Duainfey (2 page)

"You," the Queen said, "are ill. Was this done to you?"

"Ma'am, it was not. I hunger for the taste—the texture—of their auras. It may be a peculiarity of myself alone. Certainly, now that I am returned, the effects must fade. In the meanwhile, I suggest that further study is needed."

"Do you?" The Queen's face was stern, the silvered greens of her aura flowed and flared in pale imitation of those others. . . . "Shall I risk another of my Wood Wise against this malaise?"

Navarone leaned forward, her hands open. "They spoke of other settlements, my Queen, sent out from this New London. The land beyond the
keleigh
is wide, and as I have seen it is largely recovered from the wars. If these new people are—numerous, it may be in our best interest to establish relations. That, we cannot know until we send another to spy them out, and perhaps an ambassador."

Silence.

The Queen swept to her feet, and Navarone hastily scrambled to hers.

"We will speak again. Take you to the healers now, and submit yourself to their care until I send for you."

Navarone bowed; the mint-scented breeze of her Queen's passage kissed her cheek. There was a rustle, the sound of the door opening, and the pale aura faded from her senses.

She straightened, ears buzzing, and put out a hand to catch the back of the chair she had been sitting in. Abruptly, she could see them, those glorious, alien auras. Almost, she could feel them,
taste
them. Her
kest
rose without her willing it, hot and heady, as if she might indeed meld—

The door opened. She started, knocking against the inlaid table; the memories of magic shattered as her eyes flew open.

The captain of the night guard regarded her from hooded yellow eyes, and moved a hand, indicating that she was to precede him into the hall.

"The Queen sends me as your escort to the healers," he said, voice devoid of nuance; his aura scarcely a blue shadow against the aether.

"Of course," said Navarone, and sighed, and stepped dutifully forward.

Outside, the day was blue and serene. The softest of early summer breezes stroked quiet music along the leaves of the trees in the wild garden, and bore the spicy scent of fresh-bloomed spinictus through the open window and into the ladies' parlor.

The breeze rippled the day-curtains, and the candles burning in their holder on the desk occupied by the elder of the three ladies flickered.

Rebecca, seated at the card table with her portion of the list and a box of cards, laid her pen down, leaned back in the chair and let the breeze stroke her face while she stretched cramped fingers. She had planned on being out in the gardens this noon, but her mother had instead requested her assistance in addressing invitations for Caroline's dance.

It was not of course correctly her sister's dance, but their mother's. Caroline had merely pouted and pleaded and cried until Mother had agreed to the scheme, with the provision that her daughters would do their share of work. Since Rebecca had not teased for a dance—and indeed did not care for dances—it seemed hard to find herself included in all the tedium of readying for the event. Especially when there was a springtime garden to tend.

You will need to know how to manage these things when you are mistress of your own establishment
, Mother had said meaningfully, and Rebecca had known better than to argue the point.

Somewhat refreshed, she glanced at the next name on the list, pulled a card to her, picked up the pen and dipped it.

The breeze rustled through the curtains again, a little more strongly—and she smiled as the scent of the flowers reached her.

A sharp exclamation came from the third occupant of the parlor, seated before the gold and white escritoire. The pretty piece of furniture complimented the lady's own white-and-gold coloring, but the legs were loose and the surface too small, so Rebecca thought, for comfortable writing. Nonetheless, it was a charming piece and Caroline made a charming picture seated before it, with her dark day skirt swirled artfully, and her little slipper peeping beneath the hem.

"What is it, my love?" Mother murmured, without looking up from her work.

"The wind made me smudge Mr. and Mrs. Eraborne's card!" Caroline said aggrievedly.

"Write another, then," said Mother patiently. "And be more careful."

Caroline pulled another card to her, dropping the spoilt one to the pile on the carpet.

"Can't we close the window?" she asked. "The wind makes it difficult to write."

"The desk is rickety and moves under your pen," Rebecca said, as she finished Lady Quince's card, and put her pen down. "It is that which makes writing difficult—" she raised her head and met her sister's wide blue eyes "—not the breeze."

