~ Many thanks to my indefatigable beta, SueBee0619, who betas through the plague, and to my chearleader & pre-reader, Robsmyyummy Cabanaboy. I've dreamed about this chapter for a really long time & it was such a pleasure to bring to life. Enjoy! ~
xXxXx
Chapter 10
It was done. Slanting rays of light shone across a field of golden weeds and a large patch of fresh earth, but every time Edward closed his eyes he saw it all again: Rosalie dragged and dumped into a freshly dug grave, tumbling like a large sack of rocks, then hitting the ground with an earth-rattling thump. Edward swallowed in an effort to choke back the tears, instead coating his throat with dust and grit. He wiped his eyes and blinked into the setting sun. She was gone. His father hadn't taken to his philosophy about man's nature, Edward hadn't settled into his life's purpose, and now they would return to Center City, leaving Rosalie behind, buried in the Swan's fallow field.
Men on either side of him beat the ground with their shovels, tamping down the soil. Others collected their gear. They spoke of crops and the coming winter, comparing who was best prepared to endure the dark, cold months ahead. Despite their poverty, each was better equipped than he. Edward wasn't certain how he might persevere.
Jacob Black laughed from across the grave, and Edward glanced up to see him clapping Master Swan on the back. They smiled at one another, glad a day's hard labor was now in the past.
"Will you stay until she is back?" Master Swan asked Jacob.
"When do you expect her?"
Edward gathered his shovel and the bag of jerky and fruit Isabella had left with him. He gripped tightly, purposefully causing a spasm of white hot pain. It felt appropriate for it matched the seering ache in his chest. With a glance at his hands, Edward noticed his bandages were blood-stained and shredded. Yet with Master Swan and Jacob Black deep in conversation, Edward didn't have the heart to ask for the healer's aid. While every muscle in his body was screaming in agony, Mister Black appeared invigorated by the day's work.
"Excuse me, my lord." A stout man with a bushy brown beard addressed Edward with a nervous nod of his head. "I should be heading home. I have an hour's ride and a meal will be waiting."
"Thank you for your day's labor, good sir," Edward replied. He stood tall, hoping to reflect the nobility of his birth instead of the depths of his despair.
"I appreciate the thanks, my lord. I do. But, I, uh, was expecting something of more consequence for the work done here."
"Of course, sir. It is my father you seek. The elder Lord Cullen carries the purse and distributes the pay." Edward gazed across the field toward the Swan's homestead, squinting against the setting sun, hoping to spot evidence of his father's whereabouts. Indeed, he saw the silhouette of a man in the distance, walking in the direction of the fresh grave and gathered laborers.
"I believe that might be him, sir," Edward offered with a nod of his head.
"He's not your father, my lord. He's father to us all. That's Friar Randolph, unless your father's his twin."
On second glance Edward managed to discern the approaching gentleman's robes. He was trailed by a small cadre of women and children. Little girls skipped with ringlets bouncing, boys charged at and dodged one another, playing as they ran. The women hung together, heads bent, wiping their hands on their skirts. In the distance he spotted the silhouette of his own father speaking to one of the women. She was a slight, graceful figure who used her hands as she spoke, her head upturned, unafraid to look him in the face. Isabella Swan. It could be no other.
"Friar Randolph!" Master Swan exclaimed as the minster approached he grave. "What brings you to my homestead this evening?"
"I've heard of the passing of a fine friend."
"Surely it's not Widow Smythe? She was mending when I left her bedside yesterday."
"No. God willing, the widow is still with us. I understand the departed was named Rosalie?" The friar searched the faces of the gathered men as he spoke, his gaze settling on the young Lord Cullen.
Edward stepped forward uncertainly, his head bowed. "Father."
"Isabella tells me you are to enter the clergy, my son."
"I'm on leave from seminary."
"She tells me you lost a dear friend."
