Chapter 7
Deliverance
The morning after, there were no further signs of the mysterious woman, and Ada and Gideon talked together as usual at the breakfast table.
My cunny was particularly sore, and my bottom hurt from the impact of his hand, so I was more quiet and watchful.
The news was the new preacher in town, a brother from the nearby St. Mary’s Abbey and the forecast for a long, cold winter.
“Grayspires will be ready for the winter this year,” Gideon said with satisfaction. “She will be warm to her bones.”
He always talked about the house as if she was a living, breathing woman, and I reflected irritably that he’d shown more concern for Grayspires than he ever had for me being warm.
I hadn’t had a fire lit in my room yet. Surely Ada hadn’t forgotten. . .
I felt like I would burst with curiosity.
Who had that woman been?
Why had she come to visit at night?
How could I find out the answers to all my questions?
“Oh, Deliverance,” Ada said. “Gideon told me that you’ve been subject to some nervous complaints recently.”
I jumped as if I'd been struck, and dropped my eyes in confusion to the tea cooling in my cup.
“No–no,” I said. “I don’t think I have.”
"He said you saw a woman here late at night," Ada went on after a moment. "Perhaps you were overtired. There was no woman.”
“But there was!” I cried. “I saw you open the door.”
She opened her eyes a bit, but reached over to pat my hand encouragingly. “It must have been a bad dream. Such things can often happen if you have a nervous constitution."
I said nothing. I did not have a nervous constitution. She obviously believed what her brother told her.
Was there any way it had all been a dream? But I could almost feel the prickling on my skin as my husband descended the stairs within inches of me.
And the feeling of his hand on my ass was very real.
They continued to talk of household matters, but I was still silent.
After breakfast, Gideon left for his workshop and Ada disappeared upstairs.
Meanwhile, I was faced with the prospect of another cold and dreary day. Although it was drippy and gray outside, I decided to go on a walk about the grounds for lack of anything else to do.
I had expected to be the mistress of Grayspires, a respected and important member of the household.
But all I was used for was my cunny.
The grounds were not particularly well-maintained, the flower gardens overrun and wild, with many uneven sections of earth and low, pitted rocks. But it would take a lot of gardeners to maintain a place like Grayspires. I wondered about the history of this place.
It felt like it had been here for centuries, the stone worn thin by the wildness of the moor.
As I pulled my wrap tighter against the wind, I passed by the stables. There was a rough, brutish looking fellow in front of them, engaged in latching the gate closed, but I noticed several fine new horses in there that I had not seen before.
"Oh, are these just bought?" I asked. “Beautiful creatures!”
Although I was a little afraid of the size of these animals, I loved to ride my own little pony back at home. Perhaps my husband and I had something in common after all.
The rough-looking man only grunted and gave me a dour look.
"That's the master's business, innit? None of your concern."
"I was just--curious!" I cried, but he turned his back on me.
Confused, I moved on.
Although I was afraid of the tangled, gnarled woods on the edge of the moor, I often sat at the dilapidated bench on the edge of them, looking down the steep rocky hill and into the gorge below.
My head was so occupied with my confused thoughts that I sat down without looking, and instantly felt a sharp stabbing pain in my back. Twisting around with a cry, I saw a long, vile-looking thorn protruding from the back of my chair.
It had sliced all the way through my gown, tearing the sturdy gray fabric into ribbons and bursting open my flesh so that big drops of scarlet blood oozed from between my fingers.
Whimpering in dismay, I tried to cover the ruins of my gown as well as I could as my blood dripped down onto my bare thighs.
As I hurried inside, I almost collided with Ada, and she could not but help seeing my distress.
"Oh my, what has happened?" she cried. "Come with me."
With one arm comfortingly around me, she led me up the stairs to the second floor west wing.
I was so distracted I didn't notice until I was inside how different her rooms were from my own.
Her bedroom was a beautiful, spacious place, decorated in a delicate forest green and petal pink.
Everything in there was crisp and shining.
Not worn.
I tumbled out the whole story as she carefully cleaned and washed my injury and helped me remove the ruined gown.
Shivering, I covered my breasts in shame. It seemed I made a mess of everything these days.
"What a wicked, vicious plant!" I cried out. "How could it be allowed to grow there?"
"I will send word to the groundskeeper," Ada said soothingly as she pulled out a gown for me. This one almost looked like servants' wear, but I was too grateful for her kindness to say anything. "He will destroy the plant.”
“Have you noticed—other strange things about the grounds?” I asked.
“Like what?”
“Like small animals. . . strange deaths, like some large creatures have been killing for no reason?”
She opened her eyes wider. “I haven’t seen anything like that. And I walk the moors every day. I would have noticed.”
My wounds stung. How could she possibly not know what I was talking about?
And why had I been placed in such a room in the east wing if quarters like this were available? Ada's room was so clearly designed to be the lady of the house's that I did not know quite where to look.
