he was so badly cut everywhere, including his handsome face, that she didn't even know where to begin. She only knew one thing. Isabel had done something with the children, and Isabel had possessed her sister. She didn't want to leave Gregory, not like this, but she had no choice. Isabel had to be stopped. The children had to be saved.
And Cass was very afraid. Everyone present at Casa de Suen
os had been hurt by Isabel—except for herself. The odds seemed to indicate that she would soon become Isabel's next victim.
Somehow there had to be a way to outwit her. Outwit her and destroy her.
Cass slowly stood, straining now to hear, trying to overcome her own violent trembling and her equally violent fear. But the night in the courtyard was resoundingly silent. There weren't even crickets to break the silence. Not an owl, not the whir of a fan, the crackle of the fire in the library, nothing.
Just the silence of the vast Castilian night.
She wet her lips. Her pulse was in overdrive. Every fiber of her being was on alert. This was, she knew, the worst moment of her life.
A goddamn nightmare come true.
And she stepped back into the house, standing just inches away from Antonio, straining to hear something, anything.
More silence greeted her. It was vast, absolute.
“Where are you?” Cass said aloud. But her voice was a mere whisper.
“Where are you?” she tried, louder now, her own pulse deafening. “Where are you?!”
There was no answer.
Tracey had disappeared down the corridor leading to the bedrooms she and Cass had used. Cass looked around. Before she went down that corridor, she needed to arm herself. Because Tracey had supernatural strength.
Cass finally picked up a long, thin shard of glass, wrapping one end with what was left of the bandages. Her heart continued its drumlike beat. She refused to think about what she might have to do to defend herself. She started down the corridor, quickly leaving the lighted hall behind. Alfonso had not bothered to place any tapers in this end of the house—just her damnable luck.
Every doorway made her slow and then pause, waiting for Tracey to jump out at her from behind.
Cass squinted at the stairs. She was afraid to go up, afraid of what might greet her there, afraid of what—and whom—she would find.
The library was directly across the courtyard, and because of the fire roaring in the hearth there, it shed some light. Cass started up the steps, and she could only think,
Afraid, afraid, afraid.
The fear was overwhelming.
On the landing above, she stopped. “Tracey?”
There was no response.
Cass swallowed. Her own bedroom was to her left, at the end of the house. To her right, just ahead, was Tracey's bedroom and another, unused room. What should she do? Where had Tracey gone?
While Isabel might be able to walk through walls, Tracey could not. She could not have simply disappeared.
Cass suddenly heard a floorboard creak—and the sound came from her own bedroom, which she had not entered since yesterday. She froze.
And then she walked to the door, which was ajar, afraid of what she would find on the other side.
She pushed it slowly open, holding the glass tightly in her hand, behind her back, prepared to raise it and use it if need be.
A yawning blackness greeted her, illuminated only slightly by a few faint stars just outside the bedroom windows.
“Tracey?” Cass tried. Her unease grew. Her every instinct told her that Tracey was inside. “It's me, Cass. I don't want to hurt you. I want to help you.”
“Then why are you holding that glass?”
Cass jumped away in shock and fear. Tracey had spoken from behind her, so closely that Cass had felt her breath on her neck. She whirled, glass raised. Tracey stood on the other side of the threshold of her room now, and their eyes met and held.
And Cass realized those were not her sister's eyes. For in them there was no uncertainty, no vulnerability, no emotion, nothing that resembled any humanity at all.
“I want to help,” Cass croaked.
Tracey did not seem to move, she did not even seem to breathe, and Cass saw the resemblance to Isabel now; it was there, all right, and not just in her mind. It was as if Tracey's features were slowly changing, bit by bit, the way a great actor's face changes in response to different roles, and suddenly the door slammed closed in Cass's face.
Between them.
Cass cried out, leaping away, only to stand trembling not far from the bed in the center of the room. She was in shock. And just as she was trying to assimilate what was happening—Tracey had obviously slammed the door closed, even if she hadn't seen her move—she heard it lock.
Her eyes widened, and she thought, No.
This is impossible
.
Cass ran to the door and wrenched on it, to no avail. It was firmly locked.
A window slammed behind her.
Cass whirled, but she remained alone in the bedroom; Tracey had not walked through the wall, she was absolutely alone, and surely the window had not slammed closed. And just when she was determined to believe that, another window slammed closed, right in front of her very eyes, followed by another, and another, in rapid succession.
There was a small, narrow, barred window high up on the wall of her cell, and as the light inside her prison changed, Isabel was able to track the passage of time. Only two days and nights had passed since her incarceration, but those two days felt like two full years. Seated on the cold, dank, urine-fouled floor, on a pallet that had not been changed in what seemed like years, Isabel held her face to her knees, no longer in a state of shock, but in a state of raw fear.