Edward's face colored. His eyes sparkled. He was keenly aware of the gathered crowd. There was Master Swan and Isabella, Lord Cullen, Alice Brandon and her step-mother flanked by innumerable little ones, the elder Fallowell's - grandparents to the new babe who'd come to give their thanks - and there were the wives and sisters of the many men who had come to help dig the horse's grave.
"I believe there has been some miscommunication. She was a beast. She fell prey to the dark humors on our journey."
Friar Randolph grasped the young lord's arm. "No, young man. Isabella was quite clear when she came to me this afternoon. I understand Rosalie was precious. She was a friend to you, and her passing has brought with it much pain. I'm here as a courtesy, as a fellow man of the cloth. After a burial it's customary to follow with a service to bless the departed. Would you object?"
Edward blinked back the tears. "I would be ever so grateful, Father," he murmured, yet he didn't look on the friar as he spoke. He had eyes only for Isabella Swan.
xXxXx
The villagers of Bryn Athyn were a tolerant lot, especially when foreign nobility, unexpected paydays, and an impromptu feast were incorporated into something as unusual as the funeral of a chestnut mare. Friar Randolph gave a short yet earnest speech on the value of friendship and hard work, something he'd heard of in reference to Rosalie. He spoke of the necessity to treat all creatures with kindness, and how there would be recompense for those actions in the next life.
After a psalm and a prayer, the villagers were invited back to the Swan's homestead where Alice and the other women of Bryn Athyn had an autumn harvest feast waiting for their hard-working men. The laborers relaxed with flagons of mead and roasted meat, while children jumped into piles of leaves and danced and sang in the garden. Isabella talked with friends and neighbors and was finally able to sit down to eat with Alice and Jacob once everyone had been attended to. The three fell into conversation, spent from hard work and glad of easy company. Isabella was ever alert, but Edward had retired to the river with the friar following the funeral. As guests left one by one, Isabella hung about the yard as long as she could tarry before she relented and returned to the cottage to help her father set the household in order.
"Our guests are likely to leave on the morrow," Charles mentioned as he scraped table scraps into a bucket for the pigs. "Thank you for all you've done for them, daughter."
Isabella's cheeks warmed and she busied herself wiping the countertop.
"We can get back to our quieter way of life," Charles continued. "With the Cullens gone, I'll once again have use of my infirmary and apothecary. We can work together with our patients here in our home. I will be on hand more to help keep house." Charles grasped his daughter's hands and sought her eyes. "We can get back to our stories each night before bed."
"Yes, Father," Isabella murmured, tugging her hands away to gather the dishes from the table.
"What troubles you, my child?"
"One week ago I would have been satisfied with our homestead, but tonight your words bring with them sadness and longing. I don't know what I am anymore," she replied as she gathered bowls, utensils, and table linens.
Charles grasped her by the shoulders and forced her to face him. "You are my bright, shining star, Isabella Swan."
The maiden took a deep breath, then looked her father in the eyes. "What if I could make my stories real?"
"You would like to write them down?" The healer smiled at his daughter. After payment from their noble boarders they would have gold enough to purchase paper and ink to write down Isabella's fanciful tales about the stars.
"I would like to prove their truth," the girl tried to explain.
Charles chuckled and Isabella pulled herself from his grasp, making her way to the water basin. The healer followed his daughter, but she studiously avoided his gaze. "I know these days have been difficult. I know it wasn't your choice to visit the Missus Fallowell, but I believed you were equal to the task."
"Will you always love me?" Isabella asked, as if to the plates in front of her.
"How could you question my love?"
"Because I hardly know what is hiding inside of me. I don't know if I love what is within myself, so how can I be certain you will love me too?"
"No matter what comes and goes in your life, Isabella, the one thing that should always stay unspoiled is your self regard."
"Why did you laugh at my dreams?"
"You seek to prove fairy stories?"
