by Eloisa James
It sounded very dramatic to Kate, but she understood what he meant.
“I love you,” she said, when he put her on her feet at the door to her room. Risking everything, she pulled up the veil and looked into his face.
“I—” But the words seemed to catch in his throat, and her heart slammed against her chest at his silence.
Instead he bent down and kissed her and then, quickly, turned and left.
Kate waited until he turned the corner of the corridor, then tumbled through the door of her room. There was Freddie, waiting in the middle of her bed. He raised a sleepy muzzle and gave her a loving little woof. There were candles, guttering low on the mantelpiece. There were her book, and her slippers, and her nightgown waiting for her.
There was real life in this room, and behind her was nothing more than a fairy tale, and she would do well to remember that.
She could train herself in the boundaries of reality in the morning. For the present, she tucked Freddie’s warm little body under her chin and let him lick up the salty tears that slid onto his face.
Rosalie slipped through the door a few hours later, banging around the room, pulling open the curtains.
“No,” Kate groaned. “Please, go away. I can’t get up yet.”
“You don’t have to get up,” the little maid said cheerfully. “I have such wonderful news that you—”
“Out!” Kate said, sitting up, knowing that her eyes were still swollen. “Take the dogs with you, please. I’ll ring for you later.” And with that she fell backward, pulled a pillow over her head, and pretended to be unconscious.
She didn’t rise until two in the afternoon. She drifted listlessly over to the bell, rang for Rosalie, and then stared in the glass. It was faintly interesting to note that a deflowered woman looks just like any other woman.
In fact, she thought, leaning closer, she looked better than she had a week ago. Her skin had a glow to it, and her lips—
It must have been all that kissing that made them look crimson and slightly swollen.
Rosalie entered with a breakfast tray, followed by a line of footmen with hot water. “I have such a surprise in store for you!” she said again.
“Tell me after my bath,” Kate said wearily, sitting down at the dressing table and picking up a piece of toast.
“Drink this.” Rosalie handed her a cup of tea. “You had a nasty stomach upset last night. I felt terrible, not being able to tend to you, but Mr. Berwick said he just couldn’t do without me. I am good with flowers. And he promised to send you a maid. Was she helpful?”
“Absolutely. She was—she was perfect.”
“There, this will make you feel better.”
It wasn’t until she was out of the bath, dried, powdered, and dressed, that Rosalie said hopefully, “Would you like to know your surprise now?”
“I apologize,” Kate said. “Of course I would.”
“Your stepsister is here!” she said with a squeal. “Miss Victoria’s lip improved and she arrived yesterday late, but of course you were ill and not to be disturbed. Would you like me to knock on her chamber? She’s just next door. Mr. Berwick moved Mr. Fenwick up a floor so the two of you could be together.”
“Victoria is here?” Kate said, sitting down. “With my stepmother?”
Rosalie shook her head. “No. And isn’t that a blessing? Lady Dimsdale brought her, but her ladyship left immediately as she is preparing for Miss Victoria’s wedding.” She bustled to the door. “I’ll fetch her this moment. I know she’s longing to see you.”
Victoria entered the room rather tentatively, as if she wasn’t sure of her welcome. Kate got up and went over to greet her.
They could not be said to have grown up together; they had lived on the same floor of Yarrow House for only a matter of months until their father died, upon which Mariana promptly moved Kate from the nursery to the garret.
At sixteen, Kate was too old for the nursery, Mariana said, and there wasn’t any call for a poor relative to be housed on the main floor.
But Victoria had an intrinsic kindness about her that was missing from her mother, and had never joined in Mariana’s taunts or humiliations.
“Rosalie, will you fetch us more tea?” Kate asked.
The maid whisked herself out the door and Kate sat down next to her sister, beside the fire. Freddie came over and sprang into her lap. “How is your lip?”
“It’s fine,” Victoria said, patting it. “After being lanced, it was already much better by the next day.”