Caroline's eyes narrowed, which foretold unpleasant things when the two of them were alone. The Beauty, alas, possessed a thin skin and a spiteful temper.

"It might also help," Rebecca continued, turning her gaze away, and sanding the card, "if you faced the desk straight on and not as if you were riding sidesaddle."

"Your sister gives you good advice," Mother said, glancing at her youngest daughter. "Address the desk squarely and you will make fewer errors. You may make fewer still if you will write at the card table with Rebecca. The escritoire is not as solid a surface as one might prefer."

Sighing prettily, Caroline turned in her chair and faced the escritoire, her skirts ruched and untidy, and dipped her pen.

Rebecca drew the next card to her, picked up her pen, ticked off Lady Quince's name and glanced at the next on the list—

Sir Jennet Hale.

She did not sigh. There was no reason to do so, after all. Sir Jennet was the man to whom her father had promised her hand, and astonishing it was that he had found anyone to take her. That he had located a gentleman of lineage, who was neither a newlander nor a merchant must be to his credit.

As for Sir Jennet himself—Rebecca held nothing against the gentleman, having met him precisely once, at her betrothal dinner. He was a quiet-spoken man of about her father's age, somewhat portly and a bit red in the face, who had recently come heir to his elder brother's estate. His brother's lady having tragically predeceased him, Sir Jennet required a wife to hold his household. That Rebecca was the daughter of an Earl could only increase his consequence.

For herself, she found it slightly fantastical that by summer's end she would have left her parents' home, the land she had grown up on, an elder brother of whom she was sincerely fond, and a younger sister of whom she was, perhaps, not quite so fond, to become mistress of an estate in the Corlands, and the wife of a second son.

There was surely nothing to sigh about in any of that. In truth, she was fortunate to be established in an unexceptional marriage, which her father and her sister took great care to impress upon her.

So thinking, and sighing not at all, Rebecca wrote out Sir Jennet's card in her best hand. She then paused for a moment, pen poised, considering if it would be polite or unbecomingly forward to add a note indicating that she would be happy to see him at the dance. In the end it was the realization that she would be neither dismayed nor gladdened by his presence that stayed her pen.

Sir Jennet was to become a fact of her existence, like rain, or sun, or Caroline's pouting. He had thought enough of her future comfort, during their single conversation, to tell her that his estate included several gardens and a conservatory.

"They'll need a dab o' work, mind," he'd told her, as he poured himself a third glass of wine. "M'brother didn't care to keep 'em up. I hear you're a keen one for the plants and flowers, though, and I'm sure you'll know just what to do to bring 'em 'round."

Her fingers itched to set the neglected conservatory right, and she dared hope that one or another of the other abandoned plots he had offhandedly mentioned might be allowed to become a wild garden. She would not wish to lose her lore.

The door to the ladies' parlor opened precipitously, admitting the young viscount, still in his riding clothes, his fair hair rumbled and his cheeks rosy with exercise.

"Good afternoon!" he said cheerily to the room at large. Laying his hat, gloves and whip on the flower shelf, he strode to the card table.

"Hallo, Becca, old love! I'd made certain you were in the wild garden this day."

She smiled up into her brother's brilliant grin.

"Hello, Dickon," she said in her matter-of-fact way. "Mother had need of me here."

"Oh, aye," he said, picking Sir Jennet's card up and running his eye down the lines.

"Not very loverlike," he remarked lightly, and Rebecca felt herself flush.

"I thought to add something," she said, softly. "But, truly, Dickon, I hardly knew what. Ought I have written that I looked forward to his attending?"

"Only if you meant it," her brother said, putting the card with the rest. His gaze moved to her face, his own serious.

"Father should be flogged," he murmured, too softly for Caroline or Mother to hear. "You deserve better than an old roué with gambling debts and a rotting estate to put right."

This was not the first time Dickon had made his displeasure with her upcoming nuptials known. It warmed her that he cared so much for her comfort, while at the same time making her a trifle impatient. Surely he knew that no one else would have her.

She looked down, and drew the next card to her.

"Father is pleased to have found anyone to take me," she said patiently. "And now Caroline will be free to marry well." She raised her head and met his eyes once more. "Truly, Dickon, I am content."