Isabella turned to her father. He had always been the most handsome man in her world. As a child she imagined he could have moved mountains and healed everyone in the kingdom. Tonight he looked tired, his face etched with lines, his shoulders slightly stooped. Tonight he failed to see what Edward Cullen had seen in her. She sighed. "I wish to travel the skies in my mind, Father. I would like to take up Mother's work. I know her writings as if they were my own. As a maiden of these woods I have no birthright, but I have my mother. This is a purpose uniquely mine own."
Charles' chest rose and fell. He grasped the countertop as if a weight had fallen on his shoulders. "I see."
"I would need to leave these woods to take up my studies. I could not be happy otherwise. Things must change, musn't they?" she asked.
Charles smiled at his daughter. "When we stop growing, whether in body, in mind, or in our possibilities, we start growing old. You are too young to stagnate."
"It doesn't mean I love you any less."
"And it means I've loved you enough." He kissed her forehead. "Is it our guests who have brought about this simmering interest in travel and change?" he asked.
"Perhaps… yes."
"It appears we needed them as much as they needed our aid. It has been much work these past days, but perhaps it has been worth it all. You will need a sponsor if you are to study thus."
"I thought I might ask the elder Lord Cullen. His word is bond in this kingdom."
"Yes, I dare say his signature would carry some weight."
"I plan to ask him on the morrow before he sets off."
Charles' eyes glistened as he smiled down on his daughter. "Is this truly what you wish?"
"I'd never thought to make something of myself outside this village, but now I know I haven't much time. I know what my life will hold if I remain."
"It would be a good life, child."
"But I prefer to choose a life for myself, as much as I am able."
Charles cradled his daughter's head in his hand. "Your mother's light shines within you. Let us sleep on this possibility and meet in the morning before we see our guests off to the Capitol. Rest, my daughter, and dream of the possibilities you seek."
xXxXx
Isabella could not rest though. Indeed she was entirely restless. Minutes later in her chamber she slowly undressed, layer by layer - first smock, then dress, then shift, then stockings one by one. She examined her figure from one angle, then another, and then pulled on her nightgown and tied it at either shoulder. She knew where she would find the boy, but she hadn't realized she was seeking him out until she crept down the hall and out the back door with her father's traveling medicine satchel slung over her shoulder. She easily spotted the flickering lamplight from within the barn, and with several swift steps, she found him on the floor of Rosalie's empty stall.
Edward sat with his knees pulled to his chin, his eyes hidden. Although she'd run headlong to the barn, she hesitated at the entrance, recalling the first evening she's spotted him thus. His figure still kindled pinpricks of fire over the surface of her skin, her heart still beat against her chest like a drum, her breath felt strangled in her throat. Now though, now she knew the boy. Now she understood he had a gentle heart matching his gentle hands and that he was good through and through.
"My Lord," she whispered, taking a tentative step inside the barn, wondering if he'd finally fallen into merciful sleep.
"Maiden!" Edward exclaimed, hastening to his feet. His pale face was stained with tears, in strange counterpoint to the glimmer of hope in his eyes.
"Edward." Isabella breathed his name more than spoke it. It was a sigh. It was a sadness.
"Isabella."
"Edward, I am going to -"
"You brought me Friar Randolph," the lad interrupted, taking a step in her direction.
Isabella leaned against the slats of the stall opposite. "Yes, I did it both for you and for Rosalie. She deserved as much. Who am I to be the arbiter of souls when I can scarce name my own feelings?"
"I am forever grateful." Edward took another step, lingering at the entrance of his slave's former stall. He bit his bottom lip and his eyes flitted over her figure. The other horses shifted in their paddocks. Wind rushed through the trees on the ridge, and leaves scuttled near the entrance to the barn.
"And I am so glad you availed yourself of his visit. Your ideas do not track with his, but as a man in the service of your god I thought his counsel could be a comfort. I am thankful you landed here on my homestead, Edward. You've opened my mind to possibilities I never would have imagined."
"The possibilities burned within you like the light inside this lantern. Anyone might have seen them."
Isabella's cheeks went warm, but she remembered to look the boy in the eyes instead of hiding her face. He appreciated her face. She felt her cheeks go hot. "Nevertheless, I'm glad you came."
