Melting the Snow Queen

by Mary Lancaster

  Alba pushed their guest’s coffee across the table. “If by that, you mean he is somewhat larger than life, then I agree. How is your mother, sir?”

  “Thank you.” Bethurst took his seat and picked up his knife and fork with considerable relish. “She is a little frailer every year, but she always revives somewhat in the summer.”

  The conversation drifted innocuously over several local matters until Alba felt she could civilly make her escape. However, she had barely grasped the arms of her chair before Volkov sauntered in.

  Since she had last seen him, he had shaved, donned a collar and necktie, and fastened his coat. He looked dashing and imposing and yet Alba’s memory harked back to the more casual Volkov and the strong, brown column of his throat.

  “Good morning,” she said hastily and poured a cup of coffee for him, too.

  Oscar performed the introductions with supreme casualness and Bethurst graciously shook hands. Volkov dropped into the chair beside him, smiling his thanks at Alba for the coffee. Butterflies fluttered in her stomach as though trying to get free.

  “It’s a beautiful day for a ride,” Volkov said. “Is there an inn on the way? Or could we trouble your kitchen for a luncheon to take with us?”

  “Where are you off to?” Bethurst inquired.

  “Just into the marshes,” Oscar said. “Showing Volkov a bit of the country, including the ruined priory.”

  Volkov took a large mouthful of coffee and swallowed with evident pleasure. “You will come, too, won’t you, Lady Alba?”

  Alba indicated her unsuitable dress, but before she could speak, Bethurst said with amusement, “Why would Alba want to ride into the marshes she’s grown up around? They’re dangerous and unhealthy.”

  For the second time in as many days, irritation summoned perversity. “Why, for the company and the pleasure of seeing the country afresh through a stranger’s eyes,” she said pleasantly and rose to her feet.

  At once, the gentlemen rose, too. Bethurst frowned. Volkov, presumably recognizing his own words, grinned.

  “I’ll go and change,” she said abruptly. “Excuse me.”

  Chapter Four

  Unfortunately, the result of her perverse decision was that Ralph Bethurst came, too, and as she mounted, she caught sight of Rose’s face at her bedchamber window, glaring daggers at her.

  “This is ridiculous,” Alba fumed below her breath to Oscar. “It’s as if she’s accusing me of stealing her suitor.”

  “Someone’s been filling her head with nonsense,” Oscar said.

  Alba knew exactly who. It was the motivation that escaped her.

  Aloud, she said to Ralph, “So, you are joining us on our dull and unhealthy ride?”

  “For the company, of course,” he replied smoothly. “And the pleasure of looking after you.”

  Alba bit back a retort. Too much, these days, seemed to be piercing her armor of icy disinterest. Rather than argue with him, or with Volkov, she resolved to treat them both with cool disdain.

  However, this proved impossible to maintain in the face of Volkov’s irrepressible sense of fun. He and Oscar raced and fought mock battles on horseback, raising Alba’s spirits with their light-hearted banter. He was interested in everything, not just the history of the ruined priory where they paused to eat the luncheon stuffed into their saddle bags, but the countryside, the drainage, the farming methods, even the species of trees, and the birds.

  “Is your own country very different?” she asked as they sat on a blanket in the sunshine.

  “Russia is vast, so we have different concerns on the land.”

  “Is your own estate also vast?” Bethurst inquired with just a hint of mockery.

  “By your standards, perhaps,” Volkov said carelessly.

  Bethurst lifted one eyebrow and delivered what he clearly thought was his coup de grâce. “And do you then have slaves to work it for you?”

  “Serfs,” Volkov said gently. “But yes, it’s true they are not free.”

  “Does that not bother you?”

  “It did,” Volkov admitted, reaching for another slice of Cook’s excellent pie. “Before the war, when I was young, naive and idealistic.”

  “And now?” Alba asked.

  He shrugged. “Now I realize they have more immediate, more important, concerns than some philosophical concept of freedom.”

  “Your happiness?” Bethurst’s mockery was more open.

  “God, no. Not even their own. Merely, survival.”

