One Wicked Winter

by Emma V. Leech

  Reaching for the decanter, he poured himself a generous measure and swallowed close to half of it in one large mouthful. With a curse, he found the liquor too fine, too different from the rot-gut he’d grown used to in the Dials. An increasing sense of irritation and frustration gnawed at his bones and he pulled at his cravat with sharp angry movements, throwing the blasted thing away from him.

  He wanted to throw all his fine clothes from him in a similar manner and go back to the coarse, rough clothing that had become so familiar. He felt primped and dandified in his close-fitting coat and waistcoat. Everything pristine and gleaming and such a damned lie. He didn’t belong here. Not anymore. But he didn’t belong in the Dials either.

  When he’d been fighting for a living, he’d earned himself the sobriquet of the Gentleman Gravedigger, on account of his cut-glass accent and his formidable fists. It wasn’t as though he’d made any friends there. No one knew what to make of him there anymore than they did here. He didn’t fit. He was a puzzle piece with too many jagged corners, and no one could be comfortable when he was around.

  Well, that was well and good, and he’d spare them the anxiety, he decided, swallowing the rest of his glass and getting to his feet. He’d been absent long enough that there were places he could go where no one would know or care who he was, so long as he kept his mouth shut. And as he wasn’t going for the conversation, he felt that would not be a problem. There was only one way he knew of to ease the simmering fury in his blood, and he doubted it would go down well at Longwold.

  ***

  “I think we’d best start without him,” Violette said to Garrett with an unhappy smile as the butler nodded and went away to give the instruction that dinner should not be delayed any longer. “I’m so sorry Lady Russell.”

  “Oh, dear child, call me Seymour please,” Aubrey’s grandmother said, waving away her apology.

  Her sister, Lady Dorothea Sinclair, sat forward a little and added. “And do call me Dotty, everybody does.”

  Seymour cast her sister an impatient glance before she continued. “And there is no need for you to apologise. It is clear that your brother is a troubled man. Are you sure that he will stand all the nonsense this house party is likely to bring?”

  Violette shrugged, deflated at the fact her brother couldn’t even face this small gathering for her, and gave Aubrey a grateful smile as he sought her hand and held tight. “I don’t know. I admit I’m beginning to wonder if I haven’t made a horrible mistake.”

  “Nonsense,” Seymour replied with characteristic certainty. “The man can’t hide from the world forever. He’s a marquess, he has responsibilities.” She stamped her walking stick on the floor with impatience to illustrate her words. “A firm hand is what he needs, someone who won’t pussy foot about him and let him bully them.”

  Violette sent Aubrey a doubtful look and wasn’t encouraged by his expression. Her brother was large and intimidating in the first instance. Add to that the fact he seemed to have lost any grasp on the social niceties since his disappearance, and she doubted there was a woman in the whole of the country who could be bold enough to stand up to him and win. Still, she had wished for him to find such a woman, and she would do everything in her power to help that wish along. She only hoped the fates were playing too.

  ***

  Halfway down the first bottle, Eddie wondered at the fact that alcohol only increased the tension that was singing through his veins. He clenched and unclenched his knuckles, feeling the familiar rage that seemed to boil up out of nowhere as it crept into his blood and bones and tensed his muscles. His eyes scanned the dark corners of the grubby tavern looking for a likely target.

  A group of young bucks, laughing and raucous, gained his attention only to be dismissed. Too pretty and nice to give him the kind of fight he was looking for. A solitary figure, head bent over his glass was similarly dismissed. That one would take a beating alright, but he wouldn’t fight back.

  Then his gaze settled on a bald-headed fellow with the build of an angry bull and an expression to match. The fellow split his mouth in what might have been a grin, to show a lot of gum and few remaining teeth. He spat on the ground beside him, never taking his gaze from Edward, who gave a soft laugh. Finally.

  ***

  By the time he’d reached the fifth tavern, Charlie was at his wits’ end. The moment he’d heard that damned snooty butler inform him that his lordship had done the off, Charlie had known just what to expect. The problem was that he didn’t know where.

