Master of the Moors (25 page)

"Quite a while," Grady
replied with a sigh.

"While I was bedridden, I
saw many things, most of which I would be willing to dismiss as
delusion, but one thing is quite clear: In my illness I became a
pawn stuck in the center of a board with my fate in the hands of
opposing forces. On one side," he said, opening his right hand, "I
saw Helen, telling me I needed to die in order to save the
children." He transferred the glass to the open hand and repeated
the gesture with his left. "On the other, I had visions, showing me
what was to become of me if I lived. I saw Sylvia in a memory that
corrupted itself and showed the true nature of my lover, the
unspeakable thing that hid behind the immaculate mask of her face."
He gave a small sad shake of his head. "I believe that is how I was
infected, Grady. Sylvia Callow was one of them. In fact, I believe
she was their mother."

20

"Who are you?"

"My name is
Stephen."

"Where are you taking me?"
Neil shouted as rain lashed against his face, numbing his skin. All
he had managed to deduce since waking was that his hands were bound
and they were traveling across unsteady terrain on the back of a
horse. His head pounded with echoes of the blow he'd been dealt. As
the horse mounted an incline, he heard the man call out a single
word: "Home."

"Why are you doing this?"
Neil demanded, so cold he feared at any moment he would die from
it. "I've done nothing to you."

"I don't recall ever
saying you had."

"Then...why?"

For this, there was no
reply, and the further they went, the more frightened he became.
The storm roared around them, the rain like needles desperate to
pierce his flesh. He wanted to lie down, to curl up in a ball in
the wet grass and sleep. He was so very tired, but the uncertainty
of what Stephen intended to do with him kept him alert and
awake.

"They'll be looking for
me!" he told his captor. "They're probably already out with the
dogs."

"If there's one thing I
can assure you, my child, it's that no one is looking for
you."

Neil refused to believe that.
Certainly Grady would be searching for him the moment he realized
what had happened. Unless...

Unless he was still at The
Fox & Mare, getting drunk with his friends.

But surely Kate would have alerted him
by now?

He remembered standing
outside the hall, in the rain, waiting. It took a long time for her
to come looking for him. She'd had ample time to come fetch him,
and yet her arrival had been almost leisurely. She'd even tried to
lessen his despair with humor.

He shook his head in
anger.
No. They wouldn't give up on me that
easily
.

He had to believe they
were looking for him, that if he strained his ears enough, he'd
hear their voices in the distance, penetrating night and storm,
seeking him out.

"They
are
looking for me," he said
defensively, more to convince himself than the man, who already
seemed certain the opposite pertained, though Neil reassured
himself with the realization that there was no way Stephen
could
know what Grady and
Kate were doing.

In response, the man
laughed. "I'm afraid you're entertaining false hope, Neil," he
said, "and false hope is for the foolish, for those who crave
disappointment and heartbreak. I would have thought with your
intelligence and maturity you'd have given up on such things a long
time ago."

"Well...why
wouldn't
they be looking
for me? They wouldn't just leave me out here!"

"I'm afraid that's exactly
what they did," Stephen said. "And if you think about it long and
hard you'll realize you've given them something they've been hoping
for all along."

"I don't
understand."

"Of course you do. Would
you disagree with me if I opined that Kate was always Grady's
favorite? Always Mrs. Fletcher's and your father's favorite
too?"

He didn't respond because
he knew it was the truth. Kate had always been
everyone's
favorite, but he didn't
see how that made much of a difference to anything. They still
loved him and would never just forget about him if he got lost.
Never.

"I'll take your silence as
affirmation. You have always felt different from them and not just
because you're blind, isn't that so?"

Alarmingly, Neil found
himself drawn to Stephen's voice, only because it was warm and the
night was so desperately, achingly cold. That voice was seductive;
it promised relief from all of this, and though he was still
frightened, he sensed the threat recede a little for
now.

"There's a good reason for
that, child, a very good reason why you've never truly felt a part
of your family and why they in return, have never truly considered
you one of them. Oh, I'm sure they didn't
intentionally
try to alienate you, to
nudge you out of the nurturing warmth of the familial cocoon, but
nature will always separate animals into their respective packs,
just as it will divide man into the appropriate tribes. You never
belonged to them, Neil. And they never belonged to
you
."

Neil shivered, tried again
to free himself, but the attempt was somewhat feebler than before.
He felt the energy drain from him, the resistance buckle under the
force of the stranger's words. It was true that he had always felt
distanced from everyone else but he had blamed it on his handicap.
Was it even remotely possible that his captor's claims had some
basis in fact?

"I don't believe you," he
said, without conviction, and though he thought the storm might
have drowned out his words, Stephen said, "You will soon
enough."

***

"You should stick to the
road as far as you can," Mansfield said. "But it would be quicker
to cross the moors. I know the danger but trust me, I doubt it's
limited to just the fields now. If they want to find you, they
will, no matter where you are. Your only hope is that Callow will
want you to come to him, in which case those things won't bother
you."

Things like
you
, Grady thought and
shuddered.

"As I said before, if you
don't want to go, I'll understand. The sensible thing to do would
be to wait until morning, or at least until the storm clears up,
but I'm not sure we have that much time."

