The Silent Duchess

Chapter 17

With strength she didn't know she possessed, she scrambled down the rock. She grabs his arm, her small frame straining against his muscular weight. "Move, Hudson! You have to move!" she hisses through gritted teeth.

She drags him, inch by agonizing inch, toward the dilapidated hunting cabin she spotted earlier. Every movement sends waves of pain through her own body, through her stomach, but she refuses to stop. She cannot let the child die because its father bled out in the mud.

Inside the cabin, the air is stale and smells of old pine, but it is a shelter. She heaves his dead weight onto the floorboards. The Duke's breathing is shallow, his grey eyes unfocused as they track her movement.

"Stay with me," she commands, her voice cracking. "Do you hear me? You do not get to die yet."

Desperation drives her hands. She tears at the fine silk of her skirt, the fabric ripping with a harsh sound. She bunches the material together, pressing it hard against the gash in his leg. The blood immediately begins to soak through the fabric, warm and terrifyingly abundant.

"Please," she whispers, leaning over him, her blond hair falling around them like a curtain, separating them from the dark forest outside. Her tears fall onto his pale cheek. "Please, don't die. Don't leave me alone with this."

As she presses down on the wound, her free hand instinctively finds her stomach. She is terrified, terrified that the exertion will harm the baby, terrified that the wolf's howls are still approaching, but most of all, terrified that the monster who broke her might be the only thing standing between her and the cold, dark end.

The cabin is a tomb of shadows and freezing air. Laura works with the mechanical precision of someone who has learned to survive through necessity rather than choice. Her hands shake as she applies the makeshift tourniquet, using strips of her ruined gown to bind the wound. She remembers her mother's soft, steady instructions on how to staunch blood, how to keep a person from slipping away into the great dark.

"Stay," she whispers, though there is no one to answer. "You must stay."

By the time the bleeding slows to a manageable trickle, her strength has evaporated. Her body feels like it is made of glass, ready to shatter at any moment. The pain in her hip from her fall has settled into a dull, throbbing ache that pulses in time with her heartbeat.

With what little adrenaline she has left, she drags him. The Duke is a heavy man, built of solid muscle and decades of military discipline, but she manages to maneuver his unconscious form onto the narrow, rickety cot in the corner. He looks strange like this, his immaculate uniform torn and stained with blood and forest grime, his imposing features slack in unconsciousness. Without his usual mask of cold authority, he looks dangerously vulnerable.

She stumbles to the hearth, her movements slow and halting. Her fingers fumbled with the kindling, but after several agonizing attempts, a small, orange flame finally licked at the logs. It provides more light than heat, but it is enough to push back the encroaching shadows.

The cold begins to seep through the wooden walls as the night deepens. Her own body shivers uncontrollably, the thin fabric of her torn gown offering no protection against the frost creeping across the floorboards. Her stomach tightens with a protective cramp, a reminder of the life she carries the child that is both her greatest hope and her greatest fear.

Exhaustion finally wins. She cannot stay awake; she cannot risk collapsing alone on the floor.

Moving with careful deliberation, she slides beneath the threadbare blanket beside him. The cot is small, forcing them to press against one another. Instinctively, seeking the only source of warmth in this forsaken place, she curls against his side. She presses her cheek against the rough fabric of his uniform, her body seeking the heat of his large frame.

In the flickering light of the dying fire, she listens to his labored breathing. It is uneven, punctuated by small groans of pain, but it is there. She closes her eyes, her hand resting protectively over her womb, and drifts into a fitful, shivering sleep, trapped between the monster who hurt her and the man who might die in her arms.

Morning breaks not with light, but with the grey, misty promise of another cold day. Laura wakes before the sun, her body aching in ways she has never known. But the survival instinct that drove her into the forest has not left her; it has merely sharpened.

She moves through the morning like a creature born of the woods. She finds more wood to feed the hearth, ensuring the cabin remains a pocket of warmth against the forest's teeth. She finds a stream nearby, clear, cold, and promising, and fills a rusted bucket she finds in the cabin's corner. The berries she finds are tart and small, but they provide a momentary sweetness to the bitter morning.

When she discovers her trap has sprung, she doesn't hesitate. She has never hunted, but she has learned quickly that nature does not wait for manners or propriety. Using the Duke's own sword, the very blade that had killed wolves to save her, she guts and skins the rabbit with a grim, focused efficiency.

By the time Hudson finally stirs, the cabin has been transformed from a tomb into a makeshift camp. The fire is roaring, casting dancing shadows across the walls. The smell of roasting meat fills the space.

Hudson wakes to the sensation of heat and the unfamiliar sounds of crackling wood. His first instinct is to reach for a weapon, but his body betrays him. A white-hot spike of pain shoots through his thigh, forcing a strangled groan from his lips. His vision swims. He tries to sit up, but his muscles feel like water.

"Don't move," a voice commands. It isn't the soft, pleading voice of the wife he knew. It is hard, practical, and utterly commanding.

He blinks his eyes open, his vision clearing slowly. He expects to see the Duke's servants, or perhaps the physician. Instead, he sees a vision that disorients him.

Laura sits on the floor before the fire. She looks nothing like the delicate Duchess of Whitestone. Her hair is a wild tangle of gold, tangled with twigs and dried leaves. Her face is smudged with ash and dirt, her eyes bright with a fierce, primal intensity. Her gown is gone, reduced to simple wraps that leave her shoulders bare to the heat of the fire. She looks like a woodland nymph who has survived a m******e.