Chapter 31

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

J ulian saw Ester's last desperate move as though she moved through treacle. Every expression on her face, every muscle and motion was extended over seconds, minutes, to be examined and noted in detail. She gathered herself and he knew she was going to spring forward to reach for him. He screamed her name, shook his head. She would lose her footing, lose her handhold and be swept from the ship.

Then she was coming towards him, leaping with hands outstretched and a sickening horror overcame him. His gloved hand clung to the rung it was on by the smallest of grips. His weight hung on his naked hand, which was the closest to Ester's desperate reach. Her naked hand neared his. He watched her fingers coming closer as though he had all the time in the world to see. The distance closed and she was a hair's breadth from touching him, from exposing herself to the curse once more.

Julian did the only thing he could. He pulled his hand away, holding it out of Ester's frantic reach. Suddenly, his grip on the ladder was gone. His gloved hand tore away and water slammed into him with the force of a cannonball, thrusting him backward. Behind him was a deep passageway full of dark, frigid water with more pouring in from the top. A strong swimmer would be beaten down by that force even if the temperature of the water did not cramp his muscles into uselessness. He was a strong swimmer, but he knew that beating that deluge would be beyond him.

He fell back in slow motion, seeing Ester's screaming face, her empty hand reaching for nothingness. Then the ship tilted, a wave washed across the deck above and Julian screamed as he watched Ester washed away and out of sight. Black water closed around him, pulling at him, twisting him, dragging him deeper into its icy grip.

A small voice at the back of his mind told him not to fight. This was the destiny towards which he had been heading since the day he was born.

An end to the curse. An end to the Barrington line. An end to the Dukes of Windermere forever.

But... Ester.

Ester knew she could have saved him. With strength summoned from her deepest reserves, she could have held onto Julian while he fought against the raging water, helped him to the deck. If she had just been able to reach his hand. If only he had not snatched his hand away.

The curse .

Even in extremis, Julian had not been willing to touch her with his bare hand, so terrified of the curse was he. She screamed his name as she watched him slip away, but the storm swallowed her voice as the dark water surged beneath and around him, pulling him under as if it had claimed him for its own. More waves poured over him, pressing him deeper into the flooded depths of the ship. Her world lurched violently as the deck beneath her heaved, and in that moment, she lost sight of him entirely.

Then, without warning, a wave crashed into her. It threw her to the side, casting her into the air and over the rail. Somewhere, to her left, she caught a blurred glimpse of reaching arms, the shape of a lifeboat, and crewmen desperately trying to reach for her. The shock of the cold was instant and brutal. Her eyes stung from the immersion in the freezing, salty water. Light reached her from above. She could see the silhouette of the lifeboat pulling away, pushing itself off the wreck of the Sprinter. She could see the up thrusting rocks that had speared the ship and were even now splitting it apart.

She had been screaming when the wave hit and her lungs were already full of water. She coughed, expelling it but could not resist the instinctive indrawing of breath that followed. More water coursed into her lungs, even as her dress became saturated and weighed at her like lead.

This is how it began , she thought with a feeling of surprising peace. Her eyes remained open, watching the world darken. Watching the surface world recede above her. The ship, the boat, the world of humankind. She was drowning and lacked the strength or will to fight against it. It had all begun when, humiliated and defeated, she had tried to run away from the world and thrown herself into a lake.

She had wanted the dark water to swallow her, wash her clean of fear and erase her from the world. Now, it ended the way it had begun. In dark water.

Her vision shrank to pinpoints of light against which she saw Julian. Her handsome, noble, flawed Duke. The man who had been her first and only lover. The first and only man to claim her heart fully.

How fitting that he should be the last sight her dying, air deprived mind should show her. He was reaching for her, his hair floating in the dark water above his angular, exotic face. Ester smiled as she watched the vision fill the small tunnel of light that was left to her. This was how she wanted it to be. Free from fear and pain and looking upon the face of the man she loved. God could take her now.

The grip that seized her was brutal in its strength. A hand tangled itself in her hair and then there was a terrible, inexorable, and inescapable force pulling her upwards. She lacked the strength to reach up for whatever held her, could only flail until, quite by accident, her fingers brushed those that held her so relentlessly. Light was growing around her as she neared the surface and with the last feeling in numb fingers, she grabbed for the hand that was pulling her from the water. Then she was out in the air, rain and spray cascading about her. She was choking and coughing and gasping for air. Sweet, precious air.

A strong arm was around her waist, pushing her onto her back. Another held her with gentle but strong fingers beneath her chin, forcing her head back and keeping her mouth clear of the water. With the air came life. With life came fight. Ester thrashed, spluttering and kicking.

"Be still!" Julian roared to be heard over the storm, "lie still or you will drown us both!"

Ester obeyed. From somewhere distant, she heard cries, men and women. Her name. Over and over again. Closer was Julian's heaving breath, interspersed by choked coughs as he swallowed water. He was stroking with one arm, released from under Ester's chin. They rose up the side of waves and he stroked furiously down the far side. The sky was almost black with clouds—the water reflected the sky.

