Kitabı oxu: «Lord of Legends»
Praise for the novels of New York Times bestselling author Susan Krinard
“Animal lovers as well as romance readers and those who enjoy stories about mystical creatures and what happens when their world collides with ours will all find Krinard’s book impossible to put down.”
—Booklist on Lord of the Beasts
“A poignant tale of redemption.”
—Booklist on To Tame a Wolf
“A master of atmosphere and description.”
—Library Journal
“Susan Krinard was born to write romance.”
—New York Times bestselling author Amanda Quick
“Magical, mystical, and moving … fans will be delighted.”
—Booklist on The Forest Lord
“A darkly magical story of love, betrayal, and redemption …
Krinard is a bestselling, highly regarded writer who is deservedly carving out a niche in the romance arena.”
—Library Journal on The Forest Lord
“With riveting dialogue and passionate characters, Ms Krinard exemplifies her exceptional knack for creating an extraordinary story of love, strength, courage and compassion.”
—RT Book Reviews on Secret of the Wolf
Also available from Susan Krinard
COME THE NIGHT
DARK OF THE MOON
CHASING MIDNIGHT
LORD OF THE BEASTS
LORD OF SIN
Lord of Legends
Susan Krinard
Now I will believe
That there are unicorns …
—William Shakespeare,
The Tempest
PROLOGUE
New York City, 1883
“MAMA? Mama!”
Portia Marron looked at Mariah the same way she had for the past week, her eyes slightly glazed and unfocused, as if she could no longer see the real world.
But the world as Mariah knew it hadn’t been real to her mother for many years. Portia saw one much more beautiful, inhabited by wondrous creatures who sometimes crossed the barriers in her mind to whisper in her ear.
“Mama,” Mariah said again, squeezing the frail hand. “Please come back.”
Briefly, the faded blue eyes cleared. “Is that my little girl?” Portia asked in the croak of a voice seldom used. “Now, now. Don’t you fret none.”
Mariah looked away. Mama had relapsed so far that she was living in the distant past, when Papa had still been working on the railroad with his own hands and muscle, and Mama had been a rancher’s daughter.
Papa had tried to put that past far behind him. He’d done his best to buy his way into New York society, but his efforts had proved largely futile. Wealthy as he was, he was still one of the nouveau riche, without an ancient family name to open the gates.
Not that Mama had cared. In fact, it had always seemed that the harder Papa pushed his family to enter a society that rejected them, the deeper Mama retreated into her realms of fantasy.
Mariah patted the withered flesh stretched over the hills of blue veins. “Yes, Mama,” she said. “Everything will be all right.”
The brief moment of coherence left Mama’s eyes. “Do you hear them?” she asked dreamily. “They’re louder now. They’re calling me.”
It took all Mariah’s control not to squeeze too tight before she released Mama’s hand. “Not yet, Mama. They don’t want you yet.”
“But they sing so beautifully. Can’t you hear?” Mrs. Marron rolled her head on the down pillow. “So sweet. You must hear them, my darling. They will be coming for you, too.”
Mariah shuddered, knowing her mother wouldn’t see. “Perhaps someday, Mama.”
“Someday,” Portia sighed, releasing her breath too slowly. Then she turned her head toward Mariah, and a strange ferocity took hold of her gaunt face.
“Don’t let those doctors take me back,” she said. “Promise me, Merry. Promise me you won’t let them take me.”
Sickness surged in Mariah’s throat. “No, Mama. I won’t.”
“Promise!”
“I promise.” She sketched a pattern across her chest just as she’d done as a little girl. “Cross my heart and hope to die.”
Mrs. Marron relaxed, the tension draining from her body. “You’re a good girl, Merry. Always have been. You never cared about them snooty harpies. The best of them ain’t as good as you.” She smiled again. “You remember when you was little, and I read you them fairy stories? How you loved them.”
“Yes, Mama.” She had loved them: fairy tales and all the romantic adventure stories about lost princes and hidden treasures. She’d half believed they were true. Not anymore.
Mama felt across the sheets for Mariah’s hand. “Don’t give up, Merry,” she said. “Sometimes the good things seem far away. Good things like love. But it’ll find you, my girl. Sooner or later, you’ll have to believe in something you can’t see.”