"As am I. Isabella, I have something to confess, something weighing on my soul."
"Oh dear! Friar Randolph has left this homestead, there is no one here to whom you might confess."
Edward slipped outside the stall, leaning against its walls, just across the passage from Isabella. Four feet of straw-lined dirt, chilly autumn air, and a scrap or two of linen was all that stood between them. "I've unburdened my heart to the good friar, but his is not the absolution I seek. You see Maiden, I was glad for Rosalie's lameness after our first discussion here days ago. Then, days later, I ignored signs she might be more ill than we imagined in order to spend the day with you." Edward bowed his head and glanced at his hands knotted in front of him.
Isabella took a step towards the lad. "It was not my intention to distract you from your steed."
Edward shook his head. "I am not explaining myself quite right." When he tipped his head to gaze at her, his eyes burned like summer sun turned green. "Isabella, I am admitting to the feeling you asked about earlier today. There has been one on my travels who has made me feel. She is standing in front of me and she is more beautiful than any other I have ever met, her mind and her heart." Edward swallowed. "And her body."
"Oh." The young woman's skin burned and she glanced down to see if the lantern might have set her on fire. Yet it still flickered in its casing, sending shadows dancing against the walls of the barn.
"I have made vows to my god, to my seminary, and to my family. More immediately, I've made vows to your father."
Isabella startled. "My father, sir?"
"I swore to him I wouldn't touch you. I vow to you now that I have no intention to fall prey to man's baser instincts, no matter my body and its indelible will of its own."
Isabella's cheeks colored. "Mine as well," she whispered.
"Excuse me?"
"I used my mind and my imagination like you suggested." Isabella glanced at her toes, her cheeks aflame.
"I can't fathom what you mean."
Isabella wasn't of a mind to explain. Instead she stooped down to fetch the discarded remains of Rosalie's blanket in the corner of the stall. "You haven't yet told me her story," she remarked, folding the soiled wool.
Edward sighed. "It would be appropriate to remember Rosalie this evening."
"In this place," Isabella agreed as she took a seat and gathered her legs underneath her. "She was a pretty mare."
"She wasn't when Father presented her to me," Edward began. He sat so close that straw rustled against her bare legs and his breath was warm on her face. Isabella's heart hammered. Edward made certain their knees did not touch. He couldn't help but smile as he looked into the maiden's big brown eyes.
"Rosalie had been the property of a criminal named Royce. After he was beheaded, the King's men plundered his property and found Rosalie, one of many malnourished, unmanageable horses set to be rendered. However, Father had other ideas.
"She was gifted to me on the twelfth anniversary of my christening. I'd never stopped petitioning him to continue my mother's work: to travel outside the city walls bringing alms to those in need. With my gift, my father gave me his word. Not only could I leave Center City, but he would ride out with me if I could rehabilitate the beast. He meant to teach me for once and for all that nothing, neither horse nor human could be redeemed."
"T'was no gift!" Isabella countered, rising to her knees in anger.
Edward's smile was sad, and despite his promise, he clasped Isabella's delicate hands in his bandaged ones. "It was the first gift he'd given me since my mother's passing, and a precious one. It kept me connected to my mother and her ideals, even as it opened up the fresh wound of her passing. I took Father's gift to heart and set out to break Rosalie with all the wild vigor a boy could muster."
"And you were successful?" Isabella asked, clutching at Edward's hands.
Edward shook his head. "I came away from the task with bruises and broken bones. When a soul has been beaten, you cannot win them over with fear and intimidation, certainly not in the form of a timid boy of twelve."
Isabella inched closer to the boy, her bare knees scraping over dry hay. Her hands burned, her heart beat as if it would burst from her chest. "But you are here, borne on Rosalie's back, no less."
