The Sorceror's Revenge by Linda Sole Read Free Book Online Page B

tell Robert where I thought you might be?’
                  Melloria looked at her in silence.  ‘His men slaughtered innocent men and women.  They killed Nicholas.  If it were not for him I should have died giving birth to my children.  He helped more people than you can ever know, and he was always seeking knowledge for the good of others.’
                  ‘God forgive me.’ The colour left Beatrice’s face.  ‘I did not think Robert would use violence to win you back.  Forgive me, sister?’
                  ‘I do not blame you.’  Melloria looked into her eyes.  ‘Will you let us stay here, my child and I – at least until I am ready to leave?’
                  ‘You are welcome to stay for as long as you wish,’ Beatrice said.  ‘One day you will have to choose between God and a different life, but we shall give you sanctuary until your spirit has healed.’  She looked uneasy.  ‘Will Robert allow you to stay here?’
                  ‘I believe he will.’ Melloria’s face became cold, her eyes hard.  ‘If he wishes to have the wife he once claimed to love he must give me time.  I need to learn to forgive him and to make my peace with God.  Even Robert cannot deny me that I think.’
                  ‘Do you wish me to speak to him for you?’
                  ‘No…’ Melloria raised her head proudly.  She was the woman who had cursed Montroy the night the castle was taken, no longer Nicholas’s soft, gentle wife.  ‘I shall speak with him myself in a little while.  For the moment I wish to rest and to pray.  I have much to think about.’  She reached for Iolanthe, her eyes dark with anguish as she looked at her sister.  I have another child somewhere…’
                  ‘So there were two?  We were not sure.’
                  ‘Somewhere there is a child who has never known her mother.  She must be found.  If Robert wishes to have me back, he must find her.’  Melloria’s eyes were hard.  ‘He must do penance for the wrong he has done me.  He left me to follow his ambition and he alone is responsible for what happened to me that night.’
    * * *
     
    Robert knelt before the altar, his head bent in prayer.  He wanted to give praise because his wife had been restored to him but the words would not come.  He had found Melloria but she was not his wife.  She was not the woman he had adored but a stranger who screamed when he touched her and wept for another man.
                  ‘Damn him!’
                  Rising to his feet, Robert left the chapel.  He could not pray because he was angry.  This should have been a day of triumph and happiness.  Melloria was alive and he had a daughter, a beautiful child who looked very like her mother.  Why then did he feel so empty?  If Malvern had been a sorcerer his powers would surely be broken now that he was dead.  In time Melloria would recover her true self and she would love him.
                  He would wait until the morning and then he would demand to see her, because this thing must be settled.  Robert’s thoughts were guilty as he remembered that he had another wife waiting for him at Craigmoor.  What was he to do about Rhoda?
                  He could not have two wives.  Rhoda must go, perhaps to a nunnery, though she might agree to live quietly in another country where no one would know her history.  Yet there was the child.  The boy was undoubtedly his.  Robert would have preferred that his heir was Melloria’s child but a man must have a son.  He could not be certain that Melloria would ever give him an heir, therefore he must keep Rhoda’s child and adopt him as his legal heir.
                  Would Rhoda agree to give up her son and leave?  He remembered the way she had pleaded with him not to send her to the convent and