Grady nodded dismissively.
"Tell me somethin'," he said tonelessly. "Did you love
her?"

"Sylvia?"

"Yes."

"I did," Mansfield replied
without hesitation. "I believe at first it was only desire. You saw
her yourself. You know what she did to men, and I dare say there
wasn't a man in the village who wouldn't have done what I did given
the opportunity. But I fell in love with her and---despite how
terrible it sounds---I confess I would have left Helen, and the
children, and this damned house if she'd asked me to. She was
powerful, Grady, more powerful than any woman has any right to be.
It scared and exhilarated me but so did it erase all thoughts of
what I stood to lose while I was with her."

Grady chewed his lower lip
until it hurt. He didn't want to admit the disgust he felt for
Mansfield at that moment. It was perhaps, unfair. After all, he
himself had kept the secret just as long. He had known about the
affair, and what had come of it, and yet he had kept it locked away
inside. And now everything was coming apart.

"I have to go," he said,
opening the door and stepping out into the hall. Mansfield did not
follow, but said, "One more thing, Grady."

"What is it?"

"Before you go, have Mrs.
Fletcher lock this door from the outside."

Grady gave him a curt nod
and, pulling the door closed on his haggard master's countenance,
he sighed and headed into the kitchen.

***

When he returned with the
rifle, Kate was waiting for him, arms folded, eyes blazing but
still moist from crying. She had quickly towel-dried her hair and
now it hung in damp clumps.

"I'm going with you," she
said. "And don't you dare tell me I can't. I'm not a
child."

Grady set the rifle down
across the kitchen table and rubbed his eyes. "God forbid I should
ever be allowed to forget that."

Mrs. Fletcher had just
returned from locking the living room door. The ring of keys
jingled in her trembling grip. "Grady," she said. "What on earth is
goin' on?"

On the table, the
lantern's flame dwindled, then soared up the glass bulb; shadows
shrank away.

He shook his head. "I'm
not entirely sure I know, love."

"But where's
Neil?"

Grady looked at her and
composed a grin. "I'll find him, Mrs. Fletcher, don't you
worry."

"Well?" Kate asked him.
"Aren't you going to answer me?"

"What good would it do? I
don't
want
you to
go. You'd be safer here but you've never listened to me before so
why should I waste my breath now? And it certainly sounds as if
you've made up yer mind."

"Yes I have."

"But let me tell
you
this
," he
said, bringing a forefinger close to her face, "if you
do
come with me, you'll
damn well do what I tell you to or I'll lock you in the cellar
where you can scream and object to anythin' you want. Are we
clear?"

She frowned, nodded
slowly. "Yes."

"When I tell you to stay
put, you do it. If I tell you to run, you'd better be prepared to
run like the Dickens. If I tell you to go home, you'd bloody well
better do that too. You'll do
everythin'
I tell you to do or you'll
stay here, understood?"

"Stop
shouting
at me," she protested. "I
already agreed with you."

"Good." He straightened
and set about loading the master's rifle.

"Do I get a gun?" Kate
asked, in a doubtful tone.

Grady looked at her, and
was about to give her the answer she expected when he remembered
how good a shot she was. How good a shot he had
taught
her to be, though she had
never been that good with a Winchester. "Yer father's pistol is in
the cellar. Fetch it, and hurry!"

With a smile, Kate did as
she was told. Grady prayed she'd be as acquiescent for the rest of
the night.

Whatever on earth it held for
them.

21

The ground changed beneath
Neil's feet, each step resulting in a hollow thunking sound as he
sensed himself rising, the rain no longer stippling his face. His
fingers brushed against rough-edged brick and wood. Splinters
punctured his skin; he pulled away, wincing.

"What is this place?" he
asked, as Stephen tugged him forward, into what felt like a room,
cold but dry. He was relieved to be out of the storm but only
moments later the chill from his sodden clothes began to seep into
him. He hugged himself with one arm. The room smelled like the man,
but also of mildew and mold.

"Our home," Stephen
replied, releasing him at last, and Neil said nothing further.
Instead he listened to a series of what sounded like muffled
gunshots, but which he supposed was wood being broken.
Good, a fire
,
he thought, as he rubbed the numbness from his
wrist. He heard the hasty crumpling of paper, then nothing for a
few moments until the silence was broken by the hiss of a
match.

"It will take a few
moments to get warm," Stephen told him. "If you walk straight ahead
for about five paces you'll be directly in front of the fire. Come,
sit."

Neil hesitated. The
thought of warmth drew him like a magnet, but he was still anxious
and more than a little afraid of the man. "Why did you bring me
here?" he asked.

"I told you we would have
an opportunity to discuss our secrets, did I not?" He didn't wait
for an answer. "Well, now is the perfect time."

A volley of thunder
crashed overhead. It sounded almost on top of them, but despite the
weight of the fresh rain that followed it, none came through into
the room. "They'll hang you for this. It's kidnapping. If I were
you, I'd bring me home while you still have the chance. Before they
run you down like the dog you are."

There was amusement in
Stephen's voice. "But you
are
home, Neil."

The fire crackled and
spat. The acrid scent of treated wood burning filled the room,
suggesting to Neil that the man had broken up furniture to light
it. Still, he remained by the doorway. "My home is with my
family."

"I am your family, as you
are mine."