Slaughtaverty 1750

Tomorrow is the day Merry has been looking forward to for five years: her wedding day.

She'd longed to be Ransford Slatherty's wife from the first time she looked into his clear, pewter eyes after he'd finally completely recovered from the poison and defeated the curse that tried to steal his mind.

She knew she loved him with a love that could never be replicated the day he smirked arrogantly and told her she was an annoying child who should run along, play with some toys, and leave him alone because he was a man.

It was too late; she'd already seen his heart.

To his frustration, it made her laugh, and to this day, she still teases him about it. She knew it was fear and self-loathing that made him try to keep her at a distance. Fear for her safety made him act arrogant and aloof, sometimes even cruel.

His attempts to drive her away didn't work.

She didn't run along to play with some toys; she continued to talk to him every chance she got and pestered him to teach her how to ride a horse and fight with a sword.

Merry is ridiculously bad at wielding a sword, but she still enjoys practising with Ransford. She loves the way he moves as lithely as a cat. He refuses to let her anywhere near a real sword, claiming that she is too dangerous to be given anything but a blunt piece of wood. He is right. She'd stopped counting the number of times she hit herself with it and broke things around her during training. Their sessions almost always dissolve into laughter... and, these days, into kissing.

She wants nothing in this world more than to belong to Ransford forever, and gazing at the stunning white lace dress his father had made for her wedding, her heart breaks. Lord Alaric ordered many sample fabrics to be brought to her to choose from, and Merry almost cried when she saw the beautiful lace. It was the most exquisite fabric she'd ever seen.

She didn't dare to dream of having a dress made of such priceless material and had asked the merchant to show her his cheapest samples, though she knew that the price would still take her breath away. All the fabrics were wonderful, and she would've been happy with the cheapest one, but when the dress, made to her measurements, arrived for the first fitting, she'd stood in awestruck silence, staring at the garment made from the lace she'd loved so much.

Lord Alaric was present while she looked over the fabrics brought to his library, but he'd been reading a book, seated in his favourite chair, seemingly disinterested in the process. Merry had no idea he was observing her and noticed her overwhelmed reaction when she saw the lace.

Now, running her fingers over the delicate fabric, she only feels sadness.

Aridan was as excited about the dress as she was. Once it was completed, they often took turns trying it on, giggling in front of the mirror in Merry's room. Though the dress was a bit big for Aridan, she'd looked incredibly beautiful in it. Knowing that the girl who'd become her little sister would never wear a wedding dress and marry the man she loved makes Merry long to get back into bed and never come out again.

It's been the most horrible two weeks of her life.

Uilliam had a terrible relapse. Once again, he is screaming in his sleep, and Merry spends most nights holding him in her arms, comforting him. Ransford and Lord Alaric managed to calm him, but they decided that taking away his memories again would not be a good idea. Though Ransford and his father do everything in their power to lessen his pain, they are allowing Uilliam to deal with his demons and heal from them.

He is no longer a fragile six-year-old boy; he is 11 and stronger mentally and physically, but he loved Aridan so much. All the memories of the time he spent in the pig farmer's basement and losing his best friend came back to him and sapped his strength. He became quite ill, and they've all been nursing him back to health.

When Uilliam couldn't get out of bed, Lord Alaric spent hours each day reading to him, telling him about the wonderful places he would take him to see, and Ransford often carried him outside for some fresh air. A few days ago, the boy finally started to respond to them. He even smiled once or twice.

He is no longer confined to his bed. He is up and about, but he spends most of his time in the basement, reading to Aridan through the barred window of her cell while she hisses and growls at him.

When it became clear that trying to prevent the boy from sitting outside Aridan's cell only worsened his distress, Ransford brought him a desk and a comfortable chair. At first, Merry thought he was reading stories to the girl, but yesterday, when she went there to fetch him for dinner, there was a myriad of medical books open on his desk, and he was telling Aridan that the cure to what afflicts her had to exist somewhere among their pages and he was determined to find it.

It broke Merry's heart because she knew that Lord Alaric and his parents had multiple physicians searching the texts for answers through the years, and they all came up empty-handed.

Merry doesn't like that he spends so much time there, but it is the only thing that gives the boy peace, and, for now, she is heeding Ransford's advice to let Uilliam come to terms with losing Aridan in his own way.

The entire household - staff included - is in mourning for the girl.

