Magic in the Storm

Four

Four

THE WIND LASHED around Adriana as she rode to the stables. She wasn’t sure if she was directing the horse or if it was following orders from the mysterious man she had met in the woods. He had certainly said something to the horse. Was it possible that he could communicate with animals as well as heal bones?

Adriana nearly laughed at her fanciful thoughts. Men could not heal bones with a touch. Nor could she know a man she’d never met. But she did know him. Everything about him had been familiar and comforting. How could this be? She needed to think this through, but of much more immediate concern was the storm overhead, and the slate–colored clouds looming ominously. She needed to get back to the Abbey quickly.

Much to her amazement, she made it to the house just before the storm broke. The moment she was inside, there was a great c***k of lightning followed immediately by a booming of thunder that shook the old stones of Vallentyn Abbey. Rain pelted down from the sky in relief.

Adriana looked out from the doorway and took a deep breath, smelling the wonderful, fresh smell of the first raindrops hitting the ground. She was tempted to go back out into the storm—to be a part of it, to feel the cool water against her warm skin. She took a small step forward, wondering if she actually dared to go back out.

A large dog came and stood very close to her. He looked as undecided as she felt, only he stood with one paw in front of her. It was as if he was intending to block her from leaving the house.

“Adriana! What do you think you are doing? Where have you been?”

With a start she turned around and saw her guardian, Lord Devaux, bearing down on her from across the great hall. She stood up taller and moved away from the door toward the staircase in the center of the hall. All thoughts of going out into the storm disintegrated like dust at her feet. Her guardian, worse than the harshest governess, was here to see that she did not do anything daring or fun.

“I was out riding. If you will excuse me, sir.”

He stopped her at the bottom of the stairs and narrowed his little blue eyes at her as he did every time she returned from being out. What he was thinking when he did that? Was he looking for some evidence of misconduct?

If so, then he was, once again, to be sorely disappointed. She smiled at him, secure in her innocence.

“Lord Vallentyn returned nearly an hour ago and was concerned that you had not returned before him. Where have you been?” he said, his voice high with annoyance.

The large oak door closed behind them with a boom that echoed through the medieval hall—shutting out the storm, shutting out her freedom.

Adriana flinched. Her precious moments of liberty were gone, but she would hold onto whatever she could—she had to.

“I was enjoying the fresh country air,” she said in a firm, but quiet voice. “Now, if you will excuse me, I need to change and put away my sketchbook.”

He took a step back, eyeing her sketchbook with distaste. “See that you hide it well. We do not want anyone seeing that rubbish.”

Her guardian knew so well how to hurt her. She would not give him the satisfaction of showing it, however. She turned away from him and began up the stairs, her pace slow and dignified.

Her steps quickened after she reached the top of the stairs. By the time she reached her room at the end of the long corridor, she was nearly running.

Throwing open the double doors that led from her room out onto the balcony facing the back of the house, she allowed the storm to blow the hurt and tension from her mind and body. The curtains framing the door flew out behind her as the wind and rain gusted in.

Adriana did not mind. She stood just inside the door watching the magnificent storm play out as if solely for her own enjoyment.

Taking a deep breath of the cool air, she closed her eyes and allowed the wind and rain to wash over her.

Freedom. This is what it would feel like. Like the wind and the rain going wherever it willed, like a bird soaring over the land, like the waves of a briny ocean. Freedom was the knowledge that she could leave any time, or stay and do whatever she wanted. Freedom, however, was not something that Adriana had—only something she longed for with every ounce of her being.

Enjoying the feel of the storm, she could pretend that, for the moment at least, it was hers.

In her mind’s eye, she saw again the black, piercing eyes of the man in the wood. Morgan. She shivered at the memory of the fire in those eyes when he had held her leg and mended the bone.

Quickly, she spun around and grabbed up her sketchbook. With a few quick strokes of her pencil, she captured those eyes before they faded from her memory. Filling in the dark pupils, she stared at them as they stared back at her.

The fire was there. His eyes looked at her with an intensity that sent a rush of heat through her.

That same fascination, the deep feeling as if she knew him, overcame her as she stared into his black eyes in the center of her white sheet of paper.

The eyes needed a face.

She sketched in Morgan’s features around his eyes. His slightly curving eyebrows, his long straight nose and his mouth. She drew his mouth very slowly and carefully, making his bottom lip full and his top lip thin.

She imagined what it would be like to kiss those lips. They would be warm and gentle. She looked again at what she had drawn, and noticed a slight smile to his lips. Yes, he was a kind man. And set now in his face, his eyes showed him to be thoughtful as well.

She drew the outline of his face, shading in his high cheekbones and strong chin. And then his hair. He had long, wavy black hair. Adriana’s pencil took many long curving strokes in drawing his hair, reveling in its thick softness.

She added the lines of his neck and the top of his shoulders. They were broad shoulders. Strong shoulders. Perfect for relying on. She knew he would care for her and make her happy.

She sat back and studied her drawing. Yes. She had captured the man with her pencil. In careful lettering she added his name, “Morgan” to the bottom of the page and then the date, 5 May, 1815.

She was very pleased. She had never drawn a person before, only inanimate objects and nature. Storms were a passion of hers, as were sunsets, violent seas and swift rivers.

It depended on her mood what she drew or painted. When she was happy, which was not too often, she painted sunrises and sunsets with a beautiful blending of all the muted colors. When she was angry, it was a storm or a violent sea that flowed onto her canvas with its grays, blues and black. When she was feeling trapped in her London prison, she drew large open spaces—fields to run free in, beaches to splash through the cool water, rolling meadows and hills.

Painting freed her. Only in her paintings did she truly live. She did not care if her guardian was right and she had no talent. When she looked at her paintings or drawings, she felt the same feelings she had when she created them. Somehow, she felt as if she were there, wherever it was that she had painted.

Never before had she drawn a person. She looked at the man in her drawing. That he had known just what to do to make her calm unnerved her, but she had known somehow, from the minute she had seen him, that he would.

And there was something more. She was attracted to him in a way she’d never felt towards any other man. He was so large, with a raw strength that emanated from his very being, and yet he had been kind, gentle and soothing when she had been in pain.

He had healed her.

But that was impossible.

Men, no matter how strong or calming, could not heal broken bones. Yet he had. He had placed his hands around her leg and…

Adriana touched her leg where Morgan had touched it with his large, warm hands. It was bruised, but that was all. A shiver ran up her spine.

She had to find out more about him. Knowing his name was not enough.

The thought of asking sent a chill through her, but Lady Vallentyn was the only one who would know.