Chapter 11
11
Two weeks into her stay and Luna had received several letters from Marcus. The first one contained news that his business contacts were proving useful, but it also included several packets of flower seeds and instructions for Mr Webber to plant them in the greenhouse. The next two contained moderate sums of money. She was asked to pass a certain amount over to Mrs Webber in order to run the household, and was told anything remaining she could spend at her discretion…
It belatedly occurred to me that you might need clothing and other articles for your toilette, although anything suitable you find about the house you may use. I shall trust you won’t just take the enclosed money and run into the sunset – or should I say, limp…
She couldn’t help but smile.
All the letters had started ‘My dearest wife’, and had finished ‘Your husband, Marcus’, which reassured her that they were both continuing in their agreed roles. If anyone came looking for her, the household would swear to her being Mrs Greybourne, but she would be gone long before he returned to Ravenswood, with no need for the sham marriage to continue in person.
Bran was now hopping quite freely about the house, his head jutting forward with each step, and his body lopsided as he tentatively used the splinted leg. Mrs Webber tutted about having a live bird in the area where she prepared food but, from her two visits to the kitchens, Luna knew hygiene standards were somewhat lax, as dead birds abandoned on the refectory table and attracting flies were apparently fine.
As time went on, wherever Luna was to be found, Bran was usually not far behind. They presented quite a comical sight: a slender young woman hunched over a pair of crude crutches, hopping along, as a jet-black raven waddled unevenly beside her.
‘Are you kissing me?’ she would ask, as he rubbed his soft, feathered head against her own, and decided that perhaps he was. She had, after all, saved his life.
But he was a wilful creature, stroppy and demanding one minute, placid and gentle the next, and the wild animal in him remained. On days when the weather was sufficiently pleasant for her to sit outside, he would stretch out his wings and soar up into the blue, disappearing for increasingly longer spells of time. Mr Webber often reported seeing him circling above the woods, yet he always returned to Luna.
‘It’s strange how he’s attached himself to you,’ Mrs Webber said, bringing the luncheon tray and shooing the raven away from the food. The soup, which was of indeterminable ingredients, was steaming hot, so Luna stirred it as the older woman talked. ‘But the master will be pleased we’ve saved a bird. Not because he’s superstitious about the curse, more that he’s the sentimental sort. It’s why he insists on remaining in this dilapidated shell of a house; his grandfather built it and that means a lot to him. And it’s why he stuck with her… you,’ she hastily corrected herself. ‘Duty and honour.’ She shook her head.
Whilst she appreciated the housekeeper’s support of her assumed role, Luna decided it was time to find out what Mrs Greybourne had subjected her husband to, particularly should she be put in the position again where an outsider was being asked to believe she was responsible for the past actions of his wife.
‘What really happened here?’ she asked. ‘What was Luna like?’
The housekeeper cast wary eyes about the room and one hand clutched the thin silver crucifix about her neck. She lowered her voice to barely a whisper.
‘She had the most startling eyes of pale grey. Like an angel, she were, with a halo of yellow hair about her head. But she weren’t no messenger of God.’ Mrs Webber shuddered. ‘Men were always drawn to her like bees to a honeypot, even my Jed. And when she did all that naked prancing about by the well, young men from the village would try to cop an eyeful by skirting around the edge of the woods. They started the rumours and she lapped it up, taking an unhealthy interest in the dead and the occult – happy to be called a witch. Sad, really.’ She sighed. ‘Last time I set eyes on her, she were reduced to a pitiful sack of bones.’
Luna was unsettled. Was it worse if the woman was dead or alive? Because she certainly didn’t want to encounter her either way.
‘Everything he loved, she destroyed,’ the housekeeper continued. ‘Heirlooms that had been in the family generations. She threw much of the porcelain and dinnerware at him and smashed up the furniture. Two years ago, when her condition was becoming unmanageable, she took all them books from the library and started an enormous bonfire out the back. It’s a miracle the whole of the wood didn’t go up. Poor Mr Greybourne managed to get the blaze under control, but you can’t replace a collection like that. He went on a terrible rampage that night, doing a fair bit of damage of his own. He don’t know that I saw him growling and smashing his fists into the wall, but I did.’
Marcus had a temper then, Luna noted.
‘Was it because she was so destructive that you put bolts on the doors?’ It finally occurred to her that they were to keep the woman out, not lock her in.
