Chapter 7
On their third day, the rain had turned to sleet by the time they finally stopped near dusk. Travelling in darkness across rough terrain slowed everything. The horses couldn’t be pushed, and the mountains didn’t care about urgency.
Oliver’s horse stumbled for the third time in as many minutes and he made the call. “There,” Webb said ahead of him, his voice rough with pain. He pointed toward a darker shadow against the mountainside. “Cave, maybe. Or another hut.”
It proved to be both. A stone structure built into the rock face itself, larger and more substantial than the shepherd’s hut they’d left behind. The roof was solid mountain, the walls thick, and most importantly it was empty.
Oliver dismounted first, then helped Megan down. She swayed when her feet touched the ground, and he caught her elbow to steady her. Even through the sodden fabric of her cloak he could feel her trembling, whether from cold or exhaustion or something beyond both, he couldn’t tell.
“Can you stand?”
“Yes.” Her voice was thin, unconvincing.
He kept his hand on her arm a moment longer, then released her and moved to help Webb dismount.
The former sergeant’s face was gray beneath the dirt and rain, his jaw set against pain.
The shoulder wound had bled through the makeshift bandage Megan had applied earlier, a dark stain spreading across his coat.
“Inside,” Oliver ordered. “Both of you. I’ll see to the horses.”
For once, Megan didn’t argue. She moved toward the shelter with Webb leaning slightly on her shoulder, an odd sight, this slight woman supporting a solidly built soldier. But she managed it, her spine straight despite her obvious exhaustion.
Oliver led the horses around to the lee side of the structure where an overhang offered some shelter from the sleet.
All three animals were near collapse, steam rising from their heaving flanks.
He removed their tack with practiced efficiency, rubbed them down as best he could with handfuls of hay he found stored beneath the overhang, and left them with a bucket the rain had already begun to fill.
It wasn’t enough, but it would have to do.
When he entered the shelter, he found Megan had already coaxed a fire to life in the stone hearth. The flames were small and carefully contained. She’d understood without being told that the smoke would give them away. Webb sat propped against the wall nearby, eyes closed, breathing shallow.
“He’s coming down with a fever,” Megan said without preamble. She kneeled beside Webb with one hand on his forehead, already working on the blood-soaked bandage beneath his coat. In the firelight Oliver could see the competence in her movements. “The wound needs proper cleaning, or it will fester.”
Oliver shed his sodden coat and crouched beside her. “What do you need?”
“Hot water. Clean cloth. Whiskey to disinfect.” She glanced up at him. “I don’t suppose you packed a medical kit?”
“We have whiskey. I can boil water.”
“Then it will have to be enough.” She returned her attention to Webb, her fingers gentle as she peeled away the crusted bandage. “I brought some healing herbs in my satchel.” She glanced at Webb. “This is going to hurt. I’m sorry.”
Oliver watched her work as she heated water in a small pot over the fire, mixing in the herbs, tearing strips from her already ruined chemise to make fresh bandages.
Her movements were sure and practiced. Not the fumbling attempts of someone playing at nursing, but the confidence of real experience.
When she poured the heated whiskey over onto Webb’s wound, the former sergeant came awake with a strangled curse, his good hand clenching into a fist. Oliver caught it.
“Easy, Webb. She’s helping.”
“Christ,” Webb gasped, his accent thickening with pain. “It feels like she’s killing me.”
“Would you prefer gangrene?” Megan’s voice was matter-of-fact, and Oliver saw the corner of Webb’s mouth twitch despite his discomfort.
She packed the wound with herbs and bound it with fresh bandages, her small hands working with surprising strength. When she finished, she sat back on her heels, tucking a strand of wet hair behind her ear. “That’s the best I can do. He needs rest, warmth, and food.”
Oliver had already moved to unpack what remained of their supplies. The rations were meagre, dried meat and hard cheese and the hare he’d shot at twilight the night before. He divided it into three portions, then redistributed it without comment, giving Megan and Webb the larger shares.
“That’s not fair,” Megan said.
“You’re half my size and he’s injured. Eat.”
She looked at the food in her hands, then at him, and something shifted in her expression. She ate in silence, small careful bites, making it last.
