Page 81 of The Cornish Mermaid

Morvoren sucked in her lips. “Shock and loss of blood. His body’s shutting down in part to cope with the shock.” She hesitated. “He could still die. Shock can kill you even if your wound is going to heal.”

Oh, let the museum not be right.

“Can I do anything?” Sam asked, his eyes on Kit’s face. “Do you need anything else to treat him? Anything I can fetch from Carlyon Court? Should I go for a doctor?”

“Best not involve a doctor,” Jago said. “Captain Carlyon’ll be checkin’ doctors, I’ll be bound, as they’ll most likely know they wounded one of us.”

Morvoren shook her head. “Only time will tell. You go downstairs and get the kettle on. I think we all need a hot toddy.” She gave a half-hearted grin toward Jago. “I’ll stay here with Kit in case he wakes. I’ll call you if he does.”

Grumbling to himself, Jago led the way out of the room and Morvoren was at last left alone with Kit. She sat down on the chair by the bed, and reaching out, took his left hand in hers. The light of the one candle they’d left flickered over Kit’s unconscious form. He lay so still only the shallow rise of his chest told her he lived.

She studied his hand where it lay slack in hers, the fingers cool. The hand that had hauled her from a watery grave, whose touch had sent shivers coursing through her body. The hand she’d held as he’d taught her to dance, that had slid around her waist in the dark garden at Denby and drawn her close. The hand that had gone to the nape of her neck and cradled her head as he kissed her.

She had a sudden overwhelming urge to burst into tears. This wasn’t fair. She’d been somehow snatched back into the past and presented with the man of her dreams, a man she thought it her mission to save, and yet here he lay, barely breathing. She dropped her head onto her arms as the tears ran down her cheeks and cried herself to sleep as exhaustion swept over her.

She had no idea how much time had passed before something disturbed her fitful sleep and she blinked herself awake. Kit’s hand had moved. It twitched in hers a second time. She jerked fully awake and lifted her head to gaze at him. His fingers curled around hers, warmer now than they had been.

Darkness surrounded her, and the candle on the bedside table, that had half burned down, threw only a pale light across the bed. Someone had draped a blanket over her shoulders as she slept, and a glass of brandy stood alongside the candle.

Kit’s fingers tightened around hers, as though he needed something to hang onto. She studied his face. The pallor had lessened a little, and his eyelashes flickered on his cheeks as though his eyes were about to open. She squeezed his hand. “Kit?”

His eyes opened a crack.

“Kit, it’s me. Morvoren.”

His eyes opened wider, blinking as though she were something he’d never expected to see at Nanpean again. To be fair, he probably hadn’t.

“Mor-voren?” The one word came out as a breathy croak.

“You think I’d let you ride into danger alone? You think I could forget you after the way you kissed me at Denby?”

His tongue darted around his dry lips. She only had the brandy, and water would have been better, but she dipped her finger in the glass anyway and ran it around his lips. They felt papery and cool. As she did so, the intimacy of the gesture overwhelmed her and hot color surged up her cheeks. Hopefully it was too dark and he too befuddled to notice.

He licked his lips again. “Morvoren.” Stronger this time.

“Someone betrayed you to the revenue men and soldiers,” she said. “They were waiting for you on the beach. Ysella and I persuaded Sam to bring us down to Carlyon Court to save you, but everything was against us and we were delayed and delayed time after time. It was awful. I thought we’d be too late.” She finished on a gulp as she tried not to burst into tears again. Hysteria was very near the surface.

She squeezed his hand. “I thought we were going to be too late to save you because we were still on the headland when we saw you and your men were already on the beach. But Sam had pistols with him, so I told him to fire them to warn you.”

His brow furrowed. “I-I heard the shots.” He licked his lips again. “So, it was you and Sam. Well I never.” His eyes roved past her. “Have you more of that brandy?”

She shook her head. “Not good after you’ve had such a nasty injury. What you need is water. I’ll call Jenifry and get her to bring some up.”

She went to pull away from him, but his hand tightened on hers, pulling her back. “No. Don’t go. Stay.”

She sat down again.

He managed a thin smile. “How—how did you know we’d been betrayed?”

Well, Sam and Ysella both knew, so she might as well tell Kit. If he decided she was nuts then those two could defend her. Bending close to him so she could keep her voice low, just in case Jenifry or Jago was outside the door listening, she told him the truth, at last.

He didn’t interrupt and at one point when she faltered, thinking he’d drifted off to sleep as his eyes had closed, he squeezed her hand. “Keep going. I’m listening.”

It was a long story, not told this time in a feverish hurry, and Morvoren missed nothing out, finishing at last with how she and Sam had sent Ysella back to Carlyon Court and hurried down to Nanpean. They’d been there only in time to light the lantern when Jago had dragged a near fainting Kit in and dumped him on a chair at the table. “We need to get him drunk,” was all he’d said, as he whipped Kit’s clothes off to deal with his wound. “And you need to be a servant boy.”

He’d tossed Morvoren a knitted hat to cover her hair. “Get that tricorn off—no one wears’ em indoors for playin’ cards.”

“A good thing for you it was dark,” Kit said, as she finished. “You make far too pretty a boy and Fitzwilliam could have recognized you.”