  In the Dial, he had at least known Eddie’s usual haunts, and if he lost him, he knew the folks to ask and find what he needed to know. Here, though, he was lost. Too many acres of green and trees and cows and clean air. Bleedin’ ‘ell you didn’t even know you was breathing out here. In the Dials, if you sucked in a lungful, you felt the weight of it, could chew it, almost, and spit it out again. Not here.

  The taverns, though, they were more familiar. Sweat and smoke and liquor and the stench of those determined to find a good time or a good fight. That was something Charlie knew well enough, and that was what Eddie would hunt down, too.

  When he heard the crash of breaking furniture, Charlie instinctively knew he’d found his errant master.

  Cursing, he hurried into a half-timbered building with covering of heavy thatch and a faded sign that proclaimed it to be The Lamb. Once through the door, he found a crowd gathered and bets being taken as the marquess and some big, ugly brute knocked seven bells out of each other. Charlie sighed and realised he had little chance of dragging his lordship home until one or other of them was unconscious. Accepting the inevitable, he sidled up to a dodgy-looking bloke who was taking everyone’s money.

  “Gi’ me a quid on the pretty one,” he said, as the fellow looked at him in surprise.

  “Pleasure to take ye money, sir,” the fellow beamed, turning his attention back to the fight where the marquess had just been knocked to the ground with a fist resembling a ham hock.

  “Oh, ‘e ain’t dead yet,” Charlie observed with a grim smile as his master dragged himself upright and went back for more. With a resigned sigh, he found a good vantage point and settled in to watch the remainder.

  ***

  “Well, that’s a beautiful shiner you got yerself, my lord,” Charlie remarked with a grim smile as he poked at the swollen skin around Edward’s eye.

  Eddie batted his hand away and grinned back at him, the mellowing effect of the bottle he’d just finished taking the sting out of the worst of his injuries. Oh, he’d hurt like the devil in the morning right enough, but for now he felt really quite content.

  “Like one to match, Charlie?” he asked his dismayed-looking valet, hearing the words slide together and blur. But Charlie just grimaced and shook his head.

  “No ta, my lord, if it’s all the same to you.”

  “Then,” Eddie replied, waving the empty bottle at him, “do what I pay you for and get me home,” he said, with all the dignity a drunken marquess could summon.

  “Oh,” Charlie retorted, trying to get his shoulder under his much larger employer’s arm. “Is that whatcha pay me for? And ‘ere I was thinkin’ I was ye valet.”

  Eddie snorted and almost pulled Charlie back to the ground with him as the smaller man staggered under his weight. “Shiny boots,” he said, shaking his head and then pausing as Charlie looked back at him in confusion.

  “If you want to truly be a valet, you need to discover the secret of shiny boots.”

  Charlie frowned at him and tried to stop him sitting abruptly down again. “Your boots is shiny!” he objected, looking aggrieved. “At least they was, before this turn up.”

  “Nope.” Eddie gave a solemn shake of his head and wagged an unsteady finger in Charlie’s general direction. “You’ll see. Duke of Ware, look at his boots when he arrives. See your face in ‘em, you can.”

  With a harrumphing sound, Charlie somehow got him moving and outside into the fresh air.

  “How much did
you win?” Edward demanded, and earned himself a grin from the wiry little man struggling to hold him up.

  “Enough to make comin’ and dragging you outta the gutter again worth me while, you daft bugger,” he said, shaking his head.

  Eddie grinned, but then the fresh air seemed suddenly very fresh indeed and he didn’t feel so good.

  “Bleedin’ good job I bought the carriage, I reckon,” Charlie muttered as the marquess steadied himself against the wall and retched. “An’ I don’t know what Lady Violette is gonna say when she sees the state of ye. Reckon she’ll be lively when she spots that shiner, though.”

  Edward spared a moment to glare at his valet before turning his attention once again to the floor.

