Lord of Darkness (Maiden Lane #5)(42)

He closed his eyes. “I’ve told you how that went. We were happy—so very happy—for nearly a year. And then she became ill. We moved to London to be closer to the doctors. I hoped—I prayed—that we could find an elixir or treatment to cure her. I held out hope for a year and a half before I realized there was no cure for my Clara. That she would die from this disease and I could do nothing about it—nothing but watch.” A corner of his lovely mouth lifted, curling into an ugly sneer of pain. “I watched as she grew thinner, as the agony began to claw at her from the inside.”

He opened his clear gray eyes then, and she saw the remembered despair. It must’ve been truly hellish being helpless in the face of his love’s suffering.

She could stand it no more. Megs reached out, taking his cold hand in hers.

Godric bent his head, staring at her fingers atop his, making no move to grasp hers but not shaking her off either.

She took comfort in that.

“I think I would’ve gone insane,” he murmured to their hands, “if Sir Stanley had not called upon me one day. He’d heard, from my father, about Clara’s illness, and he had a simple offer: to come train with him again. He had by then the third of our small coterie, a young man, barely more than a lad. His second disciple, the one I had known, had broken away from Sir Stanley and had already become the Ghost of St. Giles. Sir Stanley made the excuse that his new pupil would need a sparring partner, but I knew. He offered salvation, a respite from the daily torment of watching Clara die. He offered the Ghost for me as well.”

Megs stared. “I don’t understand. If there was already a Ghost, how could you become one as well?”

“It wasn’t just me,” he said. “The third man took up the mask and swords soon after I did. Until two years ago, all three of us were the Ghost of St. Giles.”

Megs’s brow wrinkled. “Didn’t you run into each other?”

A smile lit Godric’s solemn crystal eyes. “Very rarely. You have to understand—I didn’t go out every night and neither did the other Ghosts. If by some chance we were both active on the same night, it was merely whispered that the Ghost could be in two places at once, which,” he said wryly, “he can.”

“But three different men …” Megs shook her head. “Didn’t people notice you weren’t the same man?”

Godric shrugged. “No. We have similar physiques. Besides, if one is wearing an outlandish costume composed of a mask, cape, large hat, and a harlequin’s livery, well, any witnesses rarely notice what the man beneath looks like.”

Megs nodded thoughtfully. “I think your Sir Stanley must have been a very clever man.”

“Oh, he was,” Godric said softly. He bent his head, seeming to be lost in a memory. He’d turned his hand in hers, and now his thumb was moving in circles on the back of her hand.

It was a rather nice sensation, actually.

“Godric,” Megs whispered carefully.

He glanced at her. “Hmm?”

She swallowed, loath to shatter this moment. But her curiosity had always been her downfall. “Clara died three years ago, didn’t she?”

He stiffened at the mention of his first wife’s name on her lips and dropped her hand. “Yes.”

She felt strangely bereft, but she soldiered on, asking the question. “Then why are you still the Ghost of St. Giles?”

WHY WAS HE still the Ghost of St. Giles?

Godric snorted under his breath as he edged close to the corner of a crumbling brick building. He peered around it, making sure the dark alley beyond was free of soldiers before darting quickly around it. It was often easier—and safer—to travel by rooftop, but the wound to his back made that impossible tonight. Thus he was forced to make his way by foot, keeping watch for Trevillion and his soldiers all the while.

He paused at the end of the alley, listening, and remembered the look in Megs’s eyes as she’d asked the question: puzzlement tinged with worry. Worry for him.

The memory made his lips quirk. When was the last time anyone had worried for him? Not since Clara had died, surely, and even before that it’d been him worrying for her, not the other way around. Clara had never known he was the Ghost, but even so, she’d trusted that he was strong enough, smart enough, man enough never to come to harm. He supposed that he should be insulted that Megs thought him so frail that she worried over him, but he couldn’t muster any outrage.

Actually, her concern was rather endearing. His wife had a soft heart—but a strong mind. She’d been shocked that he hadn’t agreed to quit his life as the Ghost. He’d known that he’d disappointed her, and there was a part of him that wished he could give her what she wanted.

Both things that she wanted.

Godric ran across the street, whirling into the shadows again as he heard approaching footfalls. Two men reeled into the moonlit street, half propping each other up, half pushing each other down. The taller of the two tripped over his own feet and sank to the cobblestones in the strangely boneless manner of the very drunk. His companion braced himself on his knees and howled with laughter, stopping only when Godric slipped from his hiding place and continued on his way. He glanced over his shoulder to see the upright drunkard gaping after him.

The two drunkards seemed a clownish duo, but Godric’s blood froze in his veins as he considered what might have happened if Megs had encountered them. Very few in St. Giles—drunk or not—were benign when faced with the temptation of a rich, beautiful woman.