Chapter Sixteen
The Crown and Anchor Inn
Longton
By morning, the sore throat and sore ear didn’t go away. It only grew worse.
The storm from the previous night had cleared away for the most part, but there were intermittent bursts of rain accompanied by bright skies and fair winds.
Cadelyn could see all of it from the window of her rented chamber, but she was coughing and sniffling, and not much in the mood for beautiful views.
She didn’t feel well at all. But to her, that was a blessing.
It meant a delay in reaching The Paladin.
She’d fallen asleep in Kress’ arms the night before after their passionate romp. In truth, Cadelyn couldn’t think of anything else. Kress had awakened something in her she never knew to exist, something hot and searing that made her chest tighten and her heart pound simply to think on it.
It had been a night for the ages.
In truth, when she kissed him, she’d really only meant to kiss him once and be done with it.
Something in her had to kiss the man and know what it felt like, at least once.
She assumed she would have to live on it for the rest of her life, but that kiss had quickly turned into something shockingly sinful.
Kress, who had been so repressed and distant from her for the entire journey, had exploded once she had touched him.
It was as if the dam had burst and there was nothing he could do to stop the forthcoming tide of emotion.
His actions had spoken volumes.
The angst and uncertainty Cadelyn felt about him was gone, replaced by a joy that was difficult to describe.
It was as if the sun were burning in her chest, this ball of hope right where her heart should have been, and it was blinding in its brilliance.
Her first kiss turned into so much more.
She should have been embarrassed by it, scandalized by it at the very least, but all she could manage to feel was joy.
Now, those poems she wrote made complete and utter sense to her.
She had experienced it for herself.
And she wasn’t going to marry the Earl of Ellesmere.
She’d made that decision this morning when she had awoken.
Kress was gone, having left sometime during the night, but it didn’t matter.
Cadelyn would permit him to do his duty, to escort her to Ellesmere, whom she was going to inform that she had no intention of going through with the marriage.
If he forced the issue, she was going to commit herself to the nearest cloister.
She’d threatened that with Kress and he had explained that if she failed to marry the earl, then he had failed in his duty.
Although she didn’t want Kress to fail at anything, she simply couldn’t marry a man when she was in love with another.
And she was very much in love, even if submitting to the cloister meant never feeling that love again.
Coughing and sniffling, Cadelyn climbed out of bed to stir the embers in the hearth a little, trying to spark a bit of a blaze.
Goliath was still there, wagging his tail and licking her when she bent down to stir the hearth.
It was quite cold in the room and she was still clad in Jude’s oversized clothing.
The fire picked up a little bit and she warmed her hands before heading to the window, arms wrapped around her body for warmth, to peer outside.
Beyond was a land of green – fresh, bright green, brilliant after the rains.
Spring had descended on the Marches and it was quite lush.
As she stood there, peering at the field below the window and spying some white flowers, there was a knock at her chamber door.
“Come,” she said.
The door creaked open and she turned to see Jude enter the chamber. With her, she carried Cadelyn’s green traveling ensemble, the one that had been so muddied the day before. It was perfectly clean and Cadelyn came away from the window, gasping when she saw how wonderful it looked.
“You worked a miracle on it,” she said, fingering the fabric. “How on earth did you clean off all the mud?”
Jude grinned proudly. “We make a soap here that will clean the spots from a cow, m’lady,” she said. “It has cleaned yer clothing well.”
Cadelyn nodded. Then, she coughed and sneezed all at the same time. Jude looked at her with great concern.
“God’s Bones,” she hissed. “Ye’re ill, m’lady. Get back tae bed and I’ll have someone come and build yer fire.”
Cadelyn let the woman rush her back over to the bed and put her beneath the heavy coverlet. “I have felt better in my life,” she admitted. “Where are the knights? Are they preparing the escort already?”
Jude tucked her in, nearly suffocating her because she tightened the coverlet so much. “There is a pair down in the common room,” she said. “I will go tae them and ask.”
“Send one of them up to me, please,” Cadelyn said. Then, she eyed the big woman. “The… the big, blond knight isn’t down there, is he?”
Jude nodded. “He is,” she said. “I saw him. Ye stay here, m’lady. I’ll bring ye something for yer cough.”