  ***

  “Edward Greyston!” Violette exclaimed, when she finally ran him to ground late the next afternoon. “How could you?”

  “Go away, Violette,” he said with a grimace. The pounding in his head seemed to pulse with the throbbing in his eye and numerous other scrapes and bruises, and he was not feeling any of the mellow contentment that had found him last night.

  “Can you imagine the scandal if it comes to light that the Marquess of Winterbourne was fighting like a ... a common thug in a low tavern? Can you?”

  In her agitation, his sister’s voice had risen to a volume that seemed to cut through his poor abused brain like a scalpel and he clutched at his head.

  “Go. Away. Violette.”

  “I will not!” she retorted, pacing up and down the room in fury. Edward sat at his desk and leaned his head on his hands, wondering vaguely why he’d never noticed before how noisy women’s skirts were. The swishing sound was making him feel positively nauseated. Though come to think of it, he’d felt like that before she’d come in. “We have people arriving in less than a fortnight and ... and look at you!” she said in disgust.

  Edward gritted his teeth. It was true that the black eye was an impressive one, and added to the scrapes on his jaw and the fact that his knuckles looked like someone had hit them with a hammer ... Well, it was a good job she couldn’t see the rest of him.

  “Be gone by then,” he muttered, knowing that he’d still have to face Lady Russell and Violette’s blasted husband before that. He couldn’t avoid them for the whole period before the guests arrived. Could he? The vague hope was dashed as Violette strode up to his desk and slapped her hand down on it in a purely vindictive manner.

  He closed his eyes against the pain in his head.

  “Well, if you think you’re going out again tonight to drink yourself into a stupor and get yourself killed, you are very much mistaken. I expect to see you at dinner, black eye and all.”

  There was a rigid silence.

  “How dare you!” The words exploded from somewhere deep and dark and ugly inside of him and he couldn’t seem to stop them. Violette gasped and took a few steps back. “How dare you speak to me in such a way? I am the bloody marquess, this is my home, and you are here at my invitation.” He stood, drawing himself up to his full height as he stepped out from behind the desk. There was real fear in his sister’s eyes, now, and he felt a surge of pleasure at the sight. He advanced on her as she began to move away from the force of his rage. “You have no say as to how or where I choose to live my life; it is not your affair. I’ve given you your bloody party, so the least you can do is leave me be. Now, damn well get out!”

  For a moment she stood still, staring at him in defiance, though her eyes looked too bright and he wondered if she would cry.

  “If you dislike me being here and worrying about you so much, I wonder that you agreed to this at all,” she said, the words trembling a little and he could see now the disappointment in her eyes.

  “So do I!” he flung back at her, wanting to see the words strike at her, wanting to see the hurt in her eyes.

  He wasn’t disappointed.

  She turned and fled, slamming the door behind her.

  He stared at the place where she’d been standing as the rage drained out of him as quickly as it had arrived.

  Oh God.

  Self-loathing welled up, replacing the rage and invading his soul, seeking out and filling every corner of his heart. Poor Violette. How could he have spoken to her so?

  Incomprehension swamped him as he stumbled back to his desk. Violette was the only family that gave a damn for him that he had left, and he’d probably just spoken the words that would make her hate him.

  He truly didn’t understand what came over him when his temper rose. It was almost like he was standing back and letting some vile demon take him over. The worst of it was that while it was happening, he enjoyed it, enjoyed the violence of his anger, the way people shrunk from him in fear. It felt powerful. It felt like control. But in truth, it was the complete opposite.

  Edward put his head in his hands. This had been a terrible mistake. He wasn’t fit for society, and soon enough, that would become abundantly clear. He would have to keep a tight rein on himself until this ordeal was over. No drinking. No fighting.

  More than that, he would have to keep his interactions with the guests to a bare minimum. Better they think him bad tempered and sullen than that he was totally unhinged and he’d lost his damn mind like many Greystons before him, but he was terribly afraid that it might be true. There was a thread of insanity in the family that couldn’t be denied, his cousin Gabriel being one he could well believe suffered the affliction. He could only pray that this wasn’t the beginning of his own slide into madness, that somehow, he could cure himself and remember just who he’d once been.

