He eyed the platform apprehensively. It looked sturdy, and the steps didn’t look too daunting, housed as they were in the trunk of the tree.
“It’s not so very far up,” she coaxed. “Not nearly as high as that tower outside Stamford.”
There was nothing he wouldn’t do at this point to make her resent him a little less. “Very well,” he said. “I’ll be up in a moment.” At her doubtful look, he added, “I mean it this time. Just let me secure the horses.”
He tethered the animals to a nearby tree that was large yet dwarfed by the elm. Then he gritted his teeth and started up, groaning when he saw the stairs were slatted instead of solid.
The first few steps weren’t too bad, but then the staircase started spiraling inside the trunk, getting more and more narrow. Look up, he told himself, look up. Eyes on the goal, not the drop. His pulse skittered, his head whirled, the blood roared in his ears.
Halfway up, he paused to lean against the hollowed interior and close his eyes. When he opened them, his vision was blurry, and he shook his head to clear it. One foot in front of the other, one step at a time, and if he felt as though his dinner might come up, well, he’d just have to ignore that.
Given her head start, he was surprised when he caught up to her. She seemed to be expending quite an effort in the climb. Being outside in the storm most of yesterday—not to mention last night—must have taken its toll on her. Another blade of guilt stabbed at his chest.
She glanced back at him. “You look pale.”
He blew out a breath and shrugged. His gaze on her back, he ordered his legs to stop shaking, and at last they made it to the platform.
“Forty-two steps,” she announced. “By all the saints, will you look at that view!” She rushed to the rail, her gaze scanning from right to left and back again.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?” he said. The platform looked as though it might hold about twenty people. Wiping sweaty palms on his breeches, he stayed in the exact center. “We’re lucky to have a clear day. London’s often covered in fog.” His stomach did a flip-flop when she leaned over the rail. “Keep back, will you?”
“London is incredible. It’s enormous! I’ve never seen so many buildings in one place.”
The view stretched for miles and miles. From his spot behind her, he pointed out the ruins of St. Paul’s Cathedral, destroyed in last year’s Great Fire, and the hills of Kent south of the Thames.
“And what could that be?” Cait asked, indicating something much closer, in the shrubby area at the far end of the heath. She turned to him. “A reservoir? With horses and carriages driving right through it?”
“Whitestone Pond.” Jason nodded at a large marker that sat near it. “Named for that old white milestone. King Henry the Eighth designed it to keep the City free of the countryside’s mud. All horses and wheels pass through it on the way in from Hampstead.” He laughed at her expression of disbelief. “We’ll be doing so ourselves in a short while.”
“It still looks a long way to London,” she said quietly.
He frowned at her tight features. “Just an hour or so.”
“I-I’m hurting, Jason.” She dropped her gaze, plainly uncomfortable at the admission. “My arm,” she explained. “I thought I could make it through the day, but…”
“Egad, and I didn’t take you foraging for plants.” Forgetting his dizziness, he moved closer and slung an arm around her shoulders. He remembered her clenched hands and the stoic set of her jaw as they rode. “Was that why you were so quiet?”
She nodded miserably.
Though he’d thought her silence had meant she resented him, he was too guilty to feel relieved. “You cannot make it another hour?”
Clouded with pain, her eyes met his. “I don’t know,” she whispered. “All the day I’ve been—”
“London can wait,” he decided, alarmed. Caithren was nothing if not strong and steady. “We’ll ride back up the hill, to Spaniards Inn. You saw it, by the tollgate?”
She nodded again.
“It’s not far at all.” He swung her up into his arms, as one would carry a small child. “You’re going to be fine.”
“Jason!” Despite her distress, she giggled, making his heart lift a bit. “Put me down!”
“I’ll hear none of it,” he told her with mock sternness, starting down the steps and forcing himself to ignore the rush of vertigo. “We’ll have you in a room in no time. Can you sit your own horse?”
“Of course I can. I rode all the day, did I not?” Warm laughter rang through the hollowed trunk, bringing him waves of relief.
But the feeling was short-lived once he looked down the steep, winding stairs.
There was nothing for it, he told himself sternly. One step after another, he ordered his feet to comply. With the drop looming before him, the way down was always worse than the way up. And doubly worse carrying Caithren, leaving no hand free to balance against the wall.
His breath came in embarrassingly short pants, and the arms that cradled her were shaking. Mercifully, she didn’t comment on any of that or his lack of speed. “Put me down,” she repeated quietly instead. “I’m not an invalid. I only wish to rest.”
He didn’t put her down, and somehow he made it to the bottom. He didn’t have the luxury to let his knees buckle or to sit a spell and recover his composure. Silently congratulating himself, he perched her on her reddish mare and mounted his own black steed.
Afraid to jar her, he led her slowly back over the heath and up the hill to the white, weatherboarded inn. Securing a room seemed a process that took forever. And he knew that forever to
