The Spine of the World - By R. A. Salvatore Page 0,68
at him.
Smiling, satisfied, the young woman stared out the coach's window as the twisting road rolled by. She saw him, and suddenly her smile disappeared. Jaka Sculi stood atop a rocky bluff, a lone figure staring down at the place where the driver normally let Meralda out.
Meralda leaned out the coach window opposite Jaka so she would not be seen by him. "Good driver, please take me all the way to my door this night."
"Oh, but I hoped you'd ask me that this particular ride, Miss Meralda," Liam Woodgate replied. "Seems one of my horses is having a bit of a problem with a shoe. Might your father have a straight bar and a hammer?"
"Of course he does," Meralda replied. "Take me to my house, and I'm sure that me da'll help you fix that shoe."
"Good enough, then!" the driver replied. He gave the reins a bit of a snap that sent the horses trotting along more swiftly.
Meralda fell back in her seat and stared out the window at the silhouette of a slender man she knew to be Jaka from his forlorn posture. In her mind she could see his expression clearly. She almost reconsidered her course and told the driver to let her out. Maybe she should go to Jaka again and make love under the stars one more time, be free for yet another night. Perhaps she should run away with him and live her life for her sake and no one else's.
No, she couldn't do that to her mother, or her father, or Tori. Meralda was a daughter her parents could depend upon to do the right thing. The right thing, Meralda knew, was to put her affections for Jaka Sculi far behind her.
The coach pulled up before the Ganderlay house. Liam Woodgate, a nimble fellow, hopped down and pulled open Meralda's door before she could reach for the latch.
"You're not needing to do that," the young woman stated as the gnome helped her out of the carriage.
"But you're to be the lady of Auckney," the cheery old fellow replied with a smile and a wink. "Can't be having you treated like a peasant, now can we?"
"It's not so bad," Meralda replied, adding, "being a peasant, I mean." Liam laughed heartily. "Gets you out of the castle at night."
"And gets you back in, whenever you're wanting," Liam replied. "Steward Temigast says I'm at your disposal, Miss Meralda. I'm to take you and your family, if you so please, wherever you're wanting to go."
Meralda smiled widely and nodded her thanks. She noticed then that her grim-faced father had opened the door and was standing just within the house.
"Da!" Meralda called. "Might you help my friend . . ." The woman paused and looked to the driver. "Why, I'm not even knowing your proper name," she remarked.
"Most noble ladies don't take the time to ask," he replied, and both he and Meralda laughed again. "Besides, we all look alike to you big folks." He winked mischievously, then bowed low. "Liam Woodgate, at your service."
Dohni Ganderlay walked over. "A short stay at the castle this night," he remarked suspiciously.
"Lord Feringal got busy with a merchant," Meralda replied. "I'm to return on the morrow. Liam here's having a bit of trouble with a horseshoe. Might you help him?"
Dohni looked past the driver to the team and nodded. " 'Course," he answered. "Get yourself inside, girl," he instructed Meralda. "Your ma's taken ill again."
Meralda bolted for the house. She found her mother in bed, hot with fever again, her eyes sunken deep into her face. Tori was kneeling beside the bed, a mug of water in one hand, a wet towel in the other.
"She got the weeps soon after you left," Tori explained, a nasty affliction that had been plaguing Biaste off and on for several months.
Looking at her mother, Meralda wanted to fall down and cry.
How frail the woman appeared, how unpredictable her health. It was as if Biaste Ganderlay had been walking a fine line on the edge of her own grave day after day. Good spirits alone had sustained the woman these last days, since Lord Feringal had come calling, Meralda knew. Desperately, the young woman grasped at the only medication she had available.
"Oh, Ma," she said, feigning exasperation. "Aren't you picking a fine time to fall ill again?"
"Meralda," Biaste Ganderlay breathed, and even that seemed a labor to her.
"We'll just have to get you better and be quick about it," Meralda said sternly.