That was the old Mama. The one who had been less and less in evidence as the months and years passed. The one who never would have survived in the asylum if not for her invisible companions.
The one Mariah missed so terribly.
She leaned over to kiss Mama’s cheek. “You should sleep now,” she said. “When you wake, I’ll bring you a nice cup of tea and a few of Cook’s fresh biscuits.”
“Biscuits.” Mama slipped away again. “I wonder if they have biscuits there. I’ll have to ask.…” She closed her eyes and almost immediately sank into a deep sleep.
Mariah’s legs were trembling as she rose from the chair beside the bed. All her efforts had gone for nothing. She had been the one to insist that Mama be brought home, so she could care for her. But she’d failed. She was certain that Mama was dying for no other reason than that she wanted to go to that other place.
A place that wasn’t heaven. It wasn’t even hell. It didn’t exist at all and never had.
Mariah trudged down the stairs, hardly bothering to lift her skirts above the floor. The idea of dressing for dinner was repellent to her, but Papa would insist. He would not abandon the life he’d fought so hard to achieve, not even with death so close in the house.
“Miss Marron?”
Ives bowed slightly, always proper, as only an English butler could be. “Mr. Marron requests your presence in his office.”
“Yes, Ives. I shall be there presently.”
“Very good, miss.” Ives bowed again, passed her and continued up the stairs. Mariah wondered if Papa had sent him to check on Mama. He still loved the woman he’d married, though in truth she’d left him long ago.
Mariah continued on to the office and knocked on the door. Papa let her in, chomping furiously on an unlit cigar. His big bear paws hung in the air, as if he didn’t know whether he ought to embrace her or fend her away.
“Well, sit down,” he said, gesturing toward a chair. “I’ve something to discuss with you.”
She sat and smoothed her skirts, reminded again of how much she detested the new fashion of large, projecting bustles.
Papa cleared his throat. She sat up straighter. He still wanted her to be the proper lady, even when no one was there to see or care.
“You know your mother and I had always planned for you to have an advantageous marriage,” Papa began, sinking heavily into his leather chair. “You asked that we put off such discussions while … while your mother was indisposed. But it is now clear that she will not recover as we had hoped.”
“She needs more time,” Mariah said, knowing that she was lying to herself as much as to him. “Please, Papa. Be patient just a while longer.”
“No.” He stubbed out his cigar and leaned heavily on the ebony desk. “No more waiting, Merry. It’s time and past that you were married.”
To someone who will take me before I begin showing the same signs as Mama, Mariah added silently. If such a person existed.
“You may wonder if I have someone specific in mind,” he rushed on. “There is a fresh crop of English gentlemen arriving this season, and you will be meeting all of them.”
Impoverished gentlemen, he meant. “Viscounts” and “earls” and assorted “sirs” who were in desperate need of a wealthy wife, even if she were American.
Mariah didn’t have to ask why Papa wanted her out of New York. Away from the influence of her crazy mother. Away from the gossip. He wanted to secure her future, her security … and, above all, her sanity. But there were some things the human will, however indomitable, could not overcome.
“I don’t wish to leave New York,” she said, meeting his gaze. “Not so long as Mama needs me.”
“You’ve spent enough time in asylums,” he said harshly. “You can’t make your mother any better, there or here.” He pinched the bridge of his nose. “She wants your happiness. You know that, Merry.” His commanding tone became persuasive, almost gentle. “You’d make her happiest in these … last days by marrying well and starting on the road to having your own family.”
Mariah pressed her palms to her hot cheeks. She wanted children. She wanted them badly. But if she should inherit the madness that had claimed her mother and her mother’s mother before her.
Papa was blinded by the hope that she would be different. He still intended to see that she climbed to the heights of society, high enough to sneer at the snobbish “old money” of New York. And the surest way of achieving his goal was by trading money for a title.
As if that would make a difference.
I don’t need it, Papa. Oh, I can ape the manners of a fine lady, but I don’t belong among them. I’ve been by myself too long. All I want is a quiet life. Then, if anything goes wrong …
“I can’t, Papa. You know I can’t.”
“I know you can.” He was all brute force now, the man who had brought the New York Stock Exchange to its knees more than once, and in spite of herself, she quailed. “You will. And you’ll begin next week, when the Viscount Ainscough arrives.” He turned his back on her. “Mrs. Abercrombie is throwing a ball for him. She has invited you.”
