Chapter Two
The ride to Withbey from London was long and uncomfortable but Ellis Gordon paid no attention to the jolting of the carriage as it ambled along the bumpy road, jostling his shoulders against the hard sides.
His mind was preoccupied with memories of the time he had previously spent in the area near the Yorkshire moors.
Images of the bonny Theodosia Bragg assaulted him.
Over and over, he replayed their last moments together.
The passionate kiss they had shared that promised more.
A future together.
A family.
And then it all came crashing down. Like a falling star hurtling from the sky to smash into the ground below. What once had burned bright, dimmed to naught quickly, and crashed to the earth.
Or at least that was what it had felt like to Ellis.
His future had been ripped away from him and he had no way of recourse.
Letters he’d sent had been ignored. Theodosia had never answered a single one.
It hadn’t been long before Ellis found out why—she was promised to another—according to her father.
She was no longer his and naught could be done to change that.
He rubbed his chest, just over his heart. The ache of losing the woman that was the love of his life was a physical pain that he could not shake. Ellis didn’t think he would ever heal from the heartbreak he’d suffered at the loss of Theodosia.
“Young Ellis, what has consumed your mind so?” Frederick Cole, his mentor, asked, eyebrows raised. “You’ve spent time in Withbey before, have you not?”
“Aye,” Ellis answered. “I left two years ago.”
“I find it to be quite the quaint getaway, if I do say so myself.” Frederick continued, either not noticing that Ellis hadn’t answered his first question, or not caring.
“The mapping of the moors you have been assigned will build up your resume more than anything you have done previously. Complete this successfully and you’ll be able to run your own cartography business. ”
Ellis nodded. It was exactly what he had been working so hard for. It was what he needed to ensure he could provide for the life he and Theodosia had oft talked about. His dream was coming true, but instead of a family, he was alone.
He pushed his hands through his thick hair and shifted his gaze to the window and watched as they passed thick trees with leaves painted in orange, red, and yellow hues.
A bright splash of color against a backdrop of brown.
The trees thinned as they rode further north.
The temperature dropped, but Ellis couldn’t decipher if that was from the chill in the air or in his heart.
“The roads you will be mapping are dangerous. Some might say treacherous. That part of the moors is untapped territory, but the magistrate says Withbey has plans to grow and they’ll be expanding into that area. They’ll need roads built.”
Ellis straightened, craning his neck to work out the kinks that had settled into his bones from traveling.
“I look forward to the challenge.” That was the truth.
He just didn’t look forward to whose path he would surely cross whilst he stayed in Withbey.
His heart tugged. He wanted to see Theodosia.
He shouldn’t want to. But he did. No matter how many times he tried to convince himself that he didn’t.
That things would be better if they didn’t see each other whilst he was in Withbey. But that was a lie. He kenned it.
“Who is the magistrate nowadays?” Ellis asked, hoping he would like the answer.
“Thomas Bragg. Same as when you were here then.”
And that name was what Ellis had absolutely not wanted to hear. Theodosia’s father would not be happy to find out that Ellis was the one that would be performing the mapping.
They hadn’t got on well two years ago and Ellis didn’t foresee a change of heart in the older man now. The passage of time would matter naught.
The carriage jolted to a stop in front of the Goose & Hound inn.
“Ah, we have arrived,” Frederick announced. As they exited the carriage and entered the inn to retrieve their room keys, he turned back to Ellis. “The gathering is this eve at the square. You should attend.”
Ellis gave a curt nod and Frederick walked away.
Theodosia would surely be in attendance.
He spent the rest of the afternoon willing himself to stand strong when he saw her, kenning it would be most difficult.
At the gathering, he purposely avoided the magistrate, not wanting to speak with him or draw his ire, which surely his presence would do.
The familiar rumblings of a headless coachman were murmured through the crowd. Without fail, the legend always made a reappearance this time of year. It didn’t escape him that the legend was tied to the very moors he would be mapping.
Ellis saw Thomas Bragg from afar and turned in the opposite direction to avoid the man, only to find his gaze clash with Theodosia’s instead. His breath caught in his throat. She was just as beautiful as the last moments they had spent together, whispering promises of love and eternity. He froze.
Time paused as their eyes locked. Hope bloomed in his chest, and then quickly burnt to ash as Theodosia spun around and fled.
A heavy sigh escaped his lips and he snagged a glass of scotch from a tray carried by a passing server. He took a sip and savored the burn the amber liquid lit in his chest as he watched her disappear into the crowd.
Making his way outside he moved to the edge of the square and nodded to a few men that called out his name in greeting.
Resting a hip on the stone wall that decorated the back of the space, he thought about his and Theodosia’s elopement plan.
They were to meet at the edge of the moors, each with a small bag for ease of traveling.
From there they would find a clergyman that would perform the ceremony.
Ellis was to send Theodosia a letter stating the date and time. He did, but never received a reply, nor did she show at their planned meeting point. He had waited hours, believing she had been delayed, before he finally conceded she wasn’t coming.
Weeks later, her father told him she had chosen duty over self, and was promised to another.
Seeing her today, every feeling he had been trying to forget came flooding back, hitting him like a cannonball to his gut, taking his breath away.
He left the gathering and returned to the inn, collapsing onto the bed. It had been a long day of traveling and old emotions resurfacing. He just wanted to sleep and forget everything.
Forget her.
Scrubbing his face with the palm of his hands, he tried to push Theodosia out of his mind. He was here to work. He’d busy himself mapping the moors as he had been tasked and leave. Hopefully, never to return.
The morn could not come soon enough and he looked forward to leaving the inn behind and trading his room for a tent, which he would pitch at the moors whilst he mapped out the routes for which he had been hired.
The air was cool and crisp as he walked the edge of the moors the next day, his gaze taking in the landscape spread out before him.
Thick haze blanketed the sloping, rolling hills, covered in heather that stretched for as far as he could see until they ebbed out into the North Sea.
It was a beautiful sight that he took time to savor for a while.
After pitching his tent against an outcropping of rocks that would protect him from the elements, he grabbed his survey equipment and trekked across the moors, looking for the best place to start.
A horse’s neigh grabbed his attention and he spun, but no horse was there.
His brows furrowed, his eyes scanned the land.
He was alone.
He returned to setting up his gear, unease creeping up his spine.
It was as if someone were watching him, but whenever he checked, he found no one.
He pushed away thoughts of the ghost of Lover’s Crossing as silly fodder.
All the talk of the apparition at the gathering last eve was making him hear things.
Confident in the designated spots he had chosen, he built a fire to get him through the encroaching night. Sitting back against the rocks, he looked over the land. There was no one about and all was silent. A quick shock of homesickness filled him.
It had been a few years since he’d left Scotland and his family, determined to make a name for himself on his own, without the influence of his brother, Duke of Gordon. He’d found his calling in cartography.
His eyes grew heavy and he tucked into the tent just as a light drizzle began to fall, the light pitter patter cadence of the rain lulling him to sleep.
Dreams of heavy hooves surrounding his tent woke him and he paused to listen and laughed it off.
Of course it was a dream.
In the morn, he checked his surveying gear and frowned when one of the compass needles spun wildly, never stopping. Underneath it, tacked to one of the tripod’s legs was something that hadn’t been there the night before.
Ellis plucked the object off and studied it. A small horse carved delicately out of wood. He lifted his gaze to see if anyone was there.
There wasn’t.
How odd.
Turning the figurine over in his hand, his breath hitched. Letters were etched into the horse’s side. But not just any letters.
T.B.
Theodosia’s initials.