by L. J. Smith
“I promise,” Damon said solemnly.
I stiffened. Was Damon escorting Katherine tomorrow night? I hadn’t thought she’d come to the party, and I couldn’t imagine proposing in front of her. But what choice did I have? Tell Father that Katherine wasn’t invited? Not propose to Rosalyn?
“Have fun tonight, boys,” Pearl said, breaking me out of my reverie.
“Wait!” I called, the dinner momentarily forgotten.
Pearl turned around, a quizzical expression on her face.
“It’s dark, and there have been more attacks. Would you like us to escort you ladies home?” I asked.
Pearl shook her head. “Anna and I are strong women. We’ll be fine. Besides …” She blushed and glanced around, as if afraid to be overheard. “I believe Jonathan Gilbert wants to do that for us. But I do thank you for your concern.”
Damon wiggled his eyebrows and let out a low whistle. “You know how I feel about strong women,” he whispered.
“Damon. Be appropriate,” I said, slugging him on the shoulder. After all, he wasn’t on the battlefields anymore. He was in Mystic Falls, a town where people liked to eavesdrop and loved to talk. Had he forgotten so quickly?
“Okay, Auntie Stefan!” Damon teased, raising his voice in a high lisp. I laughed despite myself and slugged him again on the arm for good measure. The punch was light, but felt good—a way to unleash some of my annoyance that he was able to escort Katherine to the dinner.
He good-naturedly slugged me back, and we would have broken out into an all-out brotherly brawl if Damon hadn’t pushed open the wooden door to the Mystic Falls Tavern. We were immediately greeted by an enthusiastic smile from the voluptuous, red-haired barmaid behind the counter. It was clear that Damon had made himself at home here on several occasions.
We elbowed our way to the back of the tavern. The room smelled of sawdust and sweat, and men in uniform were everywhere. Some had bandages on their heads, others wore slings, and some hobbled to the counter on crutches. I recognized Henry, a dark-skinned soldier who practically lived at the tavern, drinking whiskey alone in a corner. Robert had told me stories about him: He never socialized with anyone, and no one ever saw him in the light of day. There was talk that maybe he was associated with the attacks, but how could he be, if he was always at the tavern?
I peeled my eyes away to take in the rest of the scene. There were older men tightly grouped in a corner, playing cards and drinking whiskey and, in the opposite corner, a few women. I could tell from the rouge on their cheeks and their painted fingernails that they weren’t the types to spend time with our childhood playmates, Clementine Haverford or Amelia Hawke. As we walked past, one of them brushed my arm with her painted fingernails.
“You like it here?” Damon pulled out a wooden table from the wall, an amused smile on his face.
“I suppose I do.” I plunked down on the hard wooden bench and surveyed my surroundings once again. Being in the tavern, I felt I’d stumbled into a secret society of men, just one more thing I knew I’d have little chance to discover before I was a married man and expected to be at home every evening.
“I’ll get us some drinks,” Damon said, making his way to the bar. I watched as he rested his elbows on the counter and easily talked to the barmaid, who tilted her head back and laughed as if he’d said something hilarious. Which he probably had. That’s why all women fell in love with him.
“So, how does it feel to be a married man?”
I turned around to see Dr. Janes behind me. Well into his seventies, Dr. Janes was slightly senile and often loudly proclaimed to anyone who’d listen that his longevity was due exclusively to his prodigious indulgence in whiskey.
“Not married yet, Doctor.” I smiled tightly, wishing Damon would come back with our drinks.
“Ah, my boy, but you will be. Mr. Cartwright at the bank has been discussing it for weeks. The fair young Rosalyn. Quite a catch!” Dr. Janes continued loudly. I glanced around, hoping no one had heard.
At that moment, Damon appeared and gently set our whiskeys on the table. “Thank you,” I said, drinking mine down in one gulp. Dr. Janes hobbled away.
“That thirsty, huh?” Damon asked, taking a small sip of his own drink.
I shrugged. In the past, I’d never kept secrets from my brother. But talking about Rosalyn felt dangerous. Somehow, no matter what I said or felt, I still had to marry her. If anyone heard even an inkling of regret from me, there’d be no end to the talk.