Mariah wondered how Papa had wangled such an invitation. Perhaps Mr. Abercrombie hoped to encourage a substantial investment from Mr. Marron and had prevailed upon his wife to accept the former pariah.
“—you’ll be wearing a new gown and looking like a queen,” Papa was saying.
“I don’t need more gowns, Papa.”
“You will from now on. A new one for every concert, soirée, breakfast and party during the Season.”
Mariah rose and walked to the window, looking out over Central Park. Leaves were turning and beginning to fall. Mrs. Abercrombie’s ball was only the beginning. Soon the Season would be in full bloom, and she would be in the thick of it, as if Mama didn’t exist.
“I know it’s difficult for you, sweetheart,” Papa said, coming up behind her and laying his broad hand on her shoulder. “But you’ll carry on. You’re stronger than …”
Stronger than your mother. You won’t hear voices. You’ll behave normally. You won’t ever end up in a … “Promise that you won’t send Mama back to the asylum,” she said.
He looked at her with that shrewd, hard gaze. “Are you trying to bargain with me, Merry?”
“Keep her here. Let me see her between engagements, and I’ll become whatever you want me to be.”
His shoulders sagged. “I don’t want to send her back. I only want what’s best.” He seemed to shrink to the size of an ordinary man. “I agree.”
All the air rushed out of Mariah’s lungs. “Thank you, Papa.”
He waved his hand, dismissing her words, and returned to his desk. “The ivory gown from Worth just arrived from Paris,” he said, as if they had never discussed anything more important than her wardrobe. “You’ll wear that one to the ball. We’ll have to use a few local couturiers until the rest arrive.”
“Yes, Papa.” Mariah drew her finger across the window-pane, watching her breath condense on the glass. “How many Englishmen do you suppose I’ll have to choose from?”
“I imagine you’ll snag a duke, Merry. How could any man resist you?”
And what about love? Wasn’t she as unlikely to find that with an English lord as with anyone in New York? Was there a man anywhere who didn’t want her only for her money?
Papa would use every means necessary to quash any current gossip about the state of Mrs. Marron’s sanity, of course. Sufficient wealth could buy almost everything. Everything but what really mattered.
Mariah walked to the door. “I’d best get ready for dinner, Papa.”
“You do that. Wear that little pink frock, the one with the lace at the bottom. Bring some cheer to the table.”
She nodded, left the office and climbed the stairs, acknowledging the nurse who was just leaving Mama’s suite. As she entered her room, she wondered if she might possibly escape marriage entirely. Papa thought her beautiful, but she knew that to be untrue. She was, in fact, a nobody. She had a considerable allowance of her own. Perhaps she could bribe the noblemen to leave her alone. Then Papa would have to give up, and she could find a way to be with Mama until the end.
But things didn’t work out as she’d planned. Halfway through the Season she met the dashing Earl of Donnington, already wealthy in his own right, and fell in love. He wanted a quiet, unassuming wife who would be content to remain at his estate in Cambridgeshire while he pursued his own interests; she could think of no better arrangement.
A few months later, Mama died. Mariah insisted on the full period of mourning, but Donnington waited patiently. A year later, she was on a steamer bound for England and the marriage her father had so wanted for her. The end of one life and the beginning of another.
And she never heard a single voice in her head.
CHAPTER ONE
Cambridgeshire, 1885
IT HAD BEEN no marriage at all.
Mariah crossed the well-groomed park as she had done every day for the past few months, her walking boots leaving a damp trail in the grass. Tall trees stood alone or in small clusters, strewn about the park in a seemingly random pattern that belied the perfect organization of the estate.
Donbridge. It was hers now. Or should have been.
No one will ever know what happened that night.
The maids had blushed and giggled behind their hands the next morning when she had descended from her room into the grim, dark hall with its mounted animal heads and pelts on display. She had run the gauntlet of glassy, staring eyes, letting nothing show on her face.
They didn’t know. Neither did Vivian, the dowager Lady Donnington, for all her barely veiled barbs. Giles had left too soon … suspiciously soon. But no one would believe that the lord of Donbridge had failed to claim his husbandly rights.
Was it me? Did he sense something wrong?
