The smell of the battle was still fresh. Lothie could feel the recently departed souls in the air as he sat on his stallion, glaring over the barren fields in the darkness. The moon was hidden behind thick clouds, no creatures stirring on this cold night.
The man at the inn had questioned him why a man of station would want to go out unguarded to search for a mere soldier. Lothie didn't dignify the question with an answer, but deep in his heart he knew that he had to do it for Elizabeth.
It had been five days since he left the manor house in the middle of the night, refusing an escort as he rushed across the fields in hopes of finding someone with information as to where this Richard Hudson had ended up.
There was nothing though, just a few bits of armor and other personal possessions laying on the hard, cold ground. With a sigh, Lothie turned his horse and slowly began his journey back to the inn where he was staying, intent on brooding in the quiet solitude that his dark room offered.
"I can't find him, Gabby." Lothie stated in his mind, connecting to the mind of his love back in Suffolk.
Gabriella looked up from the book she was intently reading, looking across the room at Elizabeth curled up in an armchair, peacefully sleeping next to the fire. The voice startled her at first, Lothie never speaking to her through the use of his mind before.
"Darling?" She asked the voice, looking around the room to see if there were someone else in the room.
"Sorry, sweet one. I shouldn't have frightened you like that." Lothie apologized, turning his head down against a gust of wind that bit at his face. "I cannot find head nor tail of this Richard Hudson."
"Are you sure you're looking in the right place?" Gabriella asked, looking back down at the weathered pages of her book. "I mean, there could be hundreds of places he could be."
Lothie laughed to himself, shaking his head slightly. "Gabby, it's an island. Not many places a man can hide on an isle."
"Lothian, don't be smart with me." Gabriella scolded, looking up as Elizabeth coughed slightly and shifted in the chair, snuggling closer to the fire. "She's getting worse." She silently commented, noting the bony fingers of one of the girl's hands as she gripped the armrest. "Come home, Lothie. Please."
Lothie looked up at the dark night sky, his soul aching at the request. He couldn't go home, not yet at least. The memory of that night still weigh heavily on his mind, that feeling of uncontrollable hatred and need. Neither women deserved that side of himself and he knew that he had to find this man before Elizabeth lost her battle.
"Sweet Gabby, I have one more place to look and then, I promise with all my heart, I will come home."
"You best keep that promise." She whispered back, all of the longing that she had in her manifesting itself into those few simple words.
"I swear. Goodnight, Gabriella."
And with those words, he cut himself loose of her mind, riding in silence the rest of the way to the tiny tavern that he was calling home at the moment. It wasn't much to look at and full of seedy characters, but it was dark and that is all that he needed in the day time. That and the innkeeper didn't ask questions which worked to Lothie's benefit. As he neared the town, he could hear the loud sounds of drunken song and laughter coming from the closed door of the tavern. It was full of loud drunkards, but Lothie didn't feel like celebrating with them, not after having been disappointed so much this evening.
He hitched up his horse and pushed into the tavern, nodding to the innkeeper as he took a place at the end of the bar, listening to the noisy din and breathing in the acrid smoke. Maybe he should just give up for the evening and retreat to his room with his mind full of Gabriella. That in itself could prove to be an interesting evening, he mused to himself, a smile crossing his face.
"Find who you were looking for?" The innkeeper asked, walking towards him as he cleaned a tankard.
"No. I'm about to give up too. No one around here seems to have ever heard of this Richard Hudson before."
"Wouldn't surprise me if he was a soldier."
With that, Lothie looked up at the man, questioning wrinkling his brow. "What do you mean by that?"
"Most soldiers that come through these part are buried without a name, unless they have a friend that survived, then maybe it's possible that he could have a gravestone."
Lothie shook his head, unwilling to believe that Richard was dead. He couldn't be; all of his planning would be for not if he were. "Why do you say graves? The man could still be alive."
The innkeeper laughed and sat the tankard down, leaning on the bar to look at Lothie. "Most soldiers that fought in that battle did not survive. Many are buried in a mass grave at St. Martin's, just down the lane a ways. There were a few that were given separate plots because they could be identified. I am telling you that if this man that you look for was a soldier and was here for that battle, that is where you will find him."
"St. Martin's." Lothie whispered to himself as he stood up, throwing a coin on the bar as he started out of the tavern.
"Are you crazy going out at night by yourself? Highwaymen out there would kill a man like you in an instant." The innkeeper shouted after him.
Lothie turned in the doorway and stared at the man, his eyes glowing slightly as he pulled up the hood of his cloak against the bitter winds that kicked up. "It would be a very foolish man that messed with Lothian Moray." He said as he let the door slam shut.
Mounting his horse, he spurred him through the woods as fast as he could, keeping a keen eye out for the church steeple that had to be there. He had seen the church from a distance in his searching, but thought nothing of it, still convinced that Richard had to be alive. A sense of dread welled up in his chest as he tried to soothe himself that Richard had gotten out of the fray alive, maybe badly hurt, and that Lothie would find him and take him back to Elizabeth.
Down the lane just a few miles, the small country church came into view, the huge steeple towering over the frozen countryside. Lothie slowed his horse to a trot, leaping off with a practiced grace as he walked through the small gate and into the cemetery just to the side of the main church entrance. There were headstones everywhere, some older than the rest.
"This is going to take forever." He groaned to himself as he slowly walked through the headstones, searching over the worn rocks for the names of those buried.
