by C. K. Brooke
A butler approached with an ancient-looking bottle and poured the fine juice into their goblets. The men toasted and drank, when there came a knock at the door. “Gentlemen,” Gatspierre entreated them, rising to his feet. Macmillan, Bos and Cosmith stood.
Selu was the first to enter, proudly parading through the archway, decked in a plum gown. Macmillan shot a quick glance over at Bos. The giant was transfixed, the color rising in his face.
It then appeared to Macmillan that a stranger followed her into the room, perhaps a lady companion to Gatspierre. But the young man gave a start as he realized that the radiant girl before them, dressed in emerald sequins, her short black hair sleek and shining, was Dainy.
Macmillan’s heart raced. She looked so utterly regal and glamorous. He’d never pictured her this way before. Would she really become his bride?
“My dear!” Gatspierre planted an enthusiastic kiss on her hand. “You look astonishing! I daresay, were you not my niece, I would keep you for myself.” He laughed heartily, and Dainy smiled uncomfortably.
Gatspierre led her to sit between Macmillan and himself, and the butler brought out an appetizer of sliced cucumber tossed in a cold, fragrant sauce. Macmillan was too nervous to eat, pointedly aware of the brilliant new Dainy seated beside him.
Gatspierre sighed with satisfaction. “Now that we’re all here, I’m simply bursting with questions. My good gentlemen, please explain how it came to be that you found my beautiful niece.”
Bos cleared his throat and launched into their journey from the beginning. Macmillan noticed Dainy listening as intently as her uncle, for they’d never told her about the search party’s camp set aflame, their encounter with Quixheto, or even the full story of the fateful night on the boat, when Pascale was killed. Gatspierre’s eyes narrowed at every mention of the New Republic’s attempts to thwart them.
Macmillan glanced over at Cosmith, only to discover him staring openly at Dainy. The incorrigible man did not take his eyes off of her for the rest of the meal.
IN SHE WALKED, AND HIS pulse stopped. The carpet was unsteady beneath his feet. He became lightheaded and lost his appetite. Standing there, in all her glory, her body a glimmering jewel, her gown embracing and celebrating every contour of her figure, was the former duchess of Jordinia—the most enchanting woman Jon Cosmith had ever laid eyes upon.
The radiant girl took her seat across from him, and Cosmith could not avert his gaze. Eludaine Ducelle’s beauty was unrivaled by any maiden in West Halvea. Was this truly the same girl with whom he’d traveled for so long? All that time, had he been blind? Why had he not tried harder, worked more diligently, to win her?
Had Selu told him the truth, that night at the inn? Had Dainy really once been at his feet? And yet, he had let this magnificent person, with her porcelain smile and bell-like laugh, slip away.
How?
She was so painfully lovely; it hurt to look at her. But that didn’t stop him. He’d never fully understood the meaning of regret until he watched her that night, only just across the table from him, but already so far out of his reach.
But of course, the regal, immaculate girl would never choose someone like him in the end. For, Cosmith knew, he’d been selfish and stubborn, crude and ungentlemanly. He did not deserve her. And neither did he deserve a second chance, which he knew he’d never get, anyway. Dainy was to marry Macmillan, and the two would live happily together, as though they had never known Jon Cosmith.
As it very well should be, the man thought dejectedly. Macmillan was decent, straightforward and straight-laced. He suited her perfectly. They sang alike, laughed alike—hell, they even looked alike. Clearly, an ideal pair.
Dainy raised her tender-looking lips into a smile at something her uncle said. Those lips were the only pair Cosmith wanted to kiss, for the rest of his lifetime. Yet he would never taste them. Not once.
Why had he been such a fool?
Gatspierre’s sharp voice jarred him from his melancholy.
“Very well,” the man was saying loudly, rapping his fist on the table in a conclusive manner. “I’ve heard all about your journey. But still, the big question remains.” He swirled the wine in his goblet, examining Dainy. “I am a man of my word, Eludaine. And I gave my word that the man to return with you shall receive fifty pounds of gold, and your hand in matrimony.”