She had been charged with heresy. Why? How?
She trembled, ill within herself. Had Rob's letter not told her of the burnings of heretics? But surely that would not be her fate.
Many Protestants such as herself outwardly conformed to the queen's faith, and were left alone. In face, she suspected her uncle, Sussex, of being just such a hypocrite. Why had she been singled out for arrest and prosecution?
Alvarado's furious image came to mind and suddenly a weariness that made her feel a hundred years old settled upon her. Her husband was a devout Catholic. He hated her now. Had he a hand in this?
And what of Philip, dear God? What was to become of her son?
Isabel moaned to herself, tears slipping down her face. If she could spare her son Alvarado's wrath, she would gladly die.
Footsteps sounded.
Isabel sat upright, gasping from the pain caused by the abrupt movement. Her broken ribs resulted in ceaseless agony; a blazing fire inside
her torso. But now the pain dimmed in comparison to her fear and desperation.
This was a terrible mistake. This could not be her fate. Surely the man—or men—approaching would free her and rectify this terrible situation.
It was midday—the sun outside her window told her that—but nevertheless it was dim with shadow in her ward, and she squinted toward the two men approaching. Did she see clerical robes? Her heart began to sink—and then it soared as she recognized the second man.
Douglas Montgomery gripped the bars from outside her cell, paling as their gazes met. “What has he done to you!” he cried.
For one moment, as Isabel stared at him, her entire life played before her eyes. Too late, she regretted everything—her childish lust for Rob, her refusal of Douglas, her marriage to Alvarado, and her decision to see Rob and continue their affair after her marriage began. She stared at Douglas, saw the love and fear in his eyes, and something flared inside of her.
And with it came an ugly realization.
I
have loved the wrong man, she thought.
Oh, God, I have loved the wrong man, the wrong man has sired my child, and had I chosen differently, this man might have been my lord, my husband, my life.
Tears filled her eyes, burning with the bitterest of regret.
“Douglas,” Isabel whispered, trying to hold back the tears.
“How badly are you hurt?” Douglas demanded, gripping the bars so tightly his knuckles turned white. “I will make certain a doctor attends you today.”
Isabel slowly got to her feet, cutting off her own cries of pain. She gripped the bars, their hands touching. The effort to stand and walk cost her dearly.
“You are hurt,” he whispered, agonized. Through the bars he cupped her cheek.
His touch was a touch she had never before felt, not like that, and inside, with the pain and fear, there came exultation and relief.
I love him
, she thought wearily, eyes closed.
And I will die loving him.
Her gaze lifted and their eyes locked. “Thank you, Douglas,” she whispered.
“For what? I have yet to accomplish what I must do. You will not burn, Isabel.” His eyes darkened. “Your husband is behind this. He has
betrayed you. Not only does he know of your affair, he suspects you of further treachery, he suspects you of being a spy for the English.”
Isabel felt as if she could take little more. “Sussex is my master, and he charged me with the task of spying on my husband. But the information I passed on before I left for Spain was not of grave consequence.”
“Does it matter? De la Barca's love has turned to hate. He holds the ear of the king of Spain. Philip holds the ear of the queen. De la Barca is determined to rid himself of you, and what better way than to accuse you of heresy?”
Isabel gripped the bars. “Oh, God. Then there is no hope?”
He slid both hands through the bars to hold her face. “You must repent. Confess your sins and repent, because that is the only chance you have to be spared the stake. I will have Sussex's ear tonight. Together we will move the queen to our cause. Do you comprehend me, Isabel?” And there were tears in his eyes. “Dear God, she is a woman, and she is just, and if anyone might comprehend this impasse, it is she.”
She nodded, but she had met Queen Mary once—and seen her many times. She was more than frightened, because if any woman was like a man, it was the queen, who, in spite of her small size, was strong of will and burning with intelligence. She was also burning with devotion to her cause—Catholicism. And Isabel recalled their single meeting very clearly. The queen had not cared for her at all. “Do I confess to my affair with Rob?”
He was grim. “De la Barca has proof, does he not? And the entire court knew of your affair anyway. Do not dissemble. Beg for God's mercy, the church's mercy, and the queen's.”
Isabel stared at his beloved face. The air above her felt so heavy, it seemed to be crushing down on her shoulders from above. And she was too weak—and too tired—to hold it up. How easy it would be to let that heavy, deathly weight push her down, to sink to the cold hard floor, and just let God's will bury her alive. “She does not like me,” Isabel heard herself say.
Montgomery cursed. And then he leaned forward and kissed her.
