8. Patientia infernum est

8

Patientia infernum est

“Good day! Might you wish for a spot of companionship this afternoon?” The bold urchin with the sable curls slipped in between the heavy ballroom doors.

Knowing the room to be empty (for who would be in here when everyone else took advantage of the warmer day out on the lawn playing games?), Warrick had shoved his way in long enough ago to make his way across the barren floor where he looked out the French window. The one that gave him a soul-crushing view of ladies and lads gadding about on happy, functioning feet with laughter lighting their faces.

He directed his chair away from the view and rolled several feet forward before stopping.

“I saw you creep in here,” his visitor continued, making sure the doors latched behind her, “and decided I should follow suit and sneak in here as well.”

“Oh? Do you seek to avoid detection?” A more probable thought occurred. “Or do you play a seeking game?”

“Nothing of the sort.” She approached without hesitation. “But my hand, you see?” She raised her right hand, and flexed the fingers open and closed several times. “’Tis plumb worn out from doing lines . Hordes of them. I decided my fingers were due a respite and, since you are quite alone, concluded greetings are in order.”

Charmed despite himself, he gave her a genuine smile.

“And who are you?” Warrick inquired, even though he knew full well, still in awe of the youthful excitement coupled with wonder in every word he’d heard her speak.

“Lady Harriet Jane Larchmont, youngest daughter of Lord and Lady Ballenger. You are friends with Lord Redford, the man who is marrying my sister.”

“I am indeed. The closest of friends.” At least he had been, before he’d started letting irrational jealousy consume him the last couple days. Jealousy that had grown worse with each new thing others participated in that he could not.

Knowing that Ed’s loss rivaled that of his own, though in very different ways, he had no business avoiding Ed and the other men, but he continued to do so. Only Frost, it seemed, understood the level of strain Warrick endured, seeing so many clustered around while unable to join in, unable to be the center of fun and frolic as he had always been before.

As Lady Harriet approached, her gaze locked upon his knees, he tensed. “May I inquire,” she began, and for once her voice didn’t exude confidence, “about your injuries? Or is it best to keep mum?”

“It would be refreshing of you to ask directly, rather than speculate or rumor about. Would that others might do the same.”

“Well then.” She plopped to the floor at his feet, her dress of bright scarlet—the hated one?—straining to cover her crossed legs. “Did you get injured fighting Napoleon at the same time Lord Redford found his arm de-capped?”

“Decapitated?”

“Aye, just like that poor French lady—or was she a queen? A princess? I confess, I was not attending lessons that day—but the same thing happened to her. Only it had been not her arm , but her head sliced clear through!”

She accompanied this with ye olde slicing motion and he struggled not to laugh, the tightly held strain easing from his muscles. “I did at that, both Ed—your sister’s intended—and I felled at Albuera in Spain.”

Losing interest in his kneecaps, she captured his gaze. “Will your legs ever work again?”

He couldn’t stop the sigh that heaved from his lungs. “I wish I could say. Physicians claim ’tis doubtful. My mother would tell you yes.”

She grinned at him. “Mothers always think they know everything.”

They shared a quiet laugh.

Until she idly pulled at the top edge of one red sleeve and asked, “But what do you think? Are your legs apt to walk again?”

“What do I believe?” That it was likely time he stopped wallowing. If only I could. “Time will tell how much”—if any—“use of them I regain.”

Giving the sleeve an irritated glance, she released it to tug beneath her arm. “I confess, I am very impatient. It would make me crazed to have to wait. Especially not knowing and all.”

“On that, Lady Harriet?—”

“Call me Harri.”

He hoped his own lingering despondence over the matter didn’t show. “On that, dear Harri, we are in accord. Waiting is a sorry state indeed.”

She glanced at the door—ensuring they were still alone?—and then turned back to him, placing her arms straight behind her, palms on the floor, as she leaned back to lengthen her legs, toes pointing to and fro in an alternating fashion. “I almost wish my sister was marrying you instead. You are easy to talk to. Not like some adults…” The way she emphasized that indicated she had attempted to chatter about with a grand number who wanted nothing to do with her. “I so wish to converse with Lord Redford about his arm, you know. The missing one, not the other.”

“I gathered that.”

“Yet my sister is forever in his company now that she has decided they will suit.” The toes still danced, her feet as lively and energetic as the rest of her.