Suddenly, a new whiskey appeared in front of me. I glanced up to see the pretty bartender Damon had been talking to standing over our table.
“You look like you need this. Seems you’ve had a rough day.” The barmaid winked one of her green eyes and set the sweating tumbler on the rough-hewn wooden table in front of me.
“Thank you,” I said as I took a small, grateful sip.
“Anytime,” the barmaid said, her crinoline skirts swishing over her hips. I watched her retreating back. All the women in the tavern, even those with loose reputations, were more interesting than Rosalyn. But no matter who I glanced at, the only image that filled my mind was Katherine’s face.
“Alice likes you,” Damon observed.
I shook my head. “You know I can’t look. By the end of summer, I’ll be a married man. You, meanwhile, are free to do as you please.” I’d meant it to be an observation, but the words came out as a judgment.
“That’s true,” Damon said. “But you do know you don’t have to do something just because Father says so, right?”
“It’s not that simple.” I clenched my jaw. Damon couldn’t understand because he was wild and untamable—so much so that Father had entrusted me, the younger brother, with the future of Veritas, a role I now found stifling.
A sliver of betrayal shot through me at this thought—that it was Damon’s fault I had to shoulder so much responsibility. I shook my head, as if trying to remove the idea from it, and took another drink of whiskey.
“It’s very simple,” Damon said, oblivious to my momentary annoyance. “Just tell him you are not in love with Rosalyn. That you need to find your own place in the world and can’t just follow someone’s orders blindly. That’s what I learned in the army: You have to believe in what you do. Otherwise, what’s the point?”
I shook my head. “I’m not like you. I trust Father. And I know he only wants the best. It’s just that I wish … I wish I had more time,” I said finally. It was true. Maybe I could grow to love Rosalyn, but the thought that I could be married and have a child in just one short year filled me with dread. “But it’ll be fine,” I said with finality. It had to be.
“What do you think of our new houseguest?” I said, changing the subject.
Damon smiled. “Katherine,” he said, drawing the name into the full three syllables, as if he could taste it on his tongue. “Now, she’s a girl who’s difficult to figure out, don’t you agree?”
“I suppose,” I said, glad that Damon didn’t know that I was dreaming of Katherine at night, and by day pausing at the door to the carriage house to see if I could hear her laughing with her maid; once I even stopped by the stable to smell the broad back of her horse, Clover, just to see if her lemon and ginger scent had lingered. It hadn’t, and at that moment, in the barn surrounded by the horses, I’d realized how unbalanced I was becoming.
“They don’t make girls like her in Mystic Falls. Do you think she has a soldier somewhere?” Damon asked.
“No!” I said, annoyed once again. “She’s in mourning for her parents. I hardly think she’s looking for a beau.”
“Of course.” Damon knit his eyebrows together contritely. “And I wasn’t presuming anything. But if she needs a shoulder to cry on, I’d be happy to lend it to her.”
I shrugged. Even though I’d brought up the subject, I was no longer sure I wanted to hear what Damon thought of her. In fact, as beautiful as she was, I almost wished that some far-flung relatives from Charleston or Richmond or Atlanta would step f
orward to invite her to live with them. If she were out of sight, then maybe I could somehow force myself to love Rosalyn.
Damon stared at me, and I knew in that moment how miserable I must have looked. “Cheer up, brother,” he said. “The night is young, and the whiskey’s on me.”
But there wasn’t enough whiskey in all of Virginia to make me love Rosalyn … or forget about Katherine.
6
The weather didn’t break by my engagement dinner a few days later, and even at five o’clock in the afternoon the air was hot and humid. In the kitchen, I’d overheard the servants gossiping that the strange, still weather was a result of the animal-killing demons. But discussion of the demons did not stop people from all over the county coming to the Grange Hall to celebrate the Confederacy. The coaches backed up beyond the stone drive and showed no sign of slowing their onslaught toward the imposing stone structure.
“Stefan Salvatore!” I heard as I stepped out of the coach behind my father.