"After a year I acquiesced. I gave up my quest to leave Center City, but I would not give up on the horse's life. Perhaps Rosalie could not be rehabilitated, but I would not send her to her death. While my father believed I was in the stables working with the animal, we simply learned to share space. I would sit in her stall to study. I would gift her seckel pears in the fall and delicate greens from the kitchen garden in the spring. I learned she luxuriated in having her neck groomed, but became feisty when I handled her mane."
"As I long suspected, she was no slave, but your friend," Isabella remarked.
"What is a friend kept trapped behind a wall?"
"I might ask the same of your father."
Edward bit his lip. Isabella bit hers in reply. The two youngsters sat in a stall on their knees, holding hands like they were first to discover the excitement of twined fingers and joined palms.
"We are so different, yet so much alike. We were meant for different worlds, you and I. How did you come to be here?" Isabella asked.
"It was Emmett on his last visit to the Capitol. He found me in the stable and had his fun with me, asking whether I was studying to be friar or a stable hand."
"I shall pickle him to death for teasing you!" Isabella laughed, but Edward's eyes narrowed and his body stiffened were he sat. "I forgot. I shall not pickle with Emmett. Sorry, sir."
Edward shook his head to rid himself of the sourness of jealousy. "I told my brother of my desire to leave the city, of my predicament regarding transport. It was Emmett who saw Rosalie transformed. He mounted her bareback, teasing me for not doing the same. It took too many years for me to learn all beasts, when treated with kindness, will bend to your will out of the goodness of their heart. And if Rosalie had a heart, she must also possess a soul.
"My father is a man of his word. He was not happy to accompany me on my travels, nor was he happy with my newfound philosophy, barely tolerant of my message of the redemptive power of love, and the import of livestock."
Isabella clutched the boy's hands. "I'm sorry to say he is poorer for it. You have one of the kindest hearts I've yet to come across in my sixteen years."
"I made your acquaintance less than one week ago, but your praise stirs feelings within me I cannot name. It gives me hope I might overcome my predetermined destiny."
"Edward, you have done the same for me. I -"
"Have I?" the boy asked with a sparkle of hope in his eye.
Isabella felt her cheeks go warm from a flame ignited below her waist and between her thighs. She ducked her head and her breath came hard.
Edward squeezed her hands. "Has there been one lad in Bryn Athyn who has made you feel?" Edward asked. "Someone you've spotted from your window? Someone passing in the lane?"
"Someone spotted in a barn late at night?" she murmured.
Edward pressed his thumbs over the tops of Isabella's hands.
"Could we imagine this evening?" the maiden asked. "There is much afoot in this world. My father and yours, your departure, my future. I have found such solace in our imaginings. Could we share this space tonight and delight in the world we might make for an instant?"
Edward beamed. "Where horses might roam free?"
"My hair is already untied." Isabella shook her head and watched as the color rose in Edward's cheeks.
"It is… lovely," the boy murmured, pulling her hands towards him.
"How are your hands, my lord?"
"I do not care a wit," the young nobleman admitted.
"Might I re-bandage them? I've brought salve and new linen from the cottage."
"But-"
Isabella shook her head vehemently, silencing Edward with either her insistence or the shimmer of her loose curls. "In our world I would gladly tend to your wounds. Father watched me bandage you this morning. He cannot quarrel with medicine. He would expect nothing less from his child."
Edward released Isabella's hands, the spell momentarily shattered. "I promised your father I would not take advantage of you."
"As if I am here for the taking! Did either of you consider what I might give?" she asked.
Edward could not fathom how to answer the maiden's question.
"Now, if you fill this bucket with water from the well, I'll set up a makeshift infirmary and let our imaginations fly."
xXxXx
Seated across from one another in Rosalie's empty stall, a lantern and a bucket between them as if they were witches about to cast a spell, Isabella and Edward let the world outside the barn fall away. They could imagine nothing beyond the charged air of the small space, so close, threaded with golden light. Leaves danced against the roof of the barn, striking an uneven patter masking the battering of hearts against chests and struggling breath held within lungs.