She broke off the familiar thought and walked more quickly, lifting her skirts above the dew-soaked lawn. She was the Countess of Donnington, whether or not she had a right to be. And she would play the part. It was all she had, now that Mama was gone and Papa believed her safely disposed in a highly advantageous marriage.
Lady Donnington. In name only.
A bird called tentatively from a nearby tree. Mariah turned abruptly and set off toward the small mere, neatly oblong and graced by a spurting marble fountain. One of the several follies, vaguely Georgian in striking contrast to the Old English manor house, stood to one side of the mere. It had been built in the rotunda style, patterned after a Greek temple, with white fluted columns, a domed roof and an open portico, welcoming anyone who might chance by.
A man stood near the folly … a shadowy, bent figure she could not remember ever having seen before. One of the groundskeepers, she thought.
But there was something very odd about him, about the way he started when he saw her and went loping off like a three-legged dog. A poacher. A gypsy. Either way, someone who ought not to be on the estate.
Mariah hesitated and then continued toward the folly. The man scuttled into the shrubbery and disappeared. Mariah paused beside the folly, considered her lack of defenses and thought better of further pursuit.
As she debated returning to the manor, a large flock of birds flew up from the lakeshore in a swirl of wings. She shaded her eyes with one hand to watch them fly, though they didn’t go far. What seemed peculiar to her was that the birds were not all of one type, but a mixture of what the English called robins, blackbirds and thrushes.
She noticed at once that the folly seemed to have attracted an unusual variety of wildlife. She caught sight of a pair of foxes, several rabbits and a doughty badger. The fact that the rabbits had apparently remained safe from the foxes was remarkable in itself, but that all should be congregating so near the folly aroused an interest in Mariah that she had not felt since Giles had left.
Kneeling at the foot of the marble steps, she held out her hands. The rabbits came close enough to sniff her fingers. The badger snuffled and grunted, but didn’t run away. The foxes merely watched, half-hidden in the foliage. Mariah heard a faint sound and glanced up at the folly. The animals melted into the grass as she stood, shook out the hem of her walking skirt and mounted the steps.
The sound did not come again, but Mariah felt something pulling her, tugging at her body, whispering in her soul. Not a voice, precisely, but—
Her heart stopped, and so did her feet. You’re imagining things. That’s all it is.
Perhaps it would be best to go back. At least she could find solace in the old favorite books she’d begun to read again, and the servants would leave her alone.
But then she would have to endure her mother-in-law’s sour, suspicious glances. You drove him away, the dowager’s eyes accused. What is wrong with you?
She dismissed the thought and continued up to the portico. There were no more unexpected animal visitors. The area was utterly silent. Even the birds across the mere seemed to stand still and watch her.
The nape of her neck prickling, Mariah walked between the columns and listened. It wasn’t only her imagination; she could hear something. Something inside the small, round building, beyond the door that led to the interior.
She tested the door. It wouldn’t budge. She walked completely around the rotunda, finding not a single window or additional door. Air, she supposed, must enter the building from the cupola above, but the place was so inaccessible that she might almost have guessed that it had been built to hide a secret … a secret somebody didn’t want anyone else to find.
Perhaps this was where her prodigal husband stored the vast quantity of guns he must need to shoot the plethora of game he so proudly displayed on every available wall of the house.
But why should he hide them? He was certainly not ashamed of his bloody pastime, of which she’d been so ignorant when she’d accompanied him to England.
Defying the doubts that had haunted her since Giles’s departure, she searched the portico and then the general area around the folly. Impulse prompted her to look under several large, decoratively placed stones.
The key was under the smallest of them. She flourished it with an all-too-fleeting sense of triumph, walked back up the stairs and slipped the key in the lock.
The door opened with a groan. Directly inside was a small antechamber with a single chair and a second door. The room smelled of mice.
That was what you heard, she thought to herself. But she also detected the scent of stale food. Someone had eaten in here, sitting on that rickety chair. Perhaps even that man she’d seen loitering about the place with such a suspicious air.
But why?
She stood facing the inner door, wondering if the key would fit that lock, as well.
Leave well enough alone, she told herself. But she couldn’t. She walked slowly to the door and tried the key.
It worked. Though the lock grated terribly and gave way only with the greatest effort on her part, the door opened.