  “Is that not your responsibility as their lord?”

  Volkov’s eyelashes came down, long, black and thick as they fanned across his cheeks. “Yes.”

  Bethurst smiled as though he’d won the argument, but Alba had glimpsed the pain in Volkov’s eyes.

  “You were not responsible for the French invasion,” she blurted.

  His lashes lifted and he gazed directly at her.

  Bethurst, clearly, let foolish jealousy urge him on. “What were you responsible for? Guarding the Emperor’s life? The Empress’s?”

  “Lord, no. I’m an officer of dragoons.”

  “He fought at Borodino,” Oscar said quietly. “And all through the winter.”

  Bethurst frowned. “Then what brought you to London with the Emperor?”

  “He did, of course. No idea why. I suppose my father did him a favor once, so he probably thinks he’s returning it.”

  “Well, maybe he is,” Oscar said. “Only think how much fun you’re having with us.”

  Volkov laughed. “I am.” His gaze returned to Alba. “Carpe diem.”

  “I imagine you’ll still be here for the duchess’s ball,” Bethurst observed.

  “Unless the Tsar sends for me in a miff.”

  “Does he get very miffed?” Alba asked, entertained by this window to the everyday life of the great Russian hero.

  “Appallingly. Though he was gracious enough to give me leave to come here.”

  “Talking of the ball,” Bethurst said determinedly, “I hope you’ll save a waltz for me, Alba.”

  “Goodness, I don’t even know if there will be waltzing,” Alba said lightly. “Her Grace disapproves of it, or used to.”

  “Do you never waltz then?” Volkov asked.

  “I rarely dance at all.”

  That seemed to startle him, though it also inspired Bethurst. “It’s true,” he said smiling. “Which is why I particularly treasure our dance in London. But I suppose I am in a privileged position, having been your first love.”

  The red mists of anger fell on her so suddenly she felt dizzy. Somehow, she got to her feet, muttered, “Excuse me,” and all but bolted round to the other side of the ruin, hurrying out of sight and toward the wood. Five minutes of solitude and the briskest exercise and she would be fine…

  But, it seemed, she was not to be allowed even that much. A man fell into step beside her.

  “Don’t,” she said between her teeth. “Don’t say another word.”

  “Of course, I won’t,” Volkov replied.

  She blinked, jerking her head round to face him. Her breath caught. “I’m sorry,” she said with difficulty. “I thought you were Ralph.”

  Volkov said nothing. After a moment’s silence, she could no longer keep it to herself. “He was not my first love. Nor any love, for that matter. And yet he maintains this fiction that I adored him when I was a girl. How dare he demean Harry in that way?”

  Volkov did not respond, merely kept easy pace with her quick, impetuous strides.

  She pressed one shaking hand to her lips. “I’m sorry. You won’t even know who Harry is. Or was.”

  “Your betrothed. Though I’m not quite sure why you are so angry.”

  “Neither do I,” she said ruefully. “A year ago, such self-important foolishness earned no more than a faint curl of my lip. I’m growing bad-tempered with age.”

  “Or just allowing yourself to feel.”

  She cast him a hesitant glance. “I don’t know what you mean.”<
br />
  “Yes, you do. Feeling, laughing, even loving, do not demean Harry or your love for him.”

  She swallowed. “Not feeling is easier than grieving.”

  “Once, perhaps. Now, I think, you use grief as an excuse not to feel anything else.”

  Outraged, she flounced away from him, but he caught her hand.

  “No, listen,” he insisted. “Listen to the song of the birds, smell the sweetness of the air. Let the beauty of life into your heart.”

  “Are you a poet?” she asked shakily.

  “No.” He smiled. “But I’m an expert in appreciating life. Don’t waste yours.” He raised her hand to his lips and softly kissed it. She shivered involuntarily. “You feel that, don’t you?”

  She stared at him, only too aware of her tingling skin. Before she could squash or even ignore the feeling, he turned her hand and brushed his lips over the inside of her wrist and the pulse which suddenly galloped there. Baffled, she stared at him as he straightened and flattened her palm on his chest. Even through his coat she could feel the strong, steady beat of his heart.

