Page 76 of The Curse of Penryth Hall

I blinked again, trying to focus on his dear face, on the very shape of him. He sat beside me in a chair, a great hulk of a man with a porcelain washbasin in his lap and a soft damp cloth in his hand.Morning?My unfocused eyes drifted to the window, but the curtains were closed tight, hiding the sun.

“You’ve been sleeping for two days.”

“Two…” My voice croaked, rusty from disuse. It scratched to swallow. “Two days?”

He nodded, running a gentle hand over my forehead, his thumb caressing my scarred brow. Instinctively I closed myeyes, turning into his palm. He traced the line across my forehead with his thumb, back and forth in a slow rhythm.

“What are you doing?” I murmured beneath my closed lids.

“Something my mother used to do.” He continued with the gentle caress, chasing the pain away with each touch.

I opened my left eye, shooting him a look that might have been skeptical had I the energy for the notion. At the moment I was grateful not to be dead.

“What did you eat last? Can you recall?”

I shook my head slowly and struggled to sit up in the bed. My body weighed a thousand pounds. Limbs leaden. He leaned over to help lift me up but I shooed him away. I needed to do it myself. Gingerly, I straightened myself in the large brass bed. “Where’s Mr. Owen?”

“Safe. Here. He went for a walk a few minutes ago, he’s been worrying himself sick over you. Fairly raving until I assured him that you were not the sort to die so easily.”

I breathed out a sigh of relief.

“Do you remember where you had gone when you left Penryth?”

My head ached to shake it.

He took in a slow breath and let it out again. “Ruby… I don’t want you to be alarmed…”

I frowned. Anyone who began a sentence with that was about to say something quite alarming indeed.

“You’d wandered all the way to Bodmin Moor.”

“Bodmin Moor?!” my voice squeaked. “That’s ridiculous. That has to be…”

“Five miles, yes. Do you have any idea how you got there?”

It was impossible. Completely impossible.

“Do you remember anything? Anything at all? Did you eat something, talk to someone? See anyone?” His voice took on an almost frantic tone with his questions.

I closed my eyes, trying to remember exactly what had happened. But there was nothing there, only a giant void in my memory. “Just a child. There was a child. And a stallion. That’s all. I’m sorry, Ruan, I just don’t recall anything.”

His eyes widened for a moment in surprise. “A child?”

“Dressed in rags. I think I dreamed it, it doesn’t seem probable, does it? Following a child for miles into the moors?”

He ran a thumb over my brow tenderly and shook his head. “It sounds as if you’ve been piskie-led.”

I rolled my eyes and closed them shut. “Doubtful.”

“From what I can tell you walked all the way there, or certainly wandered through the moors. You’re quite lucky you didn’t drown yourself with all the rain we’ve had.”

“Who found me? And why would they have even thought to look for me there?”

He shifted uncomfortably, unable to meet my gaze.

“It was you, wasn’t it?”

He nodded.