As my feet hit dirt, I saw Ellen Emerson and her daughter, Daisy, walking arm in arm, trailed by two maids. Hundreds of lanterns lit the stone steps leading to the white wooden doors, and carriages lined the curved walkway. I could hear strains of a waltz coming from inside the hall.
“Mrs. Emerson. Daisy.” I bowed deeply. Daisy had hated me ever since we were children, when Damon had dared me to push her into Willow Creek.
“Why, if it isn’t the gorgeous Emerson ladies,” Father said, also bowing. “Thank you to both of you for coming to this small supper. It’s so good to see everyone in town. We need to band together, now more than ever,” Father said, catching Ellen Emerson’s eye.
“Stefan,” Daisy repeated, nodding as she took my hand.
“Daisy. You look more beautiful every day. Can you please forgive a gentleman for his wicked youth?”
She glared at me. I sighed. There was no mystery or intrigue in Mystic Falls. Everyone knew everyone else. If Rosalyn and I were to get married, our children would be dancing with Daisy’s children. They would have the same conversations, the same jokes, the same fights. And the cycle would continue for eternity.
“Ellen, would you do me the honor of allowing me to show you inside?” Father asked, anxious to make sure the hall was decorated according to his exacting specifications. Daisy’s mother nodded, and Daisy and I were left under the watchful gaze of the Emersons’ maid.
“I’ve heard Damon’s back. How is he?” Daisy asked, finally deigning to talk to me.
“Miss Emerson, we best be going inside to find your mama,” Daisy’s maid interrupted, tugging Daisy’s arm through the wide double doors of the Grange Hall.
“I look forward to seeing Damon. Do give him that message!” Daisy called over her shoulder.
I sighed and stepped into the hall. Located between town and the estate, the Grange had once been a meeting spot for the county’s landed gentry but had now become a makeshift armory. The walls of the hall were covered with ivy and wisteria and, farther up, Confederate flags. A band on the raised stage in the corner played a jaunty rendition of “The Bonnie Blue Flag,” and at least fifty couples circled the floor with glasses of punch in their hands. Father had obviously spared no expense, and it was clear that this was more than a simple welcome dinner for the troops.
Heart-heavy, I headed over to the punch.
I hadn’t walked more than five steps when I felt a hand clap my back. I prepared myself to give a tight smile and accept the awkward congratulations that were already trickling in. What was the point of having a dinner to announce an engagement that everyone seemed to know about? I thought sourly.
I turned to find myself face-to-face with Mr. Cartwright. I instantly composed my expression into something I hoped resembled excitement.
“Stefan, boy! If it isn’t the man of the hour!” Mr. Cartwright said, offering me a glass of whiskey.
“Sir. Thank you for allowing me the pleasure of your daughter’s company,” I said automatically, taking the smallest sip I could muster. I’d woken up with a terrible whiskey headache the morning after Damon and I spent time at the tavern. I’d stayed in bed, a cool compress on my forehead, while Damon had barely seemed affected. I’d heard him chasing Katherine through the labyrinth in the backyard. Every laugh I’d heard was like a tiny dagger in my brain.
“The pleasure is all yours. I know it’s a good merger. Practical and low risk with plenty of opportunity for growth.”
“Thank you, sir,” I said. “And I am so sorry about Rosalyn’s dog.”
Mr. Cartwright shook his head. “Don’t tell my wife or Rosalyn, but I’d always hated the damn thing. Not saying it should have gone and gotten itself killed, but I think everyone is getting themselves all worked up over nothing. All this discussion of demons you hear all over the damn place. People whispering that the town is cursed. It’s that kind of talk that makes people so afraid of risk. Makes them nervous about putting their money in the bank,” Mr. Cartwright boomed, causing several people to stare. I smiled nervously.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Father acting as host and shuttling people toward the long table at the center of the room. I noticed each place was set with Mother’s delicate fleur-de-lis china.
“Stefan,” my father said, clapping his hand on my shoulder, “are you ready? You have everything you need?”
“Yes.” I touched the ring in my breast pocket and followed him to the head of the table. Rosalyn stood next to her mother and smiled tightly at her parents. Rosalyn’s eyes, still red from crying over poor Penny, clashed horribly with the oversize, frilly pink dress she was wearing.
