Lord of Raven's Peak - Catherine Coulter [127]
Rollo said, his voice peevish, “Aye, one hears many things. Leave me now, all of you save Laren. I wish you to tell me the rest of the story. You left Analea in the hands of that king in Bulgar.”
Laren smiled toward her husband, and said, “Aye, uncle, I will tell you the rest of the story.”
She was sick again, pale and sweaty, and she hated it. She rose slowly to her feet, stared down at the basin, and felt her belly knot and cramp again. She eased down on the box bed and tried to relax. The cramps continued. She tried to breathe through her mouth, slow, shallow breaths, and it helped.
Her old nurse, Risa, bent, thin, and quarrelsome, came into the sleeping chamber, clucked over her, thankfully said nothing, and took away the basin.
Laren slept. When she awoke it was nearly dark. The sleeping chamber was cast into deep shadows, and the stillness was oddly frightening. Suddenly there was no comfort here. This was a place of violence, a place of fear. The sleeping chamber was again as it was two years before.
She raised herself on her elbows, calling out quietly, her voice raw as a cold night, “Is anyone here? Merrik?”
There were whispers of sounds, surely there was something she heard, but no, there was only stillness and it seemed to grow, and with it the shadows, the encroaching darkness. She swallowed, but her throat was dry and it hurt. Then she heard it. A small noise, of little account really, but it was over there, in the far corner of the chamber, a noise that was like a wounded animal.
She held herself very still.
It came again, only closer this time. She wanted to cry out, but there was only dryness and pain in her throat. “Merrik,” she said, and wondered if his name was only in her mind for surely there had been no sound from her mouth.
“Who is there?”
She swung her legs over the side of the bed, felt her belly knot and churn, and bowed her head, trying to keep from vomiting. Where was Risa? Why was she alone?
But she wasn’t alone. There was that sound again, so very soft, yet distinct, unlike any sound she’d ever heard.
“Who is there?”
It was different now, a rustling sound, no longer soft, no longer muted, and it was close. She looked toward the doorway. It seemed far beyond her, that doorway, the only way to escape this chamber and what was in this chamber and growing closer to her. When something touched her shoulder, she screamed, whirling about to see Ferlain beside her, her face as pale yet as distinct as a cold winter moon framed by utter darkness.
“How very strange you are, Laren. Why are you shaking? ’Twas you who startled me.”
There was black amusement in her voice. Laren tried to calm herself. It was but Ferlain, fat and slow Ferlain who whined and carped, but who was harmless, certainly no one to fear.
“You frightened me. Why is the chamber dark?”
“I don’t know. It was dark when I came in. I am only here to visit you. How do you feel?”
“Let us light a lamp.”
“Very well.” Ferlain held the oil-soaked wick next to a burning coal in the brazier near the box bed. Soon it burst into a small flame.
“I prefer the darkness, you know,” Ferlain said, staring at the flame. “But you don’t, do you? When I was your age I didn’t like the darkness either, but things change, you know. Always change, always grief and sorrow. But enough of that. Now you can see everything. Nothing is the matter, is it?”
Ferlain, such a common sight, comforting, the gray streaks of hair, the fat smooth hands. Surely there was nothing frightening about Ferlain. Laren said, “No, not really. I suppose when I wake up suddenly I remember that horrible night two years ago when the men came and took Taby and me.”
“Aye, that would be frightening. Helga is right. It was an act of mercy that you weren’t killed. Well, Taby died, didn’t he, but not you. No, you are safe and pregnant with that Viking’s babe and everything will