The dead and diseased were everywhere. He pulled up his mask. Everyone around him was crying out in pain and despair, forgotten by society, looked upon with fear and disgust. There were piles of dead awaiting the fire. Some were moving in the piles. But barely.
He turned away, sickened to think Lily was in one of them. Should he go look? He knew he had to, so he did. He was relieved that she wasn’t among them. Nor were Bertram, Clare, or little Eddie. It didn’t mean much, but Elias held on to it.
He spotted a few men leaving a small church, and went to them. He questioned them about Bertram.
One man called Alex remembered someone who matched Bertram’s description.
“Aye. Aye. When everyone is dead and dying around you, you see someone walking and you remember him.”
His friends all smiled and agreed. Elias prompted Alex to continue.
“Right. Right. A big, angry-looking fellow with a cut up face. He said his name was Chisholm.”
“Aye, that is him.” Elias breathed a little. He wasn’t sure if he was relieved to hear it or horrified to think of Bertram having her. Relieved only because Bertram was easier to find.
“He left and went north,” Alex told him. His friends nodded.
He? Elias’ heart slowed. Why did Alex speak as if Bertram had been alone? “And the woman with him?”
“Woman?” Alex knit his brow then shook his head.
Elias did not want to hear what the man was about to tell him. No! He couldn’t bear the answer.
“He was alone, friend.”
Alone. Elias’ blood went cold. Then, she had died in the hands of the man she despised? It broke his heart too much to bear. For the first time in his life, Elias was too afraid to move. Too afraid of losing himself, his hope. Too afraid of death.
Her death.
His destruction.
Chapter Nineteen
“I’m so happy to see that ye are not dyin’ after all, Lily.”
Bertram tried to catch her when she slid from his saddle. But she pushed herself left and slipped through his fingers.
She’d pretended and possibly led Elias to believe the worst for no reason.
“Why are we back here?” she asked, instead of arguing with him. She looked around at the village of West Wickham. They had been closer to London. Why had he come back here? She prayed the reason he still hadn’t brought her to Clare and the babe was because they were here, and he would bring her to them now.
She hated asking him. She’d barely spoken to him since she woke up with a swollen head. He’d struck her. He’d done it before when she used to travel with him. But just as soon as she found Clare and little Eddie, she would make sure he never did it again.
She had hoped Elias would have found her by now. But why would he continue to look if he thought she was dying of the pestilence? What if the innkeeper’s wife hadn’t told him that she’d winked? What if the poor woman was so distraught over her husband that she didn’t remember a silly wink? Even if he did search for her, he wouldn’t go south. He would go toward London.
“Why did ye think I would let a plague get in my way?”
In his way of what? Surely it wasn’t her he wanted. “Bertram.” As much as she hated speaking to him, she wanted him to know. “If you killed Clare and little Eddie, I am going to kill you. I vow it.”
“Well, well, somethin’ does stir the princess.” He laughed. He’d taken all her knives from under her skirts while she was knocked out. He may have tried to touch her but he hated how being aroused made him feel. He’d never gone near her or anyone else sexually again. She was more concerned about her knives, but then she saw that he hadn’t disposed of them. Fool. He carried them with him.
All it took was one to kill him.
“Fear not. They live. At least they did when I left them. The mother will have to be left behind though.”
“They live?” She dismounted and stood in front of him. “Where? Where are they? And what do you mean the mother will have to be left behind? I will not let you separate them.”
He gave her a wilted look, and touched his fingers to a strand of her hair. “Then ye will have to be left behind as well.”