Merry still hears her sweet voice singing while Ransford accompanies her with an instrument. She still sees her running in the garden with Uilliam, shouting at Ransford to stop being a pest. She still hears her laughter while playing a game with Uilliam and her cousin. Many of Merry's favourite Ransford-related memories have Aridan and Uilliam woven into them.

They want to postpone the wedding indefinitely.

Nobody is in the mood for festivities. Lord Alaric was getting ready to announce it to the population of Peace Haven, and they all dreaded the disappointment it would cause.

The islanders have suffered terribly and look forward to the celebration to finally lift the pall of sorrow that darkens their lives. Whenever Merry accompanies Ransford to the villages, she can feel the anticipation vibrating in the air around them.

She still finds it hard not to revert to her people's dialect - which would immediately give away her identity - when they visit Slaughtaverty. If that happened, the town would be traumatised all over again, and there would be too many questions. So, Merry and Uillaim nod politely, smile and remain aloof whenever their path crosses that of someone they used to know well. They're friendly but in the distant way of aristocrats.

So far, nobody has recognised the polished young lady and the healthy, well-learned young man as Mairead and Uilliam Doyle. They have no scars to identify them, and they are not malnourished, dirty and wild anymore. They are a far cry from the children who went missing five years ago.

It is hard, though.

Merry longs to embrace Mrs. Sullivan, the baker's wife (and Eoghan's mother), who used to show kindness to the Doyle children, offering them bread and cookies whenever she saw one of them skulking around town, hungry and miserable, trying to hide from their father's drunken wrath. She taught them how to make filling meals from stale bread and wild roots, and she always gave the bread that didn't sell and was about to be thrown out to one of the Doyle children to take home.

She was heartbroken when Uilliam disappeared, and according to Taillte, she cried bitterly when Merry went missing and was presumed dead as well.

Other villagers were kind to them, too, and Uilliam had many friends with whom he used to enjoy playing. Pretending not to know them isn't easy.

Uilliam almost broke down one day when he saw Dáire's mother sitting on the bench at the base of the statue erected for the lost children of Slaughtaverty. She had a cap she'd made for her late son in her hands and tears streaking down her cheeks. Things might've gone very wrong if Ransford hadn't grabbed Uilliam and Merry, dashing home with them.

They were both sobbing into his shoulders by the time he set them down in one of the mansion's gardens. They didn't go to the village again for a very long time.

Merry hates that the statue is of her and Uilliam. She understands that there was no way for the artist to capture the likeness of any of the other children, but it still didn't feel right. The baby is Dáithí o' Hara, the one Maddy clutched in the cemetery. He was the only infant whose body was recovered.

The memories of that night still wake Merry up on occasion, crying for her lost friend and the poor little baby.

Two days after Aridan was taken to the basement, Mrs. McKenna finally had the courage to enter the girl's room and have the servants clean up Uilliam's blood. When she straightened Aridan's bureau, crying over every book and quill, she found a letter among the books the girl was reading with Uilliam. In it, she begged her uncle not to cancel or postpone the wedding.

She wrote that she could feel the change coming and knew that her life, as she knew it, was about to end. Her biggest fear was not losing her mind and becoming another lost Slatherty child. Her fear was that she would hurt the ones she loved.

She was also extremely anxious about robbing Ransford and Merry of their joy and stripping the islanders of their chance to celebrate and grasp some much-deserved happiness again.

She begged for the wedding she'd been looking forward to with so much anticipation to carry on as planned if she were to turn or die before the event. Her wish was for the family to use the opportunity to celebrate the precious time she'd had to be part of them and to welcome Merry on her behalf to the family she loved more than anything.

Lord Alaric gathered the family in the downstairs dining room and read the letter to them; then, he asked them to vote on it. Everybody voted for the wedding to go ahead because nobody wanted to disappoint Aridan's last wishes, but there was no joy in the decision.

Merry didn't know if she would be able to go through with it, and she is still not sure that she can. She knows that if Aridan had any conscious thoughts, she would be horrified by the timing of her change and how broken her family is.

The morning of the day Aridan turned, she'd told Merry how much she was looking forward to the wedding and how she wanted her and Ransford to be happy and have many beautiful babies. She said that she hoped and prayed that nothing would get in the way of their happiness. Looking back, Merry regrets not seeing the girl's agitation for what it was.

She missed the chance to say goodbye.

Lowering her hand from the wonderful wedding dress adorning a wood and iron dressmaker's frame, Merry steps away from it, wiping at her eyes with the back of her hand. She has cried too much in the last two weeks and is trying not to do that anymore so her eyes won't be red and swollen for the ceremony and festivities. A miserable bride who looks like she's being married off against her will would defeat the whole purpose of the event.

