Phantasmagoria

by Madelynne Ellis

  A gangly man dressed in a fashionable blue coat and cream breeches sat perched upon the lychgate.

  Niamh swept up her skirts and ran to him.

  Bella caught up her hem too, dashed a few paces, then came to a wary halt. She had no desire to play chaperone; she and Vaughan were at odds already without her becoming muddled up in this torrid affair.

  Resolved to keep her distance, she left the path and strolled into the line of trees. It seemed strange to her that Vaughan, who valued his own freedom so much, should so ruthlessly dictate to his own sister.

  The graves beneath their shady boughs were arranged in two symmetrical lines, all stone-edged rectangles with grass growing in the centre and posies of flowers at the feet. Further on stood a row of crosses, each hung with an iron ring, as if someone had meant to keep the faeries away. Bella traced the rusted inscriptions and wondered if she should remain here, or stray further from the obscured gate.

  ‘I spy with my little eye a buxom nymph I’d like to try.’ Two hands closed over her eyes. Bella yelped and turned sharply, stamping at her assailant’s foot in the process.

  ‘Devonshire,’ she snarled, faced with his charming visage. Who had he followed out, her or Niamh? ‘I suppose you’re pleased with what you’ve done.’

  ‘You’ve heard?’ He shuffled back a few paces, kicking up the gold and orange leaf mulch as he went. ‘In my defence, I was simply obeying the instructions given me by my host.’

  ‘Well, she won’t have you now.’

  ‘A loss as you know I’m not about to mourn.’

  Bella turned her back on him. Poor Niamh. What was so wrong with Edward that she couldn’t have him?

  ‘Do you hate me too, Bella?’ His words slipped treacle soft into her ear, while his hand slid across her bottom so that the heavy cloth cleaved to her curves.

  ‘Mr Devonshire,’ Bella swirled on the spot again, this time sending a shower of leaves into the air, ‘don’t presume to touch me.’

  She shoved him hard, forcing him backwards until he hit a protruding tree root, lost his balance and collapsed with a thump onto one of the low stone graves.

  Autumn leaves swirled around his prone form, red, oranges and sunset yellows, like a patchwork quilt. He moaned and Bella crossed to his side. She wasn’t sure if he was really injured or feigning to win sympathy, but she wasn’t sorry regardless. He’d hurt Niamh.

  ‘Get up,’ she snapped.

  Raffe gave a second pitiful groan.

  ‘Mr Devonshire.’ She bent over him and prodded his shoulder with two fingers.

  ‘It’s Lord.’ His eyes fluttered open.

  ‘Not until you deserve it. I should slap you on Niamh’s behalf.’

  Strong arms wrapped around her back and pulled her down on top of him. ‘I’d rather you kissed me on your behalf.’ He cocked a leg over hers and rolled her onto her back.

  ‘Will you get off me!’

  ‘Not until I’ve had my kiss.’ He stretched over her like a snake, his loins pressing enticingly against her covered quim.

  Shocked, further objection stuck in her throat. How dare he? He was presumptuous in the extreme, although curiously entertaining too.

  ‘Ahem.’

  Raffe froze at the quiet cough and Bella scurried out from beneath him. Vaughan stood in the shadow of a weathered angel, indifference at her predicament painted across his face. His dark clothing billowed in the breeze, chasing his dark ringlets around his shoulders.

  ‘Where’s my sister?’ he asked coldly. ‘I saw you pass through the church gate not more than five minutes ago.’

  Bella stood. Clearly, he’d come round the church in the opposite direction, else he’d have already seen Niamh. There was no way to warn her. Unconsciously, her gaze drifted towards the wooden shelter, only just discernable through the trees.

  ‘Bella?’ Bending over her, Vaughan tilted her chin with the press of his thumb and looked into her eyes. His were indecipherable, clouded with the same secrets she regularly found there.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  He let her go but she was sure he’d read the deceit. ‘Is she with that dandyprat, Edward Holt?’

  Certain her tone would betray her, Bella shrugged. Her gaze quickened on the gate again and he saw the movement.

  ‘You’re not doing her any favours by protecting her.’

  With a scrunch of leaves, he left.

  ‘Edward. Thank the Lord.’ The worry in her voice seemed to blister the October air. Niamh threw herself into his arms and held him tight. Edward cradled her back.