Isabel slid her hands through the bars, until she had gripped his arms, and as they kissed, even with the iron bars pressing into their faces, what had begun as something tender and fraught with fear and regret became something else, something wild and wonderful, but oh, so bittersweet. When they parted, tears shone in his eyes as well as hers.
“We will get through this, you and I,” he said. “I swear this, Isabel. You will survive.”
She believed that he would try. But she was terrified that he would not succeed. And she was afraid to even speak her own worst fears aloud—as if that might help them to come true. “I am frightened for Philip. Douglas, what will happen to my son?”
She saw a dark light pass in his eyes. “Mayhap the boy can foster with me—or even with Rob. I imagine de la Barca will not be too eager to raise the child himself. But let us first see you freed, my dear, and then we will deal with what is to become of your son.”
Isabel nodded. “Douglas? Before you go. If there is no mercy, if I am to die, will you vow to me, upon the Bible, that you will make certain Philip is safe?”
He grabbed her hands through the bars. “Do not even speak of such an event! And, Isabel, you need not even ask such of me. I would protect and care for your son the way I do you.”
Isabel cried then, helplessly, because she trusted him completely.
As Isabel entered the chamber of the court, her steps slowed and she glanced around.
The chamber was filled to overflowing with noblemen and noblewomen who had come to see her tried for the gravest crime of all. Ahead of her, at the far end of the room, stood three bishops, including the chancellor, John Gardiner. The queen was not present, but Isabel had known she would not be, for she was still confined and awaiting the long-overdue birth of her child.
Isabel felt faint, her knees were weak, and she thought the air too warm, too stuffy—it was so hard to breathe. Panic gnawed dully within her. How had her life come to this moment in time? What was she doing there, being tried for heresy? Being gawked at like a caged bear in a circus? Her dizziness increased, as did her fear. The crowd was bloodthirsty, she realized. And it was her blood that they wished to spill.
Her gaze suddenly found Helen and she stumbled, unable to continue forward.
Helen's eyes were red and swollen from weeping, her face was grotesquely pale, and she began to weep loudly again.
Isabel felt her own tears slip down her cheeks. She looked at the woman who had been her companion since she was an orphan of eight, a companion she had never trusted and never really liked, and suddenly she realized just how erroneous she had been in her assessment of the woman. Helen could not stop sobbing. Her tears were filled with grief.
Isabel realized that Helen loved her, that she was, in fact, a dear, trustworthy friend. “Helen?” she whispered.
“Have strength,” Helen cried. “Oh, Isabel, have strength, and beg for the court's mercy.”
“Get back there,” one of the guards said, shoving Helen back into the throng that was pressing forward to stare at Isabel.
“Philip?” Isabel cried as two soldiers propelled her along, past Helen. “My son! Helen?”
“He is fine,” she cried. “Admiral de Warenne came and took the child into his care the day that you were arrested.”
Isabel clapped her hand over her mouth to cut off her cry of relief.
The soldiers were hurrying her down the aisle. A number of lords stood in the front row, and when they turned so they could watch her approach, Isabel espied her uncle, the earl of Sussex, amongst them. And standing directly behind him was Douglas Montgomery.
Her heart turned over, not with fear, but with the most profound emotion of all—true and eternal love.
Their eyes locked.
He was extremely pale, but he managed a smile, and in that smile Isabel saw and felt all of his fear and all of his hope.
“Isabel de la Barca.”
Isabel had come to a stop before a chair, which she was rudely pushed down into. At the booming sound of her name, she looked up. The chancellor stood before her.
“You have been charged with heresy. If you confess your sins and repent, the court will have mercy on you. Fail to confess, fail to repent, and know that you will suffer death by fire—and God's eternal damnation in hell.”
Isabel stared up at him. Her heart thundered in her breast. “I confess.”
“What? Did you speak? Speak now, lady. What is it that you say?”
Isabel heard the chancellor very clearly, but suddenly she was seeing her uncle's masklike face—and he avoided her eyes. She glanced past
him at Douglas, who nodded at her, his expression strained. It was then that Isabel realized that Rob had not even bothered to come to witness her trial of life and death.
“You must confess your sins, here and now, and repent your unfaithful ways if you wish for the church, this court, God, and the queen to have mercy upon you.”
Her glance found her uncle again. The usurper. But instead of seeing him, she saw her mother, on her knees in prayer in her private—and secret—chapel, her priest performing the mass. Isabel could even smell the sweet incense, she could hear Father Joseph as he droned on in Latin as clearly as if he spoke now, in the court chamber. And her petite, beautiful mother, so earnest in her devotions, was so vivid and so real that Isabel was quite certain that, if she lifted her hand, if she did reach out, she would touch her flesh as she knelt there in the knave of the chapel at Romney Castle. Tears filled Isabel's eyes.
