An elderly woman rose from where she’d been sitting on a nearby chair.
“Thank you, Mistress Medina,” Isabel said as she followed the elderly woman from the room.
The door shut gently behind them.
Megs started toward Godric but was stopped by the harshness of his voice.
“Why,” Godric rasped, “did you bring her here?”
THE PAIN FROM his wrist was nearly overwhelming—sharp, jabbing, even now making the bile back up into his throat. Still, Godric knew his words had been overly harsh. Megs flinched, withdrawing the hand she’d stretched out to him, her beautiful mouth crimping with hurt.
But it was his stepmother who replied. “Please don’t chastise Megs. I insisted on coming here, Godric. You’re hurt and I care for you very much.”
He opened his mouth, pain and irritation driving hot words to his lips, but then he looked at her. She stood before him, this little plump woman, as bravely as a martyr before Roman lions, her chin raised, her warm brown eyes steady but sad at the same time. He couldn’t do it. Couldn’t crush the flicker of hope he saw in her face.
Perhaps he simply was too weary.
She took advantage of his weakness, pressing forward. “Let us help you, Godric.”
He pressed his lips together, but the pain flared again in his forearm and he suddenly cared less for argument. He wasn’t sure he could recover from this injury. He’d known men made crippled by breaks in their bones that never healed properly. What, in that context, did any of this matter?
“Very well,” he said warily, rising. His eyes met Megs’s gaze and he thought he saw relief there.
“We’ll need a bonesetter,” she murmured. “I’ll consult Isabel to see if she knows anyone discreet. In the meantime I’ve brought you a change of clothes in case we run into Captain Trevillion again.”
Megs set a bag on the bed and then bustled from the room, leaving him with his stepmother.
“Do you need help to dress?” she asked.
“Makepeace will assist me if I need it,” he said and stood, ready to go find the home’s manager.
She moved next to him, putting her shoulder under his good arm. “Lean on me.”
“That’s unnecessary,” he said stiffly.
She glanced up at him, her eyes sharp. “Then do it for me. Let me care for you, Godric.”
So he did because it was easier than arguing further. She was stronger than she looked, his stepmother, and he stared down at her, puzzled. Why was she doing this?
Her gaze met his, and for a moment she seemed to read his thoughts, rolling her eyes. “Don’t worry yourself over it. You always were such a sensitive boy, reading too much into every little thing and making yourself sick over all possible ramifications. For now just accept that I’m helping you to make your way to the hallway.”
He laughed at that, a soft puff of air. “Very well.”
Outside the home’s sickroom, they found Winter Makepeace leaning against the wall. His dark eyes flicked to Godric’s stepmother. “There are … matters we should discuss before you leave.”
Godric glanced down at Mrs. St. John. “I’ll join you downstairs, ma’am.”
His stepmother pressed her lips together but merely nodded before turning away.
Godric looked at Winter. “My wife brought a change of clothes.”
The home’s manager followed him back inside the sickroom and watched as Godric began picking at the buttons on his leggings. “You rescued nearly thirty girls tonight. Six will need to stay abed for some days, but the rest are in fair condition, all things considered. They mostly appear to need decent food.”
Godric grimaced at the thought of little girls deprived of enough sustenance, then remembered the main part of his worry. “Did Alf tell you where the third workshop is located?”
“He did.” Winter frowned and helped him strip out of the leggings. “But I’m thinking they will have moved after your work this night. They’d be fools to stay and wait for your attack.”
“True.” Godric pulled on a pair of black breeches then looked down at his arm, already swollen. Perhaps if he braced it, there would still be time. “If I went out again tonight—”
“Don’t even contemplate it,” Winter said curtly. “You need to heal before you try again.”
“I need to find those girls,” Godric growled. The buttons of his fall were damnably difficult with only one hand.
“Yes, but becoming further injured—or killed—will do us no good.” Winter hesitated. “There’s one more thing.”
Godric cocked his head impatiently.
“Alf left just after he brought you and the girls here,” Winter said. “But he was agitated. Apparently Hannah, the ginger-haired lass he mentioned before, was not among the girls you rescued.”
“Damnation.” Godric glared at his arm. “Will she try to attack the third workshop on her own, do you think?”
“She?”
Godric nodded curtly. “Alf is a girl in disguise. I should never have brought her on tonight’s mission.”
“You—we—had no way of knowing.” Winter looked thoughtful. “Aye, and now she might be off trying to free her ginger-haired friend by herself.”
Godric had never felt so helpless. Well, that wasn’t correct. The last time he’d felt this way was beside Clara’s deathbed. He pushed the ugly memory away.
Winter looked disturbed. “I don’t think Alf will act on her own,” he said slowly. “She seemed quite respectful of the guards kept around the workshops. And remember: even if she did try something so foolish, the workshop has no doubt already moved.”
Godric nodded, though the reminder was but small consolation. Alf might be careful to project a tough and pragmatic exterior, but she’d put herself at risk to inform on the workshops’ whereabouts—and she’d been truly remorseful about delivering the ginger-haired little girl to one of them.
