Bewitched

by Cullman, Heather;

  “Are you saying that my Joseph actually believed in the curse?” Euphemia exclaimed, incredulous that a fruit from her loins would engage in such folly. Why, were he not already dead, she’d have strangled him for his own stupidity.

  Emily bobbed her head to the affirmative … goodness! Was it really too much to ask that the child’s head remain still for a moment? Watching her was making her own head spin, which did nothing to mitigate her burgeoning megrim.

  Continuing her infernal bobbing, Emily soberly replied, “After everything that happened, he had no choice but to believe it. You would too, had you been there.”

  “I doubt it,” Euphemia snapped. The chit was most definitely bringing on a megrim. Deciding it high time that she put an end to her twaddle—and her frightful head gesticulations—before the throb in her temples exploded into a full-blown pounding, she added, “However, whether or not I believe it is neither here nor there. It most certainly doesn’t change the fact that you will wed the duke.”

  “But the curse—”

  “Is drivel. There are no such things as curses.” Emily opened her mouth, no doubt to argue, but Euphemia silenced her with a stabbing hand motion. “Even if they did exist, which they do not, you should be safe enough. You said yourself that a curse cannot follow a person over water.” There! That should resolve the matter.

  But of course it didn’t. “That is what my father believed, but he was wrong.” Emily’s head was shaking again, desperation edged her voice. “It is demons and ghosts and such that cannot travel over water, not curses. Why, there have been instances of witches cursing people halfway around the world. So you see? I really cannot marry the duke.”

  Euphemia paused in rubbing her now pounding temples to cast her granddaughter a jaundiced look. “And who, pray tell, fed you that rubbish?”

  “Gitta Czigany.”

  “Who is?” she prompted with an impatient snap of her fingers.

  “She’s the gypsy I consulted after I was cursed. Her notice in the newspaper said that she is all-knowing in such matters. She was supposed to break the curse, but she left town rather suddenly.”

  “I see.” And she did. She saw that the chit was going to persist with her jabber if she didn’t settle the ludicrous matter once and for all. Intent on doing exactly that, she brusquely stated, “The very fact that the woman is a gypsy proves that this curse business is rot. Notorious liars, gypsies. Couldn’t spit out a truth if you stuffed one in their mouths.”

  “But—”

  “Enough! Not another word!” She more barked than uttered the command in her annoyance. “Your natter has given me a monstrous megrim. Since I wish to be rid of it before we arrive, you will remain silent until you are again spoken to. I suggest that you use the time to reconcile yourself to the fact that you are to be wed on the morrow.” With that she extracted a vial of lavender water from her reticule, a commodity kept on hand for such emergencies, and doused her handkerchief. Darting a final warning glance at her granddaughter, whose cheeks were now the color of raspberry cordial, she tipped her head back against the satin upholstery and draped the damp cloth over her face. Within moments, she was asleep.

  Emily stared at her grandmother, her stomach knotting with despair. She couldn’t marry the duke of Sherrington! She just couldn’t! Even if she weren’t cursed, which she most assuredly was, she couldn’t wed him on the fundamental principle that she simply didn’t know him. Why, the very notion of marrying a stranger was nothing short of shocking. That her grandmother actually expected her to be amenable to such an arrangement made her wonder precisely what sort of people these English aristocrats were.

  It most certainly made her question the duke of Sherrington’s character. Indeed, the very fact that he, whom her grandmother had touted as being young, rich, and handsome, should resort to an arranged marriage suggested some kind of character flaw on his part. A dreadful one.

  Trying to imagine exactly what that flaw might be, Emily rested her warm cheek against the cool window glass, watching the glorious Devonshire countryside unfold as she thought.

  Hmmm. It could be that her husband-to-be was eccentric, like Robbie Wolf back home in Boston, who wandered about town in a judge’s robes and wig, appealing absurd legal cases to himself. Or he might be a lecher. Was the duke the sort of man who ogled one woman’s breasts while groping beneath the skirts of another? Emily shuddered. Surely her grandmother wouldn’t be so cruel as to wed her to such a lout?