Ah, how he missed that. The freedom of childhood. Just being near young Harri reminded of it, brightened his spirits a good deal more than the sunshine outside. Then why do you not spend more time with your siblings? They are much an age with this one here.

And boom . The sky darkened once more, heavy clouds pressing in over his head and upon his shoulders. For thoughts of his own siblings only reminded him of responsibilities, and how very ill-equipped he felt now to handle them.

“Ed is good company,” he told her. “I know that to be true. If they are to be wed, one must understand their desire to spend time together.”

“But every minute ? I vow, they spend so much time together one would think they must share a chamber pot!” He snort-laughed into one fist. “I spoke with Lord Redford upon his arrival, and it was grand, but now? Merry Anne refuses to count—um, count…”

“Countenance?”

“Aye, that. She will not coun tenance me inquiring further. Claims he has already ‘tolerated quite enough of my badgering’ this week.”

“May I let you in on a secret?”

“Always!” Lady Harri scrambled to her knees and clapped twice. “I adore secrets! And I vow to keep any you share solely to myself.”

“Ed, Lord Redford, is a better man than I. He shall make your sister a fine husband. And if you find him in a quiet moment, I wager he would answer your questions sufficiently to satisfy even that inquisitive mind you boast.”

She started pulling on the dress near her waist, wrenching it downward with both hands. “I really hope you walk again. I shall put in some extra prayers for just that.”

Standing, she heaved at the sides of her bodice. Yanking the material with a vengeance.

“Difficulty?” He fought against a smile. “Ah…with your dress?”

“Very much so. It is most disagreeable. The”— tug —“horrid”— yank —“thing!”

Rrrrriiiiippp!

She groaned, her vivacious face pinching as she frowned down at the maligned frock. “Imbecilic thing! I do not have words to describe how much I hate wearing the blasted—” Hearing the curse come from her lips, she gasped. Looked more determined than contrite. “You did not hear that.”

Oh-ho. Something the infamous Lady Harriet regretted uttering? From what he had seen—and heard—a rare occurrence indeed. “Wretched uncomfortable, is it?”

“You have no idea. Though, in truth, I am to blame.” Her eyes rolled heavenward as she minced out, “ For dirtying my other and then, once clean, tearing it anew. ” After the credible imitation of her mother, she glared down her front at the wine-colored velvet. “If it were more comfortable, I wouldn’t hate it so. As it is, I would curse it if I could.”

“Mmm. You could try ruinosus veste! Or perhaps stultum veste. No, wait! Horridus rubrum veste. Est infernum! ”

“ Infernum. Hell?” Her eyes grew round. “Are we swearing in Latin?”

“Close enough.”

“You are my maxime ventus person this week!”

She was approaching one of his most favored as well. “ Gratias .”

“ Satis grata es .”

Having naught else to do with his time, knowing he couldn’t ask after her governess—the one he hadn’t seen since that first day and night—he offered, “Bring me thread and needle, and I shall mend both this one and the other you ‘tore anew’.”

She stared at him as though his severed head had rolled right back onto his neck. “You cannot.”

“Why not?”

“Men do not mend?—”

“Aye, they most certainly do. Does your father’s valet not see to his clothes?” Her nod came slowly, after thought. “I assure you. I do not mind wielding a needle and thread. A soldier learns to be self-sufficient.”

“Then I am doubly sorry you remain in the Merlin’s chair. For it must pain you quite profunde to be unable to do for yourself.”

To his very depths?

It did. It cut to his soul.

Est infernum.

“Have you found yourself beneath the mistletoe yet?” she startled him by asking.

Hadn’t everyone? For the sprite had seen it hung everywhere. “Aye, but never with an unmarried lass beneath it with me.”

He wouldn’t burden a single female here with having to bend awkwardly to give him a kiss. Nor could he, he knew because he had failingly tried, even attempt to stand to offer a buss at the proper height.

He refused to acknowledge the spike of disappointment that slammed into him at the painful reminder, for growing up, Mama always ensured mistletoe, and its accompanying traditions, remained a lively fixture in their home.

“We could conspire to make it happen.” Lady Harri beamed at him, the detested dress all but forgotten. “Who would you like to kiss?”

He knew better than to answer that. “Should the question not be who might be amenable to kissing me ?”

Are you really discussing kissing to a child?

She started it!

“Everyone agrees you are handsome.” She gave him a conspiratorial grin. “Only you and I know you are witty in English and also in Latin. Even without the working legs, I am quite sure any number of appropriate females would be in alt at the notion of sampling your kiss. I shall see what I can do.”

