Woburn Abbey, Bedfordshire

The Reverend John Thornton walked very slowly behind and to one side of Lady Anne Bedford and Noah Banks.

It was a beautiful late spring morning. The sun beat down with an unseasonable warmth, and the air had a languid quality about it, as if it contained all the heaviness of midsummer instead of the usual sprightliness of spring. Those deer and rabbits that saw the walkers moved away only sluggishly as if they were too exhausted to be bothered with panic.

The women wore broad-brimmed straw hats against the sun and light summery clothes. Thornton guessed they’d spent half the morning finding and then airing last summer’s bodices and skirts. But Lady Anne had been insistent; the moment she’d looked out upon the sun-swathed park she’d proclaimed that the day was too beautiful for anyone to spend indoors.

His position to one side and slightly behind gave Thornton the opportunity to study the two women.

Lady Anne, now in her sixth month of yet another pregnancy, looked drawn and tired, and Thornton wondered why she’d insisted on this walk. The day was beautiful, yes, but she might have been better instructing one of the footmen to set a chair on the lawns for her leisure rather than insisting on this meander through the parklands.

On the other hand, Noah looked as lovely as ever. She was a special woman, as he had every reason to know. For the past nine or ten years she’d been his lover, gracing him with her body and presence on two or three nights a week. He was in love with her. Worse, he was addicted to her. Whenever they lay together he embraced not only Noah, but also the land.

Always, when they made love, Thornton could feel the land rise up to meet him.

Do you feel it, John Thornton? she would whisper to him, and he would weep, and hold her, and say, Yes, I feel it.

Thornton had lost count of the number of times he’d begged Noah to marry him. He was desperate for her, and he was plagued by nightmares of losing her. Marry me, he would beg, marry me, and never leave me.

She cried whenever he said that, and laid a hand to his cheek. I cannot, she would say. I must leave, eventually.

Thornton was not sure how their love affair had kept itself secret for so long. He wondered if the countess suspected; she certainly knew Thornton loved Noah. She had once asked him directly if he held a “special affection” for Noah. He replied truthfully that he did, but that she would not have him.

Noah later told him that the countess had taxed her with Thornton’s apparently unrequited love, and that Noah had told the countess what she so often told Thornton.

She could not marry him. She could not marry any man, for she would eventually have to leave.

The countess was perplexed as much as Thornton was increasingly desperate.

He studied Noah now as he strolled along, hands clasped behind his back, eyes heavy-lidded against the sun.

At sixteen Noah had been lovely.

At twenty-five she was stunning.

Her glossy brunette hair had darkened a little more with age, but it was still striking. When they made love Thornton would sink his hands into its thick, cool mass, and often fantasised about losing himself within it completely. Her pale luminescent skin was as exquisite now as it had been at sixteen, and her eyes, ah, those eyes…when she smiled at him, slow and warm, those eyes glowed with such intensity that Thornton imagined he could feel their heat burning into his face.

And yet, sometimes, after they had made love and she lay in his arms, he would hear her sigh and turn her head slightly as if she looked for someone in the dark of the chamber. At these moments he would feel a falling away, but whether of Noah herself or of that remarkable sense of the land she brought with her he could not say.

At these moments he would wonder how many other men Noah had left bereft in her wake. How many men, desperately in love with her, had heard her sigh like that, and turn her eyes to stare into the unknown. Noah had been a virgin when she’d first come to Thornton’s bed, but Thornton was intuitive enough (and certainly intuitive enough after all these close years with this faerie woman) to understand that his might not have been the first heart she’d ever broken.

“Reverend,” Lady Anne said, pausing to turn slightly to wave Thornton forward. “Why lag so? I would speak with you and Noah.”

As Thornton drew abreast of Lady Anne, she resumed speaking.

“I have decided to travel to a healing spring. This child discomforts me greatly, and I need to partake of mineral waters.”

“I am sorry to hear of that, madam,” Thornton said. “To where do you travel? And when?”

“As to the when, in a few weeks, perhaps, when my husband can spare me. And as to where. Well…I have heard good reports of the springs at Hampstead.”

Thornton saw Noah stiffen, and he thought he knew what was coming. Hampstead was on the northern borders of London.

“I would have you stay and continue the children’s education,” Lady Anne said to Thornton, then she turned and laid a gloved hand on Noah’s arm, “but I would have you with me, Noah, for no one soothes my aches and discomforts as well as you. Between you and the waters, I have no doubt I shall feel well again in but a short while.”

“Madam…” Noah said, and Thornton saw panic well in her eyes.

For some reason, Noah loathed London. The earl and countess travelled to London at least once a year to oversee their interests there. They always asked Noah to travel with them; Noah just as regularly declined, citing this reason or that.

“I will have you with me,” the countess said, her voice like ice.

“Madam,” Noah began again.

“The waters of Hampstead are renowned for their curative powers,” Lady Anne continued. “I must go, Noah, and you shall accompany me.”

Thornton was sure that he saw tears in Noah’s eyes, and he started forward, thinking that if he did not grasp her hand then she would bolt for the cover of the forest like a terrified deer.

Just as he stepped forward, and raised his hand, Noah looked towards a tree, and gasped, her already pale skin losing what little colour it had.

Thornton looked in the direction of her eyes, and felt his own mouth drop open in wonder.

A tall thin creature in rough leather breeches and jerkin had stepped forward, and if his dealings with Noah had taught Thornton anything, it was that he could recognise a faerie creature when he saw one.