The chancellor was speaking again. Isabel also thought she heard Helen's sobs.
She closed her eyes, envisioning her father then, strong and robust, entering the hall after a hunt, beaming with pleasure. And then he was hugging Isabel, who was but a skinny, six-year-old child, and whispering in her ear how proud of her he was, of his little countess, and Isabel was laughing and promising him that he would always be proud …
Her father, who had allowed her mother the freedom to worship as she pleased. Her father, who had loved her unconditionally, and who had himself been a devout Anglican.
Her father, who had given her her faith, her name, and her station in this world.
Isabel began to cry.
It felt like only yesterday that she and her brother, Thomas, had sat in the front pew with their father to worship and pray. Only yesterday … but it had been at least twelve frighteningly long years ago.
Isabel blinked back her tears and stood up unsteadily, reaching back for an arm of the chair with which to support herself. It was only then that she realized the chancellor had been shouting at her, and that the crowd had been murmuring loudly in shocked tones. She stared at her uncle.
The usurper. The liar. The master of games of deception, of treachery, and of power.
“You only married me to my husband so I would spy for you,” she said, quietly but clearly.
Sussex's eyes widened. And suddenly the crowd was silent and straining to hear.
“But then, there was never any love, was there, for your brother's daughter? I was but another pawn, to be played and used to suit your nefarious schemes,” Isabel said bitterly.
“Quiet,” the chancellor commanded. “There is to be no conversation with the witnesses present. I ask you for the last time, do you confess to your sins? Do you confess to being a wayward and unfaithful daughter of the one true church, of the pope, and as such, of the queen herself?”
“I confess to being a fool,” Isabel said, and the exhaustion she had been living with for days, weeks, years, overcame her then as she turned to Douglas, with a weary smile that was only for him—and it was then that she saw Rob.
He had entered the chamber unbeknownst to her, and now he stood beside Douglas, staring at her, his expression wide-eyed and grave.
And Isabel looked at him and saw nothing to endear him to her. He was hardly as handsome as she had once thought. His face, in fact, seemed weak in comparison to Montgomery's. His cheekbones were not nearly as high as she had once recalled. His chin hardly as pronounced, his jaw hardly as wide. And now he avoided her eyes.
She took in every inch of his appearance, and what she saw was a slender man wearing silk and velvet, embellished with satin and fur and too many ostentatious jewels. She looked back at his face again, and she saw the ravages of time, and then, when she finally glimpsed, briefly, his blue eyes, in their pale, watery depths she saw nothing but lies and self-absorption and grand, unfettered ambition.
And how quickly he did look away.
Isabel smiled at Douglas, trying not to cry and knowing she failed, aware that he was silently begging her to consider what she must now do. In her heart she gave him the rest of her love—what little she had been holding back—and she faced the chancellor. “I confess to having lusted for a man not worthy to wipe the dust from the floor where I now stand. I confess to betraying my wedding vows with the reckless naivete of youth. I confess to spying for my uncle, the earl, against the better judgment of my heart, my mind, and my soul, and I confess now to loving a strong, brave, and truly noble man, far too late, with too many regrets.” Her smile was brief. “And yes, I repent.”
“Isabel,” she heard Douglas say, anguished.
“You do not confess to the sin of straying from the one true faith?” Gardiner was demanding as the crowd broke into mutters and murmurs of amazement.
Isabel stared at Gardiner, who was rather red of face, so flushed was he with his fanaticism. She glanced at her uncle, and saw only the ruthless promise of vengeance there. She glanced at Douglas, and realized he was crying. And she watched Rob leaving the court chamber, his strides hurried, his face grim and turned down.
She glanced over to her husband. His hatred had not lessened, but that was fine. For she hated him as well. She would never forgive him for how he had abused her, and for what he was now doing to her.
“Speak up now before this court condemns you to death by burning,” Gardiner shouted at her.
“I confess to worshiping God as my father did before me, with true faith, true belief, and true devotion. I confess to always worshiping God in this way. I confess to the desire to worship this way for the rest of my lifetime, whatever that might be. I have nothing more to repent,” she finally finished. And her pulse was deafening to her own ears now.
Gardiner stared at her in disbelief.
Sussex made a sound.
Douglas cried out, and Helen screamed, “No! Isabel, beg for mercy!”
“I beg,” Isabel said, her breath choked in her lungs, crying again, “to be released from this hypocrisy, this sham, this utter pretense, of that which is this life.”
Gardiner exclaimed, “So be it. Tomorrow at noon you will suffer the stake.” And he strode past her, from the room.
Isabel was on her knees. “God forgive you,” she said to Gardiner's back, “your sins, and God forgive me mine.”
BOOK: House of Dreams
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