Chapter 22 #2
Grisselle let out another low, shuddering breath, her head tossing weakly against the feather pillow. Her lips parted, a dry, unintelligible murmur escaping her throat—a string of frantic, hushed words spoken in the polished, clipped cadences of London drawing rooms.
Alpin leaned forward, his fingers tightening gently around her wrist, his thumb tracing the small bones of her hand.
"She was talking about a garden this morning," Isobel said quietly, her tone softening as she watched Grisselle’s fitful movements. "She spoke of a house with tall white pillars and roses that daenae grow in the damp. She thinks she's still there. She thinks she's in London."
"She isnae in London," Alpin said, his broad thumb continuing its slow, rhythmic stroke over her skin. "She is here."
"She nearly wasnae," Isobel replied gently.
Grisselle’s fingers suddenly twitched in his grip, her small hand clamping down on Alpin’s broad thumb with a surprising, desperate strength. Her dark eyes snapped open—clouded, wild, and unseeing, staring right through the heavy timber rafters above her head.
"The tide..." she rasped, her voice dry as dead leaves, her chest heaving as she struggled for air. "It's too heavy... I can't... the paper is wet..."
Alpin didn't pull his hand away. He leaned over the bed, bringing his face into her line of sight, his broad shadow blocking out the flickering candlelight.
"Grisselle," he said. His voice was no longer the hard, unyielding Laird's bark he used in the hall. It was low, solid, grounded deep in his chest. "Listen to me."
Her wild eyes darted to his face, her breathing ragged, her small frame shivering violently beneath the heavy wool blankets despite the heat burning in her skin.
"Ye are nae in the water," Alpin said, his free hand coming up to gently cup the side of her neck, feeling the hot, frantic pulse beating against his palm. "The shore is behind ye. Do ye hear me? Ye are in the keep. The roof is over yer head. I have ye."
She blinked, a tear slipping from the corner of her eye, hot against his thumb. For a fraction of a second, the clouded panic in her dark eyes seemed to part, a faint flicker of recognition touching her face. Her small fingers tightened their grip on his hand, her knuckles turning white.
"You..." she whispered, a faint, breathless rasp. "You... stubborn..."
A ghost of a smile touched the corner of Alpin’s mouth, brief and fleeting, before her eyelids fluttered shut again, her breathing slowing as she sank back into the heavy, deep stupor of the fever.
Isobel watched them, her hand lingering over the basin. She took a quiet breath, stepped back from the bed, and set the linen cloth on the wooden edge.
"She hears you," Isobel said softly.
Alpin didn't look up. He sat on the low stool, his large hand holding hers tight, anchoring her to the bed, to the room, and to the living world, refusing to let the dark take her back.
"She hears me," Alpin agreed quietly, his eyes fixed on her face as the second night of the fever began to fall outside the stone walls.
The light filtering through the high arch of the window was a pale, watery grey, but the warmth inside the bedchamber was suffocating. It was a thick, heavy heat—the scent of dried lavender, boiled willow bark, and the sharp, iron tang of smoldering peat.
Grisselle’s eyelids felt as though they had been stitched down with heavy linen thread. When she dragged them open, the vaulted ceiling of Herston Keep did not tilt, but the shadows clung to the stone corners.
A breath scraped out of her chest, dry and shallow.
"She’s moving," a voice rasped. It was Greer. The head housekeeper’s usually crisp linen cap was crooked, a grey strand of hair clinging to her damp forehead. Her apron, always pristine, bore a dark, rust-colored splash near the hem.
In an instant, the silence in the room fractured.
Isobel leaned over the edge of the mattress, her face so starkly white her freckles looked like spatters of dark mud across her nose. Her fingers, cold and trembling, caught Grisselle’s wrist, pressing hard against the pulse point as if counting the beats herself.
"Grisselle? Can ye hear me? Look at me, lass," Isobel whispered, her voice cracking on the last word. "Look at the window. Tell me what ye see."
Grisselle swallowed, her throat working against a desert of dust. "Grey," she rasped, the word barely more than a puff of air. "The... the sea-fog."
A ragged exhale rippled through the bedside.
Senga stood near the foot of the carved oak bed, her hands wringing the damp cloth she had been using to cool Grisselle’s brow. Her round face was drained of its bright color, her eyes swollen and red-rimmed.
"Praise the Saints," Senga muttered under her breath, crossing herself with a frantic, jerky motion. "Praise the Saints and the old stones."
"Quiet, both of ye," Greer barked, though her sternness was undermined by the hand she pressed over her own mouth. She stepped closer, reaching for a pewter cup on the nightstand. "Give her room to draw air. Isobel, lift her shoulder just a fraction, daenae let her strain."
"I have her," Isobel said quickly, sliding her arm beneath the heavy wool blankets to support Grisselle’s back. Her touch was unnaturally gentle, devoid of her usual quick, energetic movements. "Slowly now, Grisselle. Just a sip."
The rim of the pewter cup pressed against Grisselle’s lower lip. The water was lukewarm and tasted faintly of rosemary, but as it trickled down her throat, her head cleared enough to take in the rest of the room.
At the far edge of the hearth, half-turned away from the fire, stood Alpin.
He had not moved when she spoke. He looked like a statue carved from dark granite, his broad shoulders braced against the stone mantelpiece.
His dark plaid was discarded, his shirt unbuttoned at the throat and rumpled, the sleeves rolled up to his elbows to reveal forearms bruised and smeared with dried soot.
Black hollows sat beneath his eyes, deep as shadows in a ravine, and a dark stubble covered his jaw.
When his eyes met hers, he didn't smile. He didn't rush to the bed. His chest simply expanded in one massive, shuddering intake of air, his knuckles turning white where they gripped the stone mantel.
"Alpin..." Grisselle murmured.
He crossed the room in three long, silent strides. The floorboards barely groaned beneath his weight. He didn't ask the women to move, but Greer and Senga instinctively stepped back, leaving only Isobel holding her up.
Alpin dropped to one knee beside the mattress, bringing his dark head level with hers. His hand came up, heavy and warm, hovering over her face for a fraction of a second before his knuckles grazed her jawline. He was trembling, a tiny, involuntary vibration in fingers that could snap a pine bow.
"Ye're talking," he said, his voice a low, gravelly rasp, stripped of every ounce of his usual stern detachment. "Ye're looking at me."
"I am," she whispered, her hand dragging through the heavy coverlet to find his wrist. His skin was burning hot against her ice-cold fingers. "Why are you... why is everyone looking at me as if I've been dug out of a cairn?"
Isobel let out a breath that was half-laugh, half-sob. "Because ye bloody well near were, Grisselle. Three days. Three days ye've been burning through sheets, talking to spirits and asking for yer mother."
"Three...?" Grisselle frowned, trying to piece together the shattered fragments of her memory.
The chill of the entryway... the crying child...
the sharp, sudden pain that had doubled her over near the outer courtyard...
after that, there was only darkness and the sound of waves crashing against a shore she couldn't see.
"Drink the rest of this," Greer ordered, thrusting the cup back into Isobel's hands while her eyes remained fixed on Grisselle. "And daenae ye try to sit up proper yet, miss. Ye have no blood in yer cheeks to spare."
"Where is she?" Grisselle’s eyes darted past Alpin’s shoulder, searching the dimly lit corners of the chamber. "The bairn. The little girl from the door."