  “And this,” he murmured.

  “What are you doing?” she whispered. Her breath caught and she snatched her hand back in outrage. “Are you flirting with me?”

  He smiled. “Yes.”

  “You are shameless!” she exclaimed, and yet even as she swung back toward the others, something new and different struggled to rise in her. Along with the shocked laughter that hovered deep in her throat and almost spilled out several times.

  He wasn’t the first person to tell her to move beyond her grief. But he was the first to show her she could enjoy life, as well. It was an idea she liked. Her mind hovered between this thought and the acknowledgement of her own selfishness. For years, she had been behaving as if no one else’s grief truly mattered. But Oscar had lost friends and comrades in the Peninsular War. God knew what Volkov had lost in the Russian war, and yet it had taught him to embrace life, not wallow in the lack.

  When they returned to the others, they had already packed everything away and were preparing to ride on as if nothing untoward had occurred. Which suited Alba.

  Emerging back onto drier, more solid land, she found herself riding beside Volkov. “Why do you flirt with me?” she blurted. “To distract yourself from your own grief?”

  His eyes flew to hers in startlement. Although it was her face he was searching, she had the feeling he was searching himself. “No,” he said at last. “Though it’s probably why I behave badly. As on our first meeting. I wish I had met you before the war. You would still have enchanted me, but perhaps I would have been more…worthy.”

  “Worthy of what?”

  He smiled. “Flirting.”

  Her laughter spilled out, short and husky, and his smile broadened, dazzling her.

  “There, I knew you could still laugh. Celebrate with me. Race to the tall hedge.”

  ***

  If she was the snow queen society called her, that was the day her ice first cracked. She didn’t burst into merry song as they rode home, but she knew she smiled more, and she treasured the sense of excitement that realization had wakened in her.

  As soon as they walked into the house, she was besieged by servants demanding to know where they were to put the exotic hot house plants which had been delivered a day early. Should they go into the ballroom now?

  “I have no idea,” she admitted. “Oscar?”

  “Search me.”

  “I’ll ask Her Grace,” she told the servants. “Er…where is she?”

  “In her bedchamber, ma’am.”

  Where no one had dared disturb her. “Very well.”

  “Good luck,” Oscar murmured in amusement as she headed toward the duchess’s apartments. “And don’t be late for dinner!”

  Alba suspected dinner itself would be late if the servants had spent all afternoon worrying about exotic plants, with no guidance from the mistress who must have ordered them.

  She knocked on her stepmother’s door. Receiving no answer, she knocked again and simply went in.

  The duchess was seated at her desk, her head in her hands, although she jerked to face the door in fury. Her face was stained with tears.

  “Your Grace!” Since her father had married this woman when Alba was a mere six years old, she had never called her anything else. Not her name and certainly not Mama. The new duchess had never invited affection or closeness of any kind, and Alba had grown up associating love only with her own late mother. But she had never seen the duchess in such a state of weakness. She could only hurry across the room to her and take her hands, kneeling at her feet. “What is it? What has happened?”

  For the merest instant, the duchess’s fingers tightened around hers before she pulled free and all but jumped to her feet, “Nothing. Nothing, at all. A moment of foolishness.” She dashed a handkerchief across her face. “What did you want?”

  “The servants are afraid of killing your exotic plants and want to know where to put them.”

  “In the ballroom, of course! It’s made largely of glass, isn’t it? Imbeciles. I’ll be down directly.”

  It was unmistakable dismissal and, perhaps as late as this morning, she would have accepted it as such. Now, she lingered a moment longer. “Is there anything I can do to help?”

  The duchess paused, her hands gripping the side of her washing bowl. Her head drooped slightly, then straightened, almost like a soldier on parade. “Don’t stand in your sister’s way,” she snapped.

  Alba went out. Looking for answers, she went to Rose’s bedchamber and found her sister dressing for dinner, attended by the duchess’s own maid.

  “Will you go and make sure the duchess is well?” Alba said to the maid.

  “Her Grace sent me to Lady Rose.”