Ahead of them, Ester glimpsed ebony rocks, rising from the water like jagged teeth. Beyond that, dark hills. Then her foot kicked against something hard. It gave a little before resisting. It was the bottom. The seabed. Julian was gasping as he picked her limp figure up in his arms and began to stagger through waves that battered his back and water that reached almost to his neck.

Ester wanted to put her feet down and help—wanted to walk, but she knew the strength wasn't there. She couldn't seem to take a breath without coughing, water still being expelled from her lungs. Glancing up at Julian, she saw a man on the brink of exhaustion. His mouth was open to suck in great wheezing lungfuls of air. His facial muscles were slack with fatigue, eyes reddened by saltwater and half-shut. But he fought on. The water reached his chest and he forced one foot ahead of the other. His waist. His knees.

Someone was running into the surf and taking her from Julian. She saw a face framed by dark, curly hair. A young face with black eyes and round cheeks. Another man with red hair was putting Julian's arm about his shoulders. Then she heard her name. It sounded like Helen's voice. And her mother's.

She caught a glimpse of a marooned boat as she was carried up a beach. A deep voice was speaking loudly in a language Ester couldn't understand. She craned her head and saw that Julian was now held up by two men, but his feet weren't dragging. He walked, head down—but he walked. Then that dark head lifted and his eyes scanned the beach before alighting on her. Something unsaid passed between them. Blackness rolled over Ester, but not before she had seen Julian's head fall and his legs buckle beneath him.

"Julian!" Ester cried as she awoke.

She sat up in her bed. No, not her bed but a bed. A strange bed. The blankets were of thick but rough woven wool. The walls were white-painted stone and the ceiling was low and black-timbered. The floorboards were bare. The only other furniture in the room was a wooden, ladder-back chair, a wash-stand and a wardrobe. A small window provided a view of a serene blue sky and matching sea. It looked calm out there. Calmer than it had a right to be after the fury that had been unleashed on the Sprinter. How long ago?

"Julian?" she cried out, still confused but with thoughts of him uppermost in her mind.

There came the sound of shuffling from outside, footsteps on floorboards, and then the door whipped open. A woman with graying hair and a kindly sun-browned face entered. She smiled at Ester and sat on the bed beside her.

"There now, you're awake at last. Safe and sound, child, don't you worry. The sea didn't get you."

"Where am I? Where is...?"

"Julian?" the woman finished with a smile. "Your man is as safe as you. He's in the next room recovering. As to where you are, well, this is Penmon. You're on Ynys Mon, which you English call Anglesey. Your ship made it through the Straits but the wind drove you onto the rocks to the south of the headland here at Penmon Point. It tore your vessel apart, but thank the good Lord—it looks like most of the crew and passengers survived."

She spoke with a warm lilting accent and had a motherly voice. Ester swung her legs out of bed, pressing bare toes on the cold floorboards.

"My family were on the ship too," she pressed.

"A man and woman with a young lass?" the woman asked. "Don't you worry. They are hale and hearty. The lifeboat got them to the beach. They are being put up at the village inn. The rest of the survivors are in various houses around the village, everyone has taken in someone. You and Julian and his manservant are here in my house. My name is Cerys, Cerys Morgan. What is your name, my dear?"

"Ester Fairchild," she shivered. "It is quite chilly, is it not? Do you think I could have my clothes?"

"I'm afraid your clothes are sopping wet still, young Miss. You had quite the swim from what my husband tells me. But my daughter's about your size so I've borrowed a dress and some stockings from her. Here."

Ester realized that Cerys held a folded bundle in her lap. It was a black woolen dress, plain but seemingly well made, along with a pair of thick woolen stockings.

"Thank you, Cerys. I remember a man carrying me up the beach?"

"My son, Rhys. My husband was the one who rallied the village men when he saw that your ship was in trouble. He and my son were one of the first into the water, always have been first to jump into danger with both feet." She shook her head. "But this time, it came out well and I suppose it was worth it. You and your friend were just about on your last legs."

"You must thank him for us," Julian said from the doorway.

He leaned against the doorframe, pale and etched with exhaustion. But alive . Ester forgot about Cerys. She leaped from the bed and ran to Julian. She flung her arms about him, burying her face in his chest, squeezing tightly. He held her just as firmly, saying nothing. There were no words to say.

Cerys broke the silence. "Looks like your family's coming up from the village to see you, cariad ," she noted, glancing out of the window with interest.

Ester blinked, realizing the woman had likely looked for something to gaze at out there in order to give them what privacy she could—given that they blocked the doorway.

"Better get dressed. Don't want visitors while you're in your night things. I see Tom's things fit you nicely, Julian."

Ester stepped back from Julian and saw that he wore fisherman's woolens and tough canvas trousers. With his long, dark hair, he looked every inch the Welsh fisherman. She went to the window and saw her mother and father walking into a cobbled farmyard. A young man with curly hair was walking next to Helen, and they were talking to the exclusion of Helen's mother and father and the man who walked with them. He was bluff with a thick beard and a mass of curls shot through with silver.

"I'll leave you to dress and meet you downstairs," Julian said, gravely.