“It looks perfect to me,” Kate said.
“Isn’t this castle an oddity? It’s so huge. I thought I would expire from the cold last night, at least until Caesar came to bed with me.”
“Caesar!” Kate said, startled. Her hand froze on Freddie’s head. “I didn’t even realize he wasn’t in my chamber.”
“I could hear him barking,” Victoria explained. “I couldn’t bear it, so I finally slipped over here and brought him to my room. Freddie seemed perfectly comfortable so I left him on your bed.”
She fiddled with a fold of her gown, the color high in her cheeks. Kate looked at her and knew exactly what that meant. “I didn’t sleep in my bed last night,” she said with a sigh.
“I’m not one to judge,” Victoria said.
“Why did you come?” Kate asked, softening the question with a smile.
“Algie kept writing me.” And, when Kate’s eyebrow flew up: “He writes me every day. We both do, every day since we first met back in March, at Westminster Abbey.”
“You do?”
Victoria nodded. “Sometime pages and pages. Algie,” she said with pride, “is a wonderful correspondent. I didn’t have a governess, you know, so I am considerably less—well—he doesn’t mind very much.”
Kate had never really thought about how Victoria’s education was affected by Mariana’s propensity to dismiss the household servants; her sister didn’t seem someone who greatly missed tutoring. But her cheeks were pink and she was still pleating her gown.
“I’m sorry. I should have fought harder to keep the governess,” Kate said.
“You did all you could. Mother is . . . well, she is. I thought—I’ve thought for years—that it was wonderful how you protected Cherryderry and Mrs. Swallow and most of the people on the farms. You couldn’t keep a governess on top of all that.”
“I could have tried harder,” Kate repeated. She just hadn’t thought much about Victoria, the treasured, coddled daughter. “So what did Algie tell you?” she asked.
“He said that I should come here,” Victoria said, eyes on her lap still. “He said that you were—were falling in love with the prince, and it wouldn’t end well, and that I should come rescue you.” She said the last word defiantly, looking up. “I know you spent years saving all the people on the estate and in the house, and Algie agrees with me, that sometimes people like that need rescuing themselves.”
Kate sat for a second and then she started to laugh. Not a harsh laugh, but the healing kind of laughter, the kind that comes after years of being alone are over, and you discover that you have a family.
It wasn’t a normal family: Henry had no pretensions to being a paragon of virtue. Victoria was illegitimate, if kindhearted, and Algie was genuinely foolish. Yet they cared for her.
Victoria perked up at her laughter. “So you aren’t angry?” she said hopefully. “I was worried that you would be irritated by my arrival, but Algie . . .”
Kate reached over and gave her sister a hug. “I think it was tremendously kind of you. I am happy to be rescued. Although I don’t mean to stay much longer; will that be all right with you?”
“Oh yes, because we have to leave after the ball, this very night,” Victoria said. “We need to marry.”
“Of course.”
“If we leave at midnight tonight, we can be in Algie’s parish by seven in the morning. Would you—would you accompany us?”
“Driving through the night?” Kate exclaimed.
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“Well, the prince told Algie that he has to attend the ball. But Algie told his mother, Lady Dimsdale, that he would be home in time to get married in the morning.” Victoria looked at her hopefully. “My mother is already at Dimsdale Manor.”
Algie was not one to disobey a direct command, obviously. “Of course I will come with you. Did he tell you that I have a godmother, Lady Wrothe?”
“Yes . . . she calls herself Henry, doesn’t she? And will she take you to live with her?”
“She will,” Kate said, smiling.
“Because you could always come live with us,” Victoria said anxiously. “Algie’s mother is moving to the dower house and the two of us will be knocking about in that great house by ourselves. We’d love to have you.”
She meant it. “I’m so glad to have discovered that you’re my sister,” Kate said.
Victoria nodded. Her eyes were a little teary.
Kate squeezed her hand.