As our neighbors took their seats around us, I realized that there were still two empty seats to my left.
“Where’s your brother?” Father asked, lowering his voice.
I glanced toward the door. The band was still playing, and there was anticipation in the air. Finally, the doors opened with a clatter, and Damon and Katherine walked in. Together.
It wasn’t fair, I thought savagely. Damon could act like a boy, could continue to drink and flirt as if nothing had consequence. I’d always done the right thing, the responsible thing, and now it felt as though I was being punished for it by being forced to become a man.
Even I was surprised by the surge of anger I felt. Instantly guilty, I tried to squelch the emotion by downing the full glass of wine to my left. After all, would Katherine have been expected to come to the dinner by herself? And wasn’t Damon just being gallant, the good elder brother?
Besides, they had no future. Marriages, at least in our society, were approved only if they merged two families. And, as an orphan, what did Katherine have to offer besides beauty? Father would never let me marry her, but that also meant he wouldn’t let Damon marry her either. And even Damon wouldn’t go so far as to marry someone Father didn’t approve of. Right?
Still, I couldn’t tear my eyes away from Damon’s arm around Katherine’s tiny waist. She wore a green muslin dress whose fabric spread across her hoop skirts, and there was a hushed murmur as she and Damon made their way to the two empty seats at the center of the table. Her blue necklace gleamed at her throat, and she winked at me before taking the empty seat next to my own. Her hip brushed against mine, and I shifted uncomfortably.
“Damon.” Father nodded tersely as Damon sat down to his left.
“So do you think the army will be all the way down to Georgia by winter?” I asked Jonah Palmer loudly, simply because I didn’t trust myself to speak to Katherine. If I heard her musical voice, I might lose my nerve to propose to Rosalyn.
“I’m not worried about Georgia. What I am worried about is getting the militia together to solve the problems here in Mystic Falls. These attacks will not be stood for,” Jonah, the town veterinarian who had also been training the Mystic Falls militia, said loudly, pounding his fist on the table so hard, the china rattled.
Just then, an army of servants entered the hall, holding plates of wild pheasant. I took my silver fork a
nd pushed the gamey meat around my plate; I had no appetite. Around me, I could hear the usual discussions: about the war, about what we could do for our boys in gray, about upcoming dinners and barbecues and church socials. Katherine was nodding intently at Honoria Fells across the table. Suddenly I felt jealous of the grizzled, frizzy-haired Honoria. She was able to have the one-on-one conversation with Katherine that I so desperately wanted.
“Ready, son?” Father elbowed me in the ribs, and I noticed that people were already finished with their meals. More wine was being poured, and the band, who’d paused during the main course, was playing in the corner. This was the moment everyone had been waiting for: They knew an announcement was about to be made, and they knew that following that announcement there would be celebrating and dancing. It was always the way dinners happened in Mystic Falls. But I’d never before been at the center of an announcement. As if on cue, Honoria leaned toward me, and Damon smiled encouragingly.
Feeling sick to my stomach, I took a deep breath and clinked my knife against my crystal glass. Immediately, there was a hush throughout the hall, and even the servants stopped midstep to stare at me.
I stood up, took a long swig of red wine for courage, and cleared my throat.
“I … um,” I began in a low, strained voice I didn’t recognize as my own. “I have an announcement.” Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Father clutching his champagne flute, ready to jump in with a toast. I glanced at Katherine. She was looking at me, her dark eyes piercing my own. I tore my gaze away and gripped my glass so tightly, I was sure it would break. “Rosalyn, I’d like to ask your hand in marriage. Will you do me the honor?” I said in a rush, fumbling in my suit pocket for the ring.
I pulled out the box and knelt down in front of Rosalyn, staring up at her watery brown eyes. “For you,” I said without inflection, flipping open the lid and holding it out toward her.
Rosalyn shrieked, and the room burst into a smattering of applause. I felt a hand clap my back, and I saw Damon grinning down on me. Katherine clapped politely, an unreadable expression on her face.