He glanced around the table, indicating Macmillan, Cosmith and Bos. “But you’ve returned to me with three!” He issued another of his exuberant laughs. “Now, a gold prize can be divided. But you cannot wed all of these men. Unless, of course,” he teased, “there is some sort of heathen custom among those Heppestonian tribes that I don’t know about.”
The man wheezed at his own joke, and Bos and Macmillan feigned a chuckle to appease him. But Cosmith could see that Dainy did not appreciate the slight to her adoptive homeland. Following her lead, he did not laugh.
“So, what shall we do?” Gatspierre asked his niece. “How do we compensate three exceptional men? Ah, and one woman, too?”
The servers brought out an assortment of cheeses, but Cosmith didn’t think he could stomach any more food.
“I suppose,” sighed Gatspierre, fingering the cheese tray, “you and I can formulate some arrangement.”
When dinner ended, they profusely thanked Gatspierre and his staff for the meal, and their animated host invited them for a moonlit promenade outside. Seeing that the winds were low and the weather still pleasant, they agreed to a stroll.
Gatspierre led the way with Dainy at his side, while Cosmith hung back, knowing he didn’t belong. Furtively, he tapped Selu’s shoulder.
The woman turned. “What?” she murmured.
Cosmith swallowed. “Tell Dainy…she looks stunning tonight.”
“Tell her yourself,” Selu whispered.
AFTER THEIR OUTDOOR PROMENADE, WHEN the others had gone their separate ways in the mansion, Dainy toured the long halls on her uncle’s arm.
Uncle Hessian, as he insisted she call him, carried a candle and saucer to light their path. “One look at you, and I know you are family,” the man told her, beaming. “It is like having my sister back.”
“I, too, have noticed our resemblance,” replied Dainy. She was still in a state of disbelief to be there, for this to truly be happening.
Uncle Hessian turned her down another hall. “Although, I would still deem the test of blood necessary, just to be sure you are truly Dane Ducelle’s daughter.”
“Test of blood?” Dainy inquired. She had never heard of such a concept.
“It is a rare science,” explained Uncle Hessian. “But I’ve a method for ascertaining whether you truly are a Ducelle.” He dropped his voice. “There is a special type of lock, Dainy, called a Littemuse Lock. It is engineered to open only for a precise line of blood.”
“You mean, the blood is the key?” Dainy couldn’t fathom such a brilliant technology.
“Exactly.” Her uncle nodded. “Before she died, your mother told me where the whole of her children’s inheritance was hidden. It had to be moved out of Jordinia, you see, for the rebels were seizing all royal property.”
Dainy’s heart thrummed. She had an inheritance?
“There is a vault, just outside this village,” Uncle Hessian whispered, their identical eyes meeting. “And it is sealed by a Littemuse Lock, engineered to open only for the Ducelle bloodline.”
“And it contains my inheritance?” Dainy deduced, shocked.
“Yours, and the inheritances of your deceased brothers—which are now also yours.” He beamed, appearing nothing short of thrilled to share the news with her. “Eludaine, you are the sole surviving person who can open it.”
Dainy didn’t think she’d ever breathe properly again. All that time, struggling with her aunts in Beili, selling her hair and skipping meals to make ends meet, she’d held a vault of unspeakable valu
e in Häffstrom? She shivered to think what she could do with this fortune. Why, Paxi and Priya could live like queens in a manor as fine as this one. And poor Selu and her mother would never have to steal on the streets again.
“I’d like to visit this vault,” Dainy told him, her spirits soaring as she imagined her loved ones living out the rest of their days without another care in the world.
“We may go in the morning,” Uncle Hessian promised. “My advisor and I shall escort you.”
Dainy’s head spun. Why, save for the loss of dear Pascale, it may have been the best decision she’d ever made, to come there. She had entered Häffstrom a girl in rags, but would depart a very wealthy woman, indeed.
“But there’s something else we must discuss, of course,” Hessian reminded her. “And that is how the gold should be distributed among your champions. As well,” he added carefully, “there is the matter of your betrothal.”