Pray she did nothing stupid.
He needed to heal. To get back to St. Giles and finish this business.
A soft scratch came at the door before it opened.
Megs peeked in. “The carriage is waiting and dawn is beginning to break.”
Godric looked at her, his wife, hovering so hesitantly, not even venturing closer as if she feared rejection. She’d come for him when Winter had sent word, without demure or question. She’d lain beneath him earlier tonight and given him everything he’d demanded. She was so much and he felt so little—too broken, too old, too weary—to give her everything she needed. He should let her go, let her fly free to find a younger lover like her Roger.
He should do all those things, and maybe later, when he was healed and not in pain, he would, but right now he murmured his thanks to Makepeace, threw the cloak about his shoulders, and let her take his good arm. Let her draw it across her slender womanly shoulders. Let her take a small portion of his weight and guide him down the stairs.
His stepmother waited for them in the home’s entry way along with Megs’s footmen. They bracketed him and the women as he made his slow, painful way to the carriage. Godric didn’t miss Captain Trevillion, lurking in the shadows by the home, and he didn’t miss the captain’s deliberate nod. That nod was a warning, a challenge delayed. It meant, I know who you are. Come again into St. Giles and I’ll take you.
Godric knew it as surely as if the dragoon captain had screamed the words. And yet he couldn’t bring himself to care. Makepeace was right: now he needed to heal. But when he was strong again, he’d return to St. Giles, Trevillion or not, because those girls needed rescuing.
It wasn’t until they were all settled in the carriage that his stepmother spoke again.
She waited until the door was closed, until the carriage jolted forward; then she looked at Godric and said, “How long have you been the Ghost of St. Giles?”
Chapter Fifteen
Grief rolled down the Peak of Whispers, screeching his rage all the way. The Hellequin made no comment, but one corner of his stern mouth may’ve lifted up. Now Faith grew thirsty, so reaching into her pocket, she drew out a small skin of wine. She took a sip, and as she did so, the Hellequin licked his lips. She offered the skin to him. “Would you like a drink?” “I have not drunk the wine of men for a millennium,” he rasped.
“Then you must be very thirsty,” she said as she held the skin to his lips. …
—From The Legend of the Hellequin
The groan was muffled, as if Godric was doing his very best not to make any sound at all, which only made it worse for Megs—the knowledge that he must be in terrible pain to let the muted sounds slip past.
She stared at the closed door to his bedroom, wringing her hands.
“Come sit, Megs,” Mrs. St. John said from behind her. Megs glanced at her distractedly, jumping when another grunt came from the bedroom.
“Please.” Her mother-in-law patted the seat beside her on the settee. “You’ll do him no good pacing like that. In fact, he’ll be embarrassed if you see him afterward and you’re distraught. He’ll know you heard him. Gentlemen detest appearing weak.”
Megs bit her lip, but she obediently sank into the settee cushions. “I don’t think him weak. He’s hurt. And I do so wish he’d let me stay with him when he’s in such pain.”
“Mmm,” Mrs. St. John murmured in agreement. “But gentlemen are terribly stubborn and rather illogical when they’re hurt, you see. Godric’s father had the gout in his later years and he was an absolute bear about it. Wouldn’t let anyone near him, including me.” For a moment she looked wistful. Then she glanced down at her hands, folded in her lap, and said, “This is my fault, you know.”
Megs blinked, confused. “What is?”
“That.” Mrs. St. John waved a hand toward Godric’s bedroom. “I knew he was alone after Clara died, knew he was hurting, but I let his stoicism keep me away.” She grimaced. “He’s always been so very self-sufficient, so cold when I made any overtures, that it’s hard to remember he’s a man like any other. That he needs the comfort of family as much as any other.”
“I don’t see how that’s your fault,” Megs said. “You did try, and if he rejected your attempts, then surely the fault lies with him, not you.”
“No.” Her mother-in-law shook her head. “I love him as surely as if I’d carried him within my own body. A mother never abandons her child, even when he seems to want it. It was—is—my duty to break through the barriers he surrounds himself with. I should have kept trying until he gave in.” Her look softened as she watched Megs. “I thank God that you decided to seek him out, to make your marriage a true one. He needs you, Megs. You’re the one who can save him.”
Megs looked away, feeling ashamed. Mrs. St. John praised her falsely: She’d come to London, made their marriage “true” for purely selfish reasons. But she couldn’t explain that to her mother-in-law.
Instead she focused on the last part of what Mrs. St. John said, uncertainty a tight band around her chest. “Can one save a man who seeks willful self-destruction?”
The older woman’s brows arched. “You think that’s why he goes into St. Giles?”
Megs looked at her with sorrow. “Why else?”
Mrs. St. John sighed. “You have to understand that it took years for Clara to die—years in which Godric could do no more than stand idle and watch. Perhaps his dressing as the Ghost is his way of doing something good after so long being unable to do anything at all.”
“He does do good in St. Giles.” Megs frowned as she fingered the tassel on one of the settee cushions. “But, ma’am, whatever good he does others must be balanced by the evil he does himself.”