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CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

“ I hope you suffer, far worse than this,” the ghost in Cyrus’ mind hissed, his body remembering the blows that had rained down upon him. “I hope you are as miserable as you have made me. I hope that anything you own, anything you love, anything you cherish is stolen from you, you wretched thief.”

Whether his father had been cursed, or whether it was his father who had cursed him, Cyrus did not know. In truth, it was not important; he was cursed either way.

He was not a believer in the truly supernatural.

He had not seen ghosts, unless the angel in his dreams counted.

He did not think they were real, tangible things, but haunted memories that took on a life of their own.

And he did not believe that his curse was a supernatural creation, the stuff of witchcraft and sorcery, but a price that needed to be paid.

A debt of misfortune, lurking somewhere in his blood—more of an inherited sickness, able to infect others, than a magical force.

He was not in the study, as he had said he would be, but up in the blackened tower where he likely should have lost his life.

The gardens looked beautiful from the window, the flowers bowing in the evening breeze.

The sun was sinking on the horizon, the sky shot through with glorious bolts of orange and pink and purple, the clouds blushing, so perfect they looked painted.

Mr. Brewster was out by the greenhouses, whistling a jaunty tune.

Indeed, it seemed ironic that the worst night of Cyrus’ life should be so lovely.

“This is what I feared from the start,” he whispered to the empty, ruined tower, in case a friendlier sort of ghost was listening. “This is precisely why I did not want to fall in love with Teresa… why I did not want to fall in love at all.”

He peered down at the lawn below, seeing Teresa as she had looked when she fell from the crag. He closed his eyes and sucked in a deep breath, and when he opened them again, the vision was gone. But it would not be so easily removed from his mind.

She will get hurt because of me. She may die because of me. I will lose her, because it is inevitable.

To make matters worse, he had been so happy.

For a brief spell in time, he had been truly, deeply happy.

From that happiness, especially holding his wife in his arms as she slept, he had not been able to prevent his imagination from conjuring the idea of children.

Something he was so set against, and yet…

If he did not lose Teresa sooner, he would surely lose her to childbirth. History would repeat. Another beloved wife and mother would be taken. And he would be another lonely, bitter, twisted creature in this castle, hating his child because of what they had inadvertently stolen away.

I would become what I despise. I would never be able to look my child in the face and not… hate the cost for their existence.

“I was once astonished that she would ever pity her tormentors,” he murmured, running a stressed hand through his hair. “Perhaps, I understand that more than I thought.”

After all, his father could not have always been so cruel. According to the servants, he had doted on his wife, transforming into a man of smiles and laughter, willing to do anything for the woman he loved.

And he, in turn, was cruelly treated by my grandfather. He could not forget that.

“I have made a mistake,” he told the flowers and the sunset and the creaking, rotten rafters. “I broke my promise. I allowed myself to feel too much. I was… selfish.”

He took a deep breath of the perfumed air, that reminded him so much of his evening wanders with his wife. But I will fix this.

For Teresa, he was willing to do anything, no matter what it cost him .

If he had to be the lonely, bitter man while she continued to live on, safe and well and happy and far from him, then so be it.

All his life he had been a hermit; it would not kill him to revert to his old ways, and it was the only way, as far as he was concerned, that he could ensure Teresa’s survival.

“I love you, Tess,” he whispered, knowing it was the one time he would get to say it. The only time. Just for the ghosts and the evening world to hear, never to reach the ears of the woman he cherished.

The next morning, Teresa stirred to surprisingly familiar surroundings. She blinked in confusion as she fought her weary limbs in order to sit up, taking a moment to make sure she was not still dreaming, or that her sore head was not playing tricks with her eyes.

Somehow, she was in her bedchamber.

Cyrus must have carried me. Her heart fluttered with happiness, her joy so sudden and intense that she forgot all about the weirdness of yesterday. All she wanted to do was see her husband and thank him for taking her out of that dusty drawing room and back into her own bed.

“He must be well again. Belinda was not lying, after all,” she said to herself as she shuffled slowly to the edge of the bed, refusing to let her ankle or her head keep her trapped in her room.