  Would she?

  No, of course not, she told herself. Her grandmother might be overbearing, and cantankerous to a fault, but she was hardly what one would call cruel. Well, at least not intentionally so. Despite her own aversion to wedding a stranger, Emily could tell from her grandmother’s demeanor that she truly believed the marriage to be for the best.

  Yes, and the best most definitely did not include a groom who was a lecher or an eccentric. Or a drunkard or a brute, for that matter. Or someone who engaged in any of the more heinous of the seven deadly sins.

  Hmmm. That meant that the defect must be minor … yet off-putting enough to make the duke objectionable to women. A defect like, say, an aversion to soap, or a perpetually dour disposition. Yes. Something of that nature seemed more probable. Who knows? He could even be like those popinjays she’d seen lounging about Bond Street in London: vain, powdered, and ridiculously overdressed. Or … or … he might be cold and arrogant.

  Well, maybe not, she amended, remembering the gentlemen she’d met during her brief sojourn in London. By all appearances, chilled arrogance was considered a sign of breeding by the English … as were insolence, clipped speech, and the use of ludicrous terms that she couldn’t even begin to understand.

  Why, she had yet to figure out what “mulligrubs” meant. And what in the world was a “maddening mull”? In truth, there had been times during the past two weeks when she’d found herself wondering if the conversation around her was actually being conducted in English.

  Sighing, Emily glanced at her grandmother, whose lusty snores now stirred the handkerchief covering her face. She hadn’t dared ask her grandmother to translate. To do so would merely have validated the woman’s opinion that all Americans were heathens, a view she’d made no bones about voicing the instant Emily had stepped off the ship. Indeed, her grandmother had no sooner clapped eyes on her than she began her incessant pecking.

  Emily made a face at the memory of that pecking. According to the crabby old tyrant, everything about her was disastrous. Her accent was atrocious, her hair a barbaric mop, her hats frumpish, and her shoes nothing short of plebeian clodhoppers. Oh, yes. And her gowns, which had been so smart back in Boston, had been dismissed as impossibly démodé. She smiled faintly at that last word. It was French, which, unlike much of the English these British spoke, she understood, having learned the language in what her grandmother invariably referred to as the wilds of America.

  America. Home. Her smile grew wistful. How she missed it, and what she wouldn’t give to return there. Everything she loved was there … Boston … her friends … her brothers.

  Tears stung her eyes at the thought of her five older brothers, all of whom she adored to distraction. Would she ever see them again? And what of their children, her darling nieces and nephews? Would they remember her in the years to come? Some of them were so young. Why, little Katie had just started to walk when she’d left, and two-year-old Oliver had finally learned to pronounce her name. Because she’d been certain that she would never have children of her own, what with the curse and all, she had taken her role as aunt to heart and had actively shared in their lives.

  As Emily lovingly pictured those she’d left behind, the tears she’d held in check since arriving in England silently escaped down her cheeks. When she came to her father, a soft sob tore from her throat. He had been everything to her—mother, father, teacher, heart, and soul. And when he’d died, her whole wor
ld had crumbled. Not only had she lost the only parent she’d ever known, she had been torn from her home and whisked across the ocean before she’d had time to mourn and heal. Her only comfort during those dark days was that the ship that had brought her to England had belonged to her father, one of a large fleet that regularly sailed the world in trade, and had been captained by her middle brother, Daniel.

  Though she loved all of her brothers equally, she was particularly close to Daniel. In fact, her earliest memory was that of him teaching her to fly a kite, his strong arms holding her securely as he dashed across Boston Common, laughingly chiding her to hold tight to the line as the kite sailed into the air above them. To this day she adored kites, and one of her greatest delights was building them. It was a hobby she shared with Daniel, who had always found time to indulge her, even after he’d had a family of his own and a demanding position in their father’s shipping business.

