The days following the horseman's visit were uneasy, though outwardly little seemed changed. The forge still rang with the hammer's rhythm, smoke still curled from cottage chimneys, and children still played in the lane. Yet beneath the surface there ran a current of apprehension, unspoken but deeply felt.
The lovers perceived it in the glances of the villagers, kindly still, but shadowed with worry. They perceived it in the clergyman's longer prayers, in Thomas's set jaw, in the housekeeper's habit of checking the latch twice before nightfall. Lady Ashbourne's threat hung over them like a storm cloud that had not yet broken.
And then, at last, it broke.
---
On a cold morning, when the beloved returned from the forge, he found a gathering in the village square. Men and women clustered together, their voices raised in indignation and fear. At the centre stood a farmer, red-faced and trembling, holding aloft a letter stamped with the dreaded crest.
"They've doubled the rents," he cried. "Doubled, and demanded payment in coin by month's end, else the land be seized."
A chorus of voices rose—angry, despairing. One woman wept openly, clutching her infant to her breast. Another muttered curses against the lady who, from her distant manor, could command the ruin of so many lives with a stroke of her pen.
The beloved felt his stomach turn to stone. He pushed through the crowd, reading the proclamation for himself. There it was, clear and merciless: an edict from Lady Ashbourne's steward, declaring that the tenants of the village, having harboured fugitives, must pay double dues as penalty for their insolence.
At his side, the girl's hand tightened upon his arm. Her face had gone pale as parchment. "It is for us," she whispered. "They suffer because of us."
---
That evening, in the clergyman's cottage, the truth weighed upon them like lead. The old man sat with head bowed, the letter spread across the table before him. The housekeeper muttered darkly as she stirred the pot, her movements sharp with anger.
At last, the beloved spoke, his voice thick. "We cannot stay. Our presence brings nothing but ruin upon those who have shown us mercy. It is not just."
The girl turned swiftly, her eyes wide with fear. "And where would we go? The roads are bare, the world is cruel. Without work, without shelter—do you mean us to wander again, and starve?"
He bowed his head, unable to answer. The image of her frail frame staggering along frozen lanes returned with cruel clarity. To leave was to expose her once more to hunger and cold; to remain was to condemn these good people to misery not their own.
The clergyman raised his hand, his voice calm though firm. "Do not blame yourselves overmuch. The lady's malice is her own, not yours. She would grind the poor beneath her heel with or without excuse. Yet it is true: your presence is her chosen weapon."
---
The days that followed were heavy with labour and worry. Men worked the fields from dawn to dusk, hoping to gather enough coin; women bartered desperately, stretching what little they had. Still, the sum demanded was monstrous, and all knew it.
The beloved returned nightly from the forge with his wages, placing each coin into the clergyman's strongbox as though it were an offering upon an altar. Yet what were a few pence against the weight of doubled rents? Drops of water against a rising flood.
The girl, too, took in mending from the villagers, her fingers raw from the needle, her eyes strained by candlelight. She refused to keep a single coin, pressing all into the common fund. "If they must suffer because of me," she said quietly, "then let me at least share their burden."
Her beloved watched her with mingled pride and anguish. Each day she seemed paler, thinner, yet her resolve only strengthened.
---
At length, the villagers gathered once more in the square, the frost crunching beneath their boots, their breath white in the air. The clergyman stood at the centre, flanked by the lovers. His voice carried firm despite the winter wind.
"My friends," he said, "we are set upon by injustice. Yet remember this: no chain is so strong as many hands united. If we divide, if we cast blame upon these two, then Lady Ashbourne triumphs. But if we hold fast—if each bears what he can—then her cruelty will not break us."
There was murmuring among the crowd—some hopeful, some bitter. At last Thomas the smith stepped forward, his great hands blackened with soot, his voice a growl of conviction. "I say we stand together. This lad has worked beside me day after day, harder than any I've seen. She has given her hands to every task set before her. They've earned their place among us. If Lady Ashbourne means to starve us, then let us starve together—but let us not turn upon our own."
A roar of assent followed, not from all, but from enough. The beloved felt tears sting his eyes, though he bowed his head quickly lest any should see. The girl, trembling, pressed her hand to her lips, her gaze sweeping over the faces of those who, though poor and weary, still chose loyalty over fear.
---
That night, as they lay once more upon the straw mattress, the girl whispered into the dark, "We should go. For their sake."
Her beloved drew her close, his voice hushed but unyielding. "If we go, she will only press harder, proving her power. If we stay, we give these people reason to resist. We are no longer alone, dearest. And perhaps, for the first time, that is our strength."
She was silent for a moment, listening to the crackle of the hearth. Then she breathed, so soft he scarce heard it, "Then let us stay—and share their fate."
And so it was decided, not by proclamation but by the quiet meeting of two hearts—that they would not flee again, but endure, shoulder to shoulder with those who had chosen to call them kin.