"You are
always
content of late," he answered, his voice louder this time.

"Indeed," Mother said from her desk. "Rebecca is an example to us all, and she will make Sir Jennet a fine wife. Good afternoon, Dickon."

Rebecca saw her brother's eyes close, his shoulders rising and falling with a silent sigh, then he had turned away from her, and was striding across to the room.

"Good afternoon, Mother," he said dutifully and bent down to kiss her cheek. "Father sent me to tell you that his business with Mr. Snelling is proceeding well and that they will dine together. Pray do not wait the evening meal for him."

There was a pause, long enough that Rebecca raised her head to glance down-room. Her mother's shoulders seemed to droop—then straightened as she looked up at her tall son.

"Thank you, Dickon. Will you be with us?"

"Yes, of course, darling," he said warmly. "My business this afternoon is Gately and the accounts books, and my reward for tending it shall be an intimate meal with my lovely mother and beautiful sisters."

Their mother smiled, obviously pleased, though what she said was, "Piffle. You, sir, are a sad scamp."

Dickon bowed solemnly, and Rebecca bit her lip so as not to laugh. Their mother looked to her youngest, bent industriously over the escritoire.

"Caroline, pray tell Cook that we will be four at dinner. In the small dining room."

"Can't Rebecca go?" her sister asked, petulantly. "I'm writing."

"But I asked
you,
my love," Mother answered, in the tone that meant she would not be brooked.

Sighing loudly, Caroline dropped her pen, spattering ink over her portion of the list, rose, and flounced toward the door.

"Doesn't a brother get a welcome, Lady Caro?" Dickon called, placing his hand over his heart.

Caroline barely spared him a glance.

"Good afternoon, Dickon," she said coolly. "You are quite ridiculous." She was gone in a swirl of skirts.

Dinner in the small dining room was more boisterous than those taken in the formal room, with their father presiding. Mother was in good spirits, which she usually was when they dined alone, once she had finished enumerating the number of times during the month that Father had dined away. Caroline seemed somewhat cast down, though why she should be so was more than Rebecca could fathom. While the beauty of the family was certainly Father's favorite, Rebecca had long suspected that Caro did not find his company enjoyable. And as for herself—unfilial it might be, but she would be quite happy if Father dined away every evening.

Lady Quince, so Mother had heard from Mrs. Settle only this morning, had recently redecorated her receiving parlor. She was therefore questioning Dickon closely on its new style, until he threw up his hands, laughing.

"Mercy, then, Mother! You know I was only there for ten minutes to do the pretty before Ferdy and I rode out! I hardly had time to memorize the number and color of the pillows on his mother's chaise!"

"If I had asked you about a horse you had spent ten minutes with . . ." Mother returned, with a smile.

"Nay, then! Though I risk my reputation as a keen observer of horse flesh by so doing, I must confess that I was this very afternoon in the company of what Ferdy assures me is a pretty filly, indeed, and I can scarcely recall anything of her!"

"No!" Rebecca laughed, putting down her fork and reaching for her wine glass. "Were you ill, Dickon, or bespelled?"

She expected a laugh in return, and perhaps a bogus swoon, but Dickon turned serious eyes to her.

"Odd you should say it," he murmured, picking up his own glass. He looked at their mother over the rim.

"I wonder, Mother, have you met the Quince's house guest?"

Mother tipped her head. "House—ah! Mrs. Settle had said something—a foreigner, I apprehend?"

"I believe his lands are at some distance, though I would hesitate to style him a foreigner." Dickon sipped wine, set the glass down, and addressed his plate once more.

"You, sir, are unhandsome!" Mother cried after he had eaten two or three forkfuls and had said nothing further.

Dickon looked up with an innocent face. "Oh, you are interested? Mind, I did not take note of the fabric of his coat, though I'll allow it to be well cut, if you will—and it suited him. The whole day suited him, it seemed. Very odd fellow. 'Course, I believe Fey often are, according to our lights, at least."

Caroline stirred, and leaned a little forward, interest sharpening her face.