She fled the chamber and shut the door. Smug in the knowledge that Kress would soon be at her bedside, Cadelyn snuggled down beneath the covers and waited for the man to appear. It wasn’t a long wait. In fact, in very little time, there was a knock at her door.
“Come!” she called.
The panel opened and Bric stood in the doorway. He was without his helm and, indeed, he had very blond hair, so blond that it was white. No longer thrilled that Kress would soon arrive, Cadelyn looked at the man in disappointment.
“You sent for me, my lady?” Bric asked in his heavy Irish brogue.
Cadelyn shook her head. “I asked Jude if a blond knight was in the common room and she said there was one,” she said. “I meant Kress but I forgot about you.”
Bric lifted an eyebrow. “Thank you, my lady.”
Cadelyn grinned when she realized how she’d sounded.
“I did not mean to say that you were insignificant,” she said.
“I simply meant that I have gotten used to all of you with your helms on, forgetting you, too, are blond and… oh, never mind. It is of little matter. I am too ill to travel this morning so you must relay that to Kress and Alexander. I am in no condition to meet the Earl of Ellesmere in the next two days.”
Bric stood there for a moment, watching her cough and sniffle. “Alexander has already sent word to The Paladin, my lady,” he said. “He did that early this morning.”
She sniffled into the coverlet because she didn’t have a handkerchief. “Then you must tell him right away that I am ill,” she said. “Hurry, please.”
Bric simply quit the chamber without another word, shutting the door behind him.
The dog had stood up when Bric entered. He now wandered over to the bed and jumped up on it, settling down at Cadelyn’s feet.
She sat in the bed for a minute or two, coughing and rubbing at her sore ear, when there was another knock.
“Come!” she practically shouted.
The door opened yet again and Jude entered followed by Susanna.
The innkeeper’s daughter had a tray with her, setting it on the bed so Cadelyn could get to it.
Behind Susanna came a wench lugging a bucket of peat and firewood.
As the wench began to coax forth the embers in the hearth, Jude went over to help her because she evidently wasn’t doing a good enough job.
That left Susanna alone by the bed with Cadelyn.
“Are you not feeling well, Cadie?” Susanna asked quietly.
Cadelyn looked at her in shock. Susanna sounded hoarse and terrible. Her nose was red and even as she looked at Cadelyn, she coughed into her hand.
“Are you ill, too?” Cadelyn asked. “Sweet Mary, Susanna, you should be in bed as well. We are not going anywhere today.”
Susanna sighed heavily and pulled up a chair, plopping down onto it. She was dressed in her usual mail and tunic, with her copper curls braided and draped over one shoulder. She was dressed for travel. But she looked pale and sickly.
“De Sherrington has already sent word to your future husband,” Susanna said. “They will be expecting you.”
Cadelyn stayed firm. “I will not leave today,” she said. “I will not meet the earl and cough in his face. They will have to understand.”
“And if they do not?”
“What can they do? Drag me out of my sick bed?”
Susanna shrugged, coughing into her hand as Jude and the serving wench built up such a blaze in the hearth that it was licking at the wall above it.
But glorious heat filled the chamber as Cadelyn went to work on the food Jude had brought her – hot wine with honey, bread and cheese, a hunk of the pork pie and the pea soup from the night before, all warmed-over.
Cadelyn devoured the soup and bread, gave the pie to the dog, and then sipped at the wine because it felt good on her sore throat.
She even shared some with Susanna, who took it gratefully.
The two of them sat in the now-cloyingly warm chamber, feeling tired and sore, as the dog stretched out over the end of the bed, lying happily on his back with his legs sticking up.
And that was how Kress and Achilles found them.
Kress didn’t even bother to knock. Having been summoned by Bric, as he was out back in the livery with his horse, he came in the rear entrance to the inn and, seeing Achilles with the wounded in the common room, spoke briefly to the man about Cadelyn’s health.
Achilles knew nothing about it, so the two of them hastened up to the rented chamber only to find two sick women and a happy dog who was sleeping on a warm bed.
But the dog leapt off the bed when he saw Kress, excitedly jumping on him.
Kress absently petted the big dog’s head as he came into the chamber, his focus on Cadelyn.
“Bric says you are ill,” he said. “What is the matter?”
Cadelyn was feeling tired now that she’d had all that food and wine. “I am coughing and my ear hurts,” she said. “I cannot travel today but Bric said that word has already been sent on ahead.”