Tristan took a moment, because he wanted to carefully choose his words. “It’s about your fiancée.”
“I see.” Morangis set aside the paper he had been reading. “What about her?”
“You don’t love her.” Tristan didn’t mind saying it, especially since Morangis had said as much himself when he had first told Tristan about his engagement. “I do and I want to marry her.”
Morangis’ expression hardened. “Don’t you think it’s a little rude to fall in love with your host’s betrothed?”
Tristan shrugged like he didn’t care, which he didn’t. Not in the ways Morangis meant. “I suppose so, but it’s happened.”
“I thought you were having a dalliance with the maid.”
“I’m not having a dalliance with anyone,” Tristan corrected him. He was tense and careful to not pick the wrong words. Not that he cared what Morangis thought or what his family might feel at this point, but he didn’t want to cause trouble for Constance or her family. Despite their pressuring her to marry this man, he knew they didn’t know the truth and still thought he had saved her those years ago. “I had occasion to get to know her and she is a wonderful woman. I know you do not feel the same, so it shouldn’t be any hardship on you to let her go and find another.”
He pitied the idea of letting him loose to find another woman, but murder would be frowned upon.
An unpleasant expression took over Morangis’ face. “You would not want her if you knew what I knew.”
“I know all I need to, and I still want her,” Tristan replied in deadly earnest. “Let her go, Morangis. She is not right for you anyways.”
“It is not quite so free of hardship as you think, Marquis.” Morangis made his title sound like a curse, but Tristan let it go.
He inhaled slowly, deeply. “It’s about money.”
“It’s about getting what’s mine.”
Tristan’s hands were folded on the table and now tensed. “She is a person, not a piece of property. She is not yours. I know this isn’t about love, so it has to be about money.” He knew that his next act would not make him look good to Constance, but on the other hand, if it worked and she was free of Morangis but still with her family... “What if I can take care of some of your financial hardships?”
Jean-François smiled. The expression was unpleasant and anger remained in his eyes, but he inclined his head. “I suppose that would do,” he said. “But how do you even know her family would accept you? You are a visitor to this land and are unknown. I have known their family for some time.”
“They will accept me,” Tristan said with confidence. “It would be a considerable connection for them to have, after all.”
The look across the table darkened. “I suppose that’s true,” he said in a low voice. “I guess I cannot argue with... love. She is yours.” He waved his hand dismissively. “You should eat well. We have the hunt today after all.”
Tristan looked a moment longer at Morangis, but the man seemed to have already dismissed the matter from his mind and the table. He ate his breakfast and didn’t look at his guest again. He had expected more of a fight, but then, Tristan had aimed to leave him little room to fight from. Still, he was suspicious, but would take the man at his word. After all, it would be incredibly foolish for him to offend a family like the du Lyons.
When it came to self-preservation, Tristan thought Morangis cared a great deal.
Constance went with her uncle to the gathering for the hunt in the early afternoon. He didn’t seem as surprised this time as he had been the last, and she was grateful. He also hadn’t asked many questions. He and her aunt had spoken their peace and Constance had kept her attitude as demure as possible. In fact, she stayed out of their way as much as possible, and it seemed to ease the familial tensions.
It wasn’t like she didn’t have plenty on her mind this morning to keep her from needing to interact with anyone. She’d barely been able to sleep the night before. All she could think about was Tristan. She still worried that his plan was going to cause some kind of trouble, but she knew that they would find a way out of it. Instead, she let her thoughts be filled with what it had been like to be with him.
The gathering was the usual chaos. This time, they put their horses on the line and wandered on foot into the throng. Even from this distance, she could see the crowd of fawning admirers who gathered around the Marquis d’Apcher. He moved through the clusters with his usual aloofness and Constance began to search the faces around her, in the hopes of seeing Tristan and not seeing Morangis.
Separating herself from her uncle when he found a group he wanted to speak with, Constance searched as thoroughly as she could without looking like she was searching for anything. She had to appear like she was simply mingling among the rest. There were few women here and the men, hunters or valets, only glanced at her in passing. She didn’t mind, because there was only one man she had interest in.
Once a certain amount of anxiety-provoking time had passed, Constance began to worry that Tristan wasn’t coming, or that something had gone wrong. She was beginning to create contingency plans, like going home and writing a letter to send with Jeanne, when Tristan appeared at her side. She gasped with surprise, but was pleased and relieved. She wanted to throw herself into his arms but restrained the impulse.
She felt her heart beat harder at the sight of him, but she also felt her nerves fray at not knowing what was going on.
“Did you talk to him?” She kept her voice as low as possible, but given the din caused by the people and animals, that wasn’t as low as she might have liked. Still, it would have been incredibly conspicuous to slip off alone together. Constance glanced to either side as discretely as she could.
“I did,” Tristan said. “I think that he took it as well as could be hoped. He wasn’t happy, but I used both my family’s money and rank to push him around.” A small smile flickered over the corners of his mouth. It was a rueful expression, though.
“He said he would release me from the engagement?” Hope burst so strong in her that it hurt her chest.
