An excerpt from A Whisper of Rosemary, a medieval romance from my Medieval Herb Garden series. The books don’t have to be read in order; they are merely interconnected by people and place.

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The whuffling of the horses greeted Dirick as he pressed the door into the stables. Nick was near the front, and he nickered as he sensed his master’s scent. “Aye, boy, ’tis nigh time we were away from here,” he said, leading the destrier from his stall. Nick pranced spiritedly within the small enclosure, obviously eager to get on his way, and Dirick patted his nose to calm him. “’Tis happy I’ll be to see this place behind,” he said aloud.

He heard the noise behind him and whirled, hand clapping to his sword, just as her words reached his ears.

“Then ’tis happy we shall be to see you go.” Lady Maris stood there, holding a tallow candle, looking ethereal in the glow of the shining beacon.

The annoyance in her eyes did not, however, bespeak of celestial bearing. Her head had been covered with a wrap, but as the woolen veil slipped, her sable hair showed and gleamed in the candlelight. Her little chin was pointed in annoyance and her full lips were firmed into a thin line. The blue cloak trailed in the rushes on the stable floor, effectively covering her from shoulder to toe.

Dirick recovered from his surprise and dropped his hand from the sword upon which it rested. “Maris—my lady,” he amended quickly, “what do you here?”

Her frown did not dissipate. “Papa told me you planned to leave early this morrow, and I did not—I thought you must not go without something for your journey. But I see that my consideration is unwanted.” He noticed now that she held a packet under the opening of her cloak. “It seems you are so happy to see Langumont behind you that surely you wouldn’t wish to take any remembrance of this place.”

She turned to go, her back straight as a sword and her shoulders thrown back.

“Nay, my lady.” Dirick, annoyed at having been caught speaking such nonsense to his horse, spurred to action and reached for her arm. “Nay, ’tis not that I wish to leave Langumont…believe you me.”

At his tug, she pivoted back, her eyes a hard, flat brown in the flickering light. “I am not hard of hearing, Sir Dirick.”

He eased her toward him, now taking both shoulders and turning her so that she faced him fully. So close that her cloak’s hem nudged his boots. She felt small and soft beneath his fingers. “And so you heard the nonsense I spoke to Nick. I suppose it serves me right—for did I not overhear your private conversation with your own horse Hickory?” His smile felt forced. “I must leave. It is that I have no desire to do so is the reason I spoke thus.”

She looked up at him as if trying to determine whether he was merely being gallant or whether the words actually were truth. “I could not believe you would leave without a word of farewell.”

“I bid your father good-bye,” he told her, releasing her shoulders. They stood much too close. The smell of lemon and rosemary from her hair caught at his nostrils, mingling with the feminine scent of her. Dirick closed his eyes for a moment and forced himself to take a step backward. He turned into the stall to gather Nick’s bridle. “But I must leave now, my lady. I have used your father’s hospitality much too long.”

Maris worked the candle into a cup appended to the wall of the stable and stepped toward him, unwittingly blocking him into the stall. She proffered the leather‑wrapped packet from under the folds of her cloak. “I’ve brought you cheese and bread, and there is a bit of salted venison here. I did not know how long your journey would be.”

He took the packet, warmed by her thoughtfulness and tempted by her presence. “Thank you my lady. I was not able to break my fast and this will be a good meal for the road.”

“Where are you going?”

“I am a traveling knight, my lady, and I go where I can find work,” he said. “I do not know where my next place of rest will be.”

Maris frowned, a charming line crinkling around her nose. “Then why do you leave? Papa has work for you. I’m certain he would hire you for as long as you wished.”

A sudden flare of anger twisted his insides. Verily, she saw him only as a charity case. A man who could not make his own way.

Despite the fact he’d led her to believe just that, it rankled that she saw him in such a lowly light. “Nay.” He turned his back to her, taking his time to loop up the reins and bit, hoping she would leave before he mortified himself again.

Or before he gave in to the base temptation she presented.

“Sir Dirick, I vow, you make little sense of anything. You need work, and there is work to be had, but you must leave nevertheless. I vow, ’twill be good to have you gone!”

“Aye,” he said as he turned, his hands brimming with the leather bridle, “I am sure you will not miss my company now that your betrothed has arrived.” As soon as he spoke those bitter words, Dirick wished he could cut out his tongue. Foolish.

