HE shall love my soul as though
Body were not at all,
He shall love your body
Untroubled by the soul,
Love cram love's two divisions
Yet keep his substance whole.
--- W.B. Yeats
Declan and Aoife fled Rossnalough Manor, skirting north round Enniscorthy town under the midnight sky. With their bloody clothes, they kept to the dark fields and pastures alongside the road, passing shadowed cottages and dim shapes of ploughs, carts, and ruminating animals. Only one person did they spy on the road at this hour: a man on horseback, galloping towards Enniscorthy. In the darkness, the man's garb --- uniform or civilian --- was not discernable. Aoife guessed him to be the courier of some urgent message.
Where the lane turned off towards Fleetwood's farm, they continued straight ahead in an easterly direction.
No words did they utter as they strode side by side across the dark countryside, each preoccupied by their own thoughts --- if 'thoughts' was the proper term. Ever since fleeing Rossnalough Manor, Aoife knew only an overwhelming giddy feeling --- a maelstrom of sensations that could scarce be deemed coherent 'thoughts'. Her heart was racing out of proportion to the exertion of their pace, her stomach was fluttering, and her hands were shaking --- all of which surged anew when images from the confrontation with Blaylock flashed before her.
In contradistinction to her mind, her body operated purposefully, and her senses tingled with heightened acuity. Her eyes darted about the dark landscape to pick out shapes and movement...the faint glow of a cat's eyes by a barn...the silhouette of a bird sweeping across the sky. Her ears perked to the sounds of crickets, owls, wind stirring leaves, the creak of a loose shutter. The metallic odor of blood and sulphur of gunpowder rose from their clothes, but above that were detectable the variable scents of earth, animals, and chimney smoke from cottages. As they scaled walls, her fingers skimmed the jagged, cool edges of stones and soft draping vines. The ends of the dagger sheath and pistol holster tapped against her thighs as she walked, and the unfamiliar weight of the cartridge belt shifted round her hips.
By such vivid details did Aoife dispel any doubts that the fateful events had indeed transpired --- together they had succeeded, so they had! 'Twas no dream! Beside her, Declan seemed to be in a like state, the alert glint of his eyes visible in the starlight as he scanned their surroundings.
Some two hours later, they arrived at the forest. In the adjacent field, Aoife found the landmark of a blackthorn tree and led them into the woods. Once among the tall trees, the canopy of leaves shut out the stars and they were in nigh complete blackness, frustrating Aoife's recognition of the sequence of landmarks that she had used previously to return to the waterfall.
Gnarled tree trunks emerged from the darkness before them as they advanced with slow steps. An owl hooted somewhere nearby. At length, she found the fallen tree she remembered...then a little further the odd-shaped knot in the trunk of an oak...then the strangely twisted branch of an ash...and finally the double trunks of a maple...at which point the burble of flowing water became audible.
At the marker of a small pile of stones, Aoife ducked under the boughs of pine trees and within minutes they were standing on the banks of the pool below the waterfall. A ribbon of night sky showed in the break in the foliage above the stream, and the stars dimly shone on the speckled stones and highlighted the cascading flow. For several moments they stood in silent contemplation, the rush of the water and the cool, mossy air enveloping them.
Declan cleared his throat. "I'll build a fire," he said in a low, rasping voice. He set aside his knapsack and began to search for sticks, soon disappearing in the darkness under the surrounding trees. Aoife retrieved the soap from her bag and moved downstream to the end of the pool where the water swirled and tumbled through a maze of stones.
A glance showed Declan still absent, and she kicked off her shoes and stripped, unsticking the blood-drenched garments from her skin and submerging them in an eddy of cold water among the rocks --- all of them, even the torn shirt and the soldier's confiscated breeches. Aoife knelt on the bank to scrub them.
By and by, Declan returned and began building a fire on the bank upstream from her, near the base of the falls, and she saw his quick look in her direction. Pragmatic instinct had prevailed when she had doffed her clothes, but now in his presence she felt shy of her nakedness. Reassuring herself that she was sufficiently shrouded in darkness to preserve her modesty, she finished her task. Even when he had kindled a decent blaze, she was still protected from the light by the distance and intervening boulders and plants between them.
As if such a thing mattered at this juncture! And yet...even after the trial they had endured together...even after teetering on the edge of her grave, she felt the involuntary nervous excitement in her body at the knowledge that she was alone with this young man...and she was stark naked.
