Of Midnight Born (29 page)
He hadn’t comprehended her meaning at the time. He thought he did now. Her love for him had unlocked the greatest secret of the universe, the one he had utterly failed to understand: that a life without love was not a life worth living. It was love that gave life meaning, love that gave one a place on this earth.
“Come back to me, Serena,” he said softly into the night, his voice rough with tears. Let it be even a day more with her, he would give his very soul for it. “I love you. Come back.”
And as if in answer one star, a brilliant fireball, suddenly fell directly toward him, its brightness making him throw up his arm to shield his eyes as he stumbled to his feet. He heard a sound like the crackling of flames, and in a brilliant flash the fireball streaked past where he stood atop the tower, so close he could feel the heat of it, and before he could even turn to follow its course, it had struck with a crashing roar that shook the very foundations of the castle.
The cherry tree in the garden was aflame, the ends of its dead branches burning like torches. The trunk was partially split, half the tree listing at an angle. On the far side of it a large section of the garden wall was missing, the ground a furrowed crater.
“No!” he cried out in horror. Not the tree, not the cherry! Whatever trace of Serena that might remain was in it, in the very flesh of the bark and the roots that reached into the ground.
He ran for the steps, half fell down them, ran through his study, downstairs, through halls where people were emerging from doorways, questions on their lips, downstairs again and out the door to the courtyard, barely aware that Rhys
followed behind him, tying shut his robe. He sprinted across the cobbles, through the garden gate, and to the flaming tree.
“Serena!” he screamed at the flames. “Serena!”
And then he saw it, in the center of the black crack of the trunk that had been partially split by the fireball. There was a wedge of paleness, bare and new as a baby’s flesh, something there inside the trunk that could not be part of the shattered wood.
He lunged for the trunk, grabbing the opposing sides of the split in his hands and pulling them apart, forcing the split wider. Rhys grabbed at him, trying to pull him away, but he snarled, shaking his cousin off. When the wedge came wide enough he jammed his foot in, using the strength of his leg to pry the wood apart. It cracked under the pressure, sparks and cinders falling on him from the burning branches above. Rhys was shouting something, but he did not know what, and did not care.
At last the tree fell wide open, half of it crashing to the ground as Serena, naked as the day she was born, fell out of the burning wood and into his arms. He heard a shout of surprise from Rhys, and then his friend was beside him, helping to pull Serena out and away from the falling sparks, her body covered in sticky sap, her lovely hair gone, only the short blond fuzz of a babe covering her tender scalp under a coating of sap.
“Serena,” Alex said softly, cradling her in his arms, wiping at her eyes and mouth as Rhys draped his robe over her. “Serena. My love.”
Her eyelids fluttered, then opened, and her irises were as blue as a butterfly’s wings.
Spring
Serena walked the garden path to where the grafted sapling had been planted, where the old cherry had once stood. Its unusual pink double blossoms were on schedule with those of the other fruit trees, the grafted branch strong and healthy on its new base. Alex had finally found the tree in a book of botanical prints: the cherry hailed from the Far East, the lands of China and Japan. How le Gayne had ever gotten hold of such a specimen, she did not know.
The charred remains of the other tree had been hauled away many months since. She hadn’t liked to see it go, but the new tree that was part of the old softened the loss. Alex had hesitated about having the stump torn out, roots and all, fearful of what might be found entangled underneath. She had insisted, though, knowing somehow that whatever had remained of her old body was part of her now, used in the forming of this new one.
She touched the place on her face where the scar had been. It was no longer there, nor were any of the scars she had gained over the years of her previous life, however small or large. It was as if she had been born anew, a babe fullgrown emerging from the womb of the cherry.
Instead of a skeleton, what they had found when they pulled up the stump was a golden chain: the girdle that had belonged to her mother. She wore it now, loose around the waist of her pale blue gown. Beth and Sophie had assured her that it was all the fashion to add medieval touches to
one’s wardrobe—which was a good thing, as she still could not bring herself to dress completely as most women did, with their corsets and ridiculously full sleeves.
She was learning, however, the beauty of shopping, and of female friendship as well. Alex sometimes gave her a mock-frightened look that had nothing to do with her past, and everything to do with packages and a growing fascination with dress designs. It was as if she had spent her life locked away from girlish pleasures, and had finally been set free.