Tristan nodded. “I didn’t really give him much choice.”
Her heart hurt with relief as her full comprehension sunk in. Morangis had released her from the engagement. With Morangis’ acquiescence and Tristan’s rank, her family wouldn’t resist his offer of marriage. And if Constance made sure they knew that she was far more content with the new match, they would want her to be happy. Morangis wouldn’t want to offend Tristan, so he wouldn’t try anything... and once they were wed and living away from here, she would be protected.
But more than that, she would be happy. She would be with Tristan. It was too fantastic to be true and yet she was standing here, and so was he.
“Oh, Tristan,” she said, trembling with excitement. “I can barely contain myself!”
“I know,” he said with a smile. “It will not be long now. I just need to talk to your uncle, but he cannot deny me. I won’t allow it.”
His words were filled with such beautiful promises that she all but felt herself lifted off the ground. The past weeks, months and years had put emotional cloaks upon her shoulders and they had weighted her down more and more with each year. The pain of the trauma itself along with the attempt on her life, the lies she was forced to tell and the secrets she was forced to keep, and having to continue to see Morangis without anyone knowing and then the terror of being told that she had to marry him... They all had put so much weight on her that she almost walked with a stoop, but now it felt like Tristan had pushed all of the cloaks from her shoulders and let her breathe again.
Standing in the middle of the vast crowd, she didn’t feel like there was anyone but her and him. She wanted so badly to reach out and touch him, to kiss him, to embrace him, but she managed to keep herself from doing it. She could not ruin it now with any act of impropriety before it was all done. She had waited this long for her miracle. She could wait a little longer.
“My uncle is here,
” she said with a hopeful smile. “Perhaps we can go talk to him. We could go home and skip the hunt.” She knew that he wasn’t the type of man who would choose his game over her, and that was one of the reasons she loved him.
“Of course,” he agreed, just like she knew that he would. “Let’s go find him.”
They turned to head into the masses and find her uncle, but they were brought up short by the presence of Morangis. He just stood there, looking at them with a smile pasted on his face. Constance felt her blood run cold. How long had he been there?
“I suppose I should offer my congratulations,” he said. His hands were loosely laced behind him as he stepped closer.
Constance took an uncontrollable step back and Tristan moved forward, inserting himself inconspicuously between them. “Thank you, Comte Morangis,” he said flatly. “We have someone to speak to, however, so we must be going.” He stepped forward again, angling to go around the comte, but was blocked.
Morangis shook his head. “It’s not that easy,” he said. His voice was low, ominous. He was still smiling and the expression made Constance ill in the pit of her stomach. “No one says no to me, or uses their influence to push me around.”
“Only children don’t take no for an answer,” Tristan grated, meeting Morangis’ eyes without fear.
Morangis leaned forward, his face coming close to Tristan’s. Tristan stood his ground while Constance wanted to shrink into herself. “Call me what you like,” Morangis said, “but the fact of the matter is that I always get what I want in the end. I won’t let the likes of you stand in my way.”
“I’m not going to let you stop me, Morangis,” Tristan promised.
From behind him, Constance could see her love’s broad shoulders rising and falling with deep, controlled breaths.
“I’m not going to have to stop you. They’ll do it for me.” Morangis nodded at the crowd.
Constance filled with dread and uncertainty. What did he mean by that?
The comte leaned back with an arrogant look, like he knew he had already won. “The Beast has a master!” he shouted. That one statement, in his booming voice, carried across everyone and brought their attention to focus on the three of them. Constance wanted to die in that instant, or maybe kill Morangis. “Many have said it’s possible that the Beast is being controlled by a human, and I believe now that it’s true!”
He had everyone spell-bound. This had been a theory whispered among people only recently, around the time Tristan began to suggest it, but none had brought it so broadly into the light. No one had declared it as absolute truth. The very idea was shocking.
“What’s more,” he continued, “is that I know who it is!”
The crowd collectively gasped. Morangis’ hand darted out with surprising swiftness and pulled the mask off Tristan’s face. He was clearly so shocked by the act that he didn’t cover his scars, like he might have otherwise. Everyone saw them. Somehow, Constance just knew that they saw the longer lines first: the ones that looked like the work of claws, because they were, but not the Beast’s. Those who had met Tristan had wondered what was under there, but this seemed to surprise them all the same. Murmuring broke out and Constance put her hand on Tristan’s arm. He turned his face away.
“I am ashamed to have called this man my guest! He is a monster himself and has been controlling the Beast. He came here under the guise of a friend to see what his handiwork had done these past years while he remained outside our borders. Recall that there were some attacks reported from Vivarais. But now that he is unmasked, we cannot let it continue! We cannot allow him to—“ Here, he fixed Constance with a poisonous look. “—corrupt our people.”
Constance was pinned in place by that look until the ice shattered, and the most unthinkable thing happened: the crowd turned on Tristan.