  ‘I’m fine. I’m fine.’

  Niamh stared up at him in wonder. At twenty-four, Edward Holt was a fine-looking fellow, and well he knew it. His coat, fashioned by Brummell’s own tailor and his boots polished to within an inch of their existence, and his valet’s. His radiance always lifted her spirits, the same way it had the day they’d met. Alone in the churchyard, they’d stumbled upon one another, each overjoyed at the unforeseen company, and celebrated with a summer picnic among the gravestones. She’d made him a daisy chain, and he’d wound it around their wrists binding them together in friendship.

  Not that they had remained simply friends very long. As the summer blooms gave way to autumnal falls, he’d stolen one chaste kiss and then another, until some busybody had taken it upon themselves to inform her brother.

  Vaughan returned to Pennerley righteous and crazy. Even before Edward called, Niamh had known the answer would be no. Her brother wasn’t happy, and if he wasn’t happy, he made damn sure nobody else was.

  How she both loathed and loved him. He’d deserted her, left her behind while he toured Europe. He didn’t care for her loneliness, though he provided everything else.

  Edward promised her society, a house in London, excitement.

  Niamh sought the warmth of his compelling brown eyes.

  ‘My love,’ he whispered. A long red welt ran along the ridge of his left cheekbone, the result of Raffe’s brutality. She would not marry a man who lashed out so.

  Her fingers traced the air above the wound. Although the skin was unbroken the bruising was livid.

  ‘It’s nothing. A small price for seeing you.’

  Niamh stretched upon tiptoes and pressed a delicate kiss to his wound. He turned, capturing her against his chest. Not content with her chaste caresses, he drew her mouth to his, driving his hard lips against her softness.

  The sensation poured down her throat like warm mead. Gripped with a kind of fever, her limbs trembled as he pressed his tongue into her willing mouth, and with bold knowing strokes invited her to reciprocate

  Previously, when he’d grown amorous like this, she’d drawn back, soothed him with tender words and promises of a wedding night, but today, anger at Raffe and Vaughan possessed her as assuredly as Edward’s tongue, and slowly her guard slipped, letting him guide her towards what came next.

  Vaughan would not deny her everything. He wouldn’t deny her this drunken pull of one body towards another. Intoxicated, she surrendered to Edward. As he unfastened the front of her gown, she gave a soft hiss of appreciation, echoed a moment later as he took her nipple into his mouth.

  They would be seen, she knew it, but didn’t care. The feel of his hot mouth on her breast was too enticing. He drew back, blowing cool air onto her taut nipples, then slicking them with his tongue.

  ‘Be mine, Niamh. Say you will. I can’t wait.’ His tongue teased with merciless precision. ‘Say you’ll come away with me.’

  She struggled for breath and clear thought as one knee pressed insistently between her thighs. ‘I can’t, you know I can’t.’

  ‘If he loves you, he’ll forgive you.’

  ‘Edward, don’t. He’ll come round, we just have to be patient.’ There was too much risk involved in eloping. Her brother’s reputation was no myth. He’d killed before now, and had the scars to prove it. ‘Don’t ask this of me.’

  ‘Then if not this, give me something else.’

  Sh
e knew what he meant, and trembled at the thought of it. He meant to claim her, to possess her, and thus bind her to him. For a moment, there was something in his eyes, his stance, the way his muscles tensed that made her tremble with something besides lust, but his lips found hers again and soothed her fears.

  His hand found a way through her many skirts. The touch of his fingertips on the bare skin above her stocking tops sent a thrill so sharp through her womb that she almost squealed.

  ‘Shh, my sweet,’ he soothed, and silenced her with kisses so hard they seemed to bruise her lips, kisses that rained upon her like a torrent leaving her gasping and overpowered.

  He clasped her tight and inched her around the gatepost to the narrow wooden bench that ran the length of the lychgate, and bent her to his will. His hands seemed to be everywhere, pressing into the small of her back, guiding her hips, finding the slit of her stockinet pantaloons and the ripe, swollen prize beneath.

  She didn’t look when he drew out his prick, velvety soft and curiously male, but crushed her eyes closed as he guided it between her spread thighs.

  ‘There now,’ he said, and she felt him at her entrance, so hard, so demanding. She hadn’t wanted it like this, out in the open, awkwardly poised. She squirmed against him, no longer sure.

