[Samuel Barbara] The Black Angel(Book4You) (41 page)

A young woman with heavy black hair rolled into a simple knot on her head led Adriana up another set of stairs, and another, and to a bedroom set high in one of the towers. A fire burned in the grate, though it had not yet removed the chill of the room. Four arched windows, shuttered against the night and the cold, circled the room, four of them. The bed was piled high with down coverlets. A long-haired black-and-white cat had made itself comfortable in the center, and the girl was about to shoo it away when Adriana stopped her. "Let him stay."

"Do you need anything else, my lady?" Adriana shook her head distractedly and waved her away. She drifted over to the bed then, suddenly feeling the exhaustion of the long journey, and curled up next to the cat. He stretched luxuriously and began to purr. His fur was sparkling clean and there were no burrs in the long tail. She smiled, scratching between his ears. "You're a spoiled one, aren't you?"

He meowed softly, cheerfully, and butted his head harder against her hand.

A vision of Tynan's face rose in her mind, and she ached to go to him. To lie down next to him and feel his skin, to smell his hair and just… be with him. Near him. Listening to him sleep.

She had come so far, she thought, not only in the miles from London and her home, but in her life. Lying now in an Irish castle, with a cat purring under her ministrations, she thought of her father and her mother, of Martinique and ocean voyages and Malvern and the long exile she'd put on herself after the duel, and it felt to her that all roads had led here. That somehow all of it had prepared her to be not just a wife, but a helpmate and soulmate to a man who would need her.

Outside, it began to rain, the sound a pattering softness, and Adriana lifted her head. She nudged the hollow spot in her chest to see what it was made of, and wondered, Was she afraid of this? Afraid of making this foreign place her home, of making the troubles of her husband's world her own?

Perhaps a little, she admitted to herself. Perhaps she was a little afraid of what might face all of them, not only Tynan and his people, but the children they would bear. Perhaps there would be sorrow.

But the world was changing—it was in the air, as her father had always said when she came to him as a girl, disturbed by some injustice or another. He'd often teased her that she had the heart of a revolutionary, and Adriana supposed it was true. Once, she'd imagined the adventures of overturning her woman's life for that of a man, a sea captain or a trader or a pirate.

Dear Papa, who'd always seen her so clearly. If he'd been able to grant her a commission in the navy, she had no doubt he would have.

Instead he'd asked this proud Irishman to be her husband.

He'd asked Tynan to be her husband.

Adriana closed her eyes in swift understanding. All this time, she had believed that her father anticipated the dire straits of his girls' financial situation, and knowing a rich Irish lord, had married her to him for the money.

Tonight, with her love hanging in the balance, she saw that he'd done it for her, to give her a chance to have a life worth the living, a life that would test her and challenge her and sometimes—yes, even put her at risk.

"Ah, Papa," she said aloud, rubbing the cat's belly, "you knew me so well." He alone had always seen through her faces, had understood that her passion and curiosity could be directed. And he'd found her a husband more beautiful than heaven, with a task too big for him alone, so she could be engaged, heart and soul, to something that would have meaning to her when she died.

In realization, she laughed, and let the tears fall. It had been a long, strange journey, but she could not think of anywhere on earth she would rather be than under the same roof as Tynan Spenser.

She awakened to such stillness that she could not think where she was. There was some sort of bird making a funny cry, one she didn't recognize, and there was something heavy against her neck. A cat.

And there was a voice, low and melodious, unmistakable. "Riana." His hand fell on her face, smoothing away a lock of hair.

She turned and opened her eyes, lifting a hand to clasp his hand to her face. "Tynan."

There was sorrow on his mouth. "There is something I want to show you. Get dressed and come down."

"What is it, Tynan? You needn't—"

"I do," he said, and stood. "Dress warmly. 'Tis cold and wet this morn."

He left her, and Adriana dressed quickly in a warm woolen skirt and blouse, with a shawl over her shoulders. Downstairs, she found him holding her cloak, which someone had dried by the fire. It smelled of wood smoke as he wrapped it around her shoulders.

"Are you hungry?"

She shook her head, intent on getting this over with.

"Come, then." He pushed open the heavy door and they stepped into a cold, overcast day. Rain had been falling, but had stopped, leaving behind that peculiar stillness punctuated only with birds. But below that quiet, Adriana thought she heard something else. She halted for a moment and listened. "Is that the sea?"

"Aye. Just over that rise." He pointed. "That's where we're going."

