Page 2 of The Remarkable Myth of a Nameless Lady
The horse snorted but stood as commanded. The two of them had finally come to an understanding of sorts. Jacob shook his head and used the pause as an excuse to take his bearings. The narrow Irish roads cut through the hills without markings, signposts few and far between. There was a crossroads here, and right now he was unsure which turning to take.
Beside him, a figure came out a farmhouse door—a woman with a ruddy face and a half dozen children clinging to her skirts. She shouted something to him, something impossible to make out between her thick accent and the squalling of the baby in her arms.
Ireland.
He thought the word with a world of contempt behind it. This was not the journey he would have chosen, and he longed again for a solid deck under his feet, the wind and the waves his to command.
“Ravencliff?” he shouted, making the name of the manor a question, hoping such would suffice in gaining him a direction—at least before he rode miles out of his way like he had twice already, since setting out from the docks of Belfast after his arrival from Liverpool.
The woman smiled and nodded, one arm pointing to the left of the branching road. What she shouted with the gesture was anybody’s guess. Likely further directions, that were of no consequence. He could always ask again at the next crossroads if it, too, proved to be unmarked. He reached into his pouch to fling her a coin, thanking her profusely before nudging the horse back into motion.
Her thanks were lost in the pounding of hooves. His mount loved to run and seemed near tireless, though he could not say the same for himself.Surely I must be near,he thought, as they traveled between emerald green fields dotted with sheep.I remember so little from the last time I was here.
But he’d been a boy then, and the trip had been made by carriage. He didn’t remember paying attention to the surroundings after the quiet monotony of several days on the road. The hills, though, seemed vaguely familiar, and the way the road rose between a copse of woods, the forest the town had been named for.
Ballycrainn.Place of Trees.
The name was the extent of his Irish, despite having had several Irish sailors under his command at sea. But then he’d been a Captain in the Royal British Navy—of course he would expect his crew to speak to him in the tongue of the country they fought for.
He reached the top of the hill and took a breath, turning to look back, and there before him lay the town, in the shallow bowl of the valley, a place carved out of the forest. For the second time in the last hour, he drew his horse to a halt. This time not to ask questions but to look first behind, then once again ahead.
Beyond lay the forest. In the distance, over the tops of the trees, he saw the ocean. Somewhere that way lay the old castle, and the manor house that was to be his home henceforth. Ravencliff.
The setting was idyllic. Beautiful even, in its dress of summer green, the color so intense as to seemingly burn his eyes to look upon it for too long.
He hated it. Every bit of it.
Chapter 2
She was still shaking. Alicia came through the door and set her basket down hard enough on the table it was a wonder the eggs didn’t break. This wasn’t how she’d intended the day to happen. If she’d had her druthers, she’d be at the market now, trying to keep Crichton true to his word about the agreed upon price for these eggs. She was counting on that money for a bit of lace to freshen her dress.
Instead, she was here at theBroken Tankardwith her father, the one place that she had sworn upon waking she would not go today. That black-haired dandy had spoiled everything with his sudden heroics. Even now, she half-expected him to be following her father through the door.
But the door swung shut behind Robert Price and those in the shadowy reaches of the room shifted anxiously, their greetings quiet. Alicia looked around in surprise, seeing the worried, wan faces around her and realized they had likely heard all, and expected, same as she, some manner of repercussion.
The fool. The green-eyed fool! What had he been thinking to challenge her father in the village like that? Robert Price held court in this pub with as much authority here as a king did in his castle. One word from him and the men in this room would have devoured such as that blue-coated Duke.
She fussed with the cloth covering the basket, removing it, ostensibly to check the eggs before tucking it back securely again. Around her the room came to life, quiet chuckles giving way to relieved laughter as the man at the window reported the Duke had mounted his fine horse and ridden away.
“I daresay our Duke isvery much put out,” called Colin, who fancied himself funny with the exaggerated English accent he placed on the last four words, his thick brogue disappearing entirely. He loved mocking their British landlords, and had practiced the accent a long time to good effect. The group roared now, with the confidence of those who knew they’d gotten the better of someone over them.
Alicia sat down hard on the bench in front of her and glared crossly around the room. There were few enough women in the gathering. The exceptions were old Maggie, who was busy pouring ale, and Kathleen, whose laughter was loud and coarse as she leaned over her lover, Connor O’Larendon. Connor blushed, which of course was why she was so blatant in her possessiveness. Kathleen was one who thrived on attention.
Her father chose that moment to join her, setting a mug of ale down so hard on the table in front of her that the contents sloshed over the edge. Alicia shifted her basket hastily away from the spreading puddle, having no wish to visit the market reeking of the stuff. This fact her father well knew, though he insisted on bringing her drinks anyway, then drinking them himself.
“Right proud of you for the way you stood up to him, my gal,” he rumbled, taking a long drink from his own mug before sitting down across from her. “Though had you listened in the first place, none of this would have happened.”
There it was, the backhanded compliments that would be the closest thing to praise she would ever be given by her father. She wanted to tell him the fault was his own, that had he not insisted on dragging her to the inn in the first place, none of this would have happened.
“I only ‘stood up to him’ as you so eloquently put it, because he is a Duke and a man such as that could have you horsewhipped if he so chose. Whatever made you challenge him like that?” Alicia asked, slapping her palms down on the table hard enough to make the mug jump. “A Duke!”
“Ah, my gal, Duke or no, he is travelling along on unfamiliar roads. Do you really think that had he pushed the matter he would have made it safely to Ravencliff? ‘Tis such a remote place, few would look hard at a tragedy…”
Alicia’s mouth dropped open as those around her chorused their agreement with no small amount of laughter. She shot to her feet, and grabbed her basket in one hand, gathering her shawl about her shoulders with the other. “Then you are all fools! You plot treason—”
Robert shook his head, making a clucking sound with his tongue against his teeth. “We seek only that which is right for Ireland, and for her people, colleen. You know that better than many of us here. Your own brother…”
“You would not be bringing Adam into this now…” Alicia’s voice wavered as she said her brother’s name, the pain still raw after four years.
