Thread: Au-delà du Temps: Beyond Time (LeatrixSage x SacrlettRose)

No woman had dared speak so vulgarly in his presence ever before. William was taken aback when she spat at him to kiss her arse in French. The shock must have been palpable on his menacing features. Truly the giant did not know how to take it. The lady certainly did not mince her words. If it had been any other situation, she would have indeed lived to regret those words. However, as burly and demon like as the Duke was, he was far from an ill understanding man. It was clear by the ferocity in her response that the female held a certain regard for the Marquess. Draker said nought to her in response and continued with his diligent work to mend his broken friend as best as he could. It was hard and unreasonable to believe anyone could survive such a wound. It was utterly illogical and the stacks were undeniably high against Wessex making a recovery. Then Draker spied on the mysterious woman who Roarke had mentioned as Addie from the corner of his eye. She may not have said it but everything in her demeanour suggest that she expected exactly that of Wessex. A miraculous recovery. His light gaze took in all of her slight form. The woman was hardly Rochester's usual type and yet . . . here she was. Her vigour was enough to give any man hope and Draker supposed Wessex had pulled such a feat once before. His thick brows furrowed when she mentioned penicillin. Who's penicillin? He queried in a low grumble. The Duke had never heard of such a peculiar name before. Maybe it was some sort of French expression he had never heard of. Considering strange French expressions and such . . . The Duke had noticed her French wasn't exactly perfect and her accent was not the on point one to be heard from a French woman or even those schooled in it from a young age from a foreign home. It was all these little things his striking mind was picking up and listing. The boat rocked mercilessly drifting into open sea. The sun bobbed in and out through the small glass panes. There was a forlorn silence beginning to take a hold of the small, damp quarters they three occupied. The Duke had ignored the woman's outburst in regards to the concoction he had given to Wessex. The giant sat in a corner close by. Quite content in the tiny space, which seemed even tinier thanks to his overbearing form. Being seafaring folk, he had been on and off boats large and small all his life and the sea gave him little trouble in any regard. Much unlike the stranger sat across from him. The smell of death barely registered to the man having been around it for as long as he could remember. The Devil Duke was not a man given to emotion, or ease of conversation. Neither was he awkward. Simply, he was not a man of many words. The less spoken from his lips the better. Draker cognized every bit of information. Always more of a thinker than a talker. A sound that could be suspected of being a short laugh did however, make it past his lips when Adelaide said the word arse for the second time. This time in reference to Wessex. It was right then that the Duke decided he liked this woman. Whoever she was she was not afraid to speak her mind. Personally, he had no use for such a woman but looking in from an objective point of view, he preferred her company in this very moment than a simpering little miss who would be fainting every which way at the sight before her. Still, Will passed no further comment on the matter. As he had guessed, it was nothing more than the ravings of a delusional man on his deathbed. He assumed she was Wessex's mistress. There could not be anymore to the matter. He suspected she maybe a genteel woman of some sort and France was no doubt a dangerous place for her and bestowed maybe charity upon her by offering her passage to someplace safer. Draker's piercing gaze quickly shot back to Addie when she questioned him once more. A friend. Again the man grumbled simply. He felt there was no need for conversation. His musings were far more arresting than any conversation the mysterious woman could provide. And yet, his light grey eyes narrowed on her next comments. Sharp and unflinching, he glowered at her unabashedly. The cogs in his brain ticking. Could Wessex have told her . . . It was not a possibility, William quickly decided. There was no way in hell, Wessex would ever reveal himself or the agency or his motives . . . Endless questions sprung to his mind. And all at once his guard was up intensely. The Duke of Dynevor was not a man who liked to be taken by surprise. He needed to think about this all. Rising to his large feet, as much as the cabin allowed, he stomped to the small door. He needed to think, away from the pungent stench of ambivalence that filled his wretched room. I do not know what you are speaking of Madem. Draker denied her accusation. Opening the door, he was about to step out when he turned and came to stand at her back, wanting to leave her with more instructions as to how to tend to Wessex, when something caught his sights. Dynevor stopped in his tracks and peered at the small mark on the top of one shoulder, gaping past her loose attire . . . And suddenly it all started to make sense . . . Call up should he awake- Then thought twice about leaving Wessex with only her pulling the door open he shouted up in thick welsh, Alwyn! Get down here! It wasn't long before a portly man came barrelling down the constricted steps. Stay here and do not take your eyes