  “Come back to Lady Rose if you are not required,” Alba said gently.

  The resentful maid met her gaze in the glass, glaring. Then her eyes fell in submission and she trotted off.

  “That was high-handed of you,” Rose complained. “I suppose you don’t want me to have a dresser.”

  “My dear, you may have six of them, for all I care. I want to know what ails your mother.”

  “Probably the sight of you making off with Prince Volkov and Bethurst.”

  “Oh, for goodness sake! Was I eloping? With two men at once?”

  Rose sniffed. “You might as well have been,” she muttered. “There was no other female with you.”

  “My brother was with me. Trust me, he trumps any female. And he rides better, besides.”

  Rose’s lips pouted in discontent. “You will not be serious about anything except spoiling my chances.”

  Alba blinked. “Your chances of what? Of whom?”

  “You know!” Rose flung at her.

  “If I do, I don’t understand it. Do you really want to tie yourself for life to a man almost twice your age, whom you have often told me is dull?”

  “Mr. Bethurst wouldn’t be my first choice,” Rose admitted with quite alarming dignity.

  “Then you want to marry Oscar’s friend, whom even he regards as almost a loose screw? You want to go and live with him in Russia, a country ravaged by war, with winters so long and cold you’ll barely see the sun? A thousand miles away from your own family, surrounded only by strangers?”

  Fright flashed in Rose’s eyes but only for an instant. “And him,” she retorted. “The prince!”

  “Ah, you want to be a princess.”

  “Don’t you?” Rose snapped back.

  “No,” Alba said honestly. “I don’t want to marry anyone. And I won’t.”

  “Then why do you do this to me?”

  “Do what to you?” Alba asked, at a loss.

  “Be there!” Rose dashed one hand over her eyes. “Who will see me, who will even look at me when you are in the room?”

  Alba blinked, then sank down on the stool beside her. “A man who loves you,” she said frankly. “You are barely sixteen years
old, Rose. Where has all this hurry come from? All this resentment? If men pay me attention, it’s because they’re safe to do so. They’re not ready to be caught and become husbands and they know I don’t want to marry them. Do you really want to be married so young, Rose?”

  “You would have been.”

  “I would have been almost two years older on the day of our wedding.” And maybe even that was too young, an inner voice whispered for the first time. Shocked, she banished it and concentrated on her sister. “You don’t really want to tie yourself to someone before your first London season, do you?”

  “You don’t want me to be married,” Rose burst out.

  “No, I don’t,” Alba said frankly. “Not yet.”

  “Well, fortunately, it isn’t up to you.”

  Alba sighed and rose to her feet. “No, it isn’t. When is Papa expected?”

  “Tomorrow, I think, before the ball. But you needn’t think to get him on your side. He already regards you as an old spinster, utterly on the shelf.”

  “Well, that is very bad,” Alba agreed. “But do you know, there is more to life than being engaged younger than one’s friends and siblings.”

  She left her with that thought, but the unease over her stepmother’s behavior was growing. The duchess had planted these thoughts in Rose’s head. And the duchess wept alone in her room in the middle of the day.

  Alba allowed Siddons to change her for dinner and pin up her hair without really noticing. Her mind wrestled with her family’s inexplicable behavior, and if Volkov’s laughing, handsome face occasionally intruded, or her wrist tingled with the echo of his kiss, she quickly banished it for more important matters.

  On impulse, before going down to the library, she went to the schoolroom, where she found Kai and Gerda wolfing down their dinner.

  “I suppose you think your table manners may lapse when Miss Ellington is absent?” Alba said severely.

  They only grinned at her.

  She sat down at the table. “What ails Her Grace?” she asked bluntly. She never made the mistake of discounting the twins because they were children. If anyone knew what was going on in the house, it was Kai and Gerda.

  “We don’t know,” Gerda said at last. “She went out one day and when she came back, she was grumpy and took Rose away from the schoolroom. We thought Rose was in trouble, but I don’t think Mama did scold her. The next day, Rose didn’t come to the schoolroom and the day after that we came back to Winbourne.”