Nightrun

For almost a week Eleanor did everything she could to forget about Tobias Gorse and his impertinent kiss. Each night, though, she dreamed of him and in spite of herself woke each morning remembering the feeling of his lips against hers. Finally, on a night that was wild and windy and threatening rain, she could resist no longer. She tiptoed on stockinged feet to the side door and opened it with held breath - if it should creak her father or one of the staff would be wakened. Eleanor couldn't begin to think of an excuse plausible enough as to explain why she was sneaking outside on such a stormy night.
But the door was silent, and once outside Eleanor shoved her feet into her boots and began to run. She had never ventured closer to the Gorse manor than the water barrel where she had last seen Tobias, but in her dreams she'd been there a dozen times, and she moved through the darkness without fear of losing herself in the woods. A distant dog barked and small creatures made rustling sounds in the undergrowth. The moon peeked through the shredded clouds then was hidden again; the wind pulled her hair free of its nighttime braid and twisted the skirt of her nightgown until she almost tripped. There was no time for decorum, though, and so Eleanor lifted her skirts up to her knees, at once aware of how horrified her father would be if he found out and exhilerated by her own reckless defiance. She felt a sense of urgency as she ran that only seemed to increase the further she got, and she wasn't quite sure if the anxiety lay in what she would find at Gorse Manor or with her growing certainty that she was being watched.
When she passed the water barrel, the water within glinting in a sudden burst of moonlight, she paused, panting, to catch her breath. She could see the outline of the great house and a square of light that was a downstairs window. Quietly, Eleanor moved toward the window, mesmerised by the scene within.

Tobias sat in a deep and threadbare easy chair, a hugely thick book open on his lap. Much of his hair had fallen from its ponytail and hung down around his face, hiding his expression. Before Eleanor knew what she was doing her face was pressed up against the glass. Moths tapped the window around her head but she ignored them, too intent on Tobias to care. She couldn't work out what was so magnetic about him - perhaps it was only his boldness, or the strange claims he made, or that the way he had spoken to her had made it sound as if there was something special about her. All her life Eleanor had been certain of how ordinary she was. Until now.
Later she could not say which happened first, but she let out a tiny gasp and Tobias looked up. For a moment she was frozen with her nose flattened against the window pane and then, as he half-stood, she realised the ridiculousness of her situation. Hitching her skirt up again she turned and ran, hoping to disappear into the trees but knowing her pale skin and white nightgown would all but glow in the moonlight shadows.
She almost made it as far as the barrel before he caught her and as his hand closed around her arm Eleanor wondered how he could have moved so quickly.

"What are you doing out here?" he hissed. "At this hour? In the middle of the night?"
Frustrated tears threatened to spill onto her cheeks and she wished she'd a least worn a shawl. She was shamefully underdressed and when he father found out... Eleanor had never been in such serious trouble before and had never expected to be.
"Let me go," she replied. He did not.
"No," he said, looking around with something very close to fear, "no, I will not send you alone through these woods again tonight. Come inside and we'll discuss this properly."
Eleanor shook her head but she wasn't strong enough to pull free and so she allowed herself to be drawn inside his house and into the parlour.
"Wait here a moment," he ordered, "and don't think I won't notice if you try to leave before I come back."
From the look in his eyes she knew he meant what he said. She sat, folding her arms sulkily across her chest.