Christmas By Candlelight: Two Regency Holiday Novellas

“
A
curse on Christmas
.”

Nicholas Wrenfax, Viscount Killingworth, was not in the habit of swearing, but he tacked on a rather colorful expletive as he squinted through the pelting sleet and fought to keep his phaeton from running off the road. The night was black as Hades—which seemed particularly appropriate, for at that very moment Hades was just the spot to which he wanted to toss his father, along with Lord Castlereagh and the entire Foreign Office.

Tugging up the sodden collar of his driving coat, he tightened his hold on the ribbons, trying to keep a grip on his growing anger. He had, after all, been well schooled in reining in his feelings. From the time he was in leading strings, his father, a distinguished diplomat, had stressed the importance of being ruled by reason rather than emotion.

Duty over desire.

It was a lesson Nicholas had learned well, having had an admirable man to emulate. The Earl of Royster was esteemed by all who knew him as a man of high-minded principle and unyielding devotion to duty. Ever since he could remember, Nicholas had wanted to march in his father footsteps. He had applied himself diligently to his studies, and after garnering high honors at Oxford, had chosen to accept a position—granted, a very junior position—with the Home Office while most of his friends had larked off to London to sow their wild oats.

He knew that a number of them considered him a stick-in-the-mud for never kicking up his heels. But the weight of government responsibilities and family expectations kept his feet planted firmly on the ground. He felt he must toe the line. . .

Even when that line seemed at times to be rigidly straight and pinchingly narrow.

Toe the line
—yes, that explained why, curse the holidays, he was racing toward London in a freezing rainstorm, feeling cold, wet and miserable, when instead he should be stretched out by the fire at his best friend’s country estate, feeling snug warm and pleasantly foxed on the case of excellent port that had just been brought up from the cellars.

Nicholas shifted on his perch, uncomfortably aware of his father’s request tucked in the pocket of his waistcoat—its elegant parchment and copperplate script now reduced to a sodden squish. Or rather, he corrected himself grimly, his father’s
order
to rush back to Town. For despite the sugar coating of the words, the note of command had oozed from the pen strokes like the filling of a Christmas sweetmeat.

He still had a sour taste in his mouth from rereading it during the brief stop he had made at an inn several hours ago. Not that the text needed any elaborate analysis. Its message was perfectly clear. The younger Wrenfax was urgently needed for a special assignment of great importance. So Nicholas was expected to present himself without delay to take part in a whirl of holiday parties—where he was to pay court to the ward of an influential foreign count.

The match was perfect on paper, reasoned his father. The young lady’s lineage and looks were of the highest order, and a union would ensure a crucial alliance for the British government. And seeing that Nicholas had shown no particular preference for any of the ladies currently on the Marriage Mart, what possible objection could he have for his father’s making a prudent and practical match?

What possible objection, indeed! Nicholas’s exasperated snort echoed the complaint from his tired team of greys. Just because he had been too occupied with official duties to give any thought to choosing a wife did not mean he wished to relinquish the right to control his own personal life.

Damnation.
Perhaps for once in his life. . .

His mood turned even grimmer as the sleet changed to thick, wet flakes. This was courting disaster, he thought darkly as a gusting wind lashed his face. He had better come upon some sign of civilization soon. His horses were starting to stumble and his own limbs were fast turning numb. Nicolas blinked, trying to see through the swirling snow, but ice clung to his lashes, turning the surroundings to naught but an ominous blur. Still, it soon became clear that the road was taking a steeper twist, and drifts were beginning to slow his progress to a mere crawl.

Worst of all, he had a sneaking suspicion that he had taken a wrong turn back at the last fork.

A pox on Edmund for suggesting a shortcut to the London road!

And a pox on his own miserable hide for allowing himself to be spurred into making such an ill-judged journey.

Nicolas let another oath slip from his lips. He didn’t normally embark on any endeavor without careful thought and preparations, but the note of urgency in his father’s letter had caused him to abandon his usual sense of caution. Urged on by his friends, he had decided to dash down to Town alone, leaving his valet and luggage to follow in the much slower—and safer—travelling coach.

With a shake of the frozen reins, he tried to coax his team to a brisker pace. However, the phaeton was having more and more difficulty in plowing through the drifting snow. As the wheels hit a deep rut, causing a sharp skid, one of the exhausted horses stumbled and pulled up lame.

Jumping down from his perch, Nicholas quickly freed it from the tangled traces. Though tired and shivering himself, he took a moment to calm both animals, and then readjusted the harness for the straitened circumstances. He would go on for another mile or so on foot, he decided, guiding the team over the fast-disappearing road. If he didn’t come to some sort of shelter, he would have to improvise. It wouldn’t be the first time he had been forced to rough it in the wilds. Most of his acquaintances assumed he did nothing but sit behind a desk and shuffle papers, but his diplomatic mission to Lisbon had actually entailed several forays to meet with partisan fighters. If he ended up being trapped in the storm, Nicolas was confident he had the practical skills to survive.

However, it appeared that Luck had not entirely abandoned him. Rounding a bend, he caught sight of a faint light up ahead. With a muttered prayer of thanks, he stepped up his struggle through the deepening drifts and a short while later managed to limp into the narrow coaching yard of a small inn.

A rap on the stable door roused no response. Though miserably wet and thoroughly exhausted, Nicholas rubbed down his horses, and scrounged up some grain and water for them before trudging to the tavern entrance—where yet again, his knock went unanswered.

His temper, already frayed to a single thread, suddenly snapped.