The smell rolled over her like the heavy wetness of a New York summer afternoon. A body left unwashed, the stale-food odor and something else she couldn’t quite define. She was already backing away when she saw the prisoner.
He crouched at the back of the cell, behind the heavy bars that crossed the semicircular room from one wall to the other. The first thing Mariah noticed was his eyes … black, as black as her husband’s but twice as brilliant, like the darkest of diamonds. They were even more striking when contrasted with the prisoner’s pale hair, true silver without a trace of gray. And the face.
It didn’t match the silver hair. Not in the least. In fact, it looked very much like Lord Donnington’s. Too much.
She backed away another step. I’m seeing things. Just like Mama. I’m.
With a movement too swift for her to follow, the prisoner leaped across the cell and crashed into the bars. His strong, white teeth were bared, his eyes crazed with rage and despair. He rattled his cage frantically, never taking his gaze from hers.
Mariah retreated no farther. She was not imagining this. Whoever this man might be, he was being held captive in a cell so small that no matter how he had begun, he must surely have been driven insane. A violent captive who, should he escape, might strangle her on the spot.
A madman.
Her mouth too dry for speech, Mariah stood very still and forced herself to remain calm. The man’s body was all whipcord muscle; the tendons stood out on his neck as he clutched the bars, and his broad shoulders strained with tension. He wore only a scrap of cloth around his hips, barely covering a part of him that must have been quite impressively large. Papa, for all his talk of her “starting a family,” would have been shocked to learn that she knew about such matters, and had since she first visited Mama in the asylum at the age of fourteen.
The prisoner must have noticed the direction of her gaze, because his silent snarl turned into an expression she could only describe as “waiting.”
“I beg your pardon,” she said, knowing how ridiculous the words sounded even as she spoke them. “May I ask … do you know who you are?”
Anyone else might have laughed at so foolish a question. But Mariah knew the mad often had no idea of their own identities. She had seen many examples of severe amnesia and far worse afflictions at the asylum.
The prisoner tossed back his wild, pale mane and closed his mouth. It was a fine mouth above a strong chin, identical to Donnington’s in almost every way. Only his hair and his pale skin distinguished him from the Earl of Donnington.
Surely they are related. The prospect made the situation that much more horrible.
“My name,” she said, summoning up her courage, “is Mariah.”
He cocked his head as if he found something fascinating in her pronouncement. But when he opened his mouth as if to answer, only a faint moan escaped.
It was all Mariah could do not to run. Perhaps he’s mute. Or worse.
“It’s all right,” she said, feeling she was speaking more to a beast than a man. “No one will hurt you.”
His face suggested that he might have laughed had he been able. Instead, he continued to stare at her, and her heart began to pound uncomfortably.
“I want to help you,” she said, the words out of her mouth before she could stop them.
The man’s expression lost any suggestion of mirth. He touched his lips and shook his head.
He understands me, Mariah thought, relief rushing through her. He isn’t a half-wit. He understands.
Self-consciousness froze her in place. He was looking at her with the same intent purpose as she had looked at him … studying her clothing, her face, her figure.
She swallowed, walked back through the door, picked up the chair and carried it into the inner chamber. She placed it as far from the cage as she could and sat down. It creaked as she settled, only a little noisier than her heartbeat. The prisoner stood unmoving at the bars.
“I suppose,” Mariah said, “that it won’t do any good to ask why you are here.”
His lips curled again in a half snarl. He didn’t precisely growl, but it was far from a happy sound.
“I understand,” she said, swallowing again. “I can leave, if you wish.”
She almost hoped he would indicate just such a desire, but he shook his head in a perfectly comprehensible gesture. Ah, yes, he certainly understood her.
The ideas racing through her mind were nearly beyond bearing. Who had put him here?
There are too many similarities. He and Giles must be related. A lost brother. A cousin. A relative not once mentioned by anyone in the household.
Insane thoughts. It was her dangerously vivid imagination at work again.
And yet.
This prisoner had obviously not been meant to be found. And with Donnington gone, she couldn’t ask for an explanation.
Dark secrets. It didn’t surprise Mariah that Donbridge had its share.
This man is not just a secret. He’s a human being who needs your help.
She twisted her gloved hands in her lap. “I won’t leave,” she said softly. “Do you think you can answer a few simple questions by moving your head?”