Dainy’s chest tightened. “I have struggled with this myself.”
“Here’s the deal, Dainy,” said her uncle candidly. “In a safe in my drawing room are five ten-pound bars of solid gold. This was to be your rescuer’s reward. Now, if you’d like, I may give you those bars to distribute between the others as you see fit.”
Dainy’s head jerked up. “You would be so kind?”
Uncle Hessian patted her arm, leading her back to the well-lit foyer. “I am known for my kindness, my dear, if I may so boast.”
Dainy’s heart lightened significantly. She was already running the calculations in her mind, trying to weigh a fair distribution of the five bars between her four companions, who had risked so much to seek her and bring her back to her uncle, to her inheritance.
“But we’re forgetting what is, perhaps, the most important matter of all,” Uncle Hessian added, cocking his head meaningfully. “Which of those men do you wish to wed?”
Dainy looked down. “Well, to start, Bos does not compete. And now he’s with Selu. So, we’ve eliminated one man.” A pair of maids passed, curtsying to Dainy as they went. She waited until they were out of earshot before confiding, “It was always between Mac and Jon.”
Her stomach dropped painfully as she recalled Jon locked in the embraces of the blonde at the inn, and it felt as though her aching heart would burn a hole through her chest. “But Jon cares nothing for me,” she said bitterly, blinking back tears.
Her uncle looked sympathetic. “No?”
Glumly, Dainy shook her head.
Uncle Hessian set down his candle and saucer, looking upon her in that fatherly way of his. “If I may offer my humble observations,” he said, and Dainy nodded. She could use any guidance he had. “If Jon Cosmith cares nothing for you, then I doubt he would’ve spent the entire evening ogling you.”
Dainy flushed.
Her uncle steered her back to the foyer, stopping just before the staircase when a loud succession of dongs issued nearby. Dainy jumped.
“Don’t be frightened, dear girl, it’s only the grandfather clock.” He pointed to a large cabinet with the face of a sundial, and Dainy wondered whose grandfather he meant. “Dear me, but it’s already ten o’ clock! Come, and let me give you the gold, before the evening is through.”
Dainy followed him up the staircase and across the endless east wing. They passed at least a dozen doors before approaching his drawing room, a spacious chamber decorated in plaid. The man slipped around a corner to a bureau containing a small safe, and dialed the combination with a few turns of the knob. The little door popped open, and he extracted a sack that looked quite heavy—fifty pounds heavy, to be exact.
“In which room have my maids placed you, dear girl?” he gasped, heaving the load from the bottom in both hands.
Dainy hurried to her chamber, where he relieved the prize on her bedside table. “There.” He brushed his hands together. “It is yours to hand out as you wish.”
Dainy’s heart danced as she hugged him.
“Now,” he said kindly, releasing her. “Before I say goodnight ….”
She held her breath.
“I only wish for you to ask yourself one question: if Jon Cosmith cares nothing for you, but Marley Macmillan does…then why do you struggle to make a decision?”
He raised a silvery eyebrow before finally kissing her cheek, and leaving her alone to ponder. Dainy listened to his departing footfalls, until she heard his door shut a fair distance away.
She knew what she would do. After kneeling down and extracting two bars of smooth, solid gold from the sack, she left the room.
SOMEONE WAS KNOCKING. MACMILLAN KICKED off his bed sheets and made haste for the door.
It was Dainy, still dressed in her flattering gown, glowing like a thousand stars in the candlelit hallway. She glanced into his dark room, taking in his disheveled hair and rumpled bedding, and furrowed her brow apologetically. “Did I wake you?”
“You are far more important than sleep,” Macmillan insisted.
Dainy looked down, and he bit his lip. Why had he just said that?
But the girl held out something large and glittering. “Your gold,” she said simply. “Please take it.”
Macmillan’s eyes widened. If she was awarding him the gold, then surely, this also meant…?
Her laughter interrupted his thoughts. “I mean literally, Mac, please take these. They weigh ten pounds each.”