  Chapter 4

  “Wherein the guests arrive and Longwold is a hive of activity.”

  December 6th 1817

  St Nicholas Day

  Violette looked at the prettily wrapped parcel and felt her heart thud. As she looked up, she saw her brother staring at her with that uneasy, watchful look he had of late. It was as though he believed himself a monster, not fit for society, and was waiting for them to throw him out when they discovered it.

  That dreadful day in his library, she could have believed that was true. She had been afraid that the stories of the taint in their blood weren’t just malicious gossip and slander as she’d always believed. There had been febrile look in his eyes and such ... rage. It had truly frightened her.

  But now on St Nicholas Day, the traditional day for gift-giving, he had handed her a present and she knew this was the only way he could make amends.

  There had been many callers so far today. From the poorest in the neighbourhood offering anything from a song, to corn dollies, or baskets of apples. Yule candles, too, had been offered, along with some rather more decadent sweet meats to those tradesmen who relied most heavily on Lord Winterbourne’s patronage. But now they had gathered to give their own gifts, and Edward had waited until last to give his into her hands.

  “Thank you, Eddie,” she said, her voice soft.

  “You haven’t opened it yet,” he replied, looking awkward.

  She glanced over at Aubrey who was watching her brother, a cautious and wary expression in his own eyes. When he’d discovered Violette after that dreadful row, he’d been fit to be tied, and it had been all she could do to persuade him not to go and call him out. They’d had words, though, she knew, though Aubrey said the marquess had said little in his own defence. It hadn’t helped the simmering animosity between the two people she loved most in the world, though. The thought saddened her.

  Since then, they’d barely seen Edward, and she was ashamed to say that everyone had been a great deal more relaxed when he wasn’t around.

  Violette gave the purple silk ribbon a tug and pulled the paper away to reveal a leather jewellery box. Opening the little clasp, she gave a gasp as a familiar set of emerald earrings and a stunning necklace glittered before her.

  “Oh, Eddie!” she exclaimed.

  “They were Mother’s,” he said, walking away a little to stand by the fire. “I know she intended for you to have them, so ...”


  He shrugged, looking more awkward than ever. It was as though he didn’t fit in his own skin anymore, she thought with a surge of pity. There was resentment, too, though, towards the war that had taken the brother she had known and adored, and put this angry, uncertain man in his place.

  She got to her feet and reached up, kissing her brother on the cheek.

  “Thank you, Eddie, you’ve made me very happy.”

  She squeezed his hand and saw the relief in his eyes. They’d barely spoken since that terrible row, and she knew that this was his apology. She found she was only too willing to accept it.

  “Well, then,” she said, her tone a little too bright to be natural. “The guests will be arriving shortly so ... I suppose we’d better get ready.”

  ***

  Belinda looked across the carriage and wished with all her heart that there was anyone else in the world other than Aunt Grimble who could have chaperoned them. If their own lack of dowry wasn’t hurdle enough to scramble over, the mean-spirited, vulgar creature in front of her was the biggest. Surely, they would scare off any suitable gentleman unless perhaps he was head over heels in love.

  The idea of any man feeling so passionately about her was so unlikely that Belle had to stifle a bubble of laughter and covered her mouth with her hand. Crecy could, of course; she could inspire such devotion and passion with barely a lift of one elegant blonde brow, provided she kept her mouth shut.

  Oh God, they were doomed.

  Such gloomy thoughts fled however as they caught their first glimpse of Longwold.

  “Goodness gracious!” Belle exclaimed as the vast building came into sight. “Would you look at that!”

  Crecy had been positively bouncing in her seat for the entire journey, which was most out of character, but the chance of seeing Longwold seemed to have awoken something in the young woman. She had been full of excitement at the chance to see and explore the building, though Belle well knew she was dreading the house party itself.