It came to her that the last time she had seen him prior to this night was at the courthouse...when, hidden under the judges' bench, he had traced 'I love you' in her palm...and had ravished her cunny with his mouth...rousing the exquisite torment that had culminated in the astounding, rapturous release against his lips.
A warm throb grew deep in her belly.
Aoife wrung out the wet garments, then picked her way among the stones and ferns along the bank. Nearing the crackling fire, she peeped from the shelter a large boulder --- Declan was engrossed in loading the two pistols they had taken.
"Give me your clothes --- I'll wash them," she urged, her voice hoarse.
From the other side of the rock came the soft noises of him undressing, and she faced away, resisting her curiosity. Coat, shirt, breeches, drawers, and stockings one at a time flipped across the top of the stone.
Aoife split the piece of soap and stretched her arm over the barrier between them. "Soap."
"Ta."
Back at her washing station, she beheld him in the pool, vigorously splashing and ducking his head under the water as he bathed. For her own part, the congealing blood was sticky on the skin of her belly and thighs, and when at length she had wrung out the final item, she rejoiced to finally be able herself to slip into the invigorating embrace of the pool.
From the far end, she paddled her way upstream, pausing to scrub her skin everywhere with a fan of pine needles and soap, then she exhaled and upended herself in the water, diving to the pure blackness at the bottom.
'Twas even colder here --- she sat for a moment with her hands and hair waving slowly, feeling the ancient stone beneath her. The pulse that had been pounding in her ears ever since Blaylock had walked into his office was at last lulled to a slow, faraway thudding by the cold, sinuous current...purifying her...quenching her past wounds.
She burst through the surface gasping, her hair streaming back from her face. Her paddling hand inadvertently brushed against Declan's. He was a few feet away, the firelight touching upon the contours of his face above the rippling water...his teeth were chattering but his expression was otherwise unreadable as he looked at her.
"Pardon," she murmured and swam further upstream till the mist from the falls enveloped her.
A motion on the bank drew her attention, and she observed Declan standing by the fire, facing away from her, stripping the water from his skin with his hands. Her curious eyes followed his motions, observing in fascination his naked body in the restless illumination of the flames...his wide back, his taut, rounded buttocks, and his strong limbs. Aoife's belly fluttered...she ducked her head under the water again to cool her hot face.
When she surfaced, she considered the falls above her, then glanced back to the firepit. Declan was now seated upon a stone by the fire, his back courteously towards her.
Taking the offered opportunity, Aoife clambered up the wet stones to the flat rock that received the gushing plume and stood behind it to quickly soap her hair. Her head fully lathered, she peeked round the falls to assure herself he was yet facing away, then stepped under the water to rinse clean...the flowing water strumming over her breasts and mound as stirringly it had before, but this time she dallied not. Soon she dived into the pool below.
Declan, yet naked, was crouched by his knapsack when her head again broke the surface. Aoife swam to the side with her lips trembling from the chill, searching the bank uncertainly. He extracted a cloth bundle from the bag.
"Are ye finished?" he asked, standing with the bundle in front of his privates.
She nodded.
"Here's me cloak if ye want." He sat again, placing the garment on the stone behind him before presenting his back to her. As cold as she had grown, Aoife wasted no time climbing out of the pool, whisking the droplets of water from her skin, and wringing out her hair.
She unrolled the cloak and swung it round her shivering, bare body...the memory flooding her of the first time she had donned his coat...back in September after she had fallen into the river. Yet again his cloak was offered to cover her wet body...but how much had happened since then! This cloak was more like a cape --- sleeveless and fastening at the neck.
Thus clad, Aoife immediately went downstream to the rocks where she had left the wet clothes and gathered them up. Returning to the fire with her teeth chattering and the gooseflesh rising over her skin, she spread the garments over stones closer to the warmth of the flames. Declan was stirring the fire with a stick, but paused to help her, stretching his arms to drape items over the stones nearby his seat.
"Aoife, sit by the fire and warm yourself," he murmured, nodding at the moss-coated stone next to him.
She glanced round, avoiding looking at him. No other stones by the fire were the proper height for a seat, so she squelched her nervousness and sat next to him, adjusting the folds of the wool cloak so as to keep a few inches of space between their thighs.