“He is not my betrothed,” she said, the spirit draining from her voice.

“He will be anon, and well you know it. When that happens, I am quite sure Victor d’Arcy will be pleased to trail you on your treks through the wood, digging in the snow for berries and watching as you nurse the ill.” He knew he should stop speaking, but the words continued to flow. “I saw you come in here with him last night. Your father and I were watching from above. Mayhap you didn’t realize you were seen?”

Maris’s expression altered, but he couldn’t read her thoughts. “Aye. He wished to meet Hickory.”

Dirick quirked one eyebrow and managed to look sardonic even as a barrage of unwanted images assaulted him. He well knew how comfortable the warmth of a stable could be when one’s arms were filled with the warmth of a woman. Hay might be a bit prickly against bare skin, but it was springy and warm. “And was there nothing more he wanted? Mayhap he wished to taste the lips of the woman he is to wive.”

“Mayhap he did,” she replied, lifting her chin smartly.

“Foolish girl. What if he had wanted more than a taste? Did you not think to have a chaperon with you? ’Tis not meet for a lady to have assignations alone with a man in the stable of all places, particularly if she is not yet betrothed to him.”

Maris’s eyes snapped. “But here I stand with you, then. Alone in a stable, with no chaperone…and my virtue has never been safer.”

His resolve at an end, he dropped the bridle, reaching for her more roughly this time. “I would not say that your virtue is safe with me, my dear lady,” he said, pulling her flush against him. “In fact, Maris, I should say that you are treading upon very thin ice.”

He looked down at her and saw no fear in her eyes, only surprise, and he felt the warmth of her breath touch his face. His hands on her shoulders, he eased her backward until she felt the wall behind her and he imprisoned her there, holding her with his muscled legs.

Maris’s eyes sank closed as his tanned hands smoothed up the sides of her neck to cup the line of that stubborn chin. His thumb traced over her lips and her heart pounded madly beneath his fingers, pulsing in her long neck so that he could feel her unrest. Lifting her hair from the nape of her neck, he carefully pulled the long sweet-smelling tresses from the confines of her cloak. It was warm and silky and it twined like vines around his wrists and about her arms.

Dirick let his breath out slowly as his hands ran through her hair. She was not afraid, he noted, although if she had any sense, she would be. It was all he could do to keep from tearing off her clothes and tossing her onto the bed of hay in the next room.

When his hands stilled on her shoulders, and he eased back on the pressure from his thighs, she opened her eyes to look up at him. “Maris,” he said softly as their gazes met. He would never see her again, and she was not yet betrothed. It was a moment of madness, but not a sin. “I cannot leave without kissing you once more.”

He did not wait for a response, pressed her into the wall, his mouth descending to hers.

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For more information or to purchase A Whisper of Rosemary in print or ebook format, visit my website.

A friend of mine always knows when someone close to her passes away. She’s visited by what she calls a dragonfly.

She describes it as a sort of quick, sharp vibration or buzz that zaps her somewhere around the head or face, often waking her in the night.

The first time it happened to her, she didn’t realize exactly what it was until later, when she learned that someone close to her had died at that time.

But then when her mother died, my friend woke in the middle of the night to a snapping buzz at the base of her skull, just above her neck, and she knew it was her mother–who’d been declining, but wasn’t necessarily on her deathbed. It was her mother’s soul, her mother’s spirit…whatever it was, saying goodbye.

“It’s a pleasant, peaceful feeling, usually with the essence of that person. I can actually feel them,” she explained to me.

Another time, a friend of hers buzzed her near the face, while she was awake. She says, “I knew it was her immediately–I was overwhelmed by the sense of her. Peace, joy, and her personality.”

This friend of mine is much more attuned to her subconscious and unconscious than I am–although I’m trying to change that. She meditates regularly, and often has a sixth-sense about things that end up proving right.

I’m fascinated by stories like this–of experiences people have when a loved one dies, or when a health care worker sees or feels something as one of their patients passes on. Hospice workers have so many stories about seeing guides or angels waiting to usher their own loved one on to the next plane, or of things that the dying person says or does. By way of research, I read a book written by a hospice doctor when I was writing Night Betrayed (as Joss Ware). It’s the fourth book in my Envy Chronicles, set in a dystopian world, and the main character is a woman who’s gifted with very special skills–and sensitivities–to help people pass on.