Clothes were only a small part of what she was discovering, though. Her reading skills had progressed rapidly, and half of any given day found her in the newly filled library, stacks of volumes around her, bits of this and that stuck between the pages to mark her place.
The other half of the day invariably found her on the back of a horse, Alex riding at her side. The valley she had watched from above for so long she now knew again from up close. They had ridden to what was left of Clerenbold Keep, as well. As she suspected, nothing was left of it under the trees and shrubs except for a few stones. It didn’t sadden her, as she thought it might. It was too far in the past for her to feel that, and she’d had too much time already to dwell on what was lost forever.
Beezely suddenly appeared out of nothing, sauntering down the path toward her. He brushed against her skirts, passing through the edge of them. “Meow?” he asked up at her, purring.
She squatted down, holding out her hand, and Beezely tilted his head, trying to rub the top of it against her. He went through her hand, but didn’t seem to notice, his purring uninterrupted. He lowered himself to the ground and rolled onto his back, his belly to the sun.
Serena stood, feeling the breeze ruffle through her short white-blond hair, paler now than it had been when she
lived, more the color it had been when she was a child. Sophie had bought her a beaded net to wear over it until it grew out, as well as a number of pretty white caps, but she rather liked the feel of it blowing free, so light after the heaviness of her long hair.
“Serena?” Alex called from the courtyard, where she knew the carriage was waiting, Nancy at the reins. They were to leave today for Bristol, and from there they would take a ship to the Americas. It was his wedding present to her, a trip to see the world, although she knew it was something he himself had longed to do since a child.
Alex’s sisters had eventually come to accept their marriage, although they thought of her as a woman from no family—all except Sophie refusing to believe what she had been. His brothers-in-law, from what Alex said, tried not to think about it at all. Rhys believed she was who she said, though, and after several weeks of looking wide-eyed at her whenever she was near, had eventually begun to relax in her presence.
She turned, smiling, and saw Alex come to the garden gate. He looked more handsome to her now than he had the first time she’d seen him. She didn’t know if it was the deepening of her own feelings that made him look more appealing, or the sparkle that now lit his eyes, even when he wasn’t talking about shooting stars and the vastness of the universe. It was as if he had come back to life after a sojourn in his own purgatory, just as she had.
“Everything’s ready, Mrs. Woding,” he said, coming toward her. “Are you?”
“The question is not if I am ready, Mr. Woding,” she said, taking his hands as he reached her. “The question is, is the world ready for me?”
“God help it if it’s not.”
She laughed and let him lead her toward the garden gate. “I do hope we get to see a pirate while in the Caribbean.”
He groaned and squeezed her hand. At the gate she stopped to take one last look at the garden, with its beds of flowers in bloom.
“We’ll come back,” Alex said.
“I know we will,” she said, turning to him. “I know.”
Meteor storms such as those described at the beginning and end of this story do indeed occur. In 1833 the Leonid meteor shower was so bright that it woke many of the inhabitants of Rhode Island. It was estimated that 60 meteors per second were visible. At the time, the connection between meteor showers and the paths of comets was unknown, as was the precise nature of falling stars themselves.
ROMANTIC TIMES
REVIEWERS’ CHOICE AWARD-WINNER LISA CACH!
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DREAM OF ME
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COME TO ME
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Come to Me
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DR. YES
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Dr. Yes
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GEORGE & THE VIRGIN
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OF MIDNIGHT BORN
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Of Midnight Born
passes my CODPIECE test…Creative, rather Original, Dramatic, Poetic, Intensely Emotional, Comedic, and best of all, Entertaining.”
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“A mix of magic, romance and humor,
Of Midnight Born
delights the reader’s imagination…[It] kept me glued to my seat, turning pages, till the very end.”
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BEWITCHING THE BARON
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DREAM OF ME
COME TO ME
DR. YES
GEORGE & THE VIRGIN
A MOTHER’S WAY
(anthology)
WISH LIST
(anthology)
THE WILDEST SHORE
THE MERMAID OF PENPERRO
BEWITCHING THE BARON
THE CHANGELING BRIDE
LOVE SPELL®
March 2010
Published by
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Copyright © 2000 by Lisa Cach
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