Webb drifted into feverish sleep. Oliver covered him with both remaining blankets, leaving himself and Megan with only their damp cloaks.
The fire crackled. Outside, the wind howled. Oliver should be planning their next move, calculating routes and risks.
Instead, he once again found himself watching Megan.
She’d moved to the far side of the fire, as far from him as the small space allowed, and sat with her arms wrapped around her knees, staring into the flames.
Her fair hair had come loose from its pins, hanging in wet tangles around her face.
She looked nothing like the elegant captive he’d observed through his spyglass.
She looked real. Exhausted. Frightened. And unbearably brave.
“You should sleep,” he said quietly.
Megan’s laugh was brittle. “Should I?”
“You’re safe here.”
“Am I?” She turned to look at him, and his chest tightened at the expression in her eyes. “I’ve been dragged through a freezing river. I’m being hunted by the most dangerous man in Wales. Forgive me if I don’t feel particularly safe.”
“I meant what I said at the lodge. I won’t hurt you.”
“The only man who has ever had power over me said something similar.” Her voice was soft. “Usually right before he hurt me.”
“I’m not Penharrow.”
“No?” Her eyes glittered in the firelight. “Then tell me, my lord. Why should I believe you’re any better? You want something from me.”
There it was. Oliver considered his answer. She deserved better than comfortable lies.
“You’re right,” he said. “When we reach England, I need you to tell your story. Give testimony to what Penharrow has done.” He paused. “But when that’s done, you’re free to go wherever you choose. I won’t stop you. That’s not a trick or a bargain. It’s the truth.”
The silence stretched. Megan studied his face as if looking for a crack in it.
“Free,” she said finally, and the word came out strange, as though she were testing the shape of it. “I haven’t been free since I was young. I barely remember what it felt like.”
“Tell me,” Oliver said.
“Why?”
“Because you need to say it.” He held her gaze. “Because I need to hear it.”
Megan was quiet for so long he thought she wouldn’t answer. Then, still staring into the fire, she began.
“I remember a village fair. Ribbons and music and honey cakes. A woman was with me. I remember how tightly I held her hand.” She swallowed.
“And then a handsome man smiled at me. Offered me an apple. The woman turned away for just a moment.” A pause.
“Gone. Just like that. One moment I was a child with a family, and the next I was in a carriage with a stranger who told me my old life was over, and that my name was Megan.”
“What was your name?”
“I can’t remember.”
Oliver’s hands had closed into fists. He held himself still and didn’t speak.
“Penharrow kept me like a doll at first. Pretty dresses, lessons in deportment and the pianoforte. He told me I was his special girl. His treasure.” Her laugh was hollow. “I believed him. God help me, I was so desperate for kindness that I believed every word.”
“You were a child,” Oliver said. “You couldn’t have known.”
She didn’t seem to hear him. “I was sixteen when he decided I was ready.” Her voice dropped to barely a whisper.
“I fought him. That first night, I screamed and fought and begged, but no one came. The servants were too frightened to act against him. The nearest magistrate was in his pocket. I was utterly, completely alone.”
Oliver said nothing. There were no words adequate to what she was describing, and the impulse to reach across the fire and take her hand was one he had to actively suppress. Not yet. He had no right.
“Five years of being his possession,” she continued.
“His prisoner in all but name. Years of wearing what he chose, smiling when he commanded, accepting his touch because refusal meant punishment. Not always for me. For whoever he’d decided had shown me too much kindness.
” She pulled her knees tighter to her chest. “I tried to escape. Four times. Each time he found me, and each time the punishment fell on someone else.”
She stopped. When she spoke again, her voice was different, scraped thin.
“The last time, there was a stable boy, Daniel. He was kind, barely twenty, and when I asked if he might help me get a message out, he agreed.” Her throat moved.
“Penharrow had him hanged in the stable yard. Made all of us watch. Made me watch, his hand on my shoulder, his voice in my ear, telling me this was what happened when I made him angry.”
The fire popped. A log shifted.
Oliver looked at her.
He’d seen men broken by the war. He’d seen what sustained cruelty did to a person, how it hollowed them out and left something smaller and more frightened where a whole person used to be. He’d thought he understood the shape of it.
He hadn’t understood anything.