In the dystopian, post-apocalyptic world of The Envy Chronicles, there are no hospices or hospitals, or even doctors or drugs. Their health care is primitive. People die much more readily then than they do in our world.

As I wrote the book, I was reflective about hospice workers and how much they give to us and to our loved ones as they pass on. The nurses, physicians, assistants and volunteers that I’ve met who work in these situations have such breathtaking and special views on death and dying. I learn something new every time I speak with one of them. I admire them beyond words, and that’s why I dedicated Night Betrayed to hospice workers and caregivers of the terminally ill.

Some of the stories are heart-wrenching, some are beautiful, and others are even amusing. After hearing many of these anecdotes, I have no doubt that there is a life, a plane, something beyond this world, after death.

Another friend of mine had a husband who passed away after a long bout of cancer. He was known throughout the family for being extremely, extremely frugal. His wife, my friend, claimed John wouldn’t buy milk if it was over $2.00 a gallon, even though he loved milk. Even their nieces and nephews were aware of this frugality of his, and it was a family joke–so much so that one of the nieces tucked a dollar bill into his suit when he was in the coffin.

When John passed away at last, he was to be cremated after all of the viewings and funeral. My friend was meeting with the funeral director and going through things, and which of John’s items she wanted to keep (wedding ring, no, watch, yes, etc.). The funeral director quizzically asked her about the dollar bill they found in his suit after removing him from the coffin in preparation for the cremation. Was there some significance; did she want to keep the dollar or not?

My friend got a misty-eyed look and said, “Oh, let him take it with him.” And so the dollar bill was thus cremated along with John and his wedding ring.

The next day, which was to be John’s funeral at our church, one of the staff members arrived very early that morning to open up and get prepared for the funeral. There was no one else there. Everything was deserted.

But there, in the middle of the parking lot, all by itself…was a dollar bill.

(Excerpt from Sanctuary of Roses)

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She was in the garden when he came for her.

After two fortnights spent trying to banish Gavin Mal Verne from her memory, Madelyne sensed his presence even before she heard the clink of sword against his mail chausses.

A shadow, long and heavy, fell across her lap where she was forming rose beads. The black mush of stewed rose petals covered her hands and arms and spotted an old gown. The air was heavy with the scent of the flowers, nearly as smothering as the weight that settled over her when she realized he’d come.

And yet, at the same time, a rush of something else flooded her when she looked up into his grave face. ’Twas almost welcome, seeing him again, feeling the command of his full strength as she had not when he was ill.

“My lord.”

“Lady Madelyne. You do not seem surprised to see me.”

That he used her title did not surprise her. Verily he’d discovered her identity and that was the reason he’d come. For a brief moment, panic surged through her, but she beat it back and wrapped her own strength about her. God would be with her, and…God help her, but she did not believe Lord Mal Verne would hurt her.

“Nay, I am not. What do you wish from me?”

He stood, looking down at her, his shadow casting darkness over her work. “What do you do there?”

Madelyne held up two small wooden paddles, grateful for a moment’s reprieve before he should respond, and replied, “The rose petals have been cooked for days. Now, I take them betwixt these spoons and roll them into beads. See there.” She pointed to a length of linen spread in the sun, dotted with perfect, round beads.

To her surprise, he reached into a leather pouch that hung from his tunic and pulled out the prayer beads she’d left with him before. “You’ve become more skilled in these last years.”

“Aye.”

She was surprised again when he hunkered down to sit next to her on the log bench. Now, his face was nearly on level with hers, and his nearness even more overpowering. Strength, warmth, intensity vibrated from his person—yet his eyes and his countenance remained cold and bleak. Madelyne had the sudden urge, so odd at this moment when he threatened her peace and well-being, to touch his face, to learn whether it was as unyielding as it appeared. She curled her fingers into themselves and willed her foolishness not to betray her.

“Why did you trick me? Why did you not allow us to leave with some dignity?” he asked.

She swallowed. ’Twas no surprise that a man of his power should be angered at her deceit. Using one of the flat spoons, she scooped up a small portion of the black stew and began to roll it into the shape of a ball as she chose her words to respond.