No one asked for proof. No one stopped to think it through. The anger and fear of the past three years broke through the floodgates because now, true or not, they had a physical presence to vent their emotions upon. One of their own had proclaimed it so, and so they released their anger. The hunters, peasant and noble alike, became a mob of angry citizens and began shouting and advancing on the pair of them.
Tristan tried to protect her as best he could, but they separated the two of them and threw her into the dirt. She looked up just in time to see Tristan fleeing for his life.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Everything became a new kind of chaos. Comte Moncan found his niece as the crowds dispersed. He was shouting, angry at her for ‘being such a fool,’ but she barely heard him. She struggled, but his grip was iron on her arm. Somehow, he got her onto her horse and kept a hold of them to ride home.
“You don’t know what you’re talking about!” she screamed as he dragged her into the house. It was the first coherent thing she had said since everything turned upside down and the province actually thought that her Tristan was the master of the Beast! It did not surprise her from Morangis, but from the rest. “Tristan would never do this! He is not what that bastard said he was!”
“Constance,” her uncle shouted over her. “I don’t know what has gotten into you, but it has got to stop! Stop being a fool. Do not shame your family any further!”
She yanked her arm in his grip, trying to break free as they walked up the stairs. In her struggles, she stumbled but he pulled her along. Her feet slid against the polished floors. “You’re the one who is being a fool! You’re blind to who the real evil is!” She railed against him, but he was the stronger.
He tore open her bedroom door and threw her in. She landed hard on her hands and knees, crying out when the pain lanced through her. “You will stay here until we can figure out what to do with you,” he told her as she turned to face him. “You should be able to stay out of trouble here.”
The door shut and she heard the lock turning. Constance threw herself achingly to her feet and beat on the door until her fists throbbed. “You cannot lock me away like a prisoner,” she screamed as loud as she could. “I’m a human being! You can’t do this to me!” She banged on the wooden door until her hands felt raw. She slid to her knees. When they touched the floor, she cried again as new pain shot through her.
Folding herself against the door, she cried. Her body shook with sobs.
What would happen if they caught him? She didn’t even want to imagine. They would probably kill him. If they truly thought that he controlled the Beast and was responsible for all of the deaths in the province, there was no telling what they would do before rational thought could again take hold. Was there any chance that they would think before they acted violently? After seeing the mob in action, she wasn’t optimistic.
Her best hope was that Tristan had gotten away entirely. He was smart and strong. He could do it. She had to cling to that. Constance had to believe that he had gotten away and he would find her, he would come for her, because if not, then she had nothing to live for. She would lose everything that she had come to believe she could have, if she lost him.
And if he was killed because of this, it would be her fault. He was only put in this position because of her. Why had she let him go through with his plan? She should have just insisted that they run away. She should never have let him tangle with Morangis, because she knew better than anyone just how badly he handled rejection. Why had she believed that it could work with a man like him?
No one was coming for her. Her uncle had left her and her aunt wasn’t coming to her rescue. That was clear. Feebly, she pushed herself to her feet and wiped her face. Tears were still hovering in the middle of her throat, but she resisted them now. Instead, she began to pace and search her room.
There was only one door and it was locked from the outside. Why did it do that? Most of the doors in this house locked from the inside, but not this one. Had that been by design? It was a disturbing thought, but lingering on it wouldn’t help. There was only one set of windows, but she was on the second story and didn’t trust in her ability to create any sor
t of a rope to climb down with, or in her ability to do the actual climbing without falling and breaking her neck.
She was going to keep that option only as a last resort. Just in case, she walked over to the window and opened it. They hadn’t put bars on them, at least, so she was able to peer out and look down at how far she had to go. Below her, she saw a few small bushes but they didn’t look like anything that would break her fall. It looked less promising by the moment, but she wasn’t going to rule it out.
She paced around the room. If she kept moving, it made it harder to dwell. And if she couldn’t dwell, she couldn’t worry and be filled with terror about what was or might be happening to Tristan.
There was just nothing in her room that was going to be of any help in escaping. She could try to use a piece of furniture to break down the door, but she didn’t think she was strong enough for that. She could try knotting bed sheets together, but it would be unhelpful if they slipped because she didn’t knot it well enough. She knew she didn’t have time to sew them together, however, so knotting would be her only choice.
And it was beginning to look like going out the window was her only option, but the day was getting late. She didn’t know how much time she would have before it was dark, and she didn’t know how she would find him in the darkness. If he was even still... No, she refused to let herself think that way.
She needed better clothes. This dress wasn’t going to help her climb out of anything, so she hurried to her armoire. All she could find were more blasted dresses. They were all very pretty, but not at all practical. Then again, she knew that they weren’t supposed to be practical, because women weren’t expected to be climbing down sheet ropes out of windows, but desperate times called for desperate measures. This most certainly qualified as a desperate time.
Finally, she found something at the bottom of one drawer. It was a shirt and a pair of breeches. She recognized them as her father’s, but couldn’t remember why she had kept them. Strange, you would think it would be the sort of thing she would never forget, but then again, she could barely remember her name in that particular instant. She snatched them up and hurried to pull herself out of the dress.
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