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It is only when Hyde finally spots Jacqueline in the desolate clearing does he notice that she is weeping. Strange. The only love he has ever called his own is shedding tears for the freshly hanged body.
The other villagers, especially the wives and their daughters have been praising his comrades all morning. Though it did not take him long at all to notice her absence. She was not there, cheering the crowd on as one might expect. It caused him to head back through the trees, thinking she might have been in danger, or perchance she ran off in fright upon learning that one of the village girls she preferred to walk with, was guilty of Sorcery?
But, a bolt of confusion shoots through him like an arrow. It's enough to hold him hostage, freezing his footsteps to the ground. His Lady is not pleased, that much is clear. She is not sharing their joy. She is visibly distraught by the sight of the Bella Donna Witch swaying from that creaking branch. It is an odd image, indeed — the fair Jacqueline, highborn daughter with ten white horses and genuine silken bed pillows to her name — planted under the hanging tree with watery eyes, surrounded by aged bark and moss.
Hyde's practiced "mask" of stoic discipline, finally, finally cracks under the blow of her disappointment. Her look of silent judgment and anguish sours his stomach.
She turns her head to meet his eyes, as if she could sense his very presence without even a greeting… and, all the worries he's locked up tight, start to bleed out.
A new awareness settles in the crisp autumn air around them.
His following question weighing heavier with each passing breath but never leaves his tongue. He can only gaze back at her, aching and stoney in his shock.
There can only be one reason why a woman from their township would dare to mourn a dead witch.
Thirteen witches lived in a village so dark and rotten
Six w're poor and plain, wore coon tails and cotton
Four w're careful and clever, though lacked faces of pretty design
While the last three w're most dangerous, armed with it all,
dressed in pearls and felts divine
Is that true? The riddle he heard silly children recite in the street carried a sliver of fact?
"You're one, too," he surmises, notes of accusation lacing his tone.
His Lady lets out another ragged breath — and all the leaves across the glen quiver and quake, as if the force of her heartache could echo itself throughout Nature.
"And your brother said he loved her," she replies with such hidden passion that it makes his facial muscles wince. The bold and daring Mister Hyde, not so brash and fearless now, is he? "And you said you were done partaking in your brothers' hangings. You promised. You said you loved me. And this… this is what happens to my sisters when I take a hunter at his word.”
"That was before I knew you were a witch! Jaqueline, you were so…."
“What, what was I? Too rich of blood? Too unwise, too uninformed?”
"Gentle," he croaks. "Too beautiful. Guiltless and pure."
"Pure, you call me today? Even after you know that my skin is not virginal? I once lain with Sir Micheal."
"I had once assumed that was his own folly tainting your judgement. Now, I wonder who truly enchanted who."
Ah, bittersweet Mister Hyde. Always one step forward and two leaps back with you! One moment he'll cherish her, hold her like she's a shiny treasure just for his viewing alone. The next, he'll stick more thorns in her side if he doesn't favor what he hears next.
"You think me so wicked and low?!" she demands, nonetheless. "A vile succubus? And those secret kisses you placed to my cheek while I perched myself atop your lap suddenly mean nothing? The words of devotion I spoke? That was all a ploy of mine, was it?"
He lifts his head to the Bella Donna witch again. Her long red hair seems less vibrant now, less menacing. That riveting spark in her is now gone, dead as the rest of her. Personally, he didn’t see what was so wrong with an unmarried woman chopping her own firewood, or whether she decided to bathe in the river at night. That was not his business! But they all knew witches were afoot, and red hair was never a good omen in the eyes of the Church. The Bella Donna girl was too outspoken for her own good most days, and caused occasional trouble amongst the other wives as well, encouraging them to meet her in the forest to dance and defy everything their husbands would ask of them. She rejected her own womanhood, as she openly rejected her own mother. Still, Hyde had no real issue with her —
Alas, the redhead had been concerning his caretakers as of late — and that might have raised his hackles. Redford and Kathryn were the only two elders in town who weren't putting as much stock into the witch hunts as the rest. So, if they were beginning to suspect her motives, as to why she trailed after their son like he was a stray hound she merely wanted to tame and muzzle … then, absolutely. He would rather protect this family, no matter the cost.
Although, the cost is glaring back at him right now, and he loathes it. Loathes himself. The love he was envious of. The pretty Lady he craved more than any living person really understood.
"Those nights were not worthless to me," Jaqueline murmurs. "I may be what I am, but my growing love for you was not born from any evil. Even now, as my heart breaks over your deeds, I still yearn for the fire in yours."
That must have done it. Hyde's outer shell shifts, returning to the man she knows him to be.
"Go," he instructs her, with some struggle. "Go, Lady Jaqueline. Run."
"You will not hunt me down?" She wonders. "What of your brother? Your caretakers? What will they believe if I simply disappear from the township after nightfall?”
"I will stall them if needed, but they will know. They will hear of this, sooner or later, perhaps link you back to the Bella Donna. I fear the men would be tying a rope for you next."
She does not linger for long. Does not plea for him to reconsider. She cannot. "Farewell, my sweet."
"I - have a fair trip, Jacks."
With that, she hikes up her expensive skirts and flees deeper into the wood. Her dark, well-groomed curls sway across her back as she moves.
She is so raw, so painfully expressive, yet astral in her presence.
She's the essence of a star winking out of sight in the dawn. She doesn't belong to him. A wild thing like her. He should have seen it. Should have known. From the very start, the radiant Lady Jacqueline was a figure to be admired from afar. Hyde recalls her true beauty revealing itself to him under the cloak of night, under his touch by candlelight, when it was just the two of them.
The duality of her nature, equal in breathtaking innocence and refreshing candor, never ceased to amuse him.
Hyde soon comes stomping off the grassy trail, rubbing at his eyes. He wishes he could shield them from the world somehow, veil the hurt they must show. He has every intention to head home. Back to Redford and Kathryn and nurse his bruised heart at their welcoming hearth. That is, until a wide hand with long, twiggy fingers capture his sleeve.
"Steady there, brother," Eric protests. "What's nipping at your heels?"
"Not a thing." Hyde shrugs him off easily.
"We have a name of another witch!" Sir Micheal openly laughs at the thrill of the hunt. Daft and blind, he is! Not sensing the danger that lies ahead.
"Another devilish whore, no doubt," says one of the many blood-brothers Micheal has flanking around him today.
"Nay," Hyde sighs in near-defeat and continues on his way. "I cannot go fetch another."
"Wait." Eric eyes him with mild suspicion. "Why not?"
The seven sons from the Kelso clan do the same. They are surprised. None of them have denied fetching a witch since the whole devilish infliction had fallen upon their quaint township.
"Believe that I have reasons." Hyde growls before shouldering past the band of hunters with more force. "I denounce these proceedings here forth. I quit this court!"