“Drink,” he said.
She drank, welcoming the fire sliding down her throat. If it scoured her insides, so much the better.
For a moment she thought she’d be well again.
Then the deck tilted and she slid and stumbled. This time his arms were about her, though. “Don’t,” she said. “Going to be…going to be—”
“Saunders!”
Something was thrust in front of her. A bucket. Good.
Then she was retching, doubled over, so sick she couldn’t see straight. Her head pounded and her knees gave way.
Sick, so sick.
Someone was holding her. Men talked above her head. His voice. Another’s. She was shifted onto something soft. A bed. Oh, that felt good. To lie down. She would simply lie here for a moment while the boat rose and fell, rocked this way and that.
But no. She hadn’t time for this.
Someone slid a pillow under her head, then drew a blanket over her. That felt so good. But she wasn’t supposed to feel good. She had to get up. It was Jeffreys who needed help. But if she moved, she’d be sick again.
Must lie very quietly.
Impossible, with the ship pitching so. Slowly it tilted up, then slowly down again, and all the while, the horrible noises, ropes and timbers grinding and creaking and groaning as though all the souls of the drowned were rising to meet them. From a distance came the sounds of passengers crying and screaming. And somewhere above all the noise of the ship, she heard the storm’s fury, the wailing wind.
Hell, she thought. Dante’s Inferno. Or that other thing. Not a poem but a picture of Hell, of the damned. Curse it, what was wrong with her? She couldn’t lie here, wondering about paintings.
“No.” She could barely form the words. “Not me. My—my—s-seamstress.”
“Your maid?” His voice was so calm. So reassuring.
“Jeffreys. She’s badly ill. Brandy. I came for…brandy.”
More talking, over her, around her. She heard screaming and shouting, too, but far away. The world went up, then down, and down, and down.
Don’t let me be sick again. Don’t let me be sick again.
Something cool and wet touched her face. “Saunders will see about your maid,” the familiar voice said.
“Don’t let her die,” she said. Or did she? Her voice sounded far away, so small against the infernal clamor about them. Hell, she thought. This was like the Hell the righteous ranted about. The Hell in the pictures.
“People almost never die of seasickness,” he said.
“They only wish they might,” she said.
An odd sound. A chuckle? It was his voice, low and close. Behind it, around it, above it were horrible sounds, like death. A long, drawn-out moan, a terrible grinding, then a crack.
The ship…cracking open…
“We can’t go down,” someone said. Had she spoken?
Don’t talk. Lie quietly. Don’t move. Don’t breathe.
“We won’t go down,” he said. “It’s bad, but we won’t go down. Here, swallow this.”
She moved her head from side to side. That was a mistake. Bile rose. “Can’t.”
“Only a drop,” he coaxed. “Laudanum. It will help. I promise.”
She couldn’t raise her head, couldn’t even open her eyes. The world was spinning round and round, leaping up and down, throwing itself from side to side.
Where am I?
He lifted her head, so gently. Was it he? Or was it she, spooning medicine into Lucie? Lucie, Lucie.
But she was away from this. She was safe in London with her doting aunts, who spoiled her appallingly. Lucie was safe because her mother and aunts had turned into three witches, brewing potions to keep her alive.
They had not fought so hard only to leave Lucie an orphan, because her mother had made a foolish mistake. A man-mistake. More than six feet tall and beastly arrogant and…oh, those big, beautiful hands.
“A little more,” he said. “Another drop.”
Take your medicine. Get better. Get back to Lucie.
She swallowed it. So bitter.
“Vile,” she said. “Vile.”
“I know, but it helps. Trust me. I know.”
“Trust you,” she said. “Hah.”
“Clearly you’re not dying.”
“No. Devil won’t take me.”
The low chuckle again. “Then we’re all safe.”
She wasn’t safe. The storm raged and the ship moaned and rose and fell and flung itself from wave to wave. She’d been in rough seas before. She knew this was very bad, and she wasn’t remotely safe. Yet while her mind knew this, her heart understood matters altogether differently: his voice, his surprisingly gentle touch, and the calm of his presence. Reassuring. How ironic!
“Ah, you’re smiling,” he said. “The opium is starting to take hold already.”
Already? Had she fallen asleep? She’d lost track of time.
“No, it’s you,” she said. How far away her voice sounded, as though it had traveled to London already, ahead of her. “Your ducal self-assurance. Everything will give way to you. Even Satan’s own storm.”
“You’re definitely improving,” he said. “Full, mocking sentences.”
“Yes. Better.” Her insides seemed to be quieting. But her head was so heavy. She opened her eyes, and that was hard work. He was leaning over her. The light was too dim to make out details, and nothing would stay put. His eyes were deep shadows in his face. But she knew they were green. Jade green. Or was it sea green? A color not many women could wear successfully. A color not many women could withstand…in a man’s eyes.
She closed her eyes again.
She felt the cool cloth on her forehead. So gentle. A feeling she had trouble naming washed over her. Then she realized: She was protected. Sheltered. Safe.
What a joke!
“Strange,” she said.
“Yes,” he said.
“Yes,” she said.
The
