We were approaching the end of the row and I saw open country beyond. The last house on the left was quite big, had a stout and well-made fence and looked to be in good repair, and I was just wondering what was the purpose of the fence, and what it could contain, when suddenly an unearthly noise fractured the deep silence.
It made me jump so badly that it took me a few moments to realize what it was, and by then it had virtually stopped. It had been made by a small flock of geese, and already Jack was among them, his calm, deep voice quieting them as he encouraged them back inside their pen.
He looked sheepishly at me. ‘They make very good guards,’ he said with a smile, ‘and usually they don’t make a sound when I come home.’
‘When you-’
Of course.
It appeared I’d been right when I’d extended my imagination a little, and guessed that it was where he still lived.
‘This was your parents’ house,’ I said.
‘It was,’ he agreed. ‘It was where I was born, and now it’s my home.’ He pushed open the door. ‘Please, come inside.’
With a quick look at the geese, still watching me warily as if just dying for an excuse to have a peck, I gathered up my skirts, went through the gate and closed it carefully behind me, then hurried up the path and into the house.
For a workman’s house, it was indeed a good size, with a main room containing a hearth in which embers were glowing, shelves on which stood pots, platters and mugs, and a couple of offcuts of tree trunks to act as seating. The wall on the far side of the room was interrupted by an arched opening, beyond which I could just make out the shape of folded blankets, set on a low bed. As I’ve so often reflected, the secret of living in a restricted space – as the vast majority of us have no choice but to do – and not going mad with frustration is to keep it tidy and be vigilant over what you allow to come over the threshold. In my work as a healer I visit countless homes, and I’ve seen the extremes: the dirty, crowded, desperate places where there is no comfort or solace, and the jewels of dwellings where someone – usually a woman – makes it her life’s work to make a precious little haven out of next to nothing.
Jack’s house definitely fell into the second category.
He’d been in the army, I recalled. No doubt that made a man tidy, even if he wasn’t so by inclination. I was just wondering about that when Jack said, with a degree of impatience, ‘Are you going to go on standing in the doorway? I’d quite like to shut out the cold.’
He pointed me to one of the tree-trunk seats, and I sat down. He built up the fire, set water on to heat and very soon was handing me a hot drink. I tasted honey and chamomile, and smiled across the hearth at him. He grinned back. ‘Not as good as yours, but I’m learning,’ he said.
The good atmosphere that I had detected in the deserted village was here, too, in the cosy house. I realized that, for the first time in ages, I felt safe. A lot of that had to do with Jack’s presence.
Which raised another question: were we both going to sleep here, and if so, where? Perhaps it was the result of everything I’d been through that night, but my heart was beating hard, my blood seemed to be racing through my body and I wanted more than anything to lie down beside Jack and feel his arms round me. I wanted to kiss him, hug him; I wanted us to be lovers.
The realization shocked me.
But I couldn’t deny it. It was far too strong for that, and I don’t believe in lying to myself.
I raised my eyes from the flames and discovered he was looking at me. I couldn’t read his expression, for his face was half in shadow. The silence extended and the tension became unbearable.
My mouth was dry and I had to sip my drink before I dared try to speak. ‘I’ll be all right here alone if you have to go back into the town,’ I said. It was cowardly, I know, for it might well make him think I didn’t want to be alone with him, and if he thought that, then, courteous and considerate man that he was, he’d probably leave.
Which I wanted and didn’t want, both at the same time, and so desperately that I was trembling…
After what seemed a very long time, he got up. He went through into the room beyond the arch, and I heard him moving about. Then he came back, a blanket in his hands.
‘Go to bed, Lassair,’ he said calmly. ‘I’m not going into the town until morning. I’ll sleep here, by the hearth.’
I stood up. For a moment we stood face to face. I very nearly reached out to him, and I think it was the same for him. Neither of us moved a muscle.
I went on into the further room, unslung my satchel, took off my boots and my headdress, lay down and pulled the bedclothes over me. ‘Goodnight,’ Jack’s soft voice said from beside the hearth.
‘Goodnight.’
Sleep came quickly. I wouldn’t have expected it to do so, after all that had happened and given how I’d been feeling only a short while ago. But I must have been exhausted.
Just before I lost the power to think, something flashed into my mind. That strange moment in Gurdyman’s crypt when the light went out came back to me, and once again I saw what I’d seen, or, perhaps, what I thought I’d seen.
It must surely have been the result of my over-stimulated imagination; I had, after all, just witnessed a brutal killing, and what more likely a moment was there to see things that weren’t there?
And I couldn’t have seen what I saw, for when Jack lit the torch, it was to reveal that the crypt was empty of any human inhabitants except the two of us.
Why, then, was I so very certain that, in that blink of an eye, I had seen Gurdyman, Hrype and a third, shadowy figure – whether male or female, I couldn’t tell – standing there?
NINE
I woke from deep sleep to find soft morning light arrowing into the room through a long, narrow aperture set high up in the wall. I lay still, listening. Within the house, all was quiet. From outside, I heard the geese, cackling and quarrelling; perhaps they’d just been fed. There was also the splashing of water.
I had slept very well. I was sure I’d been dreaming; one or two very disturbing images still lurked somewhere near the surface of memory, but I forced myself to ignore them. I thought I’d woken once and called out, but perhaps that, too, was part of a dream. As was the feel of Jack’s warm arms around me and his deep voice telling me softly that I was safe, and the gentle touch on the crown of my head that felt just like a kiss…
It was time to get up.
I folded the blankets and the soft, sleek pelt that at some point in the night had been put over me, leaving the bed as neat as I’d found it. I smoothed my hair, put on my coif and bent down for my boots, then went through into the main room. Jack had left a bowl of water beside the hearth. I dipped my fingers in, to find that it was warm.
Before I washed, I needed to visit the privy. I went outside, to see Jack, stripped to the waist, kneeling over a trough and washing his upper body. That explained the splashing sounds. I stopped, staring at him. I’d known he was strong – his chest felt hard and solid as a barrel – but now, seeing him unclad, I could see the perfect muscles and the powerful shoulders. I was used to seeing the nakedness of both sexes, for people who grow up in households like my home do not have the luxury of privacy, and in my healing work over the years I have been presented with every inch of the human body.
You’d have thought I could look at Jack Chevestrier’s powerful form without my legs going weak.
I hurried across to the privy and was back inside the house before Jack had his head out of the trough.
By the time he came inside, fully dressed, his short-cropped hair wet and his face red from the cold, I was sitting primly beside the hearth, hands folded in my lap. ‘Good morning,’ I said. ‘Thank you for the hot water.’