Taming The Beast. Heather Grothaus

about his own hall by his wife, not to mention threatened with what he perceived as superstitious drivel, so he told my mother that if she did not care for the way he was entertaining his guests, she could be the one to leave.”

      Elizabeth was rapt, her knees drawn up in the seat beneath her gown, her fists before her mouth. She nodded quickly. Go on, go on.

      “Well. It being night, Mother was in her rail and robe, but she had slipped on some old shoes to come into the hall and take the men to task. It was brutally cold, snow was deep outside the keep door, but so incensed was she that she thought to teach my father a lesson by going to the stables for the night, where the shepherdess kept a warm and comfortable shelter. She bid my father farewell and left the keep.

      “She was no farther than the road when she heard the terrible calling of the hounds, and the sound of hoofbeats like thunder in the snow. Ever firm in her belief that God would protect her, Mother stood her ground, determined to get to the bottom of the legend that had everyone in the village terrified. Then the riders were upon her, and there was no time to hide.”

      Elizabeth covered her eyes for an instant, but then looked once more with merry excitement at Michaela.

      “The next morn, my father, feeling the ill effect of his overindulgence, and no little remorse for his poor treatment of his wife, went in search of my mother. He looked in the stables first, as although he was—by his own words—a bit thick at the time, he knew it was the only place my mother could and would go where she and I would be safe. But the shepherdess stated that she had not seen sign of Agatha since the day previous, and she had not ventured out of her hut the whole of the night, for she had heard the baying of the hounds beneath her covers and was fearful of the Hunt.

      “Well. At this, my father became concerned. As he left the shepherdess, he wondered where on earth his cumbersome and oft troublesome wife could have hidden herself away. That is, until he found the shoe in the center of the road. Mother’s footprints led up to where the shoe lay and then simply…vanished.”

      Michaela had told this tale to Elizabeth many times since coming to Tornfield Manor, and she never embellished from the version told to her by her own mother, but it was here that the story deviated from the original version. Michaela still recounted the truth, but omitted the part where Agatha claimed to have been taken up on the horse of the Hunt’s fearsome leader and lifted away into the sky.

      This was a child’s tale, after all. No need to frighten the girl with details that were—in Michaela’s opinion—likely stretched to contain some sort of twisted moral. Michaela herself had lost enough sleep over the dreadful story, until she’d grown old enough to determine what was true and what was likely dramatic embellishment.

      “It is said that my father and the villagers searched for sign of my mother for the next pair of days, without ceasing. On the third day, father took to the village chapel and fell to his knees, begging God to return his wife and unborn child to him. He prayed that he would perform any penance if his request was granted.”

      Elizabeth swept both palms away from her stomach in a wide mound.

      “That’s right. It was just then that my mother entered the chapel, nearly scaring the life out of my father. She was unharmed, but missing both shoes, and she said to him, ‘Walter, you must never fight again. You must give your life to God as a meek and obedient servant, lest you and this child be taken from me as punishment for your wickedness.’”

      Elizabeth held her palms up, a questioning look on her face.

      “So he did. Father dismissed the men of the village who were reserved for fighting, hung his own weapons on the wall of our hall, and set to seeing only to the comfort and happiness of his wife.”

      Not willing to let even a word of the retelling slip, Elizabeth pointed to Michaela’s bodice.

      “Yes, and this, I nearly forgot.” Although she hadn’t truly forgotten, she simply didn’t wish to bring it out. Michaela reached into the neck of her gown and withdrew the chain that held the small piece of metal, like a link from a chain shirt. She held it up for Elizabeth to see. It was blackened with age, thin and bent, but unbroken. Michaela had oft wondered, if it was a link of mail, how it had been connected to its mates, being whole and unbroken with no visible seam of weld. But she had never asked.

      “This was the only thing my mother carried with her upon her return from her three-day absence. She kept it with her always and then, when I was born, placed it around my neck. When I was old enough to understand, she made me swear to never take it off, lest the Hunt return for me.”

      Elizabeth pointed at Michaela, and then hooked her index fingers on either side of her head.

      Michaela rolled her eyes. “Yes, this is what the villagers say makes me the devil. Are you content now?”

      Elizabeth nodded with an impish smile.

      “Good.” Michaela took Elizabeth’s small, pale hand and kissed it. “Do you think I’m the devil?”

      She shook her head and pulled her hand free. Elizabeth circled her crown with one finger and then flapped her hands near her shoulders.

      “An angel, am I? Oh, I daresay that is the right answer.”

      Elizabeth made the sign for angel again and then spun her arms in wide, crazy circles before falling out of her chair with a look of feigned surprise.

      “Oh, you little—!” Michaela screeched in a mockery of outrage, and fell upon the girl in an attack of tickling.

      A masculine clearing of throat interrupted their play, and both girls looked up to see a smiling Alan Tornfield standing over them.

      Michaela was completely humiliated to see Lady Juliette smirking at his side.

      “Well, I must say that you were right, Lord Tornfield,” Juliette said sweetly. “Miss Fortune does make a jolly nurse for your Elizabeth.”

      Elizabeth got up from the floor and fled the hall, leaving Michaela to struggle to her feet alone, her hand slipping off the arm of the chair but once.

      “Oh, she’s not Elizabeth’s nurse, Lady Juliette,” Alan said, and Michaela wanted to think there was a bit of chastisement in his tone. “They’re…friends.”

      “Friends. Of course,” Juliette accepted. “How fortunate for Elizabeth that her father has found such a generous…friend.”

      Michaela bit her tongue until she tasted blood. She would have chewed it off at the root with her own teeth rather than say something mean and petty in front of Lord Tornfield. Any matter, Lady Juliette continued.

      “I hate to leave such entertaining company,” she simpered, “but I have a long journey to my own hearth. Good night, my lord. I hope my visit has been informative.”

      “Enlightening, certainly. I will be in touch with you very soon. Good night, Lady Juliette.”

      “Miss Fortune.”

      Michaela kept her tongue firmly between her teeth as Juliette swept from the hall.

      And then it was only Michaela and Lord Tornfield in the large, quiet room, lit by the hearth at her back. The flames bathed him in a golden glow and his hair, his mustache, his skin, looked like they were cast from that precious metal, even if his expression appeared unusually tense and preoccupied.

      Lord Tornfield held his hand out toward her, and Michaela’s favorite part of each day began as she wrapped her fingers around his forearm.

      “Amen,” Alan said in a quiet smiling voice, and then kissed the top of Elizabeth’s head before rising from the edge of the bed. Michaela stepped to the pair and added her own kiss to the little girl’s face.

      “Happy dreams, my love,” she said, and went round to the opposite side of Elizabeth’s bed to help pull the embroidered coverlet over the girl.

      Elizabeth blew kisses to them both as Alan carried the candlestick from the room, allowing Michaela to