Why court danger?

True to Miss Primrose’s grudgingly offered warning to keep his door locked, he had awakened, twice now, to scrabbled attempts to gain uninvited entry. It appeared she of the pert yet kissable nose was correct: the lure of countess , for some, did win out over unworking limbs and rumors of dust-laden coffers.

“Thank you for the thought,” he said now, “but I think not?—”

Ah. So much for declining any assistance in the mistletoe realm, for his excitable visitor was already off, scurrying away—once again yanking at the hated rubrum veste .

’Twas blisteringly cold. Thanks to the biting wind, the kind of cold that chapped faces and napped words. That made fingers numb and lungs ache.

Warrick didn’t care.

Halfway through this days-long house party, the walls and ceilings had all but closed in. With the aim of alleviating his growing agitation, he’d suffered the humiliation of being carried—at his behest—down the steps, deep into the garden and placed upon a bench beneath some winter-dead brambles that formed an arch overhead.

Bundled against the cold—rather braced by it, in fact—he sought to flick his thoughts far away. Away from everyone else’s jaunt into the nearest town for shopping, and skating if the lake had iced over, after the pleasant weather of yesterday had been obliterated overnight.

While he, unable to keep up, unable to participate, to laugh and entertain and wile the hours away—being all that was pleasing and pleasant as did all the walking gentlemen—found himself alone.

Alone and sitting outside—legs as dead as the brambles, wrapped in a blanket nevertheless—his bare hands firm upon the cold stone bench to ensure his sorry arse didn’t topple off, he sought some measure of peace.

Thick clouds hid the sun, but also kept the temperatures just this side of bearable if one craved numbness.

A couple of determined birds picked at the hard ground near the base of some dried-up, scraggled plant. Watching their antics, ’twas several seconds before the methodical climb of someone approaching from the forested area abutting one side of the estate altered his focus.

An angel come to earth, swathed against the elements, materializing from the evergreens moments later his reward. An angel not with blond, ethereal hair and feathery alabaster wings, but one sporting strands of sunset hair escaping a winter blue bonnet, no white wings upon her back, but a light brown muff about her hands.

Angels. A multitude of them. Filling his sight. Flying in on those tremendous wings, ready to swoop him away…

He blinked. Blinked again, because of a sudden, his vision no longer beheld the frozen garden and potential company who made his heart take flight, but instead, he was back on the battlefield…

Unable to move.

Mired…

“Warrick!”

Slick mud coated the side of his face: cold, thick and wet. His arm felt wrenched from its socket, twisted beneath the weight of his torso.

Richard Andrew Martinson.

He tried to pull his mind free of the sludge, never mind his face.

Who called him? Who?

For no one ever, ever used his entire name.

What was that? Nagging at his thick head? His pain-buffeted brain?

He’d forgotten something. Forgotten to be somewhere…

But where?

Richard Andrew.

The voice soothed the jagged edges of his burning flesh. But how could that be? How could fire exist where only rain and—and?—

Soldiers! Where soldiers existed? Mounds of them, piled alongside, heaped on top, smothering him deeper and deeper into the mud.

He tried to raise his arm, wipe the grime from his mouth, but couldn’t move. Pinned in place.

The distant sound of retching attempted to gain his attention but failed, his nose suddenly assailed with the stench of blood and death, vomit, piss and shit. He gagged. Gagged again, as though his body would cast up all the evil smells—and the memories that hit him at once.

Following orders and riding into battle, despite the storms covering the land and combatants. The spike of energy that flowed through him and his horse?—

Wait. His horse? Where was?—

Richard. It is time to take you from this place.

What? Who?

A gentle, gossamer touch across his brow, over his shoulder. Through eyes squeezed tightly shut against the fire blazing through his shoulder and down part of his back, he saw wings. Majestic, beautiful angelic wings.

Richard. It is time.

For what? he thought.

And was answered though he hadn’t given voice to anything.

Time to escort you ? —

To heaven? A snort-whimper escaped then. We both know that’s likely not the direction I’m bound.

Another nebulous touch; this time he felt his body moving, rolling over on its own. He sure as certain wasn’t doing anything to propel it.

Beyond the soothing presence, wind howled, gusted forth the taste of destruction and decay.

