Chapter 29:
Remy wanted to get going as soon as he could, so arranged for and paid the fare to go to New York. Baltimore was a better city than Jackson was by way of slave laws, and too many people had seen Jubilee keep the outlaw horse from stampeding into the crowd and killing people. The conductor of this train allowed Remy to take Jubilee to the sleeper car (it was almost night, now) and told Remy he would keep an eye on the exhausted, dazed girl while Remy stopped at a doctor's and purchased a roll of bandage for the cut on her forehead, and ointment for the welt on her arm. He stopped just long enough to purchase a loaf of bread, cheese, cold meat that would keep for a day or so if wrapped, and then got back on the car as the train started to pull away from the station.
She was sitting on the bunk in the sleeper car, her hands gingerly inspecting the gash on her forehead, when he came in and closed the door. "De conductor say you can travel in here wit' me instead of back in the slave car wit' de ot'er slaves," he said, sitting on the bunk next to her. "I tol' him you was my body slave, and I intended to 'enjoy your charms' tonight, so he told me you could stay." He pushed her hands away from the gash gently, "No, don' hide it, let Remy see." She dropped her hands obediently, and he sucked in a breath at the black bruise on her forehead. "Dat look nasty. You havin' any problem seein'?" At her puzzled look, he explained. "Sometime after a bad bruise on de head, de vision get fuzzy, don' work so well. Because de blow hurt the brain, keep de brain from absorbing what de eye see."
"Oh." She shook her head. "No, I'm not having problems seeing. My head hurts, a little, but that's it."
Remy carefully wrapped the bandage around her head, tucked in the ends, and put the little pair of scissors into his travel bag before unwrapping the food he'd bought. "Come on, eat," he told her. She shook her head.
"I'm really tired, Remy," she begged him, and indeed she looked it. Remy wondered if he should let her go to sleep, then thought about the way she'd just crumpled when the whip handle connected with her head, and thought maybe that wasn't such a good idea. "Not suppose to go to sleep after bein' hit on de head," he said firmly. "And you got to eat. You los' too much weight de las' mont' or so, since you was whipped. An' all dis traveling so soon ain't been real good for gainin' de weight back." In fact, she was thinner than she had been when they left Logan's. Remy was glad Logan couldn't see what she looked like now. He hadn't been so good at keeping her safe and happy.
He passed her a chunk of bread and some of the meat and cheese. "Here. Eat."
She stared at the cheese curiously. "What's this?"
Remy stared at her. "It's cheese. You never seen cheese before?"
She shook her head. "No. Is it good?"
Remy grinned. "Yes, its good." She eyed the chunk of cheese dubiously, but bit into it. From the expression that lit up her face, he deduced that she liked it.
After the supper, Remy sat back. "So how you like travelin' wit' me so far?"
She grinned wryly at him. "It's an adventure," she said with a hint of the happiness that he'd seen in her back at Logan's ranch. "Wild horses…Oh, Remy," she whispered. "I was so scared when I saw that horse. The other one, the one that scarred me, he looked like that…but Outlaw was really nice, once he got to know me."
"Let me see that scar." Jubilee obligingly came over to sit next to him, and he parted her hair until he saw the scar across the back of her head. "How long did it take you to recover from dat?" he asked.
"I don't know," she said. "An awful long time. I don't remember." She sighed.
Remy sighed too. "Eh, well, you seem okay, so let's get some sleep, non?"
She looked suddenly apprehensive, but he got up and started packing away the rest of the food, and didn't see it until he turned around and found her standing beside the bunk with all her clothes off and her hands clasped anxiously in front of her. He stared at her.
She was skinny, but not, thank God, emaciated. She hadn't lost enough weight to make her look like he starved her, which was good. People here in the East kept a sharper eye on how people's slaves looked, and if she got too thin she would attract attention. The whip cuts had all healed, and save for the lighter patches of scarred skin across her breasts and belly, and across her back, ribs, thighs, and calves, she looked normal.
Her weight loss hadn't affected her curves any, and she still looked beautiful to him that way. Desirable. His mouth watered for her, and he reached out to touch one full, round breast…then he stopped. "Chere," he said, and stopped. His voice had gone raspy. "Chere, please…"
"You told the man you wanted me in your bed tonight," she whispered, looking at him with hurt in her eyes. "I thought…Am I not pretty anymore? Did the Railmaster scar me too badly?" tears welled up in her blue eyes.
"Non, non," Remy said, sweeping her into a crushing hug. "It's just…Jubilee, Remy won' touch you unless you want me to. I won' force you like de soldiers did."
"But you said you love me."
Remy sighed and let her go. "I love you. Dat why I won' hurt you like dey did. You come to me when you want to."
"But I don't want to," she whispered, torn. "I love you, and I'll give myself to you if that's what you want, but I won't want to, because it always hurts."
Remy stared at her. "You mean…you never felt pleasure? It never feel good when a man touch you?"
"Is it supposed to?" she asked him, puzzled.
Remy nodded emphatically. "Oui. It suppose to feel good all de time, chere. If it don't de man ain't doin' de job right." He ground his teeth at the uncertain look in her eyes. "Look. Remy show you it feel good, okay? But Remy not goin' into you till you tell him he can."
"How?" she whispered.
