Page 36 of A Magic Deep & Drowning

She looked off toward the misty woods through the gloaming, her throat bobbing, but no words coming out.

His body was aching, not just from the cost of shifting his form, but from holding in all the feelings that she engendered in him. He could feel them building inside, looking for some sort of release. If he could just tell her how he felt, let the words pour out and share the joyous burden of his love with her. But as he followed her gaze to the trees shivering in the wind, he swallowed them back down. “I shouldn’t have brought you to the water, it was wrong of me. You’re free to go,” he told her, the words costing him almost everything in his chest.

A strip of lavender light glowed on the horizon, the last vestige of a rainy day. Soon what little light there was would be gone, and the air would turn cold. If she was truly free to go, she needed to go now. She was still on the ground, propped up in the cold mud where she had arisen from the dead. Scrambling to her feet, she immediately canted to the side. Her body felt light and unbalanced, like she’d had too much wine at one of her father’s interminable dinners. Maurits shot out a hand to steady her, but she recoiled, sent him a cutting glare.

“Don’t touch me,” she rasped.

He folded his hands behind his back, as if it was the only way to force himself to obey her command. He was doing afine job of looking for all the world like he was in anguish, though with himself, or at the prospect of losing her, Clara didn’t know. She didn’t care.

“That way is the coast,” he said pointing beyond the tree line when he saw her looking about in a daze. “Don’t go that way. Head toward the south. Even better, leave the low countries all together.”

Did he know how ridiculous he sounded? What sort of world did he come from that he believed that she could simply pick up and start a new life, a lone woman with nothing to her name except an outlandish story and the clothes on her back? Helma might have been able to fend for herself, find a new position and start over. But Clara had been gently bred for marriage and wifehood. She couldn’t even make a loaf of bread, let alone make her own way in the world. She was as free as a bird with clipped wings being thrown out of its cage.

She wobbled again, this time catching her foot on a stone and losing her balance. Maurits caught her neatly, pulling her close to his body. His face was an inscrutable mask, but somewhere deep in his canal-green eyes there was a pooling of sadness. Gently setting her right again, he stepped back. “I’m sorry, Clara, for everything. Here,” he said, handing her a brace of fish. “If you make a fire, you can roast them.” Mute, she accepted the fish. She was still hungry—ravenous—but she couldn’t even begin to think how to start a fire, and her pride and anger would not let her ask him to help. Taking another good step back from him, she fisted her hands into the wet cloth of her skirt. Nothing good would come from lingering in his hold, and she was already so tired, so close to letting her defenses fall. If she was to survive, it had to be away from him. Far away.

He seemed to sense that she had come to some kind of conclusion, because he gave a short nod, and stepped back into the shallow water.

There was a taught pause, the only sound the light breeze through branches and the far-off cry of a bird. “I know I have no right to ask it of you, but—”

She stopped him with a swift shake of her head. He may have saved her life, but it was only because he had interfered with it in the first place.

His response was infuriatingly even-tempered. He simply folded his hands, his elegant fingers white at the knuckles. “Very well, Clara. As you wish.”

As she began walking, her scowl faded and tears rushed to fill her eyes. Eventually there was the softestsplashand she knew that he’d returned to his world, leaving her alone in hers.

Chapter Twenty-One

The light shone out in the night, a miraculous beacon of habitation that made Clara’s weary legs begin to move faster. Hunger was a living animal in her stomach, roaring, demanding food. Though she had balked at the idea of eating the fish from Maurits, her inability to kindle a fire had rendered her pride moot. But now, after walking aimlessly for miles, there was a flicker of hope in the darkness.

Wind rushed through the poplar trees, pushing Clara closer to the light. She could have fallen to her knees in thanks when she saw that it was coming from a building. The farmhouse looked like any other Frisian dwelling—a steeply pitched roof of thatch, brick walls, and owl nests carved into the gables. The familiar sight made her chest tighten.

Rapping on the rough wooden door, Clara leaned heavily against the frame, her legs dangerously close to buckling. There were the sounds of footsteps and whispers on the other side of the door, then a blade of light sliced into the night. A wrinkled face peered out of a shawl at her, and for a moment she fancied it was Helma, come to take care of her.

But then the woman spoke, her rough accent putting Clara’s fancy to rest. “Jan! Come quick, it’s a child!” she called back into the house.

Muttered cursing, clumsy footfalls, and then a moment later a spindle-thin man in nightdress with a candle stumbledforward, crowding the door. Wiping a hand across sleep-crusted eyes, he took one look at Clara and jolted the rest of the way awake. “Well bring her in, bring her in!”

Clara could have wept as warm arms went around her, but she had no tears left. The woman led her into the main room which must have served as kitchen, dining room, and living space. In the corner, a cabinet bed with the curtain thrown open boasted an inviting pile of blankets and pillows. A fire licked merrily in the hearth. The room was small, but comfortable, with low oil lamps burning and throwing warm shadows onto the butter-colored walls. It reminded her of the kitchen at Wierenslot, and an arrow of homesickness shot through her.

The woman pressed her into a seat at the table, and a moment later a soft blanket was draped over her shoulders. “You just have a seat there, and I’ll make you up something warm to drink. My name is Tryn and that’s Jan. We’ve lived our whole lives here in this cottage, and I can’t say we’ve ever had a maiden show up in the dead of night before, but here we are.” She tutted and tsked as she prepared something to eat, the warm aroma sending Clara into a drowsy state of relief.

“There we are,” Tryn said, setting a plate of rolls and cheese in front of Clara, and a steaming mug of something that smelled like licorice. “You put some food in your stomach.”

Clara couldn’t get the food into her mouth fast enough. Nearly choking, she tipped the mug back, letting the sweet drink warm her from the inside. The last real food she had eaten had been her wedding dinner, and even then, she had only been able to pick at it, her nerves too taught to eat much of anything. Tryn watched her with keen interest, as Jan passed in and out of the room with armloads of wood for the fire.

Once she’d cleaned her plate and drained her cup, Clara looked around with renewed interest. “Where are we? Was there a flood here? Have you received news from Franeker?”

Tryn’s gray brows rose. “Child, if anyone is going to be asking questions, it’s me. You appear in the middle of the night in naught but your smallclothes, your feet near bloody, and an appetite that would alarm even a shipwrecked sailor.” Clara clamped her mouth shut. “Now, I see you are wearing a ruby around your neck and a gold ring on your finger, and what is left of your clothes is not homespun. So how does a young lady find herself in such a spot? Do you have parents looking for you?”

Even if Clara had been inclined to answer, how could she? Her story was unbelievable at best, the rantings of a madwoman at worst. Wrapping her fingers around the empty mug, she raced to put something together. “There was an accident outside of Franeker. A dike broke and my home was flooded. My family all perished, and I became lost.” She tried to gauge the effect of her words on them before adding, “Have you heard news from Franeker?”

Tryn and Jan shared a fleeting look. “Child, Franeker is a four-day journey from here,” Jan said. “Do you mean to say you walked all the way and this was the first house you came to?”

Time had begun to lose all meaning to her, but surely she had not walked that far. Maurits must have left her somewhere further from the city. Any lingering thoughts about returning to Wierenslot were quickly put to rest. “So you’ve no news of a flood?”

Tryn sighed. “I no more know the goings-on of Franeker than I do of Bruges. If there was a flood, it certainly hasn’t reached here.”

Clara’s shoulders relaxed a little. She had envisioned a flood that had reached all the way from Friesland to Amsterdam. Perhaps it had not been the magic doing of an angry queen, and simply a broken dike after all.

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