“I know this happened nearly four hundred years ago, but I can’t bear the injustice of it,” I wailed, tears blinding me to Kyle’s expression. “It’s so unfair.” I blew my nose on a tissue and faced Kyle, needing to hear the rest of it. “So I ask again, how can you be descended from Alys and Jeremy if you’re not connected to James?”
“There were other children,” Kyle said matter-of-factly.
I was growing desperate. “Kyle, what are you talking about? This is not some film with a twist ending. This is real life. Real death. A twenty-year-old woman, a mother, was hanged to satisfy another woman’s lust for revenge. She didn’t want her husband for herself, but she’d be damned if he loved someone else. For all her piety, she was the one who killed Alys Bailey.”
I shook my head, trying to chase away the pall of depression that had settled on me. I wasn’t sure I could write about this. It was too heartbreaking, too infuriating for me to immerse myself in for months on end. Even though I had known how the story ended all along, I found Alys’s actual end devastating.
“Nicole, Alys didn’t die,” Kyle said, taking my face in his hands to force me to look at him.
“What do you mean? It’s right there in black and white—well, faded brown and yellow, but still. The last journal entry says, ‘She’s dead.’”
Kyle shook his head. “Don’t believe everything you read. It’s fake news,” he added with a chuckle.
Chapter 67
Alys
Awareness came slowly, Alys’s eyelids heavy with sleep and her throat dry and sore. She forced her eyes open, her gaze meeting pine planks mere inches above her head. She began to pant as panic took hold, making her convulse with terror. Pushing her hands against the lid of the coffin, she banged on the fresh wood with a desperation born of pure animal fear. They were going to bury her alive, and it would take her hours to die, possibly even days, trapped beneath six feet of earth, her cries unheard.
“Shh,” a muted voice came. “You must keep quiet, Alys. It won’t be long now.” The voice belonged to Matthew and took the edge off her panic.
“Where are ye taking me?” Alys called. “Please, Matthew, open the lid.”
“I can’t. Not yet. I’m taking ye to a safe place. Keep still, ye hear me?”
Alys took deep, measured breaths to calm down. Matthew wouldn’t lie to her. He wouldn’t bury her alive. He was her friend. The ride continued for another ten minutes or so, but it may as well have been ten years. The only thing that kept Alys from losing her mind was the faint light filtering between the slats in the coffin that allowed air to flow in. She gulped it desperately, grateful for every breath. She gingerly touched her throat. The skin felt tender, but she must have been cut down very quickly. It was a wonder her neck hadn’t broken.
At last, the lid was pried off, and she saw Matthew, his face wreathed in a happy smile. “Welcome back to the land of the living,” he said. He helped Alys sit up and handed her the fur-lined velvet cloak Jeremy had bought for her last year, the hummingbird pin sparkling in the morning light. “Put this on. Ye’ll catch your death in yer shift.”
Matthew helped Alys out of the wagon and held her close. She had so many questions, but they’d have to wait. She was so overcome with emotions, she couldn’t manage to put any of them into words, and the only thought that kept going through her mind was I’m alive. I’m still alive.
Matthew gently pushed Alys away from him and looked down at her. “We don’t have much time,” he said. “Are ye all right?”
Alys nodded. She was as all right as she was likely to get, so whatever he had planned may as well happen now. Alys tensed when she saw an unfamiliar carriage approaching, the driver wearing a hat pulled low over his eyes. He lifted his head and she recognized Hal Robson. At this stage, Alys wasn’t at all sure who was a friend and who was a foe, but a thin wail from the depths of the carriage sent a surge of hope through her skittering heart. She barely noticed as Matthew tossed a heavy sack inside the coffin, shut the lid, and prepared to nail it down. Alys stood rooted to the spot, unsure what to do.
“Well, are you coming or not?” Hal called out as he brought the horses to a stop and looked down at her, grinning.
Alys walked over to the carriage on wobbly legs and yanked open the door. Bess was inside, Jamie in her arms. Alys climbed into the carriage and reached for her son. His milky smell soothed her soul as she pressed her face to his warm cheek, tears of joy and gratitude streaming down her face.
Alys thought Bess would come along, but Bess wrapped her in a hug, her eyes glistening with tears. “Look after yerself, Alys. We’ll miss ye.”
“Where am I going?” Alys asked, her mind still muddled with everything that had happened.
“I don’t know. He won’t tell me.” She jutted her chin toward Hal. “But I know ye’ll be all right. It’s all been arranged, it seems.”
“Bye, Bess,” Alys said as Bess climbed out of the carriage. “Tell Will I love him.”
“He knows,” Bess said. She gave Alys a watery smile and was gone.
The carriage began to move, the vehicle