Edward's outstretched hands trembled slightly as he watched the rise and fall of Isabella's chest. The hem of her nightdress fell against his knee - infinitely soft like a butterfly's wing, yet able to strike sparks like a flint against stone. Isabella gently untied the dirty, blood-stained linens, revealing broken and tender skin bit by painful bit. The gradual exposure of the lad's wrists and palms was strangely intimate and she gasped when her fingertips brushed the tops of his hands. She ached to grasp. To clutch. Once more. Twice. The night long.
Instead, Isabella guided Edward's hands underneath the cool water, gently, yet thoroughly rubbing away the dried blood. Once clean she patted them dry with a cloth. Water splashed, drops fell and sizzled against skin like tallow in a hot pan.
Isabella paused. She breathed. She eyed the healing salve on the floor between them.
"We were imagining?" she asked.
"T'is beyond the power of my brain to take me from this barn."
"Let us try it, please?"
The boy closed his eyes and bit his bottom lip. "Then I cannot look your way, for there's nowhere I'd rather be."
Isabella grinned as she picked up the tin of healing balm. "You underestimate the power of your mind, my lord. There are better worlds still. In our imagined world it has been a physically taxing day for us both since we've hefted the weight of our horses' burdens. I imagine we might recount our day to one another while I bandage your hands."
Isabella watched the rise and fall of Edward's adam's apple as she gently took one of his hands in her own.
"I would have missed your company, Maiden," he murmured. "Your touch."
The girl dabbed her fingers in the lineament then tenderly pressed against his flesh. Edward hissed in response.
"I would have thought of you while I was away," she whispered.
"How is the Missus Fallowell?"
In Isabella's mind's eye she saw all over again the tenderness with which Ben regarded Angela when he came home from a long day's labor. She remembered the familiarity with which he climbed into their shared bed, how he openly stared at her bared breast. He'd adored Angela so completely that Isabella had wanted to run.
"She is healing," Isabella barely managed to murmur. "How was your time spent on this farm?"
Edward thought back to his day spent alone in the company of the villagers as one broad-shouldered young man in particular effortlessly swung a shovel and laughed with Master Swan. "I'm afraid I momentarily fell out of my God's grace. Yet this evening I was reminded how He colors the world in all shades, so we better appreciate its beauty."
Edward opened his eyes and peered across the small space at Isabella, admiring her pink cheeks and the golden flecks of lamplight flickering in her eyes. Her hands froze. Her chest rose and fell. Her nightgown shifted around her slender frame.
"Now it is your turn to tell me more of our world," she whispered.
Edward ached to touch more than her hands as he freed his mind to dream. For a moment he felt as if he were gasping for air, but he knew what he wished in their invented world. He closed his eyes and took a breath. "At night, after the little ones are asleep, you would find me reading, and you would climb into our bed."
Isabella's heart stuttered. Edward's fingertips curled almost imperceptibly. She leaned toward the lad.
"Our bed?"
Edward opened his eyes and she was so close. He smiled. She shivered. "If we are man and wife we would have a bed. I would make sure of it."
Isabella's head swam. "We would be married?"
"With a troop of little ones who would all have your curls."
"And your eyes?"
Edward beamed. Isabella took a fresh strip of linen and began wrapping the lad's hand. She pressed her thighs together. Her skin prickled like the air before summertime thunder. She'd never felt tempted to bring her lips to anyone else's before, but it suddenly felt as if magnetite stones had been placed in each of their mouths. She didn't trust herself and scooted backwards, leaving linen hanging, breaking their handheld embrace.
"We should not touch," she reminded the boy. "But we might dream."
"It would not be the first time," the lad admitted, raking his eyes over her.
Isabella wrapped her arms around herself and shivered again despite the feeling she was on fire from the inside out. "Would you close your eyes?" she implored.
Edward did as she had bidden and Isabella traced her fingertips from her wrists to her elbows and back, leaving a trail of fire in their wake. "Where did we leave off?" she asked. She brushed a fingertip over her lips and shuddered. "At night?"