“I just wish that our father had been more gentlemanly,” Victoria said in a rush. “I wish—I wish that Algie didn’t have to marry me under false pretenses.” A tear slid down her cheek.
“He’s not,” Kate said. “He’s marrying you because he loves you, and because you love him. And that’s all anyone has a right to know about it.”
Victoria sniffed, and somewhat to Kate’s surprise made an obvious effort to stop crying. “I always believed in my father, I mean, in the colonel that I thought was my father. She even has a portrait of him, you know. Except that he never existed.”
“It’s awkward,” Kate said, considering that an understatement.
“I’m illegitimate,” Victoria said again. “I wake up in the middle of the night and think about that. That word. It’s a horrible word, all those syllables and none of them good.”
“The circumstances of your birth are not your fault.”
Victoria bit her lip. “But when my mother married your father, you lost your inheritance, and she gave it to me . . . it’s not right! I keep thinking about it. It’s as if I’m some sort of parasite. I look like a lady, but I’m really nothing more than an illegitimate, thieving chipper!” And with that she broke into genuine sobs.
“Chipper?” Kate asked, feeling rather dazed. “What on earth is a chipper?”
“A baggage,” Victoria wailed. “A trollop. I’m—I’m carrying a child out of wedlock. I’m just like my mother!”
“No, you’re not,” Kate said firmly, reaching over and pulling a handkerchief from the dressing table and giving it to her. “A wise old man in this very castle told me that kindness is the most important thing, and he was right. You are kind, Victoria, and your mother, unfortunately, is not. You are not a thief. Papa wanted you to have that money.”
“No, he left it to my mother and she—she—”
“He left it directly to Mariana, knowing full well that she would give it to you. My mother left me a dowry, you know that.”
“I’m just so grateful that he married her at all,” Victoria said, with a sob.
Kate had wondered for years why her father married Mariana. But now, looking at her pretty, silly, sweet sister, she knew why. “I want to show you something,” she said, jumping up and running to the little writing desk. “Just let me write a note first.”
“What?” Victoria said, taking another handkerchief out of her reticule. “I know it annoys you when I cry, Kate. I’m sorry. It’s something about being with child. It’s made me worse than ever.”
“It’s all right. I’m used to it.”
“Algie says I’m a watering pot and he’s going to put me out in the garden,” Victoria said dolefully.
Kate composed the note to Gabriel.
Your Highness,
May I show my sister the statue of Merry in the chapel garden? Your uncle thought that you might have the chapel key. I’m sure that Berwick would be able to help us find the door.
Yours & etc.,
Miss Katherine Daltry
“What are you going to wear tonight?” Victoria said, putting away her handkerchief.
“I hadn’t thought about it,” Kate said. “Rosalie has something chosen. I wish she’d bring up something more to eat. I’m positively ravenous.”
“You have to think about it,” Victoria said. “This is your presentation to society, Kate! I’m here, so you can go to the ball as yourself.”
Kate blinked. “I hadn’t thought of that.”
“I bought a powerful corset,” Victoria said, “so that I will look thinner. And I’ll wear a wig, and take the dogs with me.”
Just then Rosalie entered with luncheon on a tray, so Kate sent her off to deliver the note to the prince.
“It’s so odd to think of you exchanging billets-doux with a prince,” Victoria said, a forkful of chicken halfway to her mouth.
“Because I’ve been a servant in Yarrow House, you mean?”
“You were never a servant!” Victoria said. “Mother can be harsh, but not that harsh. You were . . . you were . . .”
“The label doesn’t matter,” Kate put in. “I think it’s odd that I’m writing to a prince as well. I wasn’t even sure how to address the note, if the truth be told. What am I to do tonight, Victoria? I can’t dance, you know.”
Victoria’s mouth fell open. “Of course you can’t dance. Mother only got me a dancing master when we went to London for the season. And we haven’t time for Algie to teach you either.”
“Algie?”
“Algie is a wonderful dancer,” Victoria said proudly. “And he’s such a good teacher, so kind and patient. He’s taught me no end of things.”
