Chapter 2 Sleeping Together

I awoke safely in a giant bed with black lace curtains draped over the top. Thick moonlight peeked through the window, calming my racing mind.

I wore a thin black nightgown and faintly recalled Helen helping me up the stairs of the manor, getting me out of the dress I’d been wearing, and watching over me until I had fallen asleep properly.

I twisted under my warm covers, thinking about how I had put the bruises on her arms.

Then I thought of Erik, and the piercing glare he had given me. He needed me to save him, but I couldn’t just release him right away. No, he would surely kill me if I did that.

I first would need to earn his trust and demonstrate to him that I was a changed woman.

I slid open the curtains and stepped onto the floor. I winced at the cold castle stone and sighed that I had made Erik sleep on it naked.

I blushed at the thought of Erik naked and shook the image from my head.

I searched for a light or something to guide my way, but this time period was not my own. No light switch existed I could flip on, or even a book of matches to ignite.

This wasn’t my world, and for as long as I would be here, I would need to adapt.

I would have to act and speak appropriately for medieval times. I would need to remember the werewolf customs, the alliances, and the enemies of the Oakheart Kingdom.

I wouldn’t have to pretend to be Vanessa, I had to be her.

The lock on the thick wooden door to my bedroom was unlatched and the door opened.

Helen stood in the glow of the orange flame of her traveling candelabra. I made my way to her, crossing my arms as I did so.

“It’s freezing outside of the covers,” I told her through clattering teeth.

Helen nodded and replied, “It grows icy in here when the fires are out. Let me fetch your robe and slippers.”

She scurried around to the side of the bed where there was a built-in wardrobe and drawers. Helen returned with a long, black robe made of fur, and a pair of white fur-lined slippers. She motioned for me to hold my arms out. I did so and she helped me into the robe.

“Thank you, Helen,” I said. “I appreciate all that you do.”

Helen gave me a jittery smile as if she were so unaccustomed to the gesture that it frightened her to do it.

I cozied my feet into the fuzzy slippers and asked, “How’s Erik?”

Helen licked her lips and said, “The man is sick with fever, I’m afraid. He’s quite hot.”

My mind drifted to the image of Erik standing grandly on the cover of the book.

Then I thought of Erik weak and fetal in his cage, and my heart sunk deep into my chest.

Vanessa had done that to him. Brought him down to his knees and planned on keeping him there until his untimely demise.

I said to Helen, “Bring Erik the warmest quilt in the manor!”

Helen dodged eye contact with me.

“That would be your quilt, Lady Vanessa.”

“Then so be it!” I exclaimed.

I tore the quilt off my bed, messily folded it into my arms, and followed Helen as she led me back to the lower chambers.

Behind the bars of his cage, Erik appeared worse than before.

His blonde hair stuck to his forehead with sweat, yet he shivered hard enough to see. He gripped the pendant around his neck, almost like he was praying to it.

I ran inside the cage and wrapped him up in the quilt. Helen blinked at me and handed me a wooden cup filled with water.

She said, “He hasn’t been drinking, Lady. It concerns me.”

Erik’s heart beat slowly. He didn’t open his eyes to acknowledge our presence. His breath came out in short, slow gasps and I feared he might die in my arms.

In the book, this fever led to weeks of painful sickness for him. I had to make sure that didn’t happen.

I lifted Erik’s head and guided the cup to his lips, but he wouldn’t drink.

“I have tried, my lady,” Helen said. “I fear he may not live through the night. I know you had plans for him, so I will do everything I can.”

I was so focused on healing Erik that I barely heard Helen.

In a desperate moment, I took a sip from the cup of water, then pressed my lips to Erik’s. His shoulders rose, his mouth opened ever so slightly. The water slipped from my mouth into his.

His lips rasped against mine, desperate with thirst, and I blushed.

I gave him water this way three more times, and with each time, his lips felt less chapped, and I knew my efforts were working.

I pressed the back of my hand to his forehead and wiped a drop of water dribbling down my chin with my sleeve.

“He’s still burning,” I said. “And too weak to move.”

Helen glanced at me. Cautiously, she said, “He needs warmth, Lady. Warmth… from another body.”

I gulped and nodded.

Butterflies stormed inside my stomach. I had never been naked with a man before and embarrassed by the thought.

“I’ll do it,” I said hesitantly, removing my robe, but pausing before my dress. Erik shivered next to me and I had my resolve, “It’s my fault he’s sick. I shall make him better, Helen.”

I held my robe up to cover my nakedness as if Erik could see me through the back of his head. I nestled close to Erik, afraid of touching him. When the warmth spread between his back and my belly, I inched myself closer until I thought the thump of my beating heart against his back might wake him up.

Erik exhaled powerfully, and I could feel his heartbeat pick up with me beside him.

Helen’s cheeks reddened, and she had a hand over her open mouth when she asked, “Lady, are you sure?”

I nodded at Helen and said, “I will make him warm and see that he sleeps through the night. Helen, you may get some rest now yourself.”

Helen hesitantly bowed, then said, “If that is your command, my Lady.”

Surely Erik would be too weak to hurt me should he wake, right? Nor would he want to, hopefully? 

Helen strutted away with her candelabra. The light flickered out of sight with her.

Erik and I remained alone in the dark, sleeping under the thin veil of moonlight from the single window above the prison cell. His shoulders raised and fell with each of his struggled breaths.

The soles of his feet were still cold, so I set mine under them, despite his icy feet giving me goosebumps. I kept thinking he might wake and tell me to leave, but he only shaped his body closer to mine while he rested.

I bit my lip and grasped Erik’s strong arm tighter.

A perhaps inappropriate thought popped into my head: should I die in this world, I would at least have gotten to live out my greatest dream.