"In bed."
"I am your wife?"
Edward's answer came in the form of a ragged breath. Isabella gently took up the piece of unsecured linen hanging from Edward's bandaged hand.
"You could heal anything," he murmured. "In this world, in our world. You are a wonder."
Tucking the fabric securely, the maiden brought the lad's hand to her lips. "You are kind," she whispered, brushing his fingertips as she spoke. She let go of his hand, and Edward cradled it against his chest. Isabella closed her eyes and trailed her hand from her lips, over her chin, then along her collarbone to her shoulder, sweeping her nightgown out of the way. In her mind she changed Ben for Edward, who gazed down at her lovingly as she bared her breast.
"You've taught me much," she murmured.
"Are you thinking about our world?" the boy asked breathlessly.
Isabella felt her way over linen, toward her aching breast, toward the spot that held the fire. She heard Edward gasp, or she imagined it, for her mind was taken with images of the boy; the way he looked at her in the lamplight, the way his breathing would quicken when standing close, the contours of his bare chest, the feel of his hands against hers, his fingertips ghosting against her lips. She dreamed of their newly imagined world, of Edward waiting for her in their shared bed. So, she let the feeling build, steadily stoking the fire, her breath coming quicker. She brushed, pressed, pulled, small movements and flutters with stunning impact on her senses.
"Maiden," came his strangled gasp, causing lightning to fire through Isabella's limbs.
"Please," she murmured, and there was a click from the taper as the lantern light dimmed. A rustle of fabric and straw and Isabella blinked open her eyes. The boy was on his knees in the darkness, one hand on the wall behind him, the other… she gasped.
His hand moved, as did hers, and with each motion shared in tandem a beautiful pain blossomed inside. She sank to her heels and held the boy's gaze and ached to really touch where she could bring relief. With a quick tug to either tie the nightdress slipped from her shoulders and the boy closed his eyes. She found the spot, now damp, warm and full, and his witness made blinding the all consuming ache. She watched and she felt and her insides burst into brightness, and she fell against the wall gasping as his seed fell onto his hands and into his lap.
Time slowed. Limbs loosened. Isabella drew her knees to her chin. "You taught me that," she whispered.
"Like hell," came his reply, came his grin. He couldn't look her in the eye.
"Hell, Sir? Another strike against the seminary."
"The seminary," he laughed. "The seminary!"
She peered around her kneecaps, trying to discern more of his lap in the darkness.
"What was that?" he asked.
"You were right. The ache can subside, but then it returns unrelenting. Now I know the route to the briefest escape, which is a relief because I may have been driven mad otherwise."
"This is as close to insanity as I've come," he admitted, wiping his hands on the straw-covered floor of the barn.
"You walked into my homestead with talk of horse's souls and friars' wives. The soil was already tilled for the seed." Bella pulled her nightgown to her chest and sat up on her knees. "Did you just?" she asked, nodding towards the boy's lap.
He nodded his head and avoided her eyes.
"If you find a wife you must warn her," she continued.
"What?"
"T'was much larger than I'd imagined. I mean, I had never really imagined, but assumed. I've seen men in my father's care, but not…"
Her voice trailed off. Her face hotter than a summer's day.
"I couldn't have imagined what I just witnessed," he rasped, finally finding the strength to look the young woman in the face.
"But you said you had," she countered.
"But you are more wondrous still."
Isabella's body stirred, she felt the heels of her feet firm against her sex, the scratch of her nightgown held over her breasts. Edward bit his bottom lip and his breathing came quicker. Bits of fiery sparkle seemed born on the air. "Could I come closer?" she asked.
Edward nodded and she practically sprang across the stall, settling next to him. The boy tried to gaze at her face, but his eyes were drawn to the spot where she held her shift over her breasts.
"Would you like to see again?" she asked.
"What of your honor?" the boy asked.
"Do you plan on speaking of me in disparaging terms? Keep my confidence and my honor will remain intact. What did you promise my father?"