Macmillan took the two heavy bars and lowered them onto the bureau in his room. “I thought the prize was fifty pounds.”
Dainy raised an eyebrow.
“I mean,” he amended, “not that twenty isn’t plenty….”
“Uncle Hessian and I decided to split the reward between you all,” Dainy informed him.
Macmillan felt a surge of irritation. So, Cosmith was going to walk away with some gold after all, was he? “But there are four of us,” he countered, working the figures in his head. “Twenty pounds for me doesn’t make for an even split.”
“Selu wasn’t with us as long, and only wants her share for the horses. I figure ten pounds for her and Bos, who insists he desires no compensation, ought to suffice.”
Macmillan frowned. “So that means Cosmith is receiving twenty pounds as well?” He was unable to hide his disappointment. Even after all that time, and everything the other man had done, Dainy still did not favor Macmillan? In fact, she appeared to be treating them as equals. And yet, had Cosmith not said it himself? Was there any competition left?
“So, what about the other part?” Macmillan finally asked her. “Of the prize?” he clarified. He hoped she’d catch his drift, so he wouldn’t have to endure the awkwardness of articulating it to her. Here was the moment of truth, he thought, bracing himself. It was now or never.
But Dainy simply pursed her lips, backing away. “We’ll discuss that some other time, Mac.”
Macmillan sighed, leaning up against the doorframe as he watched her go. “Goodnight, Dainy,” he muttered as she disappeared down the hall.
SELU’S VIOLET EYES ENLARGED AS she slid her fingers across the smooth bar of gold. “Ten pounds for a mere three horses,” she remarked, and secured the gift beneath her mattress. “I know not how to thank you, Dainy.”
Dainy gave her a lopsided grin. “Just be sure to share that with Bos, will you? I know he’s too noble to accept anything from me. But perhaps this will…help give the two of you a fresh start,” she hinted.
Selu embraced her. “You have made me a new woman.”
There was only one bedchamber left to visit. After retrieving the bag containing the final gold bars, Dainy emerged from her room, meeting Selu in the hallway. Her heart gave a single wallop at the thought of knocking on Jon Cosmith’s door in the middle of the night. But she was determined to speak with him. It could not wait until morning.
Clutching the mouth of the heavy black sack, Dainy made her way up the hall with Sel
u. They paused at a door that was ajar, soft candlelight pouring out from the gap. Dainy glanced nervously at Selu and suddenly shook her head. She couldn’t do it.
Selu pointed at the door, but Dainy backed away.
Before Dainy could stop her, Selu reached up and rapped on the door with her bony fist. Dainy grabbed her hand and lowered it, but was too late. The door opened, and there stood Jon, still in his suit, although without the jacket, and several buttons of his blouse undone.
Selu gave Dainy a small shove forward, glaring at her meaningfully before slinking back down the hall.
Dainy’s heart pounded in her throat. She could barely look at the man as she stood across from him, holding the sack in perspiring hands.
“Good evening, then,” Jon greeted her.
She took a deep breath, lifting her chin. “Uncle Hessian and I have agreed to split the gold between you.” She held out the bag. “Here.”
Jon did not take it.
“It’s yours,” said Dainy, thrusting the bag at him.
Without any hint of enthusiasm, he finally took it. He then lowered it to the floor, just inside the door, without so much as looking at it.
“It’s twenty pounds of gold,” Dainy informed him, although he hadn’t asked.
Jon shifted his shoulders. “You look stunning tonight, Dainy,” he said softly.
Touched, Dainy was about to thank him, when he shrugged in a cavalier manner, giving her one of his sportive grins. “You’ll surely make Macmillan a happy man. Congratulations to you both.”
His words stung. But even more hurtful was his casual tone and jaunty grin, as though he didn’t care a lick whether she should wed another man.
“Yes, well,” she tossed back. “I suppose no singular woman could ever satisfy the great Jon Cosmith, after all.” Wounded, she turned to leave, but his voice rang out behind her.
“You are the one who continually spurned my advances, Dainy.”
She swiveled back around. “Only because your advances carried other motives.”