His black eyes narrowed. Indeed, why should he trust her? He was being treated like an animal, his conditions far worse than anything Mama had ever had to endure.
She examined the cage. It was furnished with a single ragged blanket, a basin nearly empty of water and a bowl that presumably had once contained food.
“Are you hungry?” she asked.
He pushed away from the bars and began to pace, back and forth like a leopard at the zoo. She had an even clearer glimpse of his fine, lithe body: his graceful stride, the ripple of muscle in his thighs and shoulders, the breadth of his chest, the narrow lines of his hips and waist.
Heat rushed into her face, and she lifted her eyes. He had stopped and was staring again. Reading her shameful thoughts. Thoughts she hadn’t entertained since that night two months ago when she’d lain in her bed, waiting for Donnington to make her his bride in every way.
“Shall I bring you food?” she asked quickly. “A cut of beef? Or venison?”
He shook his head violently, shuddering as if she’d offered him dirt and grass. But the leanness of his belly under his ribs told her she dared not give up.
“Very well, then,” she said. “Fresh bread? Butter and jam?”
His gaze leaped to hers.
“Yes,” she said. “I’ll bring you bread. And fruit? I remember seeing strawberries in the conservatory.”
Hope. That was what she saw in him now, though he moved no closer to the bars. Who saw to his needs? She had no way of knowing and had every reason to assume the worst.
“You also require clothing,” she said. “I’ll bring you a shirt and trousers.” His eloquent face was dubious. “They should … they ought to fit you very well.”
Because he and Donnington were as close to twins as any two men Mariah had ever seen.
The Man in the Iron Mask had always been one of her favorite stories. The true king imprisoned, while the brother ruled in his stead.
“Your feet must be sore,” she went on, her words tripping over themselves. “I can bring you shoes and stockings, and … undergarments, as well. Blankets, of course, and pillows. What else?” She pretended not to notice how ferociously focused he was on her person. “A comb. Shaving gear. Fresh water. Towels.”
The prisoner listened, his head slightly cocked as if he didn’t entirely take her meaning. Had he been so long without such simple comforts? Yet his face lacked even the shadow of a beard, his hair was not unclean, and his body, though not precisely fragrant, was not as dirty as one might expect.
Again she wondered who looked after him. Someone on the estate knew every detail of this man’s existence, and she intended to find the jailer.
She resolved, in spite of her fears, to try a new and dangerous tack. “Do you … do you know Lord Donnington?”
His reaction was terrifying. He flung himself against the bars and banged at them with his fists. Mariah started up from the chair, prepared to run, then stopped.
This was more than mere madness, more than rage. This was pain, crouched in the shadows beneath his eyes, etched into the lines framing his mouth. He reached through the bars, fist clenched. Mariah held her ground. Gradually his hand relaxed, the fingers stretching toward her. Pleading. Begging her to overcome her natural fear.
Drawn by forces beyond her control, Mariah took a step toward him. Inch by inch she crossed the five feet between them. By the tiniest increments she lifted her hand and touched his.
His fingers closed around hers, tightly enough to hurt. His strength was such that he could have pulled her into the bars and strangled her in an instant. But he was shaking, perspiration standing out on his forehead beneath the pale shock of hair, his mouth opening and closing on low, guttural sounds she had no way of interpreting.
Desperation. Yearning. A final effort to make someone listen to the words he couldn’t speak.
“It will be all right,” she said. “I will help you.”
His shaking began to subside, though he refused to let go of her hand. But now he was astonishingly gentle, running his thumb in a featherlight caress over her wrist. It was her turn to shiver, though she fought the overwhelming sensations that coursed through her body and pooled between her legs.
Oh, God.
“Please,” she whispered. “Let me go.”
He did, but only with obvious reluctance. She took a steadying step back, but not so far that he would become upset again.
Her feelings meant nothing. Not when he needed her so much—this stranger who had captured her mind and heart within a few vivid minutes.
“I …” She struggled to find words that wouldn’t alarm him. “I must go now. I’ll come back soon with the things you need. I promise.”
He gazed at her as if he were trying to memorize everything about her. As if he didn’t believe her. As if he expected never to see her again.
“I promise,” she repeated, and retreated toward the door. His broad shoulders sagged in defeat, and she knew there was no more she could say to him now; he would not trust her until she returned.