  ‘Easy,’ he murmured, but there was impatience in his voice. He tried to lift her, to align her body with his.

  ‘No,’ she whimpered, but he pressed a hand to her lips.

  His hips jerked as he tried to impale her, but instead he slid past, straight between her legs.

  Niamh groaned. For several uncertain moments she knew only the press of Edward’s body, and then he gave a surprised yelp and the pressure was gone. Suddenly, she was facing Vaughan, her wantonness exposed, her brother holding Edward by the hair.

  The world stood still, then reality crashed in around her. Vaughan thrust Edward into the dirt and levelled a pistol at his head.

  ‘I suggest you run, and damnable fast.’

  ‘Vaughan, no!’ she squealed.

  Edward, without a backwards glance, sprinted from the churchyard.

  Time seemed to slow as Vaughan cocked the trigger, setting it into place with a tiny click. He took aim. Niamh ploughed into his side. The resulting explosion rang in her ears and temples. Horrified, she watched Edward stumble, then hobble on, a hand clasped to his thigh.

  ‘Edward,’ she screamed.

  Vaughan caught her about the waist, preventing her from following.

  ‘You hit him.’

  ‘You jerked my arm. You’re bloody lucky I didn’t kill him.’ He tugged her dress across her exposed flesh. ‘Cover yourself up.’

  Fingers trembling, she somehow managed the task of ribbons and buttons. Only when he spun her back towards the church did she realise that both Bella and Raffe were witnesses to her shame.

  ‘You don’t understand. You’ve never loved,’ she snapped petulantly.

  Vaughan faced her, his eyes alight. ‘I understand perfectly. That man is an incorrigible lech, and he wants you for your money. Do you think I refused him purely to spite you?’

  ‘Do you think he isn’t just after my money?’ She glared at Raffe who was leaning against an ivy-shrouded gravestone, feigning fashionable indifference. ‘He doesn’t even make a pretence of liking me.’

  ‘Exactly. He’s never made any pretence, which is all that bastard is.’

  Nerves alight with what had just happened, Niamh spat out her rage in a string of expletives she’d learned from Vaughan, but at the end she didn’t feel any better, just hardened and numbed.

  ‘Finished?’ Vaughan asked.

  A sudden sense of earthly weariness washed over her. She nodded.

  ‘Next time someone attempts to delve beneath your skirts have the good sense to knee him in the cobs.’

  ‘I’ll remember that, should I ever find a husband to your liking.’

  Vaughan raised an eyebrow, amusement twitching upon his lips. ‘That, dear sister, is your prerogative.’

  ‘Don’t mock me.’

  He laughed.

  ‘Stop it. Did you ever consider that I was enjoying it? I wanted him.’

  ‘The hell you did. If there were any real passion between you, you wouldn’t have been at it straight-legged against a rotten gatepost. You’d have been rolling in the leaf litter and, pistol or not, he’d have been man enough to face me. Credit me with some expertise.’

  ‘All you know is your own self-centred satisfaction.’

  For a moment, Vaughan grew very still. Then a flash of sadistic humour stirred in the depths of his violet eyes. ‘I think it’s time for a lesson.’

  He moved so fast, he’d upended her over his shoulder before she could squeal, and then she could only beat her fists against his back and pray he didn’t drop her head first onto the cracked stone path.

  ‘Passion,’ he said, laughing. ‘Let’s see how much I can wring out of you on the way back to the castle.’

  ‘Put me down,’ she yelled.

  Vaughan ran, heedless of her squirming and her shouts. He spun her around until the stone and grass turned into a blur, and he reeled drunkenly under her weight. Finally, he dropped her onto their grandmother’s grave. ‘What would she say, Niamh, if she caught you in public like that?’

  Dizzy and embarrassed, Niamh shook her head.

  ‘Discretion, dear girl.’ He laughed again and slapped his hand against the stone. ‘Only do what you can get away with.’ He crushed her in his embrace, pressing his forehead against hers. ‘You don’t have to have Raffe. You don’t have to have any of them.’ He kissed her. ‘Tell me what you want and I’ll provide it.’

  ‘Edward,’ she mouthed.

  Vaughan shook his head. ‘No, not him.’

