His chest shook, and she realized he was trying to hold in laughter. She stared at him, indignant. “I want to give you a choice, you idiot. I don’t want to make you feel like you have to do it.”
He broke into laughter. She groaned and curled into a ball.
“I’ve made my choice,” he said. “In fact, I’ve done everything in my power to get you right here into my bed, and I had to work very hard for it. I gave you no reason to believe that I’ll abandon you. Or murder the children and leave them on the side of the road. Really, that was priceless. I was a bit put out.”
She glared at him. “A bit put out” apparently meant three days of the silent treatment.
He pulled her close. “I’m not doing this to rescue you. I’m doing this for entirely selfish reasons—I love you, and I don’t want to be without you.”
“I love you, too,” she told him.
“Let’s get married now,” he offered. “We’ll go down to the magistrate in the morning . . .”
“Thirty days,” she said firmly. “After your parents meet me.”
“You’re an impossible woman,” he said mournfully.
“You wouldn’t love me if I wasn’t,” she said.
“True.”
She kissed him. He wrapped his arms around her, and she smiled. Tomorrow would bring new troubles, but for now she was perfectly and completely happy.
THE castle was enormous. It spread atop a hill like a crouching dragon: at the front, heavily fortified entrance, like a mouth, followed by the stretch of the wall—the beast’s neck. Next a round tall tower stabbed the sky—the dragon’s leg, followed by a cluster of fortified buildings surrounded by a high wall with a spiked parapet curling on the edge of a cliff, like a massive ridged tail around hindquarters. The brown stone, darkened with age, intensified the illusion. Rose gaped at it.
“It only looks severe,” Declan informed her. “Inside, it’s very open. The Duchess of the Southern Provinces has a fondness for natural light and gauzy curtains. It will be quick, I promise. We go in, I report to the Duke, and then we depart for Camarine Keep. We’ll be home by tomorrow night.”
Rose shrugged, trying to get rid of the tension sitting between her shoulder blades. Her horse, a smaller version of Declan’s Grunt, immediately reacted by dancing in place. He had bought it for her in that first town. The kids each got a mount of their own. George rode like a natural, with almost Declan-like elegance, while Jack mostly clung to the horse, clawing at it at every bump, until both he and his horse dashed about in blind panic.
The trip across Adrianglia had taken almost a week. Both she and the kids had ended up with raw thighs after the first day of riding, and after that, they’d taken it slow and easy. It was an odd place, clean and beautiful in some areas, stark in others. Ruins dotted the countryside here and there, scars of old wars. She had tried to prepare herself for the possibility that she might dislike the Weird, but it grew on her, with its patches of forest and horseless carriages, and children playing with magic on the sides of the roads.
She had been completely blindsided by Declan’s status. She had known he was a Marshal, but she’d never quite realized what it entailed. People bowed. When he passed through a town, a report was brought, usually by a commander of the local militia. Every stop was a working stop. The first time someone called her “my lady,” it zoomed right over her head. She had tried her best not to embarrass him. Unfortunately, she knew this would last only until she came into contact with other nobles.
Now she had to face the Duke of the Southern Provinces. He was the man to whom Declan answered. The man she desperately needed to impress, even more so than Declan’s parents. She still wore her jeans and a T-shirt. Her hair was still a short mess. She was still unrefined. She was Rose. And Declan was determined to drag her into the castle.
They rode up the road. This was so not going to end well.
They passed under the portcullis. Declan merely nodded at the guards, dressed in gray and blue. Everybody bowed. He jumped off Grunt and helped her down off her mount. The kids dismounted, and Declan started toward the doors.
“I was thinking, we might just stay here,” Rose said. “We can wait for you.”
“ ‘Dear Declan, where is your bride?’ ‘Oh, I left her outside, Your Grace.’ ” Declan shook his head. “I don’t think so.”
He took her by the hand, gently, but she knew with absolute certainty that she wouldn’t be able to get away, and guided her inside into the lobby. A wide room stretched before her, terminating in a staircase leading up. On both sides of the staircase she saw arched entrances opening into a vast hall. The floor was old worn stone. Tapestries decorated the walls. Small trees and bright flowers grew in huge pots along the walls. Bathed in the light of numerous windows, the hall looked surprisingly cheery.
A man appeared. His hair was silver, his clothes black leather, his face grim. He looked like he could kill people with his stare alone. “He’s waiting for you, my lord,” he said.
Declan nodded and glanced at her. “Wait for me, please,” he said, “I’ll be right back.”
He ran up the stairway. The man followed him. They were alone.
George looked at his shoes. Jack reached over, plucked a small leaf from the nearest tree, and nervously chewed on it.
“Jack, don’t do that,” she murmured.
A woman emerged from one of the entrances on the right. Jack swallowed the leaf.
She was older, tall, dark-haired, very beautiful, and dressed in a ragged shirt smeared with cream-colored paint. They looked at each other.
“Who are you?” the woman asked. A frosty sheen crossed her eyes and melted into their dark depths.
Oh God. A blueblood.
“I’m here with Declan,” Rose said. “These are my brothers. We’re just here for a minute.”
The woman pursed her lips. “Are you from the Broken?”
“Actually, I’m from the Edge,” Rose said carefully.
“Can you paint walls?”
Rose blinked. “Yes.”
“Would you mind helping me? I’ve been painting non-stop, and my back really hurts.”
There was only one answer to that. “Not at all.”
The woman smiled. She had a very warm smile, and Rose relaxed a little. “Come with me!”
They followed her into a side hallway, up a window stairway to the second floor and into a room layered with cloth. Half of one wall was cream. The rest was steel gray.
