Chapter Fifty-Two
Sybil
Sybil stared at John Griffin, wishing he had not come. Regretting most miserably that he should see her in such a broken state.
Those familiar gray-green eyes she had never forgotten now searched hers in a way that made the tight fist of her heart unfurl.
“I have been waiting seventeen years for a word from you,” he said softly.
She blinked.
He had been waiting for her?
All those difficult moments in her life when she had longed for him to be at her side. That painful year after he left. Her
mother’s death, having to scrape together skill enough to sell tinctures and simples to keep herself and Jacinda fed.
Even her marriage to Henry and their vow to one another, to respect and care for the other, knowing love to be impossible.
And after Henry’s death, the pain of his absence, the guilt of her role in his demise.
“Sybil, I love you.” John stepped closer.
But she pulled away, overly aware of the sharp odor of her person. “I’m…I’m not the same woman anymore.”
“But you are,” he protested. “Strong. Caring. Opinionated. Beautiful.”
A sob choked out of her, unbidden.
He approached again, slowly, cautiously, and lifted his hands to her face. “The same full lips I dream of at night and those
golden hazel eyes that see me in a light no other has since.”
“My hair—” Her voice caught.
“Will grow back, as lovely as it ever was.” There were new lines next to his eyes, a sunburst of crinkles she had not known.
Carved from laughter she had not heard and smiles she had not witnessed. Those lines transformed him from the boy of her memories
to the man he was now.
So much had changed since that boy and girl who fell in love.
And yet, as he stroked his fingertips over her jaw, as her body responded with a hitch of her breath and a quickening of her
pulse, she realized some things had stayed exactly the same.
She thought of Edith then, so convinced that she was ugly. How to those who loved her, she was beautiful.
Her loss struck Sybil anew in a blaze of agony.
Hot tears trailed down her cheeks before she could stop them.
John opened his arms, and she fell into them. The rasp of his wool robe scratched at her cheek, and she breathed him in. He
still smelled the same, fresh like a rainstorm with the underlying spice that was so unique to him. And when he put his arms
around her, she still fit perfectly against him.
He whispered her name as he held her, his voice warm with quiet affection. Slowly, his words melted into her heart, bolstered
her spirit. Until a semblance of her humanity finally returned.
When at last her sobbing ran its course, she straightened and apologized for having wept so unabashedly on his robe. The dark stain of her tears showed against the wool.
“I worried I would take too long to arrive,” John said. “I was in Ipswich when I received word from Kat. Then I was waylaid
by storms, and my horse threw a shoe. I thank God I am not too late. Surely there is something I might do.”
He had not let go of her hand, and she did not pull away. “You cannot beg for my release. It is far too dangerous. But you
can speak out against the atrocities that are being committed. They are starving us, walking us between chairs for days at
a time, having women bared and shorn—”
The words clogged in her throat. She could not give voice to such memories. Doing so made them too real when she would rather
they fade into the fog of her mind.
“They pricked me with a trick bodkin with a hollow handle and claimed I did not bleed, stating it was proof enough.” Sybil
took his hand, reveling in the warmth and strength of his long fingers. “John, I am condemned.”
He shook his head fiercely. “No, there has to be a way—”
“There is not.”
“I’ll preach against what is happening with my parish and to anyone else who will listen,” he vowed. “But you, Sybil, there
must be a way to set you free?”
She was about to shake her head when a thought came to her.
The valerian extract.
Sybil sniffed away the vestiges of her tears. “Mayhap, but it would be through escape.” She lowered her voice and glanced
toward the door, as if expecting the guard to walk through at any moment.
“I told him you wished counsel from a vicar,” John admitted sheepishly. “I think they hope it means you will confess.”
“I will never confess,” Sybil said vehemently.
“See there?” John grinned. “You are still my same Sybil. Resilient and with an iron will.”
My same Sybil.
How she cherished those words, and the way he saw strength in her that she had not felt in far too long.
Mayhap his seeing strength in her might bring it into existence once more.
“Come again tomorrow,” Sybil said. “See if you can find some clothing like the guards wear. Meet with a young woman named
Margery and give her the clothing to secret into the prison. And bring ale for the guards.” If the guards drank enough, they
would not taste the bitterness of the valerian root. “A lot of ale.”
“I shall return on the morrow.” John studied her, his gaze like a caress. “I will speak to people of what they have done here,”
he said quietly. “Of how they persecute the innocent. Of the unfairness and the brutality of Edith’s death.”
Sybil looked quickly away, unable to yield to her sorrow once more lest the loss consume her. Now was not for mourning.
Now was for fighting back.
For doing what she could to keep anyone else from dying.
John turned to go, but she caught his arm. “There is something I must tell you.” Her heart fluttered erratically and suddenly
she was breathless, lightheaded. “In case…”
In case the attempt to escape went awry and she never had the opportunity to speak to him again.
“What do you know of my life?” she asked. “Of me and my household?”
He tilted his head in that inquisitive way of his that conveyed she held the entirety of his attention.
“Jacinda,” she said.
It was so difficult to breathe. Her heartbeat thundered in her ears. Her thoughts racing.
He nodded. “Your sister.”
“Not my sister.” Sybil pulled in a deep inhale and clung to John’s hand. “My daughter.” She stared deep into his eyes, knowing
her next words would forever change how they saw the world. “Our daughter.”