Perhaps there were no other rooms available, I told myself.
After all, she had been the lady of the house for way longer than I had.
And Gideon had no idea when he left that he would come back with a wife. But now was the time to talk to Ada privately about the woman I had seen.
"Ada, I know what I saw. Can you not think of any reason your brother would have a woman here at night?" I asked haltingly as I looked down at my new dress.
“Poor little wife," she said, her pink lips curving up at me, and I did not like the mocking tone in her voice. "Are you jealous, thinking Gideon is bringing women in here at night for carnal pleasures? Are you so bad at pleasing your own husband then?”
I was so stung and startled that I cried hastily, "I’m doing the best I can! Your brother is not the easiest man to please, you must know that!”
Ada's lips were stretched into a wide smile on her lovely face.
“Is he? I’m afraid he’s always kind to me.”
I said nothing in the sullen silence that ensued.
Kind? The smell of mold and rot in my own room grew stronger every day, and there was a spreading wet spot on the floor that I had to make a wide berth around.
“If you ask me,” Ada purred, running two pale white fingers along my chin, “you should be lucky he married you at all, after the whorish way you behaved.”
My cheeks burned. I had not intended to be whorish, and I began to realize how foolish and na?ve I had been, to ask a man I barely knew about how to please men.
“You can be assured, I will never have ratafia again,” I said stiffly, and left the room.
Gideon was not present at dinner, so Ada and I made desultory conversation.
It felt like there were more servants than before, bustling around Ada, bringing us delicious plates heaped with roasted pheasant.
I could not stop thinking about what changes had been made since the day I first arrived. In addition to the servants, there was an expensive new stable of horses, and I had seen workers repairing the broken windows outside.
Certainly Gideon loved Grayspires.
Perhaps it was the way of the world, I tried to remind myself as I lay in bed later. I should ask for a fire to be lit in my room, but I had been such a bother to Ada already that day that I didn't want to risk making her angry at me.
But as I shivered, I could not convince myself.
There was something wrong here. Something rotten and strange.
Then I heard a heavy tread outside my door. The doorknob turned, and I smelled his familiar scent–deeply masculine, a hint of smoke and leather, and something else, a spicy, unusual aroma I couldn’t place.
Gideon.
"I see you have chosen to be disobedient," he grated out, startling me with his words. "You were told to mind your business.”
With one harsh motion, he strode to the bed and flipped my body around so I was nose-first in the cushions.
Ada had told him about our conversation! I felt betrayed and angry.
Why would she do that?
My heart pounded as he entered me roughly, my hands gripping the bedclothes so I would not be bounced off onto the floor.
“I just want to know who the woman is,” I cried. “I know she was here.”
“And who are you to have any say in what I do or don’t do?” Gideon asked, his voice silky-smooth with malice. “If a wife displeases a man, he is free to go and do as he pleases.”
That angle did not occur to me, and I clutched desperately at the sheets.
"Speak, little mouse," he snapped.
"Does that mean I have to behave or you might–might find other women?” I whispered.
"Perhaps.”
He was thrusting into me with a hard, rhythmic motion, grinding the front of me against the bed over and over, and I began to feel that disconcerting heaviness between my thighs.
"I expect you to be a quiet, good wife. I did not marry you for your looks or because I was in love with you, Deliverance. I married you because I’m a gentleman who didn’t want to leave you to the usual fate of all whores and sluts.
You have a wet cunny. Your job is therefore to bear me children.
Otherwise, you must listen and do what Ada says and raise this cunny to me when I want it. Is that clear?"
"Yes, sir," I said resentfully.
So that is what my marriage was to be! No tenderness or love. So why was my skin tingling with anticipation of what was to come. . .
His thrusts were like to burst me apart, those two heavy sacs between his legs landing hard against my thighs as he tipped me into the air.
Closing my eyes tightly, I waited as his rough hands gripped me cruelly on my already-sore behind, and just as I felt the powerful deluge of his release fill me, I began to shudder, full-body convulsions that made me cry aloud with the shameful pleasure.
How could it be cruelty giving me pleasure and not tenderness?
Gideon pulled out, dragging his cock across my cheeks and dripping sticky wet drops all over my bedsheets and thighs.
Now I would be forced to sleep in the mess all night long.
"I am kind to you, Deliverance. Do not force me to be angry."
"Yes," I whispered, turning my face away.
If this was kindness, what was his anger like?
I cried myself to sleep in furious shame and humiliation. And all I could see before me was the beautiful blonde woman's face.
He had smiled at her, he had taken her arm gently.
If I was more like her, would he love me as his wife?
I had to find out who she was.
Because I did not believe what I had been told. Mr. Gideon Nightshade had not married me out of duty. I didn’t know why he’d married me.
But it could not possibly be because he was a gentleman.