‘Saved what possessions he could – you can’t set fire to the silverware – hid what he could in the attic and gathered what remained of the furniture in the drawing room, just so’s he’d got a place he was safe. Locked her out if he was elsewhere, and himself in when she got too violent. Jed and I have locks on our rooms, too, though it weren’t largely us she wanted to hurt.’
Again, her eyes darted about as though she was afraid they might be overheard. It was becoming obvious that she was intimidated by her husband – maybe she didn’t want him to know that she was talking about such matters. Or perhaps she thought the Ravenswood Witch was listening.
‘She tried to kill him several times. Attempted to strangle him whilst he was sleeping and set fire to his bed; that’s when he added the locks.’
The revelations were becoming increasingly disturbing and it confirmed Luna’s decision to leave as soon as her ankle was strong enough, even though she had begrudgingly accepted that there was another magic at play. She could feel it wrap its gentle arms about her – a kindness from the housekeeper, and even from Marcus himself, along with the protection that Bran offered. There were two forces toying with her: good and evil. It was as if both wanted to weave their spell about her and anchor her to Ravenswood for entirely different reasons.
‘And he never locked her up?’
Mrs Webber shook her head. ‘Not once. Remember him saying she was like a wild cat – “trap her and she’ll become even more savage”. Always insisted she was free but that she was his responsibility and, as she became more unmanageable, his life became more focused on her, with little time for anything else.’
So, Marcus had spent the last few years looking after his increasingly unstable wife, helpless as she destroyed everything that was precious to him, and living with the stigma that he was married to a witch. No wonder he was occasionally driven to moments of rage. Her heart went out to him; he had suffered, as she had, at the hand of another. Perhaps it was a good thing he thought witchcraft was all poppycock; his pragmatism probably saved his sanity.
‘Where is she?’ It was the question she needed answering the most, but she had promised Marcus she would not pry into his past if he did not pry into hers.
‘I wish I knew. She went off into them woods and for all I know, she’s still out there. I get this queer feeling sometimes, like she’s watching me, so p’raps it’s best we talk of other things; I don’t want none of her cursing.’
The woman was genuinely distressed so Luna changed the subject as she tore a corner from her bread and tossed it to the floor for Bran.
‘I appreciate the undergarments you found me, and the nightgown…’ She had discovered that the reason her nightwear was so voluminous was that Mrs Webber had supplied one of her own the day Marcus had brought her to the house. ‘But is there a wardrobe of clothes I might use?’ she asked, aware Marcus had precious little money for that end. She only had the dress she had arrived at Ravenswood wearing, even though Mrs Webber had washed it that first evening, but it was in desperate need of repair; the hems particularly frayed from scrambling through undergrowth to evade capture by the constable .
‘Not much that is suitable. Your predecessor tended to wear things that were… unconventional – draped herself in bed sheets and curtains. Most of the nicest gowns were shredded in a mad rampage, but there might be something locked in the attics.’
Luna really had destroyed everything in this house. From defacing the walls to ripping up her own dresses, the woman had run wild.
‘Perhaps you would be so kind as to bring me what remains, and I’ll see whether I can cobble together something serviceable. Is there a sewing box I can use?’
‘Not any more. The pins were used for… other purposes and the pretty rosewood sewing table that belonged to Mr Greybourne’s mother was destroyed.’ She didn’t need to say by whom.
‘I’ll make something from the curtains, if I have to, but I must have at least one other dress.’
‘Jedidiah goes into the village tomorrow to pick up groceries and the like. Shall I get him to stop at the haberdashers and buy some pins, needles and coloured threads from Mrs Cole?’
Luna nodded. She didn’t like the idea of spending Marcus’s money unless necessary – it seemed he had precious little of it – but she could hardly live in the same dress until either she was well enough to leave, or he returned next month, regardless of how few visitors he professed would call. After all, she’d already entertained one unexpected gentleman caller.
‘That would be most kind. Thank you.’
Later that evening, as she readied for bed, she used the crutches to manoeuvre herself over to the large wardrobe that stood near the door. In his letter, Marcus had said she could use anything in the house she could find, and she wondered if there might be something suitable still hung inside, but it only contained those clothes of his that he had not taken away with him. This was, as she suspected, no longer a bedroom the Greybournes shared, but instead his alone – perhaps his only real place of sanctuary.
Her mind wrestled with all the revelations of the day, as her heart wrestled with conflicting emotions. Perhaps she should stay until his return. It would be the polite thing to do. But as she went to close the wardrobe door, she noticed a run of words scratched into the wood, jagged and rough, haunting and alarmingly prophetic, making her reassess her decision of moments earlier.
She is coming.
She will replace me.
She must die…