“I think it looks better with cream, don’t you?” the woman said.
“It looks brighter.”
The woman handed her a roller. In a few minutes all three of them were painting.
“When I become worried, I paint the walls,” the woman said. “I’ve done four rooms so far. Well, six, actually, since I changed my mind several times on the color. Your brothers are adorable.”
“Thank you. Why were you worried?” Rose asked.
“Because of Declan, of course. The whole mess with Casshorn nearly brought me to an early grave. I realize we won, but would you mind filling in the details?”
Rose bit her lip. “I’m not sure I should tell you.”
The woman smiled. “I know most of the story: Casshorn had stolen a device from the Duke of the Southern Provinces that feeds on magic and makes hounds. He took it across the country into the Edge. Declan left to retrieve it and save William, who managed to entangle himself in this mess. So how did it end?”
“Declan was flashing and Rose almost died, because she flashed to kill Casshorn and she had no flash left, and then Declan flashed at Rose to save her,” Jack said.
“Jack!” Rose snapped.
The woman’s eyes widened. “Really?”
Jack nodded. “Grandma said Rose’s mouth and her eyes were bleeding.”
George dug his elbow into Jack’s side. “Shut up.”
“I have to know the whole story now,” the woman said
“I’d rather not,” Rose said.
“Please, I insist.”
Twenty minutes and two walls later, she had the whole story, and Rose wasn’t quite sure how she’d gotten it.
“You really intend to make him wait a month to marry you?” The woman laughed softly.
“I want him to be sure.”
“Do you know how long the Duchess has been trying to marry him off? If she discovers he found a bride, you won’t escape.”
“I’m hoping to avoid the Duchess. I don’t know anything about manners, haircuts, or proper clothes, and I hope to learn a bit before we meet.” Rose hesitated. “Why would the Duchess care whether or not Declan is married? I mean, he’s a courtesy earl. I know the Duke seems to rely on him and he’s the Marshal, but I was hoping the Duchess wouldn’t take an interest.”
The woman stopped her roller. “Oh, dear.”
“I’m sorry?”
“Declan has this annoying habit. He doesn’t quite lie. Instead he allows people to arrive at the wrong conclusions and doesn’t bother to correct them.”
“You know him very well.” Rose smiled.
“Dear, in Adrianglia, nobles—they are called peers here—peers carry several titles. A duke might also be an earl or a baron. An heir can assume the rank of his sire only when his sire retires or dies. Until then, if the heir has completed his service and passed his examinations, he assumes the next best title in his bloodline. Declan is a courtesy peer, because although he completed his service, his sire is still alive. He is the son of the Duke and Duchess of the Southern Provinces.”
“Oh God.” Rose dropped the roller.
“Look on the bright side: you don’t have to worry about clothes, haircuts, or manners. If you marry Earl Camarine, you could prance into society in a potato sack and it would become the latest fashion.”
“So Casshorn was his uncle?” Rose asked. Maybe she misunderstood . . .
“Indeed. And he always hated Declan and Maud, his sister. You see, the mother of the current Duchess was born in the Broken. That’s why Declan can travel back and forth between the worlds. He is what you might call a mix. Casshorn never could stand the Duchess. Nobody quite knows why, and so he—”
Footsteps echoed in the hallway. Declan’s voice called, “Mother?” He ducked into the doorway. “Mother, have you seen—”
He saw Rose and clamped his mouth shut.
“I’ve seen, and I approve!” the woman said brightly.
“Mother?” Rose stared at her.
The woman frowned. “I probably should have mentioned: that annoying habit of letting people come to the wrong conclusions and not correcting them? He got it from me.”
Declan’s face turned icy. “You just couldn’t leave well enough alone.”
“No, I couldn’t. But I absolutely love her,” the Duchess answered. “Don’t worry about the one-month requirement—it will take me that long to organize the wedding.”
Rose simply stared. An older version of Declan appeared in the doorway. “We’ve misplaced the bride . . . Oh, here you are.” He shouldered his way into the room.
An even older man followed. Gaunt and dressed in dark purple, he saw Rose and said, “Why, she is lovely.” He glanced at the boys. “Which of you is the necromancer?”
A young female voice yelled at the door, “Let me into the room! I’m his sister, damn it!”
Rose backed away, pressing against the freshly painted wall. They were too big, too loud, too full of magic. Jack hissed.
Declan stepped forward, pushed the double doors open, took her hand, and pulled her through onto a wide balcony.
“Did you see that?” the Duchess yelled. “He rescued her from us. This wedding is on!”
“Sorry. They’re just excited,” Declan told her, leading her to the end of the balcony.
“You lied to me again.”
“No, I just didn’t tell you the whole truth.”
She shook her head. “A duke?”
“Not for another twenty years or so.”
“God, your mother probably thinks I’m an idiot.”
“She likes you. She likes the kids, too. Rose, I’m still me. Does it really matter if I’m a duke or not? If I didn’t have a title, you would’ve married me already. Forget the castle. Forget my family.”
One of the older men leaned out of the doors. “I just want to see the triple arch,” he called. “Then I’ll leave you two alone!”
“I love you. Marry me,” Declan said.
His eyes were green like grass blades.
She put her arms around his neck and kissed him as the triple arch of her flash spun about them. In the doorway, the older man swore.
Declan grinned at her. She grinned back.
“Say yes,” he said.
“Yes,” she said. “But not before the month is over.”
FB2 document info
Document ID: 490dc922-93bd-4c73-b5c8-f7a748a4efde
Document version: 1
Document creation date: 5.6.2011
Created using: calibre 0.8.2, FB Editor v2.3 software
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On the Edge te-1 Page 33