They walked in silence, leaving the path to climb a low green hill, barren of trees and studded with tumbles of rock. Overhead, seagulls circled and called, and
Adriana lifted her head to watch them, feeling a soft, blooming sense of something in her heart. In the air now she could smell the sea, that rich and evocative scent that so stirred her.

At the crest of the hill Tynan stopped. Adriana looked up at him as she came behind. Against the gray sky, he formed a silhouette of severe darkness, his hair blowing free from the queue in wisps, his dark cloak billowing on the wind. His face, still and severe in its beauty, dominated now in profile by that hawkish nose, seemed carved out of the granite that lay scattered in knots over the ground. She thought of his nickname, the Black Angel, and how it suited him, but in ways she would never have dreamed.

My blood came from that earth
, he'd said to her.

She stood beside him silently, taking in the view. Behind was the sound of the sea, not quite visible—perhaps she would see it if she walked to the edge just there. Closer in, the hill dropped into an almost perfectly rounded bowl where winter-bare shrubs clustered in groups, as if to resist the sea squalls. A flat stone marked the middle of the clearing, and a scattering of rocks and hills rose on all sides.

"My brother died here," Tynan said without preamble. "They posted lookouts on all four hills, but that day they were short a man, and the murderers came through." His voice was dull. He lifted an arm and pointed. "They caught him there, on that slab, and cut his throat."

Adriana stared at him, a hand over her mouth. "Why?"

He swallowed and turned to her. "He was a priest.
It is illegal to hold mass." For a moment it seemed he might allow escape to the grief shimmering in his eyes—those eyes made of the land and the sky—but he pursed his lips tightly and shifted his face away. "So you see, it is not as simple as it appears, and I cannot allow you to stay." He sighed. "In truth, we are not even legally bound by my church."

It wounded her, quick and sharp, but in a rush she understood all of it. "You went to mass in London, didn't you?"

"Aye." Grimly, he set his mouth. "I will not ask that you take this life. I was selfish in imagining it, and more selfish still in lying to you."

And there, in that wild beauty of his face, she saw love, and her heart rocked. She raised a hand to his cheek. "I believed there was true feeling between us these past weeks, Tynan Spenser. If I am wrong, I'll go away and leave you." Tears welled in her eyes at the thought. "But in truth, I would follow you into hell itself if it meant I could lie with you at night." A tear slipped from her eye and slid down her cheek. "I do not mind taking new vows with you."

An expression of pain crossed his face and he ducked away, striding across the crest of the hill to stand with his back to her on the edge of that rocky outcropping. Adriana gave him a moment, watching the wind whip his hair and his cloak. Then she followed him.

Below stretched the wild sea, roiling gray in the wintry wind. It crashed to the rocks and roared out its song, and she paused, overcome. The wet wind touched her face, cold and exhilarating, and she closed her eyes in acceptance, lifting her chin into it, breathing it deep. "I have missed the sea," she said in wonder. "I had no idea how much. It's like coming home, to hear that song again."

Still he only glared at the waves, that hawkish nose so bold in profile.

She reached out a hand cautiously and put it against her husband's broad, strong back. "Let me help you, Tynan. Let me be a true wife, a helpmate."

"You don't know what you're asking." His voice was rough with despair. "There is so much struggle ahead, so many sorrows for my people until we are free. I cannot ask you to share such a burden when it isn't even your own."

"The world is changing," she said, hearing her father's voice. "The American colonies are free. There is revolt in the islands. Perhaps it will not happen peacefully, and perhaps not only you, but your children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren will have to fight. But freedom will never be won if you give up."

He turned to her at last. "It will be your children, too, if you stay."

She touched her belly. "It already is." She gave him a rueful smile. "I should have known, all that fainting nonsense."

"We've made a child?" he echoed, and almost as if his hands acted without his knowledge, he reached for her, putting that long-fingered hand across her lower belly. "Our own?"

She laughed. "Yes."

For a long moment he only looked at his hand on her belly, then he raised his eyes to hers. "I fell in love with you the morning you came down the stairs to greet your brothers. There was such joy in you, and it made me feel the emptiness I'd been carrying since my brother was murdered." He paused. "Can you love me, then?"

She lifted her hands to his face and rose on her toes. "I can," she whispered, and kissed him. "I do."

With a soft sound, he swept her into his embrace, burying his face in her neck. "I love you, Adriana." A wind from the sea swept over them, and he murmured, "It will never be easy, but with you, I can face whatever comes."

She closed her eyes and sent a silent prayer upward.

Thank you, Papa.

Then they joined hands and walked back to Glencove Castle, which had stood for six hundred years, and was strong enough to stand six hundred more.