Page 9 of Spellbound
Picking up his clothes, she draped everything over the chair backs near the hearth or on nearby pegs so they could dry. Then she returned to the bed once more and placed her hand to his forehead. No fever. Not yet. But it was a nasty gash and he’d been out in the elements for longer than she liked. The risk was significant. Tucking the blankets around him, Bella went to the kitchen and began gathering some herbs. When she returned to his bedside, she gently tended the wound, applying a poultice to it that would ease the bruising and swelling and hopefully spare him any petrification of the wound. As she did so, he stirred, fitful and clearly in pain.
“Shh… be still. Let the remedies do their work,” she said softly. “You will feel better soon.” And he would. Because she would not let the curse take him.
Under her breath, as she continued her ministrations, she began to chant softly. The words would seem nonsense to anyone else, but there was power in them. She felt it coursing within her, welling up and spilling out. Hoping it would be enough, she didn’t stop the slightly melodic incantation until she’d finished treating his wound. Then she simply sat back, waiting for whatever it was that would come next.
Desmond driftedin and out of consciousness. Any movement resulted in pain, his head feeling as though it would simply explode. But there was something else, something more than just the pain. Strange as it was, there was also a kind of solace—a peacefulness. Soft hands soothed his skin and bathed his brow. A sweet and feminine voice,a familiar voice, whispered low and soft, offering a kind of comfort that was entirely foreign to him. A vision danced in his mind of a lovely, pale face with cherry red lips and a wealth of dark waving hair surrounding it. A woman whose kiss could render him senseless. A woman whom he desired above all else.
Still he clung to that voice, clung to her touch. It was his peace, his respite. But all the while, there was something else that hovered around the edges. A sense of urgency pressed upon him. Why? Why was he in pain? How had he come to be where he was? Was the angel in his mind’s eye in some sort of danger?
Lost in the confusion, he could do nothing but give himself over to the tender care of a person he knew nothing of. Save for kindness. She was unfailingly kind. That sort of kindness wasunfamiliar to him. So much so that he had to wonder if perhaps it wasn’t simply some fevered dream, a hallucination crafted in his mind to offer him something that was sorely missing in his day to day life.
Thoughts of his life in London brought tension to him instantly. He didn’t want to go back there. He didn’t want to return to the loneliness that he now knew had been his constant companion. Whether that tension caused more pain or simply made him more aware of the pain that already existed, he could not bite back the groan of discomfort that escaped him.
Instantly, those cool hands were there again, stroking his hair, touching his face with a gentleness that was simply an anathema to him. He opened his eyes, looking up to see her lovely face looming over him.
“You are my angel,” he whispered.
A soft laugh was the immediate response. “You would be the first to say so… but you mustn’t talk. Rest. Just rest, Desmond. All will be well.”
“It’s not safe,” he said. “It’s not safe for you here because I’m in no condition to protect you.” But his words were frantic, almost insensible. He was slipping away again, but that sense of urgency allowed him to hold on for just a moment longer.
“Who did this to you?”
He didn’t answer. Unconsciousness claimed him again, and he slipped into the darkness.
NINE
Desmond awakened in the darkest hour of the night. His body ached, a sure sign that he had lain in bed for far too long. It was pitch black save for a single glowing ember in what he had to assume was the hearth. There was a bit of a chill in the air, though not so much that he felt compelled to linger any longer in his borrowed bed. There was a restlessness in him, a need to move,to do something.
A soft fragrance hung in the air that teased his senses to full wakefulness. Lavender and sage and other scents he could not recognize mingled together to form a soothing aroma. It was thirst however that had him sitting up in bed. When the pain didn’t explode in his head once more, he tossed back the blankets and placed his bare feet on the floor. His confidence was short lived. The moment he attempted to stand, a wave of dizziness washed over him, forcing him to once more sink to the bed. But he remained sitting which seemed a small victory.
A noise sounded in the darkness, then the flare of a match striking tinder. The soft warm glow of a candle began to grow, spreading pale light in a circle around the woman who held it aloft. Soft as it was, still he winced, his eyes sensitive to even thatsmall bit of light. Which led him to wonder just how long he’d been unconscious.
Squinting into the light, he saw a familiar form.Not a dream.Belladonna was there. The tender hands that had soothed and tended him while he was drifting in between wake and sleep had been hers. Desmond stared at her, watching her through the flickering flame of the candle. And it dawned on him that he needed her. It wasn’t simply desire or attraction. It wasn’t even something so mundane as infatuation or so as glorious as love, though he imagined all of those things were part of it.. He needed her like he needed his next breath. To be with her, to be near her, had become vital to his very existence.
Silence stretched between them, fraught with things he hoped for but dared not name. At last, she was the one to speak, the one to break that spell that seemed to surround them.
“You are awake! I am ever so relieved. I feared the severity of your wound might be beyond my powers to treat,” she said. “Do not try to stand. You are still much too weak.”
It was true, he well knew. His first attempt had proved that. But it begged an answer to a very particular question. He was far weaker than he ought to have been in simply a single day, head wound or no. “How long have I been out?”
“You have been here for more than two days. In and out of consciousness, but thankfully there has been no fever. The swelling and bruising on your forehead has started to recede some.”
Desmond thought, for at least a split second, that he should correct her. He did indeed have a fever, but it wasn’t born of illness. It was her. Reaching up, he gently probed his forehead. The tenderness at even that simple touch made him rethink the strategy. But he needed her to know something quite urgently. He felt in his bones that he needed to share that thought with her. “I am so grateful to have met you.”
Her eyes widened and then she shook her head dismissively. “You can’t possibly mean that. Not after all this. You were hurt because of me.”
“It was an accident.” Even uttering that, it felt false. Wrong. Untrue.
“You’re not certain of that, are you?” She asked him.
No. No, he wasn’t. Try as he might, he could summon no memory of what had transpired. The kiss—that magical and drugging kiss they had shared— in the cleaning was the last thing he recalled. “What else could it have been?”
She moved back to the table and poured a cup of tea, adding cream and sugar to it—strangely enough in just the amounts he preferred—before walking towards him. “It was not an accident, Desmond. You were struck down… felled by someone on the road, no doubt.”
“A robbery,” he insisted. “Footpads. They certainly abound here.” The death of his brother-in-law was proof enough of that.
She shook her head, smiling sadly. “You were not robbed. All your belongings are accounted for, well save your shirt and neckcloth. Necessary sacrifices, I fear. Whomever hurt you was not motivated by greed.”