Gavin watched how her fine hands manipulated the paddles, noticing again the three freckles that decorated one narrow wrist. Her head was bent, and the edge of its veil obstructed much of the expression on her face, though he could see the length of long, thick lashes as she blinked. She had shown no surprise at his presence, nor mistrust, he thought. How could that be?

“We sought only to protect ourselves.” Her words, when they came, were as even and calm as the rhythm of her breathing.

She looked at him, and he saw nothing but the gray depths of her eyes, clear and without deceit, without fear. For a fleeting moment, he wondered when last a woman had looked upon him without fear…and with such guilelessness. She had naught to hide, it seemed…but he knew that could not be so.

“Forgive us for acting in such a manner,” she continued, “but, my lord, we did what we thought best.”

“You removed us from the abbey so that we couldn’t find our way here again, yet you aren’t disturbed at my presence.”

She blinked, and he could see the faintest movement of her lips as they tightened in the first indication of uneasiness. “’Tis true, I wish that you hadn’t found your way back to the abbey…but now you are here, and there is naught I can do. Your presence portends little good for me, but I pray…do you not hurt my sisters.”

“I mean harm to none here at Lock Rose Abbey,” Gavin replied. “I merely come in the king’s name.”

“The king? What has he to do with those of us here?” Confusion passed over her face, and she allowed the black-stained paddles to drop into the stew pot.

“His royal majesty, King Henry, demands the presence of Madelyne de Belgrume at his court.” His words were more formal than necessary, and he spoke them distinctly and with a hint of threat to be certain she understood the gravity of the situation. “I have been appointed to bring you to him.”

She remained silent, and Gavin waited impatiently for her outraged response. When she said nothing, he prodded her. “You do not deny that you are Madelyne de Belgrume, daughter of Fantin de Belgrume, Lord of Tricourten?”

“Nay.” The breath she expelled was silent, but of such force that he felt its warmth on his face.

“Then you know you must come with me.”

“Aye.”

Gavin was caught by the clear steadiness of her eyes, and then they were shuttered as she lowered her lids. She took away the cloth that had rested on her lap, protecting her gown, and set it on the ground. There seemed to be little more to say.

Made a bit uncertain by the ease of her acquiescence, Gavin rose to his feet and extended a hand to assist her to hers.

Madelyne reached for it, then stopped, and, dropping her hand back to her side, pulled to her own feet. “I do not wish to stain you,” she explained, spreading her blackened hands. “I will be thus for many days before it fades. Now, I must speak with Mother Bertilde. She does know that you have arrived?”

Gavin nodded, again struck by her clear practicality in what must be a moment of upheaval. “Aye. However, we must leave before matins, so do you not delay. I’ll not be tricked again, and I’ll not be held longer than need be.” The annoyance he’d felt at being deceived by a bunch of women surged within him, and he looked at her sharply. “No tricks, Madelyne.”

“Nay, my lord,” she responded. “It is past the time of tricks.”

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(excerpt from Sanctuary of Roses (c) 2011 Colleen Gleason)

And…courtesy of Random.org, the winner of her choice of any of my currently available books (e or print) is:

Michelle (commenter #5)

WOOT! Congrats, Michelle. Please email me at books at colleengleason dot com for further info!

Thanks everyone for playing!

CONTEST IS NOW CLOSED! THANKS TO ALL WHO ENTERED.

I just finished my latest book and I feel like celebrating.

Which book did I just finish, you ask? Well, it’s the first in a new series for teens coming out in 2013. (That’s a really long time, isn’t it? Yikes.)

It’s a gaslight fantasy set in a very steampunkish Victorian London, starring Miss Alvermina Holmes (the niece of Sherlock) and Miss Evaline Stoker (the half-sister of Bram and a descendant of none other than Victoria Gardella). It was a lot of fun to write and I can’t wait for it to be released!

But until then, I want to celebrate by giving away a copy of the winner’s choice of any of my currently published books. Either in E or print, winner’s choice, and open to my international readers as well!

So…to enter, post a comment answering any or all of the following questions:

• Your favorite book or scene of mine
• Which book you want and why
• Your favorite character

(PS You don’t have to have read any of my books to enter…what a great way to start!)

Contest closes on Thursday at midnight.

Have fun!