“Damnation!” Smacking his shoulder to the door, Nicholas grabbed the latch and slammed his way inside. “Is there no one to give a gentleman a hand around here?” he bellowed, stamping the snow from his boots. That his toes now felt frozen into solid blocks of ice did nothing to improve his mood.

A moment later, a balding man bustled out from a side parlor. “Forgive me, sir,’ he mumbled, wiping his hands on his apron. “We rarely get much traffic from Quality at this time of night, and I was just serving a meal to another unexpected guest.”

Nicholas doubted the isolated inn got many visits at any hour of the day. And judging by the rough-planked floor and rustic furnishings, he imagined his short stay was going to be an awfully unpleasant one.

“I will be wanting a room,” he snapped. “Preferably one without fleas.”

The innkeeper cringed as Nicholas gave him his name.

“”I—I shall do my best to see that you are comfortable, milord. Shall you be wanting a meal as well, sir?”

“Just a bottle of brandy,” muttered Nicolas. “Assuming it hasn’t been watered down with horse piss.”

“Yes, milord—er, no, milord.” Confused, and clearly intimidated, the man edged back a step before recalling his duties and returning to snap up the small valise by Nicholas’s feet. “If you would care to follow me upstairs, milord. . .”

Feeling a bit ashamed of himself, Nicholas fell in step behind the fellow. Though he was tired and frustrated, there was no call to be so arrogantly rude. “I apologize for my outburst,” he said on reaching his room. That the spill of candlelight showed it to be quite neat, with freshly ironed linens on the narrow bedstead only made him feel more like a prig.

“What with the hellish weather, the journey has been a nightmare,” he went on, “I fear my nerves are rather frayed.” The one consolation, he told himself, was that things could not get any worse.

“I quite understand, milord,” replied the innkeeper. “The storm blew in from nowhere, but I daresay it will clear off by morning and you will be able to continue on your way.”

Nicholas devoutly hoped so. Christmas was only two days off and from the way his father had phrased the request, his goose would be cooked—along with the rest of the holiday feast—if he didn’t show up at Wrenfax House for the gala ball.

“Are you sure there is nothing else I can get for you, sir?”

“Thank you, but no. Just the brandy.”

As it was, Nicholas barely managed to stay awake long enough to toss back a glass of the warming spirits before crawling under the bedcovers and falling into an exhausted sleep.

* * *

A
rrogant man
.

The young lady taking her meal in the private parlor couldn’t help but overhear the peevish exchange.
And odiously ill tempered to boot.
Why, the stomping of his boots had nearly rattled the door to her dining alcove off its hinges. Had she been the innkeeper, she would have been tempted to respond with a kick of her own—aimed right at the pompous prig’s rump!

But then, Anna Wintergrove Fedorova was not feeling in charity with
any
overbearing male at the moment.

Setting aside her tea, Anna looked down at her uncle’s letter. How dare he order her back to London, as if she were naught but a mare, to be put up for auction at Tattersall’s and sold to the highest bidder?

A foolish question, of course. The answer was staring her right in the face, the bold black script a mocking reminder of how little control she had over her own life.

Oh, if only she had her independence!

She would trade her vast fortune, her august pedigree and celebrated looks in a heartbeat for a bit of unfettered freedom. For months, she had been looking forward to escaping from her regimented life in London—if only for a short interlude—and spending the holidays with a dear school friend.

But duty, in the form of her rigid guardian uncle, had suddenly summoned her back to Town. And no one but no one dared disobey Count Yevgeny Gilpin Fedorov.

Anna made a face. The English acted as though her uncle had a great black bear chained in his study, ready to eat anyone who had the gall to disagree with him. The Count certainly looked like a fearsome predator from the steppes with his great black beard and flashing Cossack eyes. Granted, the beard was neatly trimmed, and the roar was a cultured baritone that could converse on art and music in seven different languages. A confidante of the Tsar, Fedorov had been in London for months, handling a series of delicate and demanding negotiations between Britain and Russia. Not that she had seen much of him. Save for the occasional soiree at their Grosvenor Square townhouse, where she served as his hostess, the count was rarely at home.

What with his travels and his duties, Uncle Yevgeny had been a rather distant figure of authority since the death of her English mother and Russian father had left him her legal guardian. But then, he had not really been required to devote much attention to her. Her life had been very well ordered—for years she had attended an exclusive boarding school for young ladies outside of London, and lived the rest of the year with her Russian grandmother on a vast estate near St. Petersburg.

But now that she had been out of the schoolroom for several years, her uncle’s attitude was becoming decidedly less laissez-faire.

After two whirlwind Seasons at the Russian Imperial Court, where she had driven him to distraction by rejecting marriage proposals from a number of extremely eligible noblemen, he had threatened to put his foot down. If she could not make up her mind, he warned, he would do it for her.

A sigh escaped Anna’s lips. Uncle Yevgeny meant well, but he was of the Old Guard, for whom marriage was a matter of strategic alliances.
Money. Power. Land.
His long and distinguished government career, coupled with the interminable war against Napoleon that was still raging through Europe, had only reinforced the importance of tangible assets. He simply did not seem to understand that happiness could not be negotiated in quite the same way as a border dispute. Dispassionate reason was all very well when it came to compromising over slivers of earth.

But when it came to matters of the heart. . .

She felt a tiny lurch in her chest. She did not wish to settle for a match because it tallied up well on paper. She had been courted according to the rules—impressive bouquets, flowery poetry, effusive compliments on her looks and manners. It was all so. . . expected. As were the gentlemen themselves. They were all so perfectly proper, perfectly polished, perfectly suitable.

And perfectly boring.

Not a one had shown a spark of unique character or spirit.