off her. Draker commanded in Welsh. There was clearly no need for anything more to be said as the man understood him and nodded his head in agreement. Aye Your Grace. And with that Dynevor swept back up onto the bow to think on his discovery and what it exactly meant. Of course, he could not fully know and the only man who did was on deaths door. William wrested with the idea of tying her up but maybe that was giving away his cards too early. He stood looking out across the endless ocean for hours. The smell of salt water and the spray relaxed his over wrought mind. The sun was high but could not break through the thick clouds, signalling that home was close. Every so often sending another of his trusted men down to check on Alwyn and Adelaide. All reports came back that everything was as fine as it could be. -- Alwyn was as good as his word and watched Adelaide like a hawk. He thought her pretty in a noble woman sort of way. However he preferred his women with the frame of hard working Welsh lasses. Not some fragile Miss who might break her wrist if she had to pick up a napkin. Snorting to himself at his thoughts, he sat in a corner and did not take his eyes off her. His ragged clothing and the smell of not washing for at least a week was overpowering the other odours in the tight space. Roarke on the other hand was far, far away from all this. At least his mind was while his body fought the ultimate battle of life and death. He could not feel his body shaking and convulsing as the deadly nightshade battled with his blood or see his deathly complexion. Instead, the proud Lord was lost in the river of the past that was far too lucid to him to be anything but real. The now and the present. It was strange how on the cusp of death one's mind fled to all sorts of random memories. Memories, a person may want to hold onto and other's they'd no doubt like to forget had ever happened. Much was the case with the Marquess of Wessex. First there was his childhood not an exactly happy one but there were times of joy. Running around in the wilds of Hertfordshire. The warm summer days and the lush greenness of the outdoors. The screams and playful laughter of unburdened children before time fluttered forward where a handsome twelve year old with mischief in his eyes stole his first kiss from the lips of a pretty fourteen year old maid while the strings of a quadrille weaved above them and elegant figures spun around him gayly at some ball or other. Now he was nineteen, a young buck in his prime, spotting the only woman he had ever loved since him he could remember across the crowded dance floor a good friend of his sister's whom he had grown up with until at the age of fifteen, when he was sent to Scotland to meet his destiny and train to become the man he was today, meeting his comrades and closest friends. Many here and well in his mind dancing around him merrily with one pretty woman or another though in reality they had been long dead much in the way that he may soon be too. His young heart raced when the redhead smiled across at him shyly and the next stream contained all their chaste but secretive tryst and stolen kisses until darkness began to cloud over the light feeling of joy. Roarke scowled both in reality and unreality. Speaking out physically with everything in his body working backwards and forwards to take and give life. If you love me then why are you leaving me Prudence?! He beseeched with closed eyes almost identical to the manner of how it originally happened. . . . Love isn't enough? The newly titled twenty one year old Marquess echoed her words. His father had just passed, it was already a dark time promising only to become much more darker. Again time oscillated forward and yet to his sick mind, it felt like nothing out of the ordinary for Roarke, the passing of time, the speed with which it passed was just life and living it. The battles and the travels that he journeyed through, passing on either side of him. Men that had bled at his hands and suffered, the lives he'd saved until he was standing in the marble white foyer of his London home. The cold of winter could be felt in the enormous space as the fire in the hearth burned but did little to defeat the chill. I tried my hardest but my hands are tied. He spoke once more after another hour had passed. Yet this time there was some strength behind his words. Not a lot more but some certainly. You cannot keep her that much is obvious. Unless you wish to be turned out. Give her to me. I promise you she will be well looked after. The memory continued to roll through his mind's eye as if it were happening right this very moment rather than the original seven years past when it had in reality. Taking the newborn in his arms, looking down at the wriggling figure he was clueless as to what in the hell to do with her. She will want for nothing. She will have my name and no one will dare call her bastard to her face. The passion of his words died slowly on his lips as delusion devoured him further but the rage of war inside his body was beginning to calm. The deadly fever had broken and slowly but surely his temperature was coming down. The sea blue eyes under thick lashes opened slightly but they were as murky as the ocean outside. Looking up into clear blue eyes but the Marquess was far from present in mind. His rambling once more incoherent. He's awake. The deep rumble of Draker's voice broke through the quiet of the room. Good. We're almost home.