"I would not touch you."
"Do not touch," she instructed as she let the garment fall into her lap.
"But you touched them?" he asked.
Isabella exhaled. "It is exquisite," she replied, peering into his lap. "It grows!"
Edward tried to cover himself, but Isabella shook her head. "We've been open with one another from the start. Let us still," and she slipped a hand between her thighs.
xXxXx
Edward and Isabella gazed at one another underneath the light of the stars filtering through wooden slats. Isabella lay just close enough that Edward could reach a glossy strand of hair. He twirled it round a finger and sighed.
"What would your occupation be in our invented world?" Isabella asked as she tucked her hands underneath her cheek. She watched the rise and fall of the boy's chest, then followed long lines lower.
"I would not be a priest," came his quiet reply.
"You would not be a priest."
"I would not."
"And what of me?" Isabella asked. "What would I be in our world?"
"You would be my guiding light, and mother to our children," he replied without hesitation as he twirled the lock of her hair and gazed into her eyes. "I would call you Bella."
Isabella's heart stuttered. "But what of the heavens?"
"They would bless our union."
Isabella blinked back tears. Her body burned. Her heart felt as if it had swelled so large it had begun to tear. She ducked her head.
"Have I said too much?" the boy asked.
Isabella shook her head wondering if she had the right to hope for more from a beautiful dream.
"I feel near certain we could imagine this world into being, Isabella. You and I together could make anything happen. Ours would be a land where our community comes together over the death of a beloved workhorse. Who understands when someone needs wise counsel, and brings a friar."
Isabella wiped an errant tear from her eye. Had she the right to hope for more from this world as well?
The light from the stars seemed to glow brighter as they gazed at one another, then brighter still. Softly padding feet crunched over dried leaves.
"Edward!" Lord Cullen hissed and the village and the life they had crafted shattered all around them. Two naked teenagers found themselves on a barnyard floor in Bryn Athyn.
"Edward!" the boy's father hissed again. Lamplight grew brighter and footsteps came closer.
The couple scrambled, Isabella casting about for her discarded nightgown, Edward tugging up his undergarments and struggling into his breeches.
Carlisle's footsteps approached the door of the barn and Edward had no time to find his undershirt. He ran and intercepted his father. "Father, I am here," the boy panted, rumpled, topless and covered in straw.
Carlisle appraised the boy from head to toe. "What in the world has come over you?" he asked.
"I was mourning Rosalie."
"Half dressed yet again? There are no more wounds to dress, no reason to destroy any more clothing."
"I haven't, father," Edward said, planting himself firmly in the doorway.
Carlisle's eye twinkled. "Ah ha, yes. Well, it is done, then, isn't it?"
"Excuse me?"
"It took five days, a fortune paid to a farmer, but I knew it when I saw the two of you in the lane."
"No! You are mistaken."
"Then you wouldn't mind if I go and mourn alongside you in this empty barn?" Carlisle asked, making as if he would brush past Edward. But the boy moved to block his father's entry.
"You found your adventure, my boy. We made a man of you. Good work bedding the sweet little thing."
"No!"
"No, I suppose you barned her. 'Tis less comfortable, but you wouldn't be the first to choose a roll in the hay."
"I love her."
"Son, you are nobility. You are a future priest. She is no one. She is witty and smart, and a treat for the eyes, so I promise you I will not hold this against her. Some might find it criminal to pay the father for the opportunity to bed the daughter. Some might judge quite harshly, but I assure you it won't come to that. If there is a babe we will provide."
Carlisle Cullen had expectations for each of his sons. From birth he'd expected Emmett, his big-boned, good-natured son to lead armies of soldiers into battle. He'd expected his adventurous second son, Jasper, to travel to foreign lands, plundering for the king. He had no doubts his queer, quiet, soft-hearted youngest son, Edward, would become a man of the cloth. One thing he'd never expected from Edward, though, was to be punched square in the face by him in the middle of the night in the tiny village of Bryn Athyn.