Page 40 of A Waltz with Lord Death
The reassurance should have been enough to calm her, but it wasn’t. Her gut told her something was wrong—something he wasn’t telling her.
The song ended, and a smile returned to Death’s face as he bent over her hand and kissed it. “You promised me an answer, Meira,” he murmured when they were out of earshot. “Will you accept my hand and become Lady Life? Will you become my wife?”
Lightning crackled across her skin at his touch, followed in its wake by the warmth of his dark power. His smile was enough to undo her. The sight of the light scatter of freckles across his nose sent a pleasant shiver down her spine. And once again, his gray eyes captivated her. He was very handsome. Kind. Thoughtful. And she loved him. There was no question about her answer.
However, when she opened her mouth, a familiar yet distressed voice pulled her attention away from Death and toward the opposite side of the ballroom. Tears ran down Elise’s face as she confronted Lord Farrington, who once again accompanied the brunette woman who was not his wife. Their argument happened too far away for her to catch the words, but when Elise stormed away in tears, panic crept into her bones.
“I’m sorry, Death.” She pulled her hand out of his grip. “But I have to go after her.”
She tried to ignore the concern in his eyes, the worry in the clench of his jaw, the warning on the tip of his tongue, as she ran after her friend. She wove through dim, torchlit hallways, calling after her, but to no avail. Her panic increased when Elise burst outside into the frigid cold, letting in a flurry of snowflakes in her departure.
“Elise!” she cried as she ran past several guards and into the chilly night air. A shiver raked its cold claws down her exposed arms as she squinted into the darkness. A blizzard picked up and snagged at the pins in her hair. In moments, half her brown tresses fell free around her shoulders.
“Elise!” she shouted again, but a violent gust of wind drowned her words. She took a step forward and immediately regretted it when her dainty shoe slipped on the top stair. She cried out in alarm but managed to catch herself before falling the rest of the way down the stone staircase. The sound of a whinny snapped her head up just in time to see her friend gallop past and down the road, but she didn’t make it very far before the horse slipped on a large patch of ice.
Her eyes widened in horror as the horse lost its footing and crashed onto its side, pinning Elise’s leg underneath it. In an attempt to stand, the large, spooked creature rolled right over Elise and sprinted away. Her friend’s cloaked form lay unmoving in the snow while servants rushed to her aid.
“No,” she gasped. “No!”
She slipped and slid on her way down the stairs. Her heart beat alarmingly fast in her throat, and her lungs struggled for breath in her desperate attempt to reach Elise’s side. Blistering winds battered at her hair and dress as if to try to keep her from moving any closer. But finally, she neared the servants, horror filling every inch of her expression to find her friend unconscious, bleeding, and badly bruised.
Servants shouted to one another to be heard over the raging winds, and she stood helplessly as they lifted her limp body onto a board and hurried inside. She followed quickly behind, not paying attention to people or surroundings until they reached Elise’s bedchambers.
A doctor was ushered in, and only when several more lanterns were lit did she see the full extent of the damage. Bruises covered nearly every inch of uncovered skin. Blood leaked out the corner of her mouth. Limbs bent in unnatural positions.
Queasiness clutched at her, threatening to collapse her legs from beneath her. She stumbled backward into a chair, her hand flying to her mouth as she watched the doctor’s administrations. Lord Farrington didn’t come to the room when summoned. She supposed it was the only reason the doctor ushered nearly everyone else out but her and a couple of maidservants.
Upon the doctor’s request, she pushed away her horror and stood on shaky legs to help splint bones and wipe blood from Elise’s bruised skin. They alternated warm cloths with cloths filled with snow to help bring down some of the swelling. Labored and raspy breaths moved in and out of Elise’s lungs.
Even hours later, she did not wake.
She clutched onto Elise’s feverish, limp hand, tears dripping down her face. Pain contorted her friend’s beautiful features in her sleep. No, she could not lose her friend. Not like this.
Through the night and well into the next day, she held her hand while drifting in and out of sleep, only to awake with a start to realize she’d fallen asleep. Each time, she checked to make sure her friend breathed. She would get through this. She would. The first few days would be the worst was what the doctor had said.
The door opened, and she turned her head, fully expecting to see the doctor. Shock coursed through her when Lord Farrington strode into the room. She leaped to her feet and watched as he approached Elise’s bedside with a frown on his face.
Finally, he said, “Pity.”
Anger pooled in her fists, which she kept clenched at her sides to prevent herself from doing something that might get her a position in the stocks. “Why did she run last night?” she asked quietly, afraid someone might hear from the hallway. “She would not have tried to leave the castle on horseback during a storm without a good reason.”
Lord Farrington turned toward the door. “I don’t know.”
“I think you do. She told me about your other woman.”
He froze in his tracks and turned slowly back to her, anger written plainly in the grooves on his face. He raised his hand as if to slap her but looking in the direction of the door where a maid might come in at any moment, he seemed to think better of it and lowered it.
“You have no idea of the pressure on my shoulders to produce an heir. I would rather have a bastard than have nothing at all.”
“What?” She stared into his eyes, past the anger, past the cruelty, to the hidden uncertainty. “Your mistress is with child?”
Again, he looked toward the door before he answered. “Breathe a word of this, and I will personally see you beneath the chopping block. I have good word that my request for an annulment will be granted. Elise has not only been unfaithful, but she has been denying me the right to children.”
“That is not true.”
“It is now. She will wake as a divorcee, if her ailments do not take her first, and I will marry my mistress.”
The awful man turned on his heel and strode from the room, leaving her staring after him in shock. Surely, he could not get away with his lies. Surely, he was not cruel enough to leave his suffering wife behind.