Remy laid her back on the bunk, carefully, and showed her how it was supposed to feel. His hands slid over her, touching, stroking, caressing, his kisses awakening the fire in her body until she cried out and succumbed to the pleasure overwhelming her.
When she was asleep, exhausted, Remy returned to the table and cut himself some more bread and cheese. How had she managed to keep herself together this long? She had never known that a man's touch could bring her pleasure; she only knew pain, and force. None of the people who had ever touched her had made her feel like that. He felt a sudden surge of happiness that he had been the first one; if not the first in her body, then the first one to show her what union between a man and a woman was like. His own body ached with unreleased need, but he would not, could not, take her body until she was ready for him. He extinguished the lamp in the corner of the car, his hands busy in the dark until he was satisfied. He crawled into the bunk beside her, pulling her body snug against his, and went to sleep.
The horse fair in New York was pitiful. Remy looked disapprovingly at the horses on display for sale, watching Jubilee wander among them, looking for one for herself. He thought longingly of the horse he would give her when they got home to Canada; a spirited black Arabian pureblood mare, with a coat the color the midnight sky and eyes as blue as Jubilee's own. Rogue liked the mare, and Remy had had more success with their pairings than with any other mare Charles had. The horse had cost a small fortune, but her foals had more than paid the price for her. And she would be Jubilee's when they got to Canada.
Jubilee came back, looking disappointed. "They're all so broken-down," she said. "There's none here I'd ride any distance on. They're so dispirited."
"We don't have any choice," Remy said gently, kissing the top of her head as she snuggled into the crook of his arm. "We have to get a horse for you. Isn't there any horse here that interests you?"
She sighed. "I'll go look again." He watched her disappear off into the throng.
Jubilee went back down the rows, looking here and there. As she was about to turn and go back, she saw a horse at the end of the row, and went up for a closer look.
The horse was a muddy-brown color, with a listless look in its big brown eyes. She reached out tentatively, waiting for the horse to sniff her hand, then reached out and lightly touched its neck. Her hand came away dirt-streaked; she rubbed at the neck, and saw that the muddy color was indeed mud. Underneath she saw a dark gray coat, and along the high crest, mostly hidden by matted, tangled mane, she felt a couple of odd ridges. She pushed the hair back a little, and realized they were numbers. Numbers, branded into the neck. She had to clear the mud out of the way to read them. 10T.
She stared at them in shock. Hardly daring to hope, she whispered, "Betsy?"
The horse's head turned at the sound of the name, and the ears pricked. The mare nuzzled into Jubilee's pockets, as if searching for the carrots and sugar and oats she'd always run around the ranch with, and Jubilee cried in delight and hugged the dusty neck. "Betsy!"
Betsy was the tenth foal born to Logan's herd after Thunder had come, hence the number 10. The T was for Thunder, signifying that she was Thunder's foal. Jubilee still remembered watching the mare being born almost three years before. When the time had come to sell the yearlings, Jubilee had argued bitterly with Logan over whether Betsy would go with the sale yearlings or stay at the ranch. Logan had pointed out that he didn't have room for another mare, and had sold her over Jubilee's protests. Now here she was, at a New York horse fair three years later, and Jubilee felt like she had found a long-lost friend, one last link to her beloved Papa.
Remy came up, and she turned to him. "This is Betsy, one of Thunder's foals. I watched her being born three years ago. Remy, please can we buy her?"
Remy looked doubtfully at the horse, who was now sniffing around for the oats that just had to be somewhere in Jubilee's pockets, if she could only find them. "Dis horse look like it gonna fall over anytime," he said doubtfully. "Are you sure?"
"She's only three!" Jubilee said. "If we feed her and take care of her she'll be all right. Please, Remy?"
He would never be able to refuse her when she begged him like that with those big blue eyes. "All right," he said, kissing the top of her head. "I'll buy you de horse. Go see if you can find a saddle for yourself," he pointed to a leatherworker's shop close by the horse fair, and dropped a written note in her hand, which she tucked into her pocket before bolting off to the saddler's.
By the time she came back with a full set of tack for Betsy Remy had gotten the horse washed by one of the urchins hanging around the horse fair hoping for some small job to earn money. And he had to admit that Jubilee had made a good choice. Betsy was placid, quiet, not easily startled; she was also intelligent, and her legs were sound. She still looked a little thin, but that could be easily fixed; and once the mud was washed off, the dark-gray color was nice indeed. She was the color of old iron, with big brown eyes like doe's eyes. And she loved Jubilee. Jubilee put the tack on her, sparing a minute to press her face against the slim neck and shed a few quiet tears at the memory of the man who had trained her, and then wiped them away and mounted up. Betsy picked her head up, whickered softly to Rogue, and stepped out of the enclosed horse pen where the fair was held with somewhat better spirits.
"Where to now?" Jubilee said to Remy, looking more cheerful as she put the tiny bundle that held her things behind the saddle. New York was almost completely anti-slavery, and although Remy still made sure she had a pass wherever she went, no one had asked to see it, and in fact people spoke to her as if she were Remy's equal. Even after they saw the slave collar, the thin molded circle of iron with its brass tag around her throat, they still spoke frankly to her. Remy had suggested that she take it off, but she seemed to want to wear it. He had finally left the topic alone, guessing that she still wanted that tag, Jubilee Logan, with her.
"We head north now," he said.
