Anne Bishop: Shadows and Light

Meaning, if he took a mistress as his father had done, he’d have to pay for his own pleasure. Not that he thought much pleasure could be had from a mercenary creature like the woman his father had been bedding when he died. On the other hand, he couldn’t blame her for being mercenary. It had showed she’d had a better understanding of his father than the other women the old baron had enjoyed.

“It’s a generous offer,” he said. It stung that he had to accept it, but he was practical enough to know it would be a few years before the estate would recover sufficiently to pay all the expenses. “I thank you for it.”

“Your father didn’t think it was generous.”

“My father and I didn’t see eye to eye about a great many things,” Liam said sharply. “Your father gave you an independent income for your benefit, not for my father’s and not for the estate’s. You had, and still have, every right to do with it as you please. Willowsbrook should be able to support itself twice over. The fact that it can’t quite support itself is my father’s—and his father’s—fault, not yours.”

After a long pause, Elinore said, “Would you like more tea?”

What he’d like was a hefty glass of that whiskey, but he had the feeling they’d only chewed the edges of whatever she’d wanted to talk to him about. “Please,” he said, holding out his cup. He waited until she refilled both their cups. “Would you mind if I sold the town house in Durham?”

“The estate and any other property is yours now, Liam. You may do with it as you please.”

“Would you mind?” he persisted.

When she looked at him, he saw a bitterness in her eyes she’d never allowed to show before. “There’s nothing in that place that I value.”

No, there wouldn’t be, not when his father’s string of mistresses had spent more time there than she had. Well, that was one burden and expense he could easily shed. He’d write to his man of business and set things in motion to sell the town house and its contents.

“Won’t you need the town house when you have business in the city?” Elinore asked.

Liam shook his head. “I can rent rooms easily enough for the two times a year when the barons formally meet.”

He felt a pressure building inside him, and he clamped his teeth to try to keep the words back as he’d done for so many years. Perhaps it was because the conversation was already difficult that he couldn’t hold it back anymore. “Why didn’t you leave him? He was a bastard, and you deserved so much better. Adultery is grounds for severing the marriage vow. You had income of your own, so you were never dependent upon him. Why did you stay?”

“I had three reasons,” Elinore replied quietly. “You. Brooke. And Willowsbrook.”

There was something about the way she said “Willowsbrook” that made him think she was talking about more than the estate.

“You’re the baron now. You have authority and power, not just on the estate and tenant farms but over the villagers and the free landowners, as well. You can use that authority and power for ill or for good.”

“I’m aware of that.”

“How you act will set a precedent for the rest of the people here.”

Liam snorted softly. “My father thankfully didn’t set much of a precedent.”

“If he’d ordered that something be done, that order would have been obeyed. The squires and magistrates in each village would have seen it carried out.”

Liam rested one hand lightly over his mother’s. “He still had to obey the decrees that the council of barons agree upon for the good of Sylvalan.”

“The barons have the power to change the decrees or make new ones, regardless of what the rest of Sylvalan’s people want. And a baron can impose his will over the people in the county he rules no matter what the decrees say.”

She looked pale and unhappy, and he didn’t know what she wanted from him. “To what use do you want me to put my new authority and power?” he asked gently.

“I want you to protect the witches at Willowsbrook—the Old Place this estate took its name from generations ago when your father’s kin first came here to live and work the land.”

Liam sighed, withdrew his hand. “Mother—”

“I have something to tell you,” Elinore said hurriedly. “A secret I’d kept from your father because of a few things he’d said on our honeymoon. But you have to know. You have to understand.”

“Understand what?”

Agitated, Elinore set her teacup on the table, then walked to the glass door. She stared at the world beyond the glass for a minute, as if she needed to draw strength from the view. Then she turned to face him.

“My great-great-grandfather was a witch’s son,” she said quietly. “He was the eldest son, but the Old Places always belong to the women of the family, and he wanted something to call his own. When he was a young man, he left home with his mother’s blessing. He traveled for a few years, learned a bit about several trades as he worked for his food and lodging and a few coins to rub together. Then, one day, he saw a piece of land that made him want to put down roots, so his mother and grandmother helped him scrape together enough money to buy the land and build a small cottage.

“He had a gift for knowing what the land could yield and what needed time to ripen. He was canny when it came to business—and he was canny when it came to people. Like the land, he could sense what each could yield and when something or someone needed time to ripen.

“He prospered, and the people he dealt with prospered, as well.

“When he eventually married, he took a witch for a wife. They had several children, and the family continued to prosper. By then, his merchant business was turning a good profit, and he built a large, rambling country house.

“His eldest son went into the business with him, while the other sons and daughters found their callings in other kinds of work. In time, some of them fell in love, got married, and had children, and their children had children.

“And so it went. And while the family never hid their ties to the witches who lived in several of the Old Places, they also didn’t flaunt those ties. As generations passed, not all of the spouses could make the same claim of having ties to an Old Place, and the gifts that come down through the blood became watered down or disappeared altogether.” Elinore paused, then shook her head. “Not disappeared. Nuala says the Mother’s gifts sometimes sleep in the blood, waiting to reappear again.” She smiled sadly. “The name means nothing to you, does it? Our nearest neighbor for all of these years, and you don’t even know who she is.”

“Of course I know,” Liam said testily. “She’s one of the witches.”

Elinore walked back to the sofa and sat down, folding her hands in her lap. She sighed. “Yes, she’s one of the witches. She’s also my father’s cousin, several times removed.”

Having no idea what she expected him to say, Liam drank his now-cold tea to give himself a little time. Given his father’s animosity toward the witches who lived in the Old Place that bordered the estate, he understood quite well why his mother had never mentioned this aspect of her family heritage. But...

“As you said, it was several generations ago,” Liam said, thinking she was worried about his feelings toward her changing. “You’ve no reason to feel shame because of it.”

Elinore’s eyes widened. “I’m not ashamed of my heritage. If I regret anything, it’s that my gift from the Mother is so weak.” Then she looked slightly annoyed. “Perhaps it’s because it came down through the paternal line in my branch of the family that the men’s gifts from the Mother were less diluted. My brother certainly has a stronger connection to water than I do to earth.”