“You two are—” Kate said, and the door opened.
“The prince is waiting in the chapel for you both,” Rosalie squealed.
“I want to show you something,” Kate said, holding her hand out to Victoria. “Something that you’ll like.”
“I’ve never met a prince,” Victoria kept muttering as she trotted behind Kate down the stairs. “I wish Algie were here. I do wish Algie were here. I just wish that he . . .”
Thirty-six
Gabriel looked so beautiful, waiting for them at the door to the chapel, that Kate actually felt her head spinning a little. But if there was one thing Katherine Daltry would never, ever do, it was lose her head over a man. Or swoon. Or throw herself on a funeral pyre.
So she held her head high and greeted him with a curtsy, introduced him to her sister, and generally behaved as if they were no more than passing acquaintances.
And since he did the same, there was no cause for the pain she felt. It was as bad as an arrow to her side, she thought glumly as she followed Gabriel’s brisk footsteps through the chapel to the back room, where a red door had been discovered behind a tapestry.
Wick was there as well, and of the two brothers, he was the only one who seemed to have a tongue to speak. “We had no idea the door was here,” he was explaining to Victoria, “until His Highness noticed it from the garden side.”
“I found the key,” Gabriel said, speaking for the first time since they exchanged greetings. He pulled out a huge rusty key and thrust it in the lock. It turned, but the door didn’t open.
He threw his weight against it in a surprisingly violent gesture that made Victoria squeak and jump back. Still, it didn’t move. Then Wick stepped up beside him. When they both put a shoulder to the door it opened with a terrible screeching noise.
“Rusted shut,” Gabriel said, his voice as cool and distant as if he were addressing a group of village drunkards.
Kate walked past him without comment. After a wet morning, the sun was shining fitfully on the drooping branches of the garden’s one oak tree.
“How messy,” Victoria said in dismay, as she picked her way through the door. “Dear me, Your Highness. Perhaps you should put some gardeners to work here.”
“They’re all busy in the village mending roofs,” Gabriel said. “This is not the weather to leave people without cover.”
“H
ere,” Kate said, catching Victoria’s hand. “I’ll show you the statue.”
“What statue?” Victoria said, trailing behind. “Drat, there’s my skirt caught on a rose bush. Wait for me, Kate!”
But Kate walked ahead, desperate to create space between herself and Gabriel. She stopped in front of Merry and then bent down to say hello, wiping a rain drop from her marble cheek.
“What a sweet baby,” Victoria crooned. “Oh, just look at her adorable plump fingers and her dimples.”
“Her name was Merry,” Kate said. “She was illegitimate, Victoria. Her mother’s name was Eglantine.”
“Oh.”
“There’s no record of her father . . . but there’s a record of one thing.”
“What?” Victoria reached down and pulled a leaf from Merry’s shoulder.
“She was loved, you see? She has her own garden, her own memorial.”
Victoria’s big blue eyes filled with tears. “Merry died?”
“Merry lived in the 1500s,” Kate said, schooling her tone to patience. “Of course she died.”
“But—”
“My point is that her mother loved her just as much as she would have loved any child. And my father loved you that way as well. So the ugliness of that word illegitimacy doesn’t matter. Because my father loved you enough to marry Mariana, Victoria. He was the son of an earl, and he married his mistress, a woman who wasn’t a lady. For you.”
“Oh,” Victoria said softly. “I didn’t think of—are you sure, Kate?”
“I’m absolutely sure. He knew I was taken care of, and that my mother had left me a dowry. He made sure that you were taken care of by marrying your mother, and leaving your dowry in her hands.”
Victoria’s eyes overflowed, but the sky had started splattering tears as well. So Kate wound her arm around her sister’s shoulders and led her back into the chapel, past the men standing silently next to the large red door.
She gave Wick a smile, and Gabriel a nod, because one didn’t smile at princes as if they were common folk.