Hilde
How was time passing for Elmwood, she wondered, down under the ground, being tormented by his worst memories in the dark?
She recalled watching him after their first ill-conceived descent into the root cellar, shaking in the moonlight and gasping to catch his breath.
Now he was alone in that darkness, with no way out and no respite.
It was unbearable to think of.
The Harrier was saying something to her. She tried to pay attention.
“Is he even coming home, I wonder? I must say, I am beginning to think it a little strange that I have not had a single word from my brother for over a month, only excuses for his absence from your lips.” He squeezed her face with his huge hand.
“And we all know now what kind of things you’ve been up to with those. ”
Her body laughed then, though she was not certain why. It wasn’t funny to her mind, but then, her mind hadn’t been working very well since he’d put his hands on her.
Her laughter seemed to have some effect on him, and he released her with a jerk, shoving her away.
“It’s true, isn’t it? You’ve done something to him, haven’t you?
” he said. There was something almost fearful in his voice.
It couldn’t be that he was truly concerned for his brother, for whom he had only contempt.
No, it must be because he was realizing there was a possibility that he had underestimated her.
He was beginning to understand that he was not as in control of everything as he had assumed.
That struck both her body and mind as funny, so she laughed again, this time louder, letting her chest heave with it.
“It never even occurred to you,” she said, still gasping. “The staff figured it out immediately, but Duke Engelbrooke, the Western Harrier, famous for his strategic prowess, let himself be outwitted by a farmer’s daughter.”
“Where is he?” the Harrier demanded, advancing on her again.
“I’m sorry, Your Grace, but I must regretfully inform you that your brother is—”
“Starving! What, has dinner started without me? I’m not that late in coming home, surely!”
The room stilled.
Hilde turned to the door, unable to understand what she was hearing. That voice. It could only be…
Thorgoode.
Thorgoode was alive.
Thorgoode was alive and standing in the entrance of the Hall with Elmwood beside him.
“More bread!” Hilde watched in horrified fascination as Thorgoode broke the loaf that Ed offered him in half, then tore into it like a man starved, even though she’d already watched him eat two others.
She couldn’t believe he was sitting there, chewing bread.
When she had begged Elmwood to do this, to bring him back, she had not been capable of imagining the strangeness of it.
It was almost as if everything that had taken place since that evening when she found him lying dead in the pasture had been nothing but a dream.
No. It could not have been a dream, for there was Elmwood, seated to Thorgoode’s right, and the Harrier, to his left.
She kept looking at Elmwood, trying to understand.
How and why had he found the will to use his Charm?
Was he well? His expression was carefully blank as he toyed with his food, and he wasn’t meeting her eyes.
He had given her one desperate glance when he’d entered the Hall with Thorgoode, and she had been so overwhelmed with relief at seeing him unharmed that she had called out his name like a lovesick fool.
Then Thorgoode had strode over and hauled her off her feet for a kiss, as if he had not been dead for weeks.
Now Thorgoode sat there consuming food at a prodigious rate, chortling and chatting away even though no one mirrored his jovial mood, and behaving not in the least like the mindless revenant that Elmwood had described as being the inevitable result of his Charm.
Was it because she had also used her Charm on him?
She could not discern how she felt about any of it.
Relieved, of course, that he was not some unfathomable monster, but also terrified.
For if somehow he was truly restored, what did that mean?
Were they to pick up where they had left off? That seemed quite impossible.
At least his sudden return seemed to have disarmed the Harrier, who was not eating but rather watching Thorgoode and Elmwood warily, with a suspicious line crinkling his brow.
“This broth is delicious!” proclaimed Thorgoode, slurping at a bowl of soup. “Francie! Bring more of this, and tell Cook she’s outdone herself!”
“Yes, Your Lordship,” said Francie, and then fled the room.
“Brother, I must ask you again. Where have you been?” said the Harrier.
“Oh, here and there!” said Thorgoode, dunking another half loaf into the soup and then downing it, talking around the bulk of bread in his mouth. “Business to attend, and all that!”
“I could not track you down for more than a month,” said the Harrier. “My letters went unanswered.”
“You’ve found me now, haven’t you?” said Thorgoode. “Pass the butter!”
Elmwood was frowning a little, she noticed, as he slid a butter dish down the table to where Thorgoode could reach it. Thorgoode then cut half the molded butter away with his knife and slathered the entirety of it thickly on the second half of the loaf.
The Harrier tapped one finger on the table.
“All the same, I must be able to reach you regarding matters of the estate. You well know the conditions of your management of the Croft.”
“Why should there be conditions?” Hilde’s voice rang out across the table before she was even aware that she intended to speak.
Everyone turned to look at her. She clenched her jaw, her eyes on Thorgoode.
“Why should there be conditions if Croftholde is Thorgoode’s estate, granted to him by your grandfather?
Why should you have any say at all in how we manage things here? ”
“Did he really tell you that?” said the Harrier. “Tsk, tsk, brother. I may not be married myself, but I know it’s not good form to lie to your wife, even if she is fucking this disgusting Charmer behind your back.” He gestured to Elmwood, who froze in place.
There was a moment of utter silence, and then Francie came in carrying a platter of roasted goose. She glanced frantically around.
“Begging your pardon, but there was no more soup, Your Lordship. Cook has sent this up instead. Shall I serve it?”
“Yes, give it here!” said Thorgoode. Francie went right over, and Thorgoode began piling greasy portions of goose onto his plate with one hand while commencing to eat them with the other, in a fashion that made Hilde’s hair prickle, both from the grotesque nature of it and the anger that was now surging through her.
It was as though he had not even noticed Hilde’s outburst or his brother’s insult.
“I just told you that your wife has been having an affair with—” began the Harrier, but Thorgoode cut him off.
“What a lovely dinner we’re having! It’s good to be home, at one’s own table! My, what a happy family we make!”
Hilde realized all at once that she’d had enough.
“Why?” she said, knowing her voice sounded shrill. “Why did you pretend that my hopes for this place were possible?”
Thorgoode continued eating almost frantically, staring at her with wide eyes, as if he could not stop to answer her question.
She stood abruptly, letting her chair topple backward.
“Answer me!”
Finally, as if it took great effort, he set down the goose and let his hands fall to his lap. He raised his eyes to hers.
“I lied to please a pretty girl I loved. I feared my love alone was not enough for her, and I hoped, when death came for me, that she would forgive me.”
His words had a strangely inevitable quality.
Perhaps that was why she had not felt angrier when she first learned he had lied to her.
She had already known the reason, in her heart.
His love for her had always been a bold, obvious thing—a signal light burning brightly on a hilltop.
Her love for him had tried to answer that call, but without meaning to, she had kept some part of herself smothered.
He had tried to illuminate that darkness with a lie, because love was an imperfect, flawed thing.
But she was learning that an imperfect love was sometimes enough.
“I will forgive you, if you will forgive me,” she said.
He closed his eyes and nodded once.
“Wait,” said the Harrier, drawing her attention as he rose to his feet with something like horror finally dawning on his face. “Death? Do you mean to say that…” He trailed off, then turned his eyes to Elmwood. “You dared to use your filthy Charm upon my brother?”
Elmwood grinned at him, but there was no joy in it.
“Vengeance cuts to the bone, doesn’t it?”
For a second, it felt like somehow, they had won. Then the Harrier reached underneath his coat and pulled out a pistol, raising it to point at Elmwood.