  To her eternal gratitude, Daniel had remained with her during her first few days in London, his jovial presence doing much to ease the initial shyness she’d felt around their grandmother. All things considered, their time together had been good, unmarred, as it was, by the mention of marriage to the duke. But, of course, it made perfect sense that their grandmother would refrain from mentioning it. She no doubt knew that Daniel would object to the notion of his sister wedding a stranger, and that he would most probably have spirited her back to America if their grandmother had so much as hinted at such a thing.

  Or would he? Emily frowned, suddenly uncertain. Of all her brothers, Daniel had chafed the hardest against her prospective spinsterhood. Having found bliss in his own marriage, he’d often expressed the wish that she might someday experience the same joy. Could it be that he had known about their grandmother’s plan and had seen this arranged marriage to the duke of Sherrington as her one and only chance to do exactly that?

  Her frown deepening, she repositioned her hat, which suddenly seemed intolerably hot and heavy atop her overburdened head. If what she suspected were indeed the case, what of the consequences? In order to find the sort of happiness Daniel wished for her, she would have to love the duke. And he knew as well as she that her love was a hazardous proposition. Surely he wouldn’t risk the life and limbs of this unknown duke on the scant chance that their father had been correct and the curse hadn’t followed her?

  In her heart she knew he would.

  The rutted road had now sunk below the level of the ripening fields by which it ran, its increasing roughness evidenced by the erratic lurching of the carriage. Despite the violence of the bumps, her grandmother snored on, her enormous black velvet hat dragged askew as her head slowly slipped to a rest in the padded coach corner.

  Bracing herself more securely in her seat, Emily considered what was to be done about her predicament. Hmmm. As much as she loathed the idea of wedding a stranger, she adored the thought of the children the union would bring. And there would be children. If she’d learned anything at all about the aristocracy during her short time in England, it was that they placed an extreme importance on securing the family name. Remembering that detail awakened a whole new possibility.

  Could it be that the duke wanted not a wife, but an heir? Did he wish children without the trouble of courtship or the obligation of love? Was she to be nothing to him but a belly to be filled? That motive would certainly explain his desire for an arranged marriage.

  Rather than being dismayed by that prospect, she found it … tempting. So much so that for several moments thereafter she envisioned herself with babes, a luxury she hadn’t allowed herself since the advent of the curse.

  Her babes would be beautiful, of course, even if her grandmother had lied and the duke was frightfully ugly. And clever. Yes, the duke’s flaw could be stultifying stupidity and their children would still be brilliant. And graceful. And witty. And charming. And everything else that was good and wonderful … regardless of their father’s faults. In short, they would be her children and that would make them perfect. So perfect, in fact, that it wouldn’t matter a whit that her marriage was loveless.

  Loveless? Emily’s breath caught in her throat. A beat later she slowly smiled. Perhaps it was a perfect arrangement after all. If she didn’t love the duke, which she was almost certain would be the case, then the curse couldn’t touch him, and she could have her babes without worry or guilt. Well, she could if he wasn’t vile. Even the joy of children couldn’t balance the misery of marriage to a vile man. However, if he turned out to be tolerable … well, tolerable she could endure. Easily. And who knows? Just once in her ill-starred life she might get lucky and the duke could be a man she actually liked.

  Emily crossed her fingers, hoping for that last. Like would be ideal. If she liked the duke of Sherrington, even the slightest bit, making babies with him wouldn’t be such a terrible ordeal. Liking would also give them a chance at a pleasant life together. Of course, like or not, she couldn’t wed him without first informing him of the curse and the fact that she could never love him. It was only fair that she do so. For though it seemed unlikely, there was always a remote possibility that he wished a loving marriage.

  She nodded once, satisfied with her decision. If the duke of Sherrington was tolerable, she would wed him.

  And if he proved to be insufferable? Another nod. Then she would use the curse to dissuade him from the marriage. A little embellishment on the facts should scare him off effectively enough.