He shuddered, sickened down to his bones as the memories of the last hours flooded in: the piercing screams that clawed their way inside one’s head and wouldn’t leave; the shrill of clashing swords, of booming cannon shot; the unforgettable sight of broken men and horses, flying backward or crashing to the ground. The howls of anguish. The?—

Richard Andrew. One of the many angels spoke—without moving their lips. But he heard it through the growing agony all the same. Think naught of the past. Come with me and embrace your future.

Wings flapped silently, casting a glowing warmth over him. Banishing the riotous memories. Calming the increasing torment. Creating a soothing, protective shield that made him feel as though he floated.

Now that was lovely.

He relaxed his closed eyes. Let the air lift him. His shoulder stopped hurting. The gnawing pain in his back faded.

Hell’s bells. Gup! ’Pologies, angels. But I feel smashing. As though soused just this side of sleep…

Wait until his mates heard this one! Ed and Frost were as likely to believe him as if he’d spied a flying fox jiggling on the breeze with their foxed Regent. Thinking of… Ed? “Saint Nick?” Where were his friends? His horse?

Your horse no longer suffers. Be at peace with that. As for your friends ? —

“Warrick!” The deep shout tried to pierce through his drifting, contented haze. “You damn reprobate! Where the hell are you?”

Are you ready? To leave and come with us?

Leave?

“Oh, thank God in heaven. Good Lord, man! You are covered—” More retching. More curses. More jostling around him, but none of it mattered. Not when he felt so light, so very grand.

“Where are you injured? Can you move? What— Oh. Damn, damn.”

Something jerked his torso. His heavy eyelids fluttered. Saint Nick. Frost. Filthy Frost. Warrick snickered. For his immaculate friend ’peared grossly disgusting. Mud and blood and filth covering near every inch?—

Richard Andrew Martinson. It is time.

“I say, naggin’ Nicky-boy,” he managed through a thick tongue. Had to share. Wanted to drift some more. “Angels, I tell you. Flappin’ those glitt’ry wings… Can you see? Think they’re ’bout to float me off.”

If I go, he asked his angels, and his tongue wasn’t thick anymore, what of them? My mates? Mother? The siblings?

“Angels? Pah.” Frost cursed again. What was he doing? “Apple-fed pigs would be more likely to cart off your burdensome carcass. Pray to your angels, man. I need some aid.”

What of it? Can you help my friend?

Do you wish to remain?

I can choose?

This time you may. For not all exits are decided. Some come with choices. If you choose to remain, it will not be easy. There will be challenges ahead, ones you do not anticipate. You cannot walk off this battlefield today. Perhaps not ever.

Ever? Walk? What were they trying to tell him?

The path to your future will take effort, more effort than you can conceive, and much patience. But time and perseverance will bring unimaginable rewards.

Rewards?

Happiness. Joy.

Happiness? Oh, how he like that. Loved laughing, making others smile. Loved dancing and?—

It is time, Richard. You must decide. Shall your future be decided by coming with us? Or remaining here?

If I stay, I will have that? A future? A happy one?

Eventually. With your own angel.

Now that sounded lovely. Almost as lovely as floating some more. All right. Aye, I wish to remain. To ? —

The warm, comforting presence was gone. Evaporated. Vanished in a blink.

The pain returned, rioting forth like a hundred enemy soldiers, ready to batter him to ribbons.

The smells, the memories, the strange burn—dulling now, in the lower part of his back but growing in his arm and chest—gnawed at him, competed with the damp, miserable chill and abrupt, exploring grip from Frost who knelt. Gripped Warrick’s torso against his bent knees and started fumbling with his clothing.

“Blazes, Nick… What the devil?”

“Where are you injured? Can you stand? Show me?—”

“Can see naught but you getting pert with my groin and pizzle.” Warrick scrambled, tried to push Frost’s hands away from his falls. “I don’t conjobble that way, man. Or are you tryin’ to help me piss? God damn —’pologies, angels—but I can’t feel?—”

“Help me, damn you,” Frost grunted. “Got to get you back up on my horse, for I have no hope of carrying your heavy arse?—”

“Not t’day, you crank of a commandin’ officer. Angels said I could fly with them. Fly , man. Or wait. For you. Your tardy hide. No walkin’ today. Maybe… Never?” Moisture wept from his eyes, blurring the mud and battlefield into a jumble that haunted him in the coming days and weeks every bit as much as the loss of his angels.

Of his legs.