She winced as she attempted to put weight onto her bad foot, a jolt of pain shooting up from her heel to her calf. Spotting the crooked cane that she had been using to hold back the drapes, she was thankful for her former self’s ingenuity, and hopped her way over to retrieve it.

“We shall spend the day in the library,” she chattered excitedly, pausing to pull on her housecoat, before heading out into the hallway. “He can read to me, as payment for the reading I have done for him. Oh, what a fine thing that will be. At last, he will know the ending of that last chapter.”

She barely acknowledged the pain as she hobbled through the endless labyrinth of the castle, not caring who thought she was odd when she reached the stairs and made a somewhat bold choice.

It was too difficult to try and limp down so many steps, so she did what anyone with sense and no concern for their dignity would do, shuffling down on her bottom.

By the time she made it to the entrance hall, she was positively giddy, her spirits so high she felt she might soar. Cyrus’ kiss would help with that, for the brush of his mouth and the strength of his embrace never failed to make her feel like she could fly.

“Your Grace!” Belinda’s startled voice did nothing to dampen Teresa’s enthusiasm. “What on earth are you doing out of bed? With respect, of course.”

Teresa grinned. “I have come down to have breakfast with my husband. Is he waiting for me? Goodness, I hope he has not eaten without me.” Her smile faded for a moment.

“I did not even think of that. No matter—wherever he is, I shall find him. And if you do not want me to hobble very far, perhaps you might tell me where I can find him?”

The housekeeper looked pale, her gaze furtive, not quite meeting Teresa’s eye. “He is in the gardens.” She moved closer. “But, if I may, I really think you ought to return to your chambers. His Grace won’t want to see you out of bed, going against the physician’s instructions.”

“I will return to bed once I have seen him,” Teresa replied firmly, beginning her lengthy limp to the outside.

It took a matter of seconds for Belinda to appear at her side, looping her arm through Teresa’s with a grim frown upon her face.

“If you won’t be convinced,” Belinda said, “I’m not about to let you go all that way by yourself, in your condition. But if you start to feel faint or the pain is too much, I’m taking you back. I realize you’re the duchess, but I must insist on that.”

Teresa flashed her a conspiratorial smile. “I agree to your terms, dear Belinda.”

Ordinarily, the housekeeper was the first to chuckle at one of Teresa’s jokes, but the older woman’s expression remained uneasy as she helped Teresa out of the castle.

Indeed, Belinda was so unusually stern that Teresa began to wonder if there might be a reason for that, and if it would have been better to return to bed after all.

Nonsense. Of course not. Cyrus will be fine again; he would not have carried me to my bed if he was not.

She kept that belief firmly in her heart, allowing her excitement and her joy to rise again, the closer she got to the gardens. There, she was certain she would receive the affection and relief that she craved, losing herself in her husband’s arms and the press of his tender kiss.

Shambling onto the pristine white pathways of crushed shell and gravel, Teresa stopped and raised her hand to her brow to block out the glare of the sun. She searched the gardens ahead of her with the eagerness of a bride who had waited years to see her sailor betrothed return to her shores.

Where are you, my love? Come to me, my love.

Where she eventually spotted him was not at all where she would have expected.

He stood by the greenhouses, casually dressed in just a shirt and trousers, the former open to the chest. A bucket of water rested at his feet, and in his hand he held a cloth, scrubbing determinedly at the glass walls.

There was no sign of Mr. Brewster, although Teresa doubted he would have been too pleased by the sight.

“Was I asleep so long that you decided to become a gardener?” she called out, as Belinda helped her along the path.

It was a beautiful morning. Warm, with a light breeze that took the edge off the heat; the sky blue and cloudless, perfect for wandering through the countryside. Although Teresa supposed that that particular pastime would have to wait a while.

Cyrus froze. “You should not be out of bed.”

“I could not languish in bed on such a glorious morning,” Teresa protested lightly, her heart racing at the impressive vision of him. “In truth, I had hoped to have breakfast with you. Although, now that I think of it, I do not actually know what the time is.”

Soon, surely, he would turn and smile at her, pull her into his embrace, and all of yesterday would be forgotten.