  The crisis of her marriage thus resolved, Emily commanded herself to rest, deeming it best to be refreshed when she faced whatever awaited her at her journey’s end. Doggedly ignoring her lingering hopes and fears, she shifted into a more comfortable position, then gazed out at the passing landscape. They had just entered Dartmoor, or so the weathered wooden sign proclaimed—a land, Emily quickly discovered, as dramatic as it was diverse.

  The flower-strewn meadows and lush green pastures, which had thus far made up the bulk of the Devonshire scenery, soon gave way to sylvan forest, the land growing wilder with each mile they traveled. Then they entered the moor. The unpaved road was narrow now, made all the more so by the encroaching ferns and briars. In the distance, set against the golden late-afternoon sky, swept peak after peak of vast jagged hills, their shadowed bleakness portending the desolation that lay before them.

  It was a land unlike any Emily had ever seen … remote, brooding, and utterly alien. The very sight of it filled her with loneliness. This was where she would live if she chose to wed the duke. She swallowed hard, the prospect giving her pause. Surely not all of Dartmoor was so very bleak?

  On they advanced, past wide stretches of fen and through deep, narrow valleys. Over rocky bluffs and through tangled coppices. Now and again she saw moss-covered ruins, the ravaged testimony of man’s surrender to the harshness of the land.

  It was a bleak place, yes. And primitive. And forsaken. Yet, despite its foreboding starkness, Emily had to admit that it held a certain native beauty. There was the sparkling clarity of the numerous streams, for example, and the way the heather and furze splashed purple and yellow across the otherwise drab stretches of desert. Yes, and the charming, ivy-draped moonstone bridges that linked the more precipitous hills. Then there were the hills themselves, each one magnificent in its striking contrast to its companions.

  Some of the hills rolled gently, clothed in verdant herbage; others stabbed at the sky, the brutality of their barbed peaks and sheer rises masked by crystalline waterfalls. Still others appeared almost mountainous with their boulder-strewn valleys and fantastical rock formation crowns.

  After traveling for some distance, Emily ascertained that those grayish-brown rock formations were a dominant feature of the moor. They were now everywhere, each one different in its tortured shape. As she studied a particularly arresting configuration, an enormous one with a strangely human shape, she was reminded of the biblical tale of Lot and his wife.

  His wife l
ooked back from behind him, and she became a pillar of salt.

  Hmmm. Could it be that the formations had once been giants who had been turned not to salt, but to stone as punishment for sins against their creator? She smiled faintly at her fanciful thought. Her father had always teased her about her imagination, fondly declaring it to be the most vivid one in Boston. Still, in a land such as this, anything seemed possible. Even magic.

  After spending what felt like the proverbial forty years wandering in the wilderness, they abruptly came upon signs of civilization. First it was an uneven stone enclosure, covered with gray moss and lichen, then a partially cultivated field. After that they passed several neatly tended farms, each boasting a low stone cottage with a thatched roof and a wide, arched doorway. Another two miles and they were in a village.

  Curious as to where they were and how far it was from their destination, Emily glanced at her grandmother. She still slept, sleeping the deep, sound slumber that embraced only the very young and the very old. By now the handkerchief had slipped from her face and her hat hung at a drunken angle, its lavish lavender plumes bobbing to the erratic rhythm of the coach wheels striking the road ruts. Every now and again she issued a spirited snore, followed by what sounded suspiciously like a belch.

  Emily grinned at the picture she made. Garbed in that fussy lavender and black gown, with her obviously dyed brown hair tortured into a mass of tiny ringlets, she looked like one of those sweet but dotty old dears one often saw dozing in the corners of aristocratic drawing rooms. In her grandmother’s case, however, looks were deceptive, for Euphemia Merriman was neither sweet nor dotty.

  Wondering if the wily old tyrant would ever approve of her, Emily looked back out the window. They had just left the tiny village and were turning onto a road that was even narrower and rougher than the previous one. A blink of the eye later, they entered the most dismal area imaginable. Unlike the moor through which they had passed, this land was nothing but span after span of marsh, followed, at length, by a series of boulder-strewn knolls. Everywhere were more of the bizarre rock formations; nowhere was there a sign of life.