  Bella felt her heart turn over when she heard Vaughan laugh. He was a swine sometimes, but she couldn’t stay truly angry with him for long. At the moment he seemed to have forgotten her. He hadn’t even commented on her position under Raffe.

  Behind her, the leaves scrunched as Raffe pushed himself up off a gravestone.

  ‘Leaf litter,’ he mused. ‘By that token, we’re destined for each other.’ He brushed her hair away from the back of her neck and pressed his lips to her skin. ‘Shall we return to our bower and raise some heat?’

  ‘You never give up, do you?’ she said.

  ‘No, alas. I must have you or die.’

  She bore his kisses until he reached her collarbone, then she pushed him away. ‘Why would I want to soil myself with you?’

  Raffe clasped her about the waist. ‘Why wouldn’t you? Confess, you’re a little bit tempted.’

  Perhaps she was. He was moderately charming and a lot less complicated than Vaughan. There’d been a time when she would have sank onto him without a second thought, without a care for consequences or anything beyond the salving of her lust. But things had changed. The promise of a swift fulfilment was not enough, no matter how much she craved the penetration that Vaughan denied her.

  ‘I already have an excellent lover.’

  She began walking, following Vaughan’s footsteps back towards the castle. Raffe followed her.

  ‘And who would that be?’ he asked. ‘Not Pennerley.’

  ‘Yes, and you know it.’

  He bent forwards, hands resting upon his knees, and laughed. ‘He’s not yours. Not really.’

  Anger swept through her and spiked in her skull. Her heavy riding skirt lashed at his ankles and settled in jealous green folds as she bore down upon him. ‘Yes,’ she growled. ‘Yes, he bloody well is.’

  Devonshire pursed his lips. ‘We’ll see.’

  11

  BELLA RETURNED TO find the castle alive with voices and a train of servants moving trunks between the carriage house and the gatehouse. Raffe at her heels, she swished past and made for the great hall. Pandemonium reigned there too.

  The normally echoic vault had been transformed by a gaggle of girls into a modiste’s. Bonnets and shawls lay strewn a
cross furniture and shoeboxes adorned the chairs. Someone had thrown open the long shutters, letting daylight flood in.

  ‘The Allenthorpes,’ said Raffe. ‘Be relieved they’ve only fielded the four.’

  ‘Why, how many are there?’ Bella asked, overawed by the devastation so few had caused.

  ‘Nine in total, eight girls and Gabriel.’ He nodded towards a golden-haired young man supporting a mature woman with beetle-black eyes and a roman nose. ‘That’s the chaperone, Mrs Alvanley, or Aunt Bea as she’s known. Deaf as a post by all accounts, and once a notorious light heel if gossip is to be believed.’

  ‘And do you?’

  Raffe shrugged. ‘You’d best ask de Maresi, he’s thick with them.’

  I’d rather not, she thought, and scowled at his back. ‘He stayed with them in London, didn’t he?’

  ‘That’s right. He came over from France on one of their father’s ships and has been obliging himself of their hospitality ever since. Well, until fortnight ago, when he tossed his lot in with Pennerley.’

  The remark brought the incident on the stairs back with irritating clarity. The Vicomte, she noticed, had changed. Gone was the cream in exchange for black broadcloth, exquisitely embroidered around the pockets, collar, cuffs and tails.

  Henry, too, had put on some decent wear, a pinstriped, glacé silk suit in crimson with a contrasting waistcoat of grey damask. He turned and the light caught the fabric, revealing the pattern of swooning maidens arranged in pairs, a motif replicated on his cloth-covered buttons and cravat.

  ‘Seems I’m a little drab.’ Raffe pressed his hand to her shoulder. ‘It’s early to change for dinner but I do like to blend in.’ He took his leave with a quick nod.

  Bella watched him up the stairs, wondering if she should also change. Niamh, she was relieved to find, was still in her riding habit, although she stood aside from the melange, her posture uncharacteristically stiff. Vaughan’s laughter may have lightened the mood, but he presumably still wouldn’t give his consent.

  She began to move across the hall but, before she reached Niamh’s side, Henry pulled her into the ring of Allenthorpes and began making introductions.

  Alicia, Mae and Fortuna she managed to absorb, responding with the requisite greetings, while Niamh moved dolefully around the outside of the circle.