She practices smiling daily, watching herself in the mirror to see if she looks convincing.

Merry used to look forward to her wedding day, but now she just wants it over with so she can stop the pretence and cry in Ransford's arms the way she has every day since they lost his cousin.

Aridan never visited the village. Nobody even knows about her existence outside of the Slatherty household. Once she'd passed through the challenges of the curse and was healthy and strong again, Lord Alaric would have held a coming out ball to introduce her to society abroad, and they would've brought her to meet the villagers on Peace Haven. Until then, keeping her out of the public eye was safer.

The room is stifling, the air gripping her throat in a stranglehold. The golden floral wallpaper is lost on Merry, and so are all the dainty furniture and luxuries she still cannot believe belong to her. The atmosphere in the mansion is saturating every wall and every stone with grief. The last couple of days, Merry spent as much time as possible in the gardens so she didn't have to deal with all the heartache. She can run from the pain in the mansion, but she cannot run from her own sorrow.

She still tries.

Gathering the skirt of her black dress in her hands, she opens the panel hidden by the beautiful painting in her room and flees, using the well-lit servants' walkways in the walls to find the shortest route to the gardens. She can only breathe again when her feet stop her flight in her favourite garden. She often comes here to feed the geese and to watch them play in the pond.

She'd managed to outrun her tears. She places a hand on her racing heart, panting to regain her breath. The sun is creeping below the tree tops, spangling the leaves in gold. It will soon set, and as every evening, the breeze is picking up, rippling her skirt and playfully lifting her hair streaming to her waist in red-gold rivers. She shivers when it tickles her nape, tracing a path down her back.

And then her senses kick in.

She'd been so lost in grief, so focused on willing away the tears and heartache, she didn't notice it at first. It is subtle, like a wind-carried fragrance on the air, woodsy and enticing, there and yet not there at the same time.

Twirling around, she jumps back, startled when she nearly collides with the man behind her. For the briefest of moments, while the mottled sunlight blinds her, she thinks it's Ransford, but the rational part of her brain reminds her that Ransford's hair has lost its silver sheen more than a year ago, becoming a darker blond... and this is not his fragrance.

The man she looks up at is a beautiful painting with stormy eyes and long hair gleaming almost white. He watches her with hooded eyes, slowly appraising her features, and swallowing nervously, Merry runs the tip of her tongue over her lips. She never met this man before, but even if she hadn't seen a portrait of him, she still would've known who he was.

Fiachra Slatherty, Lord Deaglan's grandson.

Fiachra Slatherty

The first time she'd seen his portrait hanging in Lord Deaglan's private drawing room, she'd been surprised since Fiachra is not in the family's good graces.

He certainly is not an ally.

She'd asked Ransford about it, and he told her that Fiachra's mother sent the portrait in an attempt to spite them since she knew how heartbroken Lord Deaglan and Lord Alaric were about what happened to her son. Instead of setting fire to it or being outraged, Lord Deaglan hung the portrait in his rooms. Despite everything that has happened, he still loves his grandson.

Why is he here?!

"To pay my respects to my cousin's bride," he informs her in a voice like scuffed silk, causing ripples of excitement to run through her body.

"Thank you," she mutters, unsure how to handle the situation. There is no love lost between Ransford and his cousin. She knows that much. He would not be happy knowing that Fiachra was here with her.

Peeking up at the man from under her lashes, Merry doesn't feel all that respected when she sees his eyes running over her from her crown to the hem of her dress. When his eyes meet hers again, they are considerably darker than before, and Merry reflexively clutches her hands together in an instinct to protect herself.

"I was told that you were beautiful," he breathes, "but nothing I heard does you justice."

Merry's eyes widen with surprise, and despite her discomfort, she laughs softly, calling sweet dimples to her cheeks. Ransford always tells her she is beautiful, but in her own eyes, she is still the dirty little shepherd daughter of the drunken sheep farmer.

She will always find it ridiculous to be called beautiful.

"It flows from inside you," Fiachra assures her, looking astonished by the phenomenon as his eyes continue to devour her. "And bathes you in a dazzling glow."

For a few seconds, he gazes into her eyes as if he's trying to find his path into the core of her soul, and then his interest moves to her nervously quivering lips. Merry watches in fascination as his eyes darken even more and his lips part on a breath.

"I sound like a bloody poet," he suddenly scoffs, breaking the spell. "I can see why my cousin is becoming a toothless puppy now that he has you by his side. Your fragrance is driving me out of my mind."

Lowering her eyes from his face, Merry takes an uneasy step away from him, gasping in shock, when he suddenly grabs her, spinning her around and pulling her body tightly against his.

"Please, my lord... don't," she whimpers, grabbing the forearm crossing past her throat, braced by a hand on her shoulder. She is not entirely sure what it is that she's begging him not to do, as she has no idea what he has in mind.

She only knows that whenever Ransford starts looking at her in the way this man just looked at her, it means that it is time for him to run to the nearest pond and become intimately acquainted with the cold water. When it's Ransford, she experiences some amusement and a touch of regret laced with a big dollop of excitement.

On Fiachra, that look in his eyes fills her with dread.

His thoughts and emotions are locked away in an impenetrable fortress she has no access to, but she can feel his body humming with tension against her back.

Ransford has always been like an open book to her. Perhaps because she is bound to him, but she can feel everything he feels and often knows what he thinks even when he doesn't tell her... unless he really doesn't want her to know.

This man, holding her in a disturbingly intimate embrace, is a complete mystery to her, causing anxiety to bubble through her veins and pool in her stomach.

"Don't what?" he asks thickly, burying his face in her thick hair. "Don't smell you? Don't breathe you in? Don't want you?"

"Please, I love Ransford," she mutters, trying to remove his arm from her throat, but he is simply too strong for her.

"Love," he snorts, dragging the fingers of his free hand through her hair, combing it from her shoulder, exposing her neck. "Is a myth. I believe in power, Mairead Doyle."

Shivering, Merry cringes away from the fingers brushing over the soft skin of her neck. She wants to call out for help but cannot find the voice to do so. Her mind cannot reach the man she loves or his father. Normally, she only has to think of Ransford to feel his warmth fill every fibre of her being in answer.

Now, he feels disconnected and out of reach.

"If you come with me, we could have all the power we could ever want or need," Fiachra tells her, running the tips of his fingers over her shoulder, pushing the fabric of her dress out of his way, letting it slide down her upper arm. "Nobody will ever be able to hurt us again."

"Go w-with y-you?" Merry asks, willing her body to stop shaking. She wishes she had her wooden sword. She might hit herself with it... many times, but she would at least be able to flee his grasp and the mesmerizing enchantment he weaves around them, trapping her inside it with him.

"Yes," he whispers against her skin, causing goosebumps to break out over the surface. "With you by my side, I could truly be free."

"I l-love R-Ransford," she repeats, upset to find tears trickling from her eyes. She'd been working so hard not to cry today, to heal her eyes, but now this man is ruining everything. She wants to turn around and push him away. She wants to scream for help. She wants to do many things, as his lips trace the contour of her neck, but she doesn't.

She remains motionless in his grasp, confused by how pliant her body has become. Her heart and mind are screaming out for Ransford, though she knows he is nowhere near the mansion, and their connection is, for some reason, not working. He is on the other side of the forest with his father and Merry's brothers, taking care of a group of turned sailors who were seen wandering the area, heading for the farms.

Did Fiachra turn them?

Did he send them there as a decoy so that he could come here and grab her? How did he even get inside the grounds undetected? Lord Alaric's manservant - his father-in-law - usually has a tight reign on everything within the walls of Slaughtaverty Manor.

She was told that Fiachra was powerful and knew all the devious Slatherty tricks and never hesitated to use them because he doesn't share their ideas on what is right and what is wrong. He does whatever it takes to have his way.

"Please," she whispers through her tightening throat, her body convulsing in terrified shivers when he runs his lips down the length of her neck and across her shoulder in a whisper-soft caress, savouring the taste of her skin.

Merry might not know all the intricate details, but she knows that whatever he wants to do to her is wrong.

"Please don't t-take me from him," she begs, her voice breaking on a sob. "Ransofrd is e-everything to me... a-and I am t-to him. P-please, my l-lord..."

"Even your fear and heartache taste good," Fiachra tells her in a husky voice she can barely hear. "I can only imagine your flavour if you were happy... or better yet, in ecstasy..."

Merry stiffens, her blue eyes blown to black, when Fiachra sinks his fangs into her neck, setting off fiery explosions in every part of her body. Her lips part, whispering Ransford's name, as her mind fills with images and memories that don't belong to her.

For a moment, her body arches against his and then, suddenly, as if all her bones have turned to liquid, she relaxes in Fiachra's arms. Her body grows warm, and her vision blurs until the garden, with its lush green plants and colourful flowers, is nothing more than a palette covered in colourful splotches, all blending together.

"I have a message for my cousin," Fiachra whispers, but Merry barely hears him as her vision grows dim and her mind floats away on a blissful sea of tranquillity.

"Merr! Merr!"

She stirs, her eyelids fluttering open, responding to the distressed voice near her ear. She draws in a long, startled breath, reaching out with clawing hands to fight off the man who wants to take her from her love.

"It's me," Ransford whispers, grabbing her hands to still them before dragging her into his arms. Shaking uncontrollably, Merry clings to him, blinking in confusion at her surroundings. It's dark, and she is on the bench in the garden, with Ransford kneeling beside her.

"Where is he?" she asks with shivering lips. She doesn't resist when Ransford scoops her into his arms, carries her into the mansion, and puts her on a sofa near the fireplace in the parlour. "Where did he go?"

"I don't know," he says through clenched teeth. "I couldn't feel you anymore and wondered if you've finally mastered the blocking techniques I've been trying to teach you so you can protect yourself. Then suddenly, you were back, and I felt... him... Merr, my heart nearly stopped," he mutters, swallowing against the anxiety still gripping his throat. "I ran here as fast as I could..."

His eyes are as black as night, burning into Merry's, and when his lips part, his fangs catch the light of the fire's golden glow.

"I am going to find him, rip off his head and stick it on a pole, and then, when the crows have picked it clean of every piece of flesh, I will use his scull as a paperweight."

"No," Merry mutters anxiously, sitting up, her fingers digging into the sleeve of Ransford's shirt. While her body still trembles with the impact of Fiachra's visit, her heart is sagging with relief that he didn't take her from the man she loves. She is happy to see his face, even if it is twisted in anger, and he is being creatively gruesome with his violent ideas... as usual. "Please don't do that, my love."

"He bit you!" Ransford growls, his anger turning his skin hot beneath her hands when she lays her palms against his cheeks.

"Yes, but-"

"Are you in pain? Do you feel drained? Have some of my blood," he says, running his hands over her face, pausing to check her eyes. His anger is fading away, replaced by the concern he'd felt when he saw her lying unconscious on the bench with the geese agitatedly flapping around near her.

"No..."

"You seem fine," he sighs with relief, resting his forehead against hers. "I'm going to kill him! Did he only take a little, or did he... f-feed you his blood?"

"I don't know," Merry says, becoming restless. She tries to rise from the sofa, but Ransford carefully manoeuvres her back against the cushions. "We need to find him," she whispers, causing him to narrow his eyes, looking suspicious. "He's in pain."

"He will be in a lot more pain when I find him," Ransford grumbles, taking the hands desperately clutching at his clothes and gently holding them between his. "Merry, the man is dangerous."

"He needs us-"

"No, he doesn't!" Ransford growls. "He's had many chances and betrayed us each time."

"Not willingly," Merry assures him, her lips trembling with emotion, causing Ransford's anger to boil over. He drops her hands and pulls away from her, closing his eyes and taking long, deep breaths until his fangs retract, and he can look at her again.

"Please tell me that you, of all people, haven't fallen for his charm," he groans, looking hurt now, more than angry. "I can assure you, Merry, that the road from here to London can be paved with all the broken hearts and disillusioned women he's left in his wake."

"There is no road to London," she whispers logically, fighting fresh tears threatening to spill from her eyes. "There is a vast ocean between the island and any other land mass."

Ransford doesn't answer; he merely stares at her, his face filled with anguish.

"He showed me things," she says carefully, not surprised to see fresh anger colour his cheeks.

"Mairead! Did you truly fall for that bastard!" he shouts, shoving his hands through his hair and leaping to his feet to angrily pace the rug near the fireplace. "He is not our friend. He is not our family. He is nothing to me!′

"He... he could be-"

"No!" he exclaims, and when he returns to her side and sits down again, she can see and feel the pain washing over him.

"I love only you," she assures him, wrapping her arms around him to show him that he is still the only man in her heart. "My love for you consumes me."

"That is a bit dramatic," he scoffs, pulling away to look at her, a sad smile softening his expression. "Merr, you are the kindest soul I know, but you must understand, Love. Fiachra is dangerous. He tried to kill me when I was a baby, and when he failed, he murdered my mother."

"He showed me things," Merry whispers again, laying a soft hand